Sorting Through the Muck

Allow me to share a dream from about 30 years ago, that I still recall vividly.  Back in the days when Corporate America invested in people via sending them to training for up to a week. I was selected to participate in a woman’s only one-week course at the Center for Creative Leadership in La Jolla.  As a single mother of two, this alone sounded like heaven and so arrangements were made for my escape, with little regard to the training content.  

Once I arrived and settled in, it became clear this program would ask me to be vulnerable with a group of strangers and explore leadership traits that were lacking, and yes, those that could be honed.  This was offered in a supported environment and was way over my comfort zone, way way over my comfort zone. 

Three days into the training a dream appeared and stayed with me all these years.  Being the daughter of farmers, I was well acquainted with how animal byproducts were distributed to the soil and the smell associated with this. The cow poop was loaded up into a manure spreader and flung over acres and acres of land. The manure nourished the soil, the smell made me glad this was not a frequent occurrence.  

In my dream, I was in the back of a manure spreader, up to my knees in manure and, with my hands sorting through each bit of it. I was convinced with absolute certainty that this was necessary, for there were clearly things buried in this pile of manure that were critical to moving forward.  It took hours and hours. I was stinky, sweaty, exhausted and still kept digging, sifting and sorting, looking for the buried jewels under the muck.  When I awoke, it was clear there was work to be done, including showing up in my vulnerability to the training that day. 

Thirty years later, I still spend time sorting through manure. I recognize the magnificent and dreadful challenge of being on a spiritual journey. It is something only you can do. Someone else can provide support and be a mirror, yet the digging, the excavation, the sorting through the sh*t,  has to be mine. The sweat of uncovering what is beneath the manure and in the deep dark recesses, the shadows, is my job and only my job. May I embrace it fully while being graceful with myself.

So, while 2020 may appear to be a stinky, smelly mess that we just want to release onto the fields and get it out of here, we also know that sorting through this mess will yield some nuggets of insight and jewels of understanding. So, please join me to explore this together.