In the mornings during my dark night, I read Jamie’s Dancing the Dream and decided to use her words as my guide. Jamie lays out seven paths of initiation inside of spiritual transformation coming from her native traditions of the Southern Seers. In the first path she lays out the importance of service to others. And service is pretty serious stuff. First a person must desire to be of service and then decide to be of service and then, and here is the kicker, finally a person moves into “personal devotion and commitment to making the world a better place for everyone.” And I’m starting to think that this is way beyond the I’ll write a check to a charity or go serve the homeless for an afternoon – both of which I did and are important – but this was a calling! The challenge for me is that I had never really considered devoting and committing myself to this level of service. Like who does that?
I certainly was not the kind of person who did that. And I had no idea how to do that even if I tried. So back to the internet.
I started to scour the internet for opportunities that might help me explore this and I came across an advertisement for mentors needed for the Friends First program at Mercy Home in Chicago. So I went to an information session. And I filled out an application and was accepted and finally I went to the mentor training and was assigned a mentee. The commitment was for one year with a max of three years and inside of that I was agreeing to outings that we would create together 2-3 days per month and a phone call every week. As soon as I met Kobe’, I knew what Jamie meant. Right then and there I knew that in this small part of the world I would personally devote and commit myself to Kobe’ and would stay that way for as long as he wanted me to.
As so many mentors will tell you, we commit to be of service to another and we end up being served ourselves. And what was so important and life changing for me is that Kobe’ propelled me out of my dark night onto a journey where he and others have been teaching me how to be the kind of person who is personally devoted and committed to making the world a better place.
Like yikes! This is way out of my comfort zone, I mean WAY OUT OF MY COMFORT ZONE! But here’s the thing about this journey so far, for in my journey I am no longer alone in my chair. Nope, suddenly i am on a big-ass couch surrounded by those who continue to guide and encourage me. So I’d just better get used to it. And as my friend Esther puts it, if you ever lose your way, I will come find you:)
what i choose to see 