Dancing the labyrinth

Thanks to everyone, near and far—whether you could join us in person last Saturday or not—for helping us "Open the Circle." The story of that evening is told beautifully in photographs. A couple come from Stephanie Engelsen and a couple from Debi. But most of them come courtesy of Patty Taylor.

The photos describe the rhythm of the evening very well on their own...

 

 

Preparing to walk the labyrinth

People have approached labyrinths in many ways—sometimes as artlessly as possible. You don't have to bring any expectations with you. Kids naturally are drawn to enter and to play in them. Over the centuries sometimes they have been sites for dancing—sometimes ceremonially and sometimes just whimsically.

There are three simple parts to walking a labyrinth: you walk inwardly to the center; you are in the center; you walk back out again. That simple archetypal rhythm has been associated with many things—as a form of birth/re-birth, for instance...and so as an opportunity to return to one's own center.

There's a potential fourth step as well—and that's whatever recollection or preparation one chooses to do before entering the labyrinth. It seems natural, sometimes even inevitable, to find affinities between the twists and turns of the labyrinth and the twists and turns in one's own life.

So gathering oneself, paying attention to how one feels—including how one's body feels in the moment—can be very helpful. Often someone brings a question or an intention—not an expectation—to one's walk. People have had surprising experiences. And very ordinary ones. It's all alright.

We'll have a brief gathering at 6 pm to help us prepare to walk the labyrinth. But you can walk (or not walk) any way you'd like. You can walk when others are in the labyrinth, and/or you can come back a little later to walk all on your own.

We're looking forward to seeing you.

Walking

I walk all the time, but even in this wild place I love so much, most of the walking that I do is along familiar paths that I follow nearly every day. It's true that I walk further afield, too, sometimes much further, where everything is new—new in a different way than these madrone blossoms and douglas irises and lupines are new. And yet I don't walk like this nearly enough—just heading out the door in favor of what comes up next.

Instead, how often we make some list of tasks fixed and determinant—just like that other list we carry with us, the one with all the expectations we imagine that others hold for us.

But when we walk just for the helluvait, we can become as fluid as the world is—as fluid in the world as we are meant to be. 

Below are two quick reading suggestions for helping you walk out the door...

The first, Edward Abbey's "Walking," is full of memorable one-line slogans to slap on your bumper, and typical of Abbey, is sarcastic as hell. 

Abbey on walking:"Whenever possible I avoid the practice myself. If God had meant us to walk, he would have kept us down on all fours, with well-padded paws...He surely would not have made mountains...read more 

The second, by Kurt Vonnegut, is no less funny...or poignant. You'll be reminded that it's as easy (or as hard) to get off your butt and ramble in a city as it is in the wild.

Vonnegut: "I work at home, and if I wanted to, I could have a computer right by my bed, and I'd never have to leave it...read more

The other day I met a guy from Tuscany wearing this t-shirt: "The internet is down...so I've come outside a while." (He's the guy on the far left—with his back to you.) We were all working side by side clearing brush along the Rocky Creek road—the one way a vehicle can get in and out of here. And we did some good work together, too. But tomorrow morning I'm heading out a different way.

"Learn how to meditate on paper"

"Learn how to meditate on paper. Drawing and writing are forms of meditation.

Learn how to contemplate works of art.

Learn how to pray in the streets or in the country.

Know how to meditate not only when you have a book in your hand

But when you are waiting for a bus or riding in the train..."

-- Thomas Merton, New Seeds of Contemplation, 1962