A young woman and dear friend recently told me a story about her path in life. I'll call her Carly to keep her anonymity. Near the end of her freshman year Carly was taken out of school by her family and placed in a wilderness program for troubled youth located in the high deserts of Colorado. She knew she needed to be there away from the parties, the drugs, and pressures of academia. The days were filled with long hikes over rough terrain, group processing around camp fires, icy cold showers, and guided meditations in the dirt. Over time her connection with the land and her wilderness guides (the staff) helped her open up to her inner pain that had been masked by her self destructive activities. She began to forgive herself and her loved ones. She began to feel whole again.
At the end of the program, the parents were asked to come an spend a few days in the wilderness with their teens so they too could experience the process that their children had undergone the past eight weeks. Carly's mother came. One afternoon, Carly and her mother sat on a few boulders with one of the wilderness guides, whom we'll call Tom. Tom moderated a discussion between the two woman.
Carly's mother, choking back her waves of emotion and tears, shared her relief and tried to empathize with Carly's past. "I think you were just lost and fell off your path. I knew that if you could just find your way again and get back on the right path, you would be okay."
The guide smiled and turned to the mother. "What if Carly has always been on her path and needed to go through this to be who she is now in this moment? What if being lost was part of her path? What if being lost is not "lost" at all?"
Tom's words seeped right to the mother's core. She knew he was right. She could see that she had been viewing her daughter's "path" in life as a straight line going from point A to B and any diversion from that line she labeled as "lost".
When we reflect on our past and where we are now, it's obvious in hindsight that it was the difficult times, the times of uncertainty, of doubt, or stuckness, that did mold our wisdom and understanding today. When we see our kids or teens struggling there can be this feeling of Oh no! They're making the wrong choices. They're going the wrong way! But when you think about it, how could it be any other way than how it actually is. We can wish that things had gone differently in the past and hope for a smooth and healthy future but the truth remains, it is how it is right now and we have no idea what will happen in the future. This truth alone, if not fully understood, can bring a feeling of uneasiness. Not being able to control outcomes can be very scary. We can say to our selves in exasperation, Well then who's driving this train! On the other hand, if we can trust that things will be how they are meant to be, there can be an inner stillness and calm and then an understanding that we are not lost at all but right where we are meant to be in the universe.
I'll share a poem with you called Lost by David Wagoner. This was recently recited in a woman's tea circle I attended and was the inspiration for this posting.
Lost
Stand still. The trees ahead and bushes beside you
Are not lost. Wherever you are is called Here,
And you must treat it as a powerful stranger,
Must ask permission to know it and be known.
The forest breathes. Listen. It answers,
I have made this place around you,
If you leave it you may come back again, saying Here.
No two trees are the same to Raven.
No two branches are the same to Wren.
If what a tree or bush does is lost on you,
You are surly lost. Stand still. The forest knows
Where you are. You must let it find you.
~David Wagoner
