I can’t believe it’s been an entire year of creating. In many respects, a year means so little in the enormity of our lives and how they unfold. The things we make huge dramas about, or the things we become consumed with or fret over, ultimately work themselves out and a year later we can hardly remember what it was that caused so much vexation.
So a year isn’t so much quantitative to me as it is qualitative.
How did you spend the year?
Were you expressed? Brave? Committed? Loving? Just a little more present? Patient? Compassionate? Dangerous? Flexible? Fearless? Joyful? In-it-to-win-it?
I read someone’s Facebook post recently that said something along the lines of “finding spirit in your life is important.” He was quoting from some televangelist, who was obviously, quite serious!
That idea made me sad.
Because spirit is always with us. Spirit is who we are. It doesn’t have to be found. It’s in everything that is alive and throbbing with intelligence and life-force. It’s pulsating through our bodies and our blood. It’s in our marrow and breath. It is in the words we speak and the dances we weave. It’s in our parents and children and lovers and ex’s. It’s in our enemies and in everyone that came before us and those who will come after. It’s in the way we express ourselves that makes each of us individually unique. That’s spirit!
And it defies labels. For some, it might be called intelligence. For others, it might simply be creativity; the way you tell a story or write a poem or play an instrument. For others, there might not be any conscious connection to it at all. It’s merely a vague term used to suggest “otherworldliness.”
But the truth is, it simply is a sort of embellishment, a stamp, or signature of how each of us does what he or she does. Different for all 7 billion of us. So do it your way. That’s connection to spirit. Not found. Expressed.
So as 2012 comes to a close, maybe we can think less on how much we’ve accomplished or created, but instead take inventory on the spirit of how these things were shared.
For it’s not really what we do or make or achieve but how we live in the world that is the only thing truly remembered.
Looking forward into 2013, perhaps we start taking stock in how much power we each can lovingly wield. How much energy to positively transform we each possess. How much possibility there truly is in the world.
So maybe it’s about shifting our awareness. From thinking we lack and therefore must find and instead, realize that it’s all inside you. As it’s always been. Just waiting more and more to come out.
In 2013 and beyond.