A weekly dose of dauntlessly dealt reality from the What It Is Wednesday Blog Carnival…
For years, in lieu of New Year’s Resolutions, my magickal mystic lunch group has chosen themes for ourselves. I can trace exactly what my themes have been and my progress on them, back to 2010. Things like “recognize patterns,” “find a better feeling,” “appeal to the High Self,” “make room for creativity,” etc.
These weren’t just themes, more like oaths. When things go awry, come back to the theme. When nothing blesses, sing it like a mantra. After a while the themes became progressive, as in movement with one dovetailed neatly into what theme could come next year.
I’ve easily spent the last month trying to come up with my theme for 2017. I read back over my journal of previous themes, tallied where I am on each of them, gave pats on the back, cringed with incompetency, and came up with a big fat nothing.
Over the last year I’ve retained two attorneys (apparently it’s the new adulting), dropped back on my shamanic practice, published one book, not contracted on any of my current manuscripts/proposals, experienced a significant decline in health, which finally was diagnosed after fifteen years of pain, exhaustion, and WTF, had two deaths in my family, didn’t take a class in anything, cried more than I can remember in adulthood, been stressed out of my mind, set glorious plans in motion, been hard-pressed to complete.a.single.thing, and my spirit allies have largely been MIA in the wake of intense planetary changes. I’ve realized in 2016 that I am against some intensely debilitating restrictions physically, and it’s taken a tremendous toll on my psyche, mobility, and drive. And if I had to isolate one of the above things that’s really doing my head in, it’s the lack of engagement from my spirit guides.
There’s no guidance to have right now. No bullet list, no meaning. What’s uplifting about that is most every shamanist I talk with frequently notes the same trend. There is a much bigger dynamic in play that isn’t at all personal, and our guides are busy tending it. The isolation left in that lack comes down to really good coping skills, a solid Tribe, and that thing about bootstraps.
In truth, the crud of 2016 has left me realizing how good I had it, before. I’ve said many times, mine has been an enchanted life, even through terrible childhood times, and sad but healing adulthood. I have always been in the company of muses, internal and beyond. I have never in my life been as lonely as I am now, spiritually speaking.
It reminds me of realizing I didn’t know how to study, in college. I always got good grade with little to no effort. I enjoyed learning, I was well-read, fairly privileged where the public school system is concerned, and even though I wasn’t a cookie cutter learner, I could get by on some innate ability to perform well in school.
I never studied. I never had to.
Then college happened and for the first time in my life I got bad grades. Of course everything that I’d held back emotionally about my childhood came out at the same time, so that was part of it. But strictly cognitively, intellectually, I was finally being challenged, and I didn’t know how to rise to it. There were no resources, no fall back skills, no faking it til I made it. There was either I knew it or I didn’t, in which case I had to figure out how to learn it. In some cases I failed outright, but every step was a PTSD nightmare of learning how to learn.
Life feels that way now, in this spiritual dearth, and I don’t want to do it piecemeal again. I am on my own, spiritually speaking, and I have to decide that I’m enough to do the things I want in my life, with this body, this family, this Tribe, open to calling, every step. There’s no muse motivation, no cheerleading fae, no ass-kicking spirit ally. There’s only me, and if that’s not enough to keep me, I don’t know what is. And for now, that’s still a question, not a diva-delivered power statement.
With that in mind, my theme this year is quite simple: breathe.
Keep the body going, let what comes move through on the breath, leaving me well-placed and clear for What Comes Next.
How simple.
How complex.
How the mighty have fallen.
I wish you the best this New Year. May 2017 bring you the realization that you are enough. You are not alone. You are beautiful, and I see you. We all see you. Thank you for what you do here.
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Thank you for your words. They make ME feel less alone. I see and hear you, too – dear soul friend.
Thank you, Tracy!