Yesterday someone whose opinion I respect challenged me on that last blog post. The one where I said I had perhaps run out of things to say.
Although it pains me to admit it - they were right. For the past few years I have been busy, very busy. I needed to recreate a career, a life - I discovered a passion. I like to learn, to develop to be made to think. I've been busy putting things into this life of mine. Studying, working, reading, volunteering and loving every minute of it.
Then earlier this year life caught up with me and suddenly there was too much. Too much life filling my head, my heart and my soul. There was no space for me amongst everything and everybody else. So I paused. My Great Pause started. I withdrew from courses, workshops, volunteer roles, I cut down on my teaching hours. I stopped putting things in and waited to see what would fall out.
It's been a difficult time and a really interesting time. It took at least three months to feel any benefit from the Great Pause. Slowly as the space around me grew me I began to see all kinds of things, opportunities and realisations. A different reality emerged through the fog.
What fascinates me about all of this is that the realisations I have come to, the things that are sticking around during this time of the Great Pause are those that were highlighted during a recent astrology reading (check out the talented
Veronika Robinson for more information about her perceptive and challenging psychological astrology sessions). This has been both validating and challenging.
On one hand it is good to know that the choices I make are not a whim, another imagined reality to capture daydreams and while away hours. On the other hand if my conscious, mindful realisations are confirmed in other more esoteric ways I feel as if they are more robust, more resiliant.
Of course everything is a choice. I believe strongly that we create our reality. Of course we can't account for the unexpected outcomes, the disasters, the random acts of goodwill or how others influence our lives. But there is a lot we can influence, a lot of choices we make that can be authentic and congruent.
That for me is the constant challenge. I want to live an authentic life - one that I am proud to say matches my ideals and ethics. A life that challenges me and a life where I can explore my life's purpose.
This is what my Great Pause is all about. I needed the space, the time, the quiet to gain a sense of my life's purpose. By listening and just being in this moment I can see things I couldn't see admist the noise and clutter of before. Workshops, courses, volunteer roles were all loud background noise that disctracted and hid the opporutnities and possibilities from me.
So it appears I haven't run out of things to say at all and since I realised this I have been saying all sorts of things.......
