Posted on August 10, 2024 by Jenn Zatopek

Years ago, I’d write in the evenings and be lost in swirls of tears, ancient and unbearable shame weighing me down like granite rocks. The voices inside would condemn me for writing, creating, using my God-given voice, and I’d fall apart under the weight of their recriminations. And now here I am, sitting upright in my writing room, pen and paper in hand, spilling words onto the page in hope and fear mingled together. This triumph isn’t lost on me, the work it’s taken to get here felt deeply inside. 

Will anyone give a fig about these words beside me? Will I ever finish the book, publish the poetry collection, be on my own side? Can I be the one I write for, the one who longs to hear what I have to say? You speak through me, and remind me that yes, true freedom lies in a long evening walk watching the bright sunshine ebb out of the cerulean sky, turning the green leaves on the trees radiant and celebrating what it’s taken to get here, to this very moment in which I sit and write in joyful expectancy. How I have chosen myself over the comfort of approval from the crowds and how that choice to nourish myself keeps feeding me still, even as our world spins in its own struggle for wise and compassionate action. 

The world is dying as we speak, people dying here and abroad in terror and animals dying lonely on city streets and factory farms, all the loss felt in vibrations of anxiety we carry in our deepest dreams, which awaken us in the middle of the night, desiring comfort and support. Sometimes I awaken and drink from the cup of water by my bed, reminding me of our watery beginnings, our inextricable connection to the earth, our thirst for belonging. Can you feel it, the sadness of what is and the pull towards possibility? 

But even as we speak the world is born again in each timeless moment, every moment new and unfurling outward and so alive with possibility for goodness. My desire for belonging is satisfied when I write and let myself capture the fleeting beauty of this world, when I meditate and feel held by the divine even as I sit in zazen, when I sit with clients who allow me the great honor of helping them heal. And even when I walk outside in the early mornings and evenings, smiling in relief that healing happens even amid uncertainty and pain, that trusting yourself is also part of freedom, part of belonging too.

Image: Hiking around Mountain Cloud Zen Center, Santa Fe.