Winter Solstice Path of the Night

As I breathe in the sharp cool air of this shortest day of the year, I look ahead with a bit of trepidation and even more excitement towards January 1st, when I start my journey down into the Tao and my own depths. Last week I listened to a Wayne Dyer/Marianne Williamson CD, and Mr. Dyer spoke of the Tao Te Ching, a 2500-year-old sacred text that speaks to the idea that there is an undivided truth at the root of all things. As I heard his words, I felt an expansion of energy rise within my being; historically, this has been my call to listen more deeply to what I am experiencing. When the 81 verses of this writing by Lao-Tzu was described, I knew that the next step for me in my spiritual journey would be to do an investigation of these wise teachings. I decided that I would create an 81-day adventure where each day would be a personal study of each of the verses.

Before starting this task, I discovered that there are over 200 English translations of the text. It felt important to me to find the one that most called to me at this point in my life. I got books and printed up pages that represented some of the different translations, and held each of them up to my body to see what type of response I received. This is the way I often make decisions as to what is right for my mind/body/spirit, from medication to food choices. I feel either an expansion, a contraction, or a neutral energy, which speaks to the power that each option has for me at that time. In this case, I easily eliminated most of them, but felt an energy expansion with 3 of them that felt fairly equal.

I didn't want to go crazy in working with even more choices, so I went ahead and read the first chapter of each of the 3 remaining options. One of them spoke the most to me. It also was the first one I had found, and, going along with the thought that our first instinct is often the most correct one, I felt comfortable with choosing this choice. It is a translation by j.h. mcdonald.

What else do I need to do to prepare for this journey? Besides creating a blog, I figured out how I want to structure the study. Each day will look like this: In the morning, after meditations to open up my body, heart and mind centers, I will read the daily chapter. After a short subsequent meditation on the words, I will then write the verse on a card. Somehow I will carry this card all day with me, either attached to my clothes or maybe clipped to my purse. I want the reminder in front of me all day, as I imagine that it will be very easy for me to forget all about it and get caught up in everyday life. As the day manifests, I will see what messages the verse has for me, and I will incorporate its meanings and lessons into my behaviors and thoughts. In the evening, I will write the verse on my blog and then describe how it affected my day. I'll see how this works, and make changes if other ideas arise.

Besides working with these logistics, I can feel my inner self getting ready for this journey. I am doing lots of emotional and physical release - including crying - to facilitate letting go of whatever is clogging up space that I want to have open and available for the learnings that I know are coming. I can only imagine how enlightening, confusing, and most certainly annoying the lessons will likely be. May I remain open to the possibilities and not remain stubbornly stuck in my old beliefs and judgments!