Fuzzy, but still noticeably cute and furry Red ruffed Lemur at Seattle zoo...

At the point of vigorous testing, at this point a decision is made. Bend or fold? Do I learn to adjust, or do I resist the changes being imposed? As I learn to find within me a calm that is not dependent upon the outside world, I grow. This is a change I shall keep. This is Xeper. I will keep this change.

All around me is the storm of uncertainty. So many shouting voices, shouting for so many different reasons. Crisis in Hawaii, crisis in Darfur, crisis in the Middle East, crisis in some small home three blocks down from me, all the shouting. At this time of election, so many shouting, "I am the best candidate. Candidate X is a blockhead who cheated on his taxes, his wife, his life..." Oh, to tune out the shouting for a moment of peace. I must find it within.

It is not that I want to ignore all that's happening in the world. But sometimes all of it can be too much with me. Sometimes the best thing I can do to 'heal the world' is to 'heal myself'. Okay, I don't like the 'sickness modality' that too often the New Age gets into.

I don't want to go there. But there is struggle, here and abroad. I can only answer my own, in this moment. As I learn to be 'proactive' and not 'reactive', tossed by every blow of the wind, I learn a strength. I have confidence this will happen.

I am coming to my ten year celebration of online journaling. And what a celebration that is! I am not the same woman that began October 31, 1996 to save pieces of memory and to hope for creative inspiration. And yet I am that same woman. Nearly thirty eight year old me said:

"And thus this journal begins. Halloween, with the chilling air of the changing seasons, is always a moody time of the year. As leaves decay, I think about my own mortality. What if I don't get the fifty more years I hope for? What if death comes early? What have I done with my life? Am I living as fully as I can? For that is the only revenge against the eventually all too certain grim reaper."

And I so agree. While I have hope I can hold my Ka and Ba against the tide of death and not disperse to disappear within the arms of Nuit, I hold to the moment which I know I do have. This moment now, whatever is happening within it, whatever I am causing to happen, this moment, that is the only sure thing.

So I want to make the most of each moment. Joy will come, and pride will come, and I will be able to say "I have done well." And yet, I am not my doings, I am the one who does the doings. I am she who is aware of THIS MOMENT. I embrace the moment, I embrace me. And I know that whatever lies ahead, however long the journey or short the journey, it will be a wonder-filled one. Of this I have confidence.

scarab, sacred symbol of evolution, regeneration and transformation . . .

© Joan Lansberry
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