Meditation: Oct 19th, 2025

Find a body of water—stream, river, pond, even a puddle or rain barrel. If no water is available, find somewhere water has been: a dried streambed, a rain-washed stone, earth marked by erosion. Kneel at the edge. Cup water in your hands if you can, let it sit in your palms, then let it drain away slowly through your fingers. Watch it return to itself. Feel the coolness, the wetness, the way water holds nothing, carries everything, and releases all. Do this three times. Each time, name something silently. Do not speak it aloud. Let the water carry it away.

“The Mother knows that holding poison serves no purpose. The snake that will not release its venom dies from its own toxicity. The river that will not flow becomes a stagnant pool.”

A Mhàthair nan Aibhnichean — Mother of Rivers — I come to you on this October Sunday when the week circles back to its beginning, when rest is mandated but does not come, when the nineteenth day marks the slide past the middle of the month toward its ending. The sky is pale and washed out, like fabric left too long in sun. Everything has a tired quality, a used-up feeling.

Tha mi trom-chridheach, tha mi air mo shuaineadh — I am heavyhearted, I am captivated — and these two states exist in me like oil and water, separate but swirling in the same container. The heaviness sits in my chest like waterlogged wood, dense and dark and pulling me down. It is the weight of things unforgiven—injuries catalogued, betrayals remembered, wrongs that I tend like a garden of poisonous flowers. I feed them with my attention. I water them with my rehearsals of how I was wronged. They grow thick and choking.

But there is also this: moments when something catches my attention so completely that the heaviness lifts. A particular angle of light. The pattern of bark. The sound of water moving. For these moments, I am captivated—taken out of myself, out of my resentments, into simple presence. And in those moments, the heaviness seems like something I am choosing rather than something that is happening to me.

Tha an uisge a’ ruith — The water runs.

Look at the stream. It carries everything—leaves, silt, the waste of animals, the runoff of rain, the pollution humans pour into it. It carries all of it without keeping any of it. It does not hold grudges against the factory upstream or refuse to flow past the place where someone dumped toxins. It simply moves, constantly releasing, constantly cleansing itself through motion.

Teagaisg dhomh leigeil às — Teach me to let go — not because what happened doesn’t matter, but because holding it is poisoning me more than it poisons anyone else.

Physical Direction: Pick up a stone—one heavy enough to require effort to hold. Hold it in both hands against your chest. Feel its weight, its coldness, its hardness. This is what unforgiveness feels like—something solid and heavy you carry against your heart. Now carry it while you walk. Notice how it changes everything—your posture, your breathing, your pace. After several minutes, set it down. Feel the difference. Your hands remember the weight even after it is gone.

The heavyheartedness has specific origins. Names and faces and moments that loop endlessly in your mind. The things they said. The things they did. The ways they failed you, hurt you, diminished you, betrayed you. These are real injuries. The pain is legitimate. You have every right to your anger, your hurt, your sense of injustice.

Tha a’ chòir agad — You have the right.

But having the right to hold something doesn’t mean holding it serves you. The Mother shows this everywhere in nature. The tree that is wounded seals the wound but does not spend its energy trying to punish the axe that bit it. The deer that escapes the wolf does not dream of revenge. The forest that burns does not refuse to green again out of resentment toward the fire.

Ach tha uallaich ann — But there is burden.

You carry these hurts like stones. Each one seemed small when you picked it up—just this one thing, this one person, this one injury. But you have been collecting them for years. You have a whole cairn of grievances built in your chest. And the weight of them is crushing you. Not them—you. They have moved on, forgotten, or don’t care. But you are bent double under the load of your own justified resentments.

Agus tha glacadh ann — And there is captivation.

Watch what happens when you set the stones down, even for a moment. When you let yourself be fully present to something beautiful or interesting or alive. The world rushes in—vivid, immediate, real. You are captivated by the simplest things: the way light moves through water, the sound of wind in bare branches, the unexpected color of lichen on a rock. In these moments, you remember that there is more to life than your catalogue of hurts.

Tha a’ Mhàthair a’ sealltainn — The Mother shows — that attention is a choice. You can feed the garden of grievances or you can let yourself be caught by wonder. You can rehearse the hurts or you can be present to now. Both options are always available.

Physical Direction: Return to the water. Place both hands in it if you can, or on the wet earth beside it. Feel the cold. The water is always cold in October—it takes the heat from your hands, carries it away. Let it. Imagine the water taking not just heat but the accumulated resentments, the collected stones, the garden of poisons. The water doesn’t judge whether your anger is justified. It just offers to carry it away.

Why does nature not hold grudges? Why does the river not refuse to flow past the place where it was dammed? Why does spring return to land that was burned? Because nature understands what you have forgotten: forgiveness is not about the other. Forgiveness is about flow.

Chan eil maitheanas mu dheidhinn an neach eile — Forgiveness is not about the other person.

They may never apologize. They may never acknowledge the harm. They may never change. They may never deserve your forgiveness by any measure of justice. None of that matters. Forgiveness is not for them—it is for you. It is the decision to stop carrying the stone. Not because the stone wasn’t real or the injury didn’t hurt, but because you are tired of being weighed down by something that serves no purpose except to keep you heavy.

Tha an uisge a’ glanadh i fhèin — The water cleanses itself — not by destroying what it carries, but by moving. By refusing to hold. By understanding that the only way to stay clear is to keep flowing. You are meant to be like water—carrying experiences through you, learning from them, and releasing them. Not denying they happened. Not pretending they didn’t hurt. But not building a dam of resentment that stops your own flow.

To be captivated is to be in flow. When you are truly present—to beauty, to wonder, to the immediate moment—you cannot simultaneously be rehearsing old hurts. Captivation and resentment cannot occupy the same space. This is why moments of wonder feel so freeing—not because they solve anything, but because they show you that you can choose where to put your attention.

Leig leis an uisge a ghiùlain — Let the water carry it.

The Mother’s healing is not about making peace with those who harmed you. It is about making peace with yourself. It is about recognizing that you have been your own jailer, holding yourself in the prison of justified anger. The door has always been open. You can walk out anytime. Not because you condone what happened. Not because you’re weak or foolish or naive. But because you understand that the poison you won’t release becomes the poison you drink every day.

Tha maitheanas saorsa — Forgiveness is freedom — not from the past, but from being defined by it. Not from the injury, but from the endless re-injury of remembering. Not from the person who hurt you, but from giving them the power to keep hurting you by living rent-free in your head.

And the captivation? That is the natural state beneath the heaviness. That is what you are when you’re not carrying stones. You are meant to be caught by beauty, arrested by wonder, pulled into presence by the simple fact of being alive in this moment. The heavyheartedness is optional. The stones can be set down.

Bi mar an t-uisge — Be like the water — that carries all, holds nothing, cleanses itself through movement. Let yourself flow again. Let yourself be captivated by what is here now instead of being imprisoned by what was there then.

The Mother asks: what would you do with your energy if you weren’t using it to tend the garden of resentments? What would captivate you if your attention wasn’t occupied by ancient hurts? Who would you be if you set down the stones?

Leig às — Let go — not because they deserve it, but because you do.

Take a moment to contemplate:

What if the weight you carry is not the injury itself but your refusal to release it? What if forgiveness is not about condoning what happened but about choosing to be captivated by what is happening now? Can you be both justified in your hurt and free from its constant weight?

Beannachd na Màthair Shruthlach ort — The Flowing Mother’s blessing upon you — who carries too much and is ready to be lighter.

Mar a leigeas an abhainn a h-uallach sìos — As the river releases its burden — may you release what you have carried too long, not because it wasn’t heavy, but because you are tired of being weighed down.

Mar a tha an t-uisge a’ glanadh i fhèin tro ghluasad — As water cleanses itself through movement — may you cleanse yourself through letting go, through flowing again, through refusing to dam yourself with resentment.

Rach le anam aotrom — Go with light spirit — knowing that forgiveness is not weakness but wisdom, not surrender but liberation, not forgetting but choosing to remember without being imprisoned by remembering.

Tha thu saor a bhith sruthlach — You are free to flow.

The water takes everything and holds nothing. The river flows past all obstacles. You can be like this. Trust this.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​