identity – Jane Tawel

Laying Down the Heavy Bags

Laying Down the Heavy Bags

By Jane Tawel

October 5, 2026

Slogging through,

hauling around these heavy bags

of selves, and roles,

of identities I have collected —

sometimes the weight of all of them

is more than I can bear.

But to leave them alone and unguarded

Beside the Road is scary.

What would it feel like to be so light?

Who would I be without my stuff of self?

Even the celestial bodies

I have assumed to wear

as coats of many colors

are nothing more than history’s passing fads.

And I am just a tad tired

of being used by my need to believe.

Belief is over-rated as a weight-bearing device.

To be lightened, without load, is scary.

To give up a closet full of theories

Leaves me lighter than I can bear.

The air is too thin

without the ballast of my strong convictions.

I’ve never been a fan of flight.

To be Light is scary.

Darkness has covered a multitude of sins.

But I have found quite lately

that the burdens I have carried

are making holes in the fabric of my life

and despite my attempts at staying under cover,

the holes keep letting the Light shine through.

There are many ways to lay down what we carry.

And I am finding that if I do not volunteer

to let go and leave my illusive, leaden payloads behind,

then bit by bit,

the holes torn in the fabric I have donned

of selves meant to disguise the soul –

those very holes enlarge,

and fill the empty spaces —

and whether I mean to or not,

I leave all my tattered rags of my small self

Scattered higgledy-piggledy

in my wandering wake.

I imagine someday you may find me

(or at least I hope You do)

crawling and inching ahead along the path,

an unknown, unknowing infant,

naked, unashamed,

and Weightless.

What Small Part of Oneness Am I?

by Jane Tawel

What Small Part of Oneness Am I?

By Jane Tawel

The ray of light is from the Sun,

it is of the Sun,

but it is not the Sun.

The cloud is in the Sky,

it is of the Sky,

but it is not the Sky.

I am in Space,

I am of the Space,

but I am not Space.

I am in Life’s Ocean,

I am not the Ocean,

but I am a small wave.

I am in God,

I am of God,

but I am not God.

If I accept the wonderous mystery

of being blind to what lies beyond,

I will be the Light.

If I let go of my anxious need

to control the weather of my life,

I will be content with being now —

Floating, not digging in and dissipating.

If I release all my desires

To contain and to enlarge myself,

My Heart will open the cage of my mind

and I will be as One;

Spacious with All.

If I, with thanks, set learning aside,

And experience God

In the Unknowingness and Love

Of the God of All Creation and All

I will no longer play God —

I will be Christ.

“Each day, I am looking at my small self as dead

And yet I AM — more alive than ever.

The anxious, painful, over-thinking self is slowly decaying.

I realize the tiny me is no longer only who I AM.

But instead, Suffering becomes Love and Joy

in the small self that is not myself

But a resurrected Savior of Goodness and Peace”**

Choose the name you wish to be crucified with –

Be it Krishna, Buddha, or as was chosen for me —

The Christ.

Die to all that is in you that does not save.

Die to all that is within you that does not heal.

Die to all that is in you that does not forgive.

Die to all that is in you that is not at peace.

Live to all that is Love.

Live to only that which is Love.

Let the clouds disperse

and release into the vast mystery

of The Sky.

Let the ray of Light dissipate

as it touches the Earth

warming others

and new things will grow.

Let the wave resolve back into the Ocean

and come and go

We know not from where or where to

But always at one with the Ocean,

Alive forever in the One.

Live, and move and have your being

in God.

And be your True Spacious Self

Be the Light of “just as I AM”*

What small part am I

in the ever-moving parts

of this planet’s short life?

In Light of Eternity,

What is Yesterday? Tomorrow? Today?

I am, at heart,

as God — beyond understanding.

But God is even beyond words.

Let me not try to understand

myself or others;

Just as I can never theologize about God.

Let my peace pass my understanding, O God.

You know all my innermost parts.

Create in me a new heart, O God.***

Hold me in the palm of Your Fatherly Hand.

Cradle me in the Womb of Your Motherly Love.

Let me Be no longer a small part,

But Be at One with All Beings;

Be at One with all Beingness;

and Be at One with You.

**My paraphrase of Galatians 2:20

***Psalm 51:10

*”Just As I Am, without One Plea” by Charlotte Elliot

A Short Poem of Encouragement

IMG_7202 3.jpeg

(Jane — where she is)

If This Is Where I Am

By Jane Tawel

July 9, 2020

If this is where I am, today

Then I need not choose where to go.

If I am here,

then I am who

I can be best,

and I can know

That even though I have some fear,

This place I am is enough-true,

To get me through

And help me grow,

Into the self that I should be,

Just for right now,

Just I, myself, and Thee.

When our living moments meet us at the day’s designs, then we are created anew into what we have always been most able to be. Enjoy Living Who and Where you are today, ~~ Jane

The Center Now Holds

By Jane Tawel

April 1, 2019

I never had a center until now.

It took me many years to make

My center sometimes appear.

And now it often all a-sudden,

Shows up–

Solid, sure and unafraid.

It was sort of lurking long inside me,

Always a jiggly mess though;

Like a cake without a finished middle,

Still raw and sloshing left and right;

Unable to hold still enough for

Me to feel I even had

what other people easily used,

As nourishment or weaponry.

All my parts were always flying off in pieces.

Now sometimes I quietly sense in me

a firm center

Unbroken and unyielding.

But this annoys or terrifies you.

So many times, I just sit quietly holding my center

While it holds me.

But while I hold myself in place,

And you stare blankly, wonderingly

At what you sense

and is now un-hidden from even me,

I let you look at all the missing and shard-ed bits,

I once hurled your way.

And instead of pieces,

I often times feel peace.

My center now holds.

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