rubber tipped arrows

walked....scattered....
tried to focus.
finally figured out i'd better prepare
for the day.

this bone sigh came to mind:

'maybe being brave is no more than
staring down the 'less than' feeling
and stepping up to the 'i am worthy'
feeling.'

that thought has proved to be a lot
more intricate than i realized when i
first wrote it.

i've gotten to love it.

and so i thought about it.

tried to figure out how to keep that in
mind. and i thought of my river of strength.

okay.
touch your river today. feel it.

and as i was thinking this, i walked by a
stream of water. it's really really wet in
my neighborhood. and there's streams everywhere.

this one was large enough to be making a
wonderful sound.

ohhhhhh.......HEAR your river today, ter.

so i tried to figure out how to do all of this.

and then i thought....okay...what do you do when
the arrows of 'less than' are shot your way?
when you see the 'you are less than' aimed right
at you from someone else....

a shield was the first thing i thought of.

and i shook my head.

nah.

that was for the old days. when you weren't
as strong. you needed that.

you don't need that now.

and i pictured a little kid shooting those
suction cupped arrows at me. would i use a
shield? nah, i'd prolly just grab the arrows
as they came my way, put them down with little
care. either love the kid anyway, or try to
figure out what was bothering him to make him
shoot arrows my way.

hmmmmmm..........
ohhhhhhhh..........

that opened a ton of thoughts.

what is provoking the arrows towards me?
maybe i can't stop them, but maybe i can be
non threatening and try to love my way thru.

and as i tried to think of what was provoking them,
i really really saw that *i* wasn't provoking them.
that they honestly weren't about me.

those arrows really really are not my issues or
my problem or my fault.

oh wow, did that help.
my river of strength roared inside and i smiled.

and yes, i noticed my foe had turned into a child
thru all of this. not the big gigantic threat it
used to be.

life is fascinating.