Slow down, relax and reflect on a bigger you [column]

WOLF SONGS & FIRE CHATS

I’ve spent the bulk of my lifetime engaged in the process of learning. When life circumstances forced me to leave school at 16, I became very serious about remaining open to new discoveries.

For the longest time, books were my university. I’ve also benefited immensely from the presence of amazing and powerful teachers who gave me spiritual, cultural and philosophical knowledge.

But sometimes you just have to listen to what life has to say to you. Sometimes our most elevated thinking and knowing can’t give us the direction or the process to follow to get what’s best for us.

As a man on the cusp of 58, I have finally come to understand this fully.

It’s not an easy thing to do. It’s not natural for us to slow down, relax and allow life to dictate what the next best thing is. You have to work at it. You have to conscientiously choose to want to do it, and you get better by degree.

Practice. Repitition. Going back over the same ground time and time again until you know it by the soles of your feet. That’s what it takes to develop this vital skill. I’ve tried to do that through the years and it’s only now starting to pay off.

For instance, the other day I had nothing on my personal agenda. There was nowhere I had to be or nothing I had to take care of. My work for the week had all been completed and since I work for myself there was a whole chunk of time with no immediate plan. It bothered me. I felt as though I had to have some idea of what to do next.

My therapist and I had worked on relaxation and visioning. It’s a process where you allow yourself to open to possibility. You close your eyes and relax and allow the next indicated thing to just emerge for you.

It’s a skill that has brought me much relief from tension and anxiety through the years. So I closed my eyes. I relaxed. I found what was most needed for me and by me that day.

I was called to a place high on a cliff overlooking a lake. I had been past the place a number of times and had always been attracted to it.

In the distance was the horizon rimmed by mountains. Somehow I knew that this had been a vision quest site and that many people had come there to fast, pray and seek spiritual direction for their lives. It was a power place and I needed to offer tobacco and leave prayer ties there. A friend drove me out to it.

I walked along the edge of that cliff and was mesmerized. The landscape was more stunning than I imagined. I found a ledge about 15 feet down the face of that cliff. It was narrow with just enough room to sit comfortably. I scrambled down to it and as I sat there I felt the power of the place as surely as my own breath. I became calm. I felt as though I truly belonged in that spot and there was nothing that I needed or wanted except to be there.

I’d taken a ceremonial rattle with me and I sang a prayer song to that lake, the mountains, and the immense spectacular sky. Then I sat and thought of my life. I thought about its quality and its quantity. I thought about its challenges. I thought about its blessings.

When the time was right I laid an offering of tobacco down and a prayer of thankfulness. Then I rose and saying another prayer of gratitude for what was already present in my life, I asked to be guided to fulfillment. I tied prayer ties to a juniper bush at the edge of that cliff.

When I walked away I felt whole. I felt secure. I hadn’t asked for physical things, hadn’t asked for anything but the spiritual feeling of being fulfilled. In truth, there was nothing that I needed except that.

I wanted to feel connected to the process of life and living. I wanted to feel that the things I was doing and offering the world had depth and consequence, that they mattered.

The prayer ties were the physical expression of my desires. Now they would flutter in the wind forever just as my prayers would always resonate with the universe. It might not seem like much to you but to me it was a vital moment.

I had filled the seeming vacuum of a day by intention, desire and a choice of action. I had asked for direction and it had been given. Life told me what I needed to do and doing it I was made bigger inside.