Being the scarf

For me the hardest thing is to say No. If someone wants something and I can do, I most likely will say sure, ok, yes I will. So saying no is not my first conditioned response. Especially since I have an exorbitant amount of energy and learn quickly, even if it is something I don't know, I will give it a try. Since the New Year I have had to pratice my "No". Even yesterday, I was asked again to continue to work on something that I have known is not for me for several months and I had to check in with myself asking "Is it time yet? Can I just say no and let it go?" The answer, as with other areas that also needed to come to an end lately, was that I was done. I have always been a hard worker and actually love to work. I'm not afraid of failure because I am eager to learn, but even if it looks impossible I will persevere. This is better to me than being bored or complacent. I'm interested in the unknown result, what can happen, what can be created. If we stay put that is all it is and that is not necessarily peace. Stillness from my experience is peace that is able to be transparent and ever changing. It's like the cork on the top of the wave or the person's scarf riding the roller coaster. It's attached and part of it, but also fluctuating and easy. Going along for the ride in an easiness, not gripping or stifling, but an easy togetherness.

I don't mind the chaos it takes to go through the creative process. Being a mother of three very energetic boys allows me to be relaxed in the midst of chaos. I love it, I revel in it and we all excell. It may not be the parenting style for most people, but I find that if I hang on too tightly we all suffer. I can only be part of the ride, not the director or the ride itself. Sound familiar Egypt?
I have had early years of trying to hold it all together as a neurotic new mother and wife and I would describe my family life as a volcano shaking before as it readied to explode and some days it did. I felt very at the mercy of everyone's explosivity. But then I slowly began to feel I was not really meant to live like that and Captain Chaos had to go. There is a difference between one person making the whole community chaotic for their own reasons and the natural chaos of a creative artistic authentic community. I chose to release my hold and cut myself free from Captain Cahos and be out there on the edge of honesty to experience what real relationship was about. My community evolved eventhough there were stuck energies as some of us gained weight and others became silent. At least we were free from the ring leader who called the shots like Britney Spears sings about in her Circus song.

Now when I feel about my family/community I feel more like I am on a rollar coaster. There's momentum and dipps and great heights that I close my eyes and use my ears to propel through. No one is higher than the next for long, we all have our turns being the first up the tracks and then slooping down again. We are in it together. We are all on the ride or not, but it is fun to look to the side and see another gleaming face. I am very thankful for that. My boys have never given up on or bailed out on the ride yet. I'm even starting to see how they are really good at some parts of it and they hold my hand giving me reassurance, readying for the breathtaking jump into the next dizzying twisting track. In some ways, they have been ready way before I was. We have all taken turns being teachers and I love that part. To me that is what it is all about to be on this ride.

I have learned how to say "no, that is not for me". It helped me to learn it so I could let go basically. I don't have room on this ride for old baggage. I have had to clean and clear so much that has been old or worn out or never really mine, so that I could just get to this point of enjoying the ride. But what's more, I'm finding out every day that while I am enjoying being on the ride I then find my boys or my friends or others I barely know. I get the courage to look around and there you are. Oh yeah this train is moving, I can see it in your eyes and the wind blowing in your hair. I am the scarf lightly touching and along for the ride.