Taking Risks

In the last couple of months, I have never taken so many risks in my life. I feel as though my heart has literally been ripped open. I realize that is how much I have been protecting it. There are so many "new" experiences, that I used to do in the privacy of my own world. I am a late bloomer. Now I am making my mistakes publicly in my late 40's. Probably the learning curve when most discovered these things, in their early college career. I am experiencing it now.

I have shed many tears of humiliation, fear, loss,but most important: I am growing. The terrain is unfamiliar, yet I expect to magically know how to arrive without a map or tour guide. That is the beautiful ignorance of youth. Leaping right in. Not worrying so much about the bumps and bruises along the way. The things that go thump in the night. I am trying to see with the eyes of a child again. Excited, new. Yet the wisdom of years. Learned patience and dogged persistence.

Most important, knowing I will not die from stretching, risking. I have been anxious to the point of dizzy, nauseous. Again with age I realize I am growing. This is what it looks like, feels like. Kind of like getting used to riding a bike. At first you think, no way. I am never going to get the hang of this. Frustration sets in. Yet you keep trying. Finally one day, you don't even notice yourself shouting at the top of your lungs, with the biggest grin on your face,"Look ma no hands."