Knowledge Is Power

I've really been wanting to love my new iPhone, but strange happenings are many and my patience, as of late, is none.

So this morning, on my day off, I made an appointment at the Apple Store at the Mall of America (god help me) and went to consult the geniuses at the Genius Bar. I was initially annoyed that I had to make an appointment. But that was yesterday when we fought the afternoon mall traffic to find a place to park and then did the stop-start walk all the way around the mall behind hoards of aimless wanderers only to be told there was a two hour wait ahead of us.

Ugh!

Needless to say, we left.

Today, however, I was smart enough to make the earliest appointment I could get, which was before most stores opened and all the walkers are professionals and actually know how to walk.

Hooray!

To my pleasant surprise, the geniuses at Apple deserve their name. Do they know everything? No. I stumped my guy a couple of times. But he knew to keep looking for the answers. And for that, I am grateful. None of this I-don't-know brand of customer service. Give me a bona fide problem solver and I'm a fan for life.

My iPhone and I are now on speaking terms -- although I continue to have trouble with accidently dropping calls, answering calls when I'm trying to silence them, making phone calls I have no idea I've made (sorry Laura!).

The patience I need, I've realized, is less for my new electronic device and more for myself. Shocker, I know. Seems that when I don't understand something, I don't just get frustrated, I get a.n.g.r.y.

And what is anger, but fear.

When did I get so afraid of not knowing? When did not knowing translate directly into not only feeling stupid, but being stupid? Maybe it's been there my whole life, but is more exacerbated now that technology is no longer my profession. I'm behind the times. I don't know it all. I don't even know all the technology that would normally allow me to figure out for myself. In the world of iClouds and syncing and backing up and disappearing calendars, and information getting pushed from places it shouldn't have access to...I don't know. It isn't rocket science, but it's new.

And new is different. And fun. But when you just don't quite get it and have been set loose with a completely personalizable piece of technology that is out of my realm of experience...well, it can be just plain scary.

Until now. Until a little Apple genius shared with me some details I was lacking. Until I embraced my fear and went in head on, willing to be vulnerable and not know it all, and asked for...

...gulp...

...help.

Knowledge is power. I walked out of the Apple store this morning feeling like a million bucks. Not because I was anywhere close to knowing it all, but because I knew in my gut that I still had the potential to learn. To be dangerous. :) And to play.

I'm not one for resolutions, but it seems to me this year it would behoove me to make better friends with my technology. Not so that it can take over more of my life, not so I can become more dependent on it, but so I can better utilize the tools I have at my disposal.

Viewing technology as the tool it is and doing the work to learn how to use it allows me to live my life where technology acts in service of me...not making me its slave.

Fear is what makes us a slave to whatever it is we're afraid of. Seeking knowledge and actively learning gives us power over the fear.

What self-limiting fears will you work to vanquish in the coming year?

Power on!//

Simple Gifts

Sometimes you have to roll with the wave of your life. No matter where it goes, no matter how fast and furious, sometimes our job is to simply let go and see where it takes us. It isn't necessarily easy or peaceful or sane.

It just is what it is.

Sometimes, for better or worse, life moves that fast. Gratefully, it can't keep up the frenetic pace forever. Which is good, because neither can I.

For as much spirit as I mustered a week ago, by last Friday night, I was beyond exhausted. A "done" sort of exhausted. No spirit left whatsoever, just a deep painful desire to sleep, to heal and to rejuvenate.

"Survival" is a funny word. It speaks of Sisu -- that grim determination. It talks of stamina and will and tenacity. It talks of a fierce unwillingness to give up.

And yet somewhere in there, too, is the energy of surrender. The willingness to let go of what dances on the periphery of our lives, the things we think are important that we normally give so much attention and energy to, and focus single-mindedly on one thing -- what is required of us to get through to the other side.

It's hard not to put all our attention on the future...when will this all be over? It can be painful to be in the moment when it is wrought with intense effort and concentration and struggle. It can be hard to reconcile the thrill of success and pulling off the impossible, with the dire physical, mental -- and sometimes emotional -- costs of the prize.

One thing I was reminded of this past week was that sometimes resistance is just...plain...futile. Unless, of course, you enjoy banging your head against the wall. Which I did plenty of. As recently as this afternoon, as a matter of fact.

If you recall, I'm a bit of a stubborn fool.

I also took away the reminder that being in the present moment -- being in the truth of what is -- requires that we shift what we deem essential to our lives according to our circumstances.

I've written before about the importance of knowing what is essential to us in our lives and acting from that space in our day-to-day. When we slip into survival mode, when we no longer feel that we're even close to bringing the best of ourselves to our daily round, our list of what's essential must be pared back even more than before. Sometimes we're only truly able to focus on our most basic needs, namely food, water and sleep.

Sometimes surrender means letting it all go. Everything. Just for now. With the promise that we can pick up what we come to know really is essential when the time is right. And not one second before.

So that when we pick up the things we are absolutely certain we want and need in our lives, we can treat them with the utmost respect and honor, with a new dedication and commitment than we were able to offer before.

Who knew this place I'm stewing around in was essential??!?

The simple gift for all of us is to recognize that it is only from this most vulnerable place that we are able to really look at our lives and make a change.

The perfect holiday is a figment of my imagination. There, I said it. Whatever "perfect" means. But still, the truth for me is that I've chosen a profession whose busiest season is the busiest season...which just compounds the stress further.

So, what do I expect?

Still, I ask: Is there a way to get through the holidays feeling relatively sane (i.e., not lip-bumblingly-out-of-control)? I continue to hold out hope that this is possible, although I've finally come to realize it won't likely look the way I expect it should.

Hmm...it seems my expectations might just be part of the problem, no?

Certainly, my trying harder to control it will not tame the beast...this much I've learned.

For now, I must be satisfied with having asked the question. With knowing that it is likely less effort than more that will get me closer to solving this riddle. And with having another whole year to work it through.

Perhaps, the answer is in always creating the space to appreciate the true simple gifts in my life:

Good night!//

Settling In

To love oneself is the beginning of a lifelong romance. ~An Ideal Husband (courtesy of my childhood chum Jane -- thanks, Jane!)


This afternoon at work, my head started to feel swimmy and sounded echoey. By the time I got home I knew my evening plans were best canceled and my biggest priorities were a bath, dinner, and bed...in precisely that order.

It's been a long time since I've been sick and while it isn't anything full-blown at this point, I'm pleasantly surprised by it.

Wha?

I know...it sounds weird. What I mean is: This may just be the first time in my forty-one years that I've started getting sick and haven't even remotely begun to...

1. Calculate exactly what I did or didn't do that "made" me sick and use that to berate and bully myself for inviting the illness,

2. Calculate exactly what I should or shouldn't do to hold it off, sure that if I do every single one of these things -- and only then -- I'll be fine,

3. Fight back with the energy of, well...fighting.

I'm pleasantly surprised because I am experiencing a complete lack of resistance. Trying to control this is simply not in my current thought process. Unbeknownst to me, it seems my old story has been cast aside and my long-held fear of being sick -- and being singly responsible for it -- has dissipated.

Who knew?

So this afternoon, instead of blaming myself for what I did or didn't do this time to make myself sick, a new, crystal clear idea presented itself...even strong, healthy bodies get sick sometimes and it is a completely natural process.

Whoa!

To take it further, I feel in my gut that my one and only job in this scenario is to respond to my needs in this moment and let the rest take care of itself. I'm finding that I'm completely confident that my choices tonight are made out of love and sincere caring for myself...not in an effort to control some outcome.

Huh.

Because maybe I'm not in control of whether or not I get sick, after all. I mean, not really.

Just maybe, in all the years that I thought I had -- or should have had -- control over whether or not I get sick, and set out to wage war against the illness, I've really just been waging war against myself.

There are so many ways we allow our thoughts, and our attachments to them, to wreak havoc with our world -- both inner and outer. The negative energy associated with fighting something with resistance -- by actively pushing away what we don't want to have happen out of fear -- simply sets up a scenario that puts us at war with ourselves. This resistance announces to us and to the world that our experience isn't true...that it isn't valid. By denying our experience and fighting to make it different, we're saying it's wrong...that we're wrong. That our life is wrong.

Meditation and learning to work with our mind, rather than against it, allows us to develop enough space to hear the wisdom of our experience. Creating space through developing the skill of quieting the mind opens the door to let our intuition in...before we can hop right back into the old groove where we tell ourselves that we did something wrong and now it's our job to fight what's happening to us and make it go away.

What if the only way out really is through? What if we trust the experiences we're having and find the strength to let go and ride the wave?

Surrender is a tricky thing. It gets mixed up into something that sounds like giving up, being ambivalent or uncaring. When in fact, it's completely the opposite. It's a softening, an easing in, an honoring of our experience, and a way to develop a complete trust with ourselves -- a trust that says, no matter what we encounter, I'm in.

Sounds a little like marriage vows.

It's the ultimate commitment we can make to any other human being. And is the most loving commitment we can make in our relationship with ourselves.

What if instead of berating ourselves for having done something wrong, we can crawl into the safe cocoon of ourselves and whisper -- it's OK. Everything is as it should be and it's OK. There's nothing else to do but simply...be...here.

When we're not focused on the past or the present, neither of which we can do anything about, we are free to Be wherever we are...and feel in every fiber of our being the peace of being perfectly in our imperfection.

As I settled into the hottest, sweetest smelling bath I could create for myself, I felt exactly that -- a peaceful welcoming in. I felt strongly that whatever my body and I are experiencing is perfect and necessary for no other reason than that I'm experiencing it. I don't have to change it, fight it, or try to make it anything other than what it is.

It doesn't mean it's going to be all fun and games -- let's face it, being sick sucks on any number of levels -- but it doesn't mean it's the enemy either.

Miraculously then, neither am I.//

Week 19 - Surrender, reprise

As I sit to write, another winter storm rolls in. The mild temperatures and melting snow of the past week or so, the patches of grass that were lusciously beginning to reveal themselves, are again a thing of the past. At least for now. Inevitably, the snow will indeed melt and the sun will reign supreme once again. But not nearly soon enough. I want it now.

I'd be lying if I said it didn't matter. It does and I'm antsy. The warmer, sunnier days helped, but Mother Nature is a tease. She tempts us and then when we put away our heaviest winter gear, whomps us again. I like lazy Sunday afternoons like the best of them. I especially like snow days. But not now. Not like this. Why is she doing this to me?!?

Boo hoo! Of course that's what I'd like to believe -- that this is personal. That on some level the Universe and Mother Nature have conspired to torture me. But the truth is, what happens, happens. What is, is. We are not victims, but simply here in this experience. It's winter in Minnesota -- what do I expect? It's up to us to respond to what is before us, not react to the perceived injustice of the situation because it doesn't match what we want it to be.

Outside the window, the squirrels and birds will not be deterred. The cardinals that began singing in earnest from the treetops a week ago in the warmth, continue. The squirrels never cease their pillaging of the feeders. The weather is the weather and they live their lives, doing what they do, being who they are, one song and one snack at a time. Why should we be any different?

I haven't written on time these past few weeks, frankly because the weather warmed up and I was out in the world more. Life called for me to be more active and I responded to the call, which left less time to sit and contemplate and write. Understandable and in being with what is. But I'm uncomfortable with that. I made a commitment to write every Tuesday and with the past few weeks being busier, I haven't held up my end of the bargain...even if no one notices but me. It feels like a slippery slope -- if I'm not writing now, if I'm willing to let part of the commitment go, will the whole project fall apart? Or am I just being dramatic because it fuels the desire to react rather than respond...to force rather than surrender?

More likely, I'm moving into another phase of the process. Life has been pretty mellow the past month or so and I've gotten used to it, gotten used to the routine. Then things begin to change...the weather became warmer, I became more comfortable stretching my wings and getting out in the world more. Like the pendulum ride I mentioned over the holidays, there is a time for activity and a time for solitude and contemplation. When we force one or the other we get antsy. When we're present, there is room for what is needed. And consequently, because we are in flow with what is called for, there is peace.

When we allow ourselves to surrender to what is, we aren't giving up...we are simply letting go of the need to fight, to control and to be right. It occurs to me that this, above all, may be the true reason I've undertaken this journey to invite meditation into my day-to-day: I've spent the better part of my life at war with myself either expecting circumstances to be different, or worse, myself. I'm happy to make the space to let that go...and to let acceptance and compassion and love take its place.

The tricky part is remembering all over again, how to surrender. Gratefully, this experience is yet another reminder.

Today, if I go with what is, is easy...a fire in the fireplace, a steaming cup of tea and a write of this blog. And so I respond accordingly. I'll save the song and the snack for later...//

Week 8 - Safe Haven

If you choose to be present, then gradually the hidden treasures will be revealed. ~Leonard Jacobson


Sometimes the winds of change take us places we don't expect. Turmoil instead of safety, chaos instead of stillness. Someplace bad when we were hoping for someplace good. For all intents and purposes, I would say I had a bad morning. Yet I still abide by the belief that life is just life. Good and bad are opposite ends of a spectrum of judgment that on a spiritual plane don't hold much weight. They're easy labels, certainly, and useful in the way that we all have an idea of what they mean, how they feel. They are a common language we all can speak with one another. But what if we suspend use of those judgments? Especially in the heat of the moment when we want to strike out or close down or let our ego soothe us in our misery by recounting for us all of the ways in which we were wronged?

I'll be honest, I don't do conflict well. Really, who does? But the longer I walk this path the more I find I'm willing to step up and the less I'm willing to brush things under the rug. If something needs to be handled, I handle it. This has worked well in some cases, not so well in others, and either way is not a road without its bumps and bruises. Yet in the end, what is, is. And in my belief that life is just life, what we need to experience arrives and we either step in willingly, or turn and run the other direction only to encounter it in some other guise at some other time. Neither good nor bad.

As I stepped into my situation this morning, as the emotions flooded in threatening to hijack me completely, I sought space...the space I settle into in my meditations. The buffer between the impulse and the reaction. I admit that looking for the space wasn't my first response -- on some level I had to move beyond the intensity of the interaction and choose it. My ego kept vying for my attention, poking at my sore spots and trying to get a rise out of me, to get me to defend its honor. How could someone say I was wrong? Made a poor choice, handled something badly? I kept choosing the space. To my surprise, it helped. And the ego's diatribe simply faded into background chatter instead of being the most important thing in the world.

Yes, the tears were flowing but somehow that was the beauty of what was revealing itself: this space of meditation that we tap into doesn't make the hurt go away -- riding the full wave of Experience does that -- but provides a safe container to hold it in. A safe place in which to sit with it, honor it, feel it and not figure it out, but let it be. My inner voice kept telling me to stop, to breathe into my anger and frustration and to not fix it, to surrender it, to leave it alone. Let me tell you, I'm a fixer to the nth degree so this felt like going against my very nature. But when I listened and heeded the call, when I honored the wisdom of my heart, I found peace. I may still have felt rotten and beat up -- this is sometimes just the way of things -- but the peace was like stepping into a warm embrace. That place that imbues us with the uncomplicated knowing that this too shall pass. Even if we don't fix it. Even if we let it go.

Meditation isn't meant to fix anything, but allows us access to a safe haven to be with our hurts, lick our wounds, learn our lessons and move on without accumulating the baggage that the ego means for us to attach to and carry with us indefinitely. Who knew? Not me. Not really. But now I know.

The ego can have its grudges and revenge. It can have its drama. I'll take the haven where it's safe to listen to my heart.//

Week 4 - Surrender

"At some point, to go beyond the mind, the power of intention has to be turned to a deep abiding surrender....Pure surrender has to be living with what is, as it is, as God." ~Swami Abhayananda from The Supreme Self


What is, at the moment, is that we're dancing on the cusp of winter. Disguised in glorious sunshine and temperatures in the 50's, I see how easy it could be to be lulled into believing the next four months won't be as dark and as bone-chilling as they will.

In all honesty, I secretly enjoy when the weather takes this turn towards winter. I love when she rages inhospitably with no apology, with the sub-zero reminder that if we don't take the utmost care of ourselves while in her clutches out in the world, all could be lost. I feel the urgency of this most simple act of survival. It clarifies things for me to know beyond a doubt that our judgments and expectations of what Mother Nature offers in her most unforgiving moments mean nothing. We are reduced to our most powerless state, just like our ancestors before us. Surrender. Nature teaches us -- be humble or perish.

In our day and age the lesson of "be humble or perish" isn't as much a matter of life and death of the body as it is of our soul. We spend so much of our lives feeling cut off from Nature, from others and consequently ourselves that our souls are literally starving to death. Until we find that way to connect with the mystery from which we all came, until we learn to surrender, we will continue to feel separate and alone.

In both cases, the lesson is the same -- communing is the key to survival.

If the past four weeks have taught me anything, it's that meditation -- or any practice for that matter -- requires this same humility. A willingness to let go and let the universal energy, the creative process, engage with us and move us to new heights, to a place not only beyond expectation, but beyond imagination. This lives in the poet who comes upon the ideal turn of phrase to best encapsulate a profound experience, the musician who hears and transcribes a song that embodies the pain of a recent loss, or the child who dances with abandon to no music whatsoever, unashamed and unafraid. This is surrender in its purest form -- an admission that we understand that our lives are an invitation to participate with Source rather than independent of it. An acknowledgement that we are not here alone to live this life, but we are one with the creative force that inspires -- literally brings breath to -- all of us.

One meditation this past week yielded the following phrase: Wise and compassionate Universe, I surrender myself here to connect with Source.

I didn't know what I was asking for when this intention came -- and stuck -- but it works for me. When I utter these words as I begin my meditation, I connect to a place of humility within myself. A place where I don't have to try. A place where I'm not looking for answers or anything in return, but simply to show up to Source and hang out a while -- to keep each other company, if you will. It helps me to see that meditation isn't about becoming disciplined or even enlightened, but is about freeing myself from my own sense of pride, my own sense of isolation, feeling like I have to live this life by my own wits and effort alone. And by doing so, it allows me to connect with all of the beauty and wonder that surrounds me and recognize myself in it.

It seems ironic that by showing up and doing nothing and expecting nothing, I receive the greatest gift of all -- connection. Yes, it's harder than it looks. But if that's all it takes, count me in.//

Week 3 - The Opening

Sometimes to see life clearly, you need to open more than your eyes. ~from the movie Local Color


Three weeks...twenty-one days. As I sit to write, I think again about my grandma's favorite piece of wisdom about how it takes twenty-one days to get used to something new. I remarked earlier about whether I would last that long. Now that the three week mark has come and gone, I realize I've just barely scratched the surface and the promise of what's possible has got me hooked. I can't imagine stopping now.

The Great North Wind has chosen today to blow in our first taste of winter. Around me is a constant state of flux. It's getting dark about three hours earlier than it did a couple of months ago and I find myself eating dinner earlier and hunkering down for the evening to write, to read and of course, to meditate. Outside my living room window, the trees are doing the fall wind-dance that sends their remaining golden leaves flying, as the squirrels frantically stuff their faces, scrounging for errant millet and sunflower seeds under the bird feeder in some instinctual last-ditch effort to put on a little more weight. The winds of change are blowing -- ready or not, here she comes.

As it is with my meditation. Week three commenced with my trying to figure out what I could do to make sinking deeply into my meditations happen faster. What should I be doing to make this work? Assuming, of course, that somehow it's not. Digging into my treasure trove of resources, I started exploring all the different techniques I had learned or read about over the years -- mantras, visualization, chanting, pranayama (breathing) exercises, counting, noting the thoughts that come...you name it, I tried it, all in the name of research.

By Sunday I was frustrated and realized that while the variety of things I had tried were interesting, my meditations still weren't yielding the results I wanted. Aha! I thought. The results I wanted. Who knew that expectations would and could still abound after last week's post??!? Seeing that I was continuing to fall back on the old worn belief that if I just tried hard enough, if I could just find the perfect combination of things to do I'd be triumphant, made it clear I was still attached to outcome.

I never knew I believed that lying within meditation was a puzzle to be solved, a goal to be achieved. Apparently, enlightenment doesn't come cheap and somewhere in here I hold a belief that it must be earned. That I must be deserving. If only I was good enough, smart enough, and clever enough to figure it out.

It occurs to me that in pregnancy, no matter how healthy a woman eats, no matter how well she takes care of herself, even if she does everything "right" there can still be complications and unfavorable outcomes. We can't control anything and yet we still take this incredible leap of faith and hang on to the hope that all will come out OK.

But where is it written that if we are good -- in anything -- we automatically get the Good Stuff? Ah, right...the promise of eternal salvation.

Is that where all of this efforting comes from? This need to dive in and "do" this thing called meditation rather than being willing to sit in the unknown day after day and let that be enough? I can't control this either and yet still I take this leap of faith and hang on to the hope that all will come out OK...whether or not it can be tallied that I have tried hard enough or am good enough or deserve whatever good can come from the showing up.

Perhaps this is the heart of surrender -- letting go not only of the compulsive need to "try" to make things happen, but also of the belief that there is some possibility that we don't deserve to connect with the divine. We are the divine. The only thing that keeps us from communing with it is us. We need to take the same blind faith we have that the sun will rise again tomorrow, that the winds of change will blow in the next season, and apply it to our own lives -- for it is our own lives. We need to trust that there's nothing we need to do in order to connect with the divine but to show up and be present with ourselves and trust that all will come out OK.

Maybe these old beliefs are surfacing because I need to see what barrier lies between me and really knowing and accepting my heart. And in opening my eyes to the truth that there is no such measure as "good enough", I can surrender to this journey of the heart and, like the leaves, go wherever the winds of change might take me.//