Lightly Among the Stones
I’m always amazed by how much stuff I carry. Physically, emotionally, and in spite of my best efforts to keep my load light, there is a nuisance of accumulation. As I schlepped my carry on tote bag through Heathrow recently, harried from a delayed flight that resulted in a missed connection, I took the opportunity to add a 16 year old whiskey to my burden, because, well, duty free. What’s one more thing, after all?
My intention in traveling to Scotland was to keep my bags light, to take only what I need. Yet my mind got caught in the game of what if and might need. So half of my suitcase was packed for a contingency, carrying around safeguards for events that never transpired. While I was happy to have my small travel flashlight, which I did need when walking the mile long lane back to my bed and breakfast on the isle of Iona in the inky blackness of night, the extra jackets and sweaters for if I got cold - which by the way never happens - quickly became a representation of how I have weighed myself down by planning for what might be and not living for what is. Travel is an extraordinary way to remember who you are and how you navigate in the world. For me, overpacking is the fear that I might miss something, some measure of comfort and familiarity that will be the difference between standing out as a stranger or fitting in, a measure of ease in assimilating to a new landscape and way of being.
In the biting gale that swept across the standing stones at the Ring of Brodgar, I walked the circumference of the stones wearing leggings, a tank top, and a sweater. The wind cleansed my soul, as the ancient sanctity of place filled my cellular memory with a familiarity and longing. I had no need for the extras in my bag - only for my Self to be present to the sea, sky, and land, to the ancient monoliths keeping silent vigil through the mists of time. I left the excess there. The fear, the uncertainty, taken by the wind to be dissolved into the nothingness from which it came. There is nothing extra that I need to carry, for everything I need, everything I am, lies within. The gift of Orkney is to go lightly among the stones, wearing the mantle of my sovereignty with ease. Blessed be.
