This morning I got up to watch the sunrise and after doing my morning journal, reading, and French practice, I headed up to the labyrinth for a meditative walk. Walking the labyrinth reminds me of the twists and turns of my life – sometimes there are long arcs of easy continuity, then abrupt changes, sometimes lots of them. I spent the first 50 years of my life moving into the middle of the labyrinth and now I’m making the slow, more thoughtful journey back, contemplating where I’ve been and seeing it from a different viewpoint having gathered all this knowledge. Now I’m deciding what I can do, what I want more of, what I can let go.
The theme of enough came up as I made my way out of the labyrinth. Questions such as:
What is enough?
Am I doing enough?
Do I have enough?
What does enough mean for me? For all of us?
How does ‘enough’ relate to gratitude, reuse, awe and wildness? (These are my four main interest areas.)
Am I enough?
That last question is a big part of what this journey is about for me. What is it that I need? What are the things that I can let go of that are holding me back?
One thing I’ve avoided for a long time is letting myself feel my negative, sad feelings. I’m so good at diverting my attention in the guise of ‘I am so lucky. I have so much to be grateful for’ and while that is true, I am still allowed to be sad and scared and upset and to feel those feelings. That’s part of this journey for me, learning to let myself feel and not be scared of negative feelings. If I’m unsure of what’s coming up for the next day I often feel lost and scared when I wake up and my default is to think about all the good things in my life and push down those anxious feelings. I still struggle with this so much.
I’m sleeping really well, much better than when I was working, I don’t have the insomnia I got on a regular basis. More often now my interrupted sleep relates to what I ate and drank, not the stress level I’m experiencing. I know the way I am living now is not financially sustainable, but it does make me see the difference a less stressful life makes. I wonder about ways of earning income that will not create the same level of stress in my body and mind.
I spent the rest of the morning with Erin cleaning one of the retreat houses to get it ready for an upcoming group. I learned how to do hospital corners on sheets and to fold toilet paper to make the pretty little points! It was a relatively meditative experience, though I did spend some time listening to a podcast while I was cleaning out one of the bathrooms. I also saw some tiles in the kitchen depicting scenes from the Bible, they look like they are from a book illustrated by Tomie dePaola. We were both pretty wiped out after 3 1/2 hours of cleaning, so I came back, had lunch and then did some work on my current JNE investigations.
After dinner, I sat outside and gawked at the constantly changing skies, it is just so different from home, and I am loving watching the interplay of light, cloud and rain, and how it changes the look of the surrounding mountains. I plan to hike to the top of the ridge one of these evenings to watch the sunset, but not after a morning of cleaning houses!
