I Am That.

"The ocean, in all its greatness, can rise up and strike with the ferocity of a tidal wave or tsunami when called to, can push past levees and wipe out entire cities, can run as low as the depths allow, and swallow whole whatever comes in its way.

Other days, it just smiles and sparkles, sunlight dancing across its fingertips, tickled and caressed, content within itself, reflecting beauty and joy to those who might gaze upon her surface, knowing full well what lies beneath."

I Am That.

I Am that capacity. I am everything I need to be, when I need to be it.

I am infinity…of the ocean meeting the horizon in one continuous stretch of blue.

Form. Formlessness. Water. Atmosphere.

One.

* * *

It occurred to me that in terms of this writing thing, it doesn't have to be so difficult. We just make it so. Figure out what it is you're trying to say, and then say it. Distill it down to a few sentences, the core message, and then write it. We make it hard. We are the critics. We put up the roadblocks. The impediments are self-imposed.

It doesn't have to be hard, or complicated…unless we like it that way.

* * *

The Steps

190 up...190 down.

One set = 380 steps.

Three sets = 1140 steps. That's one-thousand-one-hundred-forty steps straight up (and down) a nearly vertical hillside! I do this in the middle of a 2 or 3 mile jog.

I was halfway up the 2nd round when I started to think about the sheer numbers of steps I was attempting, how steep they were, how my calves and quads were feeling tired, worked. I started to observe my breath getting more labored, more challenged. I thought of how hard it was on my body to do these steps and how I'd never finish… Maybe I'd just delete that last set and only do 2 rounds today. Then I started to stumble. I saw it clearly. My thoughts were deliberately attempting to pull me off focus and my body was following its command…I began to trip.

I recognized the "mental detour" and quickly re-connected myself. I anchored my breath back into my center, pulled up the abs, resumed my balance, and stopped counting or predicting the extent of my stamina.

Back in the here and now, I just stepped.

Step, step, step. Calmly, evenly, on track.

Don't look up, don't look down. Just keep stepping.

It reminded me about motherhood. In the throws of such challenges as teething, sleep disturbances, potty training, battle of the wills--any of the challenges, really-- you think it will never end. You think you will never make it. You're so tired, strained, it feels like you can't possibly give one more ounce of nurture, or patience, or even kindness. It feels like you won't be able to last one more minute of it. So much of motherhood can seem so overwhelming, impossible. You don't know if you can do it.

And yet, although we are challenged to our very core again and again, we survive it. We grow through it. Each stage, when looking back, was really so fleeting. In it-- it feels like it will never end. After it-- it's just over. You did it. You survived it. Moving on to the next challenge. (There is always another challenge.)

Mothering is great training. Other than to do your best and show up, there is no goal per se. The goal is always changing. And we as mothers are asked to grow and change along with it, even if we can't possibly see or know how. Yet we do. We do.

I believe we are capable of quite literally anything. Tapping the collective inner-feminine: wisdom, power, tenacity, possibility...we really can achieve anything we put our minds to.

Bythe way, I finished the third set of steps before jogging back.

And this whole book thing? No big deal. Just write it out. It's just thoughts on a page…