Lorelei

The Miracle on Amelia Island

"When courageous enough to relax our soul open, the pace which our mind thinks slows to the pace at which our heart feels, and, amazingly, together, they unfold the rhythm with which our eyes can see the miracle waiting in all that is ordinary."  --Mark Nepo

I have been here at Amelia Island for one week.  One week of hearing the ocean outside my room every night and sitting by and walking near the ocean every day.  One week of unwinding and filling up my senses with the sight, sound and smell of the ocean.

I am amazed at how the sky is never the same.  There is such a wonderful variation of clouds and blue sky.

  The colors of the waves change from blue to green to gray.   

When I first got here to Amelia Island, Florida, it took me a while to wind down.  My husband went to work at the conference and I barely saw him.  I was on my own.  I looked at the ocean from my balcony and celebrated being here.  After a couple of days, I spent my first full day sitting by the ocean.  The negative ions blew through me clearing out any problems, concerns or worries and leaving me in awe of the earth.  The ocean and the beach is so vast.  It is amazing to me how the waves never stop rolling in.  There is such a deep feeling of peace and serenity.  I let it fill me up.

The next day, there was a woman lying on the ground near me. I invited her to join me in the lounge chair next to me that I was paying for under my unbrella.  We connected right away and she wanted to buy me lunch and take my picture.  It was great fun making a new friend.  After she left, I found my first shark's tooth on the beach.

 I settled into a rhythm where I felt connected to the earth and the sea. My pace slowed down and I felt a huge peace within.  I didn't need to "do" anything--just be in nature.

When my husband Michael told me he might have to work more this weekend, I took a deep breath and just accepted it.  He was able to get his work done late at night and early in the morning and we had a wonderful time together hanging out on the beach.

I will be leaving tomorrow, but I realize, for me a miracle did happen in this magical place.   The beauty of nature and this planet we live on has crept up into my heart and stayed there.

Sunrise on Amelia Island

Pushing up through clouds

The sun in all its glory

Breaks through one more time

My Cocoon

While doing some inner work in therapy, this image came to me of being wrapped in a cocoon.  My whole body was wrapped in a fine white filament  and I was hung suspended in the air, like a hammock.  Two threads came out either side (like a spider's web) and held me up.  I couldn't see what they were attached to.

Just as important as the image are the feelings.  The feelings of contentedness and love and absolute peace and serenity are deep and all consuming.  I am so grateful to be able to feel such depth of feeling and go to a place that will allow me to feel this.  It is such a gift.

SInce I can't actually share the feelings themselves on this blog, I wanted to show you what it looks like.  I looked on the web to see if I could find a picture that would come close.

 

I love this rendering of a woman curled up and nurturing herself.  The lines of the drawing have that same feeling as the filaments of the cocoon.  In my image, I am looking at it from the outside and you can't see me.  This picture shows more of what you could see if you were looking inside the cocoon.

 

 

I also liked this picture of a cocoon of energy that protects the body from outside negative influences.  That is part of the feeling of my cocoon.

 

 

 

In my image, there was no cloth, it is more like a porous filament and I was suspended, where this person is not, but the idea is the same. When I read the accompanying article, I found out that a woman is making these cocoons for people who are recovering from the devastating earthquake and tsunami in Japan.  They lay in here to recover from the trauma.

I remember when my first child Adam was first born, I did research on indigenous cultures that carry their children in a sling on their hip and/or back and do not put them down for their entire first year.  In the first few months, they wrap them tightly in cloth to imitate the womb holding them so they are more comfortable and can make the transition easier.

 

I remember when Adam was first born feeling so much love for him that I could not contain it.  My heart literally expanded.  Even though I felt some relief that someone else could now carry him, at the same time it felt like a part of my body was now living outside of my body.

At night, until he was nine months old, Adam slept with me and Michael and nursed when he woke up and went right back to sleep.  He took naps on my tummy and I carried him in a sling as much as I could.  I put him in a car seat when I had to, but as much as possible, he was wrapped up close to my body.  I remember cooking dinner with him sitting up on my hip.  There is something that felt so right about that process and he was so content.

The closest I remember to being wrapped in a cocoon is when I went to a spa on a cruise many years ago.  They filled a large piece of what looked like light foil with some herbal concoction and wrapped me in it.  I remember the discomfort of wanting to itch myself and not being able to.  But, it was incredibly healing.  I had been coming down with a cold and afterwards I felt wonderful and the cold was completely gone.

Since I don't have access to the actual cocoon in my image, my charge is to go there in my mind's eye and see that cocoon when I close my eyes---to feel what it is like to be wrapped up in all of that glorious love and goodness --suspended and weightless.  I am supposed to go there as often as I can and stay with myself in that healing suspended place.  And so I will...