Well, here we are, on the cusp of another New Year. Coming out
of a busy holiday time, full of laughter, wine, friends and family, a little
bit of too muchness – having enjoyed too
much of a good thing, and also in need of rest.
At the same time, I am prompted by my inner taskmaster to
begin to plan ahead (some of you probably planned ahead already last fall for
2019!). But one thing I have learned over time is that winter is a quiet time for
me, energy wise.
Yet still I have my lists of projects, unfinished, or not
yet begun. I see other facilitators’ offerings for workshops and retreats lined
up all the way to fall 2019, and wonder, will I offer something new this year? Or
repeat a theme that was popular in 2018, with SoulCollage(R)?
By chance I opened a journal of mine from almost ten years
ago, November 2009, before I trained to become a SoulCollage facilitator. I was
still leading journaling classes. There was a list of things under the theme:
What do I love? I am very intrigued, because it appears to me that I have lost
sight once again of what I love. I feel a bit worn down, a little fatigued with
the need to always come up with new ideas and themes. A guilty part of my soul
just wants to do nothing, see no-one, lead no one.
In yoga this morning, I felt a deep need to feel my own
serene presence.
I got flashes during the relaxation part of images of my child
self – in Grade 4, as a competitive student, wanting to raise her hand and be seen
and heard, at the top of her class. I also saw her flirting with the boys at
school. Even younger, I saw her being a good helper to her mom, playing with the
siblings and little ones, changing diapers, holding bottles.
The need to be
good, to be the best at school, the need to be seen and heard is perhaps what
lead me to service, satsang and meditation in an ashram for 8 years in my
twenties. And then perhaps lead me back to school to study English Literature
and Creative Writing and compete as a writer in a world of fiction and poetry. Then after my kids were born, it brought me
out of my little part-time writing room into the classroom to lead journaling
workshops and then add SoulCollage(R). Now, at age 64, I feel that need winding
down.
So the list of what I loved in 2009 was:
I love talking and being heard. I love meaningful conversations,
connections with people.
I love being connected to me.
I love being and feeling grounded.
I love moving with grace.
I love eating calmly with awareness, good healthy food.
I love having someone else clean and cook for me.
I love massages, Reiki and being loved.
I love my sisters and brothers.
I love my kids, and friends and family.
I love reading poems in public.
I love singing on stage.
I love the spotlight.
I love stepping out of bounds.
I love to be stretched.
I love music: flute drum bass.
I love being quiet and alone, diving deep into yoga, feeling
peace.
On the next page of my journal was written, What do I want
to do right now?
“Right now in this moment, I want to allow the wisdom of my
heart to bypass the strategist. I want the dreamer to awake and tell me her
deepest cherished dream. I want to hold her hand and shush and rock her until
she dares speak out loud her deepest wish – she has not shown herself for fear
of being judged and she is hiding underneath the bed. She doesn’t like to compete;
she hates hype, marketing, meetings and the pressure to create goals. She is
anti-goal. She lives for feeling, under the surface of things. She is a shy
fish and my outer voice is too loud, it frightens her. I courted her in the
past, but gave up, buried her under convention, under Should-Must-Duty.
Right now I want to listen.
Right now I want to receive guidance about where my life’s
interests are – a book? Classes? Healing? I want to be healed.”
What surprises me about this list is that I did actually write
and publish The Tao of Turning Fifty
a few years down the road in 2012. I did lead classes from my home until the
end of 2017 and workshops till 2018. I did seek out healers, osteopaths,
massage therapists and acupuncturists and I did receive healing. In hindsight,
it all unfolded exactly according to this desire, expressed silently in my
journal, to myself.
What surprises me about reading this now, is that I am back
in the same place – wondering what I really want to do. I have danced and sung
in the spotlight with a quartet, done some
musical theatre and sang in an acoustic band with my husband, (check!). I have a women’s circle and a SoulCollage(R)
circle where my needs for being seen and heard, and creative expression, are fulfilled.
I feel as if I have come full circle - it is time for me to listen in again and receive
guidance. I am still anti-goals. That hasn’t changed. I may be competitive by
nature, but I have zero desire to get out there and compete in the world of
self-care gurus and authors. I think I am winding down that ‘outward’ energy
phase of my life. Is that possible? Didn’t I just sign up to be the Inner
Wisdom guide? Will I be content to just do yoga, meditate and write in my
journal? Of course, the SoulCollage(R) facilitator trainer part is new, and will unfold
over the next five months. I am content to hold space for that new learning and
to attend a conference of facilitators in Italy in June.
But the burning desire to share everything I learn and know
has left me. Or at least died down for the moment. I feel afraid it may never
return. I wonder who my persona will be without that fearless leader persona
leading me.
With gratitude, I come back to the list of what I love.
I think it’s time to let go of performing and being “good”. And it's time to lose the attitude of provitude, the always striving and pushing myself to be 'better than'. High time to be releasing
and letting go of the fear of the future.
I welcome my own serene presence, dive into the sacred
moment, and the next moment. Trusting it will all unfold for me in 2019, as it
did in 2009.
“Que Sera Sera, whatever will be will be. The future’s not
ours to see, Que Sera Sera.”
Perhaps that little shy fish, la petite fille qui chantait aux fleurs, will surface and whisper
in my ear, what she really loves to do.
I'm listening....
SoulCollage(R) card: Hearing the call
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