OK, just one more post on dharma after a friend emailed me with some points that should be clarified.  And then I promise we’re done on this topic. 

The dharma list you wrote up is not a to-do list although to-do’s can come out of it.  I think of it more as an “I Am” list.  It’s about the personal gifts that are inherent to who you are.  The things that make you tick.  Now it could include “I Am Becoming” items because maybe you know what totally grooves you but you haven’t taken the time or had the opportunity to become proficient in it.  That’s where your to-do list comes in.

But I think there’s something here about purpose too.  Some of the things on my list I looked at and thought, that’s such a dumb minor thing, who cares?  But I think this exercise has more value if you throw your net wide.  Don’t bother judging what’s there. Your gifts, regardless of how “small” they seem can be helpful to some larger end. 

Like the travel example for me.  It totally grooves me but I’m not sure it’s a personal gift, even if I am gifted at missing connecting flights.  But who knows, maybe down the road my travelling will find a greater purpose. 

Here’s another example from my list.  I wrote down music - I love to listen to it, sing along to it and play it except that I haven’t done much of the latter for a lot of years.  I bought two flutes a while back and quickly realized that ‘just figuring it out on my own’ was not going to get me very far. 

So “music enthusiast” is on the list as relating to who I am, but “flute player” is something I’m still becoming.  Seeing ”music” on my list reminded me that I’ve got to call the concert pianist who lives nearby and see if show knows any teachers.  Finding a flute teacher has been a to-do of mine for a long time.

But then the question comes up - who cares?  What’s the purpose in this?  I’m not going to become a concert flautist and tour about filling audiences’ lives with joy, that’s just not gonna happen.  But I have thought that if I was able to string a few notes and interesting intervals together I might play something during Savasana for folks in my yoga classes. 

If it would help them relax, then that’s enough purpose for me.  I don’t expect that I can see very far down the road, there may be purpose to the items on my list that I haven’t conceived of.  But I know it’s my responsiblity as “Corilee” to identify, learn, explore and exercise all the things that make me “Corilee”.

Martha Graham says it well:

There is a vitality, a life force that is translated through you into action.  And because there is only one of you in all time, this expression is unique, and if you block it, it will never exist through any other medium and be lost.