On Saturday January 7t, a small group of seekers set out on their own journey down the yellow brick road. In the beginning, we explored the Walking a Sacred Path DVD by Lauren Artress. The DVD shared stories of three people who used the Labyrinth to find the courage to make a career change, to find career direction, and to find physical healing from a stroke. These three people mirrored the characters of the Scarecrow, The Tin Man, and the Lion in the story of the Wizard of OZ. The Labyrinth is a tool of transformation that allows the mind to settle while the body focuses on walking, placing one foot in front of the other. The gentle focus of movement allows the body to let go of anxiety, worries, and fear and as the journeyer focuses on walking, a mindfulness takes place that the walker does not have to strive for, mindfulness just happens. The brain relaxes and the journeyer is able to experience being in the present.
Walking the Labyrinth mirrors the Yellow brick road in so many ways. On Saturday, we explored how our inadequacies, hurts, and fears that keep us immobilized not allowing our heart’s desire to be attained. When we are busy wrestling with our inadequacies, hurts, and fears rather than becoming their friend, listening to their needs and giving them what they need then our lives are full of chaos and anguish. As Dorothy walks the Yellow Brick Road in search to find the magical wizard that will take her home again, she discovers fellow journeyers who also have needs. They travel together and in their travels, magic happens. The Scarecrow ends up being the smartest of them all, giving direction, working a travel plan and overcoming obstacles. The Tin Man is full of empathy and cries easily at other’s pain. The Lion is the one that is most fear-less taking on the witch and climbing up the wall to the rescue Toto. All along, each journeyer had what they needed inside; they just needed to come to realize it. But, like most humans, these characters still could not see what was inside until the make believe wizard gave them symbols of their inner strengths. It is human to need re-assurance that we are smart, loved, and courageous. Replicating the walk down the Yellow Brick Road can be done by walking the Labyrinth. On Saturday, the journeyer’s placed their inadequacies, hurts, and fear in baskets along the way and when they arrived into the center there was a red stone symbolizing the red shoes Dorothy was wearing. Just by clicking the shoes three times, she was able to go home to Kansas, without the Wizard’s hot-air balloon.
Come travel with me on Labyrinth Mondays as I continue to explore how the Labyrinth is a tool in your daily life. Follow me on www.drdilley.blogspot.com or www.facebook.inamomentsnotice.com
Showing posts with label wizard of oz. Show all posts
Showing posts with label wizard of oz. Show all posts
Monday, January 9, 2012
Monday, November 21, 2011
Labyrinth: Key to Inner Hunger-Outward Change
Are you hungry for change? Do you feel like something is missing in your life? Perhaps, you have become so busy that you do not notice the still small voice inside of you that is calling out to be heard. January 2012 is around the corner. Each year we are inundated with Holiday buying and chaos that takes us away from our center and each year we promise ourselves that we will do better next year. We make promises to ourselves and sometime to others that we will change, spend less, become thinner, get into shape and by November of 2012, it is possible that we will be feeling guilty for not achieving last year’s goals, and wonder what happened to our good intentions.
Walking meditation is a simple and easy way to keep us in contact with that still small voice within. By the time that we are forced to be mindful, placing one foot in front of the other, we have calmed the voice of fear, negativity, and aloneness. Those three voices are representative of the characters in the Wizard of Oz, the Lion, Scarecrow, and Tin Man.
From a psychological perspective, Dorothy’s three friends are projections of her inner critics that keep her blind to the truth that she can return home at any time by just clicking her red shoes. However, it takes a village of support to help her navigate her way through the dark forest, and down the yellow brick road. It is through this journey, becoming friends with her fear, critic, and broken heart that she harvests her one inner wisdom and gains the confidence to click the red shoes.
One paradox in this story (and there are many) is that we remain unsettled, upset and in search of something outside of ourselves until we go home. One metaphor of going home is finding our spiritual center and one key that will help us to do that is walking the Labyrinth.
The Labyrinth provides us with a way of finding ourselves and our power within. It is hard to define for you what you will experience by walking the Labyrinth, because each person’s experience is different than other pilgrims walking the Labyrinth. Each time I walk it, I have a different experience. Come on January 7, 2012 and start your year off with a walking meditation that can be first step in making 2012 an extraordinary vs. ordinary year.
Walking meditation is a simple and easy way to keep us in contact with that still small voice within. By the time that we are forced to be mindful, placing one foot in front of the other, we have calmed the voice of fear, negativity, and aloneness. Those three voices are representative of the characters in the Wizard of Oz, the Lion, Scarecrow, and Tin Man.
From a psychological perspective, Dorothy’s three friends are projections of her inner critics that keep her blind to the truth that she can return home at any time by just clicking her red shoes. However, it takes a village of support to help her navigate her way through the dark forest, and down the yellow brick road. It is through this journey, becoming friends with her fear, critic, and broken heart that she harvests her one inner wisdom and gains the confidence to click the red shoes.
One paradox in this story (and there are many) is that we remain unsettled, upset and in search of something outside of ourselves until we go home. One metaphor of going home is finding our spiritual center and one key that will help us to do that is walking the Labyrinth.
The Labyrinth provides us with a way of finding ourselves and our power within. It is hard to define for you what you will experience by walking the Labyrinth, because each person’s experience is different than other pilgrims walking the Labyrinth. Each time I walk it, I have a different experience. Come on January 7, 2012 and start your year off with a walking meditation that can be first step in making 2012 an extraordinary vs. ordinary year.
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