Late summer, 1990. Sitting alone at a table in a coffee house, waiting for a friend to arrive. Last few nights in town before I leave for my doctoral internship in a career I set my sights on at the tender age of 18, my first marriage evaporating behind me. Transient man with a pack of Tarot cards asks if he can do my reading while I wait.
Always up for an adventure, I say, "Sure".
He proceeds to lay the cards out before me, takes a deep breath and begins to interpret their meaning. Lying before me is the Death card. (I've got some good news and...). Quick to allay any concerns I may be having, my reader begins to explain...the Death card...not literally death...more like transition and change...Then he stops, puts down the cards, takes another deep breath, looks me dead in the eye and says,
Let's cut the crap. You've got a lot of work to do.
And he was right. The jig was up. I was stepping onto the craziest stretch of road in my life to date and I could no longer pretend everything was cool. I'd been miserable for a long time, living a linear life that looked great on paper but was sucking all the juice out of me. When I announced that I had been accepted to my first choice of internship EVERYONE'S immediate reply was not "cool! congratulations!" It was "you are never coming back here." Why didn't I know that?! I lived there with my husband, after all! Where would I be going and what the heck was I projecting to the world that made my misery so readily apparent to everyone but me?!
And so my own personal journey of consciousness began in earnest. I committed myself to living with integrity, clarity and taking responsibility for my choices. No turning back. This is my LIFE we're talking about, after all!
So here we are in 2005. Happily, I can say that I bear very little resemblance to that poor woman in the coffee shop but despite my personal growth I've been noticing something and wonder if you have, too...
The world is getting crazier.
(it's not just me, is it?)
This certainly isn't the world I grew up in. The world is in turmoil and the rules keep changing. No need to overstate the obvious, but...
Let's face it.
We've ALL got a lot of work to do.
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