Personal Pilgrimage

To journey without being changed is to be a nomad.

To change without journeying is to be a chameleon.

To journey and be transformed by the journey is to be a pilgrim.

~Mark Nepo

Late last year, I began reading a daily reflection book called The Book of Awakening by the talented poet Mark Nepo. Each passage begins with a tone-setting quote, verse, or poem and is followed with a beautiful interpretation by the author. Every morning when I awaken, reading one of the prolific pages helps me approach the day with observant wonder and reflection. It’s also inspired me to share some of the short reflections I have about influential insights I encounter.

This quote in particular carries some striking parallels with what I’ve been learning lately. Though, like many beautifully poignant poems, this could be taken in so many directions, one such lesson in particular keeps echoing most loudly; the journey I am on to find, forge, and follow our own path.

To walk someone else’s path is to be a nomad. To follow in someone else’s footsteps just because it has brought them success, fulfillment, or wealth is to do myself a haunting disservice.

To have no path, and simply shift with the whims of the world, is to be a chameleon. Trying to fit in at the expense of authenticity is empty and brings me no peace, no joy.

To discover my own path, and walk it courageously is to be a pilgrim of life itself.

Finding the balance and reclaiming my own path is a daily, sometimes hourly journey. There are moments when I feel alive and enlightened, like a true pilgrim. And those moments are often bookended by nomadic and chameleon-like experiences. I’ll feel like the best version of myself during one meeting, only to hear myself say something inauthentic to please someone of status during the next.

The author sums it up beautifully:

The value of this insight is not to use it to judge or berate ourselves, but to help one another see that integrity is an unending process of letting our inner experience and our outer experience complete each other, in spite of our very human lapses.