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cedar_groveThis came from yesterday's reading from The Book of Awakening: Having the Life You Want by Being Present to the Life You Have
Once – many years ago now, too many years – I would have identified with the mother, guiding and loving; loving and learning from those that walked at my side, while at the same time revelling in the discovery as a child myself, surrounded by the scents, and the softness and beauty of the blossom, and the darkness too. But an ungentle touch, a careless hand, can as easily crush the beauty of the blossoms as it can come to know them, and by such a grasp I was cast aside, exiled to the distance to watch – helplessly disempowered – as my past self moved on without me, still loving, still guiding, still child like and still beautiful as the blossoms and the perfume I sought to know.
I don't make New Year's resolutions. It's pointless as I rarely keep them for more than a month or so, and then only feel a terrible sense of failure when I finally admit to myself that I have broken them. I do usually set goals for myself though, and even though, technically, my New Year was months ago, I was not yet ready to undertake the goals I've set for myself. Am I ready now? I don’t know, but I feel that the universe is read for them to be a part of my path in the coming year. She has been ready for some time and I've just been trying to ignore her. It's come to the point now where I can't do so any more and remain healthy in spirit and mind as well as in body.
The distance, the exile I speak of in the opening paragraph of this entry is the fact that all those years ago, I lost myself. Worst of all, I've come to realise, I lost myself to an influence that I though had left my life – I thought that I had cast it aside and let it go. Yet… as I meditated for the first time in many, many years, I came to realise that I had fooled myself very well into believing that. The physical influence, in the shape of a person that was once an important part of my life, is gone, yes, but the emotional and spiritual one – the damage I allowed this person to cause in me – remains. I am weighed down by it, its chains still pull at my ankles, and with each struggling thrash against them that I have made, all I have succeeded in doing is pulling on the tree before me so that the blossoms fall around me and are trampled in my efforts for freedom from the darkness that I once happily embraced and did not fear.
Realising a fear, accepting it and taking into oneself is a part of growing; is a part of taking one step closer to where you need to be. Today, as I claim ownership of the fear that I have allowed to grow unchecked inside of myself, I feel that I have taken one step back toward the cherry blossoms. Mother turns a smile my way that I feel, but cannot see. It is a welcoming smile, a knowing smile… and I, still blind, can barely perceive the blossoms She teaches me to admire, yet now, at least, I know they are still there… as am I.
A blind child
guided by his mother,
admires the cherry blossoms...
- Kikakou
Once – many years ago now, too many years – I would have identified with the mother, guiding and loving; loving and learning from those that walked at my side, while at the same time revelling in the discovery as a child myself, surrounded by the scents, and the softness and beauty of the blossom, and the darkness too. But an ungentle touch, a careless hand, can as easily crush the beauty of the blossoms as it can come to know them, and by such a grasp I was cast aside, exiled to the distance to watch – helplessly disempowered – as my past self moved on without me, still loving, still guiding, still child like and still beautiful as the blossoms and the perfume I sought to know.
I don't make New Year's resolutions. It's pointless as I rarely keep them for more than a month or so, and then only feel a terrible sense of failure when I finally admit to myself that I have broken them. I do usually set goals for myself though, and even though, technically, my New Year was months ago, I was not yet ready to undertake the goals I've set for myself. Am I ready now? I don’t know, but I feel that the universe is read for them to be a part of my path in the coming year. She has been ready for some time and I've just been trying to ignore her. It's come to the point now where I can't do so any more and remain healthy in spirit and mind as well as in body.
The distance, the exile I speak of in the opening paragraph of this entry is the fact that all those years ago, I lost myself. Worst of all, I've come to realise, I lost myself to an influence that I though had left my life – I thought that I had cast it aside and let it go. Yet… as I meditated for the first time in many, many years, I came to realise that I had fooled myself very well into believing that. The physical influence, in the shape of a person that was once an important part of my life, is gone, yes, but the emotional and spiritual one – the damage I allowed this person to cause in me – remains. I am weighed down by it, its chains still pull at my ankles, and with each struggling thrash against them that I have made, all I have succeeded in doing is pulling on the tree before me so that the blossoms fall around me and are trampled in my efforts for freedom from the darkness that I once happily embraced and did not fear.
Realising a fear, accepting it and taking into oneself is a part of growing; is a part of taking one step closer to where you need to be. Today, as I claim ownership of the fear that I have allowed to grow unchecked inside of myself, I feel that I have taken one step back toward the cherry blossoms. Mother turns a smile my way that I feel, but cannot see. It is a welcoming smile, a knowing smile… and I, still blind, can barely perceive the blossoms She teaches me to admire, yet now, at least, I know they are still there… as am I.
