Writing the Current
A Courageous Path
Kimberlie Chenoweth, MA: Posted on Saturday, January 01, 2011
Each of us carries a dream that longs for fulfillment, a dream that holds the true, authentic self at its core. And I believe our life’s work is to manifest that dream.
What’s required? Courage. Presence. Action. Trust. Healing. In short, a Courageous PATH.
Courage. Courage is the voice of the heart rallying to say “Yes!” to the big dream. With courage, we learn to respond moment to moment to whatever the dream requires for its fulfillment, knowing that the journey holds rich rewards. The root meanings of the word courage come from the anglo-french word translated as “heart” and stemming from the latin translated as “core.” What could be more courageous and heartful than saying “Yes!” to discovering the core of who we are and what we have to offer to the world!
Presence. Cultivating a sense of presence, we remember who we are. We are not independent creatures separate from all the rest of nature. Rather, we seek to be solid and connected, like the individuality of the redwood tree standing in community with all the rest of the forest. Learning to be solidly present in the here and now, we’re able to hold our own space and place in the larger world.
Action. Not just doing, but action that stems from the dream itself. Angeles Arrien has us imagine an oil lamp. The oil is the intuitive, mysterious well from which we draw. It’s the dream itself. The flame is our dynamic action out in the world. If we have oil with no flame, the dream stagnates. If we have only flame separate from the dream, we’ll burn out. When the dream itself fuels our actions, we find fulfillment.
Trust. Walking the path of our dreams requires trust in the dream itself. The big dream is a unique process in each of us that longs to be born through us. We must trust our ability to create and persevere. Working with someone who knows the territory, trusts the process, and has faith in us while we grow can be immensely helpful, and this is the work that I do.
Healing. Healing is vital to releasing the hold the past has on the big dream. Many of us had childhoods filled with unmet needs, traumas, and demands to be different from how we actually felt. The healing process frees energies long held back and reopens the flow of aliveness through the core of our being, thus fueling even greater Courage, Presence, Action, Trust, and Healing.
Through cultivating a Courageous PATH, the heart opens. The dream speaks. As we listen, the dream itself reveals each step on the way to fulfillment.
Are you ready to say yes?
