I don’t think any of us could deny that a pull between good and evil exists. But I feel it within, not as some external force doing something to me. At times it even feels like I lack the will or even the power to change my inner landscape. Yet it seems polarity is part of the grander scheme of creation – perhaps the only part, aside from the physical senses themselves, best explored here on earth.
Why do we fear the dark shadows? In avoiding something, anything, do we not grant it all the more power over us? By holding back such a force, do we not give it a strange and perilous momentum where, in some random circumstance, it possesses the strength to overtake all our best intentions? Yet remaining open, always open to all the corners of experience can be uncomfortable. Constantly striving to integrate all that is human must be the greatest work we can do, not only for ourselves, but for the collective of humanity.
Like it or not, here I am today, shaky and in a state of inner unrest. Just a few days ago, I was feeling grounded in myself, solid – like, ahhh, finally at this point in my life I can begin to experience a measure of this! And it felt good. The way I’m feeling today does not exactly feel evil, but it certainly is not enjoyable, and my potential to do harm to myself or others is much greater in this unsettled place. And I can clearly see the temptation to numb it out, though many years ago I learned that this is never really an option.
What we resist persists.
One thing I can be sure of, however, even in times of distress, is that this feeling will not remain – nothing does – and I know this now as never before. I do not like this place I’m in, or part of me is not yet in harmony with that truth. Finding there is little movement out of discomfort, I know enough to seek healing in the soil of mother earth. I walk out in the garden and begin to prune and weed. In doing so, I find my breathing deeper, more regular. My eyes seek the vast expanse of field and sky and shoreline. I notice the small green mejiro birds, darting in and out of the brilliant orange honeysuckle. I hear the drone of insects, the cries and melodies struck by the wind as a bow to violin. My place in nature’s scheme becomes clear, if not to my mind, than to my core. More and more I return to a kind of home base within. Then I am ready to engage in something creative like writing or playing with images. Then I am ready to rejoin the world.
Sun breaking through the clouds – Hawi, HI