What a difference a few moments make. The change that took place this morning would scarcely have happened two years ago. For the first few minutes, I stumbled across my bedroom, then grabbed for covers that offered some protection from the chilly room. I was partly alive in my head, and only dimly aware that I had a body. The only reminder that my body even existed was the chill that stabbed at my skin for attention.
I was only dimly alive in my head, a faint light on top of a dark, cold and silent body. I felt chilly waves lapping at the edges of my awareness, splashing for attention, but not really rushing in.
I read a few lines from Rilke and Ellen Bass, and my inner world suddenly came alive. Within seconds of my allowing Ellen’s words to sink in, everything changed. I sank into my body again, awareness rushed to the tips of my fingers and toes. The feeling of wholeness returned, like a balloon being blown up again. My edges stretched out until they suddenly disappeared.
In just a few moments, nothing concrete existed excepted the touch of sheets, the glare of a lamp through my eyelids, the sound of a passing car. But I was aware of so much more, as everything became a part of me and my expanding body.
My mind relaxed its cautious and lonely vigil as it settled into the exuberance of a body that wanted to extend to the margins of everything. I became focused on the lively welcome going out to everything inside and outside of my skin.
The initial tiny flame of my weak and feeble alertness had burst into a roaring blaze of awareness that consumed all of my body and reached out to embrace everything it could experience or imagine.
Thank you, Ellen. Once again, a few words from you have helped transform my morning. I have emerged from an isolated, narrow corner of my mind into a throbbing body alert and aware of this new day. My steps from my bedroom have been infused with life. It had only been a few moments. In that time, my sun and world had risen.