Assess: New Year's Revolutions

original art by Kate Kroska

Musing…  

I have spent my days stringing and unstringing my instrument, while the song I came to sing remains unsung.  - Rabindranath Tagore

This is the time of year that we resolve to change something in our life, and by week 3, we realize we’re unable to sustain our resolution. Our old habits pull us back into that well-worn rut. Revolution: revolving around that orbit (path) again, and again, and again.

I say we choose THIS definition: “ a radical, complete and fundamental change; overthrowing one system and substituting with another”. We’ve seen plenty of this in our world recently. What is the change YOU wish to become in 2012?

Kate’s Turn: 

I rather like this perspective on change: throwing something off that just doesn’t fit anymore, rather than putting effort into making myself change. Perhaps deep beneath our conditioned self lies a creative, powerful being, waiting to be freed from restriction, fear and sabotage to express its unique gift to the world. Of course, I believe this!  So as I look forward in 2012, I ponder what it is I wish to leave behind, what outdated, ineffective system do I wish to overthrow. This is about letting the false layers fall away to reveal the truth of who we are. So as I imagine reviewing my year at the end of 2012, I am satisfied and delighted with all the expressions of creativity I risked – in my art, my work, my life, and I am so proud of all the times I looked fear in the face and said “What do I have to lose?  I’m betting on the love/fire in my heart!”

I, along with Oriah Mountain Dreamer, offer you this New Year’s Wish:

“ . . .. that we live our deepest Soul's desire not by intending

                             to change who we are but by intending to be who we are." 

- Oriah Mountain Dreamer

Get Fired Up: 

Allow Steve Jobs to inspire you to go for that radical and fundamental change you desire:

"Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure — these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart."
       - Steve Jobs, Stanford commencement address, June 12, 2005 

Assess: Lift Off

Musing…

“There are a lot of unemployed angels out there”, my friend Jasmine advised me when I was highway driving at night in a downpour of rain. She was sitting in the passenger seat, calmly offering an antidote to my discomfort at the wheel. Jasmine, who herself had been in a car accident that totaled her car a year before, and whose left foot will never be the same as a result, speaking with certainty about that which has no certainty. After I took her home, I drove back the same route uttering “angelride” like a mantra, like a newfound religion, asking at least one angel to ride along.  

Charise’s Turn:

Let’s go one step further. Rumi says,

“You were born with wings. Why prefer to crawl through life?”

It’s a new year, time to spread my own wings. I have two directions in my professional life – dance/yoga/movement and writing/consulting/coaching. My mind for several years has not been able to put the two together in any coherent fashion. Where do they meet? They spring from two different sources -- a masters in dance/movement therapy and a masters in social work. I’ve often thought that one dilutes the other, even when I know that one has to inform the other. I separate them all the time, especially when someone asks me what I do, choosing to highlight a single endeavor. My plan for 2012 is to wear these two directions like a pair of wings. This is more than an image, this is a desire, a call to action, and is already taking effect in redesigning my website. 

Get Fired Up:

Remember your wings and how you are meant to fly!

If not now...when?