I’ve been feeling the need to be bold lately.
I do not fit into my old life, my pre-pandemic life. No matter how hard I try to do what was easy and pleasurable before March 2020, my soul was enlarged by the different routines, the living in two-week increments of quarantine and then seeing people and then quarantine again.
Something in me longs to do some of the the things I’ve always wanted to do. And to leave behind what’s no longer needed, something of my ‘old’ life.
What about you?
August is nearly here. August.
It’s a strange word, yes?
A bold word.
It was used to name a particular heralded king, a caesar. But the word existed long before that, used to describe one (an augur) who foretold the future through the close observation of details of the present…things readily observable by anyone and everyone who is curious.
We all do something of this, you know…like when you see two people in love — even early in their relationship — and say, “Look at those two — they’re going to have an amazing life together!”
An augur’s bold ideas and bold ways of coming to know different realities and shapeshift into them and out of them is the heart of the shamanic tradition…whether that shamanic tradition is in the much older bordercrossing tradition of the prophets/ecstatics of Ancient Israel’s mountaintops or any culture that stays close to the ground out of a desire for wisdom. (The word ‘Hebrew’ actually means ‘bordercrosser,’ by the way.) Modern biblical scholars often now boldly proclaim that Jesus was a shaman with his bold ways of healing (telling people to get up!!) — much to the unhappiness of the authorities who wanted healing to flow only through them.
Nature includes all, THE ALL, after all and has far different plans than authorities alone can try to muster. Perhaps ‘healing’ is simply a process of participating with nature, right? ‘Healing’ and ‘wholing’…realizing we’re swimming in a much larger ocean, THE ALL.
Maybe you’re being invited to be bold in some way this August…to do something you’ve always wanted to do, and with that to leave behind something you no longer need.
Let us all know here at VITALITY, either by replying to this email or through social media by tagging us #vitalitycincinnati. I’ll be starting a special Facebook group called ‘A Bold August’ and invite you to join if you’re still using that platform. Let’s find ways to support each other, encourage one another in our bold new moves…that we might give birth to some newness on our amazing planet during a time when birthing new ways and realizations seems to be happening so readily.
Maybe you’re even being called to join the upcoming Aug 14-15 Healing Touch Level 1 with Mary Duennes and Stephanie Beck Borden. And guess what…we ask you to register by the beginning of August…Aug 1 — this Sunday. I’m happy to send you the details for the class, just reach out.
Our human-lives needs boldness, newness, yes?
May we be so bold…and ripen into our authenticity!
Brian Shircliff
program director
513.300.5174
Claire Long and Mike Eck celebrating their new coloring book, With You in Our Dreams!