I took this photo last weekend in the desert. I have always loved a good windmill farm and there was something so symbolic about this view, although at the time I wasn't sure what it was about the dry ground, the turning windmills and the billowy clouds above.
As I have looked at this picture since then I have imagined my life the past year is the dry, tired ground. Now new winds are blowing and there are new lofty heights to enjoy above. I've been doing a lot of new things lately and learning a lot of new things about myself.
As part of our post deployment experience we are doing a mentoring/counseling program. It is incredibly interesting to chart the highs and lows of your life, to look back at your stress levels, what events have shaped your life for the better or worse. It's been a very interesting journey and I am so grateful to have skilled guides to lead us through it.
Taking time to unlock yourself and rummage around in your head certainly can be interesting...and stressful, worrisome, tiresome and thought-provoking. It's certainly not always easy. When you start to look at WHY you feel instead of WHAT you feel everything takes on added dimension, meanings are revisited and perceptions are deconstructed. It's stunning at times to see that our greatest strengths are also our greatest weaknesses. Very often we pick up perceptions and ways of creating meanings in our childhoods, based on our experiences, that we carry into adulthood without much thought.
It has been very interesting to be taught by a variety of chaplains and therapists in past weeks and hear new ideas that start the windmills of the mind churning. Sometimes the paths are not ones a person necessarily wants to visit, but it's obvious they need to be visited. Some days it's just too tiring to think about doing more excavating of the soul. Others days it presents instant relief and comfort. What can I say, it's an interesting journey to be on as a family. So glad to have good people to guide us as we learn and grow.
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