Offend Your Mind

I recently heard a podcast where the interviewee related about a time when he left good, lucrative, successful work. There was something in him quietly pulling him in a different direction, but that new direction was pathless, off-the-grid, unpredictable, and frightening. While, on paper, nothing was wrong with the current path. He was good at what he did. Well compensated. Highly regarded.

He took a walk with a friend of his to sort out the tension. His friend listened as he laid out the terrain of the current conflict. Finally, the friend turned to him and said, "Offend your Mind."

At that, the interviewee burst out laughing.

It gave full permission to move away from his current work and explore the curiosities that were emerging. The path emerged in front of him in real time. New territory. Exciting. Worthwhile.

The only place the problem existed was in the limits of his logic where he had firmly defined worth, work, and self. In ways that didn't account for any of their scope.

I laughed when I heard "offend your mind" too as I've made my best decisions when I couldn't understand them.

I remember the fall of 2002 when I "should" have been a promising Junior at Mount Holyoke College. Instead, I had recently withdrawn, with a high GPA, and become a waitress, renting a room in West Philly. I remember walking down the sidewalks of Baltimore Ave often with tears streaming down my cheeks because I couldn't understand who or what I was anymore.

I made that decision with more clarity than almost any that preceded or followed and yet I still had to grieve. I had to grieve leaving that path. A path that I know, without a doubt, wouldn't have been healthy for me, but was clear.

I offended my mind. I offended my ideas and opinions and imaginings and beliefs. I offended it so greatly but that's because I was operating from other intelligences.

I've done that a few times since. I've felt really murky about my actions and choices because they lived in mystery. My mind couldn't decipher what we were doing. There was a lot of internal panic and sleeve tugging: "what are we DOING here???" But my body said, "keep going." Intuition said, "trust."

And intuition is a muscle. You can build it. The more you listen, the more you slow, the more you write down the dreams, journal the tarot, and trust what's off the map, the more guidance you receive.

I know. I live with an offended mind.