I learned not too long ago that jn Skydiving you can control your rate of descent by how you adjust your body. If you put your body out stretched like a starfish – it’s called a Box position. You’re going slower (obviously still falling). However if you bring everything in like a pencil and tuck your head down – you’re going into a dive. By reducing your drag – you can get to terminal velocity faster – about 186 miles an hour.
About 9 years ago I wrote a blog post about heading to Dubai and meeting my Coffee Master. In it , I talk about feeling as I have been pushed off a cliff and in this freefall. Thanks to Abdul Hamid – I got the perspective to look around at my surroundings and appreciate the fact that there has been this thing around me that’s dictated these invisible currents – allowing me to go where I am needed. I know it sounds weird – but it’s something I’ve just felt. I didn’t really have the vocabulary for all of it until I sat with Sara who was able to clearly see what I had been failing to put my finger on (of which you will always have my love and admiration for those moments ).
It would be many years until I came face to face with that experience in finding another totem that pointed me to Michael Singers The Untethered Soul. For the first time in a long time I felt like I finally understood what I was doing unconsciously. That was such an awesome feeling of feeling not alone – and that you could get lost in that feeling and these amazing emotions. Some terrifying – but most just intensely good.
Circling back to a conversation on coffee I got a chance to go back to that post and sit with it again. I remembered that while I was pushed off a cliff – the cliff wasn’t where I wanted to be. It didn’t have purpose. While I hated the feeling of falling- Abdul was able to calm the voices enough to allow me to enjoy the view – seeing it as a controlled fall.
This past year has felt a lot like that. I can see the fall – but rather than freak out about the position – I’ve just put myself in a box. Being able to slow the fall has let me survey the area and see what is at the ground. The very specific target.
In the Avengers there’s a scene where Steve Rogers jumps out of the back of a plane. A couple of seconds in a box he looks down and adjust into a straight dive.
And that’s kind of where I feel. I am right now. I was able to survey the area, I adjusted my body, and headed into a straight dive. As everything starts going faster I feel like there’s bits and pieces of me that are just flying off the size and the edges. But there is a sense of clarity as the speed gets faster. I feel like I’m aiming and I’m trying to figure out how to be able to go faster still. That – feels like purpose.
It was a cool picture in my head and a great way for me to remind myself about what I’m doing and why I’m doing it. Just go faster – try not to break any more pieces.
For most of all. Don’t lose purpose.
