This poem terrifies me for how the truth of it strikes me right in the heart. What if life is asking you to pause and stop what you are becoming?
Sometimes
if you move carefully
through the forest
breathing
like the ones
in the old stories
who could cross
a shimmering bed of dry leaves
without a sound,
you come
to a place
whose only task
is to trouble you
with tiny
but frightening requests
conceived out of nowhere
but in this place
beginning to lead everywhere.
Requests to stop what
you are doing right now,
and
to stop what you
are becoming
while you do it,
questions
that can make
or unmake
a life,
questions
that have patiently
waited for you,
questions
that have no right
to go away.
– David Whyte, Sometimes
We each arrive at that place during different times in our lives when the tiny but frightening requests are so terrifying our only choices seem to be flight or fight.
It is necessary to breathe and relax, though, and to remember that these frightening requests are a beginning…
These request are asking something new of you…NOT to become a a new you…but stop what you are becoming so you can plunge into you…to discover a new layer of you…a more real you, someone full of depth and emotion and color.
When you are on a path and you arrive at this place with these tiny but frightening requests…what do you do?
- How will you pause?
- How will you honor their existence?
- How will you breathe into those requests?
- How will you listen?
- And then: how will you begin?
Know that we are not meant to go this alone. I have had the privilege of having guides and helpers through my many tiny frightening requests.
Even today, my helpers include a close circle of business advisors, wise friends, and my husband.
If it is time for you to pause on your path and acknowledge one of these tiny but frightening requests, I’d be honored to dive in these questions that have waited a lifetime for you to explore.
Warmly,
Angie
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