Joy Springs Up in Unexpected Places

Do you know the sound the cartoon dog makes when he shoots his head straight up and suddenly becomes aware of something? And his warm, sweet and goofy awareness changes everything and comically moves the story forward?

Well - I am making that sound - dumb lovable feisty me. I am suddenly aware that I am very open to allowing a loving universe help me resolve my challenges in surprising ways!

Tears don't just come for no reason. There is something that pushes them out. I know I am still grieving, but I am having a hard time thinking grief is the only reason I am crying right now. Is it because I am experiencing glimpses of loving again in a new way? An all inclusive vulnerable way that feels safe somehow because "with Love all things are possible." Kinda feels a little profound-ish, but YES, this is exactly it!

I know this is accurate because the convulsion of painful emotion stopped once I chose to see the truth beneath the tears. Wow - that was cool! (You get this way, this sensitivity, by having cried a lot - by the way.)

I used to share my Love with just my hubby - but know it seems I am cultivating a new experience of Love. It feels alien and very familiar at the same time. I am being lovable, loving and loved with, to and by everyone!

I wonder what this all means? I wonder if this miraculous life of mine is finally blooming right here in late February like the unexpected daffodils in my backyard? These silly flowers are in the wrong place. They have blossomed in the center of a new path I installed last year. But they are bright spots of yellow in an otherwise dreary winter scape just the same. They speak to me about unexpected joy.

Frankly, I will take what I can get. I have had a very tough year and a half. "Hey Universe, Thank You. And let's get ready to R - U - M - B - L - E !" Bring on your multiplicity of synchronistic & unexpected miracles! I am ready to be amazed and happy again! I am willing to enjoy Joy wherever it shows up on MY new path.

Are you willing to just allow Joy?

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Darkness, Play, Joy

"What if this is what it looks like while my dream of the end of Apartheid is happening?  What if my being in this very situation is... part of... my overcoming?"~Nelson Mandela about his imprisonment

"Just how do we deal with agitations of the dark? How do we make our way through the tangle of being confused or sad or blocked in understanding a way to tomorrow? It seems natural enough to treat our problems like an overgrown path and go hacking our way through, doing small violence to ourselves. Yet this insight from an ancient Chinese text implies something harder and simpler. It implies that agitation itself is dark, that only when we can keep our hands off will there be room for light. It seems that agitations of the dark always cover over.  For myself, I worked for years covering over sore lesions of esteem with agitations of accomplishment, till my heart was covered over with a thicket of achievements. Only when I put the achievements aside did the light begin to move. Only then did a Universal warmth reach my sore center. Only when I let the dark energies rest did I begin to heal" ~Mark Nepo

"Play is simply the pleasure that comes from doing something directly for the soul and spirit, something that is free of the heavy ego and the seriousness of our own intentions. This idea takes us back to the important discussion we had about enjoying life rather than justifying it by working hard and being intent on helping others. Thoreau once said that if a neighbor came to his house to help him, he'd go out the back door. (not his exact words). If helping isn't a form of play, then it, too, may not be very spiritual. The lack of play is a sign of too much ego or a history of repression." ~Thomas Moore

"When we are willing to be intimate with what actually is here now, to look directly at all of our experience, we might recognize that this is our life, however different from our thoughts and ideas about it. It is as if we hunker down and actually get very real, recognizing that our thoughts of gaining and losing, good and bad, happy and sad, are what distance us from ourselves. When we breathe in fully and pause, we clear a space in our mind without judgment. If we are willing to hang in with the practice over and over again, noticing how our thoughts of gaining or losing distance us from ourselves and from what is, we open ourselves to a whole new reality. We came into intimacy with everything; we enter a world of joy that is so close, to pervasive, that we are surprised we haven't been aware of its presence all along. Once Dongshan was asked, 'What is the deepest truth? What is the wisdom that liberates?' His response was, 'I am always close to this.' It is the closeness itself- the intimacy with what is here with us now- that is the truth that liberates us. Imagine being so close to your experience of life!" ~Roshi Pat Enkyo O'Hara

What do you think about thinking?

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Get Busy Livin'

"Life presses upon us, forever challenging us with new forms of vitality that threaten the status quo which feels so good with its stability and peace. Religions seem to hate Pan and his vitality. Often, they prefer the death principle. Let things be as they always have been. No intrusions of vitality, please. I think that people in general are more afraid of living than of dying." ~Thomas Moore

It does not get more plain and to the point. "Vitality" is a very tricky word. Broken apart it's root is VITAL. What is vital in a life is air, water, food...all the Maslovian basics. But "Vitality" also connotes the energy that undergirds sexuality, pleasure and all things joyful.

Strange that one word would suggest two such diverse ends of a spectrum. Unless, as Thomas suggested, the enjoying of basic needs - air, water and food - with the same passion and pleasure that sexuality affords is in effect an expression of Spirituality.

We have all heard tell of that person who ENJOYS life. We have seen that person in movies and read of her in books. I have always held her in high esteem. And have always (until now) subconsciously wanted to be like her. To take a bite out of life, to take pleasure in pleasure freely and without apology. 

Frankly I've had my moments. My birthday last year was one. I was suffering the fairly recent death of my husband and turning the culturally charged age of 50 at the same time. How does one go through this without feeling massive amounts of pain? 

Well it was a miracle. Amazing Grace, and my sister, placed me in a place and among loving people. And as the bewitching hour approached I found myself dancing with complete abandon. My body flung itself iinto action, rhythmically pulsating and gyrating and bending and twisting with great joy and ease. "I" was lost and "I" was found at the same time. 

This was a gift of great proportions which I will never forget. Oh and being 50, by the way, boy oh boy was I SORE afterwards! 

So I get what Thomas is asking us to explore and embrace - if we can. I am so grateful for this lesson at this time in my life. Thank you, Thank you, Thank you!

"Get busy livin' or get busy dyin'." What movie is that from?

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Monkeying around with Religion

“The beginning of love is to let those we love be perfectly themselves, and not to twist them to fit our own image. Otherwise we love only the reflection of ourselves we see in them.” Thomas Merton

Thomas Merton was a trappist monk of the Abbey of Gethsemani, Kentucky, he was a poet, mystic and a student of comparative religion.

Some may have observed a recent shift toward writing about contemplation, religion and spirituality. The catalyst for this is an e-course called "Crafting your own Religion" in which I am a participate. It is being taught by Thomas Moore, author of Care of the Soul , amongst other books on religion, mind and spirit. 

Today the class was asked to consider perhaps taking a few practices from monastic or cloistered traditions toward crafting our own religions, i.e. taking a deeper dive into things! TM used the word "serious". This sounded serious to me suggesting we take religion seriously. And it felt like a red flag. I have never cottoned to folks who take religion too seriously. But leaning into something to craft a thing most to my own liking is the whole point of the class. So - from my heart - here are vows I might subscribe to and some text I might like to see illuminated in a manuscript.

Thomas Moore says, "Vows help us to avoid forgetfulness and distraction & anchor our vision." Here are my three simple vows:

To be responsible with all human relationships, i.e., be transparent, vulnerable, present & available

To do my best in all things without judgement or expectation

To laugh and be joyful

My scriptorium text (currently) would be 

"Don't think of yourself as an intestinal tract and a tangle of nerves in the skull, that will not work unless you drink coffee. Think of yourself as incandescent power, illuminated perhaps and forever talked to by God and his messengers... Think if Tiffany's made a mosquito, how wonderful we would think it was!" ~ Brenda Ueland 

The vows and quote above appear to advocate an innocence or child's eye view. But from my current perspective this is a fine and wonderful thing. For to partition off from our waking selves "childlike wonder" seems most forgetful indeed!

If you were to monk-ey around with monastic ways what would you do?

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Enlightment at Gunpoint

Looking back, my Religious/Spiritual timeline begins with casual Sunday School for one summer followed by communion and a photo of me in a dress in front of a huge pink azalea. NO inner connections were made. Everything was external and ceremonial.

During my teen years I was hit by a car and felt my soul move away from my body - no tunnel, no bright light but clearly understood at that moment that there are distinct differences between the two. Still no internal connections were felt. It was just another fact of life.

From teen years thru college I relied on my wits and which way the wind was blowing. Still no existential thoughts, feelings, actions or questions. I graduated and had a successful career during my 20s and 30s.

I married somewhat late in life. My husband, a trained Physicist turned computer programmer, was decidedly scientific and I saw myself in complete opposition to his religious skepticism. Still neither he nor I took stands one way or the other. I just led a life of knowing all of life's challenges were somehow to be overcome (dare I say gifts). And in so overcoming growth was inevitable. We supported eachother and created a life together of ease and comfort. There was no need to look further than my own doorstep or my own nose.

Then he died. This is what can be termed "enlightenment at gunpoint." Then I wanted to know more. Then I needed to inspect myself and this life to help me make best choices and become adept at living differently than before. For the very first time in my life feelings were cascading from me and I needed to know how to deal with them.

So here I am today reading everything I can and spending more and more time introspectively coming to know "knowing" and what that means. In a way I see my evolution as familiar territory. I am again, like during my young adulthood, relying on my wits. And those "winds" that propel me forward today are most likely the same that sped me along my path then. I just experience them now as born of intuition for I am now more awake and living more deliberately.

Timelines can be illuminating!

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Valentine's Day

I do not fit snugly into a world built on principles of clock time and corporeal senses alone. I may appear eccentric if I write about things like "straddling eternity." But it is in the effemera I feel most hardy. My strength seems to build upon itself in the light of my spirit. 

What do I do with this new found thing - this core within -which consists only of sweet air, energy and feeling? This thing that has no structure or mass, no handles to grasp, no parts to which I can point? How do I manage to live a life based from an open heart?

I am coming to know when my heart throbs and feels weighty I am tapped into this thing. This actual heaviness in my chest is confirmation for me. It lets me know "this is important." It seems my body can tell me when I am here connecting to whatever this is - my Truth.

I am building strength toward being more awake and available. I look forward to the day this is, if not an automatic, at least a familiar response. In this way, perhaps I can then manage to live more often from this place - a place of higher love. In this way, I figure then every day will be Valentine's Day.

Wishing you a Happy Valentine's Day!

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Thinking About Contemplation

I am struck by the difference in the participants when one contemplates verses when one meditates. It seems to me meditation requires joyous wide and vast emptiness and contemplation joyously lets in all comers. Both allow for emergence of higher understanding. Both require an acknowledgement of an inner life and willingness to see. I am so grateful for this cleaving of ideas which I never knew before!

But it seems meditation is private and contemplation leans toward being more public. Evoking a contemplative state wants grandeur and simplicity to intertwine with all of our senses. And it wants us to document it somehow - in verse, song, essay, art or other - to hopefully evoke itself again in others.

Both straddle eternity.

Have you made time to be contemplative today?

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A Messy Life

My life has made (and is making) a transition as we speak from orderly to NOT. And I am becoming accustomed to it somehow. Through grief I have warmed to uncertainty. Is this why folks want religion - to acquaint themselves with the roiling of life? And to make friends with it?

I recall letting things & circumstances happen in my youth to which I merely reacted. In this way I was carried along a path that brought me to this moment. With no overarching belief system in place I managed just fine.

Now I stretch and anguish to know how to get back to the ease of that way of living, but with an awareness about it. An awareness that allows more depth and communion with myself and others. Perhaps I am on my way there by not only recognizing the value of a non-linear messy miraculous life...but agreeing to allow myself to sink my teeth into it?

What do we have to lose by "going for it?"

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Resistance

 

Lots of pain and lots of tears and lots of strategies employed to get through a rough patch. I am so weary of revisiting these dark places. But by claiming and naming them, by the simple passage of time, and with help from those who care about me - I am slowly coming back from this episode to a life I prefer to live. One of joy, peace, love, and laughter. 

Sumo Wrestlers, that's what I saw when I asked to see behind my pain this time. A small circular battlefield confined this fight between two powerful forces, each agreeing to resist the other. This was me against myself, refusing to give in to 'what is' and pushing against reality with all my might.

I must step aside. 

Instantly I knew by stepping aside the natural FLOW of things would be restored, the tiny battlefield would have the opportunity to once again become an unbounded playing field and I would begin to feel better. 

And so I have been working hard to maintain this stance of non-resistance. Yes, I know I have done this before, but I guess I am not done learning. It is not so easy for a strong willed woman such as myself to let go. And this lesson, like most of the important ones, has many levels to it.

Today I am a follower - a truth seeking giver of nurturing love. I am awake doing just what is in front of me and letting energy FLOW freely through me once again. 

Wonder how long this will last? No matter - there is only NOW to be concerned with anyway. This is the universal recipe for success of any kind!

"Unwanted Wisdom" that's what some call the stuff we get from painful life experiences. Really is true you know. The truth is we do not get to choose everything that happens to us. But we do get to choose how we react to what happens to us.

Are there things you have to keep learning and relearning?

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I am on strike!

Seems creating requires focused alone time, and since (currently) I abhor being alone -- not alone like having no pals or neighbors, but alone like not having a confidant, an intimate buddy who sincerely listens and who sincerely cares & shares in return -- I am finding myself on strike! And so since creating is one of the things that eases the pain, I am finding I am feeling sorrow today - when I allow myself to feel at all.

Being on strike like this is bad stuff. It is generating bad stuff and it is grinding against my well being. I need some help.

Plan A is to lighten up and go out and purposely look for some fun. That sounds soooo good! Plan B is to give in and allow myself to feel it. And hopefully naming it and claiming will end my strike. I think it will take a combination of both. FYI - this is what happens when I stop mediating.

To be continued...

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