Longing

Hot and sweaty and tired. Today was a day filled with working. Which is good. Working means that I will be able to afford my expenses in these next few months. And I am grateful to have the option of a flexible part time job that doesn't require me to do anything too out-of-bounds. I'll take it. If I am able to work almost ever day until the end of school, then I will be just fine all summer. No expensive travel plans, though, which is a bummer. But I feel like I'm supposed to be here right now. I have a garden to tend, and a lot of projects to explore fully. I am exactly where I need to be.

But in the bigger picture, I spent the first few waking hours of my day in anxiety and despair. While I have gratitude for what life has given me that sustains me creatively and physically and emotionally and spiritually, I see so much in my life right now that feels limited and not in alignment with the highest vision that I hold in my heart for my life. I will take this work as a substitute teacher to fill in the gaps of my employment, but it doesn't give me any great joy, it doesn't make use of most of my gifts, and it doesn't contribute to the world in the way that I know I want to contribute. I'll be able to pay my bills for the next three months, and for that I am grateful. But I am not content with just working to pay the bills! I have known that for my whole adult life! I am an artist, a visionary, a dreamer, a creative, passionate soul. I need to know that my energy is going into something amazing that will touch lives beyond the mundane grayscale of daily life. My work as a flute teacher, as a teaching artist, and as a musician - these things have moved into that truly meaningful realm. But these things are also coming up for consideration now. I will teach flute lessons happily until the end of time, and I hope that the universe delivers me more students in the years to come. I also deeply love my work as a teaching artist, but at this point, funding has all but evaporated, and if I am to continue doing this work, I will need to dive deep into networking and getting clear on what it is that I want to offer. My work as a flutist has waned in the last few years, as I have let go of my connection to the familiar realm of classical music. I have little interest in investing my energy there, but can do it if I need to. But now, I feel a new wave of creativity coming, a new investment in the sacred improv work I have loved with all my heart. I am excited and nervous to see where this will go.

What I do know is that I don't want to be doing anything just because it helps me to get by, or because I am capable of doing it if I need to do it. That, to me, is the heart of apathy, the most boring, grayscale, flatland version of living that I can imagine. That was the source of my despair and anxiety this morning...seeing the ways that my life has slipped, even slightly, into the realm of half life.

Work is only half the story, too. The other half is this isolation that I feel in my days, this loneliness that haunts me in the shadows of my awareness. I have spent so much of my life as an independent woman, happy to roam hither and thither without a care in the world, needing no one to keep me company as I soar into the inner reaches of my being, and into the outer reaches of the world. I have learned so much in this approach - I have learned that within me is a resourceful, brave, fearless, adventurous spirit that knows that anything is possible. To quote Tracy Chapman, "I've been places where I question all I think I know." For sure. I have found that much of my life has felt held back and weighed down as a result of trying to share it with others. I have been frustrated by people who are wishy-washy and never on time. I have been irritated by people who are noncommittal and scattered. I have wanted to feel free and unencumbered, able to follow my heart and be spontaneous. And I have found that that has very, very rarely happened when I am with other people. So, for much of my life, I have chosen the solitary high road, and not regretted it for a moment.

But now, I am feeling something else settle into me. I am feeling the gifts and blessings that are possible in sharing my path with someone. I am also seeing that perhaps part of the frustrations and irritations that I have felt with others were half based on my expectations and half on my not being able to express my needs in a clearer way. I also feel that part of my frustrations and irritations with others were pointing me to the truth that I was walking in the world with people who may not have been serving the unfolding of my highest truth...and I was probably not serving theirs either. And that's okay, it is what it is. But I want to be more mindful from now on. I want to trust the feeling in my belly completely, and to listen to my heart completely. I will know the truth if I do.

I don't want to do this life alone. That is the bottom line. I have sought community and companionship, and have become a networker and gatherer of good people. I have brought people together and into my life and into my home, and I have felt the definition of family expand on and on. I have loved that my life is filled with so many beautiful beings, and that I have been given the opportunity to share life with amazing people. But deep in my heart, I yearn to meet the man I will spend my life with. I long to meet the one who will pierce my heart with his presence and love, who will accept me for all that I am, and who will enter into sacred relationship with me. I feel that there is a deep part of life that I have not yet known, not really - living in communion, in service to the Beloved through the beloved, in true love practice. I have had enough relationships to know that I have not yet been there, not at all. And I have spent so much time feeling content in my independence that I haven't sought this. But now, it haunts me every day. I long to meet my love.