Coming or Going?
















The theme over at Sunday Scribblings today is Destination. I think this is a lovely and appropriate New Year topic, and one that I have thought about lately on the metaphoric/ spiritual level a lot.

Where am I going? Will I know when I arrive? Is the act of getting there worth just as much?

On the practical level, since moving 2 hours south of where I have lived most of my life, I've re-oriented my perception of things like how far away something is and how long is "long" to get somewhere. In order to see any of our "old" (tried and true) friends, the minimum driving time is about 1 hour 15 minutes, with 2 hours being more likely. I used to get impatient driving from Sonoma County to Marin County--approximately 35 minutes. Now I don't. Now I surrender to the distance, and I let go of how long it will take and allow myself to wander in my mind, rather than notice how far I've gotten. It's freeing. And fortunately time/distance don't make a significant difference with any of our closest friends. That's a good feeling.

On the other level, the 'where am I going in this lifetime and as a spirtual being' level...well...I've found the ideas of "process over product" and "enjoy the journey, not just the destination" to be very useful to me. Because the truth is, while finishing/arriving have a deeply satisfying quality to them, pretty quickly you long for another round. It's the rough dream-making of ideas, the wild energy of creating that excites me as well as the anticipation of the long drive; the beauty of waiting.

It gets easier to become a lover of the journey when you've had a lot of rejection or failed attempts. You get used to the idea that experiences come again, that there will always be new ones, and that there's still value in that which doesn't necessarily go on to bear fruit. In a sense, all attempts do actually bear some kind of fruit. You learn from the rough drafts, the failed projects, the disappointments and heartbreaks. You put it all back into the creative soup, or into your self-awareness, or into your heart, and something better comes out so long as you keep open.

I vow to make 2007 not just a year of great projects and destinations, but one of being aware, present and happy in the acts of doing/seeing/experiencing and even just anticipating.