We Should Only Know…
The Door is Round and Open
These cold and stunning spring days, I sometimes think of myself as a “lover of leaving,” in Jelaluddin Rumi’s words.
I do my best.
I stay present.
I show up.
I meet my responsibilities well.
I care for the people with whom I work.
I am trustworthy.
I love as best I can the people in my world.
I continue to commit to the woman with whom I am learning to share my life.
And then I leave.
I get scared.
I leave in all kinds of ways.
Recently sweet things have been tantalizing me.
The occasional sweet thing might be a doorway into the moment for me, a delicious opportunity to be present with tastes and sensations and yum-ness.
The consistent sweet thing, however, is most always a doorway out of the moment, a dulling, a lack, a loss of choice, of center.
For me.
Hum.
And in my life, I meditate.
There are moments of quiet.
There are delicious spaces of silence.
There are places of deep ease and connection, me with me.
There are.
And then I leave.
I get scared.
I muddy the silence with fears of things that haven’t happened—
Things that don’t exist—
Things that are not real.
I leave.
If you told me this, about yourself, about your process, I could easily and authentically coach you about self-acceptance, self-love, about the greatest of all practices, radical compassion for ourselves.
Compassion is the doorway out of forgetting.
Non-judgment carries us back into the practice, the leaning toward remembering, returning, reuniting with that which is truly our choice.
Of course—we leave!
That is the human dilemma.
Especially in this moment, the dilemma feels heavy, this moment that feels drained of hope, this moment that feels emptied of energy.
Perhaps I’m just tired.
Perhaps I’m just cold, as I continue to commit to NOT TURNING ON MY HEAT on May 16.
Perhaps I am ready for warmer weather.
Yet I perk up as my thoughts return to this remarkable poem by Rumi, the ecstatic poet:
Come, come, whoever you are.
Wanderer, worshiper, lover of leaving.
Ours is not a caravan of despair.
Even if you’ve broken your vow a thousand times.
Come.
The door is round and open.
No matter how many times we leave, there is no judgment from anywhere but from ourselves and our own projections.
No matter how many times we “break our vow”, whenever we return, the universe greets us with spacious open arms.
We should only know…..
How profoundly and fully free…
We really are.
We should only know….
How spacious and generous
The universe really is.
The door is round and open.
No matter how many sweets I might need to sample,
As I breathe and relax, I find myself back into another moment
Of practice,
Another moment
Of choice,
Another moment
Of freedom.
And then, from that groundwork of non-judgmental witnessing,
May the right use of will be planted, like seeds in the soil
Of grace and possibility.
We should only
Know
How
Free
We
Really
Are.
Dear Friends, without judgment, just notice, how do you leave yourself? Breathe and relax. What brings you back? For me, the Shuttle-Home-to-Self can be prayer, a word repeated with inner kindness, a breath, a bunny like the one who just hopped/sprinted/bunny/fashion across my lawn, the sun caressing the huge evergreen outside my window, the touch of the chair against my butt, my back.
Dear Friends, let’s celebrate our freedom—freedom of choice, of practice, of claiming the lives we want, lives of patience and tolerance, lives of practice.
How might your life in this moment be different if the door really was round and open?
Please let me know—all voices welcomed—I am aruni@rnetworx.com