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WITHOUT LIMITS
By Cornelia Powell | August 26, 2008
[Inspired by the recent Olympics in China, I was reading some "memoirs" from my life changing spiritual journey there several years ago. My trip to China in the autumn of 2000 with a group of Qi Gong buddies and teachers was a "break-open" experience for me: I left my perceived 'limitations' as a writer at the bottom of an azure blue lake in magical Jiu Zhai Gou. Below is one of the articles I wrote about the experience after my return -- now "re-inspiring" me with 'limitless' possibilities]:
Isn’t it interesting what it takes to open up your world — to expand what you think are your boundaries and limits? I suppose I didn’t have to go to the other side of the world to discover a part of me that was there all along, but you never know where you might find the key.
Early on during my trip to China, I had this realization: I was in the presence of such immense beauty and among such tranquil people that it would be a sacrilege to complain about the lack of toilet paper! And after that, nothing was daunting or limiting, everything a captivating and moving experience.
While traveling in this vast country, we saw magnificent agriculture created out of seemingly impossible conditions: apple orchards planted in the only small patch of level ground in what was otherwise a sheer cliff; steep mountainsides painstakingly terraced to contain small tea tree farms; lush vegetable gardens growing right up to the roadside. No terrain was considered limiting in producing abundance of some sort.
In southwestern China near Songpan, settled hundreds of years ago by Tibetan Buddhists, our group was invited into the colorful warm home of a Tibetan farm woman. Whatever cultural boundaries that could have restricted us disappeared as she chatted away, serving yak cheese tea and steamed buns to these dazzled pale strangers. Although not understanding her words, we savored every moment of her unlimited hospitality and graciousness.
The Taoist priests and priestesses we met on Wudang Mountain, where my teacher Master Chen had trained since he was six years old, were kind and serene and deeply engaged in their healing work. Their austere surroundings were not at all limiting to them but provided a rich resource full of a legacy of contribution and respect.
When we had the honor of meeting Master Chen’s 128 year-old teacher, fragile yet strong in her will and spirit, she spoke to us about her ‘next’ project of rebuilding the ancient Taoist temple where she lived. I wondered at the time if this woman, whose life had overlapped three different centuries, had ever considered anything an obstacle.
I brought back home with me the inspiration of this boundless spirit, welcoming it into my world. And today if I slip into a sense of feeling limited somehow, I remember that at one time someone saw the possibility of apple trees flourishing where someone else had seen only a forbiddingly steep mountain of hard rock.
Jian Kang Kuai Le!
[Hmmmm...there is something to revisiting memories and bringing a bit of that 'limitless magic' of travel adventures back into the present with you!]
Love. Listen. Let go.
… with love from Cornelia
Topics: Inspiration, Meditation, Remembrances, Women's Notes |