Tag Archives: Healing

CRYING IN THE DARK

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November 10, 2020

Yesterday I posted a letter I’d written to my eldest daughter. I was trying to express what I feel is needed during this time of great division, intense suffering and for many, myself included, confusion.

I suggested deep listening. I said we need to choose to divest ourselves of judgment and find the courage to be open-minded and open-hearted to one another. I said we need to find the strength to question our solidly held positions — what if there is more to the story? What if there is truth in the beliefs/truths held by others that seem in opposition to what I have believed to be true? What if the information we have trusted, proves itself false?

This morning I deleted the post.

I woke up feeling more heavy hearted than I have felt in some time. I’m feeling the intensity of the pain that is washing over this whole country, my family included. The pain feels worse, more intense, than it did before.  The division feels more solid than before. I feel the heat of the anger and the rage leaking into the air we are breathing.

I’m frightened, for my own family as well as the country. I don’t know what my role is during this time, but my heart gravitates to wanting to bring people together to heal. Despite whatever is being reported, whether it is true or not, and no matter who is behind the terrible things happening and predicted, I know in the deepest part of me that we have to find a way to stand together and not against each other. Somehow we need to find a way to figure out and see through what is the lie, and what is the truth. 

But this morning I feel ignorant and confused and it seems impossible to ever bring everyone together around the table to remember that loving one another is most important.

But still…and yet… well…

I know that we need to consider that each person is “our other self” as the Alaskan Unangan people believe. Who would harm their own selves unless they have lost all hope and all faith in themselves and others? We cannot lose our hope or our faith…

But how do we manage this “coming together”? What do we need to do?

How do we spread the message to “DO NO HARM”?

How do we find the courage within us to open our eyes and see the common ground we all stand upon, and the common values and desires that bind us together?

How do we find the strength to work from our common ground and our shared values to stand against this darkness?

How do we help others to find the courage to put aside their mental, emotional and physical weapons and disengage from the brain washing that urges us to fight each other, reject each other, unfriend each other…that we need to go to war in order to bring about the conditions for peace and prosperity? 

How do we remain beacons of Light in this darkness?

SUPPORT OUR TROOPS

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November 11, 2014

I SUPPORT OUR TROOPS

I support the men and women leaving family and careers to go overseas to Iraq and Afghanistan to “serve their country”. I support them because I wish they didn’t have to go. I support them to remain safe, and whole and return able-bodied and able-minded, and most especially, able-hearted.

I support our troops. I support these men and women and pray that they will awaken deeply to the preciousness of all life— to the interconnectedness of all life—to the equality of all people and cultures. I support them to find ways to do good while they occupy a place that isn’t theirs to occupy, to do good to their fellow American service men and especially the women and to do good to the citizens of the country they are occupying. I support these men and women because whether consciously or not, intentionally or not, they are now in unique positions to bear testimony and Light to the world—to stand strong and courageously opposed to the continued mindlessness of killing and oppression. They are the most powerful witnesses for peace the world could hope for.

Several years ago I watched the testimonies of veterans at the Winter Soldier summit before Congress. One of the speakers was a co-worker of mine. These men and women spoke courageously of the crimes of war, of the violence and abuse that was not limited to being directed at “the enemy”, but was right at home within the barracks and the training fields. I will never forget the tall young man with the bright blue eyes who said that before he went to Iraq he was excited–he wanted to “go blow shit up!” Now he was ashamed of all that he had indeed blown up. This beautiful young man had shot an old woman under orders “in case she was carrying an explosive device. She wasn’t. She was just an old woman on her way somewhere and I shot her dead, bleeding out in the street.” I have read about the work of veterans against the Vietnam war, the Iraq war and the Afghanistan war—what they have seen and done and learned. Today I read the current suicide statistics of returned veterans—“every 65 minutes a veteran dies from suicide. That’s 22 per day!”

I saw a pie chart today indicating where our tax dollars are spent.  Screen Shot 2014-11-10 at 10.22.59 AM

5.6% on Veteran’s Benefits to 55% on all that outfits us for war. Another 5.5% on the needs of government. That leaves approximately 35% for all the rest of our domestic needs: education and housing and health and social security and energy and science and transportation and food.

Clearly, I am not in support of war.

I do support the men and women who have been sent off to fight these wars our leaders and their corporate sponsors create.

When he was in office, former Congressman Dennis Kucinich proposed a Department of Peace. If we can have a war department, and a defense department, why not a peace department? Pour those dollars into making reparations and amends around the world to all those we have bullied and abandoned. Pour the big salaries into men and women who know how to make peace and build relationships and co-create plans with world leaders that will allow all of us to have enough to eat and drink and a roof over our heads and education for our children and medical care. Dismantle our own WMD rather than point our finger at some lesser brother for playing with the matches we invented.

Who better to ignite this movement toward reconciliation and peace and the possibility of prosperity than the men and women who were on the front lines, witnessing the carnage and the destruction and the grief that is war and oppression and occupation? May each “peacekeeper”, become a peacemaker.

Yes, I support our troops. I support their courage and their strength and the terrible personal journey each of them are on.  I support them to find themselves, to know themselves, to separate truth from lie, Light from Dark. I love and support these brave and battered men and women—dads and moms, husbands and wives, sons and daughters, brothers and sisters.

May each one, abroad and at home, be blessed this day with a measure of peace, love and happiness. May each one find the unique healing that he or she needs, and in turn, become a healer of the world.

THE END OF A LONG, LONG JOURNEY

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WHEN YOU GET TO THE END OF YOUR HERO’S JOURNEY
YOU CELEBRATE…AND THEN SIGN ON FOR ANOTHER!

November 3, 2014

“We call upon our sisters around the world to be brave–to embrace the strength within themselves and realize their full potential.”  – Malala Yousafzai –

For two hours now I have found really important things to do other than write this blog post. I paid some bills. I sent a birthday card to my beautiful niece in London. I sent some emails off to two school principals asking to interview some of their staff for my book. I responded to some texts and emails. I finished the grocery list. I heated up some of my husband’s delicious curried vegetables for lunch. I did some laundry. I checked my to-do list a half dozen times. I found some chocolate. And ate it. I did a writing exercise after reading the article it was about. That was freaky. I was directed to turn the brightness of my screen down until I couldn’t see the words so that I would focus on the feeling of writing and write faster and not be constantly editing. I toasted a piece of my yummy, homemade gluten free bread. And ate it. I opened my blog page and looked to see who is following me. A bunch of folks I never met. That’s cool.

Okay. So, I want to tell you about this amazing weekend I had. I want to use words that will show you rather than tell you, but the words seem to have scurried down the cracks between the floorboards. Or maybe they curled up in the afghan since its only 63 degrees in here. Typical November day–grey. All the leaves fell down so the trees are bare now. The hillside looks like a charcoal drawing–smudgy lines and streaks of grey and black with a few wispy shades of brown brushed through.

I don’t remember anymore what it felt like when I woke up in the morning as a kid. But since sometime in my mid-teens, with extremely rare exceptions, I have always woken up with a knot in my gut. The older I got, the tighter it got. There have been days when I woke up and it wasn’t there. Those days are so incredible that I remember vividly what it feels like. Buoyant. Light. Happy. Easy. I think the last time I was in New York City.

Over the past nearly 20 years I have been on a journey; a quest I supposeSoulCard 6. I have wanted to experience healing in my body, my mind and my heart. Despite feeling a lot of love in my heart for others I have struggled to allow that love to flow outward to them, afflicted with criticalness and judgment, anger and frustration. I’ve been on this hero’s journey to become Grace, to learn to love, to be a light in the world, to make a difference for good, to be the change I want to see–all the time wrestling with these monsters that rage and storm through me. NO TRESPASSING signs don’t work.  They barge in whenever they feel like it.

I’ve studied positive attitude. I’ve studied how to change by changing habits of mind embedded in old belief structures. I’ve worked at it. I’ve worked hard. To my credit, yes, I’ve grown. I’ve learned things and I’ve dismantled old belief and energy structures that were not healthy and did not serve me or my relationships or my work. At one time in my life frequent depressions would flatten my life completely. I used to say it was as though a Black Hole was constantly orbiting my life. I was aware of its presence at all times, wondering when it would suck me into its fathomless depths yet again. But it has been many years since I’ve even sensed that Blackness, none-the-less become its dinner.

And yet, I have still not known what it is like to wake up naturally exuberant and happy and eager to engage in the activities of the day. I love better and deeper than at any other time in my life, and yet, my inner critic is a brazen loudmouth who never shuts up and feels it his duty to include others in his constant critiques. Particularly husbands.

It has been a long journey. Ever been on a long road trip and have your passengers begin asking, “Are we almost there?” And then, more urgently, “Aren’t we there yet?” It’s the same with these hero’s journeys. (Why do they call them hero’s journeys anyway? They so do not feel like anything remotely heroic!) “GThe Hero's Journeyood God, aren’t I almost there? How much longer? This sure looks familiar, haven’t I been here before? Didn’t I already cover this section? Wait a minute–I do not have to go down inside that, do I? Really? It’s the only way through to the other side? Oh shit. Okay, so I made it through. I’m still alive. I’m on the other side… …So how come I’m still not there yet?! How much further? How much longer? I’m lost. This sucks. I just want to be happy, like, really happy. I just want to be able to do life successfully, to love well, to be light in the world, to do good work. Consistently. I feel like I’m battering on locked gates and kicking at locked doors and trying to find my way through a veil of fog. ARRGGHH!”

Yeah, that’s a hero’s journey.  Maybe it got that name because if you manage somehow to stick with it until you actually do come to the end of it, however battered and bruised, the very fact you didn’t give up makes you a hero of some kind.Beyond the Door

Okay. Last weekend. While I was sleeping, I guess, I came to the end of it. I arrived. I finally made it through the locked door into another world. I don’t know why. I don’t know how. I don’t know why on Saturday and not last year or ten years ago or not until March 15th next year. It was now. I woke up and I could feel it in my body–something had shifted. It would be like having a pounding migraine headache for 3 weeks and suddenly waking up and it’s gone. Completely gone. It was like the morning I woke up years ago and I knew the Black Hole was gone. I just knew. And it was. And it never came back.

I feel light in my body. The knots and edginess are gone. The energy of those around me no longer feels like I’m trying to tolerate someone running their fingernails down a chalkboard. The thought of “work” no longer feels like an order to climb a mountain dragging a broken leg. Even thinking of the pile of bills for which there is no money elicits rising excitement to see how on earth this will all work out!

Whatever the blockages to the flow of Divine energy through my physical and emotional body have been, they aren’t there now. I feel love, warm and vibrant inside me. Flows of LoveI feel that love flowing through me and from me. I feel sorrow for the pain I have caused others–and oh, how clearly I can see it now that I don’t feel that knee-jerk egotistical defensiveness! I’m looking full in the face the ways that my self-absorption, selfishness, and especially all my fears have harmed others, but though I feel some grief and regret, I no longer feel worthless. Instead I feel renewed responsibility to do better. And I feel like I have the energy to do so.

The beauty in the world around me and in the people around me fills me up with happy joy! I marvel that so many people in the world wake up this way every day. I marvel at what we could all achieve in our lives and how much more loving a world this would be if we could all be free from the bondage of Fear that poisons and taints every aspect of our lives. Fear is the Dark Destroyer–the Dark Consciousness–the Father of Lies and Illusion.

I am free. For those of you who are also free–you are blessed. For those of you who wrestle monsters in the dark, don’t give up. Don’t give up. And hold fast the thought that even if you cannot see or feel it, there is a loving Presence that is with you, always.

All Through the Night
Sleep my child and peace attend theeThe Guardian
All through the night
Guardian angels God will send thee
All through the night

Soft the drowsy hours are creeping
Hill and vale in slumber steeping
I my loving watch am keeping
All through the night

While the moon her watch is keeping
All through the night
While the weary world is sleeping
All through the night

O’er thy spirit gently stealing
Visions of delight revealing
Breathes a pure and holy feeling
All through the night

Photos courtesy of David Jensen, Northern Visions Media
Soul Card images from Soul Cards 2 by Deborah Koff-Chapin of Touch Drawing