I confess to recently having looked into the mirror and noticing a drooping of my jowls, deep crevasses of a frown on both sides of my mouth. More accurately, not frowning, just the absence of laughter and smiles.
Darshan is a reciprocal experience of meeting with a holy or revered person or diety which results in the human viewer’s receiving a blessing. The person just before me to receive darshan had been told, “To be is your gift of the world. There is nothing at all selfish about just being for some period of time and letting yourself feel energetically restored. If you have a beautiful fountain, water must come into the basin or the fountain cannot continue to send out its beautiful movement. Fill the basin — with pure, radiant water.”
In much of the world, this is the season for giving gifts. But to be able to give a gift, there must also be those to receive. Most of us are familiar with the lyrics of the song about the little drummer boy.
I played my best for him
Pa rum pum pum pum,
Rum pum pum pum,
Rum pum pum pum
Then he smiled at me
Pa rum pum pum pum
Me and my drum
I was the last to receive a blessing from The Mother.
To Debra:
And this last topic is a little less precise for you. You do take time to restore, but I think after you’ve taken some and you think, “I’ve already had my restoration and its time for me to flow out again.”
Please stop thinking about in and out. The water comes into the basin of the fountain so it can go out. When it goes out it lands in the perimeter of the basin, flows into the center, then out. And it just keeps recirculating.
Sometimes you’re more in one phase, sometimes more in the other. For you it would be good to try to find where the balance is. And remember that the basin is never empty, because it is not only you that fills it, but everything around you fills it.
The gifts that you give to the world… I’ve enjoyed through Barbara reading your blog. It’s very beautiful. This is a gift to everyone. You’re hosting an event like this. This is a gift to everyone.
Now to whatever degree it’s useful, focus on, “What do you need in order to be more fully nourished? And how can you invite that into yourself, knowing that it will recycle back out? … but in this moment, what will suit me in order for the fountain to be full and ready to pour out again of light?”
This flowing of water into the basin so it is ready to pour out again brings to mind the ebb and flow of light on our planet.
It has been a challenging autumn. August 30 we tested positive for Covid. September 24 John’s brother, Jerry, passed. The week of Thanksgiving, our 55-year old niece had a brain bleed. Since the first of November John has had an extremely painful sciatica flare. But the December full moon has come and gone. Known as the “cold moon” by the Mohawk people, this full moon occurs just a few days shy of December 21, the winter solstice.
Humans have honored the significance of the winter solstice for a very, very long time. The ancient Monument of Newgrange is a 5200 year old megalithic structure built in precise alignment with the rising sun over the solstice each winter. Built around 3200 BC, that means it is 600 years older than the Pyramids at Giza, and 1,000 years older than Stonehenge.
“What do you need in order to be more fully nourished? And how can you invite that into yourself, knowing that it will recycle back out?”
I need to remember that spring always follows winter.
I need to remember that water comes into the basin of the fountain so it can go out.
I need to remember that, as Stephen Spender so beautifully expressed, “The only true hope for civilization — the conviction of the individual that his inner life can affect outward events.”
I need to remember the face of our great-grandson, Jackson, when his G-ma took him to visit Santa.
I need to remember that when my eyes fill with wonder and my heart with love or joy, I do not betray my concerns for the world — I nourish my capacity to attend to them.
From my keyboard to yours, Merry Christmas everyone….
We are enjoying wonderful weather here on Pine Island. Whether the weather is pleasant or unpleasant, John and I continue to navigate some challenging physical stuff.
John started with planting a mum early November in Michigan’s hard autumn ground. Stepping on the shovel with his right leg, he felt a pop in his low back. Three chiropractic sessions, a TENS unit, and exercises could not prevent our long drive times from Michigan to Tennessee and from Tennessee to Florida from pushing him over the edge. Fast forward to this week:
I am having some sort of chronic sinus stuff. Interestingly, my friend (who did not know about this) sent an article titled “Marvels of Mucus and Phlegm.”
It is challenging to not feel discouraged.
A couple of days ago problems with some Amazon Web Services cloud servers were causing slow loading or failures for significant chunks of the internet. Our Alexa device stopped working. Everything looked right at the configuration level, but nothing I did brought her back online. Later, when Alexa came back online, we could still not access Amazon Music Unlimited.
Add to this a new app for TV here in Florida. Hmmmm, you know about teaching old dogs new tricks, right? We are struggling big time with that.
I said to John, “This house is too quiet!!!”
True confession. Those words have never come out of my mouth before.
I miss his music.
I miss putting together thousands of puzzle pieces as he is playing his guitar and I am (badly) singing along with him.
I miss him being out-and-about gabbing.
I miss the way we have historically lived life here.
We have both realized the profound fact that a lot has changed.
John’s brother, Jerry, passed in September. John will not be hanging out with Jerry for his normal two-days-per-week-off-island this January, February, and March. Also, John’s long-time musician friend, Walt, sold his place here on Pie Island after Walt’s wife passed in September.
Big changes.
I am currently the one to go to the store, the pharmacy, the store, the pharmacy; the pharmacy, the store, the pharmacy. The other day, the pharmacy tech at CVS was having a really bad day. She used the “F” word, and she cried.
We are not alone living through these stressful times.
Yesterday I had the privilege of transcribing my (marvels of mucus) friend’s private session with Barbara Brodsky. Here is a brief excerpt:
You said you’ve been – I don’t remember who – you said you’ve been listening to some of these teachers. I am looking at the questions.
Adyashanti – alright, he is very rooted in the true self, and I don’t know the 30 specific pointers and “practices” but I would imagine they must be pointers toward remembering and resting in the true self.
I am glad you are doing that. That’s perfect.
My true self is way beyond the mucus. John’s true self is much more than sciatica pain.
For sure, everything is a reminder of how we are giving meaning to our experiences. I drew an Osho card this morning. 7 of Water. Projections. The last lines: And there are as many worlds as there are minds, because every mind lives in its own world.
Grandson Brad checked in with us last evening. He suggested John tally his highest level of well-being each day. Rather than using a pain scale to see his lows, what was he able to do/enjoy/achieve today?
A couple of evenings ago, after some lateral leg pulls and a few minutes on the makeshift inversion table John was able to walk upright. He looked like someone with a book on their head, as proud as punch!
A suggestion from my friend’s reading: I want you to find that infinite source of love, that essence of love which you are…
And from Adyashanti: Essence isn’t a small thing, essence is an immense thing. The essence of you is everything you ever see, taste, touch, and experience. Everywhere you go, every step you take, every breath you take is actually happening by the essence, of the essence, in the essence, and to the essence.
The marvel of mucus and the severity of sciatica are both happening in the essence….
Tuesday evening while still in the post-overnight-drive malaise, I tried to log on as Zoom host for our Dharma Path class. It said “username / password incorrect” so I tried again. Same thing. Then the foggy thinking took over and I questioned if the link was set up on one of the other accounts. I tried both, but neither of those worked either, so I tried the main account once more.
Up popped, “YOUR ACCOUNT HAS BEEN LOCKED FOR 30 MINUTES DUE TO FIVE INCORRECT LOGIN ATTEMPTS.”
About 15 minutes late opening the room, and about 15 minutes before the class is to begin, I used the student link to log in as a participant. That worked, but I was unable to support the class as host by making the teacher/s co-hosts, muting, spotlighting the teacher, recording the class, etc.
I asked one of the other students who is also a volunteer host to give it a try. He got the same message. I sent a text message to the Zoom team leader who was not attending the class. Perhaps she could help.
Barbara said we would begin and we would just rely upon audio recording with her iPad.
About 15-20 minutes later, the Zoom team leader was successful logging in as host! She was able to make me host, and I was able to perform my hosting duties.
You so want to be of genuine service….
I was very aware of the significance of Aaron’s opening illustration about a young child’s coming to dinner and lamenting, “I don’t want that black stuff on my potatoes.”
Note* I am allergic to black pepper. It gives me a sour stomach and “juicy” burps.
Aaron had Barbara share her experience at age 17 of being on a freedom ride with a group of students from the north who went into the deep south working toward the end of segregation. When Barbara voiced her fear in anticipation of the following day’s event, an elder church member said to her, “WE would not want you to do this if you were not afraid — you need to recognize the harm that could be done so you can already forgive them for any possible harm.”
It is like Jesus saying, “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.”
The following day their bus was run off the road. It was tipped on its side. The angry mob was breaking the windows. Glass and rocks were raining down on them. Amidst this shock and risk a single voice began to sing, “We shall overcome…” before they all joined in.
Barbara remembers that as a pivotal moment.
Great harm or even death may have come to them if not for the arrival of the National Guard.
Many of us are old enough to remember segregated movie theaters, drinking fountains, schools. Forward movement is not always a straight line.
A substantial theme of the class was this path of genuine service while navigating an ongoing pandemic and divisiveness. We were asked how we would (or could) respond if a neighbor’s child fell on the sidewalk and was obviously seriously injured. The parents of this child had been very hostile toward social distancing, wearing a mask, or getting a vaccine. Perhaps one of the parents currently had Covid. Several student were able to describe ways to tend to the needs of the child while still protecting themselves from potential exposure to the virus.
During the Q&A, sincere anger and frustration was expressed about a grown son who refused to get a Covid test for his mother to be comfortable coming to and assist the family with a toddler and an expectant mom. Aaron used the example of saying a firm “no” from a place of compassion as one would do if a teenage son had been drinking and wanted to drive the car.
Aaron responded to the anger and frustration with such wisdom and loving kindness.
“Compassion does not make you weak.”
Another person expressed fear around the deepening of positions of humans around alternate views.
“They are not here as destroyers of each other, they are teachers for one another.”
As this last month of 2021 unfolds, my sister (Janis) and I continue to use the 2020 Magic Eye calendar as a spiritual template for the upcoming month.
December’s is a lovely holiday scene.
As you let your focus relax, three deer appear in the foreground. The one on the left is looking toward the right. The one on the right is looking toward the left. The one in the middle is looking forward.
Varying slightly from culture to culture, symbolism of deer is gentleness, awareness of surroundings, unconditional love, and mindfulness. A deer represents innocence, kindness, grace, and good luck.
May all beings act from these qualities that are within each of us.
For, although it is true that fear and despair can overwhelm us,
hope cannot be purchased with the refusal to feel.
~Susan Griffin
“This time tomorrow” drifts through my head like lyrics to a song I am singing but have never heard. An internet search brought a song by that name by The Kinks.
This time tomorrow, where will we be?
On a spaceship somewhere sailing across an empty sea?
This time tomorrow, where will we be?
This time tomorrow, what will we see?
This time tomorrow
It is not easy to organize, pack, load, drive, drive, drive, unload, unpack.
It is a lot…
It is a lot like life.
John has been down with sciatica pain. He has not been able to get the leaves up. He has not been able to bike or walk. He has been quite uncomfortable…. I know readers understand. The greatest discomfort has been standing still. So grateful he has been able to sit comfortably and he can drive.
My OCD (obsessive compulsive Debra) leanings have served me well. Other than our toiletries and clothes for the week in Tennessee with Stacey and the kids, and freezer and fridge stuff, and John’s guitar, I have most everything loaded into the van already. Bikes will get loaded on the rack this afternoon. Larry Gunter will help me load the coolers tonight or tomorrow if I need him to.
Two months ago yesterday, was John’s brother’s birthday.
Interestingly, the previous sciatica flare John experienced was related to the passing of his brother, Jim….
I continue to be affected profoundly by meeting folks from IANDS. This is the group for those who have had near death or other spiritually transformative experiences. The International Association for Near-Death Studies associated with the academic field founded in 1981.
Someone said if you are afraid of death, hang around people who can literally say, “Been there, done that.”
The opening quote from “Today’s Gift” is: Trust one who has gone through it.
We have all gone through it. We have lived through the “year of firsts.”
My next post might be after Thanksgiving so I will close with this link to an article about how often feathers, butterflies, rainbows, and electronics are just a few of the 11 Signs a Deceased Loved One is Visiting.
Perhaps it is busy mind preparing for our seasonal move south, or maybe the Beaver Moon (named for the November moon because of how the beavers prepare for winter), but I am wide awake and have fingers on the keyboard. While darkness drapes the sky, I am listening to an amazing Lion’s Roar interview with Kaira Jewel Lingo, a former nun living at Plum Village with Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh.
Living every moment of mindfulness as a moment that changes our past.
“Begin Anew” practice of reflecting at the start of each week what you appreciated in the previous week about your partner/friend/coworker. One memory bring up another memory….
Sharing about inmates in Africa in 2007 becoming concerned for their fellow inmates who were hospitalized with HIV. The inmates requested and received permission to grow a garden — food to provide additional nourishment for those who were ill. That generated awareness also of orphans whose parents had died from AIDS. An “adopt-an-orphan” program led to their acquiring a sewing machine and using their own clothing to repurpose into garments for the orphaned children.
Preparing for our seasonal move might give greater significance to this idea of preparing for the ways we are going to have to adapt. Or maybe that comes with advancing age. This week John is learning a new version of the song “Jesus Loves Me.” The first line is: Jesus loves me, this I know, though my hair is white as snow.”
People have asked me if I like my new short hair.
It touches my heart that my Covid-Created long hair has been donated to a child through Wigs for Kids.
How do we prepare? How do we be ready?
Kaira spoke of the English WWI soldier who had an idea for the entire nation to spend one minute in silence. At nine pm each day, Big Ben would ring, reminding the people to do this. Twenty-one years later, following WWII, the Nazi’s said they could not take over England because, “You had this secret weapon.”
I am making a list of user-name and passwords for all of our online stuff. At some point, someone is going to need that. Preparing for the ways we are going to have to adapt.
I have been organizing meals based on what we have in the freezer and pantry. Preparing for the ways we are going to have to adapt.
When I think of something that I want to remember to take, I get it out now. Preparing for the ways we are going to have to adapt.
While not everyone is making a seasonal move, the whole world might benefit by preparing for the ways we are going to have to adapt. That truly is how to change our past!
What is this one heart we all share? It is our true nature, the essence of our being, which is love and light. Meditation is one effective way of coming to know this inner light of our divinity that is infused with love and pervades everything. Once we come to know our true nature, we develop, through practice, the ability to rest in it more stably. Then we can live more continuously from this heart of wisdom, love and compassion and truly come to know it as the One Heart we all share.
I have previously mentioned the saying, “For those who understand no explanation is necessary. For those who do not understand no explanation is possible.”
Some research indicates the saying came from Thomas Aquinas. Saint Thomas Aquinas believed that the existence of God could be proven in five ways, mainly by:
1) observing movement in the world as proof of God, the “Immovable Mover”;
2) observing cause and effect and identifying God as the cause of everything;
3) concluding that the impermanent nature of beings proves the existence of God.
The original quote was not about ‘understanding’ but about religious belief, specifically “faith.” The original quote is, “To one who has faith, no explanation is necessary. To one without faith, no explanation is possible.”
It is amazing to me how perspective differs, but what is does not. For example, this cartoon that Linda B/G shared recently.
At the retreat, the teachers spoke about the nature of karma.
I remember the nature of karma;
I am born of karma, I am heir to karma, I abide in karma, and I am supported by karma.
When I act with intention, I am the owner of my actions and inherit their results.
My future is born from such actions, and their results will be my home.
All actions with intention, be they skillful or harmful, of such acts will I be the heir.
While karma is not a term used in Christianity, it is certainly there in Galatians, Chapter 6, Verse 7: “Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap.”
One of the mystical experiences common to retreat for me, regardless of the theme, is that I will have a foreshadowing of a teaching point to come. I will write in my journal an insight, then hear the teacher/s speak that to the group.
Sharing (with permission) the words of one student:
In all the years I had been practicing, it was suddenly like, “Oh, oh….” because I was in that place.
I realized grief isn’t just an intense feeling, it is actually a REALM. I was in this place, and it wasn’t here and it wasn’t the other side. I was somewhere in between and this portal kept opening up, and when it did my heart would just explode out.
I knew, too, that the process of grief for me was a rite of passage, it was something that was changing me.
In our culture, we are encouraged to sort of get over grief and get back to our lives. That this is a measure of our mental health – how fast you can get back as if nothing has happened. I knew intuitively that this was just nonsense. That I did not want to be the same person I was before my father died. I wanted to be different in the world going forward after that.
This student and you and I, like Mary Reed, are likely becoming unwitting mystics…
In a recent interview Mary Reed was asked to name three things she wished everyone could experience before we die. The interviewer did a short animation video of her response, which added a fun, unexpected dimension to Mary’s answer. See: Three Things to Be Experienced Before We Die
The first day of the retreat was the 49th day since Jerry Basham passed. In Buddhism, we chant that person’s name along with gate, gate, paragate, parasamgate, Bodhi Svaha! Gone, Gone, to the other shore, the shore of liberation.
When I came out of silence and caught up on messages and social media, my sister-in-law had posted this:
Your Loved One in Heaven
by Sean Dietrich
Hi. This is your late loved one speaking. I don’t have long, so listen up because I have a lot I want to tell you.
First off, I get it.
Ever since I left this world you have missed me, and I know you’re bracing for the holidays without me. No matter what anyone says, this year’s festivities are going to be really tough.
In fact, let’s be honest, this festive season will probably suck pondwater. But then, Thanksgiving and Christmas are tough holidays for a lot of people. You’re not alone.
See, the misconception about the holidays is that they are one big party. That’s what every song on the radio claims. Each television commercial you see shows happy families clad in gaudy Old Navy sweaters, carving up poultry, smiling their perfect Hollywood teeth at the camera. But that’s not exactly reality.
In reality, fifty-eight percent of Americans admit to feeling severely depressed and anxious during November and December. In reality many folks will cry throughout the “most wonderful time of the year.”
Well, guess what? Nobody is crying up here in heaven. This place is unreal. There is, literally, too much beauty to take in. Way too much.
For starters—get this—time doesn’t even exist anymore. Which I’m still getting used to.
Right now, for all I know, the calendar year down on Earth could be 1728, 4045, 1991, or 12 BC. It really wouldn’t matter up here. This is a realm where there is no ticking clock, no schedule. Up here there is only this present moment. This. Here. Now. That’s all there has ever been. And there is real comfort in this.
I know this all seems hard to grasp, but if you were here you’d get it.
Also, for the first time I’m pain free. I feel like a teenager again in my body. You probably don’t realize how long I’ve lived with pain because I never talked about it, I kept my problems to myself because I was your loved one, and you needed me to be brave.
But pain is a devious thing. It creeps up on even the strongest person, little by little, bit by bit. Until pretty soon, pain becomes a central feature of life.
Sometimes my pain would get so bad it was all I thought about. No, I’m not saying that my life was miserable—far from it. I loved being on earth. It’s just that simply waking up each morning was getting exhausting.
But, you know what? Not anymore. In this new place, I am wholly and thoroughly happy.
But enough about me. I don’t have room to describe all the terrific things I’m experiencing, and you don’t need to hear them. Right now, you’re grieving, and what you need is a hug.
Which is why I’m writing to you. This is my hug to you. Because you’ve lost sight of me. And in fact, you’ve lost sight of several important things lately.
Death has a way of blinding us. It reorganizes the way you think, it changes you. You will never be the same after you lose someone. It messes with your inner physiology. It reorganizes you’re neurons.
But then, there’s one teensy little thing you’re forgetting:
I’m still around.
Yes, you read that correctly, I’m right here with you. No, you can’t see me. No, you can’t reach out and hold me. But did you know that one of the things I’m allowed to do as a heavenly being is hang out with you?
It’s true. I’m never far away. I’m in the room with you now, along with a big cloud of ancestors, saints, and witnesses. I’m shooting the breeze alongside you, watching you live your life, watching you raise your kids, watching your private moments of sorrow.
Here, in this new realm, I am in the perfect position to help you learn things. Which is what I vow to spend the rest of your earthly life doing, teaching you little lessons, lending you a hand when you least expect it, and desperately trying to make you smile. Actually, I’ve already been doing this stuff, you just don’t realize it.
What, you don’t believe me?
Well, wake up, pal. You know that tingle you get in your spine whenever you think of me? That’s me.
You know how, just yesterday, you had a beautiful memory when you were driving and it made you cry so hard that it actually felt good and you began to laugh through tears? Also me.
You know how sometimes when you’re all alone, preoccupied with something else, suddenly you get this faint feeling that someone is standing in the room with you? Hello? Me.
You’re not alone on this earth. You never were. You never will be. So during this holiday season, when cheerful families are getting together and making merry, and taking shots of eggnog, I’m going to be clinging to your shoulder, helping you muddle through somehow.
I’ll be making your spinal column tingle a lot, and I’ll be sending plenty of signs. Each of these signs—every single one—is code for “I love you.” So start paying attention to these hints.
It is 6:21 am and I am sitting with an ice pack on my left hip writing this post.
My relationship with this left hip has been long standing, pun intended.
My left hip was dislocated at the pelvis August 12, 1962, in an auto accident.
An auto accident which resulted in my having an out-of-body experience.
There, I have said it.
I distinctly recall floating above my physical body watching the scrambled flesh on my forehead being sutured.
I was watching from a “space” of no pain, no fear, no sense of myself as a separate being.
The summer of 2021 has been a time of revisiting this experience. I have connected with dozens of others who had similar altered states of being. Many shared much more extreme experiences, including those who were clinically dead for some time, but everyone identified ways that experience shaped the rest of their lives.
Possibly EVERYONE knows someone who has had some type of experience.
Profound gratitude for each person who has spoken out loud. (The International Association for Near-Death Studies is a non-profit organization based in Durham, North Carolina in the United States, associated with the academic field of near-death studies.)
It is likely not an accident that I was immersed with this community, nor a co-incidence my hip would flare up as I process that experience I had when I was twelve years old.
I will give a talk at St. Johns UCC in New Buffalo, Michigan titled, “Time Change.” Notes from that draft:
Now is not a moment moving through time. Now has no duration. There is no time through which we move.
Time is imagined to be real only when we have forgotten our true nature of ever-present awareness.
We imagined ourselves instead to be limited, located entities. Time and space are born with that thought, but there is no present moment.
This ever-present now is eternity.
Time is thought superimposed upon eternity, and eternity is just another name for our true nature of awareness.
Louise Hay, in You Can Heal Your Life, shares a probable mental cause related to hip problems: Carries the body in perfect balance. Major thrust in moving forward. Fear of going forward in major decisions. Nothing to move forward to.
Oh, my….
While the night is still dark, before I have welcomed relief from discomfort, even as you seem to be there and I seem to be here and we seem to not yet know what we moving forward to, truth embraces and erases each of these distortions.
In 1988 I was told I needed to have a hip replacement. I was only 38 years old, considered to be too young. They only got about ten years from an artificial hip at that time. The same hip could only be replaced twice due to the formation of scar tissue. The doctor said, “Replacing this hip now would leave you with no options. You just have to face it, you will never have quality of life.”
[Lisle (Isabella Rossellini) hands Madeleine (Meryl Streep) the vial of potion.]
Madeleine: “Bottoms up.”
[She drinks the potion.]
Lisle Von Rhuman: “Now a warning.”
Madeleine: “NOW a warning?”
This information may feel a lot like that. It has been an intense yet slow-moving past few months, with many of us feeling very out of sorts, even to the point of having difficult and painful experiences. But there’s a reason, according to the stars. The five outer planets (Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto) have ALL been retrograde. When a planet goes retrograde, everything related to that planet goes wonky.
If everything related to all of these wasn’t enough, Mercury also went retrograde September 27 until October 18, with a “shadow period” that lasts a few weeks before and after the actual retrograde.
Now a warning…. This will be a very intense time, as we are reflecting upon all the partnerships, relationships, and friendships in our lives to understand where we fit in. Is there balance and peace between us? Do we feel at home with these people?
I have certainly been experiencing this, as have the people in my life.
In the Tuesday, October 26, Dharma Path class we were guided to reflect on the following, with the guidance of realizing, “If we can’t hold ourselves in our hearts we can’t hold each other.”
Of what am I dismissive in myself?
What part/s of myself do I not hold in my heart?
What needs my loving attention?
I wrote in my journal:
wounded sexuality
left hip/knee/foot
inner worrywart
To begin this difficult process we were to reflect on a part of ourselves that we do embrace. That was easier. I love that I am a hearth-keeper, baking cookies, making meals, helping and supporting. I love being a nurturer.
We were gently reminded, “These parts are real. When we are dismissive we can’t bring them into our heart. We have all lost something dear to us. We all have a community within us. It is time to invite ourselves back into our hearts.”
We were instructed to look into the camera and really allow ourselves to see ourselves and to be seen through the eyes of unconditional love.
It was powerful.
At one point, the eyes literally became the eyes of my dad! I could see clearly how I had stepped in to the wounded sexuality when my dad’s indiscretion resulted in him passing syphilis to my mom while she was pregnant for me. Then my having been sexualized at a young age; my getting pregnant at 15, married at 16, at a time when females were not allowed to stay in school. Loss of libido and intimacy with the hysterectomy in 2012. Such loss…. Dismissive? Lord, yes.
But suddenly I could see this all having come from conditions – this line of wounded sexuality did not begin with me!
A flood of appreciation washed over my soul.
I wrote in my journal:
I have healed the line of wounded sexuality. I did not start it. I stepped into it.
As I was working on this post, a friend sent the perfect “Inspiration” from a Network For Grateful Living Gratefulness.org:
Place your hand on your heart. Feel what surfaces in the fullness of that space. Joy, sorrow, anger, contentment, sadness, delight, vulnerability. Perhaps an unnameable tone. Whatever you notice, allow it to simply be. Let it be okay. Let yourself soften.
When we hold ourselves and others tenderly, we nurture the relationships that make life possible. Tending is the embodiment of tenderness and so a direct path to shared belonging. We stretch toward and from the heart, extending to others and ourselves expressions of humility, compassion, and care. As Trui Snyman says in the short film Tenderness: “People are hard on each other, people are hard on themselves.…We could all do with more tenderness.”
In moments of difficulty, tenderness can serve as a starting place, offering fertile ground for the cultivation of gratefulness. Soften, and open up to the unending gifts of the great mystery in which you belong. Soften, and feel yourself fortified. Soften. Stretch toward and from your heart.
Like the weather, moods change.
Soften….
And now another warning: Venus goes retrograde on December 19 until January 29, 2021.
From my journal entry of an exercise during class on mediumship with Barbara Brodsky:
You need not teach anything, Dear One, just live as your own consciousness evolves. You have been here before — but not exactly!
Think for a moment about the park you live in now. “Separate” homes are owned and lived in yet you share the streets. Beyond that, you share the sky, the sun, the wind. Even those express with uniqueness in each case. One may be shaded because you face the east or west. EVERYTHING fits into this dynamic.
You have been dreaming of human existence on Earth without fear of death. You have whiffs of the ripple effects. Yet, not you, nor I, nor THE ALL THAT IS knows exactly what will unfold. Like a storm. Much is known, but nothing is known exactly as it will be.
Even the cookies that you bake time-after-time using the same ingredients in the precise measurements is subject to distinction.
Child, what song lifts your heart?
He’s got the whole world in his hands.
((The song began to play in my mind, including an ad lib verse of he’s got Deep Springs Sangha in his hands.))
Notice how your thinking mind wants to argue a bit with the word “he.” Your heart does not demand a change in the word. Your heart agrees with the purity of the intention in that word. Notice how some demand a special application of the gender-sensitive pronouns, preferring “they” to “he or she.” Once the heart has opened to its true capacity, none of that will generate reactions.
You will be present in the presence.
You will have peace that passes understanding.
Dear One, another song?
((Peace is flowing like a river, flowing out from you and me. Flowing out into the desert setting all the captives free.))
I had shared a quotation from a film about not asking a person who had lost a loved one how he or she is but to ask instead, “What was your loved one like?” I included a link to the film with a disclaimer, “It was a bit too preachy for my taste.” My daughter commented that probably means she would like it! When my sister commented (asking me to define preachy), I took down the post.
I looked up the definition of preachy: having or revealing a tendency to give moral advice in a tedious or self-righteous way.
Then I looked up proselytizing: the action of attempting to convert someone from one religion, belief, or opinion to another.
Somewhere in my bodies I can feel the space of Loving What Is (Byron Katie) and Whatever Arises, Love That (Matt Kahn).
Notice when you hurt that you are mentally out of your business.
If you’re not sure, stop and ask, “Mentally, whose business am I in?”
There are only three kinds of business in the universe: mine, yours, and God’s.
Whose business is it if an earthquake happens? God’s business.
Whose business is it if your neighbor down the street has an ugly lawn? Your neighbor’s business.
Whose business is it if you are angry at your neighbor down the street because he has an ugly lawn? Your business.
Life is simple — it is internal.
Count, in five minute intervals, how many times you are in someone else’s business mentally. Notice when you give uninvited advice or offer your opinion about something (aloud or silently).
Ask yourself: “Am I in their business? Did they ask me for my advice?”
And more importantly, “Can I take the advice I am offering and apply it to my life?”
One must have chaos in oneself in order to give birth to a dancing star.
~ Friedrich Nietzsche
Recently I had a very tender sharing with a dear friend. It was tender because each of us is doing the best we can to love one another and that process isn’t always neat and tidy.
Let the record show, the person I was sharing with would be considered one of the highest conscious beings you could meet. I hold that view of this friend as well.
I also see places where I project onto her. In fact, I even said that to her: “I miss having opportunity to project onto you because I know when I do that I am afforded the honor of seeing my own self.”
What we see is not a PERSONAL self.
What we see is the universal SELF.
Jerry Ashmore, dharma teacher at Empty Circle Zen Group in Hobart, Indiana, said, “Even before we practice it, enlightenment is there.”
Jung wrote, “To confront a person with his shadow is to show him his own light. Once one has experienced a few times what it is like to stand judgingly between the opposites, one begins to understand what is meant by the self. Anyone who perceives his shadow and his light simultaneously sees himself from two sides and thus gets in the middle” (Jung, 1959, p. 872).
One website suggested a simple process for working with shadow.
1. Make a list of 5 positive qualities that you see yourself as having (e.g., compassionate, generous, witty, etc.).
2. Look at each positive quality that you wrote down – describe its opposite (e.g., unfeeling, stingy, dull, etc.).
3. Picture a person who embodies these negative qualities vividly in your mind. Roughly, this is your shadow.
Mooji (Jamacian spiritual teacher from the UK) says, “Our ego is a Siamese twin, and we cannot put it somewhere else. It is important to recognize you are not it… To stop being what you are not there is something you must understand. Whatever you can see or experience, you are not this. You cannot judge your real weight by carrying a donkey on your back. When you cannot bear your self anymore, you are a good candidate for freedom.”
The Basham family continues to experience the ripple effect of loss.
Wednesday, September 29, 2021, at the exact time family was graveside with John’s brother, Jerry, in Michigan, we received news that our former sister-in-law had just passed in Texas. Her passing was not a surprise, and was in many ways a relief to her son, Jeff.
One week to the day, October 6, 2021, news that Jeff’s sister passed in her sleep was a surprise, and anything but a relief.
As long as we can be made to believe that one thing is good and another evil, we shall remain outside the Garden of Eden, and one day have health and another day disease, experience youth and vitality one day and age and debility another day because those are the pairs of opposites and they follow one another in cycles. It is only when we do not desire wealth or harmony any more than lack or discord, but seek only that which was original and primary in the Garden of Eden, that we rise above these opposites into eternal life.
Joel Goldsmith, The Thunder of Silence
As these additional conditions weave themselves through our psyche like summer weaves its way into fall, I am led to an interview by Brian D. Smith (Grief 2 Growth). Brian is sharing have said to his wife that he had not had signs for the 5th anniversary of their daughter’s passing, his wife pointed excitedly at a sign on a vehicle by them: I AM RIGHT HERE!
Brian share that with Becky (Rebecca Austill-Clausen) during an interview about her 3 Secrets to Communicating with Your Deceased Loved Ones, in which she makes these points:
Believe that the afterlife is real.
Trust in your inner self.
Recognize that love surpasses all boundaries (even physical death).
Perhaps it is merely shadow (ego beliefs) that can separate us from fluent awareness of loved ones who have passed….
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