Crow Journeys

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Photo taken by my dad on a country road in England last month.

When I named this blog "Crow's Feet" I intended to write about where those feet took me - in every sense. Sometimes recently I've got so bogged down in "stuff" I've forgotten that first intention. Today's post is going to take this back on track.

Most of my life I've looked at being alive as an experience rather than an existence. I can remember being in hospital at the age of 17 and feeling so excited and happy... because I'd never had major surgery before and this was going to be such an adventure! Somewhere along the way I forgot that. Somewhere I started seeing my life's adventures as problems and burdens rather than exciting experiences.

Okay, maybe it is weird to be excited at having surgery, but it is a great adventure.! Surely life should be a journey enjoyed and savoured rather than a struggling plod to the finish line? I’ve mostly wanted my journey to be the great adventure. Sometimes it overwhelms me and I get panicked or depressed, but it still is a great adventure.

Last week my doctor added a new health label to my alarmingly long list of personal health woes. He thinks (after loads of blood tests and examinations) that my recent pain problems are due to fibromyalgia.

I left his office with a print-out pamphlet and a head full of questions. On the plus side this thing isn't terminal and won't erode me away physically. On the down side most websites on the disease tend to make it sound debilitating and something you can never cure or escape from.

An online friend asked me yesterday:

How do you want this to manifest in the world for you? Big questions... How do you want your story to read, that has fibromyalgia as a part of the setting?

What characters will you write into your story, to help and support you....and what will be your relationship to them? What characters will you write into your story, who will be the protagonists...the bad guys, who will be trying to steal your energy....and make your quest to wholeness more difficult...

and could we eliminate them at the outset, so that the quest isn't an epic battle to the last page, but a gentle journey of quiet exploration…

How do I want my story to read? What a thought! Instead of seeing it as an unknown road before me she had posed my brain a new and amazing question; “What if you create your own road?”

Here I have been seeing my life story as the great adventure to be experienced (and learnt from), but now… Last few years the “adventures” have come too fast and too furious. I feel weather-beaten and travel-weary.

I replied to her:

I think I'll go with as much elimination of struggle and bad guys as possible. I want it to be a heart-warming success story. Gentle growth. Not so much drama and stress. More Little Women and less Alien Resurrection!

…but do I really? Yes, I do want less drama and tears and obviously we all want a happy ending to our life stories, but no adventure at all? I think that might get boring! I think that’s not really me…

So today I claim my first step on the new page of my new Great Adventure . I will write this part of my journey (hopefully) with excitement and humour rather than fear and despondency. I’m sure there will be sections where the road seems impassable (and the storm clouds gather as the cannibals get ready to cook me), but it will still be an adventure and I will try to write in the bit where I eventually get rescued. ;-)

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