The Changing Story

Waking into the dark. And there are those few, floating moments of spacious awareness unweighted by the cares and concerns and stories of the previous day. And then awareness-of-self comes flooding back, like a strong body of water surging into my own filling every possible dip and contour with mood and attachment, bias and identification, want and need, weight, gravitas, texture.

The difference between these two states and the moment they collide is dramatic. And this morning the question, who is it who comes rushing back in with what feels like such solidity and completeness? Who might I be without that narrative?

So I got up and holding that question, I moved. In the dark, to the pre-dawn silence, my little dog as witness. And you know, there’s not really an answer to that question, said my bending, swaying, unfolding, gesturing, kneeling, offering body. There is movement and stillness, she said, and you are shaped by that continual exchange. The story is always changing, the breath is always finding its way in, finding its way out.