At the retreat, following each meditation, Susan would offer us jumping-off lines to get our pens/pencils moving. This jump-off line "What's been stirred in me..." was the last one on Sunday. Here is what my pen said:
What’s been stirred in me often takes a long time to find action. I am a Ferdinand type of Taurus and it takes time to chew my cud, to bring up my feelings and identify them, my stirrings. It takes some sitting quietly under the trees, and smelling the flowers (usually freesias and star lilies) before full-blown ideas and action ever surface.
Stirred in me? Anger. Outrage at a boyfriend’s abandonment with no explanation, evoking a realized anger for the first time – I was 42. Anger was hidden in my family, and I’d perfected a trick of sending it instantly to my unconscious. Ranting and screaming into an empty house was intensely healing. This stirring event resulted in the story on the "About Me" tab at the top of this blog (originally published in Science of Mind magazine).
Stirred in me? Protectiveness. My mind-reading, gifted granddaughter needed a safe haven from her mother’s boyfriend, drugs, and alcohol. Protectiveness for her stirred in me her first year of life, yet final decisive mediation-court-approving action took nine years to get her into her father’s arms.
Stirred in me? Tribal connection. After years of solitude, depression and narrow focus on family, a need for community has re-emerged, leading me to in-the-moment decisions, as I follow soul’s dictates, I’ve been expanding my circle (next post, another piece from the jumping-off line "In the circle...") and including new people — spiritual, loving, playful — astrologers, kids, carpoolers, photographers, painters, and writers.
Stirred in me? Creativity. Multi-tasking a year and a half of grieving with workload burnout/stress and creative gestation dictated silent power/meditation. Labor Day weekend last year, an art teacher (total stranger) made me an offer, and I cracked open, open, open, and said “Yes” to her art class in Mexico in April 2009. Another few months of bubbling, stewing, and stirring and the blog was born, January 2009 — the chance to combine all my passions: writing, collage, painting, photography — recording and sharing the beauty I see in a creative way.
Stirred in me? Deeper Gratitude -- for the wonder of it all, the magic I am living, and the wondrously talented and supportive circles of people I’ve just met again.
You Can Do It (please share with others in comments): Just take up a pen or pencil, and start with the jump-off line (write it over and over until something else comes, just let your pen lead you: What’s been stirred in me…