A fierce wind rattles the window, forcing itself through invisible gaps into the room where I lay. I pull a blanket up further over my chest and listen to the gusts howl, and feel the errant drafts cross my cheek. Wind carries life and death with it, and life waiting to live. Minuscule seeds; insects; bacteria; viruses; all held aloft for miles and miles on their airborne journey in hopes of fertile ground.

I, on the other hand, am water. My veins transport fluids that also harbor life and death; life giving nutrients, dead cells to be disposed of. I feel heavy and uncoordinated. I yearn to flow and ooze into a mold that will unburden me, that will give me a shape so I can stop wondering what it is I am. But the liquid also cools my mind, and though my vision through it is hazy, it magnifies certain images so that I may examine them in all of their horrifying beautiful detail.

When the sun burns with its fire of life, its heat courses through my watery veins and reminds me that liquid has no shape; it is a shape-shifter. We have the magic to define who and what we want to be – if we can see beyond the illusory bounds that try to contain us. We are water people reliant on air, and fire, and earth too. Through our breath we bring in the knowledge of the universe, and through our feet we touch the wisdom of our own soul.

Fear is always easiest. It lives and breeds like damp moss on the underside of anger’s sharp rock. But a river flows freely across boulders and down deep ravines toward the sea without fear or anger. It flows with courage of self-knowledge. When it is no longer a river its energy still spreads and carries life and death, just as does the wind, and the soil.

It’s time to burn the lifeless shells within which we’ve hidden for lifetimes. The heat of creation is waiting for us to forge ourselves into vessels of peace and actualization. Will I let my ego evaporate with the beads of sweat on my brow? The fire may burn and scar, but we will be lighter for it, ready to scatter new seeds across the plains that will nourish those who come after us, if we are willing to tend to them. What will sprout from those seeds of intention?