Drop The Pilot

Initially may I apologise for taking a week to get back to adding to my blog.  I am discovering how quickly time flies more and more each year of my life.  The weeks fly past like days, or as Tolkien once penned, 'The years like swift draughts have passed away!"

I have titled this post Drop the Pilot, it is in reference to a song I recall from my youth.  My fellow GenX members may recall a tune by Joan Armatrading released in 1983!  Quite often when I think about our imminent Camino experience I consider both the physical realities of the journey as well as the spiritual.

'Animal, mineral, physical, spiritual, I'm the one you need!', sang a young Joan 30 years ago.  This line keeps rolling through my head.  I imagine that there will be realities across all these elements at some level but the physical and spiritual components of a pilgrimage are surely the most obvious.

So, here is where I come to grief.  You see so much energy is going into physical preparation.  Fitness training, lots of long walks, airline tickets and travel arrangements, boots, packs, coats, exchanging money, saving money, learning Spanish, failing at learning Spanish, the list goes on.  Today I even had the joy of meeting with the gentleman, Stephen, who will be filling in for me at St James in Term Three while I am away.  Getting everything just right and organised, the physical preparation, is taking up lots of time.  I am starting to feel guilty that I am not putting so much energy and effort into my spiritual preparation.

Animal, mineral, physical, spiritual, I'm the one you need.

Mmmmm.  Of course Jesus is the one we need, it is our Great Big God of Love who ultimately fulfils our innermost desires.  The answers to those things that bug us inside are found in Christ.  I plan to do lots of Bible reading and journalling and reflecting along the way, I plan to be a physical being on a spiritual journey.  I have John Brierley's book, mentioned earlier in this blog, and it gives some good tips and reminders to find a spiritual element to the Camino, its deeper than just a long walk I'm told.

Maybe I need to 'drop the pilot', to let go of the dominance of the physical, those things that are driving my preparation.  Maybe I'm 'using my army to fight a losing battle', the victory will surely be in what is achieved spiritually while facing something that is quite considerably physical.

It's usually the way.

We are not physical beings on a spiritual journey you see, rather spiritual beings on a physical journey.

There are in everyday life challenges that, in being attended to, bring us closer to our true source of sustenance, the Living Water, the Bread of Life.  I don't think we need to be walking across Spain to experience this.  I guess though that walking across Spain will help me experience this at another level.

Buen Camino Peregrinos!