The Opening

"There came a time when the risk to remain tight in the bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom". Anais Nin

Finding ourselves is a journey that takes a lifetime of unfolding as we muster the courage many times over to reach deeply into ourselves and bring forth the essence of who we understand ourselves to be in that moment. During our early years and before we are pushed into forms that are suitable for our parents and teachers, we sing, play, and dance our way through our days, stopping to rest when we need to, nourishing ourselves when our bodies insist, and experiencing life without fear and with joy.

We are open as the rose in full bloom.

Then as life happened, we learned that being open wasn't always safe. We began to close up, we became cautious and defended in order to protect our inner selves. This didn't happen overnight usually, it was a slow process but one that was effective. Many of us stopped dancing. We lost our voices. Our bodies and minds continued though to grow and we eventually became adults, "out in the world" and ready to make our mark! From the outside we looked fine, we even sounded fine. We might have even thought we were fine!

Then along came "mid-life". The Crisis as some people call it . A "Dark Night of the Soul" for some, coupled with pervasive feelings of unrest. The "who" we had learned to be no longer felt right.....there must be something more. The rose which had closed up so long before was quietly
whispering to us in the dark of night, "I need water, I am thirsty". And, if we listened, then gradually our rose began to open again, perhaps slowly at first, perhaps painfully, but opening nevertheless as we tended to her. A little pruning, fertilizer, attention and before long we were singing and dancing again! Our creative spark was awake! We were awake! And once we begin to be awake, then it is oh so hard to go back to sleep again.