With the launch of
Zoe-Life Encounters,
I am leaving
“two left feet”
behind.

Here, I am speaking
of the blog
I’ve maintained
off and on
for the last 10 years,
“two left feet”
(at jimreiter.com).

I suspect it will still continue to serve me – as I plunder bits and pieces, here and there, for reuse (much like a builder might salvage choice pieces from one construction for use in another).

Even so, now, as I share from one of my first posts (in 2010).
While this blog and its bigger web site may represent
a new “title” with a new address,
there are ways that the mission and spirit of “two left feet”
will prevail in this series and our ongoing work in and through zoe-life:
“seeking an authentic dance with Jesus, self, neighbor, and a 21^st century world.”  Here, there’s the acknowledgement that I’ll forever be a klutz –
that, in the deepest sense of the words, I’ll never leave “two left feet” behind –
so long as I am in this world:

Q: “two left feet”: What kind of title is that for a blog/journal?!?

A: It conveys my acknowledgment, that
in the dance and dancing of life and living
— with God,
with neighbor,
with the larger world,…
even my own soul;
I am clumsy, I am a klutz, I am no “Fred Astaire”!

Here, I want to be careful. I’ve been too hard on myself for too long —
and that is, in fact, a part of my struggle to fully dance with myself…
and the God who made me.

Still, there’s the way that I can and must admit my “two left feet” —as, indeed, we all must.  Clumsiness is a part of our human condition in this world. Beyond our own inner lack of rhythm and coordination and our stumbling’s as reconcilers, there is the tricky but sure truth that there’s something out there (mysteriously and inexplicably woven into our stories and the fabric of our culture) that ever seeks to trip us up.

As a “dance” and as “dancing,” life and living are a journey.
Where we start on the “dance floor” is not where we’ll end up.
And how we end up will bear some but not an entire resemblance to how we started — as me mature and refine and evolve back into, what Buechner calls, our “original shimmering selves!”

“Dance” and “Dancing”:
they are among the metaphors
that work for me
in defining and explicating the spiritual life.

Do they work for you?  It not, what metaphors do?
Feel free to leave your comments, below.

posted by Jim Reiter on July 14, 2018