Sometimes we find ourselves at a junction in life – where we are going through physical change or professional change; changes in our family or our relationships including the one with self. It could be because our children are leaving home. It could be that we find ourselves stuck in an unhappy job or an unhappy marriage. It could be a physical or mental illness that we have developed recently.
A junction where we feel constantly on edge, overwhelmed and we kind of question who we are, who we might have been and who we might yet become. A junction where we question our values – spiritual and material. A junction where we open our eyes and mind a little wider and begin to wonder what we are doing with our lives.
I too have been at such a junction – lost but with an intention to rise from the half sleep of my existence. It was then I heard the Call which beckoned me to change my life. The call that comes when we break or are ready to break. Some of us may hear the call sooner, others later.
It was then I asked myself what is that which empowers me, what is that which can bring nourishing moisture to quench my dried up life, what is that which separates me from my true nature? And what am I supposed to do, once I discover these answers? And so with such questions my journey began. A committed journey – where i must shake off the false skin i have cloaked myself in, where i let go off the old to make room for new, where i must be willing to detach from who i have been or even what i have become, before i can discover who I am really meant to be and what my work is in the world.
All through my life I found myself hiding behind a tough skin I manufactured for myself little by little over the years. Never letting anyone see I am afraid; never letting anyone see I am hurt. It wasn’t until I reached my 30’s that I realized that I had adopted this stronger, safer skin much more like a impervious shell to face the hard edged world. And then when that Call came, stripping away this old skin and searching for the new skin was long, hard, sometimes filled with twists and turns, pauses, stops and starts. Even today the search is never over. There is always a new layer to uncover like the peeling of an onion.
And let me tell you from experience, the first big step to answer the call and fall forward into the wind and let ourselves topple off the edge is very hard. Sometimes we can use the help of a person to deliver that push over the edge – someone familiar I reckon – your child, your friend, your parent or an unexpected teacher or guide that comes along your way. Sometimes we need to have the courage enough to make the plunge ourselves – to find our place, to find our element, to answer the Call to Life.
