My refuge exists in my capacity to love. If I can learn
to love death then I can begin to find refuge in change.
-Terry Tempest Williams-
Today I did a Gesalt therapy on one of my dreams which seemed all over the place. My dream featured my maternal grandmother, a creative but not a terribly approachable person. In my dream we found out she was still alive. (Keep in mind, she died in her 70s in 1975). We all went to see her, but she wasn't talking to us and we were afraid to talk to her. She had not died, but her creative life had gone on, as she sat in the corner ignoring us, caught up in some kind of craftwork she was doing. Going through the process of unpacking this dream, I was give a very pointed message: Get back to your creative life. It is waiting for you.
I am writing this post without notes or pre-thought. I have not planned what I am saying. What I have discovered is that I've made myself busy with travel and home improvement and it has sapped a lot of time and energy that I previously reserved for writing.
But even that isn't the whole truth. When I write I acknowledge change. And slowly I have allowed the changes to happen without forming them into thoughts. I mean, I do my journaling. That is different, however, than creating something that I am going to share publicly, something I have formed from making connections in my creative mind. The focus on inspiration I have found. Lessons I've learned. I've let a long time and a lot of changes go by without setting those thoughts down. And it is kind of crazy because the main way I got through a lot of 2024 was in that act of writing.
I looked for a quote to kick me off here, and the Terry Tempest Williams spoke loudest. And it seems one of the dots that connects me to what I want to say here. I have found a refuge in love -- feeling it, extending it, praying for it. I look at the world and I see so many in pain and despair. I firmly believe love is the answer to any question. Always. I learned that when the Beatles sang it, and I've never given up on it.
The last year has made love more visceral for me. I feel it stronger, along with compassion and kindness. I like to think I've always been that way, but I know it isn't true. In fact, sometimes I wondered if I was defective in that department. I used to try to "get there," but it took a couple of near death experiences and watching my husband die to put me where I find myself now.
The capacity to love has provided a refuge that soothes me, reminds me, and opens me to the moment I'm in. That is the only place love resides, and where fear of death cannot.
It's okay to be a creative person, but
being loving should supersede it, so
I have put seeing family and friends
and loving my home with necessary changes;
if I haven't been as creative as I'd like
it is fine because I continue to reach out,
love, be in the life of my friends,
grieve the loss of my dear Jim
and live my life knowing
that all the dots eventually connect
in a weird, wonderful, and colorful way,
and I'm all about that type of refuge,
one that exists because of the impermanence of all things.
❤️
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