Listen To Your Path

There are certain obstacles that shouldn’t be surmounted.  They are put in your path as indication that there’s a better way to go.  Yet, we need a keen level of discernment to know whether to push on in the face of adversity or whether we’re simply not on the right path right now.

On a recent mountain bike trek in Colorado, I was cruising along all by myself about 90 minutes in, when suddenly there were Bulls on the trail.  I mean, big, raging male cows who were looking at me as if they were going to charge (I later found out that there are several deaths a year from charging bulls).  I was doing my best to release all fear and simply be in love.  Yet, I came upon a spot where there were a lot of them directly on the trail where I wanted to go.

I was stuck.  I didn’t know what to do.  I wanted to reach the destination that I had intended that day – this beautiful, sacred spot by a stream where Eden and I had camped out two years earlier.

In my direct path on the trail, there were five bulls with some female cows and a few calves.  I was starting to get nervous as they shifted towards me.  I sensed that they were feeling like they needed to protect their young.

I noticed that if I deviated off the trail away from the bulls and went up the hill, I might be able to link up with the path again.  So with my bike on my shoulder I started walking off the path up the mountain, to where I thought the trail would eventually lead.  So here I am panting as I’m carrying my bike up this tremendously steep hill, in wet grass and bush up to my shoulders, and the thought comes in, “What in the world am I doing?  This doesn’t feel right at all.  This is really hard.  What am I doing this for?  Is this really the way I want to go?”

Then this thought came in like a thunderbolt:

“You have to listen to the path.”   

The path was telling me I went as far as I could go.  I definitely couldn’t go any farther on the trail with all of those bulls.  I could certainly climb the hill off the trail with my own sheer willpower, taking a lot of effort and energy to do so.  But to what avail?

“You have to listen to the path.”

This particular path that day was telling me that I had gone exactly as far as I was meant to go to learn the lesson that day.  I needed to simply appreciate this simple lesson of listening to the path as well as the other gifts that I had been given that day – like the spiritual experience it was to see male deer in the wild for the first time.

For me that day, I noted the big difference between flowing on a path that I’m meant to be on versus having to use a tremendous amount of willpower to get to where I think I should be going.

If you’re going to allow your path to unfold, then you have to listen to the path.  Of course you have to walk it.  And you have to have a high level of discernment in your listening to know if you should continue walking in a certain direction.

I’ve learned that it’s the step that you take before you take your first step that’s most important: To Listen.  To know what the appropriate action is for that particular moment.

May your path lead you to where you’re truly meant to go.