Toleak and a look back at Summer 2015

 Toleak Point is on the coast of Washington State, about .....

In my transformative year last year (my "Chariot" year, in Tarot), I experienced a very painful and deep loss of and unravelling family/friend relationship. By the time my first  Toleak Point backpacking experience came upon me, I was raw and exposed and desperate for renewal. Having never experienced a long backcountry hike like this one, Everything was new and fascinating and challenging and unexpected, mainly because I went in with no expectation.

This year, (my "strength" year in Tarot), that wound has begun the process of healing. This was also my second  Toleak Point backpacking experience, and I understood the physical challenges of such an excursion. As with any repeat experience, there is as much to compare with similarity as there are differences in each experience.

This year I came to Toleak feeling stronger, more grounded, having practiced setting my personal boundaries that were so thoroughly dismantled from my loss last year. I spent most of my waking moments practicing being in the present moment. This is what Tokeak means to me. I woke when I became aware of my surroundings, and got up when my body bid me to rise. I ate when I was hungry, and moved when I felt the urge to.

One of the beauties of extended "recreation" is that there is always something to do, but very little that must be done. Having the time and space to return to listening to my own intuition, my own body's requests and taking the time to fully explore each moment without agenda or time constraints is a rare gift. To be able to do it amongst a tribe of like-minded people expands the experience from a personal one to a process of building community. Each of us is able bodied, and I believe we all came prepared, but the opportunity to share our experience, our knowledge and our resources deepened our tribal bonds, and created a sense of peace and safety in the middle of the wilderness.

This sacred and safe space and community provided the opportunity for each of us to explore our own inner journey, and reclaim something we were missing, or had lost touch with. For some, it was a silent solo journey. For others, it was an opportunity to be held in love and comfort as they fell apart and released that which no longer served them.

There will be other posts for me to share some of the more playful and outward/observable moments we experienced at Toleak, but for me, Toleak is different from other adventures in that the opportunity to set up our tribal village and practice being a tribal community is highlighted. 

Just like each of us in the tribe, Toleak remains similar over the years, and yet each time we return it is undeniably changed. 

For me, having had a year to heal from my emotional scars of last summer, I see how far I've come, but the scars are still fresh and still hold me back from time to time in my relationships with others. Being able to take the time out of my day to day life, I am better able to hear that still small voice inside me, once the clatter, chaos and rush of modern civilization is removed. 

I recall one morning, as my love and I made the half mile journey around the point, over the log jam, and waded through the stream to get to some clear water to filter for the day, I felt the shift away from my civilized mind and into my human animal mind. No longer was I consciously focusing on correct body movement, and my outward appearance. It was like somebody turned off the glaring light of civilized expectation, and I was blessedly moving in the dark, using proprioception and inner cues to move my body fluidly from log to log, focusing on my place in space, rather than the gaping abyss below each log. I trusted my body's cues. It's so very difficult to find the words to explain this shift, but it was very clear to me, that I was "humaning". I was experiencing the full expression of my whole Self. My civilized shell was gone. And I wasn't rude, or bad, or wrong. I just was. I was be-ing. 

Later, my husband and I had this exchange:

E: "you are clearly in your happy place"

R: "what do you mean?"

E: "I see your light shining through clearer now than at home. You are at peace"

Well, it went something like that. The point I took from it was to remember that feeling. Seek that out in my daily life, and make that my anchor point. When I get too far from that sense of calm and sense of true Self, it's time to return to nature - my happy place - and find my center.