Alone In My Garden

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

If you try to understand love
before being held,
you will never feel compassion.

But once everyone left, he was alone with all he knew.


I've been thinking about friends and friendship… about love and loving… and being loved, and being a friend… how we make the distinction between one kind of friend and other. If we do… if we should. Surely a friend is a friend is a friend… anyone who's not a friend is either someone you don't know… and acquaintance or a colleague. *shrug* Yet, shouldn't a friend be a friend always? Shouldn't even that kind of love endure? Shouldn't that kind of compassion be always there between friends?

I have always been a bit of a loner… a bit like the boy in the garden whom people will come and talk to… but then in the end, just up and leave. All through school it was because I was the one that was diligent at work, and relatively intelligent. I wouldn't say that I was used exactly, but they were definitely more like acquaintances than friends. There was only really Nikki whom I can say we actually did friend-like things together… (staying over with each other… all that kind of thing), but even with Nikki there was always still that underlying, uneasy feeling that somewhere along the line, she was making fun of me. I did not feel 'loved.'

Even now, after so many life changes, there are those people who have drifted in and out of my garden – and when they were there, yes… it seemed like friends… people with some I shared a lot of things, the way one does with friends. People I relied on, and who leaned on me in return – but where are they now? Is it that I pulled in all my borders and put up walls during a major change in my life and simply haven't let those walls down again yet? I'm still kind of 'in touch' with some of them who I feel I could 'let in' again… people who I was very close to before – yet I still feel some hesitancy that leaves me uncomfortable.

Sinking

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

Unconditional love is not so much about how we receive and endure each other, as it is about the deep vow to never, under any condition, stop bringing the flawed truth of who we are to each other.

…we look deeply on each other, and you accept my flaws, but not my behaviour, and I am grateful for the chance to work on myself. [Somehow], it all brings us closer.


I love working through the readings in this book – honestly, I do… though sometimes it feels that we revisit many things over and over again. Perhaps I need that, maybe… to make me remember intentions and affirmations that I've made to myself… but honestly sometimes feels like a slap in the face and at least for now, I can do without any more of those thank you very much.

From learning my flaws and my failures, from having the mirror held up to my face, as well as these and other softly, and not so softly whispered reminders, I'm feeling a little bit punch-drunk… and more than a little cut off from love and protection than in truth I know I am… so I pray, Universe, please go gentle just for a little while… because even though that which does not kill me… I might just end up a shattered wreck on the ground, and I'm certain that's not the object of the exercise, even though it's easier to rebuild the jigsaw of self when it's already in pieces. I'm not asking to be coddled, or lied to… just a little compassion perhaps – a chance to breathe, so that I can regain my balance, find myself and my way once more, and live under the tenants of Unconditional Love.

I've been shut down for so long, it was only the other day, when Mir and I were talking about how I used to be as compared with how I am now, that I realised how much. Sure I felt cut off from the 'way of life' (I won't just call it my 'faith' because it's more than that) that I was living, and yes, I internalised comments that were simply 'comments' or others opening themselves, and feeling criticised by everything around me. That's a fault or flaw that I'm still working on, and it will take a while, I know… but I will get there. I just need a little strength first… because right at the moment, the 'gas tank' is approaching E… and my vehicle has dinged.

Bookworm

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

Only when I stop collecting evidence
do the stones begin to speak.

-Close your eyes, and bring into focus one thing you know from reading or studying that has helped you. Note where it comes into your awareness. Does it come alive in your head, in your heart, or in your stomach?

The reading for this entry is indeed very lovely, but as the man himself said, we have touched on the subject of 'knowing' many times before in our journey of discovery… but since the overarching thing in this is reading, indeed he says 'I've always been a reader,' I want to take about reading and books and things… just because… I feel… I need a break from all the deep stuff I've been looking at in the last few days… so pull up a chair into the reading nook, and lets have-at it. :D You might want to bring a drink and a snack too, because I suspect this might be a long entry.

First of all though I do want to take a moment to talk about a book that is perhaps one of the ones that has touched me the most through the years – (though I find truths and teachings in most things I read, somewhere along the line) – to the point that, even when I 'lost custody' of the books in when I split up with Alex, I went out of my way to find and buy the books again for myself, so that I could have them, and read them over again. The book series I'm talking about is the Duncton Series, by William Horwood, and I have reviewed the first book here. There has been much talk of love, and unconditional love and the nature of love, and of faith in these journal, and you could do worse than read these books for a beautiful exploration of these concepts. In writing this series, Horwood had a flash of genius, in my opinion.

I love reading – between reading and writing I could quite easily become a hermit in a cave… doing a little of both each day. As well as a library that covers most of my bedroom walls, (well, the bookshelves around the walls anyway), I'm enrolled in Librarything's Members' giveaway program as well as the Early Reviewer program too… as such, members (usually the authors) and publishers give books for free so that real readers can review their works. I make requests of books that seem interesting to me from their blurb, and sometimes I 'win' a copy of the book, and sometimes I don't. When I do I read and review. Most of these books are in electronic format, and that's just fine with me. I have hardly any space left for print books anyhow – and the ones I do have, I either haven't read yet, or are keepers that I know I'll want to read again at some point. Me… I have a book problem.

And right now, it is a bit of a problem too… because I don't do nearly enough reading, (there aren't enough hours in the day to do everything I want to do), and I've fallen very behind with what I want and need to read. Just because I can – Here is a list or two behind the cut:

( Reading List )

Phew – quite the list. To be fair, I read very quickly when not constantly disturbed by parental visits about faulty PCs… so two or three days at most will see a book devoured – but it would make my life a whole lot easier if the Kindle for PC reader had text-to-speech like the actual kindle.

While we're on the subject of books and book reviews, I'd encourage everyone to take a look at the way mirrani formats the book reviews that she does when she posts them to Livejournal. I'm impressed by the amount of information she includes. She is far more organised than I, in these things :D

So… I have a lot of reading to do… plus the books around my room, which number somewhere in the hundreds – and the books I have on my kindle too. I did mention I have a book problem, right?

Happy reading, folks… oh, and recommendations are always welcome.

Living The Sacred

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

The higher goal of spiritual living is not to amass a wealth of information, but to face sacred moments.
--Abraham Heschel

Certainly, there is nothing wrong with bettering our outer circumstances, but these constructions mean nothing if we never face the very pulse of life that waits like a kind mother at the edge of our exhaustion.

This is something that used to be a part of my way of life far more than it is at the moment, and something that I want so very much to get back to. What follows is a poem that came out of one such profound sacred moment… and I'd like to share.

PERFECT LOVE

Across endless, timeless waves I drifted in darkness,
Knowing and yet not knowing,
Seeing and yet blind, understanding neither love nor trust,
A truly empty vessel with no direction.
A lantern held aloft, and a voice speaks, stern in his kindness.
Is this your life long striving, to feel nothing?
And from the lantern light a figure
Golden and shining with life,
And with love of life, but I ran for I did not understand.
In that moment I knew fear, and a heart began to beat.
Sit a while within these arms and let me tell you
Of she whom men have long known
Yet most have all but forgotten.
Does he love her?
She is my life.
Moved, I sat with him, his arms enfolded me
Warmth spread through me until it touched my heart
And a voice within me answered to his touch,
Singing many lives and thoughts into my soul.
Then call to me whenever you have need
And I will show you all that you already know
But are afraid to understand.
I am She who would help you to be free,
But only you may tear aside the ties that bind you
To your guilt and fear,
For only naked and alone shall you come to me.
And having healed yourself, then shall you
Show to others understanding of that which is divine:
Ecstasy of spirit and joy on Earth.
When the way is long, remember Perfect Love
And Perfect Trust shall be our call.
Mind that you taint not your ideals and let
None judge them nor call you wrong
And turn you aside.
For only those who are true unto themselves
May hope to be true unto others and so truly know Me.
For I am the Grail and all that it contains.
Vivid colour burst like rain upon my spirit
And I asked of my companion the name of such beauty
He answered with my own and I did not understand.
You are women, Goddess, my daughter.
And you?
I am man, God, your son.
Lie a while with me that I may show you
She who is the Mother of all life.
The heat of creation spread over me
Awakening every cell, to centre,
Hovering over my womb and a song within me answered:
I who am the Land, the Earth and Moon
And the Waters of Life that stir the heart
Call within your soul.
From the waters all things pass
And all return in love.
Therefore give unto yourself you life.
Let me be loved within a balanced heart
Living in beauty with strength,
Power tempered with compassion,
Honour and humility, laughter and also reverence.
And if you strive to know me, listen,
For you shall not find me lets you look within
To find me there.
For I am within you from the beginning
Unto the end, unto the ending of desire.
Words faded quickly, but the song remained
And I truly understood
How one could be everything, yet nothing,
All things to all people. I turned to my companion
Who looked at me with loving question in his eyes.
And will you run no more from me
My Sister, my Love
How can I when you are my life, beloved?
I am also your death
Come then, let us share the circle and grant
New life to those in need.
And at sunrise, as He dawned upon a new world
Born of our love,
We two began to fade,
And only the waters, rippling on the lake
Stood as testimony to our passing.

The Inner and the Outer

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

Repetition is not failure.
Ask the waves, ask the leaves, ask the wind.

There is no expected pace for inner learning. What we need to learn comes when we need it, no matter how old or young, no matter how many times we have to start over, no matter how many times we have to learn the same lesson. We fall down as many times as we need to, to learn how to fall and get up

I think this is something I need to remember, something that will help me to avoid getting mired in frustration when I seem to be going at a 'one step forward, two steps back' kind of pace with any number of things. I suppose its something that as adults we all need to remember from time to time, and not just in matters spiritual.

You look at a child trying to master something, (especially if it's a new game or something) and they will try and try and try again, as adults perhaps we don't have that kind of persistence – whether that's through a lack of patience, or the attitude instilled in us that we 'don't have time to waste' doing things over and over again, but we stop trying in very short order some of us. There are some things I will do this with – like computer games. I'll only try so many times before frustration starts to set in and once that happens I might as well forget making any progress past the problem because I'm horrible at such things when I'm frustrated. I'm horrible at anything when I'm frustrated.

There are other things I'll persist at to the point where someone else has to tell me to stop and take a break because I'm worrying at them constantly, and getting nowhere – we each have our thresholds I suppose.

I know that there are things I need to apply this to at the moment in terms of self and development, but right now, the outer is of slightly greater import than the inner.

Wiggling My Tail

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

Far out at sea, a tuna fleet surrounded a group of spinner dolphins swimming over a school of tuna, catching them in a gigantic net. Small, powerful speedboats circled the animals, creating a wall of sound that disoriented and terrified the dolphins, who sank down silently into the net, only the movement of their eyes showing sighs of life. But when a dolphin crossed the corkline at the edge of the net, it knew it was free. It burst forward, propelled by powerful wide tail strokes...It then dove, swimming at full speed...down and away into the dark water, only to burst from the surface in a high bounding series of leaps.
--Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson

Confined against our will-or even sometimes confined with our own consent-we go lifeless as we feel the need for space. Feeling confined, fearful, enervated, not sure where the edge of the net is-this is the depressive, confusing struggle that always precedes freedom.

I can identify with this, and also feel the sliver of hope at the end of it. I've been feeling in that depressive lifelessness since I got back to the UK; overwhelmed by the sense of separation, and the pressing needs that come along with coming back where nothing is settled as yet… trying to get back into the swing of things.

I've been sending out job applications for most of the jobs I can find that are for this academic year only, including one that borders my qualifications but where the school is prepared to support continuing education in order to extend my qualifications and expertise… anything that might help me in the future. That said, at the moment, the politics of teaching is worse than ever, and that gets me down. What the hell happened to just being able to actually teach children? I understand that certain standards have to be maintained, but for goodness sake, when the politics actually prevents teachers from doing their job effectively, how is that sensible?

Maybe if I get this job at the high school it will give me a booster shot in the arm – it being a little different in a way – and I'll actually start to feel more positive about teaching again. It's hard to be positive when you know you're walking into a hornet's nest of unhappy people all the time. Maybe it's about time that teachers, like the dolphin, found the edge of the net and sank down deep… because believe me, with our tale wiggles, we – and the kids we all love in some way or another – would soar.

For now, this little dolphin though, is teetering on the edge.

Seeing Failure In Others To Avoid Acknowledging Our Own

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

If to hunt or hide is twin-edged madness, then faith's the courage to risk and receive.
I close my eyes and am impaled by light...
--Robert Mason

…we hunt after goals and hide from what we or others perceive as failure.

I think the last part of the above statement has to be what annoys me the most about people… that we (and I'm including myself in it – to do anything else would be dishonest) make judgements and perceptions about the achievements of others.

I try not to – honestly I do – because I hate when other people do it to me… you didn't… or you only… or even the most helpful, why don't you… kind of comments that we pass back and forth between us in everyday conversations, and even when we're trying to offer support or advice.

Because let's face it, who am I to judge anyone else, and who are they to judge me? Worse still if we don't actually understand the other person completely or what they're trying to do… so yeah, I try not to judge the achievements of others as either successes or failures, and I try to encourage others in a none suggestion/judgemental way… but I know I don't often succeed – if at all… because we've been raised by society to have such expectations of what constitutes success and what does not.

To society, I'm a failure, I guess… (don’t feel very successful myself right about now either)… I don't have a regular, full time job… why – because I took a stand for something I believed and wanted, against covert bigotry. Could I have found a different job? What – you think I didn't try? I'm old and expensive (because of my experience). Schools want NQTs because they're cheap and 'mouldable' – back to politics again. Ironically though, now at least, with budgets being what they are more schools are advertising only temporary positions. Shouldn't be happy about it really, but if Hawaii is a go and I really hope it is – and will be doing all that I can to contribute to make it happen, once I get some work sorted out – then I'll need to be out during the school year… and over here, that's a no-no. Don't allow teachers to do anything unless it's outside of school time… not even get married.

This is where I can almost hear the shouts echoing across the country. Those that start with: "Teachers?! Easy life!" and where people start quoting all those 'holidays' that we get… and that we only work from 9 to 3, (I wish). They don't see the flip side of all that… the fact that 9 to 3 actually is closer to 8 to midnight, once you factor in all the planning and marking – once you factor in the fact that we can't leave work at work, because even on the days we're not marking or planning, we're still doing it in our heads because we care about the kids in our care. The don't see that yes, we get about 13 weeks when we don't have to go to work – but again, planning, preparation, and the fact that at those times of year travel industries are rubbing their hands together and saying, "Eh up, kids are out, let's hike the prices by about 40%." Honestly, I tell you, as a sub, if I fly even one or two days before school kicks out for the holidays, the cost of the flight is hundreds of pounds different to if I actually have to fly in school vacation time.

Boy, did I ever digress…

Me… failure… no job… yes, that's how that little side trip took place. And I do feel it right now, with not being able to give the support and contribution, financially and otherwise that Mir and my relationship needs. I'm working on doing everything I can to make that happen. I know the pressure I put on Mir, and I hate that I do that. I love that she's my guy, and protecting and providing and all of that – wouldn't take that away from her or change it for all the world… but we're married, and I need to be protecting and providing for my guy too. It's how it works. So, I'll the what I can, as I can, the best I can, and yeah, I know I'll get looked at and some people will still find me wanting, and a failure, and all that… I can only do what I can do… the people that matter know that… the others, though their comments and judgements hurt, because I'm only human, maybe need to take a look at their own perfect selves.

To them, I ask: does it make you feel better to know that you put your own shortcomings and failures on me?

View From The Mountain Tops

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

The time has come to put our stones down.
For hands clutching stones can't freely drum.
And hearts fisting the past can't freely sing.

As long as we clutch to one thing – be it a stone, or rail, or weapon – our hands cannot open or reach for anything else.


It's a short one this time… after a whole bunch of long ones, but… it's just occurred to me, reading this, one reason why it might be that I have narrowed my focus and the number of things that I'm shifting between to one or two things is this:

Feeling low, feeling the need for praise in place of criticism, I found something that I was 'good at' that was providing me with that needed contact, (albeit from others than the ones from whom I really craved it), and latched onto that, not even seeing that I was letting go of so much for the sake of this one small thing… and having done that, I've narrowed myself so much that I can't see the wood for the trees.

There's so much I want to do… there's reading, there's writing of all different kinds and projects and stuff… there's all that goes along with the Wiccan path I follow… and the trees are closed in so tight that I'm blocking myself from it – and it's leaving my restless, and that, along with other life pressures, mean that I'm not sleeping well… and when I do sleep I'm having these insane dreams. Things that I know would never in a million years happen and yet they're haunting me… like Nazi surveys on a bus on the way to a cruise ship? Don't think so.

I hate to make a schedule for myself, because that feels like taking a chainsaw to the trees around me, and that I don't want to do, but I need those broad horizons that I once had, where I can slip from moment to moment, from project to project, and be the happier person that I was, and am inside, even though it doesn't get expressed as it should – and that ends up making those I love and care about, Mir especially, feel inadequate. As I said, I hate to make a schedule for myself, because that's not 'free flowing' but… maybe it's a way trail of breadcrumbs through the trees a bit, just to remind myself that I can do many things and enjoy them, and am good at them all.

Maybe… sorry, this got longer than I intended.

Leaning and Gripping

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

Few situations can be bettered
by going berserk.
--Melody Beattie

…leaning into what is gripping us will allow us to work our way free.

I came back to the UK with the full intention of being good… not going to bed too late, and not keeping Mir on the phone all night long once we got off the computer. For a little while, I was doing okay… bed on time, within half an hour of 7pm (midnight UK time), and actually using Skype to say goodbye, so that we didn’t talk for hours on the phone, though I missed talking on the phone, it's different somehow…

The other night – epic fail… midnight came and went and were still typing together, something that I didn't feel like dropping and I was there, on the ball with the typing the whole time. I recognise that's not always the case, but I won't take the blame for that being the case all of the time. As was pointed out to me before I used to be able to keep up with multiple rooms on Moo all the time, and I know I can keep up. What's changed I'm not sure, but… anyway, in the nature of leaning in to what is gripping me, instead of pulling against not getting to bed on time with excuses and all, I'm just going to have to go to bed on time… within half an hour of midnight… no matter how many rooms are on the go.

Pain and Truth

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

The pain was necessary to know the truth but we don't have to keep the pain alive to keep the truth alive.

We can only hope to begin this exchange today, now, by forgiving what's broken in each other and imagining through love how these holy pieces go together.


Isn't that what unconditional love is all about. Seeing others, even with their faults and brokenness and loving them anyway no matter how that 'brokenness' might affect you, and trusting them to do the same even with all of your own brokenness? I always thought so… but along with this, honestly, I think there's a responsibility to speak of what you feel to each other – not with the object of changing the other person, and not with a 'see what you did to me' kind of mentality… but more like a 'this is how I feel.'

I'm the first to hold up my hand and say, I'm rubbish at this… that even when I'm trying to say 'this is how I feel' I have a job moving past or letting go of the fact that I hurt so even when I don't intend it to sound or feel that way, I end up making it sound and feel like an accusation. I wish I didn't… I can only be honest and say that's not my intention. Maybe I've been hurt one too many times to be able to let go of it enough, but whatever the truth is, I'm just trying to keep and honest and open exchange, even when I don't do things very well.

That's actually one of the reasons I sometimes find these things hard… this whole 'being honest about ourselves and our feelings,' vs. 'airing dirty laundry,' as it were. Being honest without something seeming harsh might be hard sometimes, but I'd rather be honest, while at the same time not wanting to seem like I'm always complaining, or always unhappy about something or another. I'm not (always unhappy/complaining), but I have to address what comes up in the particular postings for the day – the same as anyone working through this book does. (And I have to say at this point that people should… it's wonderful for self knowledge – so if you're not doing this, why not!) And a lot of the time because the entries are tackling things that people find difficult to cope with, the subject matter tends to be a little on the 'critical' side of things – this is something I've noticed… this is something I'd like to try and find a way to balance.

Should We Bother Dreaming

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

If you try to comprehend air
before breathing it,
you will die.

…all the well-meaning voices telling us what we should or should not do will start to feel like strings we can't cut through.


I've been moaning about it long enough – I've been thinking enough about it for even longer, now what I have to do is go out and do it… be it… live it. After a couple of years of not participating, this year I'm doing NaNoWriMo again, as much to give myself a kick up the arse with Use'ara as anything else. Maybe having made that decision, others will follow about other things that may or may not be more important.

I'm sure there will be people out there that see this writing project of my little more than a silly pie-in-the-sky dream or whatever, who'll think I should forget about it, pull my head out of the clouds, however you want to put it, but whatever they might think, I am grounded enough to know it's not going to solve all my problems, make me rich overnight or even make me at all famous – that's not why I want to write it. I want to write it because it's been in my head for too many years – and then having written it, of course I want people to read it and hopefully enjoy it… and if I don't 'cut those strings' now, I'll never get started, and I might as well just give up even having dreams and aspirations… and what an unhealthy psyche I'll have then.

Will I Be Hated For This?

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

We are rare, not perfect.

We are in moments pure and ageless as light, and with the very next breath, we drop things or bruise the treasures of a lifetime. We need to soothe ourselves, not blame ourselves.

It is the essential duality in nature, perhaps, that has us gentle one moment and bullish in the next… and I would argue that we need neither to soothe, nor to blame ourselves, simply accept what is – essential nature.

That said, we also don't need ride roughshod over life, and not abrogate responsibility for actually behaving in a way that leans more toward the pure ageless light part, and less toward the clumsy hurt of treasures. I'll put that in perspective shall I, and hold up my hand and say here and now, that while I was sad that someone died – I did not see what all the fuss was about when Mr Jobs passed. Yes, he did some remarkable things in his life… advanced technology (oh, and made a lot of money doing it), and I'm sure he did other good things in his life, but strip everything away, and just like you or I, he was just another human being… along with all the other human beings that have died and are still dying. It's perhaps human nature to mourn the loss of one public figure and ignore the deaths of many, but that doesn't make it right… there's a lot about human nature that's not. I struggle with that one – I really do.

There was this thing I saw on Facebook the other day, where it had a split-panel picture. One side had a picture of Steve Jobs, the other had a picture of lots of young, starving children from a third world country. The caption was very pointed. On the one side it said something like, "one person dies, and the whole world is in mourning" on the other side it said, "thousands of people die and no one cares." I think the language was stronger than that, but that's the gist of it anyway… it kind of summed up how I feel, in general, about such things. Like I said, I'm sure he was a terrific guy, maybe a genius and all the rest of that, even though I didn't much care for his products, but… see the big picture folks.

Faith and Patience

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

Faith is the state of being ultimately concerned.
--Paul Tillich

So, faith is no more than the willingness and bravery to enter and ride the stream. The mystery is that taking the risk to be so immersed in our moment of living in itself joins us with everything larger than us. And what is compassion but entering the stream of another without losing yourself?


If asked, you'll probably hear me say that I follow an alternative faith… but in the wake of some deep though I find myself asking if that is actually true. I mean yes, I don't follow one of the major 'recognised' faiths, so in that regard it is, but was thinking, in response to this and other things of late, what is the one 'thread' that seems to permeate all faiths – the one thing, I might add – that we are all notoriously 'bad' at… because that one thing is actually at the foundation of my faith as well. I'm talking about love.

If you look at the teaching of any of the major recognised faiths you'll find some mention of 'love' in the scriptures, documents, sayings of religious leaders… and in Wicca, or course, we all follow the path of life in 'perfect love' according to the rede that charges us to 'harm none.'

I think it goes without saying that I'm not advocating going around throwing ourselves at everyone and everything – wouldn't insult your intelligence by explaining that really, but looking at love, as I said it's something we're all notoriously bad at… showing the kind of loving concern for all life that we would for those of our friends and family even to strangers… not getting holier than thou here, because I'm just as faulty at it as the next guy – especially when my patience is thin… which is seems to be a lot of the time. Perhaps that is why it is so hard for us to remember that love underpins most of the faiths in the world – or rather not to remember, but to live within the current of that love… because we all have so little patience? I don't know, I'm just speculating.

Dominoes Brought Me To You

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

I've never felt a pain that didn't bear a blessing.
--Gene Knudson Hofman

But, as cries are absorbed into silence, as the sun always rises just when the night seems like it will never end, as the sky holds everything flying and everything falling, there is something indestructible at the center of each of us; though the pain of being transformed and rearranged while still alive often feels unbearable.

I want to take a moment to acknowledge and then give thanks for someone wonderful in my life… my wonderful guy, mirrani and knowing her came from a chain of events that seemed like disaster/pain/anguish that gave way to blessing and I would not change that blessing for all the world – and maybe the journey has made me the stronger for it. It's one of the reasons why The Broken Road by Rascall Flatts is one of our songs.

This is going to be like a chain of dominoes… and some of that chain I know, is pure speculation on my part – things for which I have no evidence, and yet feel in my heart… but you know what – how far back do I go? I make no apologies for some things that might be painful to hear in this chain of cause and effects… nor for the judgements I make (about myself and things that happened) in hindsight.

I saw an ad for a Dr Who convention that I wanted to go to... was all ready to send my money, only to discover it was a scam… However, through this whole sorry state of affairs I met Ken. He wasn't a particularly nice guy, but I was young (early teens) and impressionable, and in my teen rebel stage too… I started seeing this guy… jump forward to late teens…

I was working as a warehouse clerk, having not gotten in to drama school like I had wanted… not that I think that's all that relevant to the chain, except maybe in point of the fact that I didn't go to med school either… I wasn't feeling well… and went to the bathroom. I was bleeding very badly and at the time just thought it was a bad period. Hindsight and instinct tells me otherwise. I never saw a doctor for medical help/treatment… Fast forward to late 20s, early 30s, skipping through some tangential stuff along the way…

When Alec's vasectomy didn't get reversed the way we had hoped it would, we engaged in the very long and expensive process of trying to use donor sperm to get pregnant… during the course of this we discovered that I also had some unexplained fertility problems… (I'm sure you can see where I am linking this with the last 'domino'). Nothing worked, we tried IUI for a long time… then eventually resorted to IVF… I became depressed, and was unable to work for a long time due to the depression… while off work our local cinema was showing The Mummy Returns, and really not having the gumption to do much else than drag myself off to the movies, that's what I did – about 6 times, as I recall… yes, I really got into the movie, and the characters, and afterwards, I tried to get into the fan fiction… Big mistake!

When it comes to other people's writing, I do expect a certain standard if it's going to be shared… and sadly I found the fanfic I read to be lacking. But you know there's that little voice inside sometimes that says, 'If you think you can do better, go right ahead and do it' so… that's what I did.

Through my fan fiction, and through the people I knew from the Mummy fan groups I was a part of, I met Nancy, and Shauna – first online, and then for real when I travelled to visit with Nancy (in NJ not Nancy in Australia, although I met her too because of TMR, and I wouldn't trade her friendship for anything either!)

Because of visiting with Shauna, I met Mir… and after many years of sharing visits and life changes, of falling in love, and finding our way through all the trials that life visits upon us – Mir and I were married on the Blue Ridge parkway, with a wonderful reception at Biltmore estate.

If ever a soul were made complete, then mine was that day. If ever love could heal a thousand heartbreaks, Mir's love is that healing touch within my heart… and if you think this might be the last domino to fall – the end of the story… think again…

Hurricane Irene this year kept me grounded in North Carolina, and we were able to spend our anniversary together – were able to have the photographs taken that we wanted… which incidentally, can be found here… and that too was a special and magical day.

Processing

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

We are so unused to emotion
that we mistake any depth of feeling
for sadness, any sense of the unknown
for fear, and any sense of peace for boredom.

"This is who I am when no one's looking." For each of us is a fledgling that eventually, if fed, will fly.


I almost missed this one somehow… I want to just talk about the last one of those things in the quotation on the right, of people mistaking peace for boredom.

Sometimes there's nothing nicer than just… sitting. Not reading, not doing, just… sitting, breathing… allowing my mind the chance to unwind or to process what's going on in there. I'm not bored, I get restless when I'm bored, I'm just… taking a moment. (Anyone tell I've been watching too much Ally McBeal?). It means there's quiet, it means there's nothing external going on… but trust me. I'm happy.

I'm wondering actually if that's not part of the problem with me not really sleeping well. I've not been giving my mind time to process... not been having any of these quiet moments.

At One With Oneness

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

No individual exists in their own nature, independent of all other factors of life. Each has the totality of the Universe at their base.
All individuals have, therefore, the whole Universe as their common ground, and this universality becomes conscious in the experience of enlightenment, in which the individual awakens into their own true all-embracing nature.
--Lama Govinda

Imagine that beneath all our distrust there is a stream of ongoing Oneness, and the only way to enter it is to take off our distrust and bad experience like clothes. Imagine that in entering the stream naked we reach, for the moment, with every hand that ever reached.

I had this idea at some point, for a character (more than an actual story – though there were stirrings of a story that started to come) who was so intensely psychic that she lived in that oneness the whole of the time, and it drove her just that little bit crazy. The only way she could 'manage' off to it was to live in an environmentally controlled domelike bubble – grass under her feet, foliage around her, and butterflies for company. She lived in such a facility maintained by the mental institution into which she was placed by a family unable to cope… unable to help her live with her gift. She was interesting, but as difficult to connect with and grasp as the butterflies with which she lived.

I managed only a few paragraphs of writing with her, in a story that only hinted at itself.:

The leaves made soft, rustling sounds. The forest stretched as far as they could see but with the trees so close the sense of oppression was greater than the feeling that they were outside and free.

Mari turned to her companion, pulling the clothes that she wore closer about her as if she were cold. "Why have you brought me here?" she asked.

"You feel something, don't you?"

"I /always/ feel something, Daniel. I asked why you brought me here." Mari turned away to once again search among the whispering trees for a sense of where the menace she felt. She needed to know from whence it came. "Here... there were people here. I feel a great sense of emotion, euphoria and… and something else."

Daniel jumped as she suddenly swung back to face him. "They were here, weren't they, the one's you're tracking... the ones that have discovered--” she didn't get any further, but folded on herself at the first stab of intense vision that had finally answered her call.

I think maybe I need to know her better before anything can really come of it all – and I think also that includes coming back to know myself better as a being within that stream of Oneness.

Beauty and Truth

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

Seeking life everywhere,
I found it in the burn of my lungs.

I have awakened and closed for nearly half a century: have run from and stopped, run to and stopped, climbed and stopped, lifted and stopped. I ask questions that can never be answered and live like an answer to all that is never asked. Like an ant building temporary homes, I keep moving what should be left alone and dropping what can't be carried, and, in the highly charged space between the skin of the world and the skin of my soul, experience rushes.

The whole of the reading for this day is so beautiful that it defies comment. So much is, and should be true, even just in the one paragraph (of the two) that I have quoted. It is the second of such deep kinds of meditations/triggers – whatever you want to call what the words above represent – that has brought me to tears. They are tears of sympathy, or empathy… of belonging to, and being outside of… tears of hope and joy and love… and tears of the loss of being unable to quite reach what is being expressed.

The other is here: http://youtu.be/Pc-Kmx8YOeU

I feel I am a poor pupil for life's lessons, a poor subject for the Universe to take under Her wing and love and protect. I have judged myself and found myself wanting.

Connections and Missing

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

There are two ways to feel wind:
climb into the open and be still
or keep moving.

Amazingly, there is great insight in children. And great innocence. They carry a wisdom they often live but seldom know. Ironically, we spend our lives trying to regain that treasured state, where being and doing are inseparably one.

The last time I can honestly say that I experienced this state of being, even for a short time was when I moved the plants from the deck at the back of the house, to the spot between the two trees where eventually I'd like for them to be in their own little garden. I can't explain what it was that connected the two… but they were definitely connected and I felt a sense of peace that was empowering. What was I doing, nothing more than picking up heavy plant pots and carrying them from one place to another… (not to mention evicting the spider from the spider plant), but I was being… earthy and real and vital… sunlight and shadow… connected with the plants… connected with Mir who had been the one to give me the plants, it was just… a brief but special moment.

I find myself wishing, as I sit here, that I knew how to recapture such a moment now; that I even had the energy and wherewithal to do so. I'm feeling particularly down and dislocated today – my doing and being are definitely separated today. Of course feeling sick as anything doesn't help, I realise that – thanks mum for the cold and all.

Broken Puzzle

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

We come with all these parts
and no instructions how they go together.

…each day shows us what a piece or two is for, where it might go, how it might fit. Over time, a picture starts to emerge by which we begin to understand our place in the world.


I am tired and I need the box lid to help – because it seems that no matter which piece I put where, even if they 'fit' the picture is never right… not quite… and I just can't deal any more. Pardon me, just having a moment. Normal service will be resumed as soon as possible.

I put in one piece and another piece somewhere else falls out. Oh sure, I try to stay positive, and not let things grab my ankles and drag me down into the dark where I haven't even got a hope of seeing the picture I'm supposed to be making… the understanding… my place in the world.

Okay, I know that actually being tired (as in not feeling rested), and thereby hangs another tale, doesn't help with feeling quite so down, and neither does not feeling well, but it can't all be down to that, right?

I've asked for help, to guide me in a way to fix my brokenness, several times, in several different ways – but no one knows how… I just have to keep on muddling through, sorting my own pieces from everyone else's… trying to put the picture together, but I'm notoriously bad at puzzles… So, I'm just sitting here with a whole bunch of puzzle pieces and still have no idea how to put them together, because want and need keep shifting the picture into two different things, and somewhere between the two I've gotten trapped. I can feel those fingers around my ankles tightening even now.

Swans In Jars

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

A man raised a baby swan in a glass jar, but as the bird grew it became stuck in the jar.
The man was caught now, for the only way to free the thing was to break the jar, killing the swan.
--Zen Saying

Even more devastating and subtle are the ways in which we jar ourselves. If our mind is the man raising the baby bird, then the swan is our heart… Too often, we can contain our way of being within our way of surviving.

I had a great deal of trouble knowing what to write in this one… partly because my mind can't shake the practical answer/question… which is not of course what the parable is about… I mean, why does breaking the jar kill the swan instead of freeing it? That's my whole problem with this one.

Same as the whole Jonathan Livingston Seagul thing (If you love something, set it free, if it comes back to you, it is yours, if it does not, it never was). Always had a problem with that too… yes it's very noble and all that, and the right thing to do, but – bleh! I'm old and cynical, don't mind me – I'm not even gonna finish that thought.

Maybe that's a prime example of me jarring myself… shielding myself in my own glass jar to avoid getting hurt, to actually say what I really thing of that. Well maybe I've been hurt one too many damn times, and I don't feel like having my feelings on this dragged over the microscope of examination and analysis. Let's just say, I've been there, done that… and they came back for as long as it suited them to be there, and then absconded again, leaving me in more pain than I was in letting them go in the first place.

Minor digression, sorry. I sound angry, I sound bitter – the fact of it is I'm neither, just sad… so, yeah… why does breaking the jar kill the swan? Perhaps if someone could explain that one to me…?

The Beat Of My Heart

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

The soul hovers like a sun within:
burning its way out
without ever leaving center.
We call this-the burning out-passion.

Yet somehow the steady tending of its release-not stopping it and not drowning in it-this steady, tender humility of holding our lips open to the rush of inner light, letting the vibrancy of all feeling rush by our open mouths-this is the rhythm of grace; this is the source of all song.

Thinking of the our one year anniversary, the day when we went back to Biltmore, dressed in our wedding clothes and spent the morning wandering through the gardens and through memories, having the wonderful pictures taken. A year gone by, but as I said to Mir at the time, every day married to her is like my wedding day, because she is the joy in my heart. She makes me happy, and I couldn't love her more… because there is no more or less in love… only love.

There was something so special in having Mir fastening my dress… her fingers straightening bits of my hair… one of my favourite pictures seen here:



is just of her fingers in the top of my hair, fixing my veil… and something even more special with tying her tie for her. I don't know what there is about that, but, to me, it's an extremely intimate and loving act – simply tying your husband's tie. It set up the feeling for the whole of the day.

Walking around, arm in arm, hand in hand, with the beauty of Biltmore around me, and the beauty of our love inside of me, it is a warmth that I shall carry with me together, beside the warmth of the day of our wedding itself, the love in all the days before, and in all the days since.

I don't pretend that it is all sweetness and light, love isn't like that in anyone's reality, and like everyone else in the world, we have our moments, but it doesn't matter, what's important is the love that's there… but whether it’s a male thing or just an expression of discomfort in verbal expression of what we know to be true, an ignored 'I love you' is like a chill wind blowing through the door. If that's all I ever have to worry for, however, if that's all that's a cause for a faltering in this song, then I'm thankful.

I am blessed to have found such a steadfast, attentive and loving protector, a guy who provides for the warmth in my heart, who reminds me what it is to be whole, as well as fallible, someone who has a giving and gentle soul and reminds me how to let that part of me out as well. Someone to whom I can give my own love and devotion, whose heart I hold as precious in the warmth of the sun as well as in the thunder and rain, who I can cherish and nurture, a true Southern Gent to balance the English Rose that I can sometimes be… the beating of my heart with the rising of the sun, and the slow silver descent of the moon.

And please do check out the rest of the images, here, they are wonderful, it really was a beautiful day.