I beg you, to have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Don't search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer.
Rainer Maria Rilke, 1903; in Letters to a Young Poet
My friend K sent me something lovely yesterday, my horoscope. It said:
Leo July 21–August 22
You become more and more aware that you’re working with powerful forces this week. They’re not only cosmic forces but people around you will be acting them out. This is an extraordinary piece of information … to know that people in our environments act out planetary motion. Observe all work realities this especially this week. Remember also that from loss comes profound new life.
People in my personal cipher have been going in, up and through it lately. There is no denying that now is a time for serious personal growth for so many - those who are ready and willing (and some not so willing!) to do the hard painful work. Those of us who barely made it out of 2009 are being confronted with our quest - get it together baby. What?! Where is my lottery win, my all expense paid vacation, my date with Will Smith? Don't I get something for making it through last year fairly sane? Yes, you get the great joy of continuing in your evolution. I feel ripped off.
A friend and I used to say that "ignorance is bliss" but the fact that we know that makes us too aware to ever be blissful. Yea, dealing in philosophical syllogisms was our version of fun in high school. But there is some truth to that statement but also a huge gift in it too. Because we experience pain we can really know joy. Someone told me that living in joy was as simple as changing your mind. Really? That seemed awfully naive to me - just change your mind? Then why isn't everyone living in joy? Because it is a lot of work. A lot of work. And requires constant vigilance. And it takes a long time - you don't see the results as quickly as you do working out. Being on the low end of the patience spectrum I always wanted things to happen as soon as possible if not before. I lose interest in routine, constant prepartion and what I perceived to be the drudgery of every day life. And mastering those things felt like a huge waste of time. But they are foundation choices that give me somewhere to go. And I have been struggling with this same issue my entire life. This is my Galileo moment - my "get it right this lifetime" lesson.
I've started re-reading old journals so I can see that I have gotten better in this one aspect of my personal growth. I have made major strides. And there is still a long road to go. I have been really hard on myself most of my life - as I am sure a great many women are. And now I think that the best way to keep moving through my evolution is to be more gentle with myself. To accept those things I don't love about myself and those things I cannot change immediately. To live them openly and fully and not push them out of my mind. And with time I, we will all live our way into the answers.
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