Honouring Our Journey - Marilyn Maychak Consulting

journey, path, road

Words that when used in the singular, noun (place or thing) context convey a single, individual, disconnected experience.

But these words often feel like a mix of the singular and plural.

journeys, roads, paths

They also feel like action-oriented, active, adjective and collective/community/relationship centred experience

journeying together
travelling together
intersecting paths
finding our way together
walking alongside each other
mapping our journey
navigating roads and paths

As future thinking, forward thinking people, how often do you take the time to:

slow down breathe look back reflect look up look within look down and around give thanks

How often do you take the time to:

honour yourself & others?
honour the season you are currently in?
celebrate the work (personal and collective) it has taken to get where you are?
honour how prepared you are for the various weather you have travelled through, and adapted to, to get to this point?

I have been thinking about these a lot these days as I know that it’s so easy for me to just keep looking ahead and say, “What’s next?”

I had a conversation with another Indigenous person a couple weeks ago about this – honouring our journeys and making space for ourselves. We got curious as to why we find it easier to create and hold space for others than ourselves.

For me, the time in spend in nature, nurturing my creativity through photography (and knitting, introducing my child to beadwork & beading, sewing), meditation and journalling are some of the ways I am choosing to honour my journey, create space for myself and give thanks.

These two poems resonated with me about journeys, honouring ourselves and each other. I hope they resonated with you.

What is one thing you do to honour your journey(s)? And the ones you travel with others?

remember the body

of your community

breathe in the people

who sewed you whole

it is you who became yourself

but those before you

are a part of your fabric

honour the roots – rupi kaur

Wild Geese by Mary Oliver

You do not have to be good.

You do not have to walk on your knees

for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.

You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.

Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.

Meanwhile the world goes on.

Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain

are moving across the landscapes,

over the prairies and the deep trees,

the mountains and the rivers.

Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,

are heading home again.

Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,

the world offers itself to your imagination,

calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting

—–

over and over announcing your place

in the family of things.

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