I usually take my walks at dawn… watching the sky lighten, the sun rise, and the world wake around me, but this evening, I headed out for a walk instead, as I’d managed to make it to 7:00pm without ever getting out of my pajamas!

The wind had shifted throughout the afternoon, bringing a breeze from the north, with an early tang of autumn. Cotton candy clouds captured the golden pink glow of the sunset, and the scent of fresh cut grass lingered like summer’s last perfume.

My walks are my connecting-in time… time with God, time with myself, time to breathe in the beauty around me, and re-ground into the goodness of this world. Since my move, it’s been interesting to watch my own process… moving through the chaos, the grief, the intensity of the work, the disorientation of the change – into something that feels softer, welcoming, and open, like my heart is a great bowl, or outstretched arms, waiting to receive what Life has to pour in next.

I noticed myself smiling at each person I passed, waving to them (we’re in the South, and you can do that safely here), and feeling such goodwill towards everyone I saw. A deep joy rolled through me as I walked. No real reason for it that I could see… just this sense that life is GOOD.

I looked up again at the clouds, and for a moment I had that feeling that I could fly. You know… the one you get in dreams – where you stretch out and will yourself upwards, and lift off from the ground in flight! Well, I had that there… on my walk. I knew how to fly… what muscles to engage… what part of my will and intention to employ… and it was the surprise of NOT lifting off the ground that caught me off guard.

Now, I’m one of those people who dreams so often, and so vividly, that it’s can be a relief to wake up in the morning. In my younger years I had flying dreams all the time, but it has been about 15 years since I’ve had them.

Until this month. In the last couple of weeks, I’ve had them 2 or 3 times… and each time, they’re so real that I think, “THIS time it’s for real… the other’s were dreams, but NOW I’m flying!!”

And then today… on my walk, it came again… like the veil thinned for a moment, and something bigger reached across. I don’t think it’s a coincidence… the flying dreams/waking vision, the sense of goodness, hope, and promise that I feel… and the opening up to this new season of life. I think I could keep myself busy, distracted, and rushing around… and I would miss it. I wouldn’t catch the magic.

And I also know, that for the past 2 years I’ve kept myself open to one of the deepest seasons of grieving I’ve ever known. For those of you who stood in the dark with me… you have my undying gratitude.

I did it differently this time. I didn’t run, didn’t distract or divert, and didn’t cover it up. I walked through, feeling the pain, the loss, the grief, until it wrung itself out.

I’ve held that space for others many, many times… and trusted the process as I guided them through it.

But to hold that space for myself, and trust diving into the darkness, that I would come out the other side… this was the first time I had taken myself there consciously, and on my own.

And a few weeks ago, I had the awareness, (like when it gets close to morning, and you can feel it’s almost time to wake up, even though you’re still sleeping), that I had come through the darkness, and out the other side. And it was time to wake up again.

I’ve felt it now for a little while… a deep contentment… unnamed joy… sense of promise… that I have never known before. I don’t even want to try to put a direction onto it… I’m just soaking in this feeling… like waking up as a child on the first day of summer vacation, and just feeling happy, without needing to know why.

So, I wanted to share… I know so many who are diving through those dark places, and it can feel like it’s unending as we go through. But it’s worth it. As we allow ourselves to open to the pain… feeling it, letting it work through us, not hiding from it, or distracting… we transform the very stuff of our lives. This is a deeper magic than the ‘feel good now’ brand our world tries to sell. This is true alchemy.

This is the ‘knowing that you can fly’…

Sending each of you love on your path…

Elizabeth