Remembering Your Rhythm
A Drum Journey Into the Pulse of Life💗
I invite you on a drum journey with me. Not because I think everyone needs to play a drum.
(although it’s quite fun!)
But because I think many of us have become accustomed to following rhythms that were never truly ours.
The rhythm of urgency. Productivity. Comparison. Constant noise.
Somewhere, we forgot what it feels like to live in rhythm.
If you’ve never experienced a drum journey, think less about traveling somewhere new and more about remembering that the same pulse moving through nature also moves through you.
Nature used two very different drumming retreats to remind me of an essential truth:
Everything relies on Rhythm. Yes… everything.
Our heartbeat. Our breath. The ocean tides. The seasons. Conversations. Creativity.
We don’t create these rhythms. We belong to them. But somewhere along the way, the noise of the world drowned them out until we forgot how to listen.
Let me explain…
Both retreats were held in the mountain landscape of Montana. With limited cell service, surrounded by pine trees, damp earth after nourishing rains, and roaring rivers nearby, I found myself slowing to the pace of Mother Nature.
When I arrived at the African drumming retreat, I was unexpectedly greeted by one of the loudest thunderstorms I’ve ever heard. The thunder cracked so fiercely it seemed to shake the valley awake. Like a drum roll, it echoed through the mountains while rain danced across the metal roof in a mesmerizingly quick tempo.
Then, as the storm passed, other rhythms stood out.
The rapid tapping of baby woodpeckers.
The rush of the river spilling over white caps.
The gusts of wind whistling through the pine trees.
Even the imperceptible low bass of trees rooted deep within the earth.
When I closed my eyes and listened with my body instead of only my ears, the chorus seeped into the places within me that had drifted out of sync with this loving pulse of Life.
Before anyone picked up a drum, the forest had already begun the lesson.
I had come expecting to learn rhythm through music. Instead, Nature reminded me that she had been the teacher all along.
Nature never loses its rhythm. We lose our relationship with it.
Perhaps that’s what happens to many of us over time. Life doesn’t usually fall apart all at once. Gradually, it becomes harder to hear the wisdom of our own bodies and intuition. We lose touch with the pulse that has been sustaining us all along.
These rhythms aren’t perfectly steady either. They rise and fall. They accelerate and slow. Every living thing knows when to surge forward and when to become still. A thunderstorm builds before dissolving into silence. Rivers rush with spring snowmelt, then slow with the heat of summer. Our own heartbeat quickens with excitement and settles again in rest. Seasons of solitude and seasons of community. Work and rest. Learning and integration.
Nature reminds us that Rhythm isn’t found in sameness, but in constant relationship with change. It doesn’t mistake change for disorder. It trusts a greater intelligence.
Perhaps we’ve mistaken consistency for wholeness, when Nature has been demonstrating an entirely different rhythm.
The beauty is that we can return to this relationship at any moment. It doesn’t take very long. Close your eyes. Take a slow, deep breath. Feel the air on your skin. Listen.
Everything is already here.
The trick, if there is one, is learning to stay connected to these sacred moments while still participating fully in the world we’ve created.
At the women’s shamanic retreat, I experienced a drum journey. It’s like entering a meditative state through rhythm. A steady drumbeat occupies the thinking mind, allowing intuition, imagination, and visions to rise to the surface. As the mind begins to rest, the soul awakens. As the shamans say, we dream our world into being.
During this retreat, I also participated in a sweat lodge ceremony. Inside the small dome-shaped lodge, the scent of earth and volcanic stone lingered in the air. I felt as though I had entered the womb of the Great Mother. Pitch black, the heartbeat of the drum echoing within my own chest. The sacred songs continue to live inside me.
The African drumming retreat revealed another side of rhythm. Where the shamanic hand drum invited me inward, the traditional djembe drum invited me into outward expression.
There was laughter. Dancing. Missed beats. Sore hands. So much joy. And then, almost magically, individual rhythms began finding one another. By the end, it no longer felt like sixty separate drums. It felt like one heartbeat.
Even as I drove home, I could still feel the rhythms reverberating throughout my whole body.
Again, Nature had been teaching this all along. Diversity has its own rhythm.
Birds don’t sing the same song. Rivers don’t move at the same speed. Trees don’t sway exactly alike. Yet the forest feels whole.
Nature isn’t synchronized because everything is identical.
Nature is harmonious because everything contributes differently, yet perfectly.
For years, I’ve written and taught about holistic healing, through my own journey and alongside others walking theirs. Yet lately my understanding of healing has been evolving. For a long time, I believed healing always had to be worked toward. Another practice. Another breakthrough. Another version of myself waiting somewhere ahead.
Now I’m beginning to wonder if healing isn’t something we achieve at all.
I’m feeling into this: healing naturally unfolds when we return to relationship with the living Rhythm that has always existed within us and around us.
What if protecting your own Rhythm became one of the most sacred things you could do for yourself?
What if you trusted your own pace instead of trying to keep up with the world around you?
We can move intentionally through life’s varying tempos while remaining connected to the deeper pulse of Life that holds us steady.
Place a hand over your heart. Feel your pulse. Notice the space between each beat.
The pause isn’t separate from the rhythm. It is part of it.
Rhythm has never stopped.
It’s simply been waiting for you to listen again.
Listen for Nature to bring you back into the rhythm of Life.
As always, blessings on your healing journey,
Brenda Carey💗🙏
Personal Update:
I have a little behind-the-scenes book news to share...
My book officially has a title!🎉
The Wild Nature of the Sensitive Soul
Thank you to everyone who took the time to vote in last month’s survey. Your thoughtful feedback was incredibly helpful as I worked through the final decision.
I’m still refining the subtitle (who knew that could be one of the hardest parts?), but the manuscript is now in its final round of editing this month.
It’s exciting to feel the book becoming more real with each passing week. Thank you for following this journey with me! I can’t wait to share it with you.
NOW AVAILABLE!📖
Orders are now open for She Who Flows: Guidance for Surrendering to the Divine Feminine and Witnessing the Miracles of Self-Love, a multi-author book in which I contributed a chapter.
Inside this anthology, 28 women (including me!) from around the world open their hearts and share personal stories of turning inward, choosing self-love, and allowing life to guide them with more grace.