Wow! What an amazing day. Everyone was prepared for the worst. People were evacuated knowing that there would be a huge demonstration on Friday. Fearing that it would be an escalation of what had happened on the previous two days, violence and destruction. We are clearly not walking a linear path. Somehow people were able to put aside the past and walk clearly into the future focusing on their vision.

People who were there felt the beauty of this unimaginable event, everyone moving back to peace after having suffered the turmoil. That is not easy to do. Even people who had been detained the previous day were willing to put that all behind them in order to move forward.

In power struggles I know from my own personal experience that if you refuse to react then usually that is the end of the struggle, not retreating or giving in, because that is also movement, but to stand steadfast in your truth, removing the charge, un-reactive. The other side cannot react, because there is nothing to ‘react’ to. It is no longer a charged situation. That is true empowerment and that is what we witnessed, not in one person but as a collective group of thousands of people. This is difficult enough to achieve in ones self, but to achieve that in a group is truly magnificent.

I did not attend the event myself but I did witness the parade leaving Tahrir Square after the demonstration. I was on a friend’s balcony which had a view of the bridge over 26^th of July Street. We heard noise and then saw people, cars and taxis honking and chanting, waving flags as they moved towards Mohandeseen. The feeling celebration and solidarity was beautiful. It brought tears to my eyes.

It truly is darkest before the dawn. And although there may be more bumps in the road we need to remember the journey thus far. Remind ourselves that things do cycle around it is not always a linear decent. We are navigating through this event as we do through our lives. Doors will open and close and as long as we have the faith that we are always exactly were we need to be we will remove resistance to the events themselves navigating through them with ease.

When you hit a wall use that as an indicator that it is necessary to adjust your course, you don’t have to tear down the wall! I think of that movie (can’t remember the name) where the guy is on a journey and comes to a wall. It is too high for him to get over. He spends his life trying different ways to get over the wall. Eventually he dies and as the camera pans out we see that the wall is actually just a small section of wall. Had he tried to go around it he would have succeeded easily. Instead he spent his life in a struggle to conquer the wall.

We need to fine tune our navigating skills so that we can ‘know’ which direction to take with great clarity, to know how to get around the wall. The best way to do that is to use all the signposts that are given to us that clearly mark our way. Be awake it is all right in front of you. Listen attentively; people usually give you the answers you seek, unknowingly. I have had so many people tell me things that they never remember saying or in areas that are so far out of their expertise that you know it didn’t come from their mind. Often we resist them or the information because we don’t feel they ‘should’ know anything. They don’t it is not from them, it is through them.

I have a cat that is 18 years old. She is deaf and almost completely blind. I believe she navigates my room through her sense of smell. She wanders around the room to her litter, her food, the bed. I watch her and it is amazing. She walks until she comes to an obstacle a wall, a door, a bowl… and then she adjusts her position moves on until she again encounters another obstacle. This goes on until she gets to where she wants to be. She does what she needs to do and then she moves on to the next thing. My room is not huge but for her these things are quite a distance away from each other. I believe she sets her destination based on smell and then fine tunes the steps by navigating around the obstacles. It is quite inspiring to watch.

For me I feel my path more is like music that I hear and am drawn towards rather than a smell that I follow, but I am sure we all sense it in our own way. The important thing is to sense it and to remember that the path may not be linear but have many twists and turns which should not discourage us but inspire us to navigate through.