It’s not in the mistakes that we make where our lessons have value, but in how we recover.
Recovery without backwards glances laced with accusations, excuses or judgment is growth. Growth is the ultimate form of healing.
Healing is recovery made good by grace, love, and kindness.
I hear the birds calling.
I feel the rustling of the earth as outside the dawn awakens.
Sleep fell so swiftly upon me as the full moon watched over and with a new sense of soft inquiry my eyes flutter open. My awareness rustles with the sounds, colors and shifting environment around me. The morning presents itself to me, as my awareness awakens with the dawn.
In this moment, as my awareness shifts from my inner state of attachment to an interconnection with what is around me, I feel a different state of aliveness. An aliveness of knowing simultaneously what is happening on the inside and the outside of the container that I perceive as me.
This awareness is scintillating and soothing, clear and not completely definable. I am aware of all and nothing.
My awareness flutters and swirls like the newly arising birds that sing and dance just outside my window, tuned as well into the mystery of awakening.
It is in the awakening of the dawn that I can explore the awakening of my awareness. It is in the awakening of my awareness where I come closer to knowing the true sense of who I am…if I am who at all.
I begin to wrap myself in the dawning of this awakening. In donning my awareness, I welcome the awakening of this harmonious interconnection with all that is around me.
…nurturing the I iN All.
I stand at the window looking outward. Not noticing the shining sun or the beautiful signs of life flowering around me. Instead I focus on the water spots, dust, and debris collected on the window pane. I am quick to blame outside factors for my spotty view.
But then I remember that I can wipe that window clean. It is not a conspiracy that the rain and flowers and earth have stirred up and thrown at me. They are not trying to obstruct my view. Rather they invite me to step outside, to clear the lens, and look in to see the beauty that lies there.
And so each time that window gets dirty, I know it is just a reminder to brush off the outside and look within. And when I focus inward with clarity, what I see looking outward shines more brightly too.
A stirring, an imbalance, an unthinkable happens and there I am…swirling in thoughts and emotions.
Although we seem unconnected, we are tethered undeniably to others’ experiences, their pain, their suffering, their anger. Their division and righteousness becomes mine, even when I don’t want it to be.
And then comes the arduous task of sifting. Sifting through the messages in all of this…not what it means to my community or the statement it makes about my society, but the fundamental lesson for me in the perceived tragedies and suffering that stand before me.
I dare not admit how my thoughts flow in circular motions…how I cannot point at the right or wrong…it all just seems to come back to me, to the fear I have that any one of them could be me.
…the “victim”…the “suffering”…the “perpetrator”…the “responsible one.”
These labels belong to my deepest shadows and like threads dancing on a loom, have long since been woven into the fabric of me.
So, I turn my anger to the scariest one in an attempt to cut that thread. And then the story unfolds, my experience is defined by calling out the grossest attributes of others although deep down inside I know they are still undeniably tethered to me, undeniably me.
It is then that I must fill with compassion, for each of them and for me. I must allow these situations and the contrast they provide to take me back to the center of my being, to turn inward and calm the swirling from the inside. Instead of needing the contrast to tug at the fabric from the outside as if separate from me, I turn inward to reweave the threads, to smooth the snag so that the fabric on the outside lays out more seamlessly.
Each time the contrast begins to pull and tug at me again, I slow the loom, treasure that thread, and remember that no matter what any of us have done or who any of us seem to be, the threads are the same – it is a complex fabric that tethers you and me.
What if your daily experiences were really no different than your dreams – simply stories pieced together to provide information. Stories intended to awaken in you parts that are dormant, numb, forgotten or that would otherwise go unnoticed. Each of these stories placed before you to illuminate a potential to think, feel, and engage differently beyond what is familiar and routine.
When I move my body in a new way, I awaken unfamiliar yet exciting new connections with muscles and bones. When I move my thoughts with curiosity, not always believing I have the answer, I am no longer reticent but have rubbed the sleep from my eyes. When my emotions flow freely, even to the point of creating discomfort, I welcome the new dawn of compassion, courage, trust, and forgiveness.
I awaken an inner knowing, like the sun illuminating the sky. I am suddenly aware of something far greater than these dreams. I rise from the darkness knowing my capacity to explore, play, experiment, feel and know, all the while aware that the stories do not make me.
Think with your heart. Have faith in your instincts. Place yourself in unfamiliar positions and you just might find you are more comfortable and happier than you ever imagined you could be.
Perspective is everything.
Perspective applies the lens, tells the story, creates the experience, leaves the memory, defines impressions and molds beliefs.
Is it time to change the lens?
