The Journey

One of my favorite poems is by the American poet, Mary Oliver, entitled “The Journey”.

This is a poem that spoke to my heart immediately upon reading it. It came to me in a time in which I had been struggling emotionally and with my work for some time, thinking - there has to be more than this!

It was a breath of fresh air, a drink of water after being desperately parched, and a response to a question I had been asking myself for some time but never truly had the courage to answer until reading the poem.

I ended up using The Journey as the basis for my resignation letter from my community mental health job where I had been for over 14 years. My supervisor cried upon reading it and told me it was the most beautiful resignation letter she’d ever read. That is what I was hoping for and ultimately how I hope to leave my life, my clients, my family and anything I am involved in - better than how I found it.

Since then, I have created Yellow Tree Counseling, LLC and started to build a life that is determined by me and for me (and family) and is more in line with my values. I share this poem with clients at times to help them identify areas in which they’d like to shift and ways to do it. Change is a process but one that we often agonize over.

What if we actually did what we, in our hearts and souls, knew to be right the moment we knew it? What suffering could we avoid? What joy could we add to our own lives or the lives of others?

What stops you from taking the steps, making the choices and living the life you’d like to lead?

---

The Journey

“One day you finally knew

what you had to do, and began,

though the voices around you

kept shouting

their bad advice --

though the whole house

began to tremble

and you felt the old tug

at your ankles.

"Mend my life!"

each voice cried.

But you didn't stop.

You knew what you had to do,

though the wind pried

with its stiff fingers

at the very foundations,

though their melancholy

was terrible.

It was already late

enough, and a wild night,

and the road full of fallen

branches and stones.

But little by little,

as you left their voice behind,

the stars began to burn

through the sheets of clouds,

and there was a new voice

which you slowly

recognized as your own,

that kept you company

as you strode deeper and deeper

into the world,

determined to do

the only thing you could do --

determined to save

the only life that you could save.”

- Mary Oliver

Image of Mary Oliver taken

by Molly Malone Cook

https://maryoliver.com/bio/