Letting Go – Letting Come

We are being called by the Spirit Keeper of the East!

Where is our east, yours, mine?

What wants, and is, gently but surely, coming to light?

Is there anything we can release or declutter for this to occur?

German-born, after years in Paris and London, destiny dropped me in the Middle East, right at the rim of the Asian continent, in Istanbul, Turkey, the city built on two continents where I live since three decades.

Four blocks down our village’s main street lays the majestic Bosporus, the water straight between the Black Sea up north, and the Sea of Marmara in the south. What’s more: it separates, or rather connects, Asia and Europe, East and West.

A bus stop away lays the harbour where over 1500 years, until the 17^th century, exotic goods had travelled along the Silk Road, and were loaded onto ships crossing the water to the Byzantine and early-ottoman bazaars on the European shore and sail further up were Venetian merchants were waiting. The city was then called Constantinople, this land always was a melting pot of civilisations and cultures.

Going to work I cross from Asia by boat to Europe, often witnessing the rising sun from behind the city hills with their silhouette of mosques and old trees. I adore waking up at dawn, sipping tea and looking eastwards, an azure sky gently turning luminous until the first rays shimmer through the old big pine right out my window.

However, am I willing to hear what is calling me from within, as surely as the sun is rising? What have I been putting off? What is my real work today, next to daily duties? What is yours?

Turned eastwards I know that my life of three decades on this land is slowly turning to completion. I will be leaving job and family home behind in a year’s time. This land and it’s people have been immensely kind to us.

Sometimes the thought of leaving feels daunting…but the Buddha faces east…

They are partners in the wheel, east and west, the latter assisting the letting go. Seemingly on opposite sides and yet in perfect alignment, they form o n e arch. Knowing this is helpful.

The Bamiyan Buddha statues (6^th century), carved into the rock, overlooked the fertile valley of the ancient community of Buddhist monks on the Silk Road. The larger of the two figures, located on the western end, measured 54m in height, the Buddha positioned in the east was 45m tall (see link below). Until their destruction in 2001 they were the largest Buddhas on earth.

Alongside material goods science and medicine, philosophy, customs and religious practises were exchanged on the Silk Road. Sarita Armstrong in her book The Tao in the Tarot, 2013, A Syntheses between the Major Arkana cards and the hexagrams of the I Ching (pdf link below) writes:

“In fact, both timeworn practices had a common source before our known religions developed, and travellers remembered them through games and plays performed along the Silk Road for thousands of years.”, she writes.

With west in our back we bless and thank the Spirit of the East, letting go, letting come. The sun’s new radiance can be our quest today, acknowledging the gift with intent and positive action.

“The past is gone, the future is yet to be.” But the present, the instant of emerging, is our best ally in the continuous flux of life. We may always begin afresh, even right now, and walk, breathe, think from the vision of a rising, bright future. Finding the feeling we simply can BE the shift.

Here are four creative and fun journaling tools which have immensely helped me to understand what wanted to emerge when fear and lack of trust were spiralling:

• The Letter from the Future: With the date set a year in the future, create the year that has just passed: “November 2023: This has been an amazing year!” Etc. Write backwards for each month what, and how well, things unfolded.

• “If I wasn’t afraid I would…”

• “Wouldn’t it be crazy IF…”

• “The hundred things I want to be, do, or have.”

ENJOY your pen roaming freely on your new page, allowing to go beyond the usual, reasonable thinking. You might be surprised what you find.

Other tools to anchor intent and vision can be an affirmation or a charged crystal in your pocket or bag, or of course an altar.

We honour and thank for your loving gift and support, Spirit of the East!

With blessing and love…

Bamyian Buddhas: https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/ap-art-history/west-and-central-asia-apahh/central-asia/a/bamiyan-buddhas

The Tao in the Tarot (pdf), by Sarita Armstrong:

https://books.google.com.tr/books?id=shn23CmWnZYC&pg=PA9&lpg=PA9&dq=what+is+the+connection+between+Silk+Road+and+Tarot&source=bl&ots=ysVL6IfKkq&sig=ACfU3U1ZfDPU2NSD7WcWjkiPVC5-Zcqk3Q&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiy46Cn1KH6AhVyXvEDHWHqC3QQ6AF6BAgeEAM#v=onepage&q=what%20is%20the%20connection%20between%20Silk%20Road%20and%20Tarot&f=false