Have you noticed this in the past months: an awareness of feeling less safe, more vulnerable? less patience, more irritability, which is sometimes what comes to the surface when what we are really feeling is not safe? or a generalized, underlying anxiety that runs rampant at unexpected times?
If so, of course, you are not alone. Even if you are not worried about feeding your family, or paying your rent or mortgage, you might be feeling for the many people who face those worries daily. And there is a pandemic, which affects us all, even when we and those we love may have managed to stay healthy for the time being. Maybe you are balancing working from home and caring for young children or home schooling children over these last ten months. Then there is racial, social, political, and economic unrest around us. Even if it seems not directly in your life, the energy of it, the sense of it, does surround us everywhere.
And then came January 6, the day when the Capitol building of our country, our democracy, was breached by an angry mob. Did you feel it in your living room and wonder what would happen next and what would make us safe at all? I did.
Because I am a human being along with you, practicing how to do this life in a satisfying way that is hopefully for the greater good, too, I have felt these feelings for myself, for those I love, and for people I don’t even know. I have noticed, too, that my underlying anxiety kept coming to the surface more often. The unsettling times seem to be constantly escalating, and when I thought I had adjusted to one part, the earth would open up in one more place. We are all affected by this. Sometimes the effect comes in ways that seem unrelated, as what happened to me. Even before the events of January 6, I had a private, internal experience of my own that took me awhile to sort out. With several periods of meditation over several days, and in the process of my sorting, a poem suddenly forced its way from my insides to the paper. Perhaps it will speak to what you have also been feeling.
Once Upon a Time…
“Go forth in joy and get on with it.” Abraham-Hicks said to me one morning in my email, and I laughed out loud and knew the truth of the message
Once upon a time in a glorious moment, I saw the essence of someone I love, surrounding his head in a shining light. Breathless, all I could do was whisper, “You are so beautiful. You are so beautiful.”
Once upon a time, dressing in my own clothes after ten days in a hospital gown, I rubbed the sleeve of my shirt and the leg of my pants, in wonder, now amazed at the beauty of the simple fabric’s texture and color that had previously been ordinary to me
Once upon a time, a friend delighted me with the gift of a title, Permission Giving Queen of the Universe, to honor what she saw as my allowing freedom and choice for each of us in our lives
Once upon a time, someone I love took my title and casually tossed it to someone else who already had different titles of her own. My awareness of my own essence and even my sense of self vanished swiftly in the moment as though I had no power at all … not even to laugh … as though someone else did have the power to take away who I am. I found myself in a dark hole that is not unknown to me, but which I visit rarely in many years
Once upon a time I was a child wounded by trauma as children frequently are. I have loved and nurtured that child for her healing and mine, and yet, there she is with me in my life form, with her pain and anger and aloneness again, abandoned again, thinking again that she doesn’t deserve
Once upon a time in moments, I knew my connection with my essence, my presence … and still I easily, carelessly slipped into the “illusionary form of this life”* with its struggles and its pain, its personal dark holes
Once upon a time I met a woman I used to know. I saw that she was a painter of exquisite landscapes and portraits in her art studio, a writer and benefactor, and a joyful creator in her kitchen besides. And I saw myself, stuck in the “illusionary form of this life,”* where a child develops the belief that she doesn’t deserve. So I listened to the quiet spaces between the sounds, and listened more … listened even deeper. Then, as “the space that is the stillness opened up,”* the child skipped off to play, and I came here to write to you because I had to, the words pushing to be written
“Go forth in joy, and get on with it.” said Abraham-Hicks.
There is much to be gotten on with in the stillness, in the knowing, in the power and the joy.
Amen…
(*concepts in quotes with asterisks are from “Essential Meditations with Eckhart Tolle”)
As I close, I wish you blessings. In your own stillness and knowing, may you be with your power and your joy.
As always with love,
January 2021
Dawn
Beautiful, Dale — especially “Once Upon a Time”. But the whole post was right on. I know what you mean and am also in and out of those places!!! So I could definitely relate! Blessings to you!
Dale Midgette Smith
Thank you, Dawn. Amazing, isn’t it, how this extensively vulnerable time clicks on the old vulnerabilities like snapping a finger? We do know this, and still it amazes.
Trish
Precious friend. I am there, as well, though much less of late. I now feel much more protected, safer, less anxious. Love to you.
Dale Midgette Smith
Oh yes, indeed, the energy of the land has settled some, which then allows the same to us. Thank goodness!
Jean Raffa
Oh, Dale. Your self-acceptance, honesty, and vulnerability are so beautiful and inspiring. I’ve felt everything you mention. And feel deeply affirmed to know that you have felt it too. And, oh, my goodness! That Ellie! I see a lot of uniqueness and power in her! How blessed we are. Love, Jeanie
Dale Midgette Smith
Dear Jeanie…thank you so much for your comment. It is, indeed, always affirming to know that someone else feels what we feel. Blessings do abound. Love, Dale
Diane
Your words and thoughts always make things better. And the pictures! Thank you. XO
Dale Midgette Smith
Thank you, Diane. And I always appreciate your comments. I write because that’s what I do. Knowing that it makes a difference is such an encouragement in the sharing. XO back to you