Recognizing the ruby slippers

Listen to post:

In some reflective journaling this morning, I came up with a new equation:
ENERGY = TRUST

Instantly, I sensed this also as TRUTH for me: pivotal, essential and wisdom pared to the core. Right now I'm just letting it sink in and experiencing a deep response outside of my brain. It's a cellular message. In my body, that's what I need to truly understand something, then it can trickle up to my brain. Doesn't work for me the other way around or, if it does, it takes years.

This message has been working its way into me for some time, but I suspect that a new healing-touch exercise I was taught and practiced this morning may have helped it manifest in an expression I can grasp.

One of my water buddies had just been to a healing-touch conference and she was anxious to connect with me and show me this effective technique for fibro and, well, anyone. It's simply a matter of reclining comfortably with feet rolling out and tapping your big-toe joints together and gently rocking your feet, legs and hips back and forth for up to five minutes. I couldn't even wait to get home to try it; I practiced in the empty sauna beginning with a minute. Instantly, I felt everything from my sacrum downward loosen.

Must've also loosened me for listening.

I began my journaling about this long waiting process of getting into my new writing, art and nurture studio. A process that began well over a year ago, but has been active since February. As I have written in Facebook posts, getting the grant money was the easy part. Going back and forth with the school, getting a clear timeframe and move-in date has been a three-month roller-coaster ride of stops and starts. These fits feed the fibro and rob my energy ... if I let it.

This morning I am recognizing that if I can trust God to let things unfold and prayerfully ask to know when to act and when to sit back and relax, I receive energy among other things.

But how counter-cultural is that? Waiting? Every fiber in this culture teaches us otherwise: to go out and get what we desire NOW. Instant gratification.

I have to remind myself of a time back in January at a retreat labyrinth when I was told I would not be asked to do any more than I would receive help with and, when I doubted, to prayerfully return to this place, this promise.

I have been too busy, e-mailing and phoning the school, insurance companies, developing, designing and writing a website and materials, planning and plotting. Almost as if I had forgotten to return when life gets ultra busy.

Prayer, really, is what helps me trust.

And, when I trust, energy is restored.

I reached this conclusion this morning after discerning that this waiting period has been a baptism, purifying and burning off all that is unnecessary and NOT me. That list included: insecurity, fear, anger, worry, regret and doubt. What's left are: drive, certainty, gratitude, awe, perseverance and creativity. Essentially, ENERGY=TRUST.

• What new equations are working in my life?
• How do I tend to receive messages?
• What helps me become receptive?
• What role does trust play in this process?
• What role does prayer play?


it's like I've had
the ruby slippers on the
whole time

and not known
their power

like I could
go home
whenever I
wanted,

returning
for that
deep, cellular
wisdom

from the
Divine spot
within

Not hoarding myself

Listen to post:

Ever noticed the difference a smile or venturing to say hello can make?

Plenty, in my experience. Take, for example, the Chinese woman who swims next to me Tuesdays and Thursdays. If I don’t say it first, she insists on offering a huge greeting each and every time we encounter one another. It wasn’t always so. I’d heard other swimmers complain that, when forced to share a lane with her, she created heavy waves and took up too much room. They hinted that, perhaps, she didn’t understand our rules … you know, the ones we Americans apply … the unwritten and, often, culturally exclusive, ones.

One day when the lanes were full, I politely asked her if she’d share. No problem. I smiled and said hello first. You can’t image the doors that has opened with her and others. Not only did we share, but we did so without hindering the other, even managed to enjoy the crowded quarters.

Ever since, we greet each other warmly and have shared again. I missed her for many weeks after the first of the year, though her husband would show up. Turns out she was visiting her home in Hong Kong for six weeks. We took up where we had left off. I don’t notice that anyone other than her husband and another Chinese couple speak to her. A fellow swimming friend told me they lived in her neighborhood, but she wasn’t certain they spoke any English. I know she does.

It reminds me of the time I traveled to Italy solo and was reticent at first to speak Italian. I felt left out and lonely, then forced myself to belt out buon giorno each time I  encountered anyone who would look me in the eyes: to the young man on the street in Florence, the well-builders in Chianti, the elderly woman at the market and the mother on the bus. Every time, I was warmly greeted just for having tried. It was a signal that I was opening myself to the world.

People complain that New York City is cold and impersonal. Years ago when my mother and I made a trip to view a Van Gogh show, a companion bus traveler gave us tokens to board. We were uninitiated and tried to use cash. The driver reciprocated her gesture, sailed through three stoplights and got us to the Met on time!

As an introvert, it’s not always easy to open myself to others, especially strangers. Children, however, are the exception. Creating that opening requires energy and confidence. I am not always in the mood to be so generous. When I am, the rewards more than make up for any effort.

Why is saying hello first so difficult?

Because opening to a stranger catapults us out of our little selves and comfort zone. Perhaps we’re too busy, in too much of a rush, are multi-tasking and didn’t even notice the other. Maybe we’re afraid or don’t want to bother, especially if we are merely visiting and will never see this person again.

But what a loss not to encounter the smile from a stranger’s lips if only fleetingly.

• What’s happens when I push myself to open to another, even a stranger, first?

• How many lost opportunities have I experienced?

• What has been the reward of such an encounter?

• What have I discovered is the best way to feel at home someplace else?

• What are the gifts of connecting with a stranger even for a moment?

all knotted up

in a tight ball

with room only

for my agenda

hardly

noticing

the man ready

to spend a smile

if only encouraged

with a few

warming words

or the woman

whose glance

I ignored

because I didn’t

want to engage

what of God was I

slighting in that person?

what of myself

was I hoarding?

Praying to the porcelain God

Listen to this post:

With the flush of a toilet, I had a flash of insight. No kidding. People in my house don't like to flush the toilet, neither do those who frequent the women's changing room at my local pool. Tell me what that's about.

It gets old cleaning up other people's, well, shit LITERALLY. When I said this out loud to myself, it hit something big, really, really big. All of my life I have been cleaning up for others, worrying myself about what I can do to make things better, how I can accommodate even strangers so that I am out of their way.

Last summer, when I took a half dozen Alexander Technique lessons from a very gifted teacher, she told me to "stop holding the door and moving out of the way for people. It takes too much of your energy," which she knew I didn't have. The technique is about moving fluidly, efficiently without extra effort or pain.

Yesterday I was taxi-driver galore, carting kids to lessons, the pool and home from friend's houses. Seems to be the pattern this summer. No wonder I'm not getting much work accomplished. I'm so wiped out that I don't have anything left for anyone, including my ill friend (who IS better) and myself. A couple of weeks ago when I needed a week just to rebound, someone wondered why I could not visit the hospital all week. The answer is: "because I couldn't." I know my energy robbers and parking in what seems like another state, walking as far as humanly possible across the hospital's suburban acreage, then from the very front of the building to the extreme back just to visit was taxing. And it's not that I'm out of shape; I swim a half mile daily ... just to have the energy I require. Then there's the sterile environment with florescent lights that used to trigger migraines, now they just make me cower, which is an improvement. All before I even get to my friend. I am used up with little to give her. But I force a smile, say a prayer and have enough for her.

I found four hours yesterday (after I swam at 5:30 a.m.) to work at a nearby Starbuck's, was deep in thought and transitioning as I packed up and some invisible guy materialized to ask me what I was writing and tell me his deep desire to write. My good-girl persona would not brush him off, but my sense of self preservation knew this could be an entanglement, so I was honest and said I had to go pick up my kids. Funny, my friend said he was flirting. I was so engrossed I didn't even get that. The only pickup on my mind was of my kids.

This string of messages about doing for myself first seems to be knitting itself together into a very loud and clear call. I am ready to listen and respond appropriately.

• What unhealthy patterns have I created?
• How can I extricate myself?
• How can those of us with the "helper" mentality disengage from the harmful aspects of this persona?
• How can we do so with no guilt?
• What might my prayer be for greater balance in my life in this regard?


lined up
blue doors swung open


and I know
whichever I choose
will require something of
me to clean up after the last person


how can I temper my anger,
channeling it to fuel, not foul me?

Unencumbering myself

I feel as if I am on the warpath. The warpath of NOT being diverted into energy-draining tasks that are not mine to do. My spiritual friend helped me see this yesterday when she likened the distractions and encroachments on my creative life and real work to the tributaries that re-direct my energy from the main flowing path that's straight ahead. It has been a welcome visual.

It has been more than merely an image. Last night I boldly stated that I could not perform a task I felt was being shoved in my direction. I am also owning my responsibility and guilt in not saying no when I should.

Today, I was shopping. Something I only enjoy occasionally and never in a mean-spirited crowd ... such as are forming now in the pre-holiday rush. I was already over stimulated and incredibly tired before the checkout. So when I spied a hole, I sped into it ... not in any obnoxious fashion, just with the urgency of being very focused on ending an unpleasant task. Hey, there was an open path and only one person waiting. I was curtly told from the adjoining aisle that I was to move to the line at the left, which was serving both sets of cashiers. It took a minute to register because it made no sense. There were two distinct lines with a barricade of dvd shelves between. But the woman was adamant and I complied. She was polite after realizing I had not intended to barge my way ahead. The woman behind me did the same and we both shook our heads in confusion.

Then the shopper from hell arrived and would have none of the nonsense. No way, she said, shaking her head in an overtly menacing way. It was as if it was MY turn to perpetuate the funky line organization, so I explained we had all tried to do that, moved over in line and been waiting. She wouldn't budge, then turned to me and said, "Sorry." I replied, "I don't think so."

Usually, I would have ignored her, maybe cursed under my breath. Today, I said it out loud. And it felt good. Really good. And any anger toward this woman dissipated. I'd had my say.

I did something similar in line at the Redbox rental a couple of weeks ago and astounded my husband. I was selecting a movie when a woman emerged from the passenger seat of a car and instantly began tapping her long, flawless pink nails on the disc covers. For crying out loud, I thought, she just got in line. And the movie choices were not cooperating. So I looked back and said: "Do you want to return a movie or something" with a not-so-nice emphasis on something. I kind of shocked myself, yet was also tickled. I so rarely speak up to rudeness. She said yes and I let her ahead (no movies were jumping out at me) and we had a pleasant exchange.

These weren't angry rebuttals, just honest ones that helped me turn my frustration outward by vocalizing it. Typically, I would have let it stay inside and bounce around in a not particularly healthy manner.

Typically, I say yes to tasks I have no interest in, but feel it either won't get done or not done as well without me. Just about a year ago at a retreat, I had the epiphany that any task should not be undertaken unless I can do it with love in my heart. A few weeks ago, someone I met at another retreat and with whom I shared that inspiration said it had meant so much to her.

Now I'm walking the walk and letting my stream flow forward without side branches to dilute my work, my life and energy.


• What's my usual response to a request of my time or gifts?
• Do I have any framework for testing whether it is, indeed, my work to accomplish?
• How does taking something on I really don't want affect me?
• How can I discern what is mine to do?
• How can I respond to rudeness without making it worse for myself or the other?


All
bottled
up


because
somewhere
somehow
someone
taught
me
NOT
to
make
a
scene


be polite
ignore it
be a good
girl


and
the
years
of
resentment
built


until
I
am
learning
to
unencumber
myself


and
ONLY
do
MY
work


joyfully

Painting my heart in the moment

It's finally here. The day, a time and payoff for which I have been waiting and working for so very long. As I write, I am watching each and every page of my artwork – all 118 pages (winnowed from many more choices, only to be pared down again) – hum through my printer and out the shoot.

I tenderly admire each, as if a child, and place them on the pile while another births itself through the printer. They seem to come back to life after sitting in a frame or dusty pile in my studio. They took on another life, when I periodically would line them up to photograph them. They continue to speak to and teach me.

It gives me such joy. And, I knew it would. It's almost indescribable and there has been so much in the way and obstacles to surmount. I can see them with perspective, in departure from when they were originally rendered. And, now, I can view them in comparison to each other, newer work and even fmy very first water color (which still speaks deeply to me), side by side and witness how I have grown, not just artistically, but spiritually and as myself.

Color and energy are the constant. But in later pieces, I see more subtlety. Maybe maturity and then I spy the fire-engine red blob that so speaks to me of being a three-year old I know I just did it a few weeks ago. I think I am recognizing and responding to many of the aspects of myself.

It's like flashes of my life, not events, but how I felt and who I was. A true gift. And, I like, really like what I see. Unlike when I flip through old photos. Those speak of what some machine captured that usually didn't feel as I did. Someone else, someone distant. Not me. The art is me, my soul.

There are the sticky-wicket times, when the world appeared bleak or I was hibernating. Yet also a large proportion showing an open heart, embracing the world. Images reflecting on unexpected gifts, tastes of the Universe, its goodness and oneness. Recorded times when I felt like goddess or running around in my birthday suit like a toddler. Many of interior spaces, water and periods of deep contemplation and reflection. So much that flashes through to me as an echo of what I have learned. In a way so different than my written words in journals.

I seem to paint what I feel and emote. Which, to me, if far more valuable and trueer than what I see with only my eyes. I paint my heart in the moment.

• What records my growth and maturity over the years?
• Do I take the time to sift through and reflect?
• What do I see?
• How does that make me feel?
• How do I capture my heart in the moment?