Dear Community,
This morning, after the neighborhood “lighthouse loop” jog under a bluebird sky, I rested and loosened my muscles in the sauna. Sometimes I will zone out and have it be more of a meditative state, today I did more of a mindless phone scroll, flipping through to speed with emails, voice notes, and updates that came through during the night. I opened an email from the New York Times, and was struck by the opening:
Every day, The Morning team and I ask each other how we can help our readers make sense of what’s happening in the world.
I thought to myself, this really is not too different, if not the same, of what I ask myself, and encourage those practicing me to ask… how can we make sense of this world? The more I learn about this life, the more I realize we are seeking, asking, dreaming of similar things… how to make sense of this wildlife we are living. We have various ways of living it out, asking, demanding, giving, needing, but, in the end, the collective living we begs to wake up and make sense and make meaning of this life. The curiosity of life is really what drew me into the practice of Yoga. To land into a method of practice that keeps asking again and again, what is happening in this world, and what is happening in me, is a practice that encourages a collective waking up. In the process of waking up, or remembering, making sense of the world and making sense of me became inseparable.
So, I choose to continue to cultivate practices, choices, habits, experiences that help me wake up and make sense of this beautiful world.
One of the ways I make sense of the world is seeing my own fears face to face, stepping close to the thresholds of my mind and bodies’ limits to really know and understand the pulse and beat of this life. Just over a week ago I stood atop of the Grand Canyon’s North Kaibab Rim. I had planned and prepared for a couple of months to run from one rim to the next rim with a fellow group of “hell yes-ers.” Together, we agreed to a total of 28 miles, 10,000 variance in elevation, and temperature shifts of 50 degrees throughout the day. The ultimate marathon. Agreeing was first fully exhilarating, then, as we got closer, a bit terrifying. All signs from park rangers to past participants said “don’t do it.” Yet, still, there was a part of me, of us all, that was up for the adventure.
We rose at 3 am, geared up, loaded into the van by 4, and started running under the stars and in the frigid 30-degree temps by 5 am. What proceeded what a day full of profound awakenings, jaw-dropping imagery, vortex energy baths, laughs, chills, sweats, rest, and one hell of a push to the end. Was it worth it? Hell yes, every minute, every step, every breath. Grand is an understatement to describe the splendor of creation that I, that we, were able to witness. That witnessing was both for the landscape of Mother Nature through the Canyon, but, also the witnessing of the grandeur of the human, wild animal being that I am, we are. I have been reading a poem over and over, and think it names some of the feeling states I experienced on the run, as well as I now hold like a prayer or scripture to how I want to continue to live my life.
Blessing for all the ways you are making sense of the world and allowing yourself to be “too awake.”
With love,
Genell
Too Awake
by Molly Remer
Be too awake.
Trust the trembling forest
place your hands on hot earth,
on cold stones,
in living streams.
Look for bridges into mystery
and thresholds into knowing
formed of leaning trees
and embracing roots.
Be too awake
and let wings of wonder
carry you into clouds of magic
winding wisps of pleasure
through your blood and bones.
Be too awake
and drink
all kinds of moonlight
curling yourself
into caves and grooves
alive with meaning.
Be too awake
for the world is full of birds
and you can feel the singing
in your soles and skin.
Be too awake
for there are lakes of longing
within you and you know how to swim.
Let the greening earth
glow beneath you
let your buried power
rise and breathe,
for it is in being too awake
that you will know yourself
as whole and here.
Be too awake
even if it is the only thing
you have left to be.
