New Dawn: HAPPY NEW YEAR!

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So, 2013 has happened. The passing of time is one of the few things (I believe) that happen to us. One of the intentions of this blog is to consider what things in our lives we could take more ownership of, because I think human beings have the tendency to become numb as we spend way too much time performing and functioning like a machine instead of realising that we are faceted with more than just what is seen and understood. It has been said that "You don't have a soul, you are a soul. You have a body" (emphasis added) and that really resonates with me. I feel as though people become lost because they attempt to navigate life as if this is all there is. Let me say it another way.

I have four Cocker Spaniels, and the youngest is turning one this month. This male Cocker Spaniel is convinced that he is made of springs like Tigger, and has jumped/fallen off a twenty foot wall twice in his young life. The first time, he shattered his hip and recently he did it again, only he was perfectly fine save his displeasure for being stranded in a huge storm drain. A rescue team of myself, my father and mother and my best friend started the retrieval effort with Daddy putting a thirty foot ladder in the drain to climb down. Paco, our little flying canine, had been barking his agitation at me because his time in the drain was no longer fun. Now this is a storm drain for large volumes of flood waters, so it's huge and deep. A man would have difficulty getting out of the drain without help, so a dog really stands no chance in there. My dad had to walk about 100 feet up the drain to a higher point to put Paco outside the walls of the drain. The problem was that this point was an overgrown mesh of razor grass, and although Paco could hear me calling him he wouldn't come because like a human, he was afraid to walk through a tall patch of grass that he couldn't see into. Eventually we found a little feeder drain and daddy placed him in it, at which point he could see me, and he ran up the drain.

My point is that Paco has claws and protecting fur which would allow him to go through that patch of tall grass, but because his context is mostly human, with mowed grass and water bowls and standard meal times, he thought that he couldn't escape. Someone had to find him where he was and show him the way out. Humans do this as well. We tend to take the context of our environment, and use that to tell us what we can and can't do, occasionally getting thoroughly stuck and having to shout for help. The thing is that most of us don't know what equipment we already have on board that might help us get through situations in our lives. Sometimes, because we've lived with someone who always said no, or we've only seen people function well enough to survive the day and earn a pay check, we assume that that's as good as it gets. Those are extreme examples, but do you understand what I'm saying? Do you remember the moment someone or something helped you discover what you could do on your own?

I want to walk into the year with you looking around for what we can do. I am challenging my context and asking you to do the same. A new year always feels like such a huge responsibility, and that can weigh on you, but I'm saying just put one foot in front of the other and try. Try HARD. Realise that you have what you need to go where you are secretly stirred to. Trust your gut and be brave...