The pendulum.

I cant help but to recall the internal voices who were calling to me before I left for Maui. They talked like I talk. With enthusiasm, fire and yet enough sweetness to make the heat seem unassuming, as if the words really didn't matter. But once you reflect on them, the weight is upon your shoulders just like a small child is when the world seems so vast above Daddy's eye-level. Heavy enough to make the muscles work, but not heavy enough to burden your skeleton.

One of the voices I heard loud and clear before I left was one who preached solitude. Today, I had a chance to ask a pendulum for guidance on this subject. Low and behold, the answer remains in clear agreeance with the voice. (Is agreeance a word? Spell check is saying no.)  Either way, the pendulum supports the voice and vice-versa. Deep breathe in, lion's breath out.

What??!?! Me!?!?! Anna?!?! You want ME to be in solitude for 'x' amount of time? Like, for more than a minute? For a few days, maybe weeks, maybe months, dare I say years? Ugh. Ok, ok. I give in-- hesitantly. I get it. I get that its a good lesson to learn. I get that I am 25 and need to experience this virtue to its fullest. I get that when you experience emptiness than even the greeting of the morning sun becomes good company. I do. I get it intellectually, but emotionally, mentally, physically, I can truly say I have not REALLY been there. I've always had a friend to lean on, or a male distraction/form of entertainment to fix my eyes upon. A car to run errands so I can at least be around people. A coffee shop or bar to see ten people I know at at any given time.

Maybe this is what the locals mean when Maui gives you tests to take, and its not that she "takes you in or spits you out", but rather, can you stand up to the test of yourself? Can you face yourself in the middle of this place that has the power to put you in touch with your deepest Spirit? Can you clean off the dirt enough to look into the mirror in front of you and be willing to meet your lips with the lips of your reflection? Ultimately, can you love yourself just as you are. No makeup, fancy accessories, no other person to tell you how wonderful you are. No car to escape far away, no nothing. Just you, yourself and the natural elements that surround you- that wrap you up in banana leaves, smear aloe on your skin and warm you with the sun that stretches between the places where the ocean meets the sky. That, and cane spiders. The entire shri-filled spectrum of her gifts. Can you handle it, she asks?

Trust. Soften. (Maybe cry, maybe smile.) Breathe.

It's the deep breathe before the plunge. My test, I am foreseeing, is to see just how far down I can go. How much dirt can I clean off, and how many possessions I can survive in the jungle without? What tools do I keep near and dear to me and which ones am I willing to let go of to take some of the weight off while I continue to crawl (and sometimes leap) forward? Not easy! For me, terrifying at times-- the kind where you feel it from your skin to muscle and muscle to bone. The kind that makes you gasp for fresh air even if you know that air can only fill one lung.

It feels heavy. I'm willing to bear the weight right now. Simply because the gift that is in near sight is more and more liberation-- freedom. Sweet, nectarian freedom. Freedom from possessions, others and the self. Then, once I let go enough for it to take its course, once the lesson reaches its peak, I can know I am getting closer to that nectar. Friends will become something I hold like I would a newborn baby. Lovers will become Gods. Family will become stone pillars that wouldn't break even in the midst of the largest earthquake. And the self will be able to shine it's light like a firefly.

This, my friends, is a high calling. If you hear the voice inside, answer to it. Do your 'self' the favor. Crawl upon the jungle floor towards the beaches of Hana. Liberate.