I was driving in the car 30 minutes ago, on my way home from dropping one daughter off at her friend's house and getting back to pick up my other daughter and drive her to the place where her day would then unfold.
Feeling relatively happy, I turned on the radio just as the song featured in the video below came on. As I drove, I imagined myself dancing with abandon (one of my favourite things to do and something I don't do often enough, I am at my most 'connected' when lost in dance and song) ... and so unexpectedly, I filled up with intense emotion that cinched my heart, filled my eyes with stinging tears and left an impression like a vice grip was squeezing my throat.
"Where did THAT come from," I asked myself. Because it definitely comes from somewhere. Pain or yearnings or guidance is in us for the interpreting - waiting, patiently waiting for a portal to emerge through; a crack, an opening, a trigger of one kind or another that allows it to show up, full force, in a recognizable way.
So I traced back through the event, looking for clues. (You'll be happy to know that at this point, I'd already arrived home. I'm one of those people who are best not to Reflect and Drive at the same time.) And this passage that I read last July came to mind:
"Sometimes there's just too much to consider, too much to understand and analyze, too many consequences to play out in our mind, too many things to clean, unpack, or repair before we can go out and play.
Sometimes the simplest and best use of our will is to drop it all and just walk out from under everything that is covering us, even if only for an hour or so - just walk out from under the webs we've spun, the tasks we've assumed, the problems we have to solve. They'll be there when we get back, and maybe some of them will fall apart without our worry to hold them up." (From The Book of Awakening by Mark Nepo)
And therein lay my answer. The song itself did not impact me nearly so much as how, while listening to it, I imagined myself jumping up out of a chair, letting my hair down, and dancing, kicking, jiving, and jitter-bugging around a room full of happy, light-spirited people doing the same.
My Spirit emerged through the radio today to remind me that, every now and then, it's both healthy and necessary to give yourself permission to ease out from under every now and then - just walk out from under the roles you play, the responsibilities you carry, the challenges you face, the resolutions you seek; and allow your Self to be the Saxman playing like his soul is on fire.
Has this ever happened to you? Can you even remember the last time you put everything down and let your Spirit dance, sing, laugh, whatever makes you light up from the inside? Maybe you could carve out a little time today, or tomorrow, or even next week to heal and rejuvenate in this way.
