What are you really hungry for?
This is the question I was asked a week or so ago by someone I admire, love and trust.
As I allowed that question to settle in and find its way to the deepest truth I held in my being in that moment, I felt all kinds of squirmy, uncomfortable and exciting feelings coming together.
The words…
Nourishment. Simplicity. Spaciousness. Homecoming… quietly floated through my mind, allowing even more room to open up in my belly, my chest, my heart.
I allowed these words to land like delicate seeds in rich, dark, fertile soil. Simply sitting with them. Not making anything of them. Just noticing the texture and feel of them.
With this question foremost in mind as I worked/ played in my journal I realized that this vessel of my daily creative expression – my beloved journal – is packed tight, bulging at the seams, tiny writing, every single page filled to the brim. Lots and lots of pages taped and added in everywhere. Full. Tight. Not enough room.
What once felt adventurous and daring now felt cramped and constricting.
As I simply noticed this without judgment it occurred to me that this was an expression of an old fear of spreading out. Of giving myself room. Of taking space. The space I was so deeply hungry for.
I saw that this is an old habit. The unconscious shadow still playing out of squeezing myself into, shrinking down, holding back, making nice, toning down, being quiet, playing by someones else’s rules. Being small-er than I truly am.At some point this served me well. Very, very well. It was a survival tactic. A defense strategy. It helped me grow. Blossom. Become who I am in this moment.
And now this strategy is like a too tight pair of shoes. It hobbles rather than supports freedom and growth.
It simply no longer serves. At All.
Taking space.
Hmmm….
The very next day, at my friend’s suggestion, I went out and got myself the largest journal I could find. Twice the size of my comfortable familiar choice. I chose this as a challenge. An invitation. A question. A wondering. A dance – with myself.
I started by adding color to the inside of the front cover and then the back. Warming up.
Then I deliberately and boldly wrote my big, burning question across two very large pages in the front…
I’ve been opening to the answers to this question ever since.
I’ve been using this journal as my practice to take space. To ponder. Explore. To open my arms wide and stretch in one place because I know that each thing we do affects every other thing we do. NO-thing is separate from another.
Sometimes there are lines in the sand we cross and nothing is ever the same.
More often our growth is a series of small awarenesses.
The choices and decisions we make as we become aware…
~ Of the shape of our own inner landscape, our longings, our stumbling blocks, our tangled bits, our intrinsic beauty.
~ Of the reflection we are observing from what is around us and what that stirs within us.
It is the willingness to shine a light, or have it shone, into our own dark unknown. Then having the good courage to see what is there. Choosing…
Spaciousness.
Love.
Beauty.
Community.
Creative Expression.
Peace.
Whatever is calling YOU… and answering that call in small ways that build – one upon another. Hand-crafting your precious life.
It is paying attention to the questions we are being asked. And the deeper questions we are asking ourselves.
Becoming experts in our own inner language of desire. Learning how to sit with the sometimes unbearable tension of that longing. Recognizing that true desire is your own Soul calling you on toward your own ever-deepening fulfillment.
It is recognizing that sometimes your path will be a path that is not the same as your family. Your friends. Your community at large. You can expect to feel alone at times. This helps you to fall back on yourself. To learn to develop a stronger trust and intimacy with your own deeper knowing and wisdom – your Higher Self, if you will.
It is knowing when appropriate external support will be advantageous and help you to soar and when it will simply muddy the waters. Then trusting that knowing.
AND… These seemingly small awarenesses lead you to the bigger questions.
These modest movements support and allow for the tipping point of awareness and understanding that can become the line in the sand you cross and never go back to again.
Those moments of transcendent understanding. When nothing is ever the same.
Wishing you…
Every. Single. Beautiful. Good thing!
Love and joyful blessings,
