sacred housekeeping

I learned the song that is playing in my head today at the Dances of Universal Peace. Their version uses the word God, but the voice in my head automatically substitutes Love:

Go sweep out the chambers of your heart.
Make it ready to be the dwelling of the Beloved.
When you depart, Love will enter.
In you, void of yourself, Love will display her beauties.

Some googling revealed that these lyrics are from The Secret Rose Garden by Mahmud Shabistari, a Sufi mystic and poet. In Sufi poetry, the term Beloved typically refers to the Divine rather than a human lover.

To me, the lyrics are a reminder that Love remains present in my heart, underneath and undisturbed by my overactive mind, just as the sun continues to shine behind the clouds. And I can restore my awareness of this Love simply by doing a little bit of sweeping now and then to remove the mental clutter from my attention.

If you want to hear the melody, there's a video of the dance here: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=5609518534218192931#

bring it on

a quote from Abraham-Hicks, 10/6/96:

The intense intertwining of two people provides valuable contrast and motion forward that could not erupt without the powerful dynamics of two powerful creators coming together.

Your relationship literally provides a springboard for ideas that are born out of the intertwining of thoughts. The intense coupling of thinkers speeds and intensifies the decision making process.

There is enormous power in the contrast that erupts from two people blending ideas, situations, beliefs, intentions and desires.

Two working together provides more growth experiences for the human experience than one million people singularly focused.

When two beings, who are individually in vibrational harmony with their own Source Energy, come together — the physical experience of Co-Creation is at its very best.

characters wearing glasses

People seem not to see that their opinion of the world is also a confession of character.

-- Ralph Waldo Emerson

As I read this the first time, I found myself nodding in agreement. But upon further consideration, something stuck in my craw. (Exactly what IS a craw, anyway? I hope it's not something gross ...)

I do believe that our opinions of the world reveal our beliefs, filters, and perceptual limitations -- what I think of as our lenses or glasses. These inner dynamics limit and define what we are capable of seeing. Our opinions reveal a lot about what kind of glasses we wear, and very little if anything about the world 'out there.'

Tell me the world is pink, and I know you wear rose colored glasses. Tell me you see corruption everywhere, and I know you wear dark glasses. Tell me you see the world as it really is, and I know your glasses are still invisible to you.

It's no biggie. We all wear filters on our perceptions. But are these glasses our character? That's the word that got stuck in my craw. It just seems so ... final, or something.

So I popped over to dictionary.com to see what most people mean when they use this word. The definition was quite long, with over 20 different meanings. I think the one appropriate for this context is: the aggregate of features and traits that form the individual nature of some person or thing.

The thing is ... I wonder if maybe character is actually who we are underneath those glasses. And I like to believe that once we realize we are wearing them, if we don't like what we see, we can try on some different ones. So I don't want to mistake something temporary (the glasses) for something permanent (the character).

I'm beginning to suspect that almost all of us are on autopilot most of our lives, operating at the mercy of ingrained habits and reactions that seem so much a part of us that we never stop to wonder if we could be any other way. Maybe many of us are walking around in glasses that we have been wearing for so long that we don't even notice them on our noses anymore.

This line of thought was triggered by a recording I listened to recently of an interview with scientist Bruce Lipton, the author of several books including The Biology of Belief: Unleashing the Power of Consciousness, Matter, & Miracles and Spontaneous Evolution: Our Positive Future (and a Way to Get There from Here). My interpretation of his theory is the product of my filters, so please visit his site and/or read his books to learn more if you are interested.

Dr. Lipton contends that our cells are basically receivers rather than generators. They simply do what they are told by a higher authority; which he identifies as the subconscious mind.

He cites brain wave research that suggests that up until age 6 or so, much of what we are told about ourselves, the world, and our experiences goes straight into subconscious storage in our brain without passing through cognitive filters. And those subconscious beliefs then affect our perception -- in effect, they become our glasses.

Subconscious storage can be quite useful. It's what allows us to drive while talking and solve problems while walking. Our brain is wired to create habits and patterns and transfer them into storage so they can run on autopilot, thus freeing up our conscious thought processes and attention to focus on something new. It's a good thing that we don't have to think about putting one foot in front of the other much past the age of 18 months!

Subconscious storage can also be not so useful. If a child under age 6 hears regularly that he will never amount to anything, or that he's stupid, weak, or sickly, those messages don't pass through any kind of reality check before they go into storage and start running on autopilot. The young child's brain is not yet capable of reasoning: "Dad only says that when he's been drinking. It's not about me, it's just the alcohol talking." Instead, the brain wires it in as truth, runs it on autopilot, and suddenly we are looking at the world through Unworthiness glasses.

When the subconscious issues commands, the cells simply comply with the instructions. If the subconscious 'programming command' says you are sickly, your conscious affirmations of health and vitality may not improve your medical condition. The cells are already busy listening to the subconscious. In effect, their hands are over their little ears and they are whistling while they go about their appointed task of making you sick. Your affirmations sound like quiet little blah blah blahs off in the distance.

I find this to be a rather intriguing explanation for why affirmations don't work for everyone. If the conscious affirmation is in conflict with the subconscious message that got programmed in before age six, the subconscious wins. You might affirm many times a day that you are healthy, but your cells continue to act out the instruction from the subconscious that tells them to be weak like your dad said you were, or to be overweight like your mom was because everyone said you looked just like her.

So the strategy Dr. Lipton suggests to resolve this inner conflict is to reprogram the subconscious with messages that support your conscious intentions. This can be done in a variety of ways, including among others energy work, meridian tapping/EFT, meditation, HeartMath coherence, and various releasing techniques. (Of course I only remember the modalities I am familiar with, but I am sure there are tons more!)

What does this have to do with Emerson's quote? When I look at it through the filter of Lipton's work, it seems to me that it may not be a man's character or essence that he reveals in his opinions of the world. Instead, he may be revealing his subconscious beliefs -- his glasses. And those, as we now know, can be changed.

So a man's opinions of the world, in the end, are basically irrelevant as a yardstick for anyone but himself to use for evaluation purposes. And if he wishes, he can view his opinions as arrows that point to the subconscious programming that is running inside him on autopilot, and make changes there if he chooses.

So here's my tweak to Emerson's quote:

Our opinions of the world reveal our subconscious programming. If we don't like what we see, we can change our perception by installing new messages into our subconscious minds.

I'd love to hear your thoughts!

reconfiguring god

Men create gods after their own image, not only with regard to their form, but with regard to their mode of life.

-Aristotle

I've agreed with this premise since the first time I heard it, which was many years ago. What I didn't realize until recently was that regardless of my intellectual stance, the "Old Man in the Sky" image of God was still deeply rooted, quite pervasive, and functioning full steam ahead in some parts of my psyche. (I guess those childhood catechism lessons must have sunk in pretty deep!)

I first became aware of it while I was reading aloud to Adelle, my 95 year old friend with macular degeneration, from her Science of Mind magazine. I can't even remember exactly which article I was reading, but the realization shot through me like a bolt of lightning: Part of me still conceptualizes God as an old guy with a white beard who is judging me. And that part is still trying desperately to earn his approval!

I came home and dug out my copy of The Science of Mind by Ernest Holmes, which I purchased a year ago so I could have well-informed discussions with Adelle about the articles I was reading to her. I randomly opened the book, and here's what I found on page 354:

The best illustration of this is in the creative soil, in which the gardener puts his seed. The soil does not argue nor deny, but goes to work on the seed and begins to create a plant which will represent the type of manifestation inherent, as an idea, in the seed.

That is, from a cucumber seed we get cucumbers; and from a cabbage seed we get cabbages. Always the law maintains the individuality of the seed as it creates the plant; never does it contradict the right of the seed to be what it really is.

And voila, the Bearded God in my psyche fell from his throne. In his place rose a new image: rich, fertile soil. Pure creative life force. Neutral. Nonjudgmental. No longer personified. Not judging, withholding, denying, or even considering the worthiness of me or my desires -- simply supporting the growth of whatever seeds that I choose to plant. And doing so because in some obscure way, I, like you, am an agent through which it can express its creative impulse.

So if I plant a cucumber seed, and after tasting the harvest realize I don't actually like cucumbers, it's not a big deal. I can simply plant a different seed, and harvest a different crop. The fertile soil has no agenda for me or my life. It does not approve or disapprove of my choices, it just germinates them so I can see them more clearly and make adjustments if I want. All just for the fun of it. Creation is the only game in town.

If you'll pardon my mixation* of metaphors, I suddenly visualized the whole gig as a lava lamp. We are little bits of god-lava that separate, leave home, and make interesting shapes, then melt back into the main blob until we heat up enough to form another glob that can separate again. None of the shapes we make are better or more worthy of love than any other.

So now I am picturing us all as god globs jumping on a big toasty trampoline, performing amusing tricks, saying Hey, look at me! And when we crash back into the big blob, it's not a tragedy. Just an opportunity for re-creation.

Hmm. That's quite a deviation from the old bearded guy, huh? I find it infinitely more satisfying.


*no, mixation is not actually a real word. neither is costed. but I like them both anyway, so I'm claiming poetic license.

fascinating article by bruce lipton

here's a brief excerpt from www.brucelipton.com:

The brain, like any governing entity, seeks harmony. Neural harmony is expressed as a measure of congruency between the mind’s perceptions and the life we experience.

An interesting insight into how the mind creates harmony between its perceptions and the real world is frequently illustrated in stage hypnosis shows. A volunteer from the audience is invited onstage, hypnotized, and asked to pick up a glass of water, which the volunteer is told weighs one thousand pounds. With that misinformation, the volunteer struggles unsuccessfully with straining muscles, bulging veins, and perspiration. How can that be? Obviously the glass doesn’t weigh one thousand pounds even though the mind of the subject firmly believes that it does.

To manifest the perceived reality of a thousand pound glass of water, something that cannot be lifted, the hypnotized subject’s mind fires a signal to the muscles used to lift the glass at the same time it fires contradictory signals to the muscles used to set the glass down! This results in an isometric exercise wherein two groups of muscles work to oppose each other, which results in no net movement-but a lot of strain and sweat.

Cells, tissues, and organs do not question information sent by the nervous system. Rather, they respond with equal fervor to accurate life-affirming perceptions and to self-destructive misperceptions. Consequently, the nature of our perceptions greatly influences the fate of our lives.

Read the entire article here:
http://www.brucelipton.com/book-excerpts/the-nature-of-dis-ease

attention, please

today's abraham-hicks.com daily quote:

People often believe that they would feel so much better if their mate would just change in this way or that way, but that truly is a backward approach to things.

When you say, "I'll feel better if you will make this change in your behavior or personality", what you are actually saying is, "My happiness is dependent upon your willingness and ability to modify your behavior; therefore I am powerless."

The reason why so many people are so hard on those they live or interact with is because everyone inherently wants to be happy, but they also believe that their happiness is dependent upon things over which they have no control.

- Abraham-Hicks


It's impossible for me to hear this reminder too often or in too many different ways. It's just so dang easy to forget that I always have a choice about what to think about and focus my attention on, regardless of what is going on around me!

Come to think of it, I have that same choice regardless of what is going on within me, as well. I've written before about my grandpa, who when asked how he was doing, would say that his top half was feeling great (and chose not to mention that the circulation problems in his legs were creating significant pain in his bottom half.)

I have a ways to go on that one. When my head hurts, I find it next to impossible to notice that my feet don't! But it's a process, and I'm okay with that.

Lately, I've been feeling quite grateful that it seems to be getting easier to simply re-direct my attention as soon as I notice that it has been on autopilot and is focused on something out of my control. Rather than getting upset that I am not more mentally disciplined and did not notice sooner, my inner critic seems to have mellowed out some.

Instead of hearing a harsh mental voice asking, "What is wrong with you? Why can't you get this figured out?" I'm hearing a kind and gentle one crooning, "That's okay. You can just shift your attention right now."

I don't know by what grace my own mind has become a friendlier place than it used to be, but I sure hope the trend continues.

work worth doing

If you want to be happy for a year, win the lottery.
If you want to be happy for a lifetime, love what you do.
--unknown

The secret to a happy life is work worth doing.
-- Justice Sandra Day O'Connor

This makes sense to me. When I was younger, I might have argued that the secret to a happy life is actually found in healthy and fulfilling relationships. And happy relationships are indeed wonderful! But day after day, it's work worth doing that gets me out of bed each morning.

I don't know exactly what the Justice was referring to, but my definition of work is broad. It might involve counseling, gardening, parenting, writing, or cleaning the kitchen, as well as the typical nine to five kind of career work. But I think she was right that engaging in meaningful activity which serves a useful purpose is often deeply important for maintaining a sense of personal well being. And it's up to each of us to figure out what kind of work we personally feel is worth doing.

I remember reading a story once about therapists who were successfully treating depression by giving their patients pets or plants to tend to, or even assigning them the simple task of keeping the front porch neat and welcoming. I love that such simple, purposeful contributions can bring the soul back into alignment with itself. It's so beautifully human to feel a need to make a difference.

ps: you can read the article where Justice O'Connor was quoted here: http://www.happiness-project.com/happiness_project/2009/04/the-secret-to-happiness-according-to-justice-oconnor.html

harassed into clarity

thanks to The Vortex: Where the Law of Attraction Assembles All Cooperative Relationships, I have a new way to look at my favorite critics and cynics:

They show me what I do not want.

My mission, should I choose to accept it, is to use that information to increase my clarity about what I do want, keep my attention focused there, and see what happens.

from p. 231:

Don't ask the person or people who helped you define what you want to become what you want so that you can have what you want.

and p. 232:

And if the others could speak it like it really is, they'd say, "Hey, it's not my job to be everything you want. It was my job to harass you into clarity about what you want. And now that you're clear about what you want, can't you see I'm not it? Don't try to make me be it. Focus upon what you want and let that come to you, and leave me alone!"

Seems to me this works for any type of relationship -- with friends, lovers, homes, jobs, pets, and even cars. Some people, things, or situations pass through our lives to harass us into clarity -- to play the role of a catalyst, and then to release us to find what we desire elsewhere.

And sometimes it turns out that our newfound clarity matches up with what that person, thing, or situation wants to become. We realize we want a red car, and our Honda needs a paint job anyway. We realize we prefer a shorter commute, and a new branch opens up closer to home. We realize we'd rather kiss a nonsmoker, and he decides he is ready to quit.

When that happens, we can stay together awhile longer and enjoy our mutual expansion. But either way -- with or without the catalyst -- we are compelled to move ahead toward what we want once we have identified it. There's no going back.

tell me what you want what you really really want

Whenever you know what you do not want, you always know more clearly what you do want.

--- Abraham

Since not much is happening this week that I don't want (being on retreat and all), I'm not getting much practice with using what I don't want to help me define what I do want. I've mostly been hanging out in neutral. Which is fine. Soon enough something unwanted will come to my attention for me to experiment with. I'll get into gear when the time is right.

In the meantime, I'll be skipping around singing tell me what you want what you really really want, which I just learned comes from the song Wannabe by the Spice Girls (!) (I didn't think I knew anything by them ...)

a guest blogger

a favorite reader of mine has started his own blog at http://windsandtide.wordpress.com/ .
He gave me permission to reprint one of his posts that really hit home for me:


"So very okay"

I live in my own universe.
I believe that we all do.

The beliefs we hold, our attitudes, and expectations.
These are no small things; they literally determine how we experience the world.
I believe our perceptions are everything.

If you look for things to be grateful for, you find them.
If you look for goodness in situations and people, you find it.
Whether you look for scarcity or abundance, you’ll find them.

Most of the time, I love my life experience.
And when I don’t, at least I know that it’s my doing, and not some outside force.

No person and no situation can cause me to suffer.
Only my thoughts (the believing of them) have that power.

What a blessing!
What a relief!
And what a responsibility.
It means that no one can save me but me.
But the only thing to be saved from are my unexplored/unchallenged opinions and beliefs.

We all believe what we believe and have our reasons.
We have lived what we have lived and we have drawn our conclusions.
We filter things through our thoughts in a way that makes sense to us.
There will always be differences – striking ones.
This is so very okay! None of it is personal.

I see that my freedom is to be found in allowing others their universe and staying busy tending my own.
This leaves me no enemies, no one to blame, no one to be afraid of!
If I allow it to be so, all I have are friends.
No one can be an enemy unless I allow them to be.
Do I dare make that choice?

Even if the cruelest insults are hurled at me, they’re only a person’s opinion.
They are only expressing what they feel is true.
Does that mean I sit there and take verbal abuse?
No, of course not. But it doesn’t mean I have to make them wrong or hate them, either.
Who am I to challenge a person’s belief system?
Who am I to question their universe? – or seek to change it?

If a person says something to me and it hurts my feelings, it only hurts my feelings because it’s something that I secretly believe about myself and have tried to hide.

For example, if someone were to say to me, “Dude, you are such a directionless loser.” If someone said that to me, it would probably sting some because a small part of me believes that. But if someone were to say to me, “You know what? You have the most beautiful blue eyes,” or “You are such a sloppy, disorganized person.” – it would be a different story. Both of those are not true for me (being a brown-eyed, neat-freak and all) – so hearing a person telling me these things would be strange and even amusing. Instead of attacking them in my mind, I might just wonder, “How weird and interesting that they would think that.” I’d not give it another thought because it wouldn’t even register as trouble – just another’s random point of view. Just one person’s statement of what they think is so. The ones that hurt like daggers are the ones we’ve already dug in to our own hearts. It’s our own beliefs that cause the pain. We are the very enemies that we think we see in others.

I like the quote by Neale Donald Walsch:“No one is ever wrong given their model of the world.”(Or something to that effect.)

Our models don’t have to match.
Our opposing views don’t have to bring conflict.
I don’t think human agreement and sameness have anything to do with Love, in the ultimate sense, anyway.

I’m pretty sure that Love can handle a few different points of view.
In fact, I’d say Love does more than just handle it or tolerate.
I’d say It revels in it.




see why I am so excited about his entrance into the blogosphere?
visit him at http://windsandtide.wordpress.com/

The Vortex

I am loving Abraham's new book, The Vortex. My copy is dog eared already and I brought it home only three hours ago! This concept alone was worth the cost of the entire book to me:

Anytime what someone else thinks about you becomes more important than your own balance with self, you are in a less-than-healthy position. Anytime you take action to try to manipulate or affect others' opinions or attitudes toward you, you are in an less-than-healthy position, because you are replacing your own Guidance System with their opinion.

moving my gaze

today's quote on www.abraham-hicks.com:

We're asking you to trust in the Well-being. In optimism there is magic. In pessimism there is nothing. In positive expectation there is thrill and success. In pessimism or awareness of what is not wanted, there is nothing.

We do not ask you to look at something that is black and call it white. We do not ask you to see something that is not as you want it to be and pretend that it is. What we ask you to do is practice moving your gaze. Practice changing your perspective. Practice talking to different people. Practice going to new places.

Practice sifting through the data for the things that feel like you want to feel and using those things to cause you to feel a familiar place. In other words, we want you to feel familiar in your joy. Familiar in your positive expectation, familiar in your knowing that all is well, because this Universe will knock itself out giving you evidence of that Well-being once you find that place.

--- Abraham

Excerpted from the workshop in San Rafael, CA on Wednesday, March 4th, 1998 #193

this is exactly what I'm playing with right now. literally moving my gaze move often. interrupting mental fixations. physically moving my body in new ways. derailing trains of thought that don't feel good. landing more lightly and not staying as long. shaking things up. loosening my grip.

nailing it

You've probably heard the saying When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail. A variation of that was running through my head all night: When you feel like a nail, everything looks like a hammer.

what seems obvious in the morning light is that some part of me must think I have to be perfect, and is expecting me to figure out how to make everyone like me, including hammers who will never like me no matter how hard I try, as well as nails who will accuse me of being a hammer no matter what I do.

This feels like a Zen koan. I don't think I can solve it in the world of hammers and nails. I have to go deeper within and unplug myself from this need to be liked. Maybe then I can get busy doing something more interesting with my time and energy than trying to convince hammers that I am not a nail, and nails that I am not a hammer.

timely

today's Daily Quote from Abraham-Hicks:


The most magnificent Creators don't want to get together with people who think just like they do. They're looking for people who have other thoughts, because out of the contradiction, comes ideas that could not be born out of sameness. Your relationships will be ultimately more if you're not identical twins just "yessing, yessing, yessing" to everything that the other one is about.

--- Abraham

simple gifts

Life's gift to you is your unique vantage point.
Your gift to life is expressing from it.

--Alan Cohen

To me, 'expressing' seems rich with possibilities. Might be writing, painting, pottery or making music. Might be how you raise your children or decorate your home and yard. Could be what you wear, your hairstyle, your smile, your handshake. Your professional contributions. Your volunteer work. Your travel photos.

The options are infinite, and nobody's expression will ever be exactly like anyone else's, so comparisons are futile. How cool is that?

And yet I seem to forget this. A lot. It slips my mind that diverse combinations of unique expressions give birth to strength, balance, and creativity.

Oh well. This reminder came at a good time for me.

:)

free from approval

When you feel free, you're free to be who you want to be under any and all conditions, and you really don't worry about what anybody else thinks about it, because you know that what they think about you is their problem. It has nothing to do with you.


And when you really feel that way, you become in the greatest place that we know of, which is in the place of allowing -- and you know you are in the place of allowing when you can see another not approving of you and it is okay with you.



~Abraham-Hicks


This was the random Abe quote that greeted me when I logged on to my computer this morning. Felt timely given what I'm working on at the moment: how to respond to advice/disapproval/judgment in ways that feel good to me. I do love me a good synchronicity, and I seem to be bathing in them lately.

Byron Katie also says something along these lines: What you think of me is none of my business. It's not exactly easy to undo years of being socialized to give credence to the opinions of others. I am still playing out that habitual dynamic every time I feel compelled to either accept or reject what someone says to me.


I'm obviously not yet free, or I wouldn't need to give an ounce of energy to my response at all. My list is just a baby step, but at least I feel some movement in the direction I want to go. One day I won't need it anymore. But for today, it feels better to have it.


And when I do manage to remember, even just for a moment, that it's not about me but rather simply an expression of what is important to them, I must say that the freedom and peace are quite wonderful.

lyrical

I have been mildly, vaguely discontented lately. Nothing is really wrong ... I'm just not feeling as lively and enthusiastic as usual.

While ruminating on this before I got up this morning, I decided that I wasn't going to put any effort into resolving this situation with my mind, as if it was some kind of problem. Instead, I was just going to 'put it out there' and wait to see if a suggestion or some guidance might flow my way.

Within 30 minutes, the response to my request beamed through my car radio. It was in a song I've heard hundreds of times before -- I've Seen All Good People by Yes:

Don't surround yourself with yourself.

I really like this song, and I always sing along with it. But somehow, I had never noticed the wisdom in the lyrics. It's hard to explain what happened as I sang along today. At this line, it was like the volume got turned up, and a little energetic zing jolted through my awareness as if to highlight it. I immediately laughed out loud in recognition and gratitude.

I heard two messages - don't spend all your time with people just like you, and don't get so self-absorbed that you implode. Both were very appropriate reminders for me right now.

I've been paying way too much attention to myself lately. Which is why the post I wrote earlier this week about Nipun Mehta at CharityFocus.org was more for me than you. I need constant reminders to just give, and the rest will take care of itself.

When I surround myself with myself, I get bored, cranky, and overly attentive to the minutia of my experience. It's such a breath of fresh air to take the spotlight off myself by giving, sharing, listening, or creating something for someone else.

Send an instant karma to me. Initial it with loving care yourself.

Message sent and received. Synchronicity rocks.

Yes!

cleaning the lens

this train of thought chugged through my morning shower today:

If I am perceiving anything other than an expression of love or a request for love from anyone, including my own self, then my inner lens needs to be cleaned.

When bugs get smashed on my car's windshield, I know that the remedy is to use my wipers, not to get out of the car and go try to clean the thing I am looking at through the dirty windshield.

the wipers I've been using lately come from the Hawaiian tradition of H'oponopono. There's an article I like that explains it here: http://www.consciousmindjournal.com/Articles/2008-02-01/Hoponopono.cfm

The short version is this:

I internally repeat four simple phrases in sequence until I feel an inner release of tension. I usually experience the release as a melting feeling in the area of my heart.

I love you.
I'm sorry.
Please forgive me.
Thank you.

These phrases are directed at myself, not at the other person.

I usually start melting the instant I tell myself I love you. It puts me right in touch with my little innocent human self, and how hard I am on it sometimes.

I'm sorry is almost always followed by more when I hear it in my head, but it doesn't have to be. I'm sorry for treating myself this way. I'm sorry for forgetting my innocence. I'm sorry for talking to myself that way. I'm sorry for forgetting who I really am, and what I am doing here. I'm sorry for hurting myself with that thought.

Please forgive me and Thank you normally stand alone for me.

So here's how this might go in real life:

Let's say I'm at the store, and someone says Hurry up, you are in my way!

Through a clean windshield, I see someone in a big hurry, and I simply step aside.

Through a dirty windshield, I might see someone who is full of himself and thinks his pace is more important than mine.

so I activate my wipers:

I love you (and it's perfectly fine for me to walk at whatever pace I like right now).
I'm sorry (for the feeling inside me when I got angry at him).
Please forgive me.
Thank you.

If I don't feel better yet, I run it again.

I love you (and there is nothing wrong with me for feeling this way).
I'm sorry (for taking any of this personally).
Please forgive me.
Thank you.

Rarely do I need to run this through more than twice before my happiness is restored. But I will happily do it for as long as it takes to feel good again.

the article I linked to above goes into more detail.
gotta dash ... I have a daughter with a DVD waiting for me downstairs.

...

I'm back, with a stomach that hurts from laughing so hard at Little Miss Sunshine, to elaborate a bit on the expression/request for love concept. It's rooted in A Course in Miracles (ACIM), which I studied about a decade ago.

The idea, as I recall it, is that verbal and nonverbal communication falls into basically two categories -- affectionate words, compliments, and kindness are expressions of love, whereas insults, complaints, demands, whining, and attacks are simply indirect and unskillful requests for love. When we hear them that way, there's really only one response that feels appropriate -- compassion.

Compassion can show up in many guises. It might be a very loving and gentle NO. It could be that we simply reassure the whiner/complainer that we care about their feelings and their experience (like a well-trained customer service representative who lets you know that your feedback is important, she's sorry for your inconvenience, and she'll do whatever she can to make it right).

Compassion doesn't mean you just lay down and let people walk all over you. It does mean that you don't see them as terrible or evil, but rather as temporarily communicatively impaired. You may choose to remove yourself until they can be more clear, or you may be willing to translate and offer love in response to their request. It doesn't really matter either way. The point is that you don't stew yourself in your own juices while building a case to prove how bad or wrong they are.

I think this quote from http://www.clearmind.com/acim.cfm expresses it pretty well:

ACIM considers all behavior to be either a call for love, or an extension of love. When we can see the “call for love” under difficult behavior, forgiveness naturally occurs, and we are left in a state of compassion rather that locked into anger, fear, or guilt. It is our compassionate mind than can then make proactive decisions which result in a more positive life.

soul food from the web

gratitude to Rob Breszny for sharing these in this week's Free Will Astrology newsletter!

paul hawken's graduation speech. wonderful:
http://www.dailygood.org/more.php?n=3697

a magical medicine story. gave me goose bumps of recognition:
http://realitysandwich.com/gathering_tribe?page=1

there's no one in your way

Of the many empowering and inspiring concepts I've learned from Abraham-Hicks over the years, one of my favorites is the idea that there's no one who can keep you from happiness, joy, and success.

You are the creator of your own reality, and so you are not in jeopardy. You do not need to control the behavior of others in order for you to thrive. Your attention to things that you think they do that keeps you from your thriving is, in fact, what keeps you from your thriving... It is not what they do to you; it's what you do to you in fear of what you think that they will do to you. -Abraham-Hicks

In the plainest and simplest terms, it is your attention that determines whether you thrive or not, not the actions or attitudes of others. That's not what most of us have been taught, so it takes a little mental retraining to keep your attention on the roses instead of fixating on the thorns. But even in the most challenging situation, there is something positive to focus on.

For example, let's look at the economic situation. Any roses there? Sure! People are talking to each other. Kindness and generosity are thriving. Families are spending more time together. Creativity is being called forth to provide new and exciting solutions. Communities are coming together. Gardens are springing up everywhere. Values are realigning. There is much to celebrate.

Only your own thoughts can interfere with your momentum. So take the focus off of what anyone else is doing, look around for the positives, and ride that wave of joy until the next one catches your attention. Don't waste one precious minute blaming anything outside of you for your lot in life. Lots of us haven't yet learned how to harness our attention. Luckily, it's pretty easy to master, once you point your effort in the right direction. It's certainly far easier than trying to force agreement, convince others to step aside, or barrel through external resistance.

Let your alignment (with Well-Being) be first and foremost, and let everything else be secondary. And not only will you have an eternally joyous journey, but everything you have ever imagined will flow effortlessly into your experience. There is nothing you cannot be or do or have—but your dominant intent is to be joyful. The doing and the having will come into alignment once you get that one down.
Abraham-Hicks in Portland, OR on Wednesday, July 14th, 2004

If you could get to the place where you no longer feel a need to push against anything that you disagree with--you would become in alignment with what you do agree with. Even within your own body, it is your pushing against those things you don't agree with, that causes you to be out of alignment with what you do agree.
Excerpted from the workshop in Philadelphia, PA on Monday, May 13th, 2002

Since nothing matters to you other than your personal alignment with your individual goals or desires, then that is where our work is. We are not here to debate the rightness or the wrongness of what you, or anyone, chooses. We are not taking sides, for or against, anything. We are here to help you understand that your life can be as wonderful or as horrible as you allow it to be. It all depends upon the thoughts that you practice. And therein lies the basis of anyone's success: How much do I practice thoughts that bring me joy, and how much do I practice thoughts that bring me pain?
Excerpted from the workshop in San Francisco, CA on Saturday, March 8th, 2003

Let others vibrate as they vibrate and want the best for them. Never mind how they're flowing to you. You concentrate on how you're flowing. Because one who is connected to the Energy Stream is more powerful, more influential than a million who are not.
Excerpted from the workshop in Portland, OR on Tuesday, June 10th, 1997

my disclaimer

I read an interview with Bill Maher in the Boulder Weekly newspaper tonight. Truthfully, I have no idea who the guy is, but I'm a readaholic, and the paper was just sitting there, so I read it. It happens with the cereal box, too.

Anyway, I was fascinated by one of his responses:

We need more people who say things that make everybody else go, “Oh, my God, I can’t believe you said that!” Yeah, well, just think about it then. At least the idea is out there. We can reject it. We can say he’s wrong about certain things. But at least he’s saying The Things That You’re Not Supposed To Say. This is such an “Oh, my God, you can’t say that” kind of country, and if someone says one thing that makes you a little bit uncomfortable, they have to go away for all time. Well, that’s not really what this country was founded as. So, yes, I don’t agree with everything he says, but I’m glad there are people like that speaking out.

So here's my disclaimer: I think maybe I have a split personality.

One side of me really does try to be nice. She believes that if I want to be helpful, (which I do,) then I have to be kind. She guides me to present my ideas gently and respectfully -- as hypotheses, so as not to trigger defensiveness or resistance.

She encourages me to hold the space for people to generate their own solutions, rather than telling them what to do. She values tact and patience and restraint. And she tries very hard not to come across as too arrogant or too confident or too convinced of her own rightness.

She has lots of friends who are therapists, and she tries to learn from them. She keeps up on the latest therapeutic modalities -- reads the studies, implements the techniques. You probably don't see much of her here in this blog, although sometimes she will take over editing duties and soften things up a bit. She normally makes her appearance during private consultations.

If I drew a picture of her, she'd be wearing long and spotlessly white lace gloves, a dainty hat with a big brim for maximum shade, and sipping a tall cool glass of lemonade. She sort of looks like the stereotypical Southern Belle.

But then there's my other personality, which seems to usually win out in the end. She's the one who blurts out unsolicited advice, imposes her perspective and interpretation on you, and is pretty darn confident that her insight is accurate.

She's dressed in a power suit, and she's on a mission. No lounging around with lemonade for her - she's got work to do. Deliver the advice and move on. Let people figure out what to do with it on their own time.

What I kind of like about her is that she trusts you a lot. She figures you will take what resonates with you, and leave the rest, so she doesn't baby you at all. She sees you as an equal, and respects your right to disagree. In fact, she kind of hopes you will, because she loves a good juicy contentious conversation.

And she won't tiptoe around you. She doesn't think she needs to, because she sees you as capable of exercising your own discernment. She's like the person Bill Maher was talking about who says The Things That You’re Not Supposed To Say.

Oh, and what's really funny about her is that she coaches probation officers in a technique called Motivational Interviewing, which is all about not imposing your opinions! She gets rave reviews from her coachees. But don't ask her to live what she teaches, okay? She's quite comfortable with her ability to teach directly rather than by example. She carries no judgment that she should be a master herself before she can work with others. (And that's another thing I like about her! She's relatively unencumbered by 'shoulds.')

My personalities are like Forrest Gump's box of chocolates -- you never know what you're gonna get. So if you are feeling fragile, craving kindness, or need to be empowered from the outside, you are sort of gambling with me. If you don't feel like risking it, I can refer you to some consistently empathetic and therapeutically gifted colleagues.

But if you are okay with being told what to do by a self-appointed know-it-all, you have come to the right place! And you can't say I didn't warn you.

the nature of 'reality'

I'm so excited to recently have come across two attempts to describe the nature of reality that really resonate with me. (goes without saying that words won't ever really capture it, right? The Tao that can be spoken is not the Tao...)

The first is an excerpt from Michael Neill's book, Supercoach, which he included in his email newsletter this week. It's his copyrighted material, and you can visit his website here: http://www.geniuscatalyst.com/:

... we each live in our own separate reality. This is not some kind of an esoteric theory, but a physiological fact. Our brains filter information through the five senses then make representations of that information inside our minds. We then experience these representations, first as thoughts and then as emotions. But as we re-present the information in our mind, certain bits of the data are inevitably deleted, distorted and generalized. And since we all delete, distort and generalize that information slightly differently, we all have slightly (or sometimes completely) different perceptions of what is going on around us.

In other words, the way we think determines what we see, hear and feel, regardless of what is actually going on around us in the world. Or, to put it slightly differently, there's what happens and there's what we think about what happens. And what makes this important is that the lion's share of our decisions, feelings and actions in life will be based on our thoughts, not the objective facts.

This is neither a new idea nor one associated with any one particular field of study. In quantum physics, the uncertainty principle says that we can never study anything objectively because 'the observer always influences the observed'. Psychologists talk about 'the Pygmalion effect' and linguists say, 'The map is not the territory.' Shakespeare wrote, 'There is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so,' and in the Christian Bible, Jesus says, 'As you think, so shall you become.'

Perhaps my favourite way of thinking about this secret comes from one of my early mentors, author and supercoach Serge Kahili King. He describes the principle of thought like this:

The world is what you think it is.

While at first glance this may seem an innocuous idea, its implications are far-reaching. If the world is what you think it is, then life becomes one giant self-fulfilling prophecy. Your expectations create your experience, and if anything happens that confounds your expectations, you will most likely find a way of explaining it away or fitting it into your existing worldview. And any attempt you might make to 'prove' your theories about the world objectively will never gain universal acceptance, because you're creating that world through your thinking in one way and other people are creating it through their thinking in another way.

The second is a transcription of a speech given by Deepak Chopra.
http://www.ascension-research.org/reality.html :

There was an experiment done at Harvard Medical School about 20 years ago. A group of scientists took some kittens and brought them up in a room that had only horizontal stripes. All the visual stimuli in the room were horizontal. Another group of kittens was brought up in a room that had only vertical stripes. And when these kittens grew up to be wise old cats, it turns out that one group of cats could see only a horizontal world. The other group of cats could see only a vertical world. And this had nothing to do with the belief system of these cats.

It's a phenomenon that psychologists call Premature Cognitive Commitment. Premature, because we make it at a very early stage of our development. Cognitive, because that's how they cognize or see the world. And commitment, because it fixes us to a particular reality, it imprisons us in a fixed mode of perception.
...

All these experiments, and there are many variations of these, are pointing to a very crucial fact as far as the mechanics of perception is concerned. And that is that our initial sensory experiences and how we interpret them or how they are interpreted for us actually structure the very anatomy and physiology of our nervous system in such a way that ultimately the nervous system serves only one function: to keep reinforcing the initial interpretation. Anything that doesn't reinforce the initial interpretation doesn't even get into the nervous system. So if you don't have a concept or a notion or an idea that something exists, then your nervous system won't even take it in.
...

I was surprised to learn that some people interpret these findings to mean that there is an Objective Reality out there which we simply cannot perceive. My surprise is, of course, evidence of my own blind spot. I thought science had proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that nothing exists independent of the observer -- that the reality which each of us individually perceives/creates is all there is.

I thought it was common knowledge that reality is just a soup of pure potential until a perceiver comes along and makes something actual via a completely private act of perception. In essence, sort of like a rainbow, reality is an interaction of perception; a relationship, rather than a separate thing.

So I thought everyone knew this, but maybe the news just hasn't trickled down into the mainstream yet. Most people have other (and better) things to do than study research about the nature of consciousness! (not me, though. LOL.) So for the cliff notes, here's Deepak again:

Sir John Eckles who won the Nobel prize in physiology and medicine several years ago made the statement, "I want you to understand that there are no colors in the real world. That there are no textures in the real world. There are no fragrances in the real world. There is no beauty, there is no ugliness. Nothing of the sort. Out there is a chaos of energy soup and energy fields. Literally. We take that and somewhere inside ourselves we create a world. Somewhere inside ourselves it all happens."

Why does it matter whether there's an objective reality or not? If we agree that we can't perceive it, isn't that good enough? Excellent question! My answer is Maybe. Maybe it is good enough. It might be good enough if we can truly agree to give each other the freedom to see things differently.

Yet how much pain, suffering, and persecution have humans historically inflicted on others who disagree with their notion of objective reality? How much effort have our chosen leaders invested into snuffing out those who see and interpret things differently?

I wonder ... if we all were to acknowledge that there is no Objective Reality, then maybe we'd realize that no one is more right or wrong than anyone else. And perhaps we could get busy figuring out our individual realities instead. We could focus our energy on fine-tuning our own filters to enable us to perceive that which inspires feelings of love and joy, rather than manhandling the filters of others so that they can suffer right alongside of us.

I also wonder ... if you believe something objective exists, and you try hard to see it as clearly as you can because you want to be accurate (or because you see yourself as a realist), then aren't you sort of missing the opportunity to get your hands in the clay and create? Are you so busy digging to uncover 'reality' that you pile the clay into a big lump behind you and leave it alone while you keep digging? Could you be missing the journey while seeking the destination? I think it was Neale Donald Walsch who said, "Life is a creation, not a discovery." I like that a lot. No doubt not everyone finds that as exciting as I do ... I betcha some people just love to dig. That's cool.

It seems to me that the folks I know who have left notions of Objective Reality behind are already busy doing their individual creative projects just for the fun of it. And I suspect at some point, critical mass might be reached, and the collective concern with polarizing into positions such as right and wrong will dissolve into a different orientation instead. It might be one that consults other criteria when making decisions; not "Is this right or wrong?" but, "Does this behavior/attitude/perception feel expansive, joyful, and authentic to me at a core level? "

It's hard to write that without sounding like a 'bleeding heart liberal' as my dad used to say. I'm not sure how to convey my vision of the question or decision bubbling up from within, like a natural spring, rather than guidance being sourced in a replacement dogma that is imposed by some external authority.

It feels like it won't even really be a question - more like an inner leaning that will become harder and harder to violate. Rules won't need to be imposed externally, and no council will be necessary enforce them. Hurting others will hurt ourselves, and we won't want to do it. Making others wrong will make ourselves wrong, and we won't want to go there. That's all. It's kinda simple, really. We will connect in creation, rather than opposition.

It will be interesting to see what happens in my lifetime, that's for sure. It's such a privilege to be alive right now. We are witnessing so much profound transformation!

gone beyond

Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing,
there is a field.
I'll meet you there.

When the soul lies down in that grass,
the world is too full to talk about.
Ideas, language, even the phrase "each other"
doesn't make any sense.

mevlana jelaluddin rumi - 13th century


After an arduous emotional battle that lasted five long weeks, yesterday I finally declared an inner truce, and made my way to that field for a much needed rest.

And there he was ... patiently awaiting my arrival.

the truth of kindness

Today I bent the truth to be kind, and I have no regret, for I am far surer of what is kind than I am of what is true. -- Robert Brault

Interesting food for thought.

I agree that it is easier to know what is kind than what is true, and I hypothesize that this may be because truth varies with perspective and is therefore rather tricky to pin down, whereas kindness is a subjective feeling.

Kindness has an distinctive internal flavor -- it's not about the spirit in which a comment is received, but rather the spirit in which it is delivered. We can all feel when our intentions are kind or otherwise. Kindess is a gift we give to ourselves, before we even say a word to anyone else. It feels good to be kind.

If we change this to say "true for me" it might be easier to determine, but even still, it's not as elegant of a guideline to keep us feeling happy and connected as "Is it kind?"

here kitty kitty

Every time I log onto Internet Explorer, I am treated to a randomly generated sequence of quotes from Abraham-Hicks, courtesy of http://sun-angel.com/abraham/index.php. The synchronicities never cease to amaze me.

Here's one I saw for the very first time just a minute ago:

If you really want to find the perfect human relationship, look for someone who is cat-like. Likes to be alone and happy to be with you. Happy when you are there and happy when you're not there. Licks your face occasionally. Will take all the scratching and petting you are willing to offer. Feels secure. Sleeps when it feels like it. Hunts when he feels like it. Basks often. Meditates regularly. Never feels guilty, ever, ever, ever, ever, EVER! Does emphatically what he wants to do. Is always glad to see you. Never cares when you leave... Seems like the perfect partner.

~ Abraham-Hicks

I don't think ALL kitties are this way, but I know that some are. It's certainly a far cry from what we've been socialized to think of as romantic love. I don't hear pop songs with lyrics like I'm happy when you come, and happy when you go. Yet I find this idea immensely satisfying ... and even a bit comforting, because it's exactly how I have come to feel in my current relationship (most of the time, anyway).

I am always happy to see my man when he arrives, and I love doing my own stuff when he leaves. When I first noticed myself feeling this way, I thought maybe something was wrong - maybe it was a sign of unhealthy detachment or distancing or something. But it just keeps feeling fine... happy when he's here, happy when he's not... happy to say hello, happy to say goodbye. Of course, they are different flavors of happy, but it's all good.

Purr... purr ... purr... meow!

or has time rewritten every line

Chi Chi Rodriquez (remember him? that cute little golfer dude in plaid pants?) apparently said:

I don't exaggerate. I just remember big.

I'm right there with ya, Chi Chi, except I'm more likely to remember things better than they actually were rather than bigger.

My mind simply does not retain stuff I didn't enjoy. Frankly, it doesn't retain a lot of the stuff I DID enjoy, either. It also seems to convert unpleasant experiences to pleasant ones before it stores them away. That's sort of a fascinating and useful programming feature, in my opinion. Can't relive a terror or be haunted by regret if I don't even remember what happened!

So it makes sense that I don't put much credence in memories. My own, for sure, but also those of others. Memory is frightfully subjective. Same with history, which to me, is just a collection of some people's perspectives that got recorded somehow.

I'm suspicious of stories, too, even first person accounts. Once the moment has passed, they are are simply narratives of a memory. Even just one minute later. Oh heck, even IN that moment, we all selectively screen out a ton of data. Our nervous systems can only process so much. The instant we try to communicate something, we have limited it. It's perfectly natural.

My theory is that memories and stories tell us much more about the personality, beliefs, and outlook of the person who is sharing them than about actual events.

By listening to your stories and memories, I can get clues about what is important to you. Do you tell me how it looked, how it felt, or how it sounded? Do you describe the people or the surroundings? Include information about individuals, relationships or systems? Use the language of feelings or thoughts?

Do you project intentions as if you know the perspective of someone else on the scene, or just report what you have observed from your position?

Lots of info there. And none of it has to do with what actually happened back then. so I guess memory and history are useful to me after all, not as a window to the past, but to contribute to my understanding of the perspective of whoever is sharing them with me.

into the new

I really enjoyed the book excerpt from The Ascension Primer that Karen Bishop included in her WINGS email recently. Since I don't always resonate with the exact constructs she proposes, I just take all kinds of liberties and twist 'em around 'til I like 'em better.

For example, what she calls Ascension, I just think of as personal growth and development. There was a list of about 30 items, but only some of them made my favorites list. Visit her site at www.emergingearthangels.com to read more of her work. My comments are in italics:

Below is a list of new ways of being that usually arrive when we begin to reside in a new and higher vibrating reality.

4. You suddenly see what it is all about and always has been and it has nothing to do with "karma", "contracts", "life lessons", or "Earth as a school".

woo hoo! I've been feeling and saying this for years, and I love reading it in someone else's words! I'm here to play, to create, to express, and to experience. I don't have the slightest interest in learning anything unless it's purely for the fun or challenge of it.

I'm not aware of making any progress or getting closer to any destination, but it is fun to me to be in motion. sorta like a dog riding with her head out the window; tongue whipping all over the place, sniffing it all in. Heck, if I did somehow accidentally manage to get anywhere, I'd probably just get bored and leave again anyway!

5. You are no longer interested in spiritual gatherings, group meditations, or the New Age arena in general.

true for me. started about 10 years ago. I love informal gatherings with like minded friends, but usually don't feel comfy attending meetings with a stated "spiritual" purpose. In fact, the last few I tried to attend, I ended up leaving early to go for a nice hike instead. my favorite soul foods are love, friendship, the sunlight, the mountains, and the pine trees ...

true confession: I have no idea what "spiritual" really means.

7. You crave simplicity and can barely tolerate anything complicated.

this one cracked me up. I thought my eyes were glazing over when I read and heard complex explanations because my brain was just getting older! I still love to read, but I go for the thin books now. nice to know that's just a sign o' the times ...

17. You no longer relate to mental and analytical processes ... We come to know that we only need to feel our way to anywhere... in the higher realms, there is no right or wrong, good or bad, or black or white. Things either feel good (vibrating high) or they feel bad (vibrating low).

whew, that's a relief. cause if I gotta think or analyze my way to anywhere, it's gonna be a real short trip. and with each passing day, it becomes harder to deny that I have definite expanded or contracted feelings about almost everything. will be interesting to see where those take me ...

27. You have an unquenchable thirst for creativity... When you arrive in this space, you will feel like you are almost manic with your creativity. The enormous amount of energy that is now running through you demands an outlet.

[like I said yesterday, dear readers, there's a storm of writing on the way, and I'm grateful to you for reading my outlet!]

ass-u-me

my mind has been exploding with ideas to write about lately, and I find myself feeling annoyed by the need to eat and sleep because they take me away from my keyboard. I can easily see myself reveling in the lifestyle of an eccentric writer like Emma Thompson's character in Stranger Than Fiction; walking around in my pajamas for days until I have recorded my latest brainstorm in text.

anyhow, I have some time before my next 'to do' this afternoon, so I grabbed the copious notes I've been taking for the past 48 hours, hustled up to my computer, and decided to open today's daily quote from Alan Cohen while I waited for the Blogger login to pop up on my screen. Lo and behold, and I should no longer be surprised at synchronicities like this, he perfectly summarized the topic I was planning to write about:

Don't assume you know what someone else should be doing.

-- Alan Cohen

Of course, I feel compelled to elaborate, but if you don't have much time today, you can just stop reading right here 'cause that's the gist of it.

oh, but first, one quick diversion. have I thanked you lately for reading me? Because I just figured out last night that writing is serious magic for me. Robin and I have been doing a lot of research on brain function lately, and I think what might be happening is that through the act of writing, I am transferring the nebulous and abstract concepts that are generated by my right hemisphere over to my left, thereby anchoring them in the concrete world. Grounding them, I spose you could say.

I write to learn, although I suspect that my enthusiasm and passion probably make it sound more like I am teaching or preaching rather than still learning this stuff myself. Sorry 'bout that! In any case, writing relieves a tremendous pressure that builds up in me, and I'm so grateful for each of you who indulge me by reading and responding. I feel deeply blessed.

So ... back to this thing about assuming you know what other people should do. I've been having an interesting email exchange about this very topic lately, and it's also came up numerous times this week while coaching probation officers in Motivational Interviewing techniques. I'm guessing I must be ripe for some growth and expansion in this area, because I'm being stimulated to think about it all over the place.

Many of us with 'helper' personality types think we know what other people need. It can seem as obvious as the nose on their face that they need to go to AA, exercise more, spend more time in prayer or meditation, surrender, go back to school, leave their relationship, eat more veggies, or whatever. But here's the thing: we cannot possibly know where anyone else has come from, and where they are going. We can't know what their God, Soul, or Inner Being (take your pick) wants them to experience and why. They are the only ones with access to that information.

This might sound radical, but sometimes it's not even accurate to assume people want to get better. Haven't you heard folks all over the place thanking their cancer or heart attack or whatever for reminding them about what was important to them? We truly don't know what any experience, pleasant or unpleasant, means to anyone else. And even if they say they want to get better, their God/Soul/Inner Being may have other plans for them. Who knows?

So it seems to me that there are more respectful and effective ways to contribute to someone else's wellbeing than 'shoulding' on them, which I'll refer to as Fixing. I like having a variety of options to experiment with, because each person is different, and brings out a different side of me. Here's my list of ideas so far:

Listen for common ground - can I personally relate to anything they are experiencing or feeling? For example, have I ever decided to make a change and found it hard to follow through? Have I ever wished I could do something different but felt stuck in the same old patterns? Have I ever complained about something before I was ready to act on it?

the answer to all of these is "Uhhhhhh .... heck yeah!"

So I can probably relate to something in this person's experience. When I find that common ground, my heart will open, and I will stop trying to tell them how simple it would be for them to fix their problem. (I laughed out loud while proofreading these words: simple to fix their problem. yeah, right! as if a) it needs to be fixed, b) it will be simple, and c) I have the solution. I crack myself up. But I really do believe all that sometimes ...)

As a side note, Motivational Interviewing research suggests that most of us are far more likely to resist other people's suggestions than implement them, whereas action plans generated from within will probably be followed through. So by suggesting a solution, I am probably just triggering resistance which actually anchors them more firmly to where they are. Which is not such a big help after all!

Empathize - don't try to connect their experience to mine in any way. just try to understand where they are coming from. stay completely present with them, actively working to understand the spoken and unspoken nuances of their experience, and communicating them in such a way as to invite further clarification.

Ask what I can do to help - this one can be tricky, and I think I need to use it only after listening or empathy. Jumping in with an offer to help before they know I understand their experience could sound like Fixing.

So let's plug these into a real scenario. Say someone says to me, "My back hurts."

Fixing response: "Here's the number of my chiropractor. She's great with back problems."

Listening response: Nod or murmur sympathetically. Think about how I felt when I had a headache last week. Remember that I appreciated simple expressions of understanding and sympathy much more than being handed an aspirin. Decide to give empathy.

Empathizing response: "Ouch. I can see you holding your body differently. That must really suck because I know you have so much to do today." Decide to offer my help.

Ask if I can help: "Is there anything I can do to help? I'm running errands today, and would be happy to pick up some groceries for you or bring your son home from school if you'd like."

Oh, darn, my writing time is over! Okay, well, if you have other suggestions for things I could add to my list, will you let me know?

thanks! :)

regarding relationship

No matter how intensely intertwined you find yourself with another person, your relationship is affected many times more by the thoughts that are moving around in your own mind than by the other person who is moving around in your house or in your life experience.


That is why it is so interesting to us to see people working so hard at controlling one another while working very little on controlling their own thoughts and perceptions -- especially since they have no real control over another and they do have complete control of their own thoughts and perceptions.

~ Abraham-Hicks


I gotta be honest ... for me, sometimes it just seems so much easier to try to control someone else than to control my own thoughts and perceptions. Historically, I think I've had better luck doing it that way.

At least sometimes people appear to respond to my cool reasoning, passionate point-making, or beseeching requests. Unfortunately, my own thoughts and perceptions seem immune to such tactics; often maintaining their original trajectory until I go to sleep or distract them in some other way.

Besides, it's kinda rewarding to successfully influence people. When I actually do manage to get someone else to do what I want, I usually feel pretty satisfied for a while. But it's sort of a false and fragile sense of gratification, built like a house of cards. One little breeze of self-determination on the part of the other person; one hint of an idea that maybe they'd prefer to do something other than what I want, and my conditional contentment comes crashing down.

So I'm working on this. When I feel unhappy, I try to remember to take a look at myself first, to see what I am thinking or perceiving that could be creating my discomfort.

And lots of times, instead of doing that, I just try to get the other guy to change whatever he or she is doing. I only remember to take a look inside myself after that initiative is not successful.

Oh well. I'm okay with it. Constructing a strong foundation of internal mastery takes some time. No doubt there will be plenty of opportunities to try again.

an opportunity to help

Here comes Thanksgiving! Regardless of the state of the economy, most of us can still find much to be thankful for. Tonight, I am grateful that I can make a contribution to an orphan from Sudan who is a student at my son's high school. Susan was terribly burned in an apartment fire earlier this week.

Here's the email I received from the director of the school, Ed Porritt. Even if I can only send $5, I always contribute something to grassroots efforts like this. I figure every little bit helps, and a lot of small contributions can still add up to something big.

I would like to share with you some sad news about one of our fellow Catalyst students. Saturday evening Susan Moi was seriously burned when her apartment in Boulder caught fire and was airlifted to the University of Colorado Medical Center Burn Unit. Susan is severely burned, currently sedated, and expected to be in the hospital for at least a month. Thankfully her medical status has improved from critical to serious. An orphan from Sudan, Susan works for her rent and food, and sends money to her brothers who still live in a refugee camp in Africa. A dedicated, hard-working student (taking three math classes at once at Catalyst), Susan was scheduled to graduate in May and plans to go on to nursing school.

During our recent study of Africa, Susan told her fellow students how she watched as her father was killed outside her home in Sudan when she was five years old. She lost her mother as the family fled the country. Susan survived years of abuse in a refugee camp in Kenya before being rescued and brought to Boulder. After three weeks in Boulder, 15 year-old Susan was left on her own. She now receives some support from Congregation Har HaShem and Friends of Sudanese American Men and Women Organization.

Susan is expected to survive. Looking forward, Susan faces a slow recovery and years of surgeries. What few possessions Susan owned were lost in the fire. In addition, she and her brothers have lost their financial lifeline.

We have set up a fund at First Community Bank to support Susan. We urge you to make a financial gift to the Susan Moi Fund, c/o Catalyst High School, 2575 Park Lane, Suite 100, Lafayette, CO 80026.

You can also send your contribution to the Susan Moi Fund, c/o First Community Bank 2695 N. Park Drive, Suite 101, Lafayette, Colorado 80026 or visit any of the First Community Bank branches in Boulder, Lafayette, Longmont, Louisville, Broomfield and Erie to contribute by credit card.

For additional information about Susan's situation you can visit 9 News

PS: look what I found in my inbox after I posted this entry! One of Alan Cohen's Daily Inspiration quotations:

We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give.

-- Winston Churchill

love yourself for it

Found this in Rob Breszny's Free Will Astrology column today, so I'm not sure if the quote is accurately attributed or not. I am sure that I deeply resonate with it, as long as we change a few words. I'll tell you what they are after you read it first ....

"The only way to get a difficult feeling to go away is simply to love yourself for it," says author Christiane Northrup. "If you think you're stupid, then love yourself for feeling that way. It's a paradox, but it works. To heal, you must . . . shine the light of compassion on any areas within you that you feel are unacceptable."

Let's replace The only way with One way, and To heal you must with Try experimenting with. Okay, that's better. Now I feel more comfy passing it on ...

Wait a sec, there's more. We don't need to get difficult feelings to "go away." They do that by themselves. So let's take that out too. How about this:

Experiment with loving yourself for feeling whatever way you feel at the moment, and shining the light of your own compassion on any areas within you that feel unacceptable.

Much better. :)

what's playing in my head today

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7zN9vd9WUiA

Drive
by Incubus

love these lyrics!!

oh! I just found an acoustic version that's even better!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RpwsuhOUAkk&feature=related

soul medicine from Hafiz

Now is the Time

Now is the time to know
That all that you do is sacred.

Now, why not consider
A lasting truce with yourself and God.

Now is the time to understand
That all your ideas of right and wrong
Were just a child's training wheels
To be laid aside
When you finally live
With veracity
And love.

Hafiz is a divine envoy
Whom the Beloved
Has written a holy message upon.

My dear, please tell me,
Why do you still
Throw sticks at your heart
And God?

What is it in that sweet voice inside
That incites you to fear?

Now is the time for the world to know
That every thought and action is sacred.

This is the time for you to compute the impossibility
That there is anything
But Grace.

Now is the season to know
That everything you do
Is sacred.

from The Gift - Poems by Hafiz the Great Sufi Master
translations by Daniel Ladinsky

This poem is medicinal for me. Since being rear-ended in February, I have been making many more "mistakes" than ever before in my life, and sometimes I feel so frustrated and embarrassed - strong reactions that are sort of foreign to me.

Back when I was in school I was always a straight A student, and I grew accustomed to trying hard, doing well, and being commended for it. Now, these temporary cognitive issues have me making errors I don't even notice.

I occasionally start typing the next word in the middle of the word I'm on, use the wrong words completely (that instead of the) or the wrong form of the word (plural when I meant singular.)

What's worse, for me, is that I don't catch my errors. The little flag that used to signal an error upon proofreading seems to have changed to the same color as the background, and I often don't see it at all.

Since the accident did not impact my desire to understand every little thing, I've been observing myself. I've identified three major kinds of mistakes so far:

- minor glitches that I don't even notice until someone else points them out to me (like missing a digit while writing a check and ending up paying interest on a bill I thought was fully paid up)

- things I try to do well and fall short on (like trying to make muffins and burning them because I forget to set the timer)

- actions that spring from deliberately good intentions but do not turn out as planned (like writing an email to commend someone that ends up being circulated and results in others feeling like their hard work has gone unrecognized)

Each seems to trigger its own flavor of ego pain in me. The minor glitches are just embarrassing, and painful in a way that is clearly out of proportion to the offense. I think that's because my long-held identity as a smart, competent, and reliable person is being chipped away one flake at a time, and because this kind of mistake happened only very rarely before the accident. But I get over those fairly quickly. It helps that most often I can take them off the books by fixing them.

Trying and falling short is a bit more embarrassing, and my mind often wants to react with some kind of contraction - like don't stick your neck out again! Only do what you can do perfectly. These, too, were somewhat rare before the accident, since I am typically pretty deliberate in my actions. But it's not too terrible to deal with, because I value expansion, and I know it requires pushing my limits, and I accept that as risky work but worth it.

The third kind --good intentions that don't turn out as planned or appear to cause harm -- well, that one really sucks. I almost always cry when the unintended consequences of my actions are brought to my attention, and my heart sinks right into my stomach. Usually these are the kind of mistake that I cannot fix, and cannot take back. They've gone out into the world and have a life of their own.

This kind of mistake had happened before the accident a handful of times in my life, and I vividly remember each of them.

Another one happened yesterday, which is why I went in search of that poem. It helps for me to think that what appears to be a terrible mistake might actually be just one thread of a larger tapestry. Takes the pressure off, and opens my little ego to the reality that there's more than me here, and that I don't know it all.

Funny how needing to know it all can lead to such feelings of false competence and satisfaction, which then can be so easily yanked out like a carpet beneath my feet. Painful as it is, I am grateful for the opportunity to find something more solid than knowledge, competence or good outcomes to stand upon.

happy virus

after my moments of personal angst have come and gone, I settle in once more to my natural state of being, which Hafiz perfectly expresses for me here:


The Happy Virus

I caught the happy virus last night

When I was out singing beneath the stars.

It is remarkably contagious -

So kiss me.



from The Subject Tonight Is Love - 60 Wild and Sweet Poems of Hafiz

translations by Daniel Ladinsky

the consciousness of loving

It is not a past time, event, or relationship you yearn for. It the consciousness you held about it. Return to that consciousness, and you will create new experiences equal to or better than those you left behind.

- Alan Cohen


Excellent timing on this daily quote from Alan Cohen. I've been noticing this very thing lately.

This is the longest I've ever gone without a man in my daily life. I've been in a self-induced hibernation since Kevin and I split up in February. Did my little two day stint on match.com, noticed I felt crappy about it, and haven't put myself 'out there' since. I have enjoyed focusing on selling my house, settling in to my new place, and spending plenty of time with my son before he shipped off to boot camp.

I also wanted to take some time to observe myself as a single person. I had thought that maybe I would miss being loved. And I do, to some degree, but what I miss even more is how wonderful it feels to love. Of course I can and do love the flowers and the rain and the earth and my children and my friends and myself. What I find myself longing for is the deeply satisfying, no holds barred, totally surrendered kind of loving that so far I have only experienced and expressed within an intimate relationship.

So my solo experiment will continue until a man steps forward who wants to expand the exploration with me. In the meantime I'm perfectly fascinated by checking out what it feels like to open up as much to the sun as I would to a lover. Or to enjoy the wind on my skin as if it were a caress, and to walk on the earth as if I am massaging its back.

I think it could be possible to open up my consciousness of loving so widely that it almost doesn't matter if there is any personal receiver. It will be interesting to find out ...

reality

The only reality is LOVE. Everything else is what you make of it.

- alan cohen

When I pondered on this, I came up with some additional refinements that helped me understand it more deeply for myself:

Everything else is exactly what I make of it and only what I make of it.

And what I make of it is nothing more and nothing less than a reflection of my own thoughts and beliefs. LOVE is not just the only reality, it's also the only truth.

So if I see something other than love, like deception, attack, or guilt, then I am looking through distorted lenses. My work then is to polish or correct my personal lens, not to try to fix that which I see or blame any circumstance or person 'out there' for my painful interpretation.

reality?

Loved this quote that Rob Breszny included in his Free Will Astrology email today:

"What concerns me is not the way things are, but rather the way people think things are."

- Epictetus

convincing

this daily quote from alancohen.com really struck a chord with me:

If you know something is true, you don't need to convince anyone of it. If you are trying to convince anyone, it is probably yourself. -- Alan Cohen

more quotes I like from alan cohen

Those who love you are not fooled by mistakes you make or dark images you hold about yourself and even defend. They remember your beauty when you feel ugly; your wholeness when you are broken; your innocence when you feel guilty; and your purpose when you are confused.



All limits exist only in the mind, and it is only in the mind that they can be overcome.

All of your errors have not built a wall against your success. They have paved your way to it.

Anything good for you brings out the best in you and does not force you to make believe you are something you are not.

At any moment you have two voices in our head: one that tells you that you can’t, and another that tells you that you can. Which will prove true? The one you give the most attention to. The one you act on. The one you make a stand for.

No matter what has happened, let today be new.

Outlandish ideas move the world ahead far more powerfully than logical steps. An outrageous imagination is ultimately the most practical contribution.

Preparing to live is not living. Don’t miss this moment ― it’s all you ever dreamed of.

Somehow it all works out.

The quality of your life equals the ratio of appreciation to complaint.

lots more here:

http://www.alancohen.com/Quotes/quotesbyalancohen1.htm

raindrops keep falling on my head

from www.dailyOM.com:

When we simply allow ourselves to fully feel our feelings as they come, we tend to let them go easily. This is all we are required to do; our feelings simply want to be felt. We often complicate the situation by applying mental energy in the form of analysis, when all we really need is to allow, as the earth allows the rain to fall upon it. As the rain falls, the earth responds in a multitude of ways, sometimes emptying out to form a great canyon, sometimes soaking it up to nourish an infinitude of plants. In the same way, the deeper purpose of our feelings is to transform the terrain of our inner world, sometimes creating space for more feelings to flow, sometimes providing sustenance for growth. All we need to do is allow the process by relaxing, opening, and receiving the bounty of our emotions.

words

my daughter is going into 8th grade, which has gotta be one of Dante's levels of hell. She sure is suffering while she works things out for herself socially. All I can do is rub her back and dry her tears and witness the fury and pain as it releases from her system. She rights herself much more quickly than I remember doing at her age. Heck, who am I kidding -- she's quicker than I am even now!!

While searching for some kind of lifeline to throw to her, I remembered a three part guideline I heard somewhere years ago, a sort of algorithm that helps us decide to speak or not. Thought I'd write it here since I will surely need to refer back to it myself:

Is it true?
Is it necessary?
Is it kind?

I think if I applied this filter, I'd be talking a whole lot less. True is not so much of a problem. Kind seems pretty clear too. I myself get real hung up on necessary. Necessary for what? For self-expression? For intimacy? For growth? For entertainment? Sometimes those seem to conflict with each other.

I suppose like most things, I just have to try it and see what happens. Maybe my mind is trying to make this more complicated than it really is. Maybe it's sort of like a Zen koan -- the gift is in the process of asking the question, not in the answer.

ps: quick update: I printed these three questions out several times in tiny font and left the page on her desk without a word. She came downstairs later and showed me with a shy grin that she had taped them to both her cell phone and her computer screen. Bless this kid's heart. She's gonna do just fine ...

that's why

I just got back from a lovely family reunion on the Gulf Beaches of Florida.
I still feel as relaxed as jello ... the sun, the sand, the good company ... so wonderful.

oh, and I even got shat on by a big ol pelican! rumor has it that's good luck.
LOL. uh huh. hope so. that stuff was tough to get out of my purse.

anyway, when I got home I caught up on my friend debra's blog and found this gem:
***
You are not on earth to make things happen. You are not on earth to spread the love. You are not on earth to make it a better place or to learn acceptance of the things you cannot change. You are not on earth to find your soul mate or your purpose. You are not on earth to put the needs of others before your own. And you are most certainly not on earth to suffer, pay penance, be tested, or judged.

Did I leave anything out?

You are on earth because in your loftiest state of being, perched high above the wonderment, at the pinnacle of your glory, you wondered what it would be like, even fleetingly, to believe in limits.

You sage
-The Universe

Thoughts become things... choose the good ones!®
© http://www.tut.com/ ®
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
And when you can grasp this from within the illusions, you will also grasp how unlimited you truly are. (And we'll probably never hear the end of it...)
***
here's what I say to that: YEE HAW!!!! I love it.
I struggled for years to make sense of that whole "Life is a school" philosophy. Finally I gave up and decided maybe life was actually the playground!

How would you live if your experience was simply a gift to the Creator, rather than a lesson, a growth opportunity, or a test?

ps: If you like this message, check out www.tut.com for a free subscription to daily love notes from the universe. cool stuff there.

be here now

The thought that you should be doing something else is a distraction. Be fully present with what you are doing, and it will lead to better.

-- Alan Cohen

ideally ...

loved this quote from Abraham-Hicks:

This is what we see as an ideal relationship: Someone who has a majority of things, that I easily feel at ease with. Things I like. Not someone who satisfies me on every single level because expansion is fun, but someone with whom I can easily be comfortable. Someone, who like me, understands that they are an expanding being, who is eager about life, and eager about expanding and willing to keep up with who they are becoming.

- Abraham-Hicks
(www.abraham-hicks.com)

me too

"I don't always know what I'm talking about but I know I'm right."

-- Muhammad Ali


I don't know about you, but I find that kind of arrogant confidence very appealing. I'm not offended by it - I think it's funny, and I'm even a little bit envious of anyone who can say it with a straight face. To me, it seems like the ultimate form of backing yourself up - no self-doubt or self-esteem issues there! no wishy washy backpedaling, no convincing others to believe you, no lame posturing. Besides, do any of us always know what we are talking about? and don't we all often think we are right anyway? at least he is forthcoming and honest about his inner process ... LOL

peace and clarity

thanks for sending this quote, monica ...

"You can do nothing. What time has brought about, time will take away. This is the end of yoga, to realize independence. All that happens, happens in and to the mind, not to the source of the "I am". Once you realize that all happens by itself (call it destiny, or the will of God, or mere accident), you remain as witness only, understanding and enjoying, but not perturbed. You are responsible only for what you can change. All you can change is only your attitude. There lies your responsibility." -Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj

real security

my friend kate sent me this quote in a birthday greeting today:

"It takes a lot of courage to release the familiar and seemingly secure, to embrace the new. But there is no REAL security in what is no longer meaningful. There is more security in the adventurous and exciting, for in movement there is life, and in change there is power."

two heads are better than one ...

“I not only use all the brains that I have, but all that I can borrow.”

—Woodrow Wilson