Not Easy, but Easeful
Six Lessons from 10 Years of A Wild New Work
Part Two
In case you missed it, last week I began a new series to mark the 10-year anniversary of my self-employment journey. You can catch up by reading part one: Here is the Only Place to Start.
Image by Gatis Vilaks, via Unsplash
Not Easy, but Easeful
It's late Summer, and Spider is coming into her full presence and power. Every morning when I walk out to say hello to the land, she's woven a new and beautiful web that seems to hang in mid-air. I often get in an accidental tangle with what she's created and try to stay calm as I search my hair and clothes for her juvenile body. I know that as Autumn approaches, she will become much bigger, change color, and spin larger webs in the garden.
When we watch her building her web, we see that it is not easy work. She has to use material from her own body to create different kinds of threads that will create the framework for her web. Then she must weave and spin, exposed to the elements and with very little scaffolding to hang onto. Spider's process is so intriguing that I recorded a podcast episode about it two years ago (Episode 106: Spider Wisdom: Living the Spiral).
Spider's work is absolutely not easy, but it is her purpose. She labors and labors, and then, once the web is established, her work becomes easeful. Bugs of all kinds can get caught in her web while she relaxes in the breeze. Once they arrive, she's able to eat in the comfort of her own home, sometimes even having enough for leftovers.
Spider's methods teach us an essential lesson about living into our purpose: that it may not be easy, but it can be easeful.
The last ten years spent following the callings of my spirit have been full of challenges and discomfort. A nervous stomach before teaching a class, fear of saying the wrong thing to a client, worry about no one showing up and the disappointment when it happened…The sheer amount of hours and effort that have gone into understanding what this work is meant to be, how to offer it to the world, and then inviting you into it. It has absolutely not been easy, and I'm still regularly uncomfortable as I stretch and try to live into the fullness of who I am in the context of our modern world.
And yet, there has been a lot of ease caught in my web.
Opportunities that come at just the right time. Sweet affirmations from listeners and readers. Magical people who find me and feel resonance. Signs and synchronicities from my ancestors that tell me I'm on the right track.
No one walking their soul's path has an easy time of it. There are no myths about people or gods who never encounter trouble. There is no way to deeply live without pain and heartache.
You can be exactly where you need to be and it can feel like shit. In my experience, it often does.
And in the midst of that hardship, the skies open for a moment and the Sun shines down, and you are touched by a profound level of ease and support that you could not have manufactured yourself. The fattest, most delicious bug flies into your web and you know that you can keep going down this path for at least one more day.
In capitalist culture, we're taught that everything should be easy. Same-day shipping, meal kits, answers to all of life's questions available at any moment - these "solutions" are offered in an effort to keep us working and spending money at an insane pace. In the haze of convenience culture, we might forget that living a meaningful life simply isn't meant to be easy. But it can be easeful.
These days, I try not to prioritize what's easy just because it's easy. I'm still attempting to spin a web through the day in, day out work of taking care and being of service, most of which goes unnoticed, like Spider spinning her web at night as we sleep.
What I look for now is the ease. When I put effort into something, does nourishment come? Do I receive resonance or reciprocity in some form, material or spiritual? Does the web catch what I need? If not, then I know an adjustment may be needed.
You'll have your own embodied sense of easy v. easeful. You're the only one who will be able to discern what's simply the work that's required and when the hardship is a sign that it's not the right thing or the right time. Sometimes a chapter of our path is super easy and full of ease. Other times, it's very challenging with only little breadcrumbs of ease to keep us going. There is no singular way for this to look, and it changes throughout our journey.
In case it's helpful, I want to offer a couple of examples of how easy and easeful have been at play in my working life.
Case study #1: Summer Solstice Retreat in 2023
The Summer Solstice retreat I held in 2023 was one of the most successful, ease-filled in-person events I've ever hosted. The idea came so softly in January of 2023, the space was available, the structure of the day fit together so sweetly, and it was (by my standards) a shining success. It was a ton of work to set it up, get catering sorted, buy all the supplies, be present for the entire day, clean up, etc., but an undercurrent of ease flowed so strongly underneath it all. I knew I was meant to be there, and I think others felt that way, too.
Case study #2: Ancestor Speak in 2023
Later that same year, I felt inspired to host an Autumnal gathering I called "Ancestor Speak." This idea came in with less time to prepare and was immediately challenging, but I didn't want to give it up. This project was not easy nor was it easeful. The location wouldn't come through clearly, the dates never quite clicked, and it didn't seem to resonate with folks. Finally I decided to cancel it and felt crumpled and tired as a result.
Case study #3: The Living the Seasons journals
As many of you know, I recently wrote and published a series of seasonal journals called Living the Seasons*. This project has really not been easy. Putting something into print has been a big challenge for me and has brought up many mental blocks. It's also taken a lot of time and energy to format the journals, figure out printing, and get them shipped to you. If there weren't any ease to this project, I would have dropped it a while ago. The ease that's kept me going has included working with incredible collaborators like my friend Sasha Davies, signs that I'm meant to write and share these with the world, and messages from readers about how helpful they have been. Maybe these journals haven’t flown off the proverbial shelves, but the aura of ease around them shows me that I'm meant to keep spinning and weaving them into being.
If you're in a place where you're trying to live the meaningful life you know you're meant to have and you're feeling a lot of crunchiness, I hope you won't lose heart. See if you can notice ease anywhere–it could be a felt sense of purposefulness, meetings that seem divinely timed, or meaningful signs that encourage you to keep going. If there is none of that ease and it's also very challenging, then perhaps something needs to shift.
Just because Spider spins her web one night doesn't mean that she'll catch breakfast the next morning. There are no guarantees in this life. But by continuing to do what she's meant to do, she'll spin and weave new webs that may eventually provide the nourishment she needs.
Many blessings to you as you continue to do the hard work of walking your path and weaving your web. May the way be full of ease.
*I'm currently giving the Autumn version of Living the Seasons a big update - more to come on that soon!