Going with the flow?

Slogging Upstream

“The universe is made up of pure energy, the nature of which is to move and flow. The nature of life is constant change, constant flux. When we understand this, we tune into its rhythm and we are able to give and receive freely...”

                            Shakti Gawain (Creative Visualization)

I grew up in the mountains of North Carolina. One of the things we loved to do when I was a young person was to take old tire inner tubes, blown up like balloons, and float down the river. Not a great, rushing, whitewater river, but a fairly shallow one, where we knew we were not in danger. We'd park our cars at a bend in the river, float a mile or so downstream, slog our way back to the bend, and do it again. Riding the river down was fast and fun and easy. The trek back, hauling a big truck tire inner tube, was not. It gave me first hand experience of the true meaning of 'going against the flow'.

The spiritual life is like walking against the river. It is not a life of easy answers. Spirituality requires us to seek within and without for our own answers to existential questions. Regardless of religious affiliation, we may choose to find our answers in scripture, or in life itself, but we must be actively engaged in the search. It has been my experience too, that the more serious we are about our inner truth, the safer we feel. Spirituality is, even in the company of like minded people, an individual journey that leads to inner strength.

I had a conversation with a friend yesterday in which she told me about her friend, a young man, who is losing his battle with cancer. His children are still in elementary school. It would be easy to go with the flow and plaster over this horrific loss with “it's God's will” and “he's going to a better place,” and all the other inane things we say when someone's dying. It is much harder to accept that life is simply life, and that sometimes people, good people, die young. The question then becomes, how do I deal with my feelings about that? Can I be brave enough to allow the grief without trying to explain it away?

The spiritual life is a slog up-stream, but by doing it, you gain real strength, not flimsy answers. It is solid ground you can stand on and feel safe when the waters around you are swirling.

                                                        In the spirit,

                                                        Jane