Getting lost

Two weeks ago was the Epiphany on the Christian calendar.  For those who don't know the significance of that day, it marks the day in which the wise men or kings arrived to honor the baby Jesus after following the star as their guide.  In some cultures Christmas Eve/Christmas Day marks the beginning of the celebration of the holiday, which for them ends on January 6, when Twelfth Night celebrations occur.  The giving of gifts at that time mirrors the gifts the magi brought to the infant.

Anyone who has lived through the drum of Christmas carols on elevator and department store music or even read William Shakespeare's "The Twelfth Night" probably at least vaguely knows about those events or traditions.  "We Three Kings of Orient Are" "The Twelve Days of Christmas," "O Little Town of Bethlehem," etc. My interest in these events is more than what I've learned from piped-in music. I've actually studied these events at some length.

I love to learn.  I particularly like to learn something that adds to or alters an understanding that was pretty well entrenched for me.  (For instance, maybe this week the discovery of the likelihood of a new planet.) So it was two weeks ago on Epiphany, when our pastor shared that the kings didn't actually arrive in Bethlehem directly.  They actually went to Jerusalem first, which was about 12 miles from Bethlehem.  They got lost before correcting their course and making their objective.

He went on to compare the journey of the kings with any spiritual journey.  Sometimes we get lost. Yesterday I wrote of getting lost on my journey to be present and grateful.  I think there have been times when I was very good at that.  Then I got lost.  I am sure the kings didn't know the first step that took them away from their intended destination, but as some point they became aware that they were 12 miles from where they wanted to be. I don't know when I began to stray either, but I clearly had.

What I do know is that it was easier when I had my own business.  I worked very hard, but I could pick and choose my work, and I could delay work when it would keep me from being really focused on something I was already working on.  For many years, clients booked several months in advance to do my intensives or to schedule a speech, usually around my schedule.

I've made it up that I can't do that when someone else is my boss.  I say I've made that up because I mostly haven't tried saying to my boss that I am overbooked when being given a new task. I haven't been clear about when my boundaries were being crossed.  I haven't said to someone that I want to talk with them later but right now I need to be present to what I am doing.  I can't say that I could be more present because I haven't tried all the things my colleague has demonstrated to me so nicely.

I also wrote yesterday about circumstances being laboratories for personal growth. Yes, it was easier to really be present when I controlled most of the variables, so that may have been "Being Present 101."  My real job that I will go back to next week will probably be the graduate school version of that lesson.

In one of her books, Carol Pearson wrote about the Hero's Journey like concentric circles.  She says that we learn the same lessons (or live the same archetypes) over and again, but each time what we learn is supposed to be different--a more advanced lesson.  I like to think that maybe I've just been in a more challenging lesson, but when the pastor spoke of being lost, it really resonated for me.  I have felt lost, but am learning.

While there is something heavy about the inevitability of learning the same lessons over and over again like "Ground Hog Day," I find it uplifting that if I am awake enough to see the lessons and learn them, I keep growing...and I will keep growing for as long as I notice the lesson.  For someone who likes to learn, that is a delicious prospect.