I've been walking the labyrinth for a while, or a very long time, depending on how you view time. I walk around this corner and that, and when a pathway opens up, I walk through it. Sometimes, I see a tunnel that I have to squish myself into in order to make it through. Sometimes in the middle of that tunnel, I realize how very uncomfortable it is to squish. myself into such an awkward position, and my spine feels bent and my hips off kilter and I cant stand up straight and that is when I meet three choices........
Choice 1 - keep going through because Ive already made it halfway and well, aren't you supposed to finish what you start? I mean that's what we've been told makes a good and fine person in our society.
Choice 2 - backtrack to the place where the tunnel began and figure once I get there, I will have time to stretch and rest and reconnect with the parts of myself that had to be tucked in tight to fit through the tunnel (this might be the liver, because that it where our life purpose dwells and also our anger........and you can bet I'm damn angry when I realize that I chose the wrong tunnel that made my back hurt.)
Choice 3 - I can pull out my trusty sword (yes, I have swords....machetes actually. I bought a bunch at the beginning of the chaos that began almost 4 years ago because I dont like guns and machetes fit my pirate witch persona better anyways.) and cut straight through the tunnel, carving my own path through the labyrinth and forging ahead.
Choice 3 is the one that I have been choosing most of the time, these past few years, as I have "grown up" a bit (which is really to say I started listening to my own advice and realizing that I too am included in the care and I should probably also heed. my words instead of always putting myself at the end of the line after everyone else was taken care of.)......and it has worked out fairly well. It satisfies my fiery feisty nature and Mars dominant persona. And it can also be exhausting. There is always a bit of going against the flow, hoping to finally break through, hoping to make a difference, hoping to finally make it all the way through the tunnel THIS TIME!
I recently realized there is a 4th choice. It has been coming out of the fog over the past year, but like most people, I can be stubborn and think I know best (and I still think I often do), and tend to want to do things my way. The fog finally cut through and illuminated a new possibility after a sort of downward dunk into what could have been a dark well of woe is me.......except that there was enough counter balance of good stuff that made it so I remained quite steady.
Choice 4 is the realization that I don't even have to be in the labyrinth in the first place. I can easily climb up and out and holy cow, there's a whole world out there. And why wouldn't I do that? Why couldn't I do that? Well, I damn well could, but for some reason that just wasn't something I really could see before. You see, walls provide us a sense of safety. It's a total illusion, because it's really not very safe to fragment yourself and squish yourself into all sorts of awkward to fit through some tunnel you don't even know if you want to be going down in the first place. And yet, it presents what we think to be boundaries (They aren't. They are barriers), and structure (actually these are rules), and we think we have a greater sense of where we are at (labyrinths can go up, down, sideways, and backwards and all kind of wild ways). The only time we really know where we are at is within our own body. How is our state of mind? How does our body feel? How connected do we feel to ALL?
I think this is something many of us do. I can say that most of us, in the holistic world are going through the labyrinth, waving our herbs and crystals and saying "come here, I have a more peaceful way to make it through." We do this because everyone else is in the labyrinth and they are used to how the maze flows with it's twists, turns, and tunnels, and well, we meet folks where they are at, or at least try to. We think we need to speak the same language in order to be heard. We, who are experts in working with energy, seem to forget that congruent energy can be felt by everything and everyone, and well......it just comes across as a bit inauthentic when in reality we don't believe in the labyrinth in the first place but we have been there for so long (our whole lives.......because most of us were born there too, we just discovered how to do things differently and stay afloat and alive in a different way), that we have forgotten that there is anything outside of the walls. OR....we remember but we think, oh it will just be me out there and I don't want to be all alone, and what if I cant find my way back? We never stop to think....maybe we wouldn't want to find our way back.
At Summer's end I applied for a job. It was something part time, something I could work from home doing and something I was more than qualified for. It was literally what I already do, but doing so for a corporation. It wasn't something I was excited about, but it did feel like it would be easy and it would provide a bit of a paycheck through the winter. I didn't get the position. I never even got the interview that I was told I would get. I simply got a letter that said that they were looking for someone who better matched the type of experience they were looking for. I won't go into too much detail, as this is a great organization and they do a lot of good in the world. AND I know that they see me as quite radical with my holistic witchy ways.....and even though I don't completely agree, I also realize that "radical" is subjective.....and compared to some of my witchy herbalist activist friends, I am not very radical at all.........but compared to my friends who are doctors and nurses and walking more in the mainstream path, I am probably seen as an extremely radical witch to be wary about. People don't like change, and it's unfortunate that change is so scary because they aren't even willing to crack the door open to see just want that change being offered might entail.
Now I was a bit irked for a; moment or two. I am someone who appreciates blunt and direct honesty, even when it's harsh. I don't like being lied to, jerked around, or having the truth glossed over with plastic words. I find it silly, unnecessary, and disrepectful. AND........that is also subjective....because I am someone who appreciates that approach and someone that can take that approach and I realize that. most people are trying just to tread water without making waves (which never really works well), and so will play "nice".
What happened next I wasn't expecting at all. Not getting something you think you want, can take some of the wind out of your sails..........AND what happened was exactly the opposite. This is when I saw that I could just step out of the labyrinth.
It wasn't even something I contemplated. I think I had been contemplating it for years, but was doing the "oh ill be all alone out in the great beyond" sort of storyline, that that choice didn't even occur to me, except I think I was peeking over the edge of the hedge for quite a while. I thought of all of the ideas I had over the past few years, especially the ones that hadn't worked so well........and I realized that they probably didn't work because I was doing so within the frame work of the maze. Well.......most people, even people who LOVE the maze, are starting to see the illusion that the maze is. And if we stay in it, trying to do our work from within, well, by connection, we are part of the maze.....and we will be looked at with a sort of wary eye.
And so I am stepping out. At least I think I am. Who knows....five years from now I may see that I just stepped into. bigger labyrinth with more space which created an even bigger illusion. We never know really and I am used to my reality being shaken up every few years....or rather with every Buhner book (Thank you Stephen, you are one of my greatest teachers!).
What is fascinating is there is not really anything different I am doing. I am not suddenly creating a whole new thing outside of the walls. I am not putting out a call to anyone to follow me. (I dont think this works like that....we have to step out only when we are ready). It's more like something ever so slight has shifted, and yet everything feels different. I think that is what we call alignment (all hail the new fan dangled woo woo words that have gotten so watered down that nobody stops to ask what they actually mean).
Nobody else notices (at least not in the way we think they. notice, but I am pretty sure that our vibration -haha another fancy woo word....vibration, what? - has shifted.
And we feel different.
We are different.
The wheel has turned and now we get to learn how to walk again.
This time I'm taking it beyond the walls..........and I'm curious what I will find in here out there.