By Debra Basham, on October 18, 2020 Like my parents taught me,
‘There are no monsters in the sea,
only the ones we make up in our heads.’
~ Christina Zenato
A friend shared an amazing video of a woman swimming with sharks. But this woman is not just “swimming” with the sharks. Christina Zenato, a professional diver, is removing fish hooks caught in their flesh!
Christina says, “It’s done on the shark’s terms, not mine.”
Amen!
Christina has a box containing over 300 hooks….
I wrote in my journal earlier today:
Dear Holy Spirit,
I am so impatient with John. What will help me be kind?
(Note* The catalyst for this latest round of impatience was him wanting to use the tablet Stacey gave him instead of lugging around the huge 3-ringed binder. He went the home of a music friend who has software he likes a lot. John returned minus his tablet, excited that his friend was going to set it up for him. Soon, John’s friend came, unable to complete the download without my email address. I get triggered into frustration at having to manage John’s technology as well as my own, especially when it is something I am not fluent in. True confession: I do not know how to work this Android tablet, nor do I know anything about this software….)
The VOICE in my journal responded:
V: The impatience is not with him, it is within you. Like so many humans currently, strong emotions around the helplessness related to the pandemic are arising. Are you providing enough space for all you are experiencing? We know you are navigating a lot, but so was Viktor Frankl.
Man’s Search for Meaning is a 1946 book by Viktor Frankl chronicling his experiences as a prisoner in Nazi concentration camps during World War II. Living through horrific happenings, Frankl was able to find purpose and positive feelings using his psychotherapeutic method.
A quick search brought up this quotation:
Between stimulus and response there is a space.
In that space is our power to choose our response.
In our response lies our growth and our freedom.
~ Viktor Frankl
During the Oakwood Retreat, John Orr shared having asked Aaron why human incarnation is so difficult. Aaron said we choose incarnation because the catalysts for growth are so readily available on this heavy density plane. Aaron said there is a plane on which soul growth can happen without so much difficulty, but without a physical or emotional body (only a mental and spiritual body), the soul growth is soooooo slow, like millions of years. Aaron said, “Soul’s who are impatient for growth choose the earth plane!”
Between stimulus and response there is a space….
You can watch for “divine” themes in each day. Howard Thurman’s Word for the Day from Gratefulness.org : Whatever may be the tensions and the stresses of a particular day, there is always lurking close at hand the trailing beauty of forgotten joy or unremembered peace.
In that space is our power to choose our response….
And the Deep Spring Center Thought for Today from Aaron:
Perhaps as you sit there by the water, let’s use a big sloppy wet dog as example, the dog comes running along and jumps across your lap. You’re wet, you’re covered with sand. You have a scratch where his claws dug into the flesh. He’s licking your feet and it’s an unpleasant feeling. Ultimate reality has not gone anywhere; pure awareness hasn’t gone anywhere; but for the moment you can’t access it. Your mind and body come back to a lower vibration. You breathe a few times. A friend comes over and dries you off with a towel. You open up, see the dog frolicking so happily, catch his joy a bit, and you open back up into pure awareness.
In our response lies our growth and our freedom….
May all beings experience the beauty of forgotten joy or unremembered peace.
By Debra Basham, on October 14, 2020 Belief can be overrated. If one did not believe in gravity, would gravity still have an effect? Of course, it would. It is likely that astrological influences are having an effect on us in much the same way.
Mercury went retrograde on October 14, where it will stay through November 3.
Tuesday, November 3, 2020, is election day….
How Mercury In Retrograde Is Affecting Your Body And Energy Levels – It’s all happening! by Susannah Guthrie
Expect to have more or less energy than you’re used to, particularly of the nervous variety.
October 2020’s Mercury retrograde will either sap you of your usual zest and leave you feeling lethargic, or fill you with chaotic, scattered energy that might have you feeling restless, unfocused and anxious.
In our third year of Dharma Path, Barbara Brodsky and Arron (check out Aaron’s new blog) have us working with a wonderful practice to navigate strong emotions in a way that prevents us from being overcome by them.
Here are the basic steps of “Akashic Field Practice.”
1. I open myself to this field in which there are both spaciousness and calm and peace, and disturbances. Because of the essence of my practice, I am willing to experience the disturbance. I’m not afraid of the disturbance, because I know that the spaciousness is much vaster than the disturbance. And so, instead of focusing on the disturbance, I focus on the spaciousness.
(We are encouraged to think of holding and comforting these uncomfortable emotions like we would hold a distressed baby, seeing the baby as a more infantile consciousness, and we ourselves are able to hold that infantile consciousness with mature consciousness. Saying to ourselves, “It is going to be OK. I love you. You are safe.” This holding, comforting, supporting is based on our highest intention for highest good of all beings, harm to none, and lovingkindness.)
2. Invite spirit (God/Higher self/Love) to support your choice for kindness.
3. Ask in your heart of any entities (angels/guides/masters) that come, “Do you come for the highest good, in service to all beings, and harm to none?” Wait until you get a clear YES.
4. Invite all loving beings (entities) to get closer as you clearly state your need. “My body is shaking. I really feel rotten. I’m not emotionally scared so much as my heart is pounding and I feel the fear in my whole body. Please help.”
Imagine feeling a warm energy moving throughout your body; loving energy surrounding you; energy clearing, as spaciousness opens up inside you.
Remember YOU always have access to this energy. This is always available.
Music can help your “mature” consciousness calm your “infantile” consciousness, especially kind during this Mercury retrograde over the next few weeks. I love Karen Druker’s Gentle with Myself, and Cecelia’s Amazing Grace (with whale sounds!).
October 14, 2020 Daily Word: Let Go, Let God
I work in divine partnership to accomplish great things.
A surfer harnesses the ocean’s power to complete the exhilarating ride to shore. I, too, place myself within the divine wave of God’s power. I neither move out in front of it by forcing my will nor do I hold back out of fear and insecurity. Only when I center myself in the wave can I discern the answer or direction I seek. I let go into the magnificent power of God and ride the wave that is my inner guidance and direction.
In prayer, I release the need to know what is going to happen and trust that my highest good is unfolding. I do what is mine to do, leaving the greater part to God. I listen to my intuitive knowing, heed the guidance I receive, and then follow through on my inner promptings with deliberate, purposeful action.
You are indeed my rock and my fortress; for your name’s sake lead me and guide me.—Psalm 31:3
By Debra Basham, on October 10, 2020 We think that the point is to pass the test or overcome the problem, but the truth is that things don’t really get solved. They come together and they fall apart. Then they come together again and fall apart again. It’s just like that. The healing comes from letting there be room for all of this to happen: room for grief, for relief, for misery, for joy.
~ Pema Chödrön
This week’s Oakwood Retreat has been very intense. Staying at home for retreat has some benefits. You don’t have the expense of lodging or travel time, and you get to sleep in your own bed. Like all of life, though, everything holds its opposite.
The morning instruction on working skillfully with distortion and heavy emotions was soooooo relevant…
I have had one of the decidedly most unskillful weeks I have had for decades. When you are sitting in meditation for 6-8 hours, day after day, stuff will come up. The catalyst for my stuff was the (hopefully) last of the work to complete home repair related to the mold remediation. But vital to realize the catalyst (whatever the catalyst) is not the distortion. The distortion is how we relate to the what is triggering us.
On one walk, I saw two crickets. On another, about a half dozen earth worms. Twice I had a red-bellied woodpecker hanging right on my window! Every day that shrub is filled with the comings and goings of sparrows. But one morning I heard a disturbance, opened my eyes and saw that a hawk was actually in the middle of the shrub. I had six Blue Jays at the feeder one morning, and this morning I had four big crows.
Cricket totem: A sign of good luck in many cultures, cricket symbolizes initiative and intelligence, and having the gift of foresight.
Earthworm totem: Working old ground; examining the past and its effects upon present conditions; including exploring past lives.
Sparrow totem: Integrity, empowerment, persistence, hard work, peace and wisdom. Guides us to learn to work hard with all.
Woodpecker totem: The power of rhythm. Discrimination. Connected to the heartbeat of Mother Earth herself. Symbolizes the stimulation and awakening of new mental faculties. New ways to look at things — new wisdom and new rhythms to dance to.
Hawk totem: Represents focus, strength, and poise, and can show you your hidden abilities to lead yourself and others to a more positive outcome.
Blue Jay totem: Symbolized by assertiveness, determination, and above all, intelligence.
Crow totem: Watchful creatures with sharp and powerful foresight. An omen of transformation and change.
When you go on retreat, you practice noble silence. This does not just mean not talking. You are excused from any of the normal social politeness. No small talk, no anticipating others needs, no distracting yourself with discursive thought. You see clearly the weeds in your own garden. So I wrote a poem.
When Weeds Grow: A Haiku
Every place where weeds grow
Oxygen is shared with you
Breathe in and feel TRUTH
Challenges abound
And LOVE is always around
We have so much help
What do you see as
Weeds grow there in your garden?
Breathe…. They are pure gift
During the final sitting, my mind went back to some trauma I experienced while traveling to Europe in 2011 — this exact same week! Mind was churning trying to remember the details. What was the name of the country where I had gone to the exotic gardens? Thinking, grasping, trying to remember until I let my mind soften, like taking a step back, and simply intended access to the information. Pop! Monaco….
This is not a new lesson for me. I remember leaving the house a bit late with my earrings in my hand. Pulling up to the stop sign, the left earring slipped in but I could not find the hole in my right ear. The next stop sign, I tried again. Again without success. At the third stop sign I asked for help. Pop! The earring went right in and I heard a voice say, “We would have helped at the first stop sign if you had asked.”
I have wired lamps, lifted heavy objects, remembered things, found things, and received guidance regularly for a very long time. Our teacher, Aaron, was speaking of how the mundane mind can be very helpful to orchestrate some tasks. One student asked Aaron if he uses Barbara Brodsky’s mundane mind for working with the technology. Aaron replied, “No, I just invite the computer to co-create with me.”
The current conditions are chaotic. We need all the co-creation with spirit we can access. As Aaron said, “How can I save anyone if I can’t save myself?”
This week I saw a quotation by Thich Nhat Hanh: “The next Buddha may be a sangha.”
It definitely took a sangha to offer this wonderful week of focused dharma practice. Sharing a few notes from my journal:
You have come as midwives. You can be the midwife who is there in the room being calm or the one running around the room saying, “It isn’t coming quickly enough!”
Be with things as they are. Not stoically, but lovingly. Liberation means walking on the unstable ground and finding your own balance.
Allow the practice to ground us in the innate perfection without denial of the conditions.
Say, “I consecrate this effort to the good of all beings.”
Each time you are able to offer kindness in a difficult condition, it changes the world around you.
One day when we sang “This Little Light of Mine” the teacher said it is really a great big light, so I wrote new words to the tune:
This GREAT Big Light of Mine
(sing it to the tune of This Little Light of Mine)
This GREAT BIG light of mine
I’m gonna let it shine
This GREAT BIG light of mine
This light is divine
This GREAT BIG light of mine
Isn’t even really mine
Let it shine, let it shine, let it
Let it shine around your town
We can let it shine
We have help, we’re not alone
Please just let it shine
Let it shine when fear appears
We can let it shine
Let it shine, let it shine, let it shine
By Debra Basham, on October 1, 2020 The headline: The first debate between President Donald Trump and Democratic challenger Joe Biden deteriorated into a bitter showdown …
It would be so easy for me to pass judgment about how unskillful bitter exchanges are were it not for the fact that I had just let myself get triggered by a friend I care for very deeply.
We knew we had only a few minutes to talk before I was to be online for meditation, so in those few minutes she got to the heart of the matter for her: “I feel betrayed.” This was not the first time I had heard her express these same words about her boss over the years. But on this day I had an expectation for something else.
When I argue with reality, I lose —
but only 100 percent of the time.
~ Byron Katie
All suffering is essentially wanting something other than what is.
The following morning I was still watching the subtle contractions with my friend when I said, “All roads lead to Rome,” and she responded, “I don’t know about that, but all roads lead somewhere.”
The saying that all roads lead to Rome was reality in the days of the Roman Empire. All the empire’s roads radiated out from the capital city, Rome. Commonly, the saying now often means all the methods of doing something will achieve the same result in the end.
Whether Trump or Biden wins the Presidential election, “Election Day” will take place on the last day of Mercury’s last period of retrograde motion in 2020! (This one lasts from October 14 to November 3.)
According to the age-old practice of astrology, we are all influenced by the effect of Mercury in retrograde. This from The Old Farmer’s Almanac: Mercury Retrograde Dates in 2020:
Review projects and plans at these times, but wait until Mercury is direct again to make any final decisions. You can’t stop your life, but plan ahead, have back-up plans, and be prepared for angrier people and miscommunication.
Some people blame Mercury retrograde for “bad” things that happen in their lives. Instead, this is a good time to sit back and review where you put your energy in your life.
The Deep Spring Center Thought for Today addresses this, too:
Please do go out and work for the candidate of your choice and also listen carefully to the other candidate and try to understand any basis of fear or confusion from which the statements seem to be coming. Do so in order not to condemn from a place of opposition but truly try to understand, because you will then have compassion for this opposition view rather than just condemnation for it. From the strength of that compassion you are much better able to say no than from the place of condemnation and oppositionality.
~ Aaron
I drew a couple of Osho cards, inviting balance. Key words from the first: “It is a time when you are ready to let go of any expectations you have had about yourself or other people, and to take responsibility for any illusions you might have been carrying.”
Key words from the second: “He has no private goals, no desire that everything should be other than the way it is.”
Oh, my.
I guess all roads do lead somewhere…
By Debra Basham, on September 27, 2020 Anyone who lives art knows that psychoanalysis has
no monopoly on the power to heal.
Art and poetry have always been altering our ways
of sensing and feeling
— that is to say,
altering the human body.
~Norman O. Brown
Reality TV, like everything else in this human incarnation, has its ups and down, strengths and weaknesses, benefits and costs. This year’s America’s Got Talent cost me a lot of tears.
As a poet myself, I am no stranger to the experience of having words make me cry. And this year’s AGT winner, poet Brandon Leake, touched the world with words like “Pookie” and “generational healing” and “no more time left for fear” and “you are so much stronger than you think” and “as soon as Covid hit, everything changed.”
Here is a link to a significant 14 minutes and 11 seconds: ALL of Brandon Leake’s Performances on Season 15 of AGT! on Youtube.
Brandon Leake said it best, “As soon as Covid hit, everything changed.”
Last evening I shared a meal at a table with someone other than John for the first time since March 15, 2020. Interestingly, I knew before I got the call inviting us that I would be doing that. Even so, it was not an easy decision when I learned that four households would be gathered!
I sent a text message to my friend:
Honest answer: Are you expecting/asking guests to arrive in masks for pre-dinner conversation; remove masks for eating (6 feet or more distance); and to put masks back on for any after-dinner conversation?
She responded:
Absolutely. And they all follow these guidelines all the time, the best I can know.
I wrote back:
We will see you there.
I cried when I read her next message:
I love you and appreciate your process in getting to this decision. ❤️🙏😷
You see, this was not just four households selected willy-nilly because we are going stir-crazy. These were two of our dearest friends hosting two other families who had been touched by recent loss. We share deep connections through church and loss and Covid.
Seated to my right is a mother and her beautiful adult daughter, who is currently living with her mom. Their husband and father died late May of a post-Covid complication: stroke. They were unable to be with him as he was moved from facility to facility, until the very last hours of his life in this body. After he passed, they were unable to gather with friends and family to celebrate his life.
Across from John and me were our hosts. Her mother passed just weeks ago… and they, too, have been unable to gather with friends and family for a formal Celebration of Life.
The fourth household is a woman seated alone. She just lost her husband to Alzheimer’s disease, after having kept him at home as long as humanly possible, evidenced by the fact that he lived only a very short time once moved to a facility. Everyone at his visitation and funeral were required to wear masks and social distance.
The serving table stretched about 12 feet with concrete landscaping blocks strategically placed to hold down autumn-colored table cloths. Placed around the perimeter are seven TV trays; each adorned with a brightly colored place setting. Cloth napkins compliment the loving atmosphere. I hear the words from the communion liturgy inside my head telling me this table has been prepared for you.
The warm autumn wind was blowing as “Eau de Cologne” of garlic wafted from the house.
After a feast fit for royalty, it was already dark as we slowly rose from the table. It was awkward to not help clear the table, go into the house to help load the dishwasher and wash the pots and pans. We were obviously all grateful for what we were able to share but also profoundly aware how very difficult it was to say goodbye without hugs. The desire rose up in my chest and left a lump in my throat.
Today I see this message from another friend, along with the photo:
Here’s my two flightless friends — Rowdy, who can’t fly but ran five miles at 4 a.m. and this monarch who hatched on Monday with imperfect wings. So he hangs out in my office on fresh flowers during the week and here at home on weekends. I feed him sugar water 1-2x day. Rowdy is getting used to sharing his home with a monarch companion.
Just as Rowdy is getting used to sharing his home with a strange companion, we are getting used to sharing our lives with this pandemic….
By Debra Basham, on September 23, 2020 OOPS…. A mistype of the most important kind.
Several individuals expressed feeling depressed with all that is going on right now. I mentioned how the uncertainty shifts us into the SYMPATHETIC nervous system – fight, flight, or freeze.
Some people are said to look for love in all the wrong places. Trying to find peace or trust or love or joy while the sympathetic nervous system is active is like setting a lobster trap in the Sahara dessert.
The sympathetic nervous system simply can never find peace!
By Debra Basham, on September 23, 2020 I go to nature to be soothed and healed,
and to have my senses put in order.
~ John Burroughs
Several individuals expressed feeling depressed with all that is going on right now. I mentioned how the uncertainty shifts us into the sympathetic nervous system – fight, flight, or freeze.
Some people are said to look for love in all the wrong places. Trying to find peace or trust or love or joy while the sympathetic nervous system is active is like setting a lobster trap in the Sahara dessert.
The sympathetic nervous system simply can never find peace!
Later that day, another group gathered and the same topic came up! The teacher, Barbara Brodsky, invited us to think about the experience itself.
Can we acknowledge that mental and emotional and energetic experience called depression, without trying to get rid of depression? Who is the one that is watching this experience of depression? And what is the energy field and mind like for the one who is watching depression?
When something is unpleasant, what happens in my mind?
Being truly present you can see depression as an object arising out of conditions — impermanent, not “self.” Without trying to fix it, just really look at what it is. Here’s this strange object called depression. But what is it, and from what does it arise? Where will it go?
~ Barbara Brodsky
The parasympathetic nervous system handles uncertainty very differently. Recognizing the only constant is change, and like a young child, you see everything as an adventure. Each step is an amazing part of the journey.
Watching a panel discussion on Infinite Potential sponsored by the Fetzer Foundation, I was in awe of how much is known about science and spirituality. Everything science can prove, mysticism has always known.
One of the closing comments, this one by Bob Roth, CEO of David Lynch Foundation, is worth holding onto with your head and your heart:
Water puts out fire, if the fire is too large, you need more water. Its not the fault of the water, its how large the fire has grown.
Yes, there is a lot going on right now, and yes, the sympathetic nervous system misses the truth, but each step is an amazing part of the journey of our Infinite Potential…..
By Debra Basham, on September 16, 2020
Sometimes people get the mistaken notion
that spirituality is a separate department of life,
the penthouse of existence.
But rightly understood,
it is a vital awareness
that pervades
all realms of our being.
~Br. David Steindl-Rast
Today, it is this beautiful planet we call home that calls us home to our hearts. We are being asked to plant seeds of wisdom and love. I told John today one could consider if you are hearing or reading something that is stating who or what was or is to blame about anything, to please just consider this: Anyone can win the game of Monday-Morning-Quarterbacking. It is the coaching before and during the game that makes the difference.
I have been patient (mostly) with the world around me. While not first in THE world, I was first in my world to not allow smoking in my home. While not first in THE world, I was first in my world to save things believing they would some day be recycled.
I have been asking John for years to consider a more environmentally friendly yard. It makes little sense to spend time, energy, and money to kill what flourishes naturally, then invest more to plant things that cost even more to be fed and watered to survive and contribute little to myriad species called nature.
But we are where we are: we are where wild fires rage and tropical storms blow: too much or too little wind or rain. The following powerful excerpt is from the Seattle retreat in the fall of 2019 (reviewed and with some additions and edits on 09-14-20). It was just posted on the Deep Spring Meditation Center Facebook page, and it is so timely.
Aaron: These fires in California deeply concern me, not just for the immediate damage they are doing, burning people’s homes and so forth — although it is sad that people are losing their homes, their livelihood, even and especially their lives — but for what it’s doing to the energetic and spiritual environment. To me, if people choose to live in an area where there will be a likelihood of such fires, they know that this can happen to them. But the trees did not thusly choose. Well, yes, the trees agreed to grow there, but they agreed to grow there not to be burned away but to help support a wholesome environment.
They agreed to grow there with no foreknowledge of man’s thoughtlessness of the environment. It was a possibility but not yet a fact. The earth is ancient and the short-lived choices of mankind are more recent. And so, the Earth is getting a different message. Trees and other vegetable life are beginning to say, “Maybe it’s not safe to be here on the Earth. We are not cherished as we need to be in order to flourish. Maybe it’s time for us to shift ourselves to some other kind of evolutionary space where we may evolve with love.” Such a shift or even thought to shift is going to further downgrade the Earth’s environment. Just as man destroys the environment for certain animal species, he can destroy it for trees, and even for the elements themselves.
Once these fires are under control and out, I’d like to see large teams of people going into the woods, into the charred roads, thanking the earth, thanking the trees, and planting seedlings. With a strong commitment, speaking to the seedlings; speaking to each from their heart, “Thank you for making a new attempt to grow here. We will try very hard to cherish you, to take care of you and the environment in which you grow.”
It is not only our planet that is suffering. Our emotional bodies are going through these turbulent times as well. After the wildfires of anger and jealousy, fear and disdain, it is imperative we are willing to plant seedlings of forgiveness, wisdom, kindness and compassion.
One morning after we finished (virtually) sitting together in meditation, I shared a deep and precious conversation with Bob. Bob mentioned “A Course of Love”, describing it as sort of like the sequel to A Course in Miracles. “There are several chapters you can read for free,” he said.
ACIM was one of the bridges over troubled water when my spirituality out-grew the religion of Christianity in which I had met and committed my life to Jesus.
From Chapter 14: New Frontiers Beyond the Body and Mind, Form and Time, A Course of Love – The Dialogues:
What might this situation look like if I forgot everything I have previously known about similar situations, and looked at this in a new way?
Do I really need to worry about this situation, or can I affect this situation simply by not worrying about it and allowing it to be and unfold as it will?
While I realize that the facts would tell me this or that is true, I wonder what would happen if I disregarded the facts and was open to this being something else?
There is so much to disregard. Our old habits, thoughts, beliefs and actions are being invited to surrender. In The Language of Letting Go, Daily Meditations on Codependency Melody Beattie affirms: “We relinquish our tight hold and our need to control in our relationships. We take responsibility for ourselves; we allow others to do the same. We detach with the understanding that life is unfolding exactly as it needs to, for others and ourselves. The way life unfolds is good, even when it hurts. And ultimately, we can benefit from even the most difficult situations. We do this with the understanding that a Power greater than ourselves is in charge, and all is well.”
I whisper to all sentient beings that we will do our best. We are able to cherish life and summon that vital awareness that pervades all realms of our being into new frontiers….
By Debra Basham, on September 11, 2020 Joel has been having ongoing challenges with his gmail account. I reached out to Rebecca, our wonderful webmaster, and she is on it. When he wrote saying, “I think I must have been cursed by the gods of the internet. What did I ever do to them….” I wrote back:
“Well, bless the sea snakes!!!! Rebecca is going to see if Geek Squad can help her help you!”
The following morning, Joel responded:
I don’t remember how the sea snakes got in this. They play a prominent role in Coleridge’s “Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner.” Everyone on the ship has died except for the “hero,” and the ship is floundering and adrift. The only person left alive on board is about to die. He has to bite his tongue to have enough moisture in his mouth to speak, but with what he thinks will be his last words, he blesses the sea snakes surrounding the vessel. With the blessing, the wind comes up, and the ship makes it back to England.
Recently I was listening to a dharma talk by Kyoun Sokuzan. Sokuzan met Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche, a preeminent teacher of Tibetan Buddhism, in late 1973 and became a student. In 1974, Sokuzan attended the first session of Naropa Institute in Boulder, Colorado. In 1975, he established the Dharma Study Group of Battle Creek, Michigan. The group is currently meeting via Zoom. When someone asked Sokuzan if we need protection from the coronavirus, Sokuzan answered, “You don’t need protection, but you ask for protection. You participate in the realm you are in.”
Continuing, “Everything is temporary. Work with it however it shows up in your neighborhood.”
This all comes as I see my mind grasping for a safe way to be with friends and family. I hear Sokuzan say, “Go into the darkness. That is where the light is.”
Human experience is polarized. I was one of those odd ducks who was anti-abortion and pro-legalization of abortion. A woman desperate not to birth a baby will take dangerous measures to end that pregnancy. Coat hangers are just one… Truth. Some people argue that making abortion legal motivates more women to choose that option. This is just not truth. The same argument is happening around the legalization of marijuana. Truth?
Sokuzan: “It’s all relative truth. You can’t see the truth.”
A friend stopped by briefly yesterday, willing to do me a huge favor. I had placed the two chairs on our front porch at the furthest distance. I donned my cute little kitty mask (a gift from my sister, Janis) and went out onto the porch. As my friend got out of her car, she saw me in my mask. “Do you want me to put a mask on?” she asked. She had one in the car. I said I would appreciate her putting on a mask.
My friend was obviously not comfortable in the mask she was wearing. Every few seconds she would need to adjust it. The mask just did not fit her face well. As I watched, I had the thought it was more like a thong than a bikini. I hate when my underpants ride up in the crack of my butt. I have never understood someone wearing a thong. Maybe it is like Erma Bombeck’s having said she does not eat chocolate cake — she just smears it on her hips and thighs because that is where it is going to end up!
Early in the pandemic, I began making masks that are fun. Many of those iterations have been shared in previous posts. Why? Because, as Sokuzan says, “It’s all relative truth.”
If my friend or I had been an asymptomatic spreader of the virus, would our actions have been enough to protect the other? Sokuzan said we don’t need protection but we do need to work with things however they are showing up.
Sokuzan used a Buddhist teaching term I had not previously run into, unless I had heard it and did not yet fully embody the dharma these words are pointing to. Trycycle has an excellent article on the teaching if you are interested. Here is the link: “Drive all blames into one.” From the article:
“Conveniently, blaming others allows us to avoid looking into our own role in the problems and conflicts we encounter. We look outward, but we do not look within. And even in looking outward, once we have assigned the blame, we go no further. So we do not get to the root of the problem. We stop short, satisfied that we are off the hook and someone else is at fault.”
I think a lot about my family. I take drive all blames into one to heart. If we went for a visit (as we soooooo want to do) and one of them was an asymptomatic spreader, and John or I got ill and/or died, who would be to blame?
“This slogan {drive all blames into one} is quite radical. Instead of blaming others, you blame yourself. Even if it is not your fault, you take the blame. It is important to distinguish this practice from neurotic self-blaming or the regretful fixation on your own mistakes and how much you are at fault. It also does not imply that you should not point out wrongdoing or blow the whistle on corruption. Instead, as you go about your life, you simply notice the urge to blame others and you reverse it.”
If my action exposed me to the virus, not even the virus is to blame. But if my action exposed someone else to the virus, I am responsible. It is simply how things showed up in the neighborhood. Drive all blames into one….
“Pay attention to how blaming arises and what patterns it takes. See what happens when you take on the blame yourself. Notice what changes in your own experience and in what you observe around you.”
A friend rented a hotel room near her daughter’s cottage as the extended family gathered for the Labor Day weekend. My friend took her own provisions, and she was masked and maintained safe-distance as she joined them for the wonderful celebration of her grandson’s 25th birthday.
Other friends are leaving this weekend to visit their son and family out of state. They, too, will stay in a hotel and enjoy time with the family out-of-doors.
Soon, in the Northern hemisphere, it will be winter. “What then?” you might ask.
Bless the sea snakes….
Everything is temporary.
By Debra Basham, on September 4, 2020 My sister and I are having a wonderful experience with the Magic Eye calendar for 2020.
We meet via a video call on the first day of each month and we turn the page together. We love the sharing: looking; not seeing; relaxing; looking again; seeing. That is how the process works!
September was a very challenging image to see. We both had to make at least a half-dozen attempts.
Relaxing is key.
Our collective exhilaration when we finally see is palpable.
My writing time with Southern Circle Poets began with someone’s post about “Ambiguous Loss” that I had re-posted on Facebook:
Someone once said when you love someone with dementia you lose them more and more everyday: when they are diagnosed, when they go through different stages, when they go into care and when they die.
This is called “Ambiguous Loss.”
‘Rapidly shrinking brain’ is how doctors described it.
I wouldn’t wish Dementia on anyone. As the persons brain slowly dies, they change physically and eventually forget who their loved ones are. They can eventually become bedridden, unable to move and unable to eat or drink.
There will be people who will scroll by this message because dementia has not touched them. They may not know what it’s like to have a loved one who has fought or is fighting a battle against Dementia.
My friend, Claudia, knows this experience well, as does Katey, one of the Southern Circle Poets.
I wrote:
I cannot expect you to understand what it feels like to see someone struggle with tasks that once were as easy as breathing. To hear a loved-one say or ask the same comment or question over and over again.
And to know the truth, “I cannot fix this.”
Being present with my own inner struggles with wanting it to be fixed is the best I can do.
I begin a poem:
You Once Were
You once were so skillful; and willful.
You once were so strong.
The writing doesn’t go anywhere from there, so I begin again…
Ambiguous Loss
I wonder when I first recognized you were losing precious skills we had both taken for granted. Like scales falling off the catch-of-the-day, your identity seems to be hell-bent on shedding strengths.
Crossing the street as the afternoon sunlight was casting shadows, I saw autumn trees on the face of the glistening parking lot still damp from a brief shower. This the first time I had accepted it was me cautioning you to watch your step. Red, yellow, orange and gold…. green now sleeping soundly somewhere.
I cannot see your world from here.
Permission granted to enjoy the hint of fall as the breeze blows in from the window behind me, almost cool enough to cause a chill.
Permission granted to witness the tightness moving mechanically across my chest as I wonder what your future will unfold to.
Permission granted to be content with both the not knowing and the wanting to know and the soft, sensuous dance between seeming opposites.
Memory drifts back to delivering my mom to the adult foster care home. Grief at leaving her there as she looks into my face calling me Debbie, and pleads, “Don’t leave me with these strangers….” and the guilt at being my relief to be leaving her there. The years of her decline, the day of her passing—edges blur as they burn a hole in my emotional body, a single heart breaking open enough to hold the whole human happening.
Profound gratitude now for the dear ones who have walked this path previously, providing a trail of recognition along this treacherous terrain. Remembering Hansel and Gretel and their crumbs of bread being consumed by the birds….
I make the choice to trust I am still moving toward the center of our being.
This morning I had a near-identical conversation with two people I love. One was about the news that a job would be ending. The other was about having been at an eye doctor’s office with frighteningly lax procedures for prevention of the spread of Covid-19. Although the content of these two experiences looks dissimilar, the words that came crossed the chasm of delusion: Every experience will be pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral. We learn from it all.
I said, “When you have already already felt the pain of the experience, be sure you reap the benefits.”
Having worked at jobs which demanded so much that life balance was sacrificed isn’t failure. Noticing is gaining insight.
When a child is burned by touching a hot stove, the child learns from the pain how to be safer.
Now, this is “Ambiguous Gain…”
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