March has arrived, rainy and warm, rather more like April. More March-like is the stiff and gusty breeze, whipping the conifers and threatening to send hats and recycling careening down the street.
Like the March wind, events can clear the cobwebs from our minds and thaw the icy bits from our hearts, allowing our minds and hearts to heal us. This week, person after person has spoken to me of terrifying dreams and premonitions, and incidents of abuse and bullying, contemporary and ancient. Yet there have also been stories of hearts or minds cracking open, revealing a deep and abiding connection to All That Is. I wonder whether this time of rising evil may teach us to live in both worlds, the everyday world of great challenge and the underlying world of unity and connection with Mother Earth and the Ancestors.
Growing up in two worlds taught me that holding seemingly incompatible realities is no simple task. Frankly, I continue to struggle to encompass multiple worlds. Mostly I swing maddeningly between them, seldom settling into any singular world for long. There are always other realities demanding I make space for them, some less than pleasant, yet each a powerful teacher if I can allow them to be so.
We live in a culture that insists that the material world is the only world, elevates mind over heart, and prefers gut over either. Each day we are invited, in innumerable ways, to choose one preferred way of comprehending the world, as though any singular way of understanding our lives would give us the means to understand the complexity of experience. Making space for the entirety of us is indeed hard work, yet it is the task we must take up if we wish true healing.
Award winning Anishnaabe, poet, writer, and blogger Vera Wabegijig, writes about her experiences on our shared journey along the road the Creator made for our lives. This week she shared her deeply personal thoughts on the ways the mind, and the heart, may open and steer us back to a live well lived. I found her post to be a profoundly satisfying read. She began:
For four and a half years I had the pleasure to work at a local Indigenous women’s centre here in Ottawa as a cultural programmer. Over the years I put my energy in service of Indigenous women and children who came through the doors. The mandate is to serve Indigenous women and their families who are escaping domestic abuse, healing from intergenerational trauma, survivors of residential school, and who want a place to feel safe in an urban world. I learned so much about myself, my path, and my passion. The work itself was rewarding and it helped me to clarify where I really want to go with my love for language and my passion for writing. It challenged my worldview, ideologies, and beliefs. It was really life changing.
When have you felt lost in life’s brambles, and what experiences and journeys have aided in your healing and brought you back to the Good Road?
Please share your thoughts and join the conversation!