The Long and Winding Road

Acceptance doesn’t mean resignation, it means understanding that something is what it is and that there has got to be a way through it.”
                                                                                                                          -Michael J. Fox

The Long and Winding Road is a Beatles song and also the paths our lives take. Just as in all paths of healing, they are not straight, but they wind around and sometimes we don’t know where they are taking us. What we have with us is our own unique moral compass that leads our way. 

There are so many self-help books and gurus and guides as well as meditation techniques all really there to help us to tune into our own small inner voice. This inner voice is what we call our soul and our true voice. It is who we are connected to and with all that is. I had written before about what I call living in the mean time. This is living day to day not knowing where each day is taking us and knowing in our bones that we are moving towards our goals and dreams. Living in the mean time can be short lived as in towards a change in our lives and not knowing the immediate direction, or it can be of longer duration as in moving towards knowing our life’s purpose or in moving towards loving a parent and ourselves in a very difficult early situation. The truth is, it is possible for us to achieve our goals and to live in our own moral compass; even in finally loving us and accepting us.

What comes to mind here is a personal story regarding my father. As he is no longer with us, I don’t have the access to our weekly breakfasts anymore. What I do have are my memories. I have also written about his early life and many traumatic situations as well as from last week, his long and winding struggle towards himself and his parents. We had discovered an old letter he had written to his father in which he stated how he loves him…and much more. (See last week’s blog) He has no memory of this feeling towards him or this letter. As he is slowly losing his mind to dementia, I didn’t know if, in his own unique path, he would ever find his way to himself or to his parents.
During my last visit, I had also compiled old photographs from his mother’s collection into a couple of CD’s. I read the letter he had written to him as well as showed him and the family all these old pictures. We had hugged and then I left to go home. My sister in Denver and I spoke shortly after this visit and my father, whom I had thought was lost, told her that he had spent his life helping others to find out who they are and that he doesn’t know who he is. He would like to know himself. She told him that she is pretty good at that and would like to help him if he could let her. 

That exchange they had together touched me. Here is a man I thought might not find him in this lifetime, and in his own winding way, might in fact, find his way to him and to his parents in a new and life-affirming way. It doesn’t matter how our road winds and where it goes so much as it matters that we are on our path and our own healing path towards us. 

Shift Your Story, Shift Your Life: Guided Visualization/Meditation

Take a minute and get comfortable with your feet gently planted on the ground in front of you. Take 2 or 3 deep breaths. Each time you breathe in, breath in life and openness, and every time you breathe out, breathe out darkness and blockages. Do this consciously again 2 or 3 times. Now imagine yourself walking down a path. Take your time and let it come to you organically. Begin to see the path in front of you and under your feet. What are you stepping on, rocks, grass, dirt, a path from a garden, what? What is by your side, trees, flowers, mountains, ocean, what? What do you hear and who or what are you aware of? Reach down and touch the sand or flower, or ground. Take in a deep breath and smell the smells around you. Now just notice your surroundings as you continue down your path. Is there something you would like to know, someone you would like to see, someone you would like to talk to gain understanding to an old situation that is unfinished, a question in your life you would like clarity with? Have that question clearly in your mind as you walk your walk and notice all around you. Continue walking and be aware of what you would like. Does someone come to you, or do you hear an answer, or do you feel something change inside of you, does a vision come to you? Notice and take it all in. Feel the air around you and begin to breathe deeply again 2 or 3 deep breaths. Feel your feet beneath you as you are sitting here for this meditation and find your way back to this body. Then open your eyes. Just be with what you got for a few minutes and let it sink in. If nothing happened, that is ok. It will eventually on another visit. 


If any of you would like to share how this experience was for you I would love to hear from you. Or if you would like to share your own winding road I would also like to hear from you. See you next week.


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