Lessons from the canyon........

"Go back to what you know"

The answer came clearly. 

And quickly. 

Both crucial when you are lost in the dark. 

It was an adventure of the giggly sort from the very beginning.  A group of friends, mothers, with 18 kids between the five of us, set off for a brief escape from the never ending joys of motherhood. 

It was a spur of the moment trip of a lifetime.  4 days backpacking in the Grand Canyon and swimming in the healing waters of havasupi falls. 

We were one with the earth.  

We spent the days hiking, meditating, validating and reveling in the exhilaration that comes from only having to apply sunscreen to yourself. 

We all came with the need for healing. Different reasons. Same Peace. 

I find that God most often grants this peace when one is a part of his earth. His creations. 

When one is quiet and away from the noise of the world. 

We hiked out at 2:30 am to beat the heat. And despite the hour and the heaviness of our packs we were surprisingly giggly. Witty really, hence the giggling. We hiked by the light of the full moon. It was breathtaking. 

Humbling. 

 

After a few hours the canyon narrowed and the moon dissapeared. 

This is the part in the story where we get lost. 

We weren't sure how it happened.  Nobody who gets lost ever is. 

And despite our attempts to push forward and straining our necks to further the feeble light of our headlamps, we just couldn't find the trail. 

A prayer was suggested.

A prayer was given

"Go back to what you know" 

"Go back to where you knew for sure you were not lost, to the last place you knew for certain you were on the right path"

Isn't it easy to get lost? One moment you are head down trudging along and then you look up and wonder how you got there. 

Life this summer found me gypsying across the country with my little family and settling in a new unfamiliar place. There were so many emotions swirling in my soul that I almost couldn't acknowledge them. So I distracted myself away from quiet and stillness and pondering and thinking..... 

And I looked up and realized I was a little lost. 

I needed to acknowledge my soul, and spend a little time with it. 

And one morning I looked up and the kids had gone back to school and the little ones were taking a nap and there it was.

Solitude. A quiet moment alone. And instead of unpacking boxes I decided to unpack my mind a little bit. 

Find out what i had packed away in there so many months ago. 

This kind of solitude takes work. It is so much easier to pick up my phone and distract away the time. It's easy, it's tempting and I don't think it's one bit a coincidence that there is not a single minute in our day that we ever have to feel alone. 

There's an app for that. 

Anne morrow Lindbergh has had my mind all in a flutter this week. Her book gift from the sea is like a long walk with your own soul. 

Me and mine needed to get reacquainted. 

" we are aware of our hunger and needs, but still ignorant of what will satisfy them. With our garnered free time we are more apt to drain our creative springs than to refill them. "

" not knowing how to feed the spirit, we try to muffle its demands in distractions. Instead of stilling the center, the axis of the wheel, we add more centrifugal activites to our lives , which tend to throw us off balance."

"In other times women had in their lives more forces which centered them whether or not they realized it. Their very seclusion in the home gave them time alone. Many of their duties were conducive to a quiet contemplative drawing together of the self."

Anne morrow Lindbergh

Imagine if she could see our world today. 

I'd like to sit on the sea shore with her, this thought provoking woman of the 1930's and discuss the gifts this earth gives to us and the truths it shouts when we are quiet enough to listen and close enough to be part of it. I think we'd be friends. 

A few days after moving in to our new house here I  drove up into the mountains that sit at our back door. 

My heart soared to be back in my beloved Sierras. The trees were like old friends that welcomed me with cries of "come, be part of us, sit and feel and remember"

I think I will take them up on it. 

Patience is not a strong quality of the little people I happen to share my life with. Time to myself is even more rare. Which is why I cannot let the fleeting small moments be ones that are wasted. Spare moments cannot be spent draining my spirit. They must be gathered and protected and used to fill it.  Autopilot is too tempting, my brain yearns to think, ponder, write. My soul yearns to feel. It yearns to feel even the pain, so it can feel peace. 

Go back to what you know. 

Learn to be still.