I've never been lost before.It made me think that finding our way is actually relatively easy - in theory. There's an internal compass that guides you in your decisions. A magnetic point that points due North when you're on the right path. And you know when you're on the right path. All those little ducks are in a row. The planets are aligned. And everything works, everything flows. It's the Universe ticking all the boxes.
You were my true north.
I could always steer for home when you were my home.
I suppose it's easier to know when we're out of kilter, when the ducks are scattering to the four corners of the duck pond. Everything feels like an uphill climb. The world seems to be conspiring against you, not working with you. You have that uneasy feeling in your gut. It's the best way to tell that you're on the wrong track. The important thing is to heed the warning.
Like a sailor would do, you have to correct your course. If you've lost your bearings, you need to stop, re-assess and change direction. All too often we keep going as we are, further and further down the wrong track, and getting increasingly frustrated with situations and ourselves in the process.
There's something to be said for maintaining your course - but only when you're headed in the right direction. But, for some reason, we often maintain our course even when we know it's all going pear shaped. I suppose it's partly inertia, being in our comfort zone but sometimes it's simply that we can't see through the fog that surrounds us.
Lately I've been looking at my bearings to decide the direction I should be going. And I've been maintaining my course even though my instincts have been telling me (yelling at me) that I'm on the wrong track.
And then suddenly, and apparently out of the blue, a shift occurs. On Thursday I donated my poppy pin badge to the barista in Starbucks. He asked me where I'd got it. I could tell he really wanted a pin of his own. I unpinned mine from my lapel and gave it to him. It was such a small thing but it was a big thing for him and I knew that, for reasons of his own, it meant a lot to him. It was the briefest of moments but one of those instances where the stars are all in alignment, and I think a little shift occurred. I went through some invisible portal.
The next day emails appeared in my inbox that told me, between the lines, that I was on the right track. A text message came. The shift had happened. You can't explain these things but it's as though a river has been dammed and there's a tiny gap now letting the water through. You only need a tiny shift to start putting you back on track. The way to make that shift seems to be to give something away. Give of your time. Declutter and give to the charity shop. We're back to that decluttering thing once again. As one door closes, another one opens. Make space for something new to come into your life.
