THE JOUNREY

I took this photo on the day I captured the intuitive images for A Year of You ™ - January's Active Faith virtual circle. It wasn't meant to be part of the circle that day - so it wasn't - but it was taken within the same intention and same energy. I've been stumbling upon it over the past few days and so I decided to share it.

I felt that virtual circle was a deepening into faith for me as well as all those that took part. And I really had no idea when I took this image that specific things would come up for me this week that would really challenge the deep faith in the unknown I had cultivated for myself over the past few years. Life, I am learning, is a constant deepening. Deepening in understanding, humility, surrender, trust...faith... and anything else you can think of. We travel a spiral, journeying through repeating themes, just in a deeper way each time around, and with greater understanding and awareness and capacity to grow into more of the same.

The trail is partly what captured my attention. I had been walking back home when I turned around to see the sun again. And my path drew my attention. The path I had created on my way to the sunrise, the path I retraced back home.

Have I not been on this path before?? I wonder today. Did I not do this immense journey of faith already? I DO NOT want to do it again. I resist.

We venture out, so far, and then return back to safety. We trail blaze as far as we can, and then retreat back to ourselves, to the safe space inside where we can soothe and comfort and replenish before the next venture. Am I going to be venturing out in growth - expanding and contracting - forever and ever, fearing I didn't get anywhere, but the when I look back, seeing how far I've really been <3 ? We expand and we contract; we grow and we rest.

It is no straight line, that's for sure. But the beauty of it really is in the wandering, the crooked uncertain path, that eventually leads to clarity and insight. Be ok with not knowing, which is an enormous challenge sometimes.

Keep going, yet return within when you need it <3. Listen to your limits, and honor them. Growth is rough and feels stretchy, and there's a time to pull back and just be with it too. And let ourselves be where we are on the path. Knowing there's no wrong place to be.