THE LOW HANGING CLIFFS
starting with the easy spells
I thought I might start again. Start small. Not overthink. I forgot the sentence I wanted to start with but I want to start anyway.
I was reading a book about place and community and our bodies just now and it made me remember the black, rolling rocks I jumped off of a few months ago into the cold waters of late summer Lake Superior.
I’ve been laying here trying to figure out what made me think of jumping off the rocks. Please bear with me while I find my way back.
There are images in my mind:
I stood on the rock, looking down at my friend on the other side of our own tiny inlet. They looked so small crouched by the water’s edge. I felt their eyes like a rope attached to my body. I hear their voice traverse the inlet and tell me to jump.
There’s a still from a video of the jump where my friend’s foot is touching the horizon line like it’s a tightrope. Limbs are out in all directions. Clothes are off. Water is dark dark blue. The body is in the sun.
As if I could stand behind myself, I see my own body, hugging my knees on the cliff’s edge, eyes closed. I see the reel of doubt behind my eyes turning faster and faster, until the isolated fears turned nebulous and became panic. I was hiding the drop from sight, hoping it would give me the courage to jump, but I’ve always liked looking down from high places.
I thought jumping would be easy.
I thought that if I summoned up all the fear I held in my body, fear of things less tangible than heights, that I’d have to jump to prove to myself that I could feel the fear and do it anyway. That’s what my mom always said to me when I was afraid as a child.
I’d watched my friends both jump. I few times I said, “Okay, I’m ready.” My body would lunge forward like I was going to leave the rock and then it would jolt to a stop. It felt like a hand was reaching through my skin and grabbing my spine. I was getting so frustrated. Tears were silently escaping my eyes and my brain was spiraling into a place of discouraging voices that all sounded eerily like my own.
I was turning something fun into something sad. I wasn’t the fearless person I wanted to be. I had an audience. I didn’t know how to share the fire that was burning in my head. I didn’t know if I wanted to.
Maybe you do this too: turn moments into metaphors and make actions symbolic. I’ve always liked marking time with my body. That’s why I go to the spa and have them scrub all the dead skin off my body when I’m starting something new.
Then I looked toward the horizon and saw the lower cliff. I looked at it for a long time trying to decide if scaling back would feel like failing or opening a door. The panic was rising in me because I knew I couldn’t leave without jumping and I was beginning to believe I might not have it in me.
A dear friend of mine saw me looking at the lower ledge, walked over to the spot, and jumped off.
I thought about what my crossfit coaches used to say about the strength and skill of scaling to where you’re at on any given day. Listening through the preset expectations is where it gets sticky.
I knew in my body I could jump off that lower cliff. I also knew that jumping off the lower cliff would make it easy to jump off the cliff where I’d laid in utter defeat for thirty minutes. I decided to relinquish the shame I felt about needing to jump off the lower cliff first and stepped toward the edge, toes curling around the dark rock catching late sun.
The second my feet reached the edge, I looked down at the water, now in shadow, and my feet finally left the edge. My sun-warmed skin broke the surface of the chilly water and I felt the entirety of my body, cold and warm all at once. I burst through the surface with a laugh. All the time I’d spent teetering on the edge was forgiven, or at least I decided it would be.
The lesson then felt obvious. I was trying to force my way through the fear rather than adjusting to accommodate it. In this case, it needed a slower start and a little encouragement. I was a step closer to enjoying the time I had in nature with my friends.
So this book I’m reading right now “Holding the Center: Sanctuary in a Time of Confusion” by Richard Strozzi Heckler, demonstrates many beautiful lessons, all of which orbit in the idea that connection to place, others, and the life force in our own bodies is the foundation of a happy life. Conversely, a disconnection from these things is at the root of deep suffering.
I’ve long been longing for a place to stay and see through its seasons. Seeing the land cycle from spring into summer and then into a colorful autumn in Michigan only made me more sure that I want to be somewhere wild, I want to be with my friends, and I want to stay.
I’m still seeing my friend’s face looking at me encouragingly from me at the waters edge. I see their feet walking the horizon and I know they saw me through some seasons and I saw them too. I often cannot believe that there are people around me who want to bear witness to my breakdowns on the edges of cliffs. And I am so grateful that they continually remind me of their existence.
Having recently left a small wooded community where I saw familiar faces every day and rarely wanted for a friend, I am noticing myself walking around all day in the city carrying a heavy wanting to be held.
When I can’t feel the depth of my grief or forget where my joy begins, the memory of my body flying through space over and over again off the cliff reminds me to go towards the lower hanging cliffs instead of the floor-less room of my fears.
It’s harder to hold people when they’re far away but I’m trying to invent new, fun ways to play the game of communication. It’s harder to hold myself when my body aches and happiness is slippery. But there’s so many good things and I hope the good things will help lead me to acceptance for the harder things.
I started working with clay again for the first time in a long time and it feels big and important. I think I just set off on a life long journey of touching and firing earth into thoughts and vessels for thoughts. I feel like the last six months of watching people move through their creative practices made me more clear than ever that we create practices to externalize our truths and move us through the day. Strozzi writes “A practice is not so much about achieving a goal, avoiding something, improving yourself, or making your wishes come true, as about creating a positive environment, internally and externally, for the awakening process to take hold.”
So, right now as we are entering this seasonal time of rest, I want to keep starting where it feels easy. You’d think we would naturally do what feels good but I think we do what we think should feel good, or what seems to feel good for other people. I want to do what my friend said to me last night in a text before bed, “dream easy magic.”
I’m doing the easiest spells right now. These look like showing up on a yoga mat and making sure the milk for my chai is warm and sweet.
It’s not always easy to do the easy thing, but I’m going to be walking out on those low hanging cliffs.
For The Record:
Things I’ve been enjoying lately
This poem by Adam Zagajewski from his book “Mysticism for Beginners” and other eps of this podcast. Padraig O Tuama’s voice when he reads and analyzes the poems is so calming.
This album by Conor Oberst
I think that might be all for now. If you made it this far, thanks for reading. Feel free to drop me a line or leave a comment if any of this resonates. Until next time.
"That’s why I go to the spa and have them scrub all the dead skin off my body when I’m starting something new." !!
Enjoyed reading this, Jenn! here's to lots of scrubbing in the next year.