At the beginning...again

It never ceases to amaze me how things always end up coming full circle. Somehow, despite our valiant struggles to "move forward", we inevitably find ourselves right back where we started.

And so here I am. Again.

I started a blog under a different name nearly two years ago. It's been almost a year since the last post. Now, I am beginning again.

So much has changed so rapidly. I remember the day when this journey began in earnest for me...the day that I realized there would be no turning back this time. It was late 2000. I was standing on the platform waiting for the West Coast Express to take me to work for the day and I remember feeling very agitated in my head. It was like there were over a dozen voices all clamouring to be heard and acknowledged. That day, above the din, there was one voice that was louder and very clear in its message. "Better hang on tight girlie, because here we go." And then I had the sensation of jumping and falling off the edge of a cliff. Or was I pushed? No matter. The result was the same.

At the time, I had no idea of what that message meant. But boy do I understand it now!

Slowly and almost imperceptibly, things in my world began to shift. We moved to a new home, I had my first baby, I changed jobs, a couple of friends left my life. Nothing out of the ordinary, right? Happens all the time, right? Uh huh.

Then as time went on, the shifts began to get a bit more pronounced and were accompanied by significantly more drama. Time to try for a second baby, a painful loss, more job changes, new people entering my life...people that were unlike any others that I had ever met before. Or since.

By this point in time I had discovered the magic of yoga. I knew about yoga (as in exercise) before, but it wasn't until 2007 that I really understood what amazing gifts could be found within a regular Yoga Practice (capital Y and capital P) and within the branches of the 8 limbed "tree of yoga". As I began to deepen my explorations, I found all sorts of other goodies...meditation, Reiki, angels, crystal healing, Sacred Gifts, and, most significantly, my own intuition and power.

And now the fun began for real.

The past three years have been like getting sucked into a spinning vortex of chaos. I've felt a certain kinship with Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz...and I became very envious of her sparkly red shoes that promised to take her home.

"There is no growth in the comfort zone and no comfort in the growth zone."

That's a quote I heard recently that sums it up pretty well. True, growth is anything but comfortable, but there are days that plucking nose hair would seem less painful. Don't you agree?

So now I feel like the vortex has finally finished with me and has spit me out...or what's left of me. And truth be told, there isn't much of the Me that got sucked into the vortex all those years ago left anymore.

It was today as I was writing an email to a friend who also happens to be a Reiki Master (LOVE her!), that it really hit me full force just how different ME is these days.

Words that would never have entered my thoughts let alone my conversations, or heaven forbid, my descriptions of myself, are now getting tossed about with sheer abandon. Words like "transformed", "confident", "aware", "beautiful", "successful" and, my favorite, "self acceptance". Those are words to describe other people, people better than me, people more enlightened than me. Aren't they? NOPE! HA! SURPRISE! Those words are me. Somewhere, somehow, in the middle of that vortex, my whole life changed.

Where do I go from here? I don't know, but I can't wait to find out! Where once there was darkness and dread, my future outlook is now full of hope, promise and Extraordinary Trust. I can have it all if I want it. Do I want it? You bet I do baby!

As I finished up that email to my friend the Reiki Master, I once again felt like I had approached the edge of the cliff. But this time, with a smile on my face, I put down the heavy backpack of things that I no longer need to carry with me, things that no longer serve my purpose, things that no longer are a part of me. And this time, I know for sure I jumped. Heck, I took a running start this time! And over the edge I went: willingly and purposefully, screaming with joy, all the way down.

Samasthiti. We begin again.