Gifts of Imperfection - Guidepost 10 -Cultivating Laughter, Song, and Dance

The last of the guideposts - Cultivating laughter, song, and dance...I don't have much of a singing voice and don't have much in the way of coordination when it comes to dancing. But I do like to laugh so I've got that going for me.  But with all of these, there's the questions that come...Will I look or sound silly? What if I embarrass myself or others?

The thing that I heard in Brown's chapter is that when we cultivate these areas in our lives, we lose some of the control that we so desperately want to hold onto.  We don't like the uncertainty of not knowing how someone will respond when we start to dance or when we sing (my daughter generally freaks out whenever I bust out my amazing singing voice) or even when we start to bust out laughing.  These come from such a deep place within us that true singing, true dancing, true laughter are reflections of what is stirring deep within us.  But when we put it out there...we don't always know where it is going to lead.

A week ago, I was early to a local cemetery for a funeral service.  As it was a beautiful Autumn morning, I drove around with my camera for a bit while I was waiting for folks to arrive.  I happened to come across this little path that I hadn't seen before (or maybe saw in a new way that day).  There was so much beauty and color around it but I wasn't sure where the road would lead...But yet the path was still needing to be taken, to enter into the beauty, to lose a bit of control and certainty, and see where it would go...