Wandering in 2021: Heart Anchor

2021 has felt like a very awkward birth to me. Like in all birth processes—I don’t know who this “baby new year” will be. For me the new year has entered during a kind of internal backlash that I see played out on our national stage. It feels uncomfortable at best, with moments of great relief, and moments of suffocating despair.

In December I co-created a community ceremony to celebrate the Solstice. This initially came as an internal directive that asked me to be vulnerable: to show deep parts of myself and commit to something I loved in a public way. Initially I ignored the directive, but as the weeks approached and it became louder and more imminent, I agreed to take action. It felt good to act. There was great joy in surrendering to this intuitive ask. It flowed—the work did not seem too hard. And ultimately the ceremony filled something for people; it was a “success”. But in the gap of time that followed, the parts of myself that would have preferred I laid low, scrambled to re-arm—to protect the vulnerability that had been laid bare. I was exhausted, and the fortress of myself, now weaponized, threatened everything. Saboteurs pulled me under.

I wrote this before last Wednesday’s attack—and now I see very similar expression on a bigger stage.

This new year has not come in easily, we have churned and turned ourselves on this wheel of time into it, hopeful for change weary. Carrying dreams in our hands and covid on our backs. Or is it the other way around?

It has become my personal custom to choose a word as a heart anchor for the year. In 2020, this useful anchor was willingness. The word that has been rising to my lips when I speak to the land, the prayer that comes is holy. Holy, holy, holy. I feel it resonate in my chest and throat when I sing it. It fills the space. A friend’s blessing that came with the birth of my son. 

I feel how the energy of this word shifts my reality when I allow it to take me. I can be standing in the wreck of mental sabotage, and remember this word and it turns me towards wholeness. The wholeness of others. The Other. Myself. I feel the filter of my ground shift—in a breath what is alive emerges, gratitude comes. Self-made restrictions dissolve. The trees stand forth as whole beings, as holy subjects. The Mountain receives me. And what kind of transformation could occur to reorient myself over and over this way: to the world as whole and holy. This pen. This glass of water. The reflection in the mirror. This chair. You. The cellphone of my addiction. The hum of the refrigerator. The silence when it cuts off. The yowls of my aging cat. This mask. The air. Your eyes. This conflict. This virus. This dance. This sleepless night. This trapped energy. This exhale. How would my relationships evolve when we are all holy? It seems impossible that it would not be in the direction of healing. I would love for THIS—the dimensionality of holiness—to infect my consciousness. Language is one of the unique creative gifts of humans. How can I create my reality this way, even the things I hate, the feelings I fear, the undertow that takes me down sometimes. When there is more holiness than fear, than pollution, than despair.

So in 2021 I am apprenticing to the word holy.

What you, Holy Reader, will take from this writing I do not know. Perhaps it will be to choose a word for your heart anchor. This word came to me over and over as I wandered out on the land with my drum over weeks and then months. Maybe you also take yourself to a place, and as you step over the threshold of that place, have a question of what is my heart anchor this year? How do I orient to this very wondrous, very difficult world? May that be our wander. How to anchor our hearts, so that we can lean into the actions we are called to perform, and the love we have to give.

A note on the format: The possibility was suggested to consider the new moon wander a call, and the full a response. I'll be exploring this structure in 2021, and we'll see where it leads us.

You are welcome to join our Zoom group, where we share the experiences of our wanders. Our next meeting will meet Feb 1 at 3:30pm Mountain Time. If you would like to receive the link and/or to be on the mailing list for when there is a new post, please let me know: indercoppola [at] gmail.

Love always,

Inder