Just One Foot In Front of the Other

 What a simple concept, on paper.  Just focusing on taking one step at a time, putting one foot in front of the other to slowly and steadily make your way.  No planning or focusing on where these steps will take you, how long it will take or what the path traveled will actually look like.  Just focusing on putting that one foot in front of the other. 

This may sound repetitive and if I have talked about this before, bear with me.  You see I have finally come to a point in my journey where my head and heart have found alignment with this idea and practice.  It has only taken me nudging up against the same limiting beliefs that I have held about myself over and over again to finally arrive at the a-ha that has allowed me to push past this barrier.  I guess you could say that the headache and heart ache finally caught up with me and has made me realize that I can no longer ignore or push down the truth that I hold inside of me.  That may sound painful or dramatic, and it is neither.  It is actually quite liberating, and has opened me up in a way that I didn't realize was possible.  Actually what it has done is made me re-evaluate what IS possible and that is where the sense of opening has come from.

This may also sound a bit cryptic, and I don't mean to be.  For now I want to share this work and also protect the seed that I am nurturing so will not go into specifics.  As I thought about writing this today, I was reminded of when I first considered playing ice hockey.  I grew up in Oshawa which is quite a hockey town, and went to school with many hockey players and fans of those players.  Needless to say I never quite fit into those spaces.  I felt very much like an other and decided that those feelings meant that I was not a hockey fan, and so I basically lived my life with the belief that I hated hockey and that was that.  (insert audible gasp from friends who play and who may be reading this - apologies!)  Fast forward several (SEVERAL) years to me watching my partner at the time playing beer league hockey and seeing how much fun the players were having.  A pang of regret at having never played team sports growing up and all that I might have missed out on registered and I decided that I wanted to play something...hockey seemed out of the question as I couldn't skate and so I hemmed and hawed about what I could possibly do.  Soccer didn't interest me, and ball hockey was a possibility...but for some reason ice hockey was calling to me.  Finally I gave in, bought some skates, strapped them on and took some very difficult steps onto the rink.  It was not easy - I had bad memories of failed figure skating lessons swirling in my head from my younger years, but fortunately persisted and managed to get enough skill to enroll in a hockey skating class, which led to hockey skills which led to me playing on teams for the past six or so years.  When I bought those first skates (which were at least a size too big) I definitely did not plan or expect to end up loving the sport and playing on summer and winter league teams down the road.  I just focused on putting one foot, or skate, in front of the other and letting things unfold as they did.

And as I reflect on that story, I can think of many other examples in my life where a similar pattern has taken place.   What I find interesting is that the instances where I have allowed myself to just start something with out planning out the entire experience has been limited to hobbies or areas of my life that bring joy but are at the same time not life changing.  I think that there has been fear around actually putting this practice into place where by doing so I could actually change the trajectory of my life...or not.  The unknowing of this is what I find so daunting.  It is one thing to take skating lessons and maybe never play hockey.  It is another thing to start something new which may very well lead to a new life path entirely.  And even if that path is one that you have been called towards, it is still a bit scary.  So here I go, strapping on my skates and taking a stride away from the boards and seeing what comes next, one step at a time.


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