rise

Rise to the occasion of your one and only heart.

live wild, be brave

Coast to Coast, 2015

Money is a little tight at the moment BUT when I heard Cheryl Strayed was coming to town I immediately booked a ticket for Live Wild, Be Brave. An Evening with Cheryl Strayed. What struck me was how present she was, how heartfelt, authentic AND laugh out loud hilarious. 

A few days have past since the how to: Academy event and a couple of things have stuck in my mind. Firstly, Cheryl is the first person I've heard voice this: that if you are bought up in a toxic home your safe is outside. You must step over the threshold and search for safety in the world, home is not where your heart can reside. This has resonance for me in my feelings of safety experienced while walking alone in landscape. It's not that fear is absent but that I can handle fear in a way that contains it and close my ears to the cultural messages forbidding women to venture forth alone. Observing others, I see they can't do this, their fear is in control.

Secondly, she spoke about her work on Dear Sugar Radio with Steve Almond, and the thousands of letters they receive. These letters reveal that the unhappiest people are those whom, for whatever reason, project an outer persona at odds with their true inner self. When your outer self is a true reflection of your inner self then you are an authentic person in the world, you can truly meet others without shadow or agenda. This is an ongoing process for me, but I am far down the path.

Thank you Cheryl Strayed.

measure of quality

While walking an easy three mile circular route from my flat this summer I experienced a moment of clarity and heightened awareness of consciousness in THIS body in THIS time, in THIS place. Aware of myself as a wondering measure of quality, flesh and blood responding to the sensory stimulus around me as finely tuned receptor, genderless, without culture.

My surface, registering the gentlest breeze, hairs rising upon some impulse from my sympathetic nervous system, this system operating me from before birth to my death. Eyes that see and make sense, or find sense in the environment, perceiving light, distance, colour with a sensitivity no camera could duplicate. Turning home, facing the setting sun I experienced its blinding rays, a last hurrah as the horizon rose to conceal the light. This haze of golden light felt timeless, I could be anywhere, this could be anytime, I could be anyone.

Footsteps measuring pace, distance, rhythm, stone crunch underfoot, a buzz and chirrup from the long grass, the music of trees and breeze, a rush of urgent whispers. Breath rhythm, inhalation, exhalation, an emotional swell in my chest as I feel, I feel. Mind, self, cognisant, piecing together now and before. A belly full of wonder at this awareness, connection, consciousness - my time on the Earth is now, this is my time. Recognising the gift of this moment, legs that carry me, a bright and curious mind, the preciousness of taking a deep, easy breath.