Wednesday, February 20, 2008

Life is Like a Labyrinth

I was traveling with my Resonance Repatterning friends Dee & Jane to a seminar in upstate New York. It was held at the Empowerment Center, an old school in the middle of nowhere outside Goshen. I love it there. It's beautiful and remote with hundred-year-old lilac bushes that are like trees. We had driven for 6 hours and it was approaching midnight as we were on the final stretch down the back road. Up ahead were those orange barrels and a road block. That was not a good sign. The bridge was not there. Instead, there was a crane sitting in the middle of the creek, and some cryptic note saying to follow the detour signs. Detour signs? What detour signs? There were detour signs? Where?
We could see the building lit up on the hill, a 3 minute drive away. The detour signs took us in circles, so we stopped for directions. Several times. We finally got there 2 hours later. I had decided that no matter what, we were going to keep the situation cheerful. There's nothing worse than being in a situation and then getting all grumpy along with it. The situation is the situation. I would like to take credit for such enlightenment, but I had just re-read Victor Frankl's Man's Search for Meaning prior to our trip. In the whole vast configuration of things, getting lost in Goshen was spit compared to what he went through. One of the things he said after surviving the Nazi concentration camp was, "Everything can be taken from a man but ...the last of the human freedoms - to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way."
So we chose to laugh. And we did. We came upon Crack Street. Plumber jokes abounded! I think we laughed more in those 2 hours than the whole weekend, and a weekend with Chloe Wordsworth is pretty spectacular.
The next morning as the seminar was about to begin, I handed Chloe a gift which she set on a table to open later. She began by welcoming us and telling us that some people had given up and didn't make it. She said, "We've all come through a labyrinth to get here."
"Chloe," I whispered. "You have to open your gift, now. It's very appropriate." So she opened the LABYRINTH journal that I made for her. Inside I had written:


Life is Like a Labyrinth

Whatever path you are on, you ARE on a path.
Sometimes it may feel like you’re going in circles,
and then you turn the corner,
and you’re closer to your goal.
The journey is just as important as the destination.
Weather happens & the terrain may be rocky,
Seasons come and go. In all these things,
You get to choose if you’ll SMILE on your path
And who you’ll share your journey with.
May your path bring you BEAUTY, JOY,
and much, much LOVE and LAUGHTER .
BLESSINGS to you on your path, wherever you are. :-) LOVE, H.

2 comments:

Jane said...

I had pushed that memory way back in my mind! Thanks for the refresher and I'm still considering.

Hali Chambers said...

YAY!!! :-) H.