Approaching 2019, I wonder – how can I instill my practice, and my life, with a sense of meaning?
And then, is it possible to hope for meaning, and not get caught up in – and probably disappointed by – specific goals?
Those of you who been practicing with me during the last 10 or 15 years know I have walking a self-curated razor’s edge that has specificity and discipline on one side and exploration and inquiry on the other.
Some days it feels fun, playful! And others, my practice feels a bit lost, circling round like a kitten chasing her tail.
One way of focusing a practice is to clearly embody the quality of being deliberate. Similar to being mindful, being deliberate brings an intentional, systematic, step-by-step feeling that has a quality of taking aim.
For me this is different than setting a goal; rather it is a focusing that allows you to measure your movement along a line of exploration. It is defined enough to sense and trust your intuition. It has a quality of faith – not hope – but faith, in the process. It is eminently and necessarily renewable. One breath, and then the next…
With deliberateness, each practice gains a map-able experience. Not a map that is known ahead of time, not a been there, done that known. But a knowable in the rearview mirror kind of a map. This is a chart-able map that one can ponder along the way and after the fact.
It is reflection. It is sense-based. It is what it is, and cannot be changed or judged.
It can give us a starting place for tomorrow, inspiring us to begin again. And again… charting our evolution day by day, practice after practice, breath after breath.
