I wrote a little over a year ago about my rediscovery of going barefoot, and how I discovered it helps to keep me connected and open to Mother Earth. Life flows when I am in touch with the Earth, and stops when I cut myself off.
A year on, and I am still suffering from the practical point of how to keep my feet warm enough. Wearing socks around the house seems to be a good compromise for me, but except on rare occasions I have been unable to go barefoot outside. Until last week.
The sandy beaches of Northumberland called to me, and I took my shoes off. A wonderful feeling. I stood in the sea, letting the waves run around my ankles, and had a huge feeling of knowing I had been there before. In that place on Bamburgh beach, hundreds of years ago. I looked out and knew the place, knew it was right that I had returned. Thanks to the protection of the Farne Islands, and Lindisfarne in particular, it had changed less with the passing of time than many other beaches to the South, although I think the castle and certainly the lighthouse had been built since. I knew then, if I hadn’t fully known it before, that it is time for me to start remembering who I was in previous lives so that I truly know who I am now and what I am here to do.
There have been a number of aspects to this remembering and reconnecting, but this was the first that really spoke to me so I’m writing about it first. More may follow as it feels appropriate. Ultimately my aim in remembering past lives is to know the lessons I wished to learn from them, so that I may fulfil my purpose in this life. I have long felt that this life will be my last. As part of this, I have found it interesting to realise how my remembering that area of Northumberland makes sense for several of my interests – a fascination with eighth and ninth century English history, a draw towards Celtic parts of Britain and their later history and myths, and particularly Celtic writing and knot work such as forms my Sorrel leaf image. I have also had a huge amount of discomfort towards Viking and Anglo Saxon history of the same period…
Bamburgh beach felt like somewhere I had been pleased to reach, having lived elsewhere and travelled East to greet the sea. A pilgrimage possibly, for which reaching the beach was an achievement but not the end of the journey. It reminded me of my own wish to walk the ‘Wainwrights’ in Cumbria.
Later in the week I was barefoot on another beach less than five miles away, and was amazed I had none of the same feelings of recognition. Lovely beach, almost identical sand and waves, but not remotely familiar to me.
My other discovery however was finding that I could carry M for miles in the carrier, barefoot along the beach or in the sea, with far more ease than I normally carried her with my shoes on. We were part of the same Earth that I was connecting with, who supported us fully and completely. She was part of me, and we were both part of the Earth.
Under a Rowan Tree 