Repetition

“They always say, “Do it again”… [It is] grown-up people [who] are not strong enough to exult in monotony. But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible that God says every morning, “Do it again” to the sun; and every evening, “Do it again” to the moon…. The repetition in nature may not be mere recurrence; it may be a theatrical encore.”

My sister led me to a new, beautiful, delightfully happy and good, blog called:

www.aholyexperience.com


In one post she talks about ceremony-the repeated act of celebrating things that are important to us.

I was thinking about how we repeat the same poses in yoga over and over again. I thought about how sometimes I'm surprised that a pose feels new. Sometimes we have to walk the same path in life several times, over and over, for it to become new again and teach us something (I'm thinking temple, here). I'm reading this poet right now, Kay Ryan. She has a poem about it.

Repetition

Trying to walk

the same way

to the same

store takes

high-wire balance:

each step not

exactly as

before risks

chasms of

flatness. One

tumble alone

and nothing happend. Few

are the willing

and fewer

the champions.

I get grumpy sometimes about doing the same thing because its nearly impossible to repeat something exactly as before and sometimes the chasms are scary. The chasms of flatness can feel like deep grooves that you sink into and cannot escape. But there are risks and tumbles don't really do anything except tumble. Anyway, I am appreciating the value of doing something many times. Of forgiving seventy times seven, or writing the same sentence over and over until it is right. The skill of walking the same path over and over is one that takes so long to develop but is so rewarding. The familiarity of things makes them that much more special. Sometimes these days I long for sameness. I long to do the same thing each day and feel the grooves of my life get smooth. Unfortunately, it doesn't always work out that way. So, in the meantime while we are working things out I think I will try to find the grooves we have and work on maintaining them as we are trying to sort out the new ones.