Learning to fly….again

              Oh that I had wings like a dove! for then would I fly away, and be at rest.

                                                                        Ps. 55

A young dancer recently described her move from her hometown to a big city this way:  “Back there, my skin felt too tight.  Here, it feels too loose.  I haven’t found my shape yet.”

When I wake one day and find that the life I’ve been living has gotten too small, or that I feel myself in too cozy a cage, I know that I must learn to fly again – as I once did, as we all once did, when we were young and brave and beautiful.

I go to the herons when I need a reminder that my flight path is not written in stone, or in clay, or even in my flesh.  I must learn to fly – over and over again — if I am to continue to be part of the great flowing “everything.”

I recently came upon this wise instruction from a photographer to his students.

“Strive to be free and empty.  You’ll find that freedom and emptiness need to be learned.  When behind a camera, allow yourself to approach the world in an unselfconscious, instinctive way…Approach your subject with an open mind.  The mind can be temporarily clear.”

 

• For a week on your walks, intentionally empty your mind Feel the freedom of the birds.  Study their ways.  Look for fallen feathers.  What new insights appear?  I invite you to record them in your journal for the days when your wings need an updraft….