Finding the light

I'm struggling with what to write, where to start, unsure how to give presence to the page with my surroundings, the nuance, noise and beauty. I feel pickled like after sitting in a hot bath that's turned cold, my fingers and toes pruned, my bones damp with waiting. As I look at this white screen, I fear filling it with my angst and woe, but I fear forfeiting my monthly post just as much. For it is in the rituals and routines where I am able to find levity, purpose and perseverance.

I've never ran a marathon, but after hearing what many runners experience over the grueling race, I feel as if I'm in one. The first 18 miles are met with satisfaction and joy, pain follows and at mile 22 things start to fall apart. In the last mile or so there are doubts of reaching the finish line, thoughts of surrender and a possible DNF (did not finish). You've already heard me go on about the multiple moves, the lift offs and landings, and here we are with Game Day less than two weeks away and I question my staying power, resources and resilience.

The roosters cockadoodling at 4 in the morning inconveniently set my day's start too early. The steady 94 degrees feels like a perpetual hot flash. My most likely torn meniscus waves a white flag on my already tested body and psyche, keeping me from releasing those oxytocins I crave in a run. And most egregiously, my creativity dribbles out of me with contracted awe and suspicious wonder. There's no wind in my sail and my tires leak hot air with too many holes to repair.

Over the last 20 months of nomadic living, this home-less marathoning, where dates are centered around times of waiting, moving and doing, I've been trying to write and revise my book. It's been challenging with the ebbs and flows, but I've made some head way. And since we've landed in our final spot before the move in, in a charming Airbnb that looks out over town's multi-colored plaster walls, red roofs and turquoise water, there have been spaces of quiet, opportunities to work without distraction. And even so, I find myself floundering without strength or stamina to write through my mental muck. As I read my pages, I question who wrote them? Where did she finds those poetic turns of phrase? And where did she go? And then I wonder if I'm even fit to help her go deeper and tighter into the story (which is always necessary when revising and editing) with my swampy and waterlogged imagination. I find faults and gaps, but have no finesse to repair them because the artisan in me is at a loss for prose and wisdom. Dangling between walking away and plodding on, the page becomes another purgatory, another holding pattern seeking a landing strip. I doubt if I can finish, if my story is worthy of completion, let alone worth reading, as I grasp at the courage and privilege that guided me into writing a book in the first place.

Dear reader, I am sorry to hand this over to you. I beg your forgiveness and understanding. My hope is that in using my writing muscle, it will abate potential atrophy. I've even spoken to a few friends about over-sharing my distress and they've guided me to "Let it go!" and "Get it out!" So here I am and I appreciate you.

I once spoke to a healer who was helping me release some energetic stagnation, excise some uninvited demons, and as she helped me clear the heaviness and cut unhelpful chords she asked me if I had a complaining rock. I told her no because I didn't know what a complaining rock was. She said to find a rock on my next walk, one I could put in my pocket, and, whenever I needed, I could hand all of my woe over to the stone as I held it in my hand. She said the rock would take my angst and complaints so I no longer had to carry them. I never found a stone, but I kept the idea. I began to think of my worry and frustrations as things that could be let go to the earth, water, wind and fire.

Since that time of healing, I've continued to practice the elemental release. In swims and showers, I imagine the water rinsing me of residue, cleansing my boundaries. When I put my feet in the sand or dirt, I'll silently pray to the earth to help me ground the build up of emotion. When there's a need to brush things off, let things big and small go, I'll place one hand out the window as I drive and feel the wind run through my fingers. And then there are the fire pujas I attend on new and full moons, to chant a mantra for an hour in front of a kept fire, praying for healing, collectively and intentionally. The mindful acts do help clear the mired energetic dust and I trust Mother Nature is willing to take the muck and compost it.

But right now these practices aren't quite reviving me. Fear and fatigue have me swimming in circles and my well seems muddy, if not dry. I judge not only my creativity, but my faded exuberance, my growing lack of patience and my challenged kindness. Like an uprooted plant that waits for a pot and new soil, this no-man's land feeling has my leaves prematurely shedding. I dread the fall out, the what if's of failure and a DNF. I crave an IV of dazzling inspiration. I pray that moving into our home will guide me out of this dismal, flat thinking and give me purchase to create and write from.

To end, and maybe even to explain part of my mental mishegas, Pluto in retrograde has been hanging out with my sun for some time. Pluto is known as the lord of the underworld in Roman mythology. In modern astrology, Pluto represents those underworld themes like death, rebirth, transformation, the subconscious and taboo subjects. His presence astrologically, when he's conjunct or making an aspect to a planet in your natal chart, is significant. Think an accelerated phoenix cycle. When he's retrograde, he's influencing the native (the owner of the natal chart) to review unresolved issues, hidden patterns and positive pathways around healing. And with Pluto conjunct my sun off and on over the last year, I guess you could say I'm in a period of figuring out my shadow, maybe even trying to make friends with it, as he lingers so close to my light, my life force. Not that I'm making excuses for my grumbling, but I guess I'm being forced to reckon with a part of my essence that fears and feels and judges. And I can only hope that by expressing these feelings (on this page) that seem to depress me, I'm giving space so the light can still find me.

I thank you again for reading and, hopefully, releasing. Let's just keep on keeping on for now.

With deep gratitude,

St. Sunshine