The idea of creating an energy template for my day really has me thinking. It's one of those back burner ideas that I find myself chewing on at the oddest times, like while fast forwarding through commercials, taking out the trash, and between bites of my dinner. It's an important idea, and I think it is the nexus of several things I've been thinking about or learning over several years.
A year ago, I retook the Reiki III (personal mastery) course because I realized I hadn't been using that level of it regularly. I was sitting there among new learners, people who were eager to learn it, and me having had it 10 years earlier only to let it slip away. It was an interesting day for me, and one where I was asking some big questions (ha, no surprise there).
The answer I got that day, the single thing I wrote on my notepad for the day, was that having a daily routine of working with energy grounded it. I realize that I'm a sort of nexus for the spiritual and physical worlds. I can use my daily living to ground the spiritual energy, imbuing matter with life, and at the same time, adding a sort of weight to the spiritual essence so it sticks close to the ground.
This idea of consciously living my life aware of my energy and driving my day by it is not a new one, but my understanding of why and what it is about is certainly greater than ever before.
I'm really glad that I haven't just drafted a mental plan for how to do this, you know, an hour at the computer writing up a document and then filling in a schedule. I do think there will be schedule made at some point, but after I feel my way through this a bit more. I need more discovery time, and I'm taking it.
In the meantime, I'm suddenly wondering if some of the stranger events of my last few days are a direct result of this intention. Walking through life passing forward in time, it seems as if puzzle pieces are floating around me, like I'm navigating shards of meaning that connect together like puzzle pieces, but I can't see it from this perspective. That's what my writing is for, right? To help me see things in a different context, and to let me sift back through the highlights when I know more and can see the build-up happening long after the crash has taken place.
Thursday, October 27, 2005
Saturday, October 22, 2005
Approaching a New Door
An hour ago, I woke up from an important dream. Since then, I've done my best to rewalk it so I can remember it to write down.
In the first segment, my living space was invated by a large black dog that insisted on interacting with me and would not leave my space. I did not want this dog, I did not choose it, but it seemed that I was unable to remove it from my life. I interacted with others to learn more about the situation, and they believed I had no choice in the matter. I repeated ordered this dog to leave my yard and my space, and that seemed to just trigger more interaction with it. It would bite onto me and refuse to leave me alone the more attention I paid to it.
In the second segment, I was with a pack of dogs. Actually, we were people who could fly, and when we started flying, we changed into dogs. Once we were airborn, we would link up, paws to shoulders, forming a huge dog pack link that was flying. In our first flight, we had about 30 or 40 dogs in formation, but we slipped from the flight mode and landed safely back on Earth. Some of us returned right away to people, some remained dogs, and other dogs were joining us to prepare for the next flight attempt.
My sense about the flying was that it worked the same way my individual flight works in dreams. There is a state of mind that I must reach, one that allows me to fly as naturally as if I'm walking or doing anything else, and it is more like a meditative state that involves a feeling as well as a thought component. If I doubt I can fly, I crash. If I get scared or have any other strong emotional reaction, I can't fly, either. As a pack of dogs, we also seemed to need to create a sort of group mind that would keep us flying together at the same altitude and in formation.
While we were preparing to launch for the second time, we saw another pack fly over us and could see other formations in the sky at a distance. But some bad dogs were among us, and they were trying to hurt some of my friends. I personally crushed the middle section of a dog that was attacking an old friend of mine, someone who seemed to be a cross between Bill and the guy I worked with at MediServe. Another bad dog was hurt in this process of getting us away from the bad ones. We were running away inside a structure with rooms and hallways and outside access, and were trying to hide amongst the other peole who were there.
I thought we had gotten away, and I was hiding by engaging in a conversation with a woman who was like Donna from CTG when I suddenly realized that the entire situation had shifted away. The pack of dogs was gone, and I was being told that I was the bad one, the one they called the American Undead and there was something about a 40% bend in me caused by someone else. This bend was supposed to be the mark of the AU. I immediately flew off by myself, not wanting to be recognized as someone bad which I did not believe was true.
The third part began organically as I flew off and landed in a place among people. It seemed to be a churchlike setting but it was either a large indoors area or outdoors. The path from the entrance to the alter area curved and there were people along both sides. I landed at the entrance, greeted by a man who looked like Alan Rickman but was in angel garb and his chest had a logo/crest and some words, something about Salt Lake City. As I joined him, he began giving me instructions about how to greet the people we were passing, and I realized that they had been waiting for me to arrive. I was not just to lead the service, I was sort of the person they had come to worship, the person they came to adore and learn from, like a guru or master teacher. Alan and I floated above the path, I was greeting them with a blessing, and after curving around through the place we landed at the alter area.
There were other attendants there for me, and they were a bit upset that I didn't have all of my responsibilities understood and didn't know all of the protocols. There was a huge book that had attached strings of fabric flowing from it, and I was supposed to be holding this sort of sacred book and it was never to be set down. My own clothes had the same sort of angelic flying fabric attachments. The alter area was three dimensional, it was like a Greek temple in the middle of this outdoor area. I was flying all around it, and entered the building through pillars and a sort of window on the second/top floor. I was flying, weaving in and out of this building and a few others, and decided that I wanted to leave. One of the attendants was helping me to slip away without causing any problems with the people who were there on the ground to see me. After a few misdirections to the crowd, I was able to fly away and make my escape. I didn't like being there and felt relieved to be gone.
I found myself flying into other buildings, single story buildings, through the windows, but somehow once inside, it was more like I was in the basements. There were other people around. I was generally flying higher than the rest, and kept tearing out the underside of the wooden floors to allow myself to get as high as possible, always trying to get higher. Part of this just seemed like where I should be, part of it seemed like I felt more comfortable higher, and part of it was trying to stay away from the lower people who I felt would try to hurt me if they could reach me. It seemed as if I could use mind power to enlist other people to help me tear out the ceiling to reach higher places, people who I thought might want to hurt me, but suddenly they were helping me. But I didn't feel easy. I wanted out of those places and into a higher place.
The last segment took place in one of those settings. I was doing my best to sort of route myself through the wooden ceiling when I hit about the highest spot I could. I seemed to stay there, like my head was attached to the space, and my body was floating, my limbs and that angelic fabric around me was floating everywhere. There was something sensual about the way my body was moving and enjoying the movement. This seemed to happen several times, that I would fly to a different location, see other people doing what I had been doing, and I would join them.
The last place I arrived, there was a woman who was giving instructions to us about how to call in this being, what to say and what to do, and it was basically what I had been doing before, with clear instructions this time so with intention where before I had just been imitating others in a natural way. In the midst of this, I heard the doorbell ring.
This ring seemed so real and woke me up to a different level of consciousness. At first, my body reacted as if my real doorbell had rung and I must get out of bed and answer it. But I've had this experience before. Usually, I hear knocking instead of a doorbell. And it jolted me to a new awareness.
I immediately said NO and said that I do not give my permission for anyone to enter. I called upon my guides to protect me and stated my intentions about the types of beings I allow to enter my space to interact with me. I spent several minutes in this space, restating protection and intention.
It's been a long time since I've found myself traveling like this. I believe this is related to two things going on, first in menopause and a breakthrough to a new level of being, and the second is the infection my body has been fighting related to my dental work.
In the time since I've been awake, I realized that I complete trust my protection and I do feel safe. It's been so long since I've chosen to enter that reality, and since it has come to visit me like this. I don't mind, it's not that I've missed it. I haven't forgotten it, and I've been learning about how to be aware of both realities in my waking consiousness. I'm even learning how to approach my work with a different reality as a conscious intention. I believe I've been learning a great deal and making a lot of progress.
It feels like I'm reaching a new door in my growth. There are two parts to this process. First, there is the awareness that a new door has been reached. And second, there is figuring out how to get through the door once you exactly find its location.
The dogs in the dream are interesting, domesticated animals, so the connection is to conscious emotions. There seems to be a social component to this dream, about fitting or not fitting into groups, not being comfortable with my role in some groups, and the fact that I was in a dog pack and dealing with a group consiousness. I wasn't comfortable throughout most of the dream, but when I heard the doorbell, I KNEW it was time to withdraw myself in truth, not just in the dream.
I'm not sure what to think of this. I'm going to spend some time working through my spiritual protection and may even sever my astral connections to everyone to clear out my space. This was certainly an interesting event in my space.
In the first segment, my living space was invated by a large black dog that insisted on interacting with me and would not leave my space. I did not want this dog, I did not choose it, but it seemed that I was unable to remove it from my life. I interacted with others to learn more about the situation, and they believed I had no choice in the matter. I repeated ordered this dog to leave my yard and my space, and that seemed to just trigger more interaction with it. It would bite onto me and refuse to leave me alone the more attention I paid to it.
In the second segment, I was with a pack of dogs. Actually, we were people who could fly, and when we started flying, we changed into dogs. Once we were airborn, we would link up, paws to shoulders, forming a huge dog pack link that was flying. In our first flight, we had about 30 or 40 dogs in formation, but we slipped from the flight mode and landed safely back on Earth. Some of us returned right away to people, some remained dogs, and other dogs were joining us to prepare for the next flight attempt.
My sense about the flying was that it worked the same way my individual flight works in dreams. There is a state of mind that I must reach, one that allows me to fly as naturally as if I'm walking or doing anything else, and it is more like a meditative state that involves a feeling as well as a thought component. If I doubt I can fly, I crash. If I get scared or have any other strong emotional reaction, I can't fly, either. As a pack of dogs, we also seemed to need to create a sort of group mind that would keep us flying together at the same altitude and in formation.
While we were preparing to launch for the second time, we saw another pack fly over us and could see other formations in the sky at a distance. But some bad dogs were among us, and they were trying to hurt some of my friends. I personally crushed the middle section of a dog that was attacking an old friend of mine, someone who seemed to be a cross between Bill and the guy I worked with at MediServe. Another bad dog was hurt in this process of getting us away from the bad ones. We were running away inside a structure with rooms and hallways and outside access, and were trying to hide amongst the other peole who were there.
I thought we had gotten away, and I was hiding by engaging in a conversation with a woman who was like Donna from CTG when I suddenly realized that the entire situation had shifted away. The pack of dogs was gone, and I was being told that I was the bad one, the one they called the American Undead and there was something about a 40% bend in me caused by someone else. This bend was supposed to be the mark of the AU. I immediately flew off by myself, not wanting to be recognized as someone bad which I did not believe was true.
The third part began organically as I flew off and landed in a place among people. It seemed to be a churchlike setting but it was either a large indoors area or outdoors. The path from the entrance to the alter area curved and there were people along both sides. I landed at the entrance, greeted by a man who looked like Alan Rickman but was in angel garb and his chest had a logo/crest and some words, something about Salt Lake City. As I joined him, he began giving me instructions about how to greet the people we were passing, and I realized that they had been waiting for me to arrive. I was not just to lead the service, I was sort of the person they had come to worship, the person they came to adore and learn from, like a guru or master teacher. Alan and I floated above the path, I was greeting them with a blessing, and after curving around through the place we landed at the alter area.
There were other attendants there for me, and they were a bit upset that I didn't have all of my responsibilities understood and didn't know all of the protocols. There was a huge book that had attached strings of fabric flowing from it, and I was supposed to be holding this sort of sacred book and it was never to be set down. My own clothes had the same sort of angelic flying fabric attachments. The alter area was three dimensional, it was like a Greek temple in the middle of this outdoor area. I was flying all around it, and entered the building through pillars and a sort of window on the second/top floor. I was flying, weaving in and out of this building and a few others, and decided that I wanted to leave. One of the attendants was helping me to slip away without causing any problems with the people who were there on the ground to see me. After a few misdirections to the crowd, I was able to fly away and make my escape. I didn't like being there and felt relieved to be gone.
I found myself flying into other buildings, single story buildings, through the windows, but somehow once inside, it was more like I was in the basements. There were other people around. I was generally flying higher than the rest, and kept tearing out the underside of the wooden floors to allow myself to get as high as possible, always trying to get higher. Part of this just seemed like where I should be, part of it seemed like I felt more comfortable higher, and part of it was trying to stay away from the lower people who I felt would try to hurt me if they could reach me. It seemed as if I could use mind power to enlist other people to help me tear out the ceiling to reach higher places, people who I thought might want to hurt me, but suddenly they were helping me. But I didn't feel easy. I wanted out of those places and into a higher place.
The last segment took place in one of those settings. I was doing my best to sort of route myself through the wooden ceiling when I hit about the highest spot I could. I seemed to stay there, like my head was attached to the space, and my body was floating, my limbs and that angelic fabric around me was floating everywhere. There was something sensual about the way my body was moving and enjoying the movement. This seemed to happen several times, that I would fly to a different location, see other people doing what I had been doing, and I would join them.
The last place I arrived, there was a woman who was giving instructions to us about how to call in this being, what to say and what to do, and it was basically what I had been doing before, with clear instructions this time so with intention where before I had just been imitating others in a natural way. In the midst of this, I heard the doorbell ring.
This ring seemed so real and woke me up to a different level of consciousness. At first, my body reacted as if my real doorbell had rung and I must get out of bed and answer it. But I've had this experience before. Usually, I hear knocking instead of a doorbell. And it jolted me to a new awareness.
I immediately said NO and said that I do not give my permission for anyone to enter. I called upon my guides to protect me and stated my intentions about the types of beings I allow to enter my space to interact with me. I spent several minutes in this space, restating protection and intention.
It's been a long time since I've found myself traveling like this. I believe this is related to two things going on, first in menopause and a breakthrough to a new level of being, and the second is the infection my body has been fighting related to my dental work.
In the time since I've been awake, I realized that I complete trust my protection and I do feel safe. It's been so long since I've chosen to enter that reality, and since it has come to visit me like this. I don't mind, it's not that I've missed it. I haven't forgotten it, and I've been learning about how to be aware of both realities in my waking consiousness. I'm even learning how to approach my work with a different reality as a conscious intention. I believe I've been learning a great deal and making a lot of progress.
It feels like I'm reaching a new door in my growth. There are two parts to this process. First, there is the awareness that a new door has been reached. And second, there is figuring out how to get through the door once you exactly find its location.
The dogs in the dream are interesting, domesticated animals, so the connection is to conscious emotions. There seems to be a social component to this dream, about fitting or not fitting into groups, not being comfortable with my role in some groups, and the fact that I was in a dog pack and dealing with a group consiousness. I wasn't comfortable throughout most of the dream, but when I heard the doorbell, I KNEW it was time to withdraw myself in truth, not just in the dream.
I'm not sure what to think of this. I'm going to spend some time working through my spiritual protection and may even sever my astral connections to everyone to clear out my space. This was certainly an interesting event in my space.
Wednesday, October 19, 2005
Singing with My Heart Wide Open
I can't sleep, so I'm up watching Elton John interviewed on Inside the Actor's Studio. And I've fallen in love with him all over again. Not that I had ever gotten over him. It's not the man that I love, it's his spirit. The sound of his music reaches a part of me that nothing else does. It started when I was a young teen, obsessed with Goodbye Yellow Brick Road, playing all of the songs on the family piano along with him and singing at the top of my lungs. I was alive, and I was in touch with who I was. I even named my only pet dog Reggie after him.
He's wonderful to listen to, his words and his gifts of song between questions, and I'm so glad I've discovered this interview. His music is always on my CD player, and I must own at least 6 of his albums right now, most of them greatest hits compilations which I play full blast while I sing and dance my way around the living room from time to time. I'm tired, I should be sleeping, but instead, I'm awake and alive and loving this time.
But that isn't why I've stopped the interview to come in here and write. Something clicked since this interview started. I've got something that I've never really had before, something I understand that has escaped me before. And right now I get it. I have many talents, many gifts, and I do my best to use and develop them all. But I've lived my whole life with this feeling that there is something else out there, something waiting for me to discover it, something that will turn my life around. It seems to touch nearly every part of my life. With my work, it's the sense that I have been chronically underemployed. I watch performers, like Elton John, and while I don't have a huge musical gift, I have a huge desire to sing and play, and the remnant of the dream to be a concert pianist. There's the dream of writing books. There's the image that I could run a big company, that I belong in the board room and not a cubicle. Even in my personal life, there is a sense that the people around me just really don't get me, that there's a great deal here to offer to someone who just takes a moment to look and see me. There's a sadness that follows me with all of this, a sadness that I've just lived with.
And tonight, what I get is this: I haven't missed anything. My gifts and talents are what they are, and they are here to enrich my life. I do my best to develop and enjoy them. What I get is that they are unfolding as they should. There are no missed opportunities, no wrong decisions, that have lead my life to this mostly-engaged but still feeling a bit disengaged state. I have more depth to explore, more to unfold. I am as I should be. I am who I am. The best is yet to be, and yet, the present moment is pretty spectacular. There is no end to the richness that will roll out before each step I take on this journey.
If I was meant to express a talent like Elton's, it would have been obvious at an early age. The same with the other things. I have spent most of my conscious life pursuing my heart, using my talents and abilities, and living as fully as I know how in each moment. That's all I can expect, and in truth, that is a whole lot of everything! If there was something else for me, it would have been obvious. I've been taking the next obvious step consciously for almost my whole life. I'm not derailed, I'm not off course, I'm not just missing something really wonderful. My life is as it should be.
I still expect wonderful things in the future. I still expect to have a shelf in my bookcase one day of books I've written. I still expect to put my feet in the dust of places like Marrakesh and Tangiers and Paris and London and Rapa Nui and Macchu Picchu. I still want to sail in the warm waters of the Mediterranean, and drive a red convertible with the top down. There is still so much texture that I want to explore in my own life, and experiences that I want to try. I'm refreshed by my life experiences, and I'm hungry for more, more diversity, and more scope. I want to take everything in my life to the next place, to find the next level within myself.
I want to dance every day to Elton John (and others) playing full blast on the stereo, singing with my heart wide open, celebrating the joy of my being.
He's wonderful to listen to, his words and his gifts of song between questions, and I'm so glad I've discovered this interview. His music is always on my CD player, and I must own at least 6 of his albums right now, most of them greatest hits compilations which I play full blast while I sing and dance my way around the living room from time to time. I'm tired, I should be sleeping, but instead, I'm awake and alive and loving this time.
But that isn't why I've stopped the interview to come in here and write. Something clicked since this interview started. I've got something that I've never really had before, something I understand that has escaped me before. And right now I get it. I have many talents, many gifts, and I do my best to use and develop them all. But I've lived my whole life with this feeling that there is something else out there, something waiting for me to discover it, something that will turn my life around. It seems to touch nearly every part of my life. With my work, it's the sense that I have been chronically underemployed. I watch performers, like Elton John, and while I don't have a huge musical gift, I have a huge desire to sing and play, and the remnant of the dream to be a concert pianist. There's the dream of writing books. There's the image that I could run a big company, that I belong in the board room and not a cubicle. Even in my personal life, there is a sense that the people around me just really don't get me, that there's a great deal here to offer to someone who just takes a moment to look and see me. There's a sadness that follows me with all of this, a sadness that I've just lived with.
And tonight, what I get is this: I haven't missed anything. My gifts and talents are what they are, and they are here to enrich my life. I do my best to develop and enjoy them. What I get is that they are unfolding as they should. There are no missed opportunities, no wrong decisions, that have lead my life to this mostly-engaged but still feeling a bit disengaged state. I have more depth to explore, more to unfold. I am as I should be. I am who I am. The best is yet to be, and yet, the present moment is pretty spectacular. There is no end to the richness that will roll out before each step I take on this journey.
If I was meant to express a talent like Elton's, it would have been obvious at an early age. The same with the other things. I have spent most of my conscious life pursuing my heart, using my talents and abilities, and living as fully as I know how in each moment. That's all I can expect, and in truth, that is a whole lot of everything! If there was something else for me, it would have been obvious. I've been taking the next obvious step consciously for almost my whole life. I'm not derailed, I'm not off course, I'm not just missing something really wonderful. My life is as it should be.
I still expect wonderful things in the future. I still expect to have a shelf in my bookcase one day of books I've written. I still expect to put my feet in the dust of places like Marrakesh and Tangiers and Paris and London and Rapa Nui and Macchu Picchu. I still want to sail in the warm waters of the Mediterranean, and drive a red convertible with the top down. There is still so much texture that I want to explore in my own life, and experiences that I want to try. I'm refreshed by my life experiences, and I'm hungry for more, more diversity, and more scope. I want to take everything in my life to the next place, to find the next level within myself.
I want to dance every day to Elton John (and others) playing full blast on the stereo, singing with my heart wide open, celebrating the joy of my being.
Friday, October 14, 2005
Being a Learner vs. Following a Teacher
I had an interesting conversation today with a new friend. I was sharing with my friend a resource that I have found invaluable to my growth. When I explained a bit about the resource, the friend said "So this is your teacher?" The answer was "no" because I don't consider this person to be my teacher, and yet, this is a person of value to me because I've learned so much from her.
Ah, I realized that I hadn't put the resource in a bigger context when I explained it. In my world, there are no teachers. There is no one further along the road than I am, someone deserving of respect, whose words I hang on to suck the meaning from them, and whose example I strive to follow. That is how I define a teacher. Instead, I have set my heart to be a learner. I'm open to learning from anyone or anything at any time. That includes learning from myself, when I have the presence of soul to do that.
The difference seemed very subtle to my friend, almost imperceptible to her. But to me, the distance between following a teacher and being a learner couldn't be any further apart. I strive to be a person whose heart and mind are open to discovery and eager to incorporate new truths or ideas into my life and outlook. From within myself, I look to see what the universe presents at my feet. And within myself, I try out the new ideas, testing them with experience, to see if they inform me. I decide if the truth fits me or not, and adjust myself according to what I discover. I'm looking within to find the teacher by setting my heart to be a learner.
I trust that when great souls cross my path, people who could help me become the person I want to be, I've got my heart set to recognize the gifts that appear at my feet. And if not from that soul, I trust that another soul or situation will present itself in a way that I open to it, at a time when I'm prepared to learn each lesson. That is my faith, and that is my course.
Ah, I realized that I hadn't put the resource in a bigger context when I explained it. In my world, there are no teachers. There is no one further along the road than I am, someone deserving of respect, whose words I hang on to suck the meaning from them, and whose example I strive to follow. That is how I define a teacher. Instead, I have set my heart to be a learner. I'm open to learning from anyone or anything at any time. That includes learning from myself, when I have the presence of soul to do that.
The difference seemed very subtle to my friend, almost imperceptible to her. But to me, the distance between following a teacher and being a learner couldn't be any further apart. I strive to be a person whose heart and mind are open to discovery and eager to incorporate new truths or ideas into my life and outlook. From within myself, I look to see what the universe presents at my feet. And within myself, I try out the new ideas, testing them with experience, to see if they inform me. I decide if the truth fits me or not, and adjust myself according to what I discover. I'm looking within to find the teacher by setting my heart to be a learner.
I trust that when great souls cross my path, people who could help me become the person I want to be, I've got my heart set to recognize the gifts that appear at my feet. And if not from that soul, I trust that another soul or situation will present itself in a way that I open to it, at a time when I'm prepared to learn each lesson. That is my faith, and that is my course.
Wednesday, October 12, 2005
At Peace With Confusion
Something is definitely going on with me. I'm not quite myself, and I haven't been for about two weeks, but it is getting more obvious, and perhaps, more painful. I thought I was just having trouble snapping back from being exhausted and burnt out from my project marathon. But that's been a long time ago now. I'm always tired, I continually have bags under my eyes, and I can't seem to sleep more than 3 0r 4 hours at a stretch, no matter what time I go to bed.
This whole week it is impacting my work. Yesterday, I felt so disjointed that I cancelled a conference call with my client because I didn't feel sharp enough to collect the info he was going to give me. I don't feel much sharper today. The puzzle of ideas on my desk today seems unusually challenging, and I think it's me and not the puzzle. I don't seem to be able to rely on myself in the usual way. I'm having to give myself extra time, and make extra notes while I'm working. I can adjust to this. I'm doing my best to observe the confusion and shadow within myself. I know that where there is confusion and shadow, the divine can appear. I'm doing my best to keep moving, and waiting for the divine to show itself.
This whole week it is impacting my work. Yesterday, I felt so disjointed that I cancelled a conference call with my client because I didn't feel sharp enough to collect the info he was going to give me. I don't feel much sharper today. The puzzle of ideas on my desk today seems unusually challenging, and I think it's me and not the puzzle. I don't seem to be able to rely on myself in the usual way. I'm having to give myself extra time, and make extra notes while I'm working. I can adjust to this. I'm doing my best to observe the confusion and shadow within myself. I know that where there is confusion and shadow, the divine can appear. I'm doing my best to keep moving, and waiting for the divine to show itself.
Tuesday, October 11, 2005
Shopping Blues Redux
I was walking through the house today, taking a short break from my work to put in a load of laundry when I had a huge revelation. When I wrote about my shopping experience on Saturday and losing my credit card, I tried to accurately report the truth about the story, mentioning about every little thing that went wrong but showing that I kept my perspective about it. I was glib about the details of what went wrong, and didn't pay nearly as much attention to the things that went RIGHT.
I have to laugh at myself. Ooooppps, I did it again seems the appropriate response.
Many years ago, I realized that I wasn't telling the correct life story any more. The old story, the way I used to talk about my life, was all wrong. It was true, but it was the story that went like this: "I had this disaster, but I learned this from it. I tried something new, it failed, but it lead me to this other thing. " It was as if I was staking out the property line of my life with fenceposts at each disaster, stringing barbed wire between them. I was reliving my life as a story of disasters I had survived.
The truth was really quite different. Yep, I had some disasters, and I did learn from them. But no where in my story were some of the most important decisions of my life. Didn't those events, events not linked to surviving a disaster define me as well? So why wasn't I including them in my story?
And here is what really got me... the disaster survival story just describes how I've reacted to things that have appeared in my life. They are not the story of the things I chose for myself, the times in my life that I just decided to change direction because I wanted to, because I was taking responsibility for my life, listening to my heart, and following my dream. I wanted to reinforce the story of a woman who processes events and feelings, who makes decisions or has gut reactions, and TAKES ACTION ON THEM. Isn't that truly who I am, the actions I choose to take when I have plenty of options available to me, instead of my reactions to things that happened to me?
Of course, both types of events make up who I am, but I had been completely ignoring one set of fenceposts and depending entirely on the other. When I went backward in my autobiography, I found new fenceposts all over the place. And this time, instead of linking them with barbed wire, I imagined them as a split rail fence, solid but accessible and lacking the sharp points that exist only to inflict cuts.
Perhaps later I'll actually rewrite the adventure of my Saturday using the other fenceposts, or perhaps, I'll just smile that I've been reminded to stay focused on the positive things, the evidence of abundance in my life, the events that show me the overflowing well-being in the universe with the same glibness I used to reserve for narrating the less than positive and the near misses.
I have to laugh at myself. Ooooppps, I did it again seems the appropriate response.
Many years ago, I realized that I wasn't telling the correct life story any more. The old story, the way I used to talk about my life, was all wrong. It was true, but it was the story that went like this: "I had this disaster, but I learned this from it. I tried something new, it failed, but it lead me to this other thing. " It was as if I was staking out the property line of my life with fenceposts at each disaster, stringing barbed wire between them. I was reliving my life as a story of disasters I had survived.
The truth was really quite different. Yep, I had some disasters, and I did learn from them. But no where in my story were some of the most important decisions of my life. Didn't those events, events not linked to surviving a disaster define me as well? So why wasn't I including them in my story?
And here is what really got me... the disaster survival story just describes how I've reacted to things that have appeared in my life. They are not the story of the things I chose for myself, the times in my life that I just decided to change direction because I wanted to, because I was taking responsibility for my life, listening to my heart, and following my dream. I wanted to reinforce the story of a woman who processes events and feelings, who makes decisions or has gut reactions, and TAKES ACTION ON THEM. Isn't that truly who I am, the actions I choose to take when I have plenty of options available to me, instead of my reactions to things that happened to me?
Of course, both types of events make up who I am, but I had been completely ignoring one set of fenceposts and depending entirely on the other. When I went backward in my autobiography, I found new fenceposts all over the place. And this time, instead of linking them with barbed wire, I imagined them as a split rail fence, solid but accessible and lacking the sharp points that exist only to inflict cuts.
Perhaps later I'll actually rewrite the adventure of my Saturday using the other fenceposts, or perhaps, I'll just smile that I've been reminded to stay focused on the positive things, the evidence of abundance in my life, the events that show me the overflowing well-being in the universe with the same glibness I used to reserve for narrating the less than positive and the near misses.
Monday, October 10, 2005
Begin the Dream Again
The last four years have been the greatest challenge of my life where I've faced the hardest situations and redefined myself from the inside out. It started with being unable to shake off the flu which turned out to be sepsis (blood poisoning) and required surgery and intensive antibiotics to fight off. I was left with reduced mobility, causing me to move to a one-story home. I'm grateful to report that I've regained 90% of my mobility at this time, and believe I can improve even more. I'll share with you sometime what I learned about myself during this well-being crisis, but in summary, it allowed me to rethink everything I had believed about being alive and pick out the old ideas that had stuck around but no longer fit me. Sort of like cleaning out the cobwebs.
A few months after I moved into my house, my father-who was almost never sick in his life-went in for bypass surgery and ended up having a stroke and other complications. For the next year and a half, I shuttled back and forth between Arizona and Ohio to help my family deal with his situation, including his last six months spent at home bed-ridden with my 70-year-old mom as his primary care giver. Facing his death and my own, I came away from this with a greater sense of priorities in my life, and the awareness that I'm now leading my life from my heart more than ever before.
The grief I felt at that time was immense, and I found myself in the role of being a caretaker for my mom and my other family members in varying degrees. I lived with mom for about the first 6 months of her new life, helping her to sort out the house and begin to see the possibilities of what she could create with her life. It built a new bridge of understanding between us, it gave us a new common ground for understanding each other.
I hadn't really had time to grieve the issues around my illness, compounded with the issues around my father's death and my family's strained relationships, and the challenges of rebuilding my business after walking away from my clients for nearly two years. I had a heavy heart. I'm not one to give into self-pity, and did my best to remind myself of how good my life has been, and to remind myself that I know next to nothing about the kinds of suffering that appear around me in the world.
Even so, I would wake up in the middle of the night and sob uncontrollably until I was too tired to cry and my eyes were swollen shut. There was no spark in my eyes and no lightness in my heart in spite of my best efforts to be cheerful. It was like standing at the edge of a clearing, the place where the woods and the meadow meet, and being unable to step away from the shadows into the full light.
Late this spring, I took a contract assignment to work in an office an hour drive away out of necessity. I filled my drive time listening to books on CD, which was one of the greatest surprises and delights during that time. But there were a few afternoons where I was either out of books or just wanted a change of pace. On one those afternoons, I popped in C'mon C'mon by Sheryl Crow. When I got to the song Diamond Road, something amazing happened. I felt like I had fallen into a gulch or a ravine of sadness in my own heart, like the flesh had been torn and I was in the middle of the tear, deep inside it. The sadness was overwhelming, and I recognized that this place was the source of middle of the night sobbing.
Feeling underwater and at the same time intrigued by what I saw was happening, I replayed the song a couple of times and found that I was unable to utter more than a few words of singing between sobs. I must have been a sight, driving down the highway in the afternoon drive time, radio blaring, singing and sobbing at the top of my lungs. But something amazing was happening. I felt like I was really feeling the core of my grief in a way that I had not done before. After a few times through the song, I was exhausted and put on something else to distract me.
During the next weeks, I found that I was still waking up sobbing, and some afternoons, I would experiment to see if I could get through Diamond Road without crying. I could not. Every time I reached the second verse, I would feel my eyes burn hot and huge tears flow out of them until my clothes were damp. I would do my best to sing, and would play the song a few times until I felt I was done for now.
For the next couple of months, I would test the healing of my heart with this song. Sometimes, I would sob from the beginning to the end. A few times, I found that I only cracked a couple of times, eyes hot and heart torn open, but no real tears or sobs. There was no pattern to this, my reactions seemed almost random. But there was no doubt that my reaction to this song was strong.
And then one day, a miracle happened. I sang the song all of the way though without crying. I was actually able to sing this song to my own soul as a song of my truth instead of a song of my sadness. When I reached the end, I actually let out a wooooo-hoooooo!! while I restarted the song. I must have sang it that day for most of an hour, celebrating the healing of my own heart.
I have always felt that my voice has a strong power in my own life. I learned many years ago to be careful about what I said out loud about myself (and of course what I said silently, too). I am a person who loves chanting, to be around chanting, and to do chanting. I learned a sacred chant from an eastern religion that gives me peace each time I say it, and I can feel the power of the sound of my voice after many repetitions in my meditations. I absolutely believe that music is powerful.
This song, this wonderful song, allowed me to speak tenderly to my broken heart. "Little bird" [that's my heart] "what's troubling you? You know what you have to do." [emphasis on know-my heart always knows what is best for me] "What is yours you'll never lose" [I'm spirit in a body, having a human experience, but nothing human can take away my core, who I really am] "and what's ahead may shine. Underneath the promise of blue skies, with broken wings I'll learn to fly" [brighter days are ahead, I will learn again what I need to know] "Pull yourself out of the tide" [keep raising your face to the sun and continue to do what you know to do] "and begin the dream again."
It's the last line that hit the deepest when I admitted to myself that I had stopped dreaming about my life. I was afraid to dream, I had started to believe that this sadness was always going to be with me.
I still play this song in the truck, and I still sing it at the top of my lungs, but now as a personal anthem, the song of my heart. It did "take a little time." but I find that I've made "it to the other side" of my grief. I'm flying again, and best of all, I'm dreaming the dream of my life again.
If you don't know the song, here are all of the lyrics.
A few months after I moved into my house, my father-who was almost never sick in his life-went in for bypass surgery and ended up having a stroke and other complications. For the next year and a half, I shuttled back and forth between Arizona and Ohio to help my family deal with his situation, including his last six months spent at home bed-ridden with my 70-year-old mom as his primary care giver. Facing his death and my own, I came away from this with a greater sense of priorities in my life, and the awareness that I'm now leading my life from my heart more than ever before.
The grief I felt at that time was immense, and I found myself in the role of being a caretaker for my mom and my other family members in varying degrees. I lived with mom for about the first 6 months of her new life, helping her to sort out the house and begin to see the possibilities of what she could create with her life. It built a new bridge of understanding between us, it gave us a new common ground for understanding each other.
I hadn't really had time to grieve the issues around my illness, compounded with the issues around my father's death and my family's strained relationships, and the challenges of rebuilding my business after walking away from my clients for nearly two years. I had a heavy heart. I'm not one to give into self-pity, and did my best to remind myself of how good my life has been, and to remind myself that I know next to nothing about the kinds of suffering that appear around me in the world.
Even so, I would wake up in the middle of the night and sob uncontrollably until I was too tired to cry and my eyes were swollen shut. There was no spark in my eyes and no lightness in my heart in spite of my best efforts to be cheerful. It was like standing at the edge of a clearing, the place where the woods and the meadow meet, and being unable to step away from the shadows into the full light.
Late this spring, I took a contract assignment to work in an office an hour drive away out of necessity. I filled my drive time listening to books on CD, which was one of the greatest surprises and delights during that time. But there were a few afternoons where I was either out of books or just wanted a change of pace. On one those afternoons, I popped in C'mon C'mon by Sheryl Crow. When I got to the song Diamond Road, something amazing happened. I felt like I had fallen into a gulch or a ravine of sadness in my own heart, like the flesh had been torn and I was in the middle of the tear, deep inside it. The sadness was overwhelming, and I recognized that this place was the source of middle of the night sobbing.
Feeling underwater and at the same time intrigued by what I saw was happening, I replayed the song a couple of times and found that I was unable to utter more than a few words of singing between sobs. I must have been a sight, driving down the highway in the afternoon drive time, radio blaring, singing and sobbing at the top of my lungs. But something amazing was happening. I felt like I was really feeling the core of my grief in a way that I had not done before. After a few times through the song, I was exhausted and put on something else to distract me.
During the next weeks, I found that I was still waking up sobbing, and some afternoons, I would experiment to see if I could get through Diamond Road without crying. I could not. Every time I reached the second verse, I would feel my eyes burn hot and huge tears flow out of them until my clothes were damp. I would do my best to sing, and would play the song a few times until I felt I was done for now.
For the next couple of months, I would test the healing of my heart with this song. Sometimes, I would sob from the beginning to the end. A few times, I found that I only cracked a couple of times, eyes hot and heart torn open, but no real tears or sobs. There was no pattern to this, my reactions seemed almost random. But there was no doubt that my reaction to this song was strong.
And then one day, a miracle happened. I sang the song all of the way though without crying. I was actually able to sing this song to my own soul as a song of my truth instead of a song of my sadness. When I reached the end, I actually let out a wooooo-hoooooo!! while I restarted the song. I must have sang it that day for most of an hour, celebrating the healing of my own heart.
I have always felt that my voice has a strong power in my own life. I learned many years ago to be careful about what I said out loud about myself (and of course what I said silently, too). I am a person who loves chanting, to be around chanting, and to do chanting. I learned a sacred chant from an eastern religion that gives me peace each time I say it, and I can feel the power of the sound of my voice after many repetitions in my meditations. I absolutely believe that music is powerful.
This song, this wonderful song, allowed me to speak tenderly to my broken heart. "Little bird" [that's my heart] "what's troubling you? You know what you have to do." [emphasis on know-my heart always knows what is best for me] "What is yours you'll never lose" [I'm spirit in a body, having a human experience, but nothing human can take away my core, who I really am] "and what's ahead may shine. Underneath the promise of blue skies, with broken wings I'll learn to fly" [brighter days are ahead, I will learn again what I need to know] "Pull yourself out of the tide" [keep raising your face to the sun and continue to do what you know to do] "and begin the dream again."
It's the last line that hit the deepest when I admitted to myself that I had stopped dreaming about my life. I was afraid to dream, I had started to believe that this sadness was always going to be with me.
I still play this song in the truck, and I still sing it at the top of my lungs, but now as a personal anthem, the song of my heart. It did "take a little time." but I find that I've made "it to the other side" of my grief. I'm flying again, and best of all, I'm dreaming the dream of my life again.
If you don't know the song, here are all of the lyrics.
Walk with me the diamond road
Tell me every story told
Give me something of your soul
That I can hold onto
I want to wake up to the sound of waves
Crashing on a brand new day
Keep the memory of your face
But wipe the pain away
When you're lonely (you're not alone)
When your heart aches (on diamond road)
It's gonna take a little time
Yeah, it's gonna take a little time
When the night falls (you're not alone)
When you're stumbling (on diamond road)
It's gonna take a little time
To make it to the other side
So don't miss the diamonds along the way
Every road has led us here today
Little bird, what's troubling you
You know what you have to do
What is yours you'll never lose
And what's ahead may shine
Beneath the promise of blue skies
With broken wings we'll learn to fly
Pull yourself out of the tide
And begin the dream again
When you're lonely (you're not alone)
When your heart aches (on diamond road)
It's gonna take a little time
Yeah, it's gonna take a little time
When the night falls (you're not alone)
When you're stumbling (on diamond road)
It's gonna take a little time
To make it to the other side
So don't miss the diamonds along the way
Every road has led us here today
Won't you shine on
Morning light
Burn the darkness away
Walk with me the diamond road
Tell me everything is gold
Give me something of your soul
So you don't fade away
When you're lonely (you're not alone)
When your heart aches (on diamond road)
It's gonna take a little time
Yeah, it's gonna take a little time
When the night falls (you're not alone)
When you're stumbling (on diamond road)
It's gonna take a little time
To make it to the other side
Don't miss the diamonds along the way
Every road has led us here today
Life is what happens while you're making plans
All that you need is right here in your hands.
--by Sheryl Crow
Sunday, October 09, 2005
Shopping Blues
Saturday, I finally got around to shopping for my new vacuum. I knew the brand and model I wanted, and thanks to Sears.com and the magic of database driven website design, I thought I knew which store in the metro Phoenix area had one in stock. Because it was quite a drive from my house, I had a two pronged approach.
First, I decided to stop at various other retailers along the way to see if they had the same one at a better price. And if that failed, second, I would use that store location as an excuse to drive to the far side of town to shop at some stores I almost never visit since moving into my house. So with a plan, good music on the radio, and my seatbelt in place, I headed out to fulfill my mission.
I stopped at several stores, and was surprised to see the differences between the in-store selection and the website selection. If anyone who works on retail websites is reading this, it's REALLY a good idea to let customers know what items are web only stock.
When I arrived at the destination Sears, I had to drive completely around the mall to locate the Sears outside entrance thanks to a huge, gas-guzzling SUV that blocked my view of the navigation signs and my dumb luck to choose the opposite direction of the store. Then, I realized that the store entrance shared the parking lot with the mall multi-plex. Saturday afternoon movie and mall parking. You get the picture.
But once inside, I quickly found my way to the appliances, and to my pleasant surprise, there were three employees chit-chatting right in front of the exact model I wanted to purchase. The young clerk was friendly, and even ran upstairs to make sure that the 1 vacuum that showed up as in-stock was actually available before ringing me up. I decided on the extended warranty, got directions to the merchandise pickup, and even found my truck easily in the parking lot. The guy at merchandise pickup was also friendly and helpful. I hopped back into the truck with a new vacuum in the back seat, and my heart ready to visit my old stomping grounds.
I arrived at the first store and found something I wanted to buy. But as I stood at the register, I realized that I no longer had my credit card, the one I used to purchase the vacuum. I used another card for this purchase, and returned to the truck. I called Verizon information, and they connected me to the main number for that Sears store, now approximately 40 miles away. Somehow, Verizon connected me to a dead number, as the recorded operator voice explained. I called back into Verizon information, got a credit for the first call, and was connected yet again to a non-working number.
I called a friend and asked him if he had the time to look up a phone number for me. He explained that they don't have any phone books in their household, they use the Internet. He is explaining this to be because his wireless connection to his laptop is currently unavailable, so he can't help. He offers to call me back with the number. I decide that perhaps I had better just freeze the account until I know what is happening, so while I'm talking to my bank, his call beeps in, and I let him roll to voice mail.
After getting thing setup with the bank, I go to retrieve his voice message when a text message appears on my screen from him with the number. I try to call the number and only get a busy signal. In the meantime, I've headed out the parking lot towards the Sears store, redialing the number continually for more than 10 minutes. I give up, knowing that I've got a better chance for resolution in person. I call my friend back to thank him, and he tells me that he had to send the text message because my cell's voice mailbox is full. What?! The next 10 minutes of my drive time is spent playing back the voice mail messages and deleting them, most of them being automated calls from the library, sometimes several calls a day, about reserve items ready to be picked up.
I arrive at the store, return to the appliances, and find out that my card has been placed in the safe area of the office. It's another bit of a walk, but easy to find. I was very happy that the woman asked to see my ID before giving me the card! When I got back to the truck, I headed home while I called the bank to turn the account back on. I hit both Home Depot and Lowes on the way home, as well as Target, and arrived loaded with practical purchases that took me most of today to assemble and begin using.
It wasn't exactly the day I had in mind, but overall, I've got no complaints.
First, I decided to stop at various other retailers along the way to see if they had the same one at a better price. And if that failed, second, I would use that store location as an excuse to drive to the far side of town to shop at some stores I almost never visit since moving into my house. So with a plan, good music on the radio, and my seatbelt in place, I headed out to fulfill my mission.
I stopped at several stores, and was surprised to see the differences between the in-store selection and the website selection. If anyone who works on retail websites is reading this, it's REALLY a good idea to let customers know what items are web only stock.
When I arrived at the destination Sears, I had to drive completely around the mall to locate the Sears outside entrance thanks to a huge, gas-guzzling SUV that blocked my view of the navigation signs and my dumb luck to choose the opposite direction of the store. Then, I realized that the store entrance shared the parking lot with the mall multi-plex. Saturday afternoon movie and mall parking. You get the picture.
But once inside, I quickly found my way to the appliances, and to my pleasant surprise, there were three employees chit-chatting right in front of the exact model I wanted to purchase. The young clerk was friendly, and even ran upstairs to make sure that the 1 vacuum that showed up as in-stock was actually available before ringing me up. I decided on the extended warranty, got directions to the merchandise pickup, and even found my truck easily in the parking lot. The guy at merchandise pickup was also friendly and helpful. I hopped back into the truck with a new vacuum in the back seat, and my heart ready to visit my old stomping grounds.
I arrived at the first store and found something I wanted to buy. But as I stood at the register, I realized that I no longer had my credit card, the one I used to purchase the vacuum. I used another card for this purchase, and returned to the truck. I called Verizon information, and they connected me to the main number for that Sears store, now approximately 40 miles away. Somehow, Verizon connected me to a dead number, as the recorded operator voice explained. I called back into Verizon information, got a credit for the first call, and was connected yet again to a non-working number.
I called a friend and asked him if he had the time to look up a phone number for me. He explained that they don't have any phone books in their household, they use the Internet. He is explaining this to be because his wireless connection to his laptop is currently unavailable, so he can't help. He offers to call me back with the number. I decide that perhaps I had better just freeze the account until I know what is happening, so while I'm talking to my bank, his call beeps in, and I let him roll to voice mail.
After getting thing setup with the bank, I go to retrieve his voice message when a text message appears on my screen from him with the number. I try to call the number and only get a busy signal. In the meantime, I've headed out the parking lot towards the Sears store, redialing the number continually for more than 10 minutes. I give up, knowing that I've got a better chance for resolution in person. I call my friend back to thank him, and he tells me that he had to send the text message because my cell's voice mailbox is full. What?! The next 10 minutes of my drive time is spent playing back the voice mail messages and deleting them, most of them being automated calls from the library, sometimes several calls a day, about reserve items ready to be picked up.
I arrive at the store, return to the appliances, and find out that my card has been placed in the safe area of the office. It's another bit of a walk, but easy to find. I was very happy that the woman asked to see my ID before giving me the card! When I got back to the truck, I headed home while I called the bank to turn the account back on. I hit both Home Depot and Lowes on the way home, as well as Target, and arrived loaded with practical purchases that took me most of today to assemble and begin using.
It wasn't exactly the day I had in mind, but overall, I've got no complaints.
Saturday, October 08, 2005
In the Morning Light
I've been a sort of self-help junkie since I was about 15. I've always been asking big questions like why am I here, what is the best thing I can do to meet my unique set of gifts and skills, and how does everything work. This curiosity, this need to understand myself in a larger context, has been the engine strapped onto the scooter of my life. Nearly everywhere I've been in my journey traces back to this idea.
Along the way, I've experimented with philosophies and religions, studied anthropology to see how other people in other times and places have answered these questions, waded through the rich patterns of abstract algebra, and asked friends and acquaintances probing personal questions to try to collect a wide set of answers. I've watched the titles change on the NY Times bestsellers list to tap into the collective curiosity and watch its currents. And I've read more books than anyone I know, at times devouring 60 or more titles a year, mostly non-fiction.
I've also participated in study groups, attending services at a wide range of religious organizations, attended workshops, listened to audio tapes of even more workshops, and even conducted workshops. I've traveled to 35 of the 48 contiguous states by car, stopping to experience the landscapes, the sacred places, the places of natural beauty, the local cultures and accents--always curious about what was around the next bend or over the next hill.
I've joined gyms, taken classes in aerobics and pilates, learned how to lift weights, and studied more nutritional programs than I can count. I've had a series of workout regimines and used several types of trainers. For a time, I walked 2.5 miles a day, and tracked my total distance which nearly reached to Los Angeles on the map.
I've embraced my inner child, done hypnosis, participated in sweat lodges, and reviewed my relationships with everything from transactional analysis to ennegrames to Myers-Briggs. I've explored archetypes, swam in the collective unconscious, read fairy tales, and written my life story as a mythological tale. I've collected images from rock art, ancient cultures, various scientific disciplines, and crop circles. I've listened to trace channelers, had my horoscope drawn, been to Tarot readers, and been in the presence of people with true psychic gifts.
I've been through a life-threatening illness that shattered my ideas about health and well-being, and have rebuilt myself and my sense of invincibility with the understanding that death is waiting for me. I've supported a family member through an extended fatal illness, worked through my own grief, and supported my family through theirs as well. I've arrived on the other side with a richer appreciation for love, and greater willingness to fling open my heart, knowing that loss is woven into the fabric of love.
All of these things have contributed to where I stand today. I've collected nuggets of wisdom from these things and from my reactions to them. I've incorporated many disparate elements into my personal world view, and stand today on the bedrock of these experiences. And when I look out today on my life, what seems important surprises me.
I woke up this morning before sunrise for the first time in a few weeks. It's the time of day I love for waking up, and it felt good to be back to it. What I love about the early morning is how easy it is for me to wake up and start my day thinking about myself and my core values. I find that if I wake up and light shines into my eyes, it seems to jump start my brain, which resumes thinking about the work problem I left on my desk the night before. My day starts off with a sprint. But if I wake up gently, before the light, I can stay inside my heart. I can move about in candlelight, do my yoga and meditation with my eyes closed, and set my intentions for the day before my brain begins to get engaged. I can feed my soul at that hour without any distractions of the mundane life that awaits me. I arrive that those responsibilities fresh, nurtured, and eager to begin. It's a wonderful way to start the day.
This morning, as I enjoyed my softly lit world and interacted with my heart, I enjoyed every nuance of that time. As the sun came up, I found myself reflecting on a thought that has been arising in my mind for several weeks, triggered by different events and observations throughout this time. The thought is this: I've come to the place in my life where I trust myself, and that makes all of the difference.
I still have big questions and still seek big answers. But what drives me now is a more pure curiosity than ever before. Before, it was mixed with some worry about am I weird (the answer was usually yes), or why isn't my life working, or why does my life look so different from other people? Why can't I just accept what other people seem to accept, why do I have to have my own answers and my own experiences? The strange thing to me is that I can't answer any of those questions now, but the pain of not having the answers is gone. I understand today that I'm doing the best that I can in each moment and really know that is true. It's all I can ask of myself, to show up and be present in my life. The rest is just details. Finding myself, finding this trust, was hard work, but worthwhile.
Along the way, I've experimented with philosophies and religions, studied anthropology to see how other people in other times and places have answered these questions, waded through the rich patterns of abstract algebra, and asked friends and acquaintances probing personal questions to try to collect a wide set of answers. I've watched the titles change on the NY Times bestsellers list to tap into the collective curiosity and watch its currents. And I've read more books than anyone I know, at times devouring 60 or more titles a year, mostly non-fiction.
I've also participated in study groups, attending services at a wide range of religious organizations, attended workshops, listened to audio tapes of even more workshops, and even conducted workshops. I've traveled to 35 of the 48 contiguous states by car, stopping to experience the landscapes, the sacred places, the places of natural beauty, the local cultures and accents--always curious about what was around the next bend or over the next hill.
I've joined gyms, taken classes in aerobics and pilates, learned how to lift weights, and studied more nutritional programs than I can count. I've had a series of workout regimines and used several types of trainers. For a time, I walked 2.5 miles a day, and tracked my total distance which nearly reached to Los Angeles on the map.
I've embraced my inner child, done hypnosis, participated in sweat lodges, and reviewed my relationships with everything from transactional analysis to ennegrames to Myers-Briggs. I've explored archetypes, swam in the collective unconscious, read fairy tales, and written my life story as a mythological tale. I've collected images from rock art, ancient cultures, various scientific disciplines, and crop circles. I've listened to trace channelers, had my horoscope drawn, been to Tarot readers, and been in the presence of people with true psychic gifts.
I've been through a life-threatening illness that shattered my ideas about health and well-being, and have rebuilt myself and my sense of invincibility with the understanding that death is waiting for me. I've supported a family member through an extended fatal illness, worked through my own grief, and supported my family through theirs as well. I've arrived on the other side with a richer appreciation for love, and greater willingness to fling open my heart, knowing that loss is woven into the fabric of love.
All of these things have contributed to where I stand today. I've collected nuggets of wisdom from these things and from my reactions to them. I've incorporated many disparate elements into my personal world view, and stand today on the bedrock of these experiences. And when I look out today on my life, what seems important surprises me.
I woke up this morning before sunrise for the first time in a few weeks. It's the time of day I love for waking up, and it felt good to be back to it. What I love about the early morning is how easy it is for me to wake up and start my day thinking about myself and my core values. I find that if I wake up and light shines into my eyes, it seems to jump start my brain, which resumes thinking about the work problem I left on my desk the night before. My day starts off with a sprint. But if I wake up gently, before the light, I can stay inside my heart. I can move about in candlelight, do my yoga and meditation with my eyes closed, and set my intentions for the day before my brain begins to get engaged. I can feed my soul at that hour without any distractions of the mundane life that awaits me. I arrive that those responsibilities fresh, nurtured, and eager to begin. It's a wonderful way to start the day.
This morning, as I enjoyed my softly lit world and interacted with my heart, I enjoyed every nuance of that time. As the sun came up, I found myself reflecting on a thought that has been arising in my mind for several weeks, triggered by different events and observations throughout this time. The thought is this: I've come to the place in my life where I trust myself, and that makes all of the difference.
I still have big questions and still seek big answers. But what drives me now is a more pure curiosity than ever before. Before, it was mixed with some worry about am I weird (the answer was usually yes), or why isn't my life working, or why does my life look so different from other people? Why can't I just accept what other people seem to accept, why do I have to have my own answers and my own experiences? The strange thing to me is that I can't answer any of those questions now, but the pain of not having the answers is gone. I understand today that I'm doing the best that I can in each moment and really know that is true. It's all I can ask of myself, to show up and be present in my life. The rest is just details. Finding myself, finding this trust, was hard work, but worthwhile.
Thursday, October 06, 2005
Today, It Doesn't Suck to be Me
I've been using my project downtime to get some household projects done, things that I've been postponing mostly because I've been too busy, but also because the searing summer heat didn't magically end at Labor Day. Things like pulling up the dead weeds that have accumulated from my weed spraying the gravel in the back yard. Things like recovering the small garden along one side of the garage from the invasive weed that has almost choked out all of the plants. Things like reorganizing the garage to separate out the future garage sale items from the things that are waiting for cabinets to be installed to give them a home.
When it gets too warm outside (day times have been into the high 90s) or in the garage, I've been inside doing more of the same. Reorganizing the bathroom vanities, sorting out the linen closets... you get the idea. I've been busy with all of the "invisible work" -- the things that don't show until you don't do them.
Part of this effort has created a bit more mess inside. I've trimmed the plants, and picked out the dead leaves from the Boston fern. I've moved everything and dusted behind it. I've been through a whole box of Swiffer duster refills, along with half a bottle of furniture polish. I've piled things on the counters, only to move them from one side of the house to the other, or in from the garage to a new storage place, or outside to the garage for the garage sale bins.
The one thing I've not worried about is running the vacuum. I seems like every time I walk through the house with an armload, something more gets on the floor. The dirt and pieces of gunk have reached the point where they are visible to the naked eye when I'm standing up. I thought I would wait until this mess-creation phase had ended before I really cleaned the floor. Normally, I love the tile floors throughout my house, but when they are dirty, there is nothing worse!
But Wednesday, it got to me. I stepped out of the shower with wet, bare feet and walked into the family room. In just those few steps, I could feel that the water acted like adhesive, and there were hard bits of gunk now stuck to my feet. I sat down on the couch and rubbed my feet together to wipe it off. I got up, determined to reclaim my floor for bare feet and my sanity.
I went through the house and put all of the movable furniture up off the floor, pulled up the throw rugs, and prepared to vacuum. I started the job like an obsessive compulsive control freak who was on a mission. But my mission ran into trouble in five short minutes. The vacuum, a Eureka Boss that I truly love, started making noises in the beater motor area. I stopped, moved to the middle of the living room floor, and turned up the lights in the vacuum surgery suite. Phillips screwdriver in hand, I opened her up. I found a few large gunk chunks rattling around inside and a dime that I had missed in my previous scouting. I checked the brush and it was clear. The belt was solid and seemed to be the correct tension. I closed her up and turned her over, ready to resume my mission.
But when I turned it back on, I was greeted with a high whine, and before I could fumble in my bare feet to find the off switch, the whine increased and I caught a whiff of the dreaded engine overheating smell. In my heart, I knew I had just lost the battle. But before I gave up, I opened her back up one last time, hoping that I would understand something new in that recently familiar place. But no such luck.
This vacuum joined my household five years before, and I wasn't ready to just throw it out. I went to the computer and opened up the PDF of the user manual I had downloaded from the company website a couple years ago when I couldn't find the important place where I had filed the original. It seems that my vacuum needed a trip to that appliance spa they like to call the repair shop, where they sit around without doing any work, get massaged, and run up a huge bill. I wasn't going down that road this time.
I logged into Consumer Reports and began researching vacuum options. I found a best buy rated upright vac, another Eureka Boss model, and began doing some price checking online. After filling and abandoning several site shopping carts (the only way to get the shipping price quoted to you) I realized that the online price savings was balanced out by the shipping costs.
Tomorrow, I'll be hitting a couple of stores to see if I can get a good price on my new vacuum. But until then, nothing in my house sucks, including me. And I'm making an effort to avoid wet, bare feet until I know the coast is clear.
When it gets too warm outside (day times have been into the high 90s) or in the garage, I've been inside doing more of the same. Reorganizing the bathroom vanities, sorting out the linen closets... you get the idea. I've been busy with all of the "invisible work" -- the things that don't show until you don't do them.
Part of this effort has created a bit more mess inside. I've trimmed the plants, and picked out the dead leaves from the Boston fern. I've moved everything and dusted behind it. I've been through a whole box of Swiffer duster refills, along with half a bottle of furniture polish. I've piled things on the counters, only to move them from one side of the house to the other, or in from the garage to a new storage place, or outside to the garage for the garage sale bins.
The one thing I've not worried about is running the vacuum. I seems like every time I walk through the house with an armload, something more gets on the floor. The dirt and pieces of gunk have reached the point where they are visible to the naked eye when I'm standing up. I thought I would wait until this mess-creation phase had ended before I really cleaned the floor. Normally, I love the tile floors throughout my house, but when they are dirty, there is nothing worse!
But Wednesday, it got to me. I stepped out of the shower with wet, bare feet and walked into the family room. In just those few steps, I could feel that the water acted like adhesive, and there were hard bits of gunk now stuck to my feet. I sat down on the couch and rubbed my feet together to wipe it off. I got up, determined to reclaim my floor for bare feet and my sanity.
I went through the house and put all of the movable furniture up off the floor, pulled up the throw rugs, and prepared to vacuum. I started the job like an obsessive compulsive control freak who was on a mission. But my mission ran into trouble in five short minutes. The vacuum, a Eureka Boss that I truly love, started making noises in the beater motor area. I stopped, moved to the middle of the living room floor, and turned up the lights in the vacuum surgery suite. Phillips screwdriver in hand, I opened her up. I found a few large gunk chunks rattling around inside and a dime that I had missed in my previous scouting. I checked the brush and it was clear. The belt was solid and seemed to be the correct tension. I closed her up and turned her over, ready to resume my mission.
But when I turned it back on, I was greeted with a high whine, and before I could fumble in my bare feet to find the off switch, the whine increased and I caught a whiff of the dreaded engine overheating smell. In my heart, I knew I had just lost the battle. But before I gave up, I opened her back up one last time, hoping that I would understand something new in that recently familiar place. But no such luck.
This vacuum joined my household five years before, and I wasn't ready to just throw it out. I went to the computer and opened up the PDF of the user manual I had downloaded from the company website a couple years ago when I couldn't find the important place where I had filed the original. It seems that my vacuum needed a trip to that appliance spa they like to call the repair shop, where they sit around without doing any work, get massaged, and run up a huge bill. I wasn't going down that road this time.
I logged into Consumer Reports and began researching vacuum options. I found a best buy rated upright vac, another Eureka Boss model, and began doing some price checking online. After filling and abandoning several site shopping carts (the only way to get the shipping price quoted to you) I realized that the online price savings was balanced out by the shipping costs.
Tomorrow, I'll be hitting a couple of stores to see if I can get a good price on my new vacuum. But until then, nothing in my house sucks, including me. And I'm making an effort to avoid wet, bare feet until I know the coast is clear.
Monday, October 03, 2005
A Word of Warning
Last week, I purchased software online and was asked to take a satisfaction survey when I finished the ordering process. I elected to do it. I understand how important feedback is to a company, and appreciate that someone is taking the time to ask me what I thought.
The purchase process had not been totally smooth, but compared to other similar purchases, I would have given them a 4 on scale of 1-5. Only the survey didn't ask me for that kind of feedback. In fact, I was thrown for a loop at the questions they did ask me. They never asked me the basic questions about my satisfaction. They kept asking me why I had purchased from their website (which on the surface is a fair question), and the answers were these canned things that sounded strangely like management objectives for their website team. I had to answer the same question twice, each time with different options. I wasn't given the chance to say what I thought, I had to select between which of their goals I thought they had met.
Not only were the questions they asked off from what I expected, the answers were skewed even more. It was so obvious that they designed the survey entirely so they could report to upper management that the website had met its management goals.
I know a bit about designing surveys and about the statistical analysis behind them, having taken a graduate course in applied statistics and writing a major paper based on recreating a national survey for a small, localized audience. Perhaps this makes me a bad choice to complete a survey even though it drives me to offer my feedback when asked.
At any rate, I was so frustrated by the poor design of the survey that I decided to provide additional feedback on the survey and that part of my experience. At the end, there was an email address for such feedback, and I took advantage of it. I told them what was frustrating about the experience and why I thought they would not get valid results because of the flaws in the survey design.
Today, I received an email response to my email feedback. On the surface, the first paragraph seemed cordial and thoughtful. However, in the second paragraph, the writer let me have it, explaining that I was wrong (of course) and inserting a page from the survey to prove it.
My initial response to the email shifted immediately, as soon as the passive/aggressive attack on me began. I did read the note all of the way through to the end, and decided that the writer was not able to hear what I was saying, so repeating myself would do no one any good, least of all me.
I deleted the email.
A couple of hours later, I found myself struggling a bit with my work, and suddenly this volcano of seething anger began to rumble deep inside of me. Rather than walk away from the project with a short break, I found myself thinking back through that horrible example of customer service I had deleted. And I realized that I did have a response. I went through my trash bin, found the note, and quiped back this response:
Apparently, that volcanoe is full of piss and vinegar. My public service announcement for the day: Don't cut me off in traffic today.
The purchase process had not been totally smooth, but compared to other similar purchases, I would have given them a 4 on scale of 1-5. Only the survey didn't ask me for that kind of feedback. In fact, I was thrown for a loop at the questions they did ask me. They never asked me the basic questions about my satisfaction. They kept asking me why I had purchased from their website (which on the surface is a fair question), and the answers were these canned things that sounded strangely like management objectives for their website team. I had to answer the same question twice, each time with different options. I wasn't given the chance to say what I thought, I had to select between which of their goals I thought they had met.
Not only were the questions they asked off from what I expected, the answers were skewed even more. It was so obvious that they designed the survey entirely so they could report to upper management that the website had met its management goals.
I know a bit about designing surveys and about the statistical analysis behind them, having taken a graduate course in applied statistics and writing a major paper based on recreating a national survey for a small, localized audience. Perhaps this makes me a bad choice to complete a survey even though it drives me to offer my feedback when asked.
At any rate, I was so frustrated by the poor design of the survey that I decided to provide additional feedback on the survey and that part of my experience. At the end, there was an email address for such feedback, and I took advantage of it. I told them what was frustrating about the experience and why I thought they would not get valid results because of the flaws in the survey design.
Today, I received an email response to my email feedback. On the surface, the first paragraph seemed cordial and thoughtful. However, in the second paragraph, the writer let me have it, explaining that I was wrong (of course) and inserting a page from the survey to prove it.
My initial response to the email shifted immediately, as soon as the passive/aggressive attack on me began. I did read the note all of the way through to the end, and decided that the writer was not able to hear what I was saying, so repeating myself would do no one any good, least of all me.
I deleted the email.
A couple of hours later, I found myself struggling a bit with my work, and suddenly this volcano of seething anger began to rumble deep inside of me. Rather than walk away from the project with a short break, I found myself thinking back through that horrible example of customer service I had deleted. And I realized that I did have a response. I went through my trash bin, found the note, and quiped back this response:
Wow. Thanks for proving to me that you were right and I was wrong. What a brilliant strategy for rebuilding a good relationship with me. Or am I completely wrong yet again? (I'm sure you will update me accordingly.)
Apparently, that volcanoe is full of piss and vinegar. My public service announcement for the day: Don't cut me off in traffic today.
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