Oh Deer!

By Kellie Meisl

Spring has caught me completely off-guard. Gone are my days of walking for hours in the forest, opening my heart and getting my head clear. I didn't plan on this. So far I have walked every day of 2012 and had planned to continue until April 9th, on my one hundredth day, when I would then switch to neighborhood jaunts, or more likely the treadmill, spending outdoor time in my gardens.

Why have my walks ended abruptly? Deer ticks. I found about twenty of them on me and my dog Ribsy (none embedded) after our walk to the beaver pond yesterday, one of my favorite locations. The warnings are stern, don't mess around with these Lyme carrying creatures, most no larger than a common pin head.

That said, I was making my morning cup of tea, and thinking that I don't feel quite ready to tackle the gardens yet, though the 80-degree March days seem to be nudging me to do so. And then I thought about a big dream I had two Marches ago where I was standing in my yard, reveling at my neglected gardens and realizing they had survived just fine on their own, even their borders were in tact. In the dream, a wise woman who stood beside me ignored my frenzied call to pull a large, twisted tree from the rushing stream beside the gardens, one I thought I should grab--for the sake of art--it would've made a great piece. In her simple defiance of what was supposed-to happen, she transmitted to my mind and spirit a calm that let me know there was no rush.

The dream has taken on a life of its own, becoming a piece of art work, truly, but more so, a creed by which I now fashion my life (when I remember to): Go With the Flow.

Flow 3/17/2011

And then I remembered the words of my dear friend who told me, just yesterday, she has been consciously telling herself of late that she should do the things that she usually tells herself she shouldn't and she shouldn't do the things she normally tells herself she should, and it has been giving her great peace of mind. All of this came about as she, like me, has been examining her core beliefs and how she has bought into some backward thinking she would now like to reverse.

To add to this, I just read in The Mastery of Love, by Don Miguel Ruiz, that we shouldn't believe a word we say. He says, "Don't believe [the inner voice], because it isn't true. Open your ears, open your heart, and listen." He is referring to the inner voice with the negative belief system, the one that was basically implanted when we were innocent children and, still developing, hadn't the awareness yet to hit the delete button for beliefs that didn't resonate with us.

And so, with the simple inconvenience of the deer tick, and the true words of my dear friend, along with the life-changing message from the wise woman, I have come up with my annual summer garden theme: let go and Listen.

I am quite sure the gardens are trying to tell me something and have politely waited as I've rushed around in frenzied fashion scooping up their dried up remnants, thoughtlessly planning their future without even consulting them.

Ahhh, this a relief then, for I am invoking the guidance of the wise woman and nature devas, what more have I to do, but listen.....

Writer Kellie Meisl, of Pittsfield, Massachusetts, keeps a blog called Walk, in which this piece appeared first. A visual artist, Kellie relies on dreams as a springboard for her work. In 2009, she published her first book, "Dream Stories: Recovering the Inner Mystic." Her visual art, including the collage "Shattered Cups," which appeared on the cover of Seeing Red, can be viewed at her website: www.kelliemeisldreamart.com.