FREEDOM MONTH: DAY 21: “You wanna fly, you got to give up the shit that weighs you down.”― Toni Morrison
Flight is always our vision of freedom. We are earth-bound, seemingly anchored by gravity. Some days I do not feel the anchor, but I know it exists. Other days I feel too heavy and burdened to move.
These are both a sense I have of myself in the world. I used to run a lot. I loved it! I often felt that I could just jump up and fly. Running felt like freedom to me as well. I wanted to always go faster and faster. I am not a fast runner. Now I do not run at all. I did a lot of damage with running, even though I never ran on cement and was almost always on dirt or grass.
No matter. I am not built to run. Some folks do it without doing such damage to their bodies. I cannot. I cannot fly either. My freedom must come from within. It does. I actually feel it more strongly than I did with running. I have also done the closest things I could find to flying, parasailing and parachuting. Did not care for the parachute gig. Landings are brutal and my body did not resonate with it at all. But parasailing is fabulous! So is zip-lining for a cheaper and easier to find fix. (And I get to run for a minute off the cliff!)
Step 9 asks us to let go of all of our shame and guilt and clean up our messes like big kids. We can, but so many won’t. And they will never know the freedom that I get by having done this in every area of my life. Not as much fun as the other things I spoke of here, but I am free inside myself, where my inner soul knows the Universal Power and we can be together. That is the good shit, right there!
Dolphin Hug 