Fast forward 3 days and apparently, I took a Deep Dive after the initial 36-hour-settling-in period. I have only just surfaced and the hours, days, the ideas, the feelings, the thoughts, sensations, activities, the silence, the earth, air and the fires I made, endlessly, are so fresh in my mind.
A comparison might be moving to a new country: if you want to live and be (in) a new way, live in a new environment, you need to learn the language and the culture before opening your mouth and venturing out amongst the locals.
The Campbellian ‘Call to Adventure’ I wrote about as I left on this quest, is something you feel and not something you think. And it wasn’t until I arrived that I truly understood why I wanted this, why I was here. This wasn’t merely another Rite of Passage. This was also an opportunity to experience and design a journey under my own leadership so I can pass it on.
‘It is time to be the teacher and teach. It is time to pass on all the Ancient and Eastern Wisdom traditions you received and combine it with the Academic teachings you learned. Then have it benefit the next generation, the young professionals.
It is time to expand the frame yet again, and to find vocabulary for this next step.’
Already I feel courageous meeting myself in this full aloneness and I can honestly say that some moments, it felt a bit like Frodo going into the mountain of doom and facing the fire at the end of the journey he was called to embark on. It will take time to give my week in the Pod and my experiences words, to find language to convey.
First, I will sit with it in my heart and let it ruminate.
I will say this: after a few days, you start feeling that sense of belonging to yourself, first. You start listening to the beating of your heart as a compass, listening in a new way. The skin you need to live in is your only real home. Or as poet John O’Donahue puts it: ‘Where you get to rest in the house of your own heart’.
We experience things moving forward and we interpret them looking back. And even though the visions that came to me this week were instant, word-less and insight-full, IN the moment, I will find the clarity and language needed to share the experiences in hindsight. What did it all mean?
And how can it benefit someone else? I was immersed in my journey. In Silence, with the forest, the trees, the air, water and fir, alone in my pod.
A rite of passage can be done at any age. I prepared with passionate energy and built a structure that would work. In the end, I learned the most by letting (it) go. And taking that one small, next, best step. One at a time.
This experience is rich and full and I am in deep gratitude for my husband and children for letting me carve out this time and I can only hope it will inspire and benefit more of you moving forward.
Barbara Piper-Roelofs
~
Barbara writes about the qualities of kindness and compassion and takes a positive approach to health. She supports leaders and teams in their personal development and compassionate leadership. To cultivate what is often referred to as ‘soft skills’ and what she calls the ‘hard skills’; communicating with presence, practicing deep listening and a non-judgmental attitude; being (self)compassionate and building (self)awareness. www.berooted.nl
“By connecting to yourself first, we start living from the inside out and become more resilient.”
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Messages from The Pod
The Deep Dive
Fast forward 3 days and apparently, I took a Deep Dive after the initial 36-hour-settling-in period. I have only just surfaced and the hours, days, the ideas, the feelings, the thoughts, sensations, activities, the silence, the earth, air and the fires I made, endlessly, are so fresh in my mind.
A comparison might be moving to a new country: if you want to live and be (in) a new way, live in a new environment, you need to learn the language and the culture before opening your mouth and venturing out amongst the locals.
The Campbellian ‘Call to Adventure’ I wrote about as I left on this quest, is something you feel and not something you think. And it wasn’t until I arrived that I truly understood why I wanted this, why I was here. This wasn’t merely another Rite of Passage. This was also an opportunity to experience and design a journey under my own leadership so I can pass it on.
‘It is time to be the teacher and teach. It is time to pass on all the Ancient and Eastern Wisdom traditions you received and combine it with the Academic teachings you learned. Then have it benefit the next generation, the young professionals.
It is time to expand the frame yet again, and to find vocabulary for this next step.’
Already I feel courageous meeting myself in this full aloneness and I can honestly say that some moments, it felt a bit like Frodo going into the mountain of doom and facing the fire at the end of the journey he was called to embark on. It will take time to give my week in the Pod and my experiences words, to find language to convey.
First, I will sit with it in my heart and let it ruminate.
I will say this: after a few days, you start feeling that sense of belonging to yourself, first. You start listening to the beating of your heart as a compass, listening in a new way. The skin you need to live in is your only real home. Or as poet John O’Donahue puts it: ‘Where you get to rest in the house of your own heart’.
We experience things moving forward and we interpret them looking back. And even though the visions that came to me this week were instant, word-less and insight-full, IN the moment, I will find the clarity and language needed to share the experiences in hindsight. What did it all mean?
And how can it benefit someone else? I was immersed in my journey. In Silence, with the forest, the trees, the air, water and fir, alone in my pod.
A rite of passage can be done at any age. I prepared with passionate energy and built a structure that would work. In the end, I learned the most by letting (it) go. And taking that one small, next, best step. One at a time.
This experience is rich and full and I am in deep gratitude for my husband and children for letting me carve out this time and I can only hope it will inspire and benefit more of you moving forward.
Barbara Piper-Roelofs
~
Barbara writes about the qualities of kindness and compassion and takes a positive approach to health. She supports leaders and teams in their personal development and compassionate leadership. To cultivate what is often referred to as ‘soft skills’ and what she calls the ‘hard skills’; communicating with presence, practicing deep listening and a non-judgmental attitude; being (self)compassionate and building (self)awareness. www.berooted.nl
“By connecting to yourself first, we start living from the inside out and become more resilient.”