Lost in the Wilderness

 

photo by: CJ McGannon

A moment happens sometimes when the chronic diving into activity, mechanical habits, spinning repetitive thoughts, planning and subsequent worry has me realizing I am lost in the wilderness.  It's the ache of loneliness, of having been a long time away from myself that first wakes me to this. Somehow, once again, I am far away from Home, from having an awareness or ostensible sense of force in Self.  It's just a moment, a moment of recognition. There is no hope of finding my way back right then, I am in that moment buried in the static tension of purpose, knowing, believing, doing, desire. Still, there is a distant, long ago and far away vague voice heard: "Come home.  Where are You?"

Lost in the Wilderness.  Again. There is nothing to do about it. There I am.  To struggle being there just puts me deeper in the woods. So something quiet activates, is willing to open to the subtle.  Plunging ahead is not an option.

I suppose it would be appropriate to have gratitude for the cresting automatic in myself.  After all, it is its mounting, frenetic force that has brought a stop of sorts, a first notice that I've been missing-in-action. It's extreme has woken Other up.  The prodigal Self comes back to memory, back into being.

To know one is in a wilderness is a big thing. It makes it possible to reconsider the treadmill one has been on, to feel the aloneness of having been away and distant. Like waking, the engagement of my senses is once again possible and a sensitization to the ephemeral in and around me, the thing that will direct me back Home actually has a chance to do so.