By Debra Basham, on March 25, 2012
I have been thinking a lot about the difference between illness and wellness, and how some people are able to maintain a sense of wellness in the midst of illness. I heard Dr. Dean Ornish say the difference between illness and wellness is the contrast between “I” and “We.” For sure, science has shown a correlation to feeling isolated or knowing you are connected as a component to your healing.
I often mention Mark Nepo’s The Book of Awakening, because what he writes about really seems to fit what is on my heart and mind at the time. I made a note from yesterday: “To be broken is no reason to see all things as broken.” For sure, it helps to see your own wholeness, even if, at the moment, you have symptoms or even a diagnosis.
When you think about nature, what is it that allows you to know the sun is still in the sky and still shining even on a cloudy day, or in the dark of night? You are not confused by what your senses might indicate, because your perspective is broader and you know what is true regardless of appearances!
I have sometimes seen a squirrel on the outside of the window—tail flapping, alert, nose almost pressed against the glass—while one or both of Joel’s cats is on the inside thinking, “Let me at ’em…. Just let me at ’em!” Something stands between the risk and the safety, in this instance, it is a piece of glass.
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| This photo is of Henry, in his home in Yellowstone country. Henry is the grandson of Pamela Chappell,who provides the background music for our Welcome Baby! audio. I just saw the photo on her Facebook page and knew it was perfect for this blog.You can sample her music by going to http://www.scs-matters.com/products_download.shtml. |
When a person has symptoms or a diagnosis or even when an individual is obviously preparing to leave this earthly body (something every one of us does), all that stands between the risk of fear, worry, or anxiety, and the safety of remembering our eternal nature, is your ability to know you are still whole (and holy) every step of the way.
Nepo (March 24) continues: “Feel the sun even in the dark. To not lose the truth of things when they go out of view. To grow just the same. To know there is still water, even when you are thirsty. To know there is still love, even when we are lonely. To know there is still peace, even when we are suffering. None of this invalidates our pain, but only strengthens our way back into the light.”
By Debra Basham, on March 18, 2012
I was already working on today’s blog, pondering the question of whether life has taught you to be more curious or more afraid, when I came across this Chinese Proverb in a thought for the week from a friend of mine, Byron Stock, who works with emotional intelligence.
“That the birds of worry and care fly over your head, this you cannot change, but that they build nests in your hair, this you can prevent.”
I have been reading Pema Chödrön’s Start Where You Are: A Guide to Compassionate Living. This morning’s reading was about a man who had lived in the wild, the last of his tribe, before coming into civilization. He shared that they had seen railroad trains and thought they ate people because people would get on the train and the train would move out of sight. When he was brought to the train in San Francisco, he was able to get on. Later, when asked how he was able to do that, he responded, “Well, my life has taught me to be more curious than afraid.”
I am working with all of that right now. How many tornado watches have I gone through compared to how many tornados have I endured? How much of what we worry about never comes to be? I am coming to recognize that I can embrace the unknown with curiosity rather than with fear.
I remember a joke about a man who was training to be a truck driver, hauling loads of logs down out of the mountains. The time came for a quiz, to know if he was ready to go out on the road with his heavy load. The first question was what he would do if he was coming down the hill and the brakes failed. He answered correctly that he would downshift into the lower gears to slow the truck’s engine. Then what would he do? He would put on the emergency brake. What if that failed, too? He said with total calm, “If the emergency brake failed, too, I would wake up my partner who was sleeping.” Asked why he would do that, the response was an enthusiastic, “Because he won’t want to miss the wreck we are going to have!”
Rain and sun comes to the earth. Death is as much a part of life as birth. Endings and beginnings are each sacred. Loss and gain are simply movements in the endless cycle. The meaning we give to our experience is the meaning we choose. Everything, seen in its true light, is beautiful, including this Black Vulture feeding on a dead raccoon.
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| Black Vulture feeding on a raccoon, along Stringfellow Road on Pine Island. |
Ah, now the Vulture is a species that is able to make lemonade out of lemons. Let us all awaken our own sleeping inner-vultures…. So we can be more curious than afraid!
By Debra Basham, on March 4, 2012
A flock of peacocks live here in Harbor Hills, where I am visiting my husband’s brother and sister-in-law. Cindy and I wanted to get some photos. One day they were out, but neither of us had our cameras with us. One day we both had our cameras, but it was very foggy, so lighting would not be very good.
We decided to wait for a better day.
Thursday morning, our patience was rewarded!
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| Peacocks in Harbor Hills, Florida. |
The timing was just right for some really amazing encounters with both the peas and the hens. I got an amazing video with full display.That got me thinking about patience and timing in other areas of my life….
I know in the past I have been impatient with regards to developing consciousness, especially around my work. For example, when I think about Richard Bandler and John Grinder having created NLP (See: http://scs-matters.com/scs_nlp.shtml#) forty years ago, and not have it integrated in education or psychology or religion or life, yet.
I learned Healing Touch™ over seventeen years ago. I have since worked with a man who was able to cancel back surgery following one session. I enjoy being pain free, after having been told I would never have quality of life. I have seen cysts dissipate with my work. Yet, I still meet people who have never heard of Healing Touch™, I work for a hospital that will not allow Reiki (another energy modality) because it is considered to not be Christian, people can be afraid to make changes, and I have even been told that energy work is Satanic.
Yet, I notice this all seems very insignificant in the long run.
YET is a very important concept in this discussion. I trust it is just a matter of time until everyone recognizes what a difference energy work and NLP makes. In fact, often it is the difference that makes all the difference.
The next time I feel impatient, I hope I can remember the joy I had photographing the peacocks, and I can enjoy more patience and trust the timing. This is a snip from the video, but even thought it does not make a good quality photo, you can see that we were gifted a full display. The reward for our patience and timing….
By Debra Basham, on February 22, 2012
What would I do if I knew that I could not fail
If I believed would the wind always fill up my sail
How far would I go, what could I achieve…
Trusting the hero in me
If I Were Brave, words and music by Jana Stanfield and Jimmy Scott
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| Amazing sunset view seen while riding back from the marina off Maria. |
This morning it is still dark as I am enjoying the quiet activity here on the canal on Pine Island, savoring the last few mornings in this magical place. I just read a very touching chapter in My Grandfather’s Blessing, by Rachel Naomi Remen, M.D. It is titled simply, “When It Works.”
Rachel was an intern, working in an emergency room, when an unconscious infant was brought in. He was found to have a profound electrolyte imbalance and an irregular heartbeat, the result of severe dehydration following severe diarrhea.
The baby went into heart failure, and after four attempts with the defibrillator, the senior resident threw the paddles down, left the room, and went to give the parents the horrible news. Remen was left standing in that room with two nurses, and that baby.
She writes that something inside her called out to him, much as you might call a child in from playing to dinner. “I was too young a doctor and too inexperienced to know that after four attempts at defibrillation, no one comes back.” She grabbed the paddles and gave one more shock and it worked!
This past weekend I took a workshop in an energy technique called BARS. I did my first session with a good friend yesterday. In addition to learning a new energy technique, I appreciated those places where what was presented fits with what I have been teaching in SCS/NLP for years. For example, “If your logical mind could solve the things that were not working in your life, wouldn’t it have done so already?” and “Every time you do a Bars session on someone else, all the considerations that they have that are like the ones you have go away at the same time.”
And probably my favorite: “This is one way of doing it and you can also follow the energy….please follow your knowing.”
Suddenly I am reminded of a song chosen by dear friends for their wedding. “If I Were Brave,” by Jana Stanfield and Jimmy Scott, sung by Jana. You can find the rest of the lyrics online and listen at this link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UF5V2PEujqs.
The words touch my soul deeply today as I think of Dr. Remen and the man that baby boy grew up to be and I will leave you with the question….
Like the mighty oak sleeps in the heart of a seed,
are there miracles in you and me?
What would I do today if I were brave?
By Debra Basham, on February 15, 2012
In that half-asleep, half-awake state, I had the image of the word pain as a call to Place Attention Inside Now. A few moments later, arising for the day, I was sitting in silence with my journal on my lap (as is my morning schedule). I opened a daily inspirational book (Mark Nepo, The Book of Awakening) and read: “Until the heart becomes an inlet, it cannot be free….[P]ain comes from measuring the inevitable events of life against some idea of how we imagine things are supposed to be…. Life is hard enough without viewing all our pain as evidence of some basic insufficiency we must endure… All spiritual warriors have a broken heart, alas, must have a broken heart—because it is only through the break that the wonder and mysteries of life can enter us…. In daily life we are judged, discounted, and even pitied for glories that only we can affirm.”
My recent past has been filled with self-nagging. It feels as though a fog is lifting and I am seeing myself and the events through the lens of that broken heart. In the same way that a child will be terrified by the shadow cast on the wall, and have nothing to fear, what I am seeing now looks nothing like what I had imagined it being.
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| Immature Brown Pelicans at the Van Meter’s in St. James City on Pine Island |
Rachael Naomi Remen, M.D., author of Kitchen Table Wisdom, has written another marvelous book, My Grandfather’s Blessings: Stories of Strength, Courage, and Belonging. In a chapter titled “The Emperor’s New Clothes,” she writes about the broken hearts of a mother and father following the death of their five year-old son, Timmy. At Timmy’s funeral, the pastor encouraged each person to allow his or her pain to touch him or her in a unique way, to draw strength from knowing we are not alone in that pain.
Each person was told the pain would help us love our children, each other, and life itself. That is living of life through our broken hearts. I have used the phrase, “Our hearts only break in one direction: open.” That did not come to me through the lens of a broken heart, for I have not buried my five year-old child, and, in the grand scheme of things, I have not had a difficult life.
Remen writes: “Spiritual awakening does not change life; it changes suffering.” Perhaps knowing, at some deep level, the depth of love that rushes into the heart that is broken open, I had been, like the shadow cast upon the wall, seeing the pain in my life as much larger than it really was, wanting all along, to love with all my heart, my mind, my soul, and my strength. I will begin now to see pain—physical or emotional, mental or spiritual—as what it really is, a sacred invitation to place attention inside now….
By Debra Basham, on February 8, 2012
Understanding our feelings is a lot like trying to change the diaper of a wiggling toddler. As soon as you think you have a leg up on it, something unexpected erupts. I have appreciated some of the writings about all this that have come into my awareness of late. On December 4, 1993, when I wrote this poem, I thought I was writing it for my sister, Janis. Today, I know it was as much for me and for you, too.
The Magic Sack
God has a gift for you…It is a magic sack.
It is tailor made, and fits upon your back.
It is filled with happy, mad and sad. All yourfeelings; good or bad.
There is room for every feeling here, as long as it’s your own.
Its not too heavy or too light, God made it so it fits just right.
Now comes the part to ease your heart, though difficult to bear.
YOU may not carry another’s sack, it is their own to wear.
For each child upon this earth, God made and loves for all life’s worth.
And each and every one, you see, mother, sister, and even me,
Has their very own magic sack tailor made to fit their back!!!
In times of less awareness, we may expect or even demand that others take on our emotions. According to Mark Nepo, in The Book of Awakening, this was because we wouldn’t “take the risk to ask them to hold us while we are hurting.”
Fortunately, you can learn to be present to your own emotions. And it is never too late to have a happy childhood. Nepo says it best: “If you think you have given them what’s yours to carry, go to them and thank them for holding your sadness and then lift it off their hearts and take it back. Ask them to hold you instead.”
I am profoundly grateful to those who have been willing to hold me rather than taking on my feelings. I have been held with respect and compassion and tenderness, and that has taught me to hold myself.
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| St. Jude Trail on Pine Island |
From today’s Daily OM: When we simply allow ourselves to fully feel our feelings as they come, we tend to let them go easily. This is all we are required to do; our feelings simply want to be felt.
By Debra Basham, on January 30, 2012
I am in South Florida. I was reading in The Book of Awakening by Mark Nepo and noticing how, more and more now, life is presenting me with opportunity to “walk my talk.”
[E]verything, including you and me, is connected by a small piece of the beginning.
The past few days have been a bit stressful. Today is Monday. Friday morning, my beloved son-in-law, Doug, had surgery in Middle Tennessee. Knowing the procedure was expected to take between five and six hours, the waiting seemed l—o—n—g. Grateful for news. Text messages came from Stacey. The first that he was out of surgery and going into recovery. We waited some more. Receiving news he was going to a room and she would let us know how Doug was doing in the morning meant more patience was needed.
We are home. Doug is sleeping in our own bed….
I am going to get meds and pick up stuff for dinner….
Doug is out of normal sinus rhythm (this is what the surgery was designed to correct); feeling discouraged; I am wondering if he might be hospitalized this week again….
Doug is feeling some better…. He has gone to work…. I will touch base with the doctor….
Since early Friday morning, I did what needed to be done, and while I enjoyed time with family here, I certainly know I was a bit cranky over the weekend. I know not to pray for patience because life will just bring more situations to try the patience you do have!
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| Patience pays off: Heron on canal, Pine Island, Florida. |
This morning I am contemplating the patience this bird had in gathering food. And I am very thankful for the soothing sounds of nature that are wrapping around my heart today as I think of Doug and Stacey and all of you. It seems perfect to sign off with the rest of Nepo’s words:
When we believe in what no one can see, we find we are each other. And all moments of living, no matter how difficult, come back into some centered point where self and world are one, where light pours in and out at once.
In the Imagine Healing process (See http://www.ImagineHealing.info) we remind folks, “Even when things go better than could have been expected, healing is a process….”
While we patiently welcome Doug’s healing, I take this opportunity to thank each of the ONE who continues to be faithful in seeing wholeness for Doug, for me, and for themselves.
By Debra Basham, on January 20, 2012
A friend of mine recently used the term “skirmish” to refer to a bit of a tiff she had experienced with a close friend. I was still thinking about that when I was catching up with a few days reading in a book by Mark Nepo (The Book of Awakening: Having the Life You Want by Being Present to the Life You Have). The heading for the first day was “I Say Yes When I Mean No.” The next day’s was about the inevitability of conflict. The heading for that one is “The Friction of Being Visible.”
I recall tenderly the journey to authenticity I made with my adult daughter. It was about twenty years ago. It became too painful to say yes when I meant no. It is as though your own soul wakes up and realizes it has an obligation to speak the truth with love and trust. Something as simple as a request to babysit, or asking for advice, or even arguing a point of view becomes a journey home to your whole and holy self.
It was new for me, so when I first would say no, irritation sometimes happened. In my current awareness, I can sense that irritation as mine, for having been asked something that I was not able to give. In a quiet way, that might have been the Divine, calling me to my center, and using Stacey as a guide. I have heard that it is good to ask, “Why are you doing this for me?” the next time the temptation is there to feel put out by another or life itself.
It is probably like any other skill you are developing, first efforts are rarely artful… but with patience, and persistence, and the understanding of how valuable the learning is, you get better at it as you go along. That makes me think of a momma alligator I saw in South Florida. She was poised in front of a log, on which seven babies were visible behind her.
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| The baby gators were only about a foot long. They looked so cute! |
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We were only about twenty feet away, and we were all quite fascinated at seeing these little ones. Seeing how cute these little ones are, you can understand. One man, in his eagerness, knelt down to get a closer look. Immediately, that momma gator raised her head slightly and out of her throat came a very guttural growl that said clearly, “Keep your distance if you want to keep your head.”
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| Momma gator was close by watching out for her babies! |
The point is, when a person is trying to keep peace, hoping to avoid conflict, peace of mind (inner peace) is lost. Nepo writes: “If we choose to avoid all conflict with others, we will eventually bread a poisonous conflict within ourselves.”
Think about it this way, giving what you can give with peace, you give peace both to yourself and to the other. Honesty, sincerity, openness with my daughter has resulted in a profoundly delightful relationship. Over New Years when I decided to go to Magic Kingdom for the day (after having been on the fence about it), she said she needed to know why I had changed my mind because she did not want me to be going to take care of her. I replied, “You do not really have to know why I changed my mind, you only have to remember that I am honest with you and I do not rescue you. I decided to go for my own reasons, and you can trust that.”
Let the record show, I had a great time and even rode on Space Mountain!
By Debra Basham, on January 10, 2012
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| New Smyrna Beach, Florida, December 28, 2011 |
I am once again brushing up against a profound spiritual truth about the gifts hidden within adversity, pain and apparent loss. If a powerful soul lesson could fit neatly into the lyrics of just one song, it would probably have to be Country Western! This truth about hidden gifts would fit best for me in Garth Brook’s “Unanswered Prayers.” The lyrics are about having run into an old high school flame and having the powerful realization (and deep gratitude) that, despite diligent prayers back in the day, there was total grace in things not having worked out with this particular person the way he had so desperately wanted them to. Here is the link for you to listen if you would enjoy hearing it: http://bit.ly/J10kw.
But this is a truth that goes across contexts, and it is not just about life partners. I recall the sense of despair we had when my husband got fired when he was expecting a promotion! His boss had been manipulating the books and skimming cash from the company, and John had gone to a district supervisor. The audit was welcome, but the results unexpected—the whole team got fired! Shortly after that, a family crisis (John’s father had a major stroke) helped us see the gift of being in our hometown so we could offer support to his mother.
In a message on January 8, 2012, part of a series on Quantum Living, Reverend Janice Cary, pastor at Unity of Fort Pierce, Florida, referred to your ability to see the bigger picture and to recognize the grace within every event in your life as quantum thinking. There must be something in the air about this right now, because on January 9, 2012, Russell Bishop, an educational psychologist, author, executive coach and management consultant based in Santa Barbara, California, wrote in “Soul-Talk: What Happens When God Closes a Door?” (See http://huff.to/wZrDIm): “…[A]whole lot of things had to be removed in order to make way for the next level of opening. As much as it may have appeared to me that God was closing a door, He was really opening a whole new universe.”
This year, one of my goals is to feel this truth of the hidden gifts, even of unanswered prayers, right in the midst of the normal chaos, change, disappointment, and uncertainty we call life. It is my intention to live in that beauty of the bend of the earth where the ocean meets the sky.
By Debra Basham, on January 5, 2012 We could hold my husband responsible for the rest of the storythat is the basis for this blog entry, because he is the one who bought a go kart for the kids when our grandson, Adam, was only about four, but the truth is Adam was born loving to drive. As a toddler, he would sit on anyone’s lap and grab the steering wheel with glee, even though he was not going anywhere. Adam’s legs were too short for him to reach the pedals on that first go kart, so his dad put a block on the accelerator.
Adam loved to get his Grandpa into the kart and drive full throttle. John would feign terror and Adam would laugh so hard he was falling over as he circled their house round and round as fast as they could go.
Adam had only one speed—full throttle.
And full throttle is what Adam was driving the last race of the event there at Daytona International Raceway in Daytona, Florida. It was Friday, December 30, 2011, about one-third into the race. He was drafting in a group of four drivers, going over ninety miles per hour, when the guy right in front of him hit the brakes a bit early going into a turn. In an instant, Adam had to decide to either rear-end that kart or hit his brakes.
It is now five days after the event, but when I saw the video of the crash for the first time today, I am still totally overcome with deep gratitude.
That turn was right in front of the stands where we were standing to view the race. Hearing his tires squealing, seeing his kart hitting the wall before sailing backwards, and then seeing him in the kart as it rolled over and over still seems surreal to me, but oh, my, how much worse the outcome might have been.
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| Adam and his go kart getting picked up at race end! |
Deep gratitude is the only way to describe those moments immediately following as we watched him climb from the wreckage. Deep gratitude that he was on his feet. Deep gratitude that no other driver hit his kart as it was there on the track. Deep gratitude that he suffered only minor injuries. And deep gratitude that he was able to talk about it…
I was immediately called to the tonglen meditation I have been practicing. If you are curious about the practice, you can read about it online. What I remember most was the immediate thought to get over myself and to breathe in any embarrassment, frustration, shock, and pain Adam was feeling. Then I thought about his grandpa, his mom, Doug (his step-dad and racing partner), his older brother, and his younger sister. We were all there and we had all seen the crash.
I let myself feel my own pain. What if Adam had been permanently or severely injured, or even killed? Then I thought about families whose loved one did not survive. And I let myself feel the pain that others have felt. How does one find a sense of gratitude again?
At other times in my life I might have thought I have some sort of advice to offer. That is not the case at this moment. At this moment, I know nothing other than deep gratitude.
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