Ithaca

 

Mony Dojeiji

These past few days, I’ve been receiving signs around the word “Ithaca”. It comes as I finish up my latest book, a collection of my most personal writing. And, as often happens at this stage, I want it finished now. I want to share it all now. I want to reach my goal and put that check mark beside that list item. 

But as this poem reminds me, it is not about arriving to Ithaca. It’s about the journey there. Spirit cares more about the growth that happens during the journey, and not necessarily the final goal, no matter how beautiful or meaningful that goal may be because it is the learning that we take with us, not the achievement. I had the same feeling when I arrived in Santiago, and in Jerusalem. Although I struggled during those walks, when I finally saw the Cathedral doors and ancient city walls before me… my steps slowed. I didn’t want the journey to end.

So it is with any “goal” that I set out to achieve. In this case, it is Spirit that has inspired this book. But Mony – with her plans and ideas – wants to get it done, to move it along according to her schedule and her needs. Ithaca comes to remind her to surrender to Spirit, to trust in Its wisdom, and to listen closely to Its whispers rather than the drumbeat demands of her mind.

This, in a small way, holds a bigger teaching around all that we see in our world, and the changes we so wish to make. In setting out for that promised Ithaca, we miss important stuff along the way:

The opportunities we’re offered to heal the raging storms of our hearts and minds;

To practice choosing unity over division, and love over fear.

This is the stuff of spiritual growth and maturity, the stuff that truly changes universes.

May all awaken to the journey that their Ithaca inspires. 🙏🏽💕

~Mony 

* * *

Ithaka (by C. P. Cavafy)

As you set out for Ithaka

hope your road is a long one,

full of adventure, full of discovery.

Laistrygonians, Cyclops,

angry Poseidon—don’t be afraid of them:

you’ll never find things like that on your way

as long as you keep your thoughts raised high,

as long as a rare excitement

stirs your spirit and your body.

Laistrygonians, Cyclops,

wild Poseidon—you won’t encounter them

unless you bring them along inside your soul,

unless your soul sets them up in front of you.

Hope your road is a long one.

May there be many summer mornings when,

with what pleasure, what joy,

you enter harbors you’re seeing for the first time;

may you stop at Phoenician trading stations

to buy fine things,

mother of pearl and coral, amber and ebony,

sensual perfume of every kind—

as many sensual perfumes as you can;

and may you visit many Egyptian cities

to learn and go on learning from their scholars.

Keep Ithaka always in your mind.

Arriving there is what you’re destined for.

But don’t hurry the journey at all.

Better if it lasts for years,

so you’re old by the time you reach the island,

wealthy with all you’ve gained on the way,

not expecting Ithaka to make you rich.

Ithaka gave you the marvelous journey.

Without her you wouldn't have set out.

She has nothing left to give you now.

And if you find her poor, Ithaka won’t have fooled you.

Wise as you will have become, so full of experience,

you’ll have understood by then what these Ithakas mean.

***

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