I found a beautiful box turtle just down our road two days ago.  I had been wanting a turtle all season for our garden pond and there it was crossing the road!  I took Turtle home to meet the frogs who have adopted us and visit with our cats in our fenced-in outdoor sanctuary. I soon realized that Turtle wasn’t happy in the confines of its imposed home. She had explored all there was of pond and began exploring fence to find a way out to freedom. Slow and steady, all around the edge. Yesterday as the sun warmed frogs and cats, she slept not in a spot of warm October sunshine, but hid under the morning glories planted along the fence.

Yesterday I got news that the treatment I am receiving for a chronic viral infection of 38 years is working, but not quite “fast enough”, not quite “good enough”. My viral load, which had been 5.5 million per 1 ml of blood plasma just eight weeks prior was reduced to 70 by triple drug therapy, impeccable self-care, visualization and the prayers of family and friends. Though this is great news, in order for treatment to end at 28 weeks, “numbers” needed to be under 40 at that eight-week milestone. Treatment has been extended to 36 weeks. It is a metaphor for my life, feeding my story is that I am never quite “good enough” that I can never do things “fast enough”.

Like the turtle, it seems to take me longer to accomplish tasks and goals. Though as I reflect I am sure from turtle’s view of the world “life” happens good enough and fast enough. Perspective is everything. So what if it takes me longer to climb a mountain, swim across a pond, learn a new skill, read a book, write a blog entry, get the punchline of a joke, cosmic or otherwise? So what if it takes me longer to clear an infection? So what if I am destined to have this longer experience, whether it leads to a cure or not? This is my unique journey and my life in itself is a miracle.  In the story of the tortoise and the hare, tortoise wins the race by slow, steady, undaunted persistence. It is not hare, tortoise was never meant to be hare. It accepts the perfection of its being tortoise.

I do climb to the top of mountains, swim, learn, grow, write and “get jokes” eventually. I am undaunted when I choose to be.

When dawn breaks in an hour, I will take Turtle back to her large wooded wetland. I will walk Turtle across the bridge to the other side of the pond and stream of the beautiful Girl Scout Camp she likely wandered from to cross my path and deliver her message. I hope that she does not find the road again unless it is her destiny. I will free Turtle from the confines I created for my cats who don’t do well in the wild and return her to her wild home where she will live her life as she was born to do. As I set her safely down in the woods near the stream, I will metaphorically release myself from the confines of my limited beliefs and expectations of what is possible for me in my healing and in my quest to deliver my unique gifts to the world. Turtle has delivered her powerful message. Thank you Turtle.

Just hours before I saved Turtle from the road I heard the news that the world lost its greatest innovator and inventor. Undaunted by his own illness, Steve Jobs kept on delivering his unique gifts to the world right to the end of his days on Mother Earth.

Yesterday on receiving the news that longer treatment is advised, I asked myself, “W.W.S.J.D.? What Would Steve Jobs Do?” I heard the answer in this quote from Steve Jobs mentioned in the news and posted all over Facebook moments after his passing: “Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know of avoiding the trap of thinking that you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.”

Thank you, Steve Jobs, for delivering your unique gifts and sharing this wise perspective.

I accept today that this is my destiny, my journey, my cosmic lesson and I embrace it joyfully with every cell of my being. I am undaunted like Turtle. Slow and steady. I hear and breathe in Steve Jobs message. I will continue to follow my heart. I will continue my journey knowing and trusting that all is as it should be.

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