It’s amazing what can happen in a short bath. I can never again say that I don’t have time for:
This all happened in a span of 45 minutes, including a chi machine jiggle after and what I am writing right now.
Listen here:
I had my heart opened up.
Just enough to let the light in.
He didn’t try to do it. He didn’t do anything but smile, dance, and then hold me sweetly. My body remembered the sweet grace of a warm embrace, the mutual sigh of contentment, if only for that one shared moment.
And right on the heels of the night, Doubt came galumphing along. Doubt is an insidious character, the elephant that never forgets an infraction by anyone (real or imagined).
Doubt lacks compassion. Doubt assumes the worst. It’s a real downer.
And Yearning also popped in for a visit, which only made Doubt more insidious.
Tired of the chatter and confliction, I went for a walk in the park, something I had not done for much too long.
Walking along the creek, something softened in me. That sound, that rushing, undulating current of water always softens my edges, washes away my crusty armor, and leaves me naked, ripe for the taking, if only I allow it time to work its magic.
The water surged, welling up in my eyes, across my forehead, and deep into the belly.
“What on earth am I sad about?”
And at that moment, it was clear. I was mourning the loss of Nature in my life, of MY nature…..the familiar turn of the tides in me that I have turned from in an effort to be strong, to leave the painful past behind, to turn my intention to the future, toward stability and growth.
I have made it so I don’t have time for my dear friend and confidante. I shunned her because she washes away my armor, she opens up my soul and leaves me naked, bared to anyone who can See.
It’s scary being vulnerable, being true and open and honest. It’s scary opening up after a heinous divorce and then being let down yet again.
It’s scary to trust myself, knowing I have let mySelf down so many times.
My friend, no matter how long I neglect her, is there, reminding me to remain sensitive, to trust in the evolution of process. She is there in my orchids that took 18 months to bloom, and Oh! How they bloomed! And she is in my herbs, and drooping plants, and bright plants, and in everything that grows and dies in my life.
And she spoke to me at the park.
“Stop, and listen. Hear the creek, the rhythm, let it beat upon your back. Let the air rush through your lungs. You are alive as you can be. Isn’t it glorious?!”
And she showed me her treasures….tiny flowers nestled in the knot of a tree, nature’s flowerpot, mini worlds of fungi, lichen and moss, solo flowers standing proud, and then a tall, smooth tree that beckoned me with it’s quiet, unassuming strength.
And I laid my face upon its smooth skin and let my tears fall, and it held me.
No judgement, no expectations, no words of advice. It just held me, supported me and welcomed my tears. And I wrapped my arm around the trunk, so thankful for the unconditional and ever-present love, support and acceptance of my dear friend.
“It’s been too long, my friend, too long.”
As is par for the course on a New Years Day, I slept in. Thankfully, I remembered to turn off my alarm, and at 10am, I awoke, with crusty eyes, swollen hands, and an internal panic of all that I “have” to do.
Insert big EXHALE here.
Let me start over. I know 2016 is going to be big. 2015 was huge. I let go of a lot and brought in so much that I now don’t have enough hours in the day to do all that I brought into my life and would LOVE to do! It’s a real problem, folks.
I wake up, and my mind starts with, you “should” do yoga. That’s a healthy way to start the day, every day. You shouldn’t drink coffee. It’s hard on your adrenals. You really should go play on your pole. Don’t sit down on the computer right away without stretching and being active first. And on and on… I think I have an internal mother on overdrive.
And then I think of all that I want to DO in my life.
And yet, I am remembering going through some of my old posts last night after coming back from New Years festivities. So many of the posts are about Surrendering to the unknown, to letting the current image of things as we think they should be fall away. They are about Trust, Self Love, and BEing.
So, I sit down with my coffee, open up my computer, and this page is looking at me (which I opened last night)
(9,538 people have taken this course)
This is a 365-day on-line course available from Stephanie Bennett Vogt. We will email you when your new lesson is available and you will be able to login and read each lesson on-line or print as they become available and click to listen to the guided audio meditations. Your first lesson will be available immediately after you enroll.
“The journey is the treasure.”-Lloyd Alexander
Well, I took it as a sign, and I signed up. Part of me thought, “Amy, there you go committing to yet one more thing,” and the other part of me said, “It needs to happen. It will help me focus on what is most important each day, help me in seeing that I don’t have to do it all every day, that it’s ok to let some things go so other things can come in.”
So, no New Years Resolutions, except maybe to ALLOW my Self to be all that I imagine and more, or less than I imagine, and to trust that letting go of what I imagine will allow something I cannot imagine because it is a whole new way of being.
I like the sound of that!
What is on your mind as we head into 2016?
I love how clarity just happens, often when we aren’t seeking it. I was sitting on the couch the other day, pondering the concept of being triggered. It has become more and more evident how our triggers can either block us from living life or lead us to greater clarity and self-compassion.
And it dawned on me. I am not a wounded person. I am whole.
Suddenly, I had flashbacks to so many times I reacted based on a story in my mind, how as proud of being independent and positive I was, I still put myself in the victim role with stories of being wounded. Those stories suddenly didn’t matter. They were just….stories. At that moment, I didn’t identify with them. What happened next was a big, full, ecstatic and life-affirming inhale as my chest softened and let life in.
Does not being wounded mean we don’t get triggered? Hell no! What it means, for me, is that I have another chance to undo a negative pattern and redirect it through truth seeking and self love. I can get triggered, but not identify myself with the stories that caused the patterns.
I am not what I was.
I am.
I’m tired of thinking.
“Why?”
“Is that true?”
Questioning my thoughts, constantly. Questioning myself, constantly.
Do I really want to do that? Or am I motivated by ….God forbid…Weakness?
I hear myself talk to people and feel I am dominating the conversation. Something in me believes that I am selfish, self-centered. I guess I am afraid of being perceived as so,…to be honest. My parents used to tell me I was selfish. They told a boyfriend of mine I was selfish. Stories.
It all happened then, so why should it matter?
Exactly.
Round and round the chicken coop we go. Feathers flying, words bouncing around and hitting the heart, emotions everywhere. Feathers bleeding rainbow…
I cry easily. I am emotional. I am rational. I think a LOT. I want connection with others….bad. I find myself wishing someone would reach out to me. I have reached out to so many, but things don’t come to fruition often. And when I really think about it, am I seeking connection with others or to disconnect from myself? From the mental chatter, the disorienting constant shift in thoughts? The internal drive to do, and the struggle with not wanting to do anything….
My, how shifty is the feeling of “rightness”, the feeling of wholeness and content. My, how the mind likes to drive me. It takes so much time, it seems, to be quiet with these thoughts, to let them play out until I reach the truth. Perhaps meditation is good for that… a focused exercise in being quiet and still. YET, for me, so much clarity has come from letting my mind chatter and watching it, following it’s thought patterns.
Feathers bleeding rainbows…I like how that sounds.
In a half hour, a complete stranger helped me to understand a power struggle between my daughter Keely and myself that has caused us much strife over the past year. I left this call with a “stranger” able to breathe freely in a way I haven’t felt in months.
This person somehow, in a twist of celestial fate, showed up in my Facebook feed yesterday offering free 30-minute calls to people. She goes by April Dawn*, which I find even more interesting, as my daughter goes by Keely Dawn.
She reminded me indirectly of the mirror our lives are to our internal state. I expressed concern over my daughter’s ability to make things happen in her life for herself, and how I hate being in the position of having to decide whether to step up for her again or to let her feel the consequences of her lack of action. April said she sensed a lack of trust in my relationship with my daughter, and asked me to turn around my lack of trust in my daughter’s ability to make things happen. She asked if in some way I might be acting from the fear that I am not able to make those things happen in my life, and it hit me like a brick.
Yes, as always, it was my issue all along.
I let myself down when I was 18 when I quit San Francisco Ballet School. I have lived with that regret ever since. I have found ways back to dance here and there. I blamed circumstance. I pointed the finger at my folks for not financially supporting me when I needed it. But in the end, it was my responsibility to ask for help, and to find a way to make it happen, to believe in myself enough and to love myself enough to make my dream my life.
And I didn’t do that for myself.
And I project that regret onto my daughter, fearing she will do the same thing. And it’s not right, nor is it helpful.
The call happened twenty minutes ago, and already some of the details are fading, but the lesson isn’t. I have put so much energy into trying to “help” my daughter succeed at what I think are the most basic things, and all I really need to do is make things happen for myself. Live by example.
My fear of not being able to make my own dreams come true, has led me to put pressure on my daughter to make hers happen. Near the end of the call, April asked how I felt about making things happen for myself, and I remembered that in the past year, I have actually made some huge strides for myself in that direction. Lately, I have been feeling very stuck and impotent in that area, but reminding myself of the steps I have taken suddenly reaffirmed my trust in myself, and hence, my trust that my daughter will be o.k. She is on her own path, and she will find her own way. I sighed out tension I have been holding for months.
When I take away my fear of letting myself down and learn to trust myself, I suddenly trust that my daughter can do what’s right for herself. And when I am in that place of trust, I can guide vs push her. I can be there for her, but let herself do what she needs to do. I can allow her to find her own way, and remain available for her, but not intercept.
I can trust her because I can trust myself, and that’s a HUGE relief for both of us!
*April Dawn has a Relationship promotion going which I am happy to spread the word about. If she can help me reach clarity in a half hour on something I have missed for months, I can only imagine how she can help guide people in 4 months!
It’s been years, and I had forgotten that all pervasive internal movement, the constant inner dialogue of dance.
Driving away, I find myself going through each movement, breaking it down into all its parts. I had forgotten how dance connects me to myself, how it reminds me of the interconnectedness of every little part of me, and how every little part of me connects to all that is around me.
Yes, how the smallest intentional movement can translate through your body and out into something big and beautiful, or something so small and profound. The dance inside mirrored out there, out in the world.
The unfurling of the soul.
I had forgotten how movement out there brings me closer to the movement in here, in my heart, in my very own body that remembers so much. The fascination of movement, and of slowing everything down to its infinitesimal purity, only to speed it back up again. And the test is to remain so in tune with the transitions that time stays slow, so that you can move like lightning.
That’s when life makes sense, when nothing else exists but the movement within and without, when my inner merges with the outer, I am space, I am flow, I am alive.
It’s as if the sky is crying for me,
and the thunder wails for me,
so that I may relax into this feeling of despair,
so I may exhale into a comfortable heap of tired.
And the storm will pass, the tears will wash away,
and we will start afresh,
cleansed from the outpouring of our hearts
and the washing of our souls.
I am not even sure where to start, except that….
I MISSED WRITING!!!
Sometimes, we have to take an extended break from something to see how much it fulfills a deep need in our soul.
I took a break from so much that I love, in order to experience a new way of being. I have no complaints. It needed to happen. I needed the break, the fresh start, the time and space to work through so many internal issues that have plagued me (many still do, such is life).
Today, I went to Unity Church here in my new hometown of Ashland, Oregon. I had never been, but was graciously invited by a dear friend. The topic was Death, or rather some of the questions around those last couple weeks of life when someone is transitioning out of his/her body.
The speaker was the author Mary Landberg of Enduring Love: Inspiring Stories of Love and Wisdom at the End of Life. One thing (of many) that stuck with me was her stories of people essentially reliving their life’s passion. She spoke of a gifted quilter “sewing” invisible fabric, a fisherman casting his line into an “imaginary” lake over and over, an Ob/Gyn doctor putting on his gloves and preparing to deliver a baby.
It struck me that they were in this place with, as Mary put it, ‘one foot firmly planted where they are going, and one foot precariously placed in this world.’ And what they chose to act out and to experience are those things in their life that brought them joy.
It is so often the simplest thing that brings us joy, that carries us even to our deathbed. Each person knows what makes their heart sing. I love to dance. I love Truth, and I love to write.
When we are at the crossroad into the unknown and out of this bodily form, what will matter is how we lived. I talk not of regret, but of celebrating now what may seem small, but nothing that makes your heart sing is small. It is what feeds your soul, which in turn feeds the hearts and souls of those around you.
So, I sit here blogging again, because it brings me clarity and joy. I blog not because I want affirmation, but because by sharing our process, we all grow. In my search for truth, I seek greater authenticity. I seek to weed out all that keeps me from being absolutely authentic.
More on that in a future post. There is so much to share, and I am so thrilled to be back!
