Let me begin by wish you all a heartfelt dancing New Year as we enter 2013.
I have spent the last few days of this New Year reflecting on the nature of transitions as in moving for one way of being or doing to another way of being or doing. I know myself well enough by now to know that I do not really like the feeling of dangling over empty space waiting for the drop to occur. It has taken me a long time to make the shift in my work that is beginning as of this month, this new year.
In my way of trying to find some new ground to put my feet upon that might support me in this transition space I came across this poem by John O’Donohue which sums up how life is as I enter a new beginning and stand on the edge of the transition:
For a new beginning
In out of way places of the heart,
Where your thoughts never think to wander,
This beginning has been quietly forming,
Waiting until you were ready to emerge.
For a long time it has watched your desire,
Feeling the emptiness growing inside you,
Noticing how you willed yourself on,
Still unable to leave what you had outgrown.
It watched you play with the seduction of safety
And the grey promises that sameness whispered,
Heard the waves of turmoil rise and relent,
Wondered would you always live like this.
Then the delight, when your courage kindled,
And out you stepped into new ground,
Your eyes young again with energy and dream,
A path of plenitude opening before you.
Though your destination is not yet clear
You can trust the promise of this opening;
Unfurl yourself into the grace of beginning
That is at one with your life’s desire.
Awaken your spirit to adventure;
Hold nothing back, learn to find ease in risk;
Soon you will be home in a new rhythm
For your soul senses the world that awaits you.
I feel such a sense of gratitude to John who died most unexpectedly on January 3, 2008 for writing such affirming and steadying words. I sense myself very much at the stage of : Though your destination is not yet clear, You can trust the promise of this opening;
He christened the mist that often falls on the mountains of Connemara “Ceo Dríochta” (magical mist) as it has the habit of weaving its way in and round the mountains and valleys. It sits lightly on the earth, sometimes completely covering any view of what is around or ahead and then in a magical instant it lifts and the clarity of the landscape is stunning and in the next magical instant all is covered over again. This sequence of covering and uncovering , seeing and not seeing is the dance of this mist.
Right now I feel within this rhythm of seeing and not seeing as my soul makes its way to ” the world that awaits“.
I am so glad that so many of you who have practiced with me over the last 20 years will still be with me on this part of the journey and hopefully we will meet many new souls wanting to dance to “Awaken your spirit to adventure“