Here’s something I’m thinking about….
Last week I took a run in the woods with some friends. The trails were covered in leaves, and so I quickly realized that my eyes needed to stay down on the ground, carefully looking at the next step. Every time I was tempted to raise my eyes and look around (it was beautiful, and I don’t know the trails well and am always curious about where we are heading), I would stumble. As frustrating as it was, if I took my eyes off the next step, I ran the risk of that next step being a fall.
My mind being as it is, this made me think about how this isn’t a bad plan, really. If I just stay focused on the next best step, I have a better chance of actually getting to where I want to go (and in one piece). If I keep trying to look around and plan 5 steps ahead, I risk missing the best step that is right in front of me.
Reminds me of one of my favorite David Whyte poems:
Start Close In
Start close in, don’t take the second step or the third, start with the first thing close in, the step you don’t want to take.
Start with the ground you know, the pale ground beneath your feet, your own way of starting the conversation.
Start with your own question, give up on other people’s questions, don’t let them smother something simple.
To find another’s voice, follow your own voice, wait until that voice becomes a private ear listening to another.
Start right now take a small step you can call your own don’t follow someone else’s heroics, be humble and focused, start close in, don’t mistake that other for your own.
Start close in, don’t take the second step or the third, start with the first thing close in, the step you don’t want to take.
~David Whyte, River Flow: New and Selected Poems
This week I’m thinking about what that next step might be for me, the one I don’t want to take. And I’m trying to keep my eyes there, on the ground right in front of me…even when I’d rather look up to
enjoy the birds-eye view.
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