Step in

"like a turtle or hare, the choice is yours"

We hung on facetime for most of the morning. Drinking coffee, listening and responding slowly, it was more about connecting than the stories we shared. We are similar in a lot of ways, like night and day in others. We offer one another contrast while feeling like a safe spot to land when either is confused or off balance. Our worlds are small, intersecting daily, and revealing connections we didn’t know we had. OUR world is small. We forget how small it is, maybe on purpose. We create space to protect ourselves, to give us a sense of security when we feel unsettled.

“We’re like turtles,” she said.

I shook my head no. “like jack rabbits.”

She looked up the spiritual symbolism of a turtle. I took a sip of my coffee.

The Turtle is the symbol of the World and the Earth, inspiring us to chart our own course with energy and determination. Another of its important symbolic meanings refers to survival, stability, longevity and protection, with its shell always on its back.

This is what I grabbed from the internet, the book she read from said something similar but I can’t remember exactly her words other than the gist of a turtle be slow but sure. I jumped quickly to wanting more sooner than later. I imagined the hare and tortoise racing, the moral of the story not escaping me forty some years later after reading the fable in school.

“I’m the jack rabbit,” I assured both her and myself. She giggled and whispered quietly no. I scrunched my nose, the child in me wants what I want not what I need. I conjure great visions of having life figured out, flying above struggle and strife, and having no worries at all.

The Jackrabbit spirit animal represents the qualities of intuition, agility, and adaptability. Those who connect with the Jackrabbit as their spirit animal may find themselves drawn to activities that require quick thinking and swift action. The Jackrabbit spirit animal can also bring a sense of lightness and joy into one's life, encouraging them to move with grace and ease.

I am a jack rabbit, I act before I think. I react quickly and leap into new territory without weighing out the risks or investments needed to see something to the end. THIS is what has gotten me caught up in the past. I race out of the starting gate, full speed, certain of where I am headed until I exhaust myself and reconsider where it is that I was going. I know this about me. It is who I am. Does it mean that I am less or unworthy of certainty? Who knows. My friend the turtle, keeps her cadence slow and steady. Somedays I have to fall back to where she is, having had raced ahead of her in life. Other times I have to speed up and catch up to where she is after I had fallen behind and needing to catch my breath from sprinting at full steam.

I am who I am.

Am I?

Am I me or my experiences as a whole?

I imagine having it all figured out, settling into the security of the Divine, knowing that everything always works out in the end. I imagine reclaiming who I am and knowing that I am enough regardless of my past sins or inabilities to fill my own skin.

I imagine finally stepping in to all that I am without hesitation or second thought. Today I can imagine it but not able to do it.

Today that has to be enough.

Tomorrow is another story. Maybe tomorrow I will step in full and be who I am, without question or quandary.

I am almost there.

I am getting closer.

I am excited.

I am happy.

I am even closer.

My heart is beating, quickening as I imagine what it will feel like.