In the fall, we are cycling down into hibernation and repose.
Some things, like the vibrant garden and the flowers and leaves appear to die or at least
change dramatically. Every life form experiences letting go, each in its own way.
For us humans, each change can bring us deeper into reflection upon our own seasons of letting go.
Some things, like the vibrant garden and the flowers and leaves appear to die or at least
change dramatically. Every life form experiences letting go, each in its own way.
For us humans, each change can bring us deeper into reflection upon our own seasons of letting go.
Our lives might be understood as a continuous process of letting go. From the moment of birth to our final breath, we let go of the familiar; the immediacy that provides meaning and definition. We give up crawling in order to walk. We lose our first baby tooth, outgrow our favorite dress or shoes, say farewell to a best friend. Later we leave school for employment, change jobs and hair styles, let go of relationships, move to a different house, replace old beliefs with new understandings.
Some of our letting go experiences may seem trivial in retrospect or in comparison to momentous ones or to those times of letting go when we really didn't want to but had to. Every letting go experience remains in memory and can resurface with emotional intensity with just the slightest trigger. Sometimes letting go is replete with anxiety or guilt or shame or fear. Even when we know that letting go is the best action to take, we may second guess ourselves and be plagued by regret. We are shaped by our choices at every juncture of our journey.
Letting go of outgrown, outworn, no longer useful, or harmful habits, people, jobs, and locations that need to be released can give us a sense of relief, as if a huge weight has been lifted. Yet even that kind of letting go carries with it elements of uncertainty; there's an emotional thread that binds us still. There is an ego attachment, a sense of self importance - I got rid of it! The letting go is not clean and we will return to relearn and redo and redeem. And repeat; maybe in a different form but the same content.
We can let go in a higher way but the journey is long and twisting and the outcome cannot be anticipated. We must be willing to withdraw from all that we know to live with our shadow side. We will be required to honestly question all of our reasons for choosing. We will have nothing but our own still small voice to guide us. We need to give ourselves generous amounts of time for reflection until our clarity is unshakeable and we are certain that we have completed all that was set before us in the best way possible. Only then do we receive the hidden gifts of letting go: a sense of unlimited spaciousness and the blessing of true authenticity. We let go and receive the fullness of light!
O O O O O O O O
Some of our letting go experiences may seem trivial in retrospect or in comparison to momentous ones or to those times of letting go when we really didn't want to but had to. Every letting go experience remains in memory and can resurface with emotional intensity with just the slightest trigger. Sometimes letting go is replete with anxiety or guilt or shame or fear. Even when we know that letting go is the best action to take, we may second guess ourselves and be plagued by regret. We are shaped by our choices at every juncture of our journey.
Letting go of outgrown, outworn, no longer useful, or harmful habits, people, jobs, and locations that need to be released can give us a sense of relief, as if a huge weight has been lifted. Yet even that kind of letting go carries with it elements of uncertainty; there's an emotional thread that binds us still. There is an ego attachment, a sense of self importance - I got rid of it! The letting go is not clean and we will return to relearn and redo and redeem. And repeat; maybe in a different form but the same content.
We can let go in a higher way but the journey is long and twisting and the outcome cannot be anticipated. We must be willing to withdraw from all that we know to live with our shadow side. We will be required to honestly question all of our reasons for choosing. We will have nothing but our own still small voice to guide us. We need to give ourselves generous amounts of time for reflection until our clarity is unshakeable and we are certain that we have completed all that was set before us in the best way possible. Only then do we receive the hidden gifts of letting go: a sense of unlimited spaciousness and the blessing of true authenticity. We let go and receive the fullness of light!
O O O O O O O O
offspring
each one knows his own name
and the names of all the neighbors
together they endured everything
that time presented them
on cool and balmy days of leisure,
through blistering heat and drought
that hardened them for adversity.
sometimes late spring blizzards
took the smaller weaker ones
the others held together, carried on
till softer days returned
with endless joys of summer,
cool crispness of lazy autumn.
the season of their waning days came
as they knew it would
and though their time grew short
they aged into a brilliance
unforseen in springtime,
a glorious explosion of color echoing
through familiar neigborhoods
till one by one
they loosed their tenuous hold on life
floated gently then joined again together
weaving an eternal quilt upon
their mother's breast
- pab 2016 -
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