9/17/18—Battling Myself

Tonight as I hopped in the shower, I realized I've been feeling frail lately. And, as the hot water poured down upon my head, I questioned myself, "Am I frail or am I stronger than I ever imagined?"

In my moment of fragility, I wanted to answer, "I am frail". But even then I couldn't. I am alive and better than I've been in years. I'm stronger than I ever imagined.

I can't count how many times I came close to death in the 2010s...times I was in significant trauma that I can only now see how serious it was. The first three months of this year was a festival of those moments, with multiple hospital visits and ambulance rides. I slept with the door unlocked in case I couldn't make it to the door in an emergency. Turning over in bed left me breathless. Crying fatigued me, so I couldn't cry. I waited while my heart valve told me I was dying and my doctors told me my valve wasn't as bad as I thought. When they finally looked at it when I was moving, they were literally horrified by what they saw (I know this because my cardiologist told me as much afterward) and scheduled surgery immediately. The horror they saw was the horror I had been living with for years while they considered me everything from a hypochondriac to overly dramatic.

Nobody heard me. Nobody seemed to care. Meanwhile, I was terrified all the time. It was like a waking version of that nightmare where you can't scream. No matter what I said or how bad I looked, nobody heard me screaming.

When you're sick like that, you learn to cope by being frail. By being aware of your frailty, you make choices to protect yourself. You avoid drains on your energy. You sleep a lot. You cocoon. If you refused to acknowledge your frailty, you'd overextend yourself and make yourself sick. It's more than just a state of health, it's a state of mind.

I suppose I have been feeling frail lately because I got some sort of chest cold or something and it's taking a long time to clear up. But I also realized I had become comfortable with frail. That frail had become one of the ways I saw myself. And I also realized it had become outdated.

On the other hand, when you've been defined by your limitation for so long, it's scary to come out of that. You have learned to live with your prison. And you believe in the prison because when you tried to go beyond your limits, your limits stopped you. So, even though I'm well, it intimidates me to go beyond those previous limits. I've done it, of course, but my brain hasn't been reprogrammed to "stronger than I ever knew" yet. 

It's not just the feeling of frailty that I'm confronting lately. I'm confronting a lot of things. My mindsets of feeling unloved, not worth spending time on, and like nobody cares has come into question. So many stepped up to the plate for me once they knew I needed help. And, of course, my dogs understood my situation and took good care of me. So I don't get to go through life thinking that anymore...not without my higher self reminding me it's not true. 

And I also gave my power over to doctors....as we all are trained to do. The fact is, they can perform miracles and can save your life, but if you're feeling horrible and they're telling you you're fine, it's your duty to your body/self to tell them to go to hell until you find one that listens. I have definitely learned to trust myself over doctors through this ordeal. So another fallacy I am challenging is that I have to defer to others who are "smarter than me" about my body. Turns out, even overweight and out of shape, I'm more of knowledgeable about how my body is feeling than they are. 

And beneath these things are other truths I have to come to terms with. The world doesn't think I'm frail and vulnerable. I do. So I see the world through those eyes. And it's not necessarily the world that doesn't care about me or listen to me or see me unworthy (though those people do exist). It's me who does that. And I greet the world through those eyes, so it's no surprise I get that in return. In addition, I'm the one that enabled the doctors to tell me I was fine when I wasn't. They didn't trust my accounts and I didn't trust myself enough to make them. My lack of trust in myself supported their lack of trust in me.

Maybe it's what I've been through the last few years, or maybe it's just my age, but there is a reckoning of sorts going on within me now. I'm battling myself and it can be nothing but good for me, as painful as it is to abide in the short term. 

So consider the things you feel about your world right now. Maybe you feel insignificant. Or unloved. Or betrayed. Less than. Over the hill. Hopeless. Or incapable. Challenge those beliefs. Is it possible you're the one that perpetuates your insignificance? Do you actually betray yourself? Are you the one focusing on your limitations and not your possibilities? 

In all my many years of spiritual exploration and looking inward, I have yet to come across a problem anyone else could fix for me. Except for my heart valve. :D But I'm talking about my beliefs and my issues with others. All of those things can only be fixed and healed by myself. Even when it's clear someone else is to blame, I find that I played a role myself. And when I start to heal the reasons why I believed something or put up with something for so long, the problem disappears...or I move beyond the problem. 

So what's bugging you and what do you need to change to heal it? It may not be a fun process, but at least you can take comfort in knowing that I and many others are going through it alongside you.

9/10/18—Waiting For Fall

I'm fortunate to live in a part of the US that has four distinct seasons each year—beautiful, miserable, breathtaking and reflective.

I have declared summer (aka "miserable") over a number of times in the past month, only to have it return uglier than ever. I hesitate to do so again, but it is cold and rainy outside and I have hope…a NEED…for autumn to be here at last. It’s my favorite time of year and I believe it's especially spectacular in the mid-Atlantic. The temperatures are perfect for being outside, building fires, hiking on trails, leaf peeping. And as the leaves fall, they lay the branches bare, prompting us to do the same within.

For me, spring and summer coax my energy out of my body. Fall and winter lead it within, toward the core of my spirit. As days grow shorter and nights get cooler, the presence of spirit seems to grow stronger in me. To me, that means not just being "in good spirits". But it also means a deepening connection and communion with that energy or source that we are part of, yet is greater than us all, whether you call it God, nature, Buddha or something else.

I can’t deny "waiting" for a spiritual connection to find me, instead of going after it right now. I've been feeling disconnected for a while and nothing seems to "take" lately. While there have been times connection feels effortless, we still have to show up...and show up in the right frame of mind...to receive. We can't expect spirit to beam into us while we're returning emails, running errands or watching TV. In fact, for me, I am most connected when I am fully in the moment, and even more when I am fully in the moment in meditation or prayer.

Autumn has a way of supporting that connection in me. It’s cool. It’s beautiful. I want to be out and about. And the prompt of having those leaves falling off the tree triggers a shedding for me, too. It leads me within. While I’m always led within, there’s a different quality to it…creative, surrendering, safe.

There has been a lot of heavy stuff on my mind. Some of it I’m not ready to tell. Other stuff I can’t speak of to protect the privacy of others. All of it leaves me uneasy because I have dropped my connection and am counting on fall to bring it back to me. It sounds a bit lazy and silly, I know. But fall has a way of bringing healing to these kinds of things for me. It can’t get here soon enough.

8/27/18—Finding My Inspiration

I started doing some writing this week on a book I'm calling The Seeker's Guide to the Spiritual Path. And it was a truly mystical experience.

I was writing the story of how I started on my spiritual path and all the influences that shaped my beliefs. I've told short versions before, centered around how I learned about forgiveness and set out on my spiritual journey in the wake of my father's death.

The story I've never told before was the FULL story that includes a tiny red book my mother kept in her bedside table. Neither of my parents were religious and, if it weren't for this red book, I would claim neither were spiritual, also. But my mother would frequently pull this book out and read it. It seemed to bring her comfort.

At first I thought it was a book of love poems and thought it was odd my mother would refer to it over and over again throughout the years. But what I didn't realize until after she was gone was that the Rubaiyat by Omar Khayyam was a book of devotional poems written about the Divine. 

I was too young and atheistic and, frankly, heartbroken at the time she died to care too much about that little red book. But when I look back over my life, I see that I was always curious about it, just not curious enough. That is, not until I really started on my own spiritual journey. 

So, I was writing about all of this and got very emotional because I felt my mother all around me. I heard her in my ear and felt her in my fingers as I tapped the story out. My mother died when I was 21, so I'll never really know her relationship to that book, but I always thought it was like a Bible to her. And while she would quote from it from time to time, I suspect her relation to those words was something she kept private, as we all do with our most intimate and personal thoughts. 

Part of why I got emotional is because it has been rare in the past 32 years to feel my mother around me. And there have been times I have desperately needed her. Even when I dream about her, I dream about her not communicating with me! It makes no sense because I felt she and I had a deep soul bond in life. We locked horns many times, but underneath we both understood it was because we were too much alike. As she was dying, we were very close. There were times I was the only one allowed to touch her and care for her. I felt there was a deep understanding between us about a lot of things. I thought if she were to come back to anyone, it would be me, if for no other reason than that, with my psychic capabilities, I'd be the easiest to connect to. 

So I have felt hurt and been puzzled over this for years. I told myself it's because she and I have no unfinished business. My father and I had a lot of unfinished business and he came around A LOT during certain times of my life. 

So, as I was embarking on writing this particular book, and as I was insecure about my abilities and qualifications, and as my mother and her little red book were swirling up around me, I decided to randomly choose a quatrain from the Rubaiyat to read for inspiration. The number 28 popped into my head. This is what #28 says:

With them the seed of Wisdom did I sow,
And with mine own hand wrought to make it grow;
And this was all the Harvest that I reap'd--  
"I came like Water, and like Wind I go." 


OK. So. Wow. First, it speaks to the role of a spiritual teacher, walking the talk. And the transcendence that can come from that practice. But then it also speaks to the seed planted within me by my mother's deep connection to the book at her bedside, kind of like she had passed the baton to me. Of all the 101 verses in that book, this one in particular, speaks most to the role of the teacher, the student and the seeker. 

Then, I found my mother's favorite passage. As I read it, I connected to her sense of spirituality. As a child, I misunderstood the "Thou" for a lover. But the "Thou" is god and it speaks to solitary communion with the higher power (it also conjures up the thought of Buddha under the Bodhi tree):

A Book of Verses underneath the Bough,
A Jug of Wine, a Loaf of Bread--and Thou
Beside me singing in the Wilderness--
Oh, Wilderness were Paradise enow!


So as I was writing this part of my book, I dove deep into a swirl of my mother's energy for the first time in over 30 years. And I knew she'd be with me in some way as I wrote moving forward. And all of this gave me encouragement and peace on entering the author phase of my life. I'm already an author, I know. But the Deck of 1000 Spreads was more a product than a book to me. Books like the one I'm writing now are what I'm becoming an author to relate.


Another thought has occurred to me over the past week, too. It involves why my mother waited so long to come to me. I was raised in a home that was about as free as you can get from religious or spiritual input. And yet look at me...a blogger with 1200 posts on spirituality and multiple books in progress. A discussion with my mother about that little red book would have been lovely. Her insights on her journey would mean everything to me. She died too soon for us to share this in real time.


So maybe that was our unfinished business. I hadn't even realized how much that book of hers influenced me before I sat down to write about it. In fact, I've been realizing her influence a lot lately. I have zero doubt that if she were alive we would not only be kindred in our beliefs, but she would be my biggest fan in my efforts as an author. I'm feeling now that I am carrying a torch that she lit—a torch she couldn't carry for herself. And whether that's accurate or not, it is just the inspiration I've been looking for.

8/20/18—Eating Boogers and Farting

A couple of weeks ago* I posted that one of my best kept secrets was that I liked to do ceremonies. To that, someone quipped that I have fewer and fewer secrets all the time. It seems as if my evil plot may be working. :D

When I'm not being jibed for over-sharing or sharing the obvious, I hear people say I'm brave to post about my fears, anxieties and inadequacies (as well as more positive stuff) online for everyone to see. You wouldn't know that just a few years ago, the thought of doing that was too scary for me. In fact, for most of my life I felt I had to contain my more negative or weaker aspects, lest people would think differently of me or change the way they saw me. I had a lot of fear around that. I guess I wanted to look like I had things all together. But I also feared that if I ever tried to do anything notable, someone would stand up and expose me in some way...mar some image of myself I had tried to create.

Unlike most issues that people would rather keep hidden, when you're overweight most of your life, one of your biggest issues is right there for everyone to see and judge. So appearing otherwise charming and pulled together was also kind of like damage control for me. It protected me from further hurt. Or so I thought.

But the fact is you can't control what others think of you. Whether you're a mass murderer or Mother Theresa, you will always have people who dislike you for one reason or another. Those people will always whisper behind your back. Some will tell hurtful lies about you. Some will tell painful truths. And most will be doing it in their own effort to make it look like they're more pulled together than you.

Putting it all (well, not ALL) out there has actually proved to be very freeing. I don't have to worry about people saying, "well, did you know she sometimes wears her pajamas all day and into the next?" Or "she acts all happy, but I'll bet she has problems with depression." I don't have to worry about anything like that and, in retrospect, I wish I'd never worried in the first place. It has held me back in some ways. But now if someone were to accuse me of, say, losing my temper with telemarketers, I can just point them to a blog where I've already admitted it to the world. :D It's not news. Coming out as flawed and neurotic is very freeing. :)

But there's another reason why I open up about fears around mammograms, inner conflicts around moving on from friendships, anxieties around writing, sad moments from my past, internal fears and all the other stuff I've written about in over 1000 posts. I write about it because it's not stuff we talk about. It's stuff we keep inside because we're ashamed, have nobody to tell, or think we're the only one or whatever.

Remember when you were a kid and the most horrific thing you could be accused of was farting or eating your boogers? I was never able to understand why that was, because doesn't everyone fart? And doesn't every kid sup on a booger or two? So why all the shame around it? Why all the mockery and meanness around it? Even in kindergarten, I understood the unfairness and hypocrisy of it all. We were all booger-eating farters! And yet some kids got branded with the scarlet B or F, while the accusers (who often went home to a large plate of boogers, followed by a bonfire fueled by nothing but farts, btw) came out looking like they had no adverse bodily functions at all!

So this idea of shame and separation and limitation at the hands of things we all have in common has bothered me for a really long time. We all have dark moments and times when we weren't at our best. We all have self doubts and crap we kick ourselves over. We all have bad habits and blind spots. We all have guilty pleasures. And yes, we all fart. And I'll be the first to admit that some of the things I've talked about on this blog have held me back. In fact, this very thing—the secrets we keep, not because we cherish them, but because we have shame or embarrassment around them—has held me back...kept me in the shadows and contributed to fears around being all I can be.

So I say stuff here and, instead of being judged, people thank me because they no longer feel so alone. They no longer feel like a booger-eating farter. And the thing is, I still have private things. And  you'd think I feel more vulnerable because of all this sharing, but I actually feel less vulnerable. By the time something makes it to the blog, I've come to terms with it. The blogging actually helps me work through it. Pushing "publish" is like getting another stamp on my passport to freedom on the matter. 

Opening up your baggage and placing it on display like this isn't for everyone. But we're all carrying stuff around that imprisons us. Maybe we drink too much. Or our marriage isn't as idyllic as it's portrayed. Maybe we've got a kid who's struggling in some way. Have a lot of debt. Are afraid of the changes ahead of us. Or maybe we're a fully grown adult who doesn't even have the first idea of who we are. There's nothing in any of that that can't be understood and felt by people around us.

So today I just want to say that, whatever it is, you're ok. Your issue is understood and shared in some way by more people than you know. And that it's ok to find someone—or an entire community—you can trust to confide in so you don't have to carry the secret on your shoulders any longer. It's ok to slough that weight and move on.

I suppose there's some value to being more of a woman of mystery. But I'd rather be a woman of truth. Illusion takes a lot of work to maintain and you don't even realize how much until you start letting it drop away. Let's face it, we can't run from ourselves. We know who we are. To hide it from everyone else just keeps people from understanding you, seeing you as you are and loving you regardless. It just makes us feel alone. We're so much more alike than we know. And the fewer and fewer secrets we keep, the thinner the wall is between ourself and the rest of humanity. 

*This is a classic post from 8/6/14.

8/13/18—Getting Back to the Silence

I've been avoiding silence lately. 

I tell myself that I meditate and spend a lot of time in silence, but that is not currently the truth. It hasn't been that way for a while. I'm used to spending a lot of time in my head, but clear, constructive head space was overtaken by worry, fear and non-constructive chatter a while ago. 

What's more, I find myself restless when I do sit in silence these days. If I'm outside, I go in the house where the TV is on. If I'm inside, I turn on the TV, peruse the internet or otherwise put noise in my head. Or I'll nap. Reading, radio, whatever...it's all noise that may make you think, but it distracts you from inner work. 

The thing is, when I'm able to get a big dose of nothingness, I feel great. I feel more powerful. More connected to the universe and its flow. When I transcend earthly concerns—even for a few minutes—I get hours of relief from the list making or worrying or dreaming or self-flagellation or whatever else that's making my head chatter and keep me both out of the moment and out of constructive thought. So what am I avoiding confronting? And why am I choosing a noisy head over relief?

Some of it may be part of a gestation within me. Sometimes I feel like I process things unconsciously while being distracted, yielding passive growth. But some of it, I know, is self sabotage, holding myself in an outdated place because it's comfortable. 

When I was sick, few things past survival were possible. I lived in that reality for years, frustrated by my limitations. Now I have possibilities again but I'm not doing anything about it! I'm not even sure if what I wanted before is what I want now. Is it big enough or right enough to be worthy of a second chance at life? 

In some ways, I have to reassess who I am, what I want and how best to serve. Which, of course, is a cycle we go through over and over again—catch up to our current self, move forward in our new shoes, coast, realize we've changed, catch up to our current self again. I'm just not sure I've ever felt it so heavily before. 

So that's where my head is at. Right now I just want to escape and, for some reason, I think that's not OK. Maybe I fear I'm just procrastinating or I'll never make certain changes. But maybe I have to learn to give myself permission to just rebalance, reassess, figure out where I'm going and chart a course. For me, there's a thin line between the two. But I do feel a calling back to the silence, regardless. Hopefully I'll get there soon.

8/6/18—Stopping The World

Stop the world: I want to get off.

That was the name of a musical that came out a few years after I was born. I remember hearing the phrase as a toddler and not knowing what it meant. But I found it a very interesting premise.

Maybe five years after that, I remember watching a merry-go-round spin and contemplating the idea again. I still didn't understand what it meant. But I wondered why anyone would want the world to stop just for them.

As I meandered through adulthood, I came to understand. Sometimes life moves too fast. Too much is happening. You can't catch your breath. Maybe you're dreading some form of adulting you have to do. Or maybe you've had too much of humanity for a while. 

Most of my world-stopping fits into that last category. I went through a protracted phase about a decade ago where I just really felt I didn't fit in with humanity. Recently, however, I've been struggling with all the other motivations. I've been through A LOT the last few years. And I just want to walk away from life. I want to drop all my worries and woes and never look back. But I can't afford to do that monetarily and, frankly, I think if I ever did just take off for a month or two, I would never come back. I might be lost to society forever. I'm just hermity and bohemian enough for that. Not that that would be a bad thing...

In the musical, the main character takes issue with everything in his life. His wife isn't good enough. His job isn't good enough. His children are girls, not boys. 

He has affairs. He attains wealth and status. Yet he continues searching for what's better. Then, one day, his wife dies and he realizes that he always had plenty of love in his life, but he never stopped searching for more long enough to appreciate it. With this, he is a changed man. He is no longer "selfish". He learns to put others first.

I have a lot to be grateful for. When this year began, I was close to death. I had fought a years-long battle with some "mysterious illness" and it was taking my life while my doctors watched and dragged their heels. All of that is over now. I should be elated. And I am. I feel like I have conscious gratitude for that on a daily basis. I have a second chance and I truly appreciate that. 

My complaint is that that struggle has moved on to another struggle—albeit a rosier one—without giving me time to take a breath in between. I only stopped working for two weeks after my heart surgery, ferchrissakes, and I spent all that time drugged and institutionalized. 

When you are given a second chance, all sorts of considerations arise, including "why was I saved...what was I kept alive to accomplish?" Then on top of that, you need to earn money to survive. You may have obligations to others. We are truly on a hamster wheel that never stops spinning. And while you hear stories of people dropping all worldly responsibilities and trekking across the US on a shoestring budget in search of meaning, I don't have the balls to do that. 

It's not just me, though. I see others all around me struggling with that same thing. When my brother died, my sister in law didn't have the luxury of having a proper nervous breakdown because she had four kids to raise. When people have children, they don't get a breather in between. In fact, for most of us, life changes of any sort catapult us immediately onto another game board that we have to learn to maneuver. 

Fact is, if I had a month—or a year—of grace from life, I would do nothing and accomplish nothing. I wouldn't properly take advantage of the opportunity. I'd spend all my time in my head (and I can do that without a roadtrip!) Then I would bemoan the "waste" of a month or year of my life, even if doing nothing was my entire objective. Besides, even if you do stop the world for a little, you'll have to return sooner or later...or end up half crazy in some remote cabin in the woods. 

It seems like the only way to win is to accept and find the gifts within the hamster wheel. The gifts for me lately have included being a little more social, a little less fearful and a slow return to the enjoyment of wandering around in nature. There is some excitement and growth unfolding for me now. Focusing on that, rather than the ways the world is either too overwhelming, too crazy or not enough for me, makes me long for escape a little less. And let's face it, even if you did stop the world, there would still be adulting to do—gotta feed the dogs, cook food, keep your space clean, etc. 

If I had enough money not to worry, I'd take that sabbatical. But I don't. So instead, I'm going to take life. I've already had the alternative. I'm happy to just be alive. I may not be alive on some meditative spa retreat or on a roadtrip to National Parks with my pups, but I'll take it.

7/30/18—Seeing The Light

I apologize in advance if today's post gets a little gloomy. It was inspired partly by someone I thought I knew, but didn't, and partly by the recent death of Philip Seymour Hoffman (this post is from 2014). What the two things have in common is something we all have in common—a dark side. 

Beneath the addictions, obsessions, bullying, lying, anger, abuse, excesses and other unhealthy behaviors lies pain and fear. And no matter how beautiful, rich, famous, talented or loved you are, you're not immune. Nobody is immune. 

We hurt ourselves and others because WE are in pain and can't always pinpoint the source. Maybe we had something tragic happen to us, but really that's just an excuse. What's really at the bottom of this, I believe, is something we forgot before we were even born. 

Before we come here and after we leave, we are without ego. Ego in the way I use the word is a self awareness that separates ourselves from others. So it manifests in us feeling "more than" or "less than" others. It seeks approval. Yearns for status. Desires recognition and understanding. Speaks in terms of us and them. Wherever you find ego, you also find a forgetting of our true nature...the one we'll return to when we die.

Our true nature is oneness. Universal love. It is inclusion. There is no separateness or self awareness because there is no individuality. All is one. If god indeed said "I am that I am", what that means is that we are everything we see. We are. There is no separation between you and the most vile entity on earth. No separation between you and the most beloved on earth. There can be no separation, because everything is one. And everything is an expression of love.

But, see, we come here to be individuals. And as long as we're individuals there will always be a pained, lonely, frightened place within that seeks the universal love we love we left behind. We may not remember, but the soul never forgets. There are times when we are so filled with light (or delusion...haha) that we drift far enough away from this place that it seems to disappear, but that is just an illusion. It is always there. This pain, loneliness and fear comes from believing we're separate from source. And it's the price of being human.

There are times that the experiences of life and the attachment to ego build upon our souls like so many magnetized barnacles that we draw ever closer into the gravitational field of this painful empty place. If we don't reach this place by our own volition, we may be pulled into it by a loved one. We may even be wired to explore this place through depression or mental illness. Sometimes it is all we can see. And the closer we get, the more pain we feel and the more pain we cause. We try to keep it at bay with drugs or purchases, anger or violence, lying or bullying. But that just makes it worse. 

And the further into the hole we travel, the more it hurts and the lonelier it feels. And then even the most brilliant and fortunate among us end up dead of an overdose with the hypodermic still in our arm. And we think, "what a waste of such a gifted life." But see, that's just our ego talking. There are no adjectives or superlatives in oneness, only in our separation. Interestingly, however, even in our separateness, we are still the same. Because we all have this place inside. 

But this empty, lonely place can be filled. The only thing that can fill it is universal love. And the path to universal love is the recognition of oneness. When we see an angry person, we recognize them as ourself and we love them...not from a place of being better off, but from a place of recognition of self. There is no human atrocity we can deny being within us (albeit dormant, perhaps), just as there is no human grace. We are all of that. We are. 

And while there are many paths that can lead us there, regular communion with god or source or light or whatever you want to call it, is key to spending as much time as possible in a place where the gravity of the empty place is the weakest. This is why we seek to raise ourselves and grow...so we can  balance our humanness with what we've forgotten. Not so we can forget we're human, because that's why we're here. But to remember we're so much more.