shedding

one of the most beautiful aspects of autumns arrival is the breathtaking experience of walking through the park...as the leaves turn their shades of golden reds and yellows, it is as if they are pulling the sun into their tiny form before dropping back into the earth to settle, disintegrate, disappear and return back into that place from which they were borne...

this is the time of shedding...

but not mindlessly..oh no...staying present to the process of shedding is where we often get lost, confused, or simply close our eyes and turn away from...

why?...very simply, shedding is a damn painful process!...it hurts man!...as the leaves bravely take their turn in the one way sky dive which is their fate, i wonder whether the branch from which they previously sat gently aches at its loss, the edges still sore and slightly bruised for a while...just like when a scab falls off, the new skin underneath, tho ready to do its job and take its place on the finery of our knee, is raw, new, and ever so slightly tender...

this week i have been feeling the tenderness of shedding, tho in the more human bean form of loss...3 pieces of achingly sad news has found its way to my heart, dear ones suffering and coming to terms with some aspect of themselves being cut off and lost...i feel that loss, not because it is mine personally, but because we all know this feeling..it lies deep in our hearts, our bones, our memories, from the initial birth into a 'separate' world, through losing toys, parents attention when a new sibling has arrived, friendships in the petty battlefield of the playground, virginity and the loss of our innocence, or voice, our power, grandparents, parents, friends, dreams, lovers...life is full of loss..it is part of the continuos process of shedding...for without it, nothing new can arrive...

essentially what is shed in some way is the alchemy potent for transformation...no matter how much we battle against this, and i learned recently that the humble caterpillar, though most likely aware that his turn to become the glorious butterfly like his friends before him is inevitable, still resists with all his might this transformation...

whatever happens to us in life, and no amount of practice can offer protecton from matters of the heart, is part of the cycle...our practices can give us the opportunity to stay with it all..to feel the heart ripping openness of loss, the grief which feels like an endless pit, and the sense of strength we all hold to breathe through the pain until, as it will, somehow, someday, pass, leaving us transformed, different, and changed into something new...

maybe thats why those leaves turn red n orange...transformation burns, and the fire is the force which fuels this shift