{"id":197,"date":"2010-05-18T02:43:12","date_gmt":"2010-05-18T02:43:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.katrinakenison.com\/2010\/05\/18\/second-journey\/"},"modified":"2010-05-18T02:43:12","modified_gmt":"2010-05-18T02:43:12","slug":"second-journey","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/second-journey\/","title":{"rendered":"Second Journey"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/span><\/span>\u201cThe call to a second journey usually commences when unexpected change is thrust upon you, causing a crisis of feelings so great that you are stopped in your tracks.\u201d\u00a0 — Joan Anderson, The Second Journey<\/a><\/p>\n

I first read those words about nine months ago, sitting alone in an empty kitchen, having wondered for weeks just what I was meant to do next, now that the house was built, the long-awaited book finally written and published, the sons nearly grown.<\/p>\n

This weekend, I went to meet the woman who wrote them, the woman who once ran away from home to spend a year in a cottage by the sea<\/a>,\u00a0<\/a>in order to find her way back to her own true self, a self long since lost to the demands of marriage, motherhood, career, and the needs of others.<\/p>\n

Packing the car on Friday afternoon, I still wasn\u2019t quite sure what I was looking for on my own \u201cSecond Journey\u201d retreat, or why I was going off to spend a weekend with a group of strangers on Cape Cod, when I had more than enough to do right here — weeds to pull and a garden to plant, a manuscript to read for a friend, a husband who\u2019d have preferred to have me around, a to-do list filling the whole right page of my calendar.<\/p>\n

And yet.\u00a0 The ache I\u2019ve felt deep in my breast this year has not been assuaged by any of the small, worthy tasks that fill my days.\u00a0 I do all I can, in all directions, and then lie awake at night, worrying about things beyond my control. I meditate in the morning, practice living in the moment, and yet carry a deep sadness for moments already gone. I love the people in my life, and yet feel battered again and again by unsettling, difficult conversations.\u00a0 I reach out to my teenaged son, and feel not connection but more distance, our relationship raw and tender to the touch, like second-degree burns on my heart.\u00a0 I answer my e-mails, read a little, write a little, spend time with my family, bring lunch to a friend. The days are busy and full and good. Still, the question nibbles at my edges: What now?<\/p>\n

Saturday afternoon, standing barefoot on the beach, I glimpsed the beginnings of an answer.\u00a0 Part of the ache, I know, comes from my own sense of still not being quite up to the job of being me.\u00a0 Not a good enough mother, wife, or friend, no matter how much I care.\u00a0 Not a good enough writer, or yoga student, or meditator, no matter how hard I try.\u00a0 Not a good enough public speaker, or checkbook balancer, or wage earner, no matter how much effort I put in.<\/p>\n

I know that where I see only lack and failure, others see competence. But I keep my own secret list of insecurities and shortcomings, certain that what seems to come so easily and naturally to others must be hard-won by me.\u00a0 I want to be better at living my life than I am these days, to feel sufficient just as I am, more certain of what I\u2019m meant to do now, and how I\u2019m meant to be.<\/p>\n

We had arrived on the outer banks by boat, rolling our pant legs up high and hopping into the clear, cold water one by one to wade ashore.\u00a0 With a knowing twinkle in her eye, Joan had given us each our marching orders back at the dock, along with our bag lunches: solitude and silence.\u00a0 Out here, both were easy to find.\u00a0 A few steps along the beach, and I was already alone, heading out toward the breaks, the surf, the wide open stretches of dune and shore grass and wild water.\u00a0 The sun was warm, the wind so fierce it whipped stinging needles of sand onto every morsel of exposed flesh.<\/p>\n

For four hours or so, I wandered in silence, shedding layers of extra clothing along with layers of identity, feeling, thoughts, and inner chatter.\u00a0 There was nothing to do but walk and look and wonder, no where to go except where my feet carried me.\u00a0 No sooner had I taken a step, than the next wave rolled in, erasing my foot prints from the sand. The scouring, relentless wind washed my mind empty of thought and judgment and doubt.\u00a0 Step by step, moment by moment, I relaxed.\u00a0 First into a kind of inner stillness.\u00a0 Then, into peace.\u00a0 And from there, it was not much of a leap to joy.<\/p>\n

How satisfying it is, to disappear, and then to be found by the world. How exhilarating, to be relieved of all expectation and commitment, and then to rediscover your own bare-naked self.\u00a0 What a relief, to lighten my psychic load, to let go of all the worries and judgments and doubts I lug around day after day.\u00a0 What a blessing, to see what it is that remains, after everything heavy and useless and outgrown has been dropped and left along the way.\u00a0 What joy, to be slowly but surely filled right up to the brim again with love.<\/p>\n

Far from the mainland of my daily life, it dawned on me: love allows me to get out of myself, and to be grateful for all things.\u00a0 Love enables me to embrace my life exactly as it is, rather than regretting that it\u2019s not precisely as I want it to be.\u00a0 Love heals that which is split within; it restores my strength and faith, reminds me that who I am really is all right with me.<\/p>\n

Joan Anderson calls the beach walk a scavenger hunt for the soul.\u00a0 And so it is.\u00a0 Sometime late in the afternoon, as I trudged against the wind, back toward the lighthouse and civilization, I picked up a wide, white, bowl of a clam shell, rubbed smooth by wind and water.\u00a0 A vessel it was, but not one that could ever hold very much.\u00a0 Water would flow in and out with ease, passing through this gentle curve of a cup,\u00a0 as shallow as my own open hand.\u00a0 This, I realized, is what I aspire to — to unfurl my fist, to allow love to pour in and to spill right out again with ease, without all the grasping and the holding that so often entangles me. How I yearn to be as pure and clean and simple as that bleached white shell:\u00a0 receiving and releasing, filling and emptying and filling again, eternally open to the flow of life.<\/p>\n

I adore Joan Anderson\u2019s books of self-discovery and renewal, love her willingness to laugh at herself even through tears of confusion and despair, her generosity of spirit, her eagerness to share what she\u2019s learned with the rest of us restless, middle-aged seekers. And I am so grateful now that when I first wrote to her, months ago, she answered my letter. \u00a0And that when she said, \u201cCome to the beach,\u201d I said I would.\u00a0 There is not a woman among us who couldn\u2019t use a weekend away, a walk on the shore, a good night\u2019s sleep alone in a bed far from home.\u00a0 I know I am lucky to have had all those things this weekend, along with the most precious gift of all — time to just be, without one bit of pressure to do.<\/p>\n

In the end, I did find what I was looking for, out there on the outer banks:\u00a0 Hope.\u00a0 Hope that things will work out for the best. Hope that when the going gets tough, as it always does,\u00a0 I will remember who am and draw strength from the truth that I already know: love enlarges and sustains us.\u00a0 Love saves us from ourselves.\u00a0 Love is pure, positive energy. Love really is all we need.<\/p>\n

Joan gave us much this weekend, from a candle-lit lobster dinner in her home, to belly laughs and yoga on the beach. \u00a0But I think the words that I treasure most now that I\u2019m home again were not hers, but ones she shared by Robert Frost.\u00a0 Asked if he had hope for the future, Frost replied:<\/p>\n

\u201cYes.\u00a0 And even for the past, that it will turn out to have been all right for what it was.\u00a0 Something that I can accept–mistakes made by the self I had to be, or was not able to be.\u201d<\/p>\n

I drove away from the Cape last night refreshed and inspired, and bearing this same small hope in the palm of my own hand.\u00a0 It is time to forgive myself for not being more. Time to love myself, imperfections and all, just as I am.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cThe call to a second journey usually commences when unexpected change is thrust upon you, causing a crisis of feelings so great that you are stopped in your tracks.\u201d\u00a0 — Joan Anderson, The Second Journey I first read those words about nine months ago, sitting alone in an empty kitchen, having wondered for weeks just […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15183,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17,20,22,24,25,29,39,14,15],"tags":[57,180,243,270,357,358,367],"class_list":{"0":"post-197","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-acceptance","8":"category-books","9":"category-change","10":"category-connection","11":"category-courage","12":"category-friendship","13":"category-midlife","14":"category-soul-work","15":"category-writing-and-reading","16":"tag-acceptance-2","17":"tag-forgiveness","18":"tag-joan-anderson","19":"tag-love","20":"tag-renewal","21":"tag-retreat","22":"tag-second-journey","23":"entry"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/600x600.png?fit=600%2C600","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=197"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15183"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=197"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=197"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/katrinakenison.com\/new\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=197"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}