Being Slowly

From The Book of Awakening: Having the Life You Want by Being Present to the Life You Have.

Live slow enough
and there is only the beginning of time.

Unfortunately, we are all so high-paced, running so fast to where we want to be, that many of us are forced to slow down through illness or breakage. In this, we are such funny creatures. If we could see ourselves from far enough away, we would seem like a colony of insects running into things repeatedly: Thousands of little determined beings butting into obstacles, shaking our little heads and bodies, and running into things again.

I'm put in mind of a computer game that used to be about - whatever happened to it I don't know - where you had to guide the little creatures to all fall off the cliff together or some such thing. As funny as that sounds, it's also very sad and as someone that truly has been running around like a lemming these last few weeks. Doing, doing, doing, tryintg to sort out one thing or another, now that I've had the opportunity - at least in part - to stop a little bit, I realise just how much I have been doing that. How much, as a good friend of mine would say, I've been a 'human doing' rather than a human being.

But truly, it's hard to slow down, when you perceive that you have so much to do... or when your perceptions tell you that if you're not 'doing' something you must be 'being' lazy.

Yesterday, I read half of a book. It was a good thing to do, definitely enjoyable, definitely went part way to recharge the batteries of self... and they do need recharging. I realised I'm exhausted. Oh, not the kind of exhausted where I need to drop into bed and sleep for a week - though the last two days I have been pleasantly tired (as distinctly different from too tired to sleep properly - as I had been before that) - but the kind of exhausted where, if I didn't stop and do something for me, pay some attention to my 'inner child' I was going to explode.

Thankfully, being here, with the woman I love, able to share in things together, experience the things we have in the last few days, together, has allowed me the chance to do that, and I'm embracing it with both hands. A common phrase over the last few days in this house has been, 'We're both movin' real fast' and I don't think that particularly has had anything to do with being lazy, just that we've both been enjoying those moments of inner quiet sharing and togetherness before we move on to the next task that we need to do.

At least for me, that's been the case - and I needed that.

Authority Figures

From The Book of Awakening: Having the Life You Want by Being Present to the Life You Have.

The stuff of our lives doesn't change.
It is we who change in relation to it.
- Molly Vass

The thresholds go nowhere. It is we who, in our readiness and experience, keep coming back, because the soul knows only one way to fulfill itself, and that is to take in what is true.

It has taken me a long time to figure this one out. What is the threshold I return to again and again, the thing that keeps on coming back to haunt me as it were. Yet, as I sat here, I started thinking of how much of a challenge the last week or so has been, how much I have hated - and I use that strong word deliberately - dealing with the people and issues I have had to deal with, and I came to one conclusion.

I am cowed by authority.

I should maybe clarify that a little bit, in saying that by 'authority' I mean those whom I perceive as having some kind of 'power over' me, even if only in a little way. As an example... I really have a hard time talking to people on the phone when I need to sort something out. Oh, I don't mean I can't talk to my friends on the phone, that's easy, they're my friends, and we have certain commonalities which we share. However, as an example, calling a restaurant to make a reservation - I'm happier if someone else does it. Calling a customer service department to report a fault - I did it, but it was hell, and when I got downstairs to discover that mum was trying to call them too, my first thought was 'why didn't I just wait?' and as for calling the agency to speak with the manager to discuss a serious issue, or complaint - it was so hellish to me that after every call (and it took a while to get hold of the man - I think he was avoiding me), I would have to take many long moments to stop shaking.

But why should this be? I do not consider myself weak, or subservient to these people, for all that I'm usually more apologetic than anything else when making such calls. It's not that I lack a certain amount of confidence - I would be able to do the job that I do if I did... but I definitely do have problems in seeing myself as being as 'deserving' as the person at the other end of the phone, of a certain degree of authority.

It spills out into other interactions too. If I can't find something in a store, I'm often afraid to ask, (though I do more often these days, for a number of reasons). I don't like to bother people for things even when I have every right to do so.

And I worry that this particular issue, this threshold is hampering my ability to take charge of my own life to the degree that I need to. That's not to say that I'm not in charge of it at all - just that I probably could be more so, in a more positive way, were I just to realise - to accept, that I am just as much entitled to have authority and to exercise is as the next man, woman or child. If I could just do that, then I truly believe there would be far less awkward moments, I would definitely worry far less, and often get a better night of restful sleep, rather than be awake half the night worrying because I have to call this person, or that person.

The other thing I worry over is - since I didn't always used to be this way - what happened to push me along this road, and when, exactly did it happen. What has been feeding my insecurities?

Body Language

From The Book of Awakening: Having the Life You Want by Being Present to the Life You Have.

Before we blink,
we know each other.

We speak before we speak, with eyes and lips, in how we tip our heads, in how we lean like trees tired of waiting for the sun. we tell our whole story before we even open our mouths. Yet we frequently pretend that nothing is conveyed. We pretend we are strangers and deny what we learn before words.

I'm often told that I'm 'furious' when I'm not, that I'm stomping around and huffy, when I honestly don't believe I am, and of course that annoys me to be told that, and then it becomes true.

I appreciate the idea of body language, and everything, I don't deny that it exists and that it often speaks of more than our actualy words do, and I don't deny that there are and have been times when, even with the best will in the world to want to I've been unable to hide the way I feel because of that body language, which of course, makes it a right royal pain in the a$$.

It gets to the point sometimes when I am terribly afraid to get up and move, to get something, or fetch something to do because I know that in doing so, I will be allowing my disappointment to show - I will be displaying my emotion at a time I want to be supportive of someone else's needs, and so I stay still and then get agitated and the whole thing becomes a viscious circle. If I've promise to weigh the words I speak, should that not include the ones my body speaks for me?

I do get disappointed sometimes, and I do find it hard to hide that disappointment - it's not something I deal well with, and I know that, I confess that for all the world to see, but what I actually get annoyed about is feeling guilty for wanting to get up and get something to do, and not feeling able to because of the reasons I mentioned above.

On the completely other hand, there are times when I wish my body language would show in a better way just how I'm feeling. There are some times when I'm doing things with Mir and enjoying them tremendously, having a great time, but I end up making Mir feel like that's not the case because I'm not showing it. I don't want to end up triggering anyone's insecurities either because of the words my body is speaking, or the ones it's not speaking when it should be... and I don't know how to get aroud that - I wish I did.

Learning the Journey

From The Book of Awakening: Having the Life You Want by Being Present to the Life You Have.

I learn, by going, where I have to go.
-Theodore Roethke

We drove to a lake that one of us had heard of. Around it was a path. We brought a few simple things: bread, water, bananas. We circled the lake, stopping at certain patches of light. Huge acorns were dropping from the canopy and small ravens where preening on branches sagging over the water.

Mir and I have this little bag, and a little book each in which we note down places of interest to visit in North Carolina. We haven't really been anywhere in a while, what with one thing and another, but that's not the point. It's the exporing that is the fun part... and I know we'll get back to doing that when we're ready :)

But it brings to mind a funny story - well, funny in a serious kind of way...

We were looking for a park that, supposedly, had a large relief map on NC state somewhere in the middle of it. We were pretty sure that we'd found the right place, but had no idea where abouts it might have been and time was getting on... so we decided to take a walk along a woodland trail, walking along seeing what we could see. On the map, the trail didn't look to be too long and was a circular trail, so we would end up pretty much back where we began and able to get back into the car and drive on home.

Walking the trail was really quite special - to see all the woodland plants, and the creatures that lived on or beside the trail, and on the lake that the trail went around. We were enjoying ourselves, taking pictures, just walking along and being together - precious times.

Yet... we walked and walked and still no sign of getting back to the beginning, just getting further and further out away from where we started... and as I've mentioned, time was getting on. Mir is very protective, and gods know, I love her for that. She's my guy. Her every thought is about making sure I'm safe and happy. I couldn't be a luckier woman for that reason alone, but that's just the tip of the iceberg of our love for one another. Anyway, I digress... time was getting on and still no sign of the 'end' of the path, so... worried that we'd get lost and I'd be stuck in the middle of the wood as it was getting dark and no really very safe, Mir decided that we had to turn around and go back the way we'd come.

Not a bad plan really, except that... in order to get back to the car before it got dark, what had been a leisurely walk through beautiful surroundings, because a forced march along the path. Please don't think I'm complaining. I'm not. Mir and I still laugh about this now, but we definitely learned a lesson on that trip, a few lessons most likely... not the least of which was never trust the map, even if it says it's to scale.

This particular trail was far longer than it looked on the map - and one day we will get back there, early in the day, to walk the rest of it. It truly was a beautiful walk.

A Wounded Heart

From The Book of Awakening: Having the Life You Want by Being Present to the Life You Have.

Beneath most headaches
is a heartache.

Often we find it easier to think our way around things rather than to feel our way through them: What can we do to pull ourselves out of a bad mood? What can we buy, remove or repair that will reduce or solve a loved one's anger or sadness?

I'm tremendously guilty of this... particularly of late... by which I mean in the last several years, not necessarily just days or weeks.

Ironically, I do this because I was told that this is what I should do - that reacting to something with feelings, that feeling the way through a problem, experiencing the emotions and everything that goes along with them was the wrong thing to do

That message went against everything I knew, and everything that I was... it was contrary to the very fabric of who I am. Did I listen to the Robbie inside my head and heart that stood there saying 'Danger, Will Robinson, Danger?' No I did not. I went along with this person, bought his message, invested in his plan to... well whatever the hell his plan was... and ended up in the filthy mess I'm in now.

If you detect a little hurt or bitterness in those words, it's hardly surprising - it's because it's there. Because once you buy into the 'what can I do' problem solving for dealing with these kinds of issues it is almost impossible to get out of them... and for me, has ended up causing no end of conflict, because instead of giving an emotional comfort when one is needed, I end up 'overthinking' the whole thing, and then either the moment passes, and I've ended up giving the impression that I don't care, or I've suggested something totally inappropriate with the same effect, compounded by having now annoying the loved one who was already hurting. Worse still, I know I do it... and seem to be helpless to stop it. So yes, I'm bitter.

There was a time when I felt emotionally wise... I was able to 'think emotionally' - feel my way through things - express emotions in a way that was supportive and loving and showed those I care about how much I value their emotions. Somewhere inside, I hope, even if that somewhere is in a repressed little corner inside of me somewhere, that wisdom still exists, along with the mantle of the person I was. Now, however, I feel somewhat emotionally bereft... in a state of emotional poverty. Not that I don't feel - just that I no longer express that feeling - not longer feel able to be guided by the feelings as I once was. As a result, I fear that my entire balance is off.

I need to find my way to that way of thinking once again... and not really even for my own sake. Could this be a case of 'Physician, heal thyself?'