So it is the new year, 2021, and we start afresh and brilliantly renewed! Or so the story goes…. it’s another day which happens to be the day after New Year’s Eve. It is another 24 hours that we have been given to live, create, love, laugh, cry, come and go! This moment is it for us….this is all we have. Whether we have Lyme Disease or a new baby or lost our best friend, this moment is where we put our feelings and agony or joy.
I feel we truly are all in this together…think about that. This means the good, the bad and the ugly are all One. Love is easily bestowed on the beautiful and good, more difficult to give to the poor, diseased, angry and vengeful perpetrator. Living in love is my choice! Knowing the magnitude and enormous charge this is often overwhelms me and challenges every fiber of my being. Yet, I am moving forward, one step at a time, breathing in and out, one foot in front of the other. I am a work in progress not perfection.
I had seven weeks of relief, to a large extent, from a Lyme episode. My gratitude was overwhelming and big. I allowed my psyche to put total health out to the Universe. I see myself as whole, energetic and absolutely cured. Out of the blue and totally unannounced, I am slammed with an episode that literally knocks me off my feet and plants me horizontal for 10 to 12 days. I am pushed to the ground mentally and emotionally simultaneously. I live in the vision and belief so fully that when reality interrupts my jamming, I am shocked, surprised and just a bit resentful. I get self-indulgent instead of living in the actual moment, episode or not. This being present is the most magnanimous present I can give myself. So why not live in it, swim with it and swallow every delicious bit of the now? It takes thoughtfulness regarding what we think, do and say. It takes prayer and doing for others. It takes loving the other person no matter their convictions, qualities and feelings. I have not conquered any of these to perfection, but I am more committed and will continue my journey in this beautiful, transient landscape towards love and being present.
So be here now, with me, as Ram Das would say. See all around you, every color, object and pattern. Breathe in all the aromas including flowers, fresh air, smoke from burning embers and various olfactory delights. Tell the person nearest you that you love them in your own special way, as I love all of you just the way you are! Love and peace to all, CJ
Claudia is a business woman, a wife, a mother, and now a Chronic Lyme patient. Life changed, yet with the challenges have come opportunities – she is a writer who now has time to do just that! Claudia is a Columbia CSL member and a volunteer leader with our Youth and Family Program, sharing her words of wisdom with all of us. Check out more of Claudia’s story here.
