Day 66 – Become an Edge Dancer

I will give credit to Patrick Overton for this poem. I have seen similar quotes and the concept is certainly not new – but here is the poem attributed to Patrick Overton:

When you have come to the edge
Of all light that you know
And are about to drop off into the darkness
Of the unknown, Faith is knowing
One of two things will happen:
There will be something solid to stand on or
You will be taught to fly

The reason that I emphasize this poem is a concept that I thought of this morning. As you know, running is one of the hardest things for me to do. Which is why I took it on, maybe I am a some sort of masochist that derives pleasure from my own suffering, but I felt that I needed to overcome this. So this morning, I blew past Chevron (the first major milestone in my running path) and then blew past RTA (the second major milestone in my running path) and then kept going past the 3rd and 4th Dragons (what I call milestones). As I finished running around the entire neighborhood, lost in thought, it occurred to me that I was no longer even thinking about running – I was just doing it.

This did not take very long at all. In fact it took exactly 13 days. So 13 days into my new jogging thing – and I am able to run around the entire neighborhood without stopping, without collapsing, and am at the point where it no longer kills me to do so. When I first started this it seemed insurmountable. Running to the mailbox felt overwhelming to me and it was. There is a lesson I have learned here and it starts with walking up to the edge of the light and stepping into darkness. Our minds/spirits/nature will resist the uncomfortable, avoid the new, absolutely withdraw from chaos and certainly not want to do anything that challenges you physically.

There is a process of overcoming that resistance, of challenging the unknown, of starting to organize chaos, of stepping into the darkness that is a must for us to progress. It feels like something we are intended to learn, or at least must learn or forever be doomed to the comfortable yet slow withdrawal into mediocrity. I have learned that the initial effort to dance on the edge of chaos is the hardest part – once you have done so you will find that it is not that hard and that it gets much easier after deliberate effort.

Chaos is not conquered by a giant reckless plunge into the unknown, it is won by the slow and deliberate efforts of individuals that have faith and courage to step into the darkness only to find that there is something solid to stand on. So my recommendation is to challenge yourself. Find the thing that is the most in your way and become an edge dancer! Dance on the edge of the light and defeat the unknown! Believe me you will find that after your initial effort, you will find out that Chevron was never really a dragon after all, he was actually just a cute little kitten that says meow as you run past each morning. Go on and learn to fly Edge Dancer!

Guy Reams (66)
365 Member
Dance on the Edge

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