Thursday, August 29, 2013

this duality is difficult

I am having a hard time playing.  and being joyful and light.   Daily life- whew!!
"Responsibilities no longer seem relevant but are still necessary."  So true.
This daily existence feels heavy, exhausting, tedious.  I feel impatient and irritable with people, especially when they don't respect my time.  (I don't even want to be here, don't waste my time!)
Not my ego I hope, I'm not trying to judge.  I am different, and they don't even begin to get it.  It's exasperating to be around people.

I didn't have a NDE (near death experience) to begin my spiritual emergency.  I have never fit in, have always felt like an outsider.  Animals and babies love me, people are drawn to me because I am gentle and nurturing, but then the people trample me.  I can touch plants and they grow.  I want to become a healer, a lover, a musician, an artist, a writer, a dancer, an angel, a star seed.  For now I am feeling anti-social, cranky, and lonely.  

I've always known something was different, longed for more meaning, truth, love, connection--- like elves and trees, fairies, butterflies, all living in harmony and communicating with their hearts, part of a beautiful bigger heartbeat of the universe.

I don't know how to get there, but I'm on my way.

The dual-ness is difficult.  Daily tasks while I'm thinking about the big picture of the universe and infinity, all is love, everything is as it should be... Weeding when I want to be growing strawberries, working when I want to be swimming, working too many hours to barely get by and not enough time to grow my food... living in the city when I want to live in the forests, near a beach and warm ocean, barefoot, lots of stars.  Focusing on the present, I don't yet like the present.  

I like what will be.  I need to be joyful in the present, even though the present currently feels shallow and mundane.  Be in the present, and think about growing.



Thursday, August 15, 2013

best book I have ever read (to date)

Eat, Pray, Love  by Elizabeth Gilbert
(Please please please go read this book for yourself.  My summary here won't do it justice, and I sincerely hope I do not insult the author by losing the magic of her writing by sharing my thoughts and her words here)

*****start of section in book*****
On chronicling the time elapsed between divorce, falling apart, losing everything, finding everything, and now, being free and alive...  

"My unhappy mind was a battlefield of conflicted demons... I told all my warring and confused parts the same thing:  we're all here together, guys, all alone.  And we're going to have to work out some kind of deal for how to get along, or else everybody is going to die together, sooner or later...."

...All emotions and pain is caused by words.  Find true silence to strip away the power of (negative) words... Then everything started coming up.  In that state of silence, there was room now for everything hateful, everything fearful, to run across my empty mind.  I felt like a junkie in detox, convulsing with the poison of what emerged.  I cried alot.  I prayed alot.  It was difficult and it was terrifying.  But this much I knew-  I never didn't want to be there...

and then healing...  "This is it" I said to my mind.  "This is your chance.  Show me everything that is causing you sorrow.  Let me see all of it.  Don't hold anything back."  One by one, the thoughts and memories of sadness raised their hands, stood up to identify themselves.  I looked at each thought, at each unit of sorrow, "It's ok. I love you.  I accept you.  Come into my heart now.  It's over." 

I would actually feel the sorrow (as if it were a living thing) enter my heart (as if it were an actual room).  Then I would say, "next?" and the next bit of grief would surface.  I would regard it, experience it, bless it, and invite it into my heart to. I did this will every sorrowful thought I'd ever had- reaching back into years of memory- until nothing was left.

Then I said to my mind, "show me your anger now."  One by one, my life's every incident of anger rose and made itself known.  Every injustice, every betrayal, every loss, every rage, I saw them all, one by one, and I acknowledged their existence.  I felt each piece of anger completely, as if it were happening for the first time, and then I would say, "come into my heart now.  You can rest there.  It's safe now.  It's over. I love you."  This went on for hours... and I swung between these mighty poles of opposite feelings, experiencing anger thoroughly for one bone rattling moment, and then experiencing total coolness, as the anger entered my heart as if through a door, laid itself down, curled up against its brothers, and gave up fighting.

Then came the most difficult part.  "Show me your shame." I asked my mind.  Dear God, the horrors that I saw then.  A pitiful parade of all my failures, my lies, my selfishness, jealousy, arrogance.  "Show me your worst," I said.  When I tried to invite these units of shame into my heart, they each hesitated at the door, saying, "No, you don't want me in there... don't know you know what I did?"  And I would say, "I do want you.  Even you.  I do.  Even you are welcome here.  It's ok.  You are forgiven. You are part of me.  You can rest now.  It's over."

When all this was finished, I was empty.  Nothing was fighting in my mind anymore.  I looked into my heart, at my own goodness, and saw its capacity.  I saw that my heart was not even nearly full, not even after having taken in and tended to all those calamitous urchins of sorrow and anger and shame; my heart could have easily received and forgive even more, its love was infinite.

I knew then that this is how God loves us all, receives us all... Because if even one broken and limited human being could experience even one such episode of absolute forgiveness and acceptance of her own self, then imagine-- just imagine!-- what God, in all his eternal compassion, can forgive and accept.

My heart said to my mind, "I love you.  I will never leave you.  I will always take care of you."  I think about the woman I have become lately, about the life that I am now living, and about how much I always wanted to be this person and live this life, liberated from the farce of pretending to be anyone other than myself.  I think of everything I have endured before getting here and wonder if it was me, I mean, this happy and balanced me--who pulled the other,  younger, more confused and struggling me forward during all those years. The younger me was the acorn full of potential, but it was the older me, the already-existent oak, who was saying the whole time, "yes- grow! change! evolve!  Come and meet me here, where I already exist in wholeness and maturity!  I need you to grow into me!"

Right here, right to this moment. Where I was always waiting in peace and contentment, always waiting for here to arrive and join me.

*****  end of section in book ********

I love this.  It rings truth, right into my soul.  I would like to be as wise and beautiful and eloquent and witty as the author.  I also would like her insight and wisdom, and I am getting there, slowly, each day, little by little.

I also love the idea of protecting myself, inviting all my flaws into my heart, and keeping them safe.  I had always wished for parents would would take care of me like that...  who would love me, nurture me, tend me, keep me safe.  Somehow I felt 'not good enough' since I never had that.  But that was their inadequacies, not mine, really.  So now the older me can nurture the younger me, and I shall treat me the way I wish to be treated.  How lovely :)

perfect puzzle piece

a grey puzzling world
I was trying to explain to my son the difficulties of "being different".  You don't want to lose who you are, or give in, just because it's easy, or because you are afraid to stand up for yourself.  Especially if you have spent most of your life wondering what is wrong with yourself, why can't you just behave and fit in?

But at the same time, you want to be respectful of others, not hurt feelings.  You want to feel like you are giving and doing what you can to make space better for those around you, when YOU are the one ruffling feathers by being odd.
why can't I fit in this spot?

No, I don't want a coke.  I don't want to watch tv.  I don't want a desk job.  I don't want McDonalds, or watch commercials, or go to bars, or to buy lots of things...  This is so upsetting to people, they furrow their brows in question, trying to reason in their minds what is wrong with me.   And since I care, it makes me feel bad that I am causing them confusion or uncomfort.

who I actually am


My son thought for a minute, and said, "well.  Maybe there is nothing wrong with you.  Maybe you are a perfect puzzle piece, and they are trying to smash you into the wrong spot."

Well said, little buddy!!

finding the right spot


boxing negative voices

Strange how something, such as a feeling or a voice, can rattle around in your head for years, and even IF you become aware of that little negative voice, you still have to wrestle it into silence.   I wonder why I even try to reason with it anyway?  Where did that self-sabatoging "self" come from?  How did it get in my head?  Who let it in?  or worse, invited it in?

A friend told me something so simple, yet profound.  An utter lightbulb, forehead slapping aha moment.   "That isn't YOUR voice.  It's someone else's, maybe your parents.  It doesn't belong to you, isn't part of you.  Its a rodent, a pest.  Don't let it run amok in your head.  Tell is to behave or it can't stay.  Tell that voice to be positive, or you will lock it up in a box in your head.  (figuratively)  Give it a time out."

Know what?  I love knowing that the negative voice doesn't belong in there, and the vivid visual image of taking that nasty intruder, grabbing it by the scruffy neck, and putting it in a dark box.  

Now that I am becoming aware of the negativity running amok in my head, I am learning to see the difference and am learning to separate my true self from those rodents who whisper and chatter.... "you aren't good enough... you messed up... you are a failure... you are unloveable... you are worthless... "   Negative rodents indeed--  I had a full infestation and needed an exterminator!!  

It's hard work, becoming aware of them, finding them, catching them, telling them to behave or get in their cages.  Or better yet, telling them they are at the wrong address, and are not welcome here.  GET OUT!! 

I don't want to lock up all the windows and doors of my heart, put brick walls around myself, to protect me from negative invader thoughts.  So maybe I shall consider putting up some screens, so the air and music, breeze and starlight, love and life, can still come in, and I can still move freely within myself. 

Its a big job, this extermination business.

world makeover

Know what I would like to see?  A reality show about a makeover- for the world.

All humanity, no government.  Wealth would be distributed fairly, people would work because they were passionate and not slaves.  All humans would share, relax, co-exist, a community, a village.  No wars or different nations.

Enough for all- money, food, happiness, joy, music, truth, health...

No chemicals, disease, poisoned foods.  Organic, fresh, and healthy would be the standard for all people, not just the fortunate, wealthy, or picky.

Media would be truthful and share the goal of spreading humanity and community.

Everybody would be content, satisfied, fulfilled, enriched, and whole, as part of the whole.

don't have to be perfect to change the world

Sometimes I am frustrated at how little I know.  How can I help make the world a better place, when I am just one small person?  How can I inspire others to live a better, more meaningful life, when I myself am flawed?

Then it occurred to me- I don't have to be perfect to change the world.  I just have to care.  And I do!

And I realized I don't have to reach out to everybody-- the half living, zoned out sheeple.  I just have to find ones that care, so we can put our flames together, make bigger splashes and ripples in the pond.  If I can find those that care, we can inspire each other to create change.

And there are a lot more good people in the world than bad.  So there is hope after all!