A Heavy Weight, Lifted

A Heavy Weight © 2009 Bo Mackison

“For the next 30 days—the time most experts agree it takes to make a practice into a habit—I’m going to return to my practice of deep writing and walking meditation. Both of those practices help me nurture my spirituality, work on karma debts, hatch some creative ideas and allow them to fledge, and explore the rough ledges of forgiveness and healing.” – Quinn McDonald

I decided to do the practice of writing and walking, especially appropriate during this season, a hustling — and yes, I used the word hustling without the bustling, because I feel rather hustled by the Holiday consumer push — and busy time of the year.

Also, in the upper Midwest, it is a dark and gloomy time as we approach the shortest day of the year. It has been days since even the sun has come out for a peek. And yes, I was feeling a bit overwhelmed by all this, and the idea of meditative walking and writing sounded like a great prescription for my darkening mood.

In fact, I needed the meditative experience so much, I decided to take the day off from my photo work and from the computer yesterday. I needed some “me” time to refresh not only my wellspring of creativity, but also my “soul” well that felt painfully dry.

When I went walking, I walked around the neighborhood pond, noticing the thin ice, the bare sticks poking from the rough surface. At the north end of the pond, a large patch of browned stalks of water plants sprang from the slushy surface, not yet decayed. There was beauty there. Deep beauty. I stood and watched the silent landscape for many minutes. It was meditation, of sorts.

I wrote at different times during the day, paying attention to how the different times worked for me. I slipped in a couple of naps, too, for it was such a silent, dark day. I read poetry – pages and pages of poetry. And I experienced a wealth of emotions – from despair to facing reality with a stiff upper lip to hope, and everything in between. I went to bed very early.

This morning, even though the light of day has not yet come, even though a steady cold rain is pelting the earth and it is likely to be another gray day, I feel as if I have refilled my soul well, at least partly – enough so that energy has returned, determination to see my way through has returned.

Perhaps exploring the depths of emotions leads not only to a re-emergence of creativity, but also a sense of rejuvenation and a renewed understanding that life is a set of many cycles, that winter’s gray and silence provides the base for spring’s renewal, that a season of light always follows a season of darkness.

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Bo Mackison is a photographer, owner of Seeded Earth Studio LLC. She is spending 30 days exploring and refreshing the wellspring of creativity. And Bo is refilling her soul well, too.