Wolves in the Woods December 7, 2009
Posted by gerrystarnes in General, Healing, Learnings.Tags: life, love, risk
5 comments
Footprints in deep snow,
Surrounded by woods,
The moon bright overhead,
Lights the wet white carpet.There are wolves in the woods.
They make no sound,
Yet they are there in the dark,
Watching between the trees.
Tingling flesh, racing heart, shallow breath: is it excitement or fear? The body cannot tell the difference.
Toes on the knife-edge precipice,
Wind gusting at your back.
Skidding just beyond control,
Useless steering wheel.
Wolves in the woods on a frozen winter night.
In the moment, we rarely get to choose. It happens; we are in it. We respond beyond thinking from that deep place. It is like a predilection: programing running just beneath the surface, installed by someone else, by the past.
A loved one revealed something recently that drove down into that place with a long, cold blade so swift there was no time to think, to reflect, to choose. Thought whirled around the numb bubble that encased it, believing it was OK, that the wound was not as serious as it might have been.
When the numbness dissolved, the body responded with an overwhelming mood that reflected the weather outside: cold, gray, raining, inescapable.
Close the door. Bolt and seal it.
Hungry wolves cannot enter where there are no windows.
I lay in that dark place with the sensations – racing heart, buzzing nerves, restless hyper-awareness – trying to feel my way through the panic and confusion. Alone with the wolves.
Two sides showed themselves: the fear of letting go of a belief no longer tenable, and the excitement of letting go of a belief no longer tenable. The body did not know the difference. It was up to me – to my Soul, not my helpless mind/body – as to which interpretation I would choose to attach.
The programming can be overwritten, the curse removed, the imprint erased. Step by step, choice by choice.
Run quickly out of the woods,
or walk in full awareness
into the maelstrom that Love has prepared.
I may survive into a new level of Joy, or I may be torn into ten thousand pieces that I must gather, heal, and re-member myself again. I am not helpless. An act of Courage is the purest expression of Freedom.
A warm, excited heartbeat,
Aware, yet unafraid moves steadily;
A brother wolf who walks upright,
Just passing through.
(Original artwork by Kevin Vinson. Used by permission.)
Risk Is Life October 23, 2009
Posted by gerrystarnes in Healing, Learnings.Tags: life, love, risk
1 comment so far
From Conscious Dancer, an article on Vin Marti clearly expresses the challenge and opportunity of taking a chance in life:
“Let’s remember that to love is to risk not being loved in return. To live is to risk dying. To hope is to risk despair. To try is to risk failure. But risk we must, because a greater hazard would be to risk nothing. Only a person who risks is free.”
Some people are immobilized by the very idea of relationships, much less intimacy. Having been hurt and betrayed in the past – perhaps many times – the fear of rejection became paralyzing. And yet, feeling alone and empty, they longed for significant connection to another.
Relationships require courage. They are rarely easy and one is always vulnerable to the unexpected. We take into them all our past hurts as well as past joys, all our history as well as our hopes and expectations. This is true, not only for long-term significant relationships, but also for the shorter-term friendships, and brief connections of any kind.
There is no “safe” way to do life. Each action requires courage in the face of risk, as Vin says: of failure, of rejection, of despair, of death itself.
Certainly, one must also be cautious. The skydiver makes careful choices and prepares for the unexpected. Only when all systems are “Go” does he make that leap. In that moment, in that free-fall into the unknown, is exhilaration and the excitement of being fully alive. It is the risk that makes the jump worthwhile.
As a dancer, or artist, or teacher, or parent, or any of the other personas that we wear in everyday life, we must risk in order to Live. And really, the only choice for those who seek Freedom is to embrace risk in the face of fear, and cast ourselves full-on into the moment.
“One must Risk in order to be Free.”
