New Dawn, New Day

Last night, just before early bed, I read a friends caring bridge journal entry: making great strides on a recent-onset debilitating illness, she wrote of seeing what life she can build with what she can still do.  I was humbled; clearly her eye is on opportunity, not just on limitation.  She is facing, and embracing, the challenge of remaking her life.

This morning, waking in early light, lime green covers strewn about, an inner call stirred, demanding that I get up.  Not sure what or why, I sensed it was a moment to say yes.

Finding vertical, I was greeted by a golden ripple of cloud filling the eastern sky, bouncing dream light up off the awakening lake.  Sun radiated through the glowing mass of clouds and connected with rain clouds downstream, setting off rainbows lifting from the lake.

Snuggling in my host’s fleece jacket, wrapping a beach towel over my bare legs, I grabbed my camera and headed for the dock.

Standing there, surrounded by light, I listened. What else did the knowing that pulled me awake have to say?   “Do not be afraid.”

Writing now, wind lifts fresh curls off the waves as dawn flows into day, and the lightest shower eases in, giving moisture to this breath of air, this message feels like:  Learn to write with abandon once again.  This whole glorious cacophony of light and wonder is at your back.  Set yourself free.

What else could one long for, than this aliveness, this beauty, this now?

Yes to listening.  Yes to honoring that voice within that leads with precision, pulling from slumber of all kinds.  Yes to remaking our lives in this changing world, facing, and embracing, whatever challenges emerge along the way.

“You must do the things you think you cannot do…”

 Eleanor Roosevelt

 What is courage, if not the ability to act as our spirits lead?

I often hear struggle ensue when our inner knowing provides a clear path forward – but not an easy one.  We sometimes then wrestle mightily to honor that inner wisdom – our intuition or our body knowing – often for longer than we care to admit!    Yet, to not act on these knowings means we risk losing ourselves, and over time the costs become clear.

Thus, these moments come, as Denise Levertov describes below, where struggle gives way to courage, opening our hearts to own strength, and to faith in Spirit’s leading – even when this means swimming upstream of others’ expectations.  

In these moments, it is as if we are touched by a far greater force.  We find that we can do “the things (we) think (we)  cannot do.”

 Where is your inner wisdom leading you?

What is the “the thing you think you cannot do?’

Where is the place to put your attention that will help you live your courage?

Variation On A Theme By Rilke

(The Book of Hours, Book I, Poem 1, Stanza 1)

 A certain day became a presence to me;

there it was, confronting me — a sky, air, light:

a being. And before it started to descend

from the height of noon, it leaned over

and struck my shoulder as if with

the flat of a sword, granting me

honor and a task. The day’s blow

rang out, metallic — or it was I, a bell awakened,

and what I heard was my whole self

saying and singing what it knew: I can.

 ~ Denise Levertov ~

February 1.  I am just in the door from a weekend-long silent retreat over on the west slope of the Cascades.  A story from my weekend… (there will be more.)

Early Saturday eve, as thirty of us sat in sweet silence, circled around a crackling fire, I had a message reverberating in me. In my Quaker tradition, this reverberation signaled to me that this message might be meant for another, as well as for me.

Since this was a silent retreat, at the rise of this gathered circle, I simply wrote the message on a yellow lined notepad and left it on the table where we were sharing information through the weekend.

Sunday morning, hiking solo down trail after climbing eagle-high to watch water surrendering into a succession of cascading falls – the essence of power and grace –  I passed a woman from my retreat deep in thought on the lower trail.  I was curious what was unfolding for her, but given our vow of silence, we did not speak. Sharing all the care one can radiate without words, we passed and each continued on, knowing we would reconnect soon.

As we finally broke silence in the early afternoon, and each shared the meaning of the weekend for us, the woman I had passed on the trail spoke poignantly on her transforming inward journey from her morning hike, and the importance that message on the yellow notepad had played.  I will protect her privacy and not speak of her story, but I will share the message. (You’ll have to visualize the yellow note pad…)

“Do not get lost in your fears.

Surrender into love.”

I don’t know what this will mean for you.  On my hike, watching the interplay of water and rock, the meaning became clear for me: in this ancient dance of waterfall and rock channel, it is the power of water that softens rock and opens the path ahead.  

Whatever challenge I face, I will have all I need so long as I remember to allow the water-like flow of love within to guide me.  This then, reminded me of a favorite poem that never fails to open my heart when fear comes near:

I Will Not Die an Unlived Life.

I will not die an unlived life.

I will not live in fear

of falling or catching fire.

I choose to inhabit my days,

to allow my living to open me,

to make me less afraid,

more accessible, 

to loosen my heart

until it becomes a wing,

a torch, a promise.

I choose to risk my significance;

to live so that which came to me as seed

goes to the next as blossom

and that which came to me as blossom,

goes on as fruit.

-Dawna Markova

What does that message on the yellow notepad mean for you?

What could open if you were to shift your focus to nurturing the positive forces that are alive and well in your life?

I love hearing your comments.  What speaks to you?