Okay, so you’ve re-committed after those early annoyances (which can be more than minor irritants, but are just a taste of things to come), and are back on the journey. Yeah!
You know the funny thing about when you commit, truly commit, to the journey, you walk through some sort of supernatural portal. Or, it can sure feel that way.
Like, remember in Star Wars when the characters have all signed on, and head out to parts unknown? They stop off at that crazy bar. Filled with creatures of all aspects and descriptions and eyeballs. Lots of eyeballs. I’m not exactly sure why that’s what I remember but I do!
Anyway, here our heroes are going, what the ??
Haven’t you had that experience? You’ve begun the journey to your dream, and walk into the coffee shop and it’s filled with strangers where once you knew everybody? It’s that ‘where am I’ sort of feeling. The realization that ‘Toto, we’re not in Kansas anymore.’
But almost always someone you didn’t know walks up and offers you a map of some sort. You’re in the bookstore and this wizened old man asks what you’re looking for, and knows just the tome to find your answers. You’re putting a piece together for your new business and find someone online who’s walked this very path and says, “Oh, here’s what you need.” You decide to write a book and the perfect mentor shows up, almost out of thin air.
I always loved this quote by Patanjali: “When you are inspired by some great purpose, some extraordinary project, all your thoughts break their bonds: Your mind transcends limitations, your consciousness expands in every direction, and you find yourself in a new, great, and wonderful world. Dormant forces, faculties and talents become alive, and you discover yourself to be a greater person by far than you ever dreamed yourself to be.”
And for whatever reason, those dormant forces bring with them these types of allies.
Some of the helpers show up and disappear, and you wonder if they were ever real at all. Angels sometimes walk amongst us to then vanish without a trace. The nurse who prayed over your bedside and you immediately felt well, then when you asked of her, no one had ever worked at the hospital with that description. A supernatural being? Who knows. But often even the “real” ones take a hike out of your story and don’t come back.
But a lot of them stick around for the journey, helping you in this way or that, teaching you, offering you lessons to learn parts of whatever you’re needing to succeed on this quest.
And often they truly seem to fall out of the sky.
Way back when, when I quit my executive position, moved to the farm, and began my writing career, I saw in the paper (yes, the stone ages, pre-Internet!) a tiny ad for a writer’s conference. I just happened to catch it, as living out in the middle of nowhere, I didn’t have much access to the Ft. Worth newspaper. And this tiny ad was only run once.
But that led me to go to the conference, where I found to my delight a writer’s workshop, which I joined. And that led to meeting a host of publishing folks, ultimately to a literary agent, and finally to a publishing contract. All allies on my quest, indeed.
A similar thing happened last summer, when I was speaking at a literary conference, and led to a meeting with a blogging coach and a new publisher and . . . well, my life took a different direction.
Serendipity? Supernatural energy? A guardian angel of the arts looking after me?
Who knows! I don’t question anymore.
What I do know for true, however, is that once you go through that portal into a new dimension, natural laws seem bent a bit differently, and the allies you need show up. Look for them.
Who has helped you on your path?
