I am a weird one. I think differently than lots and way more than most. I analyze, I worry, I weigh, I back and forth, I stew, I worry some more. That mind of mine buzzes and spits and farts all day long until I make a conscious effort to SLOW IT DOWN! Even when I catch myself on the hamster wheel of worry and work at slowing down my mind through yoga or meditation or walk through the forest or snuggle with my dog, I can be enjoying blissed out moment to moment peace and BAM! A worrisome thought comes and I'm right back there hashing out and solutionizing (think I made that one up, but it fits).
I say I'm weird, but I know that today, this is an all too common way of being for people in the west. So what do we do? Being this way with this fast mind and fast heart and strung out nervous system...frankly, sucks. It causes bad digestion, anxiety, that feeling where you're feet don't touch the ground, cortisol overload, and kick my butt low energy and I-could-sleep-right-here-in-the-middle-of-driving-my-son-to-baseball tiredness.
This is what we do. As my good friend (never actually knew him but dang he is a wise dude), Joseph Campbell says...Follow Your Bliss.
I know, Cliche! But, whatever. Finding Joy and keeping Joy as part of our every day lives is IMPERATIVE to healing. I am not talking about half-assed "My bliss is running. I like to run, so I run and run and run. It makes me feel good and the bonus is that I stay in great shape!" I have been a runner my whole life (until my back enforced a strike on this type of high impact activity for now) and there are some people who have running as their absolute happy place, but I know for a FACT that this is rare. (I pick on running only because I used to try to convince myself that this was my bliss, but alas, it was not!). Most of us, myself included, run because it is quick exercise and yes, it can be great therapy. I am not knocking running, but don't try to tell me that running is your bliss. There is more to life than running!! Keep running, but keep time to add things in that make your heart swell and your inner child giggle and shout while you do them (just got tears in my eyes during that last sentence, my inner little girl is squealing at the prospect of me setting her free for what she wants to do!).
Those of you who know me well, might have figured this out by now that my bliss is being with horses. Not just riding them, but being around them, gazing into their deep eyes, noticing and being grateful for whatever communication and wisdom they have to impart to me and my favorite, sticking my nose deep into their coat to breathe in that strong horsey smell. I love it! My little me is just screeching about the prospect.
so what's the problem? Follow your bliss! I have set my life up for this. I've bought a farm and I have done a 9 month course on facilitating Medicine Horse work with people, my husband is mostly on board, so what else is there? I am terrified. That's it. THat's the rawest truth of it. I am paralyzed by fear.
But my little inside kid won't take no for an answer. I have given her all the reasons this is a really bad idea right now and that I'm not quite ready and blah blah blah, but she keeps on. Then she went over my head and worked with her friends at Universe Inc. and set up for me that this gorgeous black awesome friendly grounded willing and ready mare would be plopped in my lap. And unlike other horses that I have met (whom I thought were for me but maybe weren't ready for the work I want them to do alongside me with people), she is ready. I just know if. She keeps looking at me in my mind like, come on, let's do this! This is what you said you wanted! So you can imagine, there's my inner girl and this horse, one on the other's back, staring at me screaming, Let Go! Let Go! Stop being so serious and responsible and adultlike!! It's boring! Let's go for a ride in the meadow and then you'll know for sure that you must do this! See? I warn you! Bliss is a great goal, but it is dang hard and makes you drop ALL of your walls that you have built around you to control your little world and keep it small and safe. Like human children, you give them an inch and they will take 10,000 miles. You even listen to their little stories and all of a sudden you're jumping through the forest with a fake sword and climbing fake mountains and slaying fake dragons. You know? It's crazyville.
But...I have lived an adult life for 20 years (actually more like 40 because I was a serious, worrisome, anxious child) and you know what? I'm kinda bored and ready for more magic!! I know that it's good for a child to be bored because then they use their imaginations, but using my dreaming and imagining faculties has been what has gotten me into this mess of my dreams. When you're an adult, boredom shows that you are living in the duldrums of adult life and far from what your Soul and inner child want. It means you are focused on the surviving and the doing and the accomplishing and the buzzing and the rat-racing... and this with no fun is making us sick as a society.
So today, I will visit that black mare and I will keep my heart open. I will let my inner child ride her like the wind. I will feel my way through the visit instead of thinking and worrying my way into the future with her and we shall see what abundance and gifts are brought to me in this state of allowing my dreams to come to me. Sounds like more fun than stressing, doesn't it?
