This month’s question is from our dear friend Tuğba in Türkiye:
How is it possible to desire something intensely and yet remain within the state of seeing it unfold in slow motion? A person imagines what they want to attain. They imagine the end. But how do you imagine the path to get there? How do you follow that path? How do you remain still in that slowness, without thinking about the future, the path to attainment?
From Debra …
Dearest Tuğba, I so appreciate your questions and it is interesting … all of yours have been in the weave of conversations I have had this very week with friends. Your wonderings are in the air with other fine wonderers, so I want to first reflect that connectedness and resonance back to you. It is important to have a community of people, even if they are just a handful or an online platform of fellow journeyers like this one, to explore your questions out loud … so often we are not alone in what we are curious about, even if it feels that way. The shared perspective and the felt sense of the company of others is always an anchor for me. We have the ability to call in and create that community … and sometimes that comes from unlikely or surprising sources, including with other-than-human family.
The poet William Wordsworth wrote these lines in his autobiographical epic poem called “The Prelude”:
The earth is all before me. With a heart
Joyous, nor scared at its own liberty,
I look about; and should the chosen guide
Be nothing better than a wandering cloud,
I cannot miss my way. I breathe again! 1
We are always where we need to be, amongst the wandering clouds or other fellow family … two-legged, four-legged, wing-ed, rooted, finned, elemental, seen and unseen. Who are your guides? Mine are particular birds and animals that often appear as messengers of this or that or appear right after I wonder about something. Who consistently shows up in your day and what do they mean to you? With them, you cannot miss your way. When approached with respect, appreciation and a lack of entitlement, they are brilliant companions on the path.
Desiring something intensely and thinking about the past and future are very human. And I believe everything we need is right here. I’m pretty sure that how desires are realized is not even my business. When I am anchored in the present and get beyond my mind’s need for an outcome (or end as you call it) to look a certain way and happen in a certain time, then the concept of slowness disappears in favor of right timing. I can then recognize what is really unfolding and how are prayers are really being answered.
