Turning Points Noted Down by the River

There is something inside of me that has shifted...It is subtle...There is a clarity and a lightness that was not there earlier...

These last few days have been so special on so many different levels - celebrating birthdays here and there, reconnecting with dear ones, letting go of attachments and the past, quietly reaching and noting milestones attained...So many moments and experiences - some of them very interior - indicating a series of very tangible turning points...

I realize that I am able to feel compassion for someone for the first time - despite a rift that may never be healed in this lifetime...

I realize that I am able to drive down a road I have avoided for a couple of years because of the deeply painful and very emotional memories that it elicited...

I am moved to reach out and make a connection that I had avoided in recent years...

I am able to reunite with dearly beloved souls and feel an ease in our being with one another that had been absent for so long...

I find my meditations yielding much deeper fruit after years of dedicated effort...

I am more comfortable being in the present moment and what it has to offer...

I can delight in the feeling of joy that simple pleasures disclose...

In the early morning I go down to the river and enjoy every moment I spend there - I drink in the experience of the sun beating down on me - and delight in the softest semblance of a breeze caressing my face...I go to the river and I ground and realize for the first time there is no lesson for me to learn there - there is no sense of urgency - only the experience of the river and I deeply communing. Yes, my time on this river feels different. I am not the same - and neither is this river...

I return home after a shorter time spent on the river that I would have desired. There is much yet to do...I come home to chant with my Reiki meditation group and we all feel surrounded by powerful energies and the loving presence of beings drawn to this sacred circle...

I emerge from the river and know that I have reached a turning point that becomes more evident as a dear friend and I go for a walk and I share with her my observations of very subtle changes...

Something is different...I see differently...I feel different...I am not who I was a few weeks or months ago - certainly not who I was a few years ago...Slow growth is hidden...So much work has been done, energetically, in therapy, so much stripping and releasing, and I am truly seeing the magnitude of the work done...

There is a nascent freedom, a lightness, and a clarity, and a sense of direction and purpose that was not previously evident - and that I had yearned for that now surrounds me and embraces me...

The river has been a silent witness to all that has transpired. And while most of my time this past year or so has been spent in solitude, this week - and particularly this day - has been a time for friends...

I meet one friend at the river as I launch Grace...I come home to friends I have been chanting and meditating with for nearly a year and half...I go to meet another friend on a walk that has been incredible support to me these last couple of years...And later in the evening, one more friend comes to practice yoga with me, someone who has also been very supportive...As if to mark all of these blessings, I step onto my new Revolution mat for the first time to practice...It seems fitting to end this day - and mark another phase of my life, with a new mat!

This river that has mirrored my soul and been witness to all of my interior growth, my pain, my sadness, and my newly found freedom and nascent joy is a river of grace and it has been the midwife to my own re-birth. I give gratitude for all that I have been shown on the shores of this river, and within it - and to all that I have experienced - both the special graces and the challenges as well - for they have all contributed to making me who I am today...

It was one year ago yesterday, that Grace and I launched ourselves into this river - with trepidation - and wonder. I could not have imagined the journey we would share together...A year ago, on August 3rd, I baptized Grace and anointed her with prayers, with holy water and sacred oils, with these words...

"Let her be strong...Let her take me places I have not been to yet in my spiritual journey...Let her open doors for me that I have not yet been able to access...let her enable me to surrender more fully to the river...

I journey from having been an observant spectator at the river, to having become a more active participant - and to finally merging and becoming one with the river - satisfying my thirst for wholeness...

I will surrender to the river, and in so doing, I will surrender more deeply to God..."