Category Archives: Letting Go

THE BREAKING

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Like a Seed My Heart Breaks Open

April 30, 2023

“We spend our lives trying to anchor our transience in some illusion of permanence and stability. We lay plans, we make vows, we backbone the flow of uncertainty with habits and routines that lull us with the comforting dream of predictability and control, only to find ourselves again and again bent at the knees with surrender to forces and events vastly larger than us. In those moments, kneeling in a pool of the unknown, the heart breaks open and allows life — life itself, not the simulacrum of life that comes from control — to rush in.”

So reads the opening paragraph in the April 30th, 2023 edition of Maria Popova’s weekly newsletter, The Marginalian. It is the beginning of her introduction to Tina Davidson’s book, Let Your Heart Be Broken. She goes on to describe Davidson’s memoir as “a lyrical reckoning with what it takes to compose a life of cohesion and beauty out of shattered bits and broken stories.” 

She had me. Right there in the lines, “We lay plans, we make vows, we backbone the flow of uncertainty with habits and routines that lull us with the comforting dream of predictability and control, only to find ourselves again and again bent at the knees with surrender to forces and events vastly larger than us. In those moments, kneeling in a pool of the unknown, the heart breaks open…” 

Yes, the heart breaks open – and if we allow it, Life will rush in. But sometimes, in our confusion and grief, we desperately try to put the two halves of our heart back together. We resist the call to allow something new to emerge. We resist the opportunity to change and to grow. We just want things back the way they were. It’s as if a seed, having broken open to release life, frightened of the deep dark in which she finds herself, would try to close back up, rather than to push up toward the Light. It’s a little bit like a baby bird trying to crawl back inside the egg that just broke open and released him into the world.

Popova quotes Davidson’s book:

Let your heart be broken. Allow, expect, look forward to. The life that you have so carefully protected and cared for. Broken, cracked, rent in two. Heartbreakingly, your heart breaks, and in the two halves, rocking on the table, is revealed rich earth. Moist, dark soil, ready for new life to begin.”

For the past two years I have been repeatedly bent at the knees with surrender to forces and events vastly larger than [me] – than any of us. I have not just been kneeling in a pool of the unknown, I have been swimming in it. And some days I am just treading water, surviving. The thing about this pool of the unknown is that there are no clear answers. What is truly true is obscured. There is nowhere to gain a solid footing. It is a deep, dark pool of unknown.

This morning I also read two other bits of news. One was a report from DFL candidate Marianne Williamson, reporting from the South Carolina DFL convention. She wrote:

“Democratic activists [are]being told what to say to convince their friends and constituents to vote for Joe Biden in 2024. The official position – despite the fact that 51% of Democrats have expressed a desire to hear from other candidates – is that President Biden is the nominee and that’s it. Everyone is supposed to toe the party line this year, regardless… There is an anemic and delusional spirit in the air here, I’m afraid – an almost trancelike way in which Democrats are instructed by an official narrative to be so concerned about fascism…that we’re willing to limit our political imaginations, suppress debate among ourselves, and diminish our own commitment to the democratic process.”

The second article I read was about the man in Texas who shot 5 of his nextdoor neighbors on Friday. He was angry that they had asked him to stop shooting his AR-15-style weapon in his front yard at 11:00 at night because the noise was keeping their baby awake. So he walked into their house and shot them.

Marianne’s report heightened my current discouragement with politics. I used to be involved. I used to care. I used to vote. But since the political upheavals of 2016 and 2020, since the political and social fiasco of Covid-19 and vaccinations, since the national, and international confusion and hate filled squabbles about what is conspiracy and what is truth, what is mis-information and what is censorship, what is “fake news” and what is real, unbiased journalism, well, it all seems pointless. I’m angry. And impotent. I refuse to “take a stand” just so I am comfortable and can belong somewhere with like-minded folks. I have opinions – some of them strong ones… but in this grey of the unknown, I am committed to remaining open to the possibility that none of us are “right”, and all of us are “wrong”. Someone once said, “When there are two camps each declaring they are the ones who are right and know the truth of something, then the true truth is camped somewhere else.”

The article about the shooter in Texas broke open yet again that place in my heart that contains this bottemless well of grief. It’s like a slow hemorrhage…it never stops bleeding. 

What I could only do in fits and starts was to look squarely at the two halves of my heart rocking on the table, revealing the rich moist soil of possibility and opportunity and begin planting seeds for something new and beautiful. These were seeds of love and compassion. These were seeds of hope. These were seeds of courage. But as we know, there is a time lapse between the planting of seed and its fruition. 

Between these momentary fits and starts when I would find my footing, were the days and sometimes weeks of treading water, days of darkness with barely enough energy to engage in the bare necessities of living. When you’re nearly drowning in the unknown with no anchor, it is difficult to know what in the world to do. Some days it all felt too hard, too painful, too pointless. Feeling like that was unbearable – so I’d read novels, or binge watch TV series, or busy myself with household tasks. 

My primary lifelines to still giving a damn were my children and my work. I work with educators supporting them in creating healthy learning environments rooted in the philosophy of Restorative Justice. The challenges of this work are what kept me swimming for shore; gave me courage to plant some seeds now and then in the fertile soil of my broken heart. My children and my family were my reason to keep returning to making the choice to open my heart, to feel the feels as my daughter calls it. To reckon with the grief and the anger, to slowly find my way through the valley. 

And then there were, and are, the occasional songs, or blog posts, or something a stranger would say…messages from the Universe… “Keep going. Keep swimming. Keep loving. Allow. Open to love and joy and gratitude, allow them to fill you up and radiate beyond you into the world.” 

Sometimes that is all we can do. Sometimes that is enough. 

YANKING AT THE VEIL, KICKING AT THE DOOR

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March 29, 2015

CREATING PEARLS OF LIGHT

It is grey here today and rain is predicted. The sky inside me is also grey, brooding. I listened to a presentation this morning about the deeper mysteries of the creation of human beings and of Earth that are coming to light; truths that are only beginning to be understood by the Western World. These are truths, realities, that many indigenous cultures have known for millennia because they were the keepers of the Mysteries, the keepers of the Secrets. I am wondering where I fit into this grander, bigger picture of the Universe, of Earth, of this shifting and evolving that is happening to us. My heart longs to understand what is veiled, to enter the full stream of the power of the Creator. I am irritated that we are fed riddles and enticed with visions of the possible–and yet most of us remain too weak or too dense to come fully into who we are. We have to work so hard, not only to overcome the unconsciousness and the fear within us–but to overcome the evil and darkness that aligns against us from without. I yank at the veil; I want to see things as they truly are, to understand fully who I was created to be! I kick at the doors; I want access–now–to all the desires of my heart. My limitations are a fiery itch under my skin that I cannot ease.

When I stop my kicking and my yanking and my stomping about, I grudgingly acknowledge that all I can do, the most important thing any of us can do is to cultivate compassion, love, kindness, forgiveness and courage. To keep faith and to steadfastly maintain positive thought creations while living from gratitude for whatever IS our experience in this NOW moment. How often have we heard it said, or read, that all we have is this present moment? How much better, how much brighter are each of those moments when they are lived with gratitude, compassion, kindness, and courage–moments strung together, connecting to the moments others are living with compassion and grace. Eventually a string of Light, like a necklace of pearls, reaches all the way around the world–spilling into new moments–lighting up entire days. The Earth turns and we spin through the years. And one distant day from this moment in which we stand today, the Light is complete and the Darkness overcome and Fear vanquished by Love.

The winds of change begin with the flutter of a butterfly’s wing. They begin with a choice to smile bravely; to forgive a wrong; to bless instead of curse. They begin when I steadfastly hold the vision that I am thriving even when in this moment there is no money to pay the bills, my child is ill and somewhere a bomb blows up some mother’s children.

I hold a stick in my hand. I wish it was a wand and that I could channel magic throu10857342_10152711930831439_858846269660153274_ogh it. I kick again at the door. I scratch the itch. I want to do so much more–NOW! I lift my face to the grey sky and let the tears of Gaia drizzle on my face, mingling with my own. I take a breath, and in this moment I offer thanks for this simple pleasure of the gentle rain that will bring the flowers.

 

 

 

 

KEEP FAITH WITH ME

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March 6, 2015

KEEP FAITH WITH ME

“Although we have been made to believe that if we let go we will end up with nothing, life reveals just the opposite: that letting go is the real path to freedom.”  – Sogyal Rinpoche –

In a swirl of snow and roiling clouds the color of ashes I skiied across the ballfield and headed into the woods. With nine inches of new snow, I could break trail and go wherever I wished. The trees writhed and groaned as the wind tore through them, leaving only its tattered bits behind to brush against my cheeks. Inside myself a storm also raged, a nameless darkness boiling and screeching.

I found three chairs sitting in a circle of birch trees, holding space around a buried campfire. I stood and watched them for awhile. I became aware of the Circle within mySelf; except the chairs are not empty. And the fire has not gone out. A bit of Winter lingers, but the storm is quieting.

I skiied down the hill. Well, mostly I sat on my skiis and slid down the hill, the feathery snow flying in my face, washing away all trace of tears and leaving me breathless and laughing. I found a clan of cattails alongside the trail and picked one that was only beginning to release its seed to the world. I tucked it into my hand with my ski pole. As I skiied down the trail, little helicopters of cattail seed streamed out behind me, riding the frigid currents of air.

I followed a deer trail back up into the woods. The wind had dragged off most of the piles of dirty clouds and the sun was spilling through the openings, a raging fire against the deep blue sky. Cresting the hill, I wandered off the trail into a natural basin ringed with birch and a huge boulder. I sat and leaned wearily against the boulder, gazing up into the drama in the sky as the last of the fuzzy clouds were blown out over Gitchi Gummi, somewhere beyond these forested bluffs and ridges.

“Keep faith with me.”

Such a quiet, unobtrusive thought to slip in between the ragged clouds slowly dissipating in my soul. “Keep faith with me. Keep faith with yourSelf. Trust.”

I have clung so tenaciously to what I want for my life, to what I want to do with my life, to what I want to do for others. Year after year I struggle against obstacles and hurdles and although I make headway, it seems so little–so far removed from the thriving life of abundance that I desire to create. I get tired. Discouraged. I feel abandoned. I get angry.  And then I feel guilty and ashamed because I have been blessed with so much that is good, and so often experienced the love and support, encouragement and direction of that which is beyond the veil of what my human eyes and ears can see and hear: God, Ancestors, Angels, Light Beings who guard and guide me, the Divine Soul within me. Shredded to tatters like those clouds, bullied about like these trees, my courage and faith are at the mercy of the dark winds of Fear–the Saboteur. And then I cling tighter…I will to create and manifest the life I not only desire, but feel I have been purposed to live. But all I do is tread water, and wait, and grow weary.

I see mySelf now, laying back against that boulder in the snow, all the weariness draining slowly away into the rock and the snow and the earth beneath. My spirit flies away to another scene where I am clinging with my little boat to a tiny bar of earth and rock in the midst of the River of my Life. I am nervous in the rapidly increasing tumble of white water. I insist I cannot continue without assurances of safety–either calmer waters, or a better boat–something! I design a map and wave it about, asking for assurance that the path of my River will conform to this map.

I’m told that all my requests have been received; there is no need to continue waving the map about and shouting out my litany of desires, requests and intentions. “Trust the benevolence of the Creator; of ‘God Inside’. Trust the flow of life that is indeed shaped by your intentions. Trust that the journey will unfold as you allow it to. Get back in the boat and release your fear-filled grip. Let go of the map, let it melt into the Energy of Life that surrounds and fills you. Breathe! Fill your lungs with this sweet Light that is the very Power of Creation, the Power of Life–a Power fueled by Love–a Power that dances with the Joy of Consciousness. Sing! And with trust and gratitude move again into the flow of the River of your Life.”

I won’t know until I go.

This is paddling down the River of my Life: acting upon what I DO know and keeping the promises I’ve made to mySelf, to my Creator and to others. It is honoring the Gift I have been given by developing it and sharing it with the world. It is focusing my energy and love upon the work I’ve been given, embracing joy and gratitude each day. Stroke by stroke, I move down the River, in the flow, the flow of Life that allows more Life.

I don’t know if the path of this River will conform to the map I carried in my head; perhaps it won’t and perhaps I will be glad because there is so much I do not know. Keeping faith with the Creator of the Universe? What a terrifying and awesome request–to trust enough in the benevolence of the Creator to let go of my control, releasing my expectations, and relaxing into Love.