The ability to alter one’ perspective – to shift certainty to openness – allows for deeper engagement, life affirming and inspirational, akin to wonder…
To deviate is to dare.
(Image my own)
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Maybe I just needed a new perspective – like the famed Hanged Man of tarot – committed to some deep, internal need, I willed a horizontal shift; landed with intent.
Maybe it is not my legs that are disabled, but a soul longing to escape the continual discord of perpetual motion, a never-ending to-do list of the success-driven persona.
Maybe there is a greater purpose for being that is not encompassed by outer drive – a mysterious meaning that is revealed only in the quiet stillness in which I now dwell.
Maybe I have been called to a personal pilgrimage – a Camino of sorts – a crusade of spirit designed to cleanse and enlighten – the journey is certainly arduous enough.
Maybe it is through acceptance, finally having released a need to control, move, achieve, accomplish that I am able to embrace the true lessons of suffering.
Maybe this cocooning is an act of Grace demanding surrender before the actual transformation occurs, and I will emerge, legless or not, winged and ready to soar.
Maybe, just maybe, this stripped down, barren existence is not a penance for shameful living, but a desert crossing, offering re-alignment: hard-fought peace.
(Maybe first appeared here Feb. 2017. Image my own)
Disability corners me twixt two directions – the hurried rush of ambition’s call and the gentle nudge of wisdom settling
Confined to four rooms I am distanced from – invisible to – the weekend warriors whose self-satisfied grimaces race by my window
I remember that push – not enough hours to the day not enough money to succeed never thin enough, fit enough always grasping for more…
Legless and exhausted, I am disqualified from competing, immersed in retrospection, luxuriating in perspective –
I’ve always had, indeed, continue to have everything I need: a home I can navigate, the endless beauty of nature and the care of loved ones.
Abundance, I’ve discovered, is attitude: recognition and acceptance that life is sufficiency
(I’ve derived this poem from a post by the same name, dated October 2014. At the time, I was five months into the losses that were Myalgic Encephalomyelitis. Image my own)