The Non-Ordinary – Part VIII: Connecting With Place – Ocean

Pensacola Beach Retreat 2016

Of all of places that have the capacity to trumpet out, in clarion tones, majestic archetypes into our world, the Ocean by far deserves Summa Cum Laude, Highest Praise.

The Ocean and the Seas are mystery, the realm of Poseidon, Atlantis, the merpeople. The Ocean is the deeps, the last frontier on this planet, the quest. It is the resting place of ancient sunken ships, their treasures and their ghosts. It is the home of the undiscovered.

“The sea is like music. It has all the dreams of the soul within itself…The beauty and grandeur of the sea consists in our being forced down to the fruitful bottom lands of our own psyches where we confront and recreate ourselves in the animation of the mournful wasteland of the sea.”

C.G. Jung from Memories, Dreams, Reflections

Carl Jung has left us a legacy, an invitation to explore the unconscious. And he has given us a great metaphor to help us grasp the depth of what we’re dealing with – the Sea, the Ocean.

Rivers, lakes, creeks, these all speak to me. Even the smallest drop of water can speak volumes.

During a spate of day hikes on and around the Appalachian Trail my hiking partner, who is also my sister, and I visited Luray Caverns in the Shenandoah Valley. The "Great Stalacpipe Organ,” a musical instrument constructed from stalactites, is featured in one of the "rooms" of the cavern. As I stood there in that “room” listening to Amazing Grace being piped through a millions of years old, underground wonder, I looked up at the vast and the ancient space above me and one single drop of water fell from a stalactite onto my forehead. The profundity of it settled down over me like a mantel. I will never forget the sense of sacredness I felt in that moment.

Yet what I long for, what I yearn for is the Ocean. The Ocean is my constant mirror of what lays beneath the surface in my own life. It is my reminder of everything beyond my capacity to grasp, both in the Universe and in the depths of who I am. It calls to me and draws me back to its shoreline. Much of my life has been spent at the waters edge. It was my escape as a young person. Hop on the bus, drop a coin and step out into burning sands and thundering waves, away from the chaos at home. Even now, any retreat or attempt at a time of renewal finds its highest intention at the edge of the vast and endless sea.

In her book Women Who Run With the Wolves, Clarissa Pinkola Estes closes out the chapter, “Joyous Body: The Wild Flesh” with this statement, “ The body is like an earth.” I believe she is here reinforcing the themes of mystery and reverence for our bodies, the gift we’ve been given to partner with our soul and spirit. And she is linking this mystery and reverence with another gift we’ve been given as a partner, the earth, the earth with the places that speak all the volumes of secrets to be discovered, languages to be learned, ways to simply be – the breeze through the leaves, the echoes of the canyons, the roar of the waves.

How will you find greater reverence in place?

Writing Prompt for the Week: The Ocean’s Voice