Is there something bugging you: the unfinished manuscript, the half-launched service project, the aching desire to feel good again? Something you want to get unstuck and get going?
Perhaps you’ve skipped.
The skip gets us all.
The skip is the bypass. the work around, the avoid-dance. We all skip out. Over. Around.
In spiritual practice, it’s the spiritual bypass, the using of wise teachings to avoid what you most need to deal with.
In creativity, it might look like plugging away on a story or a painting, and suddenly, this other idea is SO MUCH better, you just have to do it and… a few moments/days/years later you find yourself completely becalmed. Creating nothing and feeling lost.
In the self-employed space, it might look like doubting this is your “true passion” and signing up for a newest training in acrobatic ikebana or some other “passionate” pursuit.
No shame. Skipping feels good. It has shine. Only hitch: skipping devours your courage and direction. It costs you self-trust.
So let’s stop skipping and get sticky.
To get sticky translates as dive in, deeply, right where you are. Plug your ears from the Siren’s whines. Borrow the eagle’s eyes.
(Hey, it’s almost the summer Olympics – think of this as not just sticking the landing but sticking the whole process.)
If you want to rest, then rest. Become luxuriously selfish. Ruthlessly prune. Listen as closely to your creative heart as you would your beloved breathing his or her last words to you.
If you want to triumph, ride the horse with all you got. Don’t push, rather sustain — yourself & your dream (notice the singular). Pull your focus in, tight. This is not the time for new learning. Go into your creative hive. If the voices say “But this idea is so much better,” bat them away – with love, of course. If someone dryly whispers, “Aren’t you worried this won’t work?” rejoinder “Of course. But why would I let that stop me?”
You cultivate freedom and wholeness by getting sticky. You do not cultivate the life you want by following the Sirens on the rock keening, “Skip ahead to something better, something known, even if it utterly sucks.”
Sirens lie. Big time.
Listen: What is calling you now? Not 5 years from now, not 7 years ago, now.
I don’t care how flimsy or unreal or impossible that call feels – listen.
Go there. Go deep. Get sticky. Stay true.
P.S. My last 2 retreats in 2012 will be at Kripalu in October. You’ll experience getting unstuck. Two retreats to choose from – and if you stay in the dorm, it’s a super affordable way to experience the goodness of the best retreat center on the East Coast– and me!
