We were lucky enough to spend the last week or so before school starts up floating in the ocean and practicing our best “go with the flow” moves in the high tides of the Aquarius Full Moon and the hurricanes blowing past our waters. August is my favorite feeling water month. The water feels softer and warmer than it does during the other summer months. The excitement of summer finally getting here after the long winter and spring(ish) months has quieted down and we can truly let our bodies relax into the energy of warm summer waters.
This August we spent our time offering our hearts to the water and the letting go process that I often don’t let myself feel. Sinking into the waves that lap over our floating bodies, it takes some trust this year to stay afloat. We are surrounded by moon jellyfish, a benign slippery crystal clear creature that squishes by. I can look through their bodies and I contemplate the concept of transparency. What can we truly look through in our lives without the veils of belief systems, judgements and projections dressing up the illusion of transparent truth. We experience the feeding frenzy of striped bass chasing the minnows, chubs, and alewives into shore. I try not to startle and move too fast as the fish jump around us, breaking the silent stillness of dusk with their fins slapping the water. One hundred, maybe two hundred, birds descend upon the waters, piercing the silence with their cries of delight. They feed happily. Aggressively. Freely. It is true joy being out here in the water, just observing. Every day I offer my denser energies through the black belt of my sacral energy center to the water that has been my companion for almost my whole life. I stand solid footed in the warm water, calling out to the nature beings softly, but surely. Building relationship with the energies of nature has become a natural part of my life. I engage in the sacred reciprocity of breath, offering an exchange of my light, my CO2, to the plants around me as they freely offer me their sweet oxygen. My lungs fill, and I hold it for a second, savoring the moment as I imagine my cells lighting up like stars in the night sky as they oxygenate. In my mind I see my own blood deepening it’s rich red tones as it fills with oxygen.
I exhale and let my breath fog an imaginary window in front of me. Ujjayi. I release into the breath and let go. By the time we are finished swimming for the night, our bodies heavy with waterlog, our fingers and toes wrinkling up with the wetness and the cold, I feel sedated and calm. I silently ask the Universe to allow me to feel this serene when I am not in the water. I long to carry the feelings of satiety and peace, wonder and awe with me wherever I go. But I know that in the storm of today’s world, with the excitement and worries of starting another year of counselling in the schools that I may not be perfect at this. And so I practice. This night and every night, I will continue to practice just going with the flow.