For the first time in days the sun burst through the cloud ceiling. Patches of blue meet my eye and my contracted heart makes a few ebullient skips. Lost and found. In a split second of blue. I'm walking along the canals in frosty Copenhagen.
Without noticing I've move from the uber-modern Islandsbrygge with its sleek high rises and elegant designs, and find myself in Christiania, one the last hippie bastions of liberal (as in free) Denmark. The worn, wacky little houses along the water front, the messy childlike paint jobs and creative living environments with sculptures, gardens, frayed prayer flags and infamous Christiania bikes make my heart sing. Hope springs forth in the contrasts and contradictions.
I'm in the in-between time, the interim, with one foot still in the old life, the other searching for the new. One day I'm exalted by freedom, the next submerged in nostalgia. What am I doing here, I wonder.
So what do we do in the in-between times of our lives?
Walking through Christiana, I happen upon a tiny beach. Empty, except for a scooter left in the sand and a deflated red balloon swing moving gently like a pendulum between memory and anticipation. A warm summer day frozen in time. A beach on standby, waiting for inspiration and play and sunshine. I sit there for a while and let the air breathe me.
This is what we need in the interim time. A beach.
(Why, my thoughts drifted to the movie, The Beach (yours too?) and a pristine paradise complete with coconut juice and hot lover. This is not the beach I think of now (but it might come next). Rather…
The interim is a potent pause. A keeper of your solitude. A place to dream and listen and wait.
The task at this time is to sort and shift, embrace and integrate, as your are offered a review of your life. It's a time to let everything surface from the depths of your being, cleanse your aura and with discernment, choose the colors you wish to paint your new canvas with. It's a time to acknowledge your longings and evaluate what you love. It's a time to let go of the garbage and honor the gifts.
I love my little beach. And my friend's apartment in Copenhagen. Like a bear in winter, I hide and hibernate and gather strength here. I notice I prefer the company of people who like myself, have taken leaps and lived in foreign lands, and avoid conversations about what I'm doing. It's not about doing. It's about being.
Don't rush, trust life is meeting your half way
The temptation to externalize the search and go look for answers and inspiration outside is ever-present. To get on with life. To have a plan and goals to achieve. To hurry on to success. This is what we've been taught life is about. But is it? Mostly, this adds noise to your inner radio frequency and overshadows the delicate signs and symbols surfacing from your soul.
From solitude and dream, essence emerge …
With my leap into the unknown, I opened my arms for life to take me. A clean slate was so appealing to the adventurer inside of me. Barely 8 weeks into my interim, I'm surprised to discover this: Creative projects that's been incubating for a long time hang at my sleeves like crying babies: me, me, me. Rather than being pulled forward, I'm being pulled backward, into the body of work I've amassed over the course of my life. No, no no. Is my first reaction. I want new inspiration, new life. I resist.
There will come a time
when you believe
everything is finished.
that will be the beginning.
~ Louis L'amour
Here in the interim, I am learning that what is left when all is gone is the creative impulse, the sacred work I'm called to stay loyal to, surrender to and share with the world. To this I belong. First and foremost. On days like this, it feels as if my sacred path is already written, and my job literally is to get out of the way.
Do you how what is your sacred work? What you must stay loyal to and surrender to in this life? What you keep resisting?
Consider how you can nurture your (inner) beach of simplicity, solitude and dream. Silence the outside noise and listen to your silent heart. Notice, what falls away? What emerges?
Resist nothing. Trust your creative impulse. Even if you don't, it knows where you are headed. Open your heart and hands to that which is emerging in you.