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?

Up the kite string

Lily's been wanting to be with me lately – like really close and snuggly. Just us. So, she set her alarm for 6:15 am, a half hour early, and crept into my bed. Tad was up at 6, so it was just the two of us. I had forgotten how wonderful that can be. So much melts away. She has always had a loud bark, which, often, makes me forget how young she is. The snuggling reminded me that she still does need and want my care and touch.

We both fell back to sleep. Later, she asked if I felt her medicine. I thought a minute and said, yes.

Ever since I've discovered I have fibromyalgia, she has physically comforted me in particularly bad spells. Either I haven't had as many lately or I haven't remembered to ask. So much of parenting happens in a blur that special nuances and rituals get lost. Even forgotten. I am so glad to be reminded that she is my medicine. Wild thing that she can be, she has a really big heart.

I have always loved the book, Where the Wild Things Are, and get a lump in my throat when I watch the movie because Lily is Max and every kid who feels alone, different or isolated ... until he finds a kindred spirit. As Carol, the wild thing, and Max are medicine for each other, Lily and I do the same. I have that relationship, though differently, with each of my daughters.

What intrigues me most about Lily is show different we are. Autumn I know like the back of my hand, which has its pluses (I totally understand her) and minuses (because I do, I often pay more attention to Lily and her wildness). I am learning that Lily and I are mirrors for each other. I teach her about discipline, dedication and respect and she reminds me to be fierce and playful. Sometimes together. Some day, I want to write a book called Letting my Lily out.

I had an interesting dream several years ago about being attached to what seemed like a kite string and looking up to see where it went. When I did, I saw Lily boosting herself up and waving for me to follow. She is fearless. It was as if she knew the grand adventure of climbing into the mystery and had no qualms about starting.

I'd put my child-development books away and hadn't thought much about them until a month or so ago, when Lily's behavior perplexed me. Then I read a really revealing article from the Waldorf School on the development of nine-year-olds and how it is such a pivotal time as they move away from the comfort and safety of childhood and familial closeness to gaining a sense of singleness, isolation and identity. The whispers of individuation. I feel that on the opposite end of the spectrum as I grow beyond middle age and into new, uncharted and wild territory.

Guess I will always be following her up the kite string. Thank heavens I have a trusted, though sometimes feisty, guide!

• What are my children or the children I know teaching me about myself?
• Is there anything in their development, fears or anxieties with which I can identify?
• Is there anything in their fearlessness and enthusiasm that I should reclaim?
• Who is my medicine? To whom am I medicine?
• What's up my kite string?

I've been
so busy
looking
down
at the
ground,
that I
hadn't
noticed the
string
the string
gently
looped around
my wrist
so as not to
get lost
for me,
not to
get lost
the tugging
made me
notice and
look up
up to
where
Lily
was
climbing
into the
clouds
with a
ferocious
smile and
wild wave,
begging me
to follow
and,
I did

The hand of One

I saw the sparkle well before I saw the what-looked-about-like-a-second-grade girl float onto the bus steps. The early-morning sun caught her jelly shoes just right, transforming her into a fairy princess ascending her coach. The way she danced up to the vehicle as the sun glowed orb-like around her let me know the shoes were new and her present pride and joy. They were magick.

Minutes later, I watched mystical little bubbles, as if something ethereal and effervescent coursed through them, encircle my arms after they cut from midair into the wet surface during my lap swim. They were there as I initiated the workout, easily stroking end to end. And still, as my heart beat faster and faster and I pushed myself mid workout. And, yet again, as I slowed and cooled. They never left me. Magick.

Yesterday, Autumn pointed that word out to me in a title at a bookstore: magick she said is different from magic and what our beloved nine-year-old friend Caleb says he practices. He's always listened to trees, chanted, come from another place and lived like no one else I know. Magick.

I don't know what the actual definition is, but I believe it has a lot to do with mysticism, belief, trust, faith, awareness and openness. Those times when the veil between physical and other worlds thins.

Perhaps it's always there, we just have to be in the right frame to experience or notice it.

I wonder why I was privy this morning. Possibly because I had spent all of the previous afternoon and evening digging in my garden, planting lettuce and spinach cuttings and 11 trees alongside Autumn. I was happily dirty and grounded. Or maybe that it was Sunday and I had deeply entered worship to that place that's almost sleep, but not quite. Where I feel loved, cared for, nurtured and totally safe. Entranced, yet still aware of my surroundings, though they don't distract me. Where I can feel only love. Nothing more, nothing less.

Conceivably the ineffable lunch I'd had Friday with spiritual friends sorting out some difficulties, peppered with laughter, tears and extremely open hearts. Spirit took the extra chair. Or Saturday's dinner lovingly prepared by my sister of choice and all she required was my presence, not a thing more.

As I recount these imagined reasons, I see what gifts I have been given just since Friday. Deep gifts. Precious gifts. Unconditional gifts. All from One hand through others open to be used.

I think that's the same hand that parts the veil, on occasion, just so we know what lay beyond.

• When have I experienced the veil parting?
• What, exactly, did I experience?
• What prepared me or preceded it?
• What kind of space does that create in me?
• Am I able to merge even a piece of it into myself?


golden morning

glowing girl
swirls onto the bus

bubbles boost
my swim,
armoring me
with love
and energy

forcing me
to examine
all of the recent
gifts

all
of the open
hearts

and the hand
of ONE

thank you

A hard heart

How do you let go?

Of all of it: resentment, responsibility you feel isn't yours, old attachments, draining commitments, feeling let down?

Just as I feel I am making progress, something, usually external, crops up and I feel I am back at square one. Except I don't usually know that for awhile. And I blame the external for an internal struggle.

Thank God, I have a very wise shamanic healer/counselor. He reminded me yesterday of several things:

#1 Responsibility is the ability to respond.

#2 Choices are not black and white; there is a rainbow of color.

#3 Unmet needs often color how we respond to others.

#4 The creative life requires discipline.


#1
Being able to respond implies a choice, that the answer does not have to be automatic, other- or self-damaging. It reminds me of wisdom I re-learned last fall and must remind myself of again: "IF I can't do it with love, don't do it." This week a school mother called and asked if I'd be on the PTO board. It was easy to reply with an immediate no, yet I felt I had to explain why. I did, however, stick with my no. Much harder when it's someone with whom I have a close relationship.

#2
My gut reaction is always to say yes ... no matter what. I like the idea of a constellation and varying degrees of choices. I adore color, so why not start making colorful choices, not just the dreary black-and-white yes or no. This puts a whole new spin on the feeling-compelled-to-say yes mindset.

#3
How many times have I been upset with someone else, when it was really something within myself I didn't like or had not tended to. Very, very often. I have been paying more attention to my inner children, but still forget, at times, until they grow whiny and get my attention via some thing or one external. No one else will met my needs for me. That's my job.

#4
Trying to carve out time between duties, responsibilities and obligations for a creative life does not a creative life make. Setting aside that time to write and paint, then working the others around it is a truer plan. I get fed, release that constant energy pushing me forward and can then take care of others and other things. I also believe that if I don't respect that as well as my boundaries, neither will others.

Maybe it's less letting go and more re-prioritizing to be my authentic self, the one who rages to create, yet also respond lovingly to others.

• What in my life do I need to grasp less tightly or completely let go?
• What effect is that tightness and inflexibility having on me and my relationships?
• Can I creatively see more colorful, perhaps more Spirit-led, choices?
• Are there things I should re-arrange or re-prioritize?
• What are my inner children/deep needs seeking right now?


a hard
heart is
painful

and not a
place to
live for
long

it's easy
to pin that
rigidity
on others

when, in
reality,
it's within
myself

what can
I give
myself

that I
have been
seeking
elsewhere?

In the cover of darkness

How come in the darkness of night, everything seems so ominous? I awake at 3 a.m. (I used to more often and am grateful it's not so frequent) and everything, I mean everything, weighs so heavily on my mind. I think I had had a very heavy dream, which woke me ... although I don't recall it.

This morning all of that worry seems like a mere shadow ... the one under my eyes. However, at the time, it seemed disastrous and anxiety-inducing. Not a nice place to be when sleep should be rejuvenating.

What is it, exactly, that kicks into gear in my mind (primarily) and body at that hour to instill such panic? Is it connected to whatever I had been dreaming? Is the sense of isolation and loneliness when no one else is awake the culprit? Is it hormones and aging? I've read that as we get older, our sleep gets less and worse. I used to be such a fantastic sleeper. My head would hit the pillow and I would be sacked out til light and fully rested. Ready to tackle anything.

This morning, I drug myself out of bed shortly before the alarm at 5:25 a.m. and headed to the gym. I was shocked, and not pleasantly, when our longstanding instructor had been replaced. And, perhaps because of my 3 a.m. mindset, not very generous in spirit and a bit grumbly. Until I started to pay attention and found she was, indeed, a terrific instructor and taught an amazing workout. My body is still basking in the afterglow. I also suspect my change of attitude happened as the sun rose, absorbing the darkness.

I know I adore the light: warm sunshine, reflections on the water, sunset and rise. But, early evening as the sun blurs to orangish-red has always been my favorite time of day. When the daylight hours have been rewarding and there's the promise of more to come with evening. That darkness looms close. That liminal, transitional time.

I was re-introduced [because I tend to forget important lessons] last fall to the idea of spiritual darkness being a productive and transformational space. Much like hibernation when things are happening beneath the surface, under the cover of dark. I had not thought it it quite in that light before -- as a positive and necessary place. As a Quaker, we're always talking about being in the light as if darkness is the evil antithesis. Quite frankly, I've probably felt more in the dark than in the light in my adult lifetime. And it was affirming to know that it's ok. I think I have been striving for that illusive enlightenment or nirvana where everything is placid and nothing should matter. I have never achieved that and am not sure I ever will. I feel like my heart's too big. It picks up so much, perhaps more than it can hold. I guess I don't know how to release all of that and still be me.

A friend at the pool this morning told me a neat trick to use at night. "Think of your thoughts as clouds," she said. And I quickly added "and let them pass." "Well, no," she said, " try to go to the spaces between the clouds."

Wow – what a concept. Perhaps that's the liminal place between light and dark and the balance.

Think I'll try it the next time I'm awake at 3 a.m. or, maybe, even in a daytime meditation.


• How do I settle my mind when it becomes anxious?
• What are my triggers?
• Where's my balance of living in light and dark?
• Have I been able to safely navigate the darkness?
• What are those spaces between for me?


bolt awake
in total
darkness,
feeling
isolated

nothing to
distract
my mind,

so it
lurches
into overdrive

wielding havoc
on my body

how do I
flip that
switch?

can I begin
to think of
darkness
and night

as necessary

and quit
fighting
them?

Mosaic of the cosmos

I had a message last week in worship:

There is no bigger picture,
just a series of smaller ones.
Like mosaic pieces that,
together, form one –
a creation of beauty.

It's been haunting me all week. At the time it was an ah-ha moment about me continually whining for a clear path and to know/see everything ahead or at once.

Later in the day, during a clearness committee* for a dear friend whose position of six years is ending, I recognized that she embodies living faithfully and comfortable with one piece at a time. Her piece.

I have joked the past couple of years that if Spirit had showed me my path ahead of time, I would have never moved. It would have looked too hard and rocky. But that would have been my myopia and lack of trust. For the journey has been unlike anything I could have fathomed or chosen. I am learning it it not a joke, but reality. In our humanness, we are stuck on control, which is, essentially, the opposite of trust.

I am progressing in accepting my one small piece at a time. I don't think I could digest any more. Tucked into that acceptance is trust and a wonderfully new knowledge that it will be more than all right, it will be authentically me and wonderful and richer than anything I could even comprehend.

It's really the lesson of living in the present, taking my one piece and really living into it. Not debating what will come next or what happened previously. But just being with it as fully as I can.

Last week's revelation makes me see that if we all learn that (some already know this and others, like me, are figuring it out), this mosaic that we are building is truly a glorious thing. More so when we can trust to do just our part – and do it with love and joy and enthusiasm – and no more. A work in progress for which only the master artist has the whole picture.

* Quakers may call a clearness committee for discerning anything central in their life from marriage and congregation membership to spiritual struggles and career changes, etc. It's a wonderful corporate tool.
....

• Have there been times when I could accept the one piece of my path and trust?
• How was that different from the times I struggled to maintain control?
• Have I figured out the balance of trust, yet doing what's required of me ... not just waiting for something to happen, even if it means patiently waiting?
• What's it like when I glimpse someone else's piece or even mine?
• Can I begin to see the oneness and connection in our universe?


Often, I have
selfishly held on
to this one
piece, unaware
that if I use
it well ...

use it to the
best of my
ability and
gifts, as
others are,

something
truly amazing

is being created

and I am one,
joyful, loving
part of the
grand mosaic

of the cosmos

Shedding the mask(s)

I've been pondering the idea of how an introvert lives in community.

This forming theory was tested with a group trip to a lodge over spring break. Don't get me wrong, it was a wonderful time and experience. Shared cooking, laughing, no worries about kids because there was always another parent around.

One of my fondest moments was in the kitchen preparing a dinner, and cooking stirs my soul (no pun intended), while someone I had just met did all of the hard-core chopping. And another gave periodic massages! It freed me to do the creative thing and my faithful chopper said she was happy for the job. I felt I really got to know her as she wielded the knife, creating a meditative staccato, and I merely concocted the fruits of her labor.

I only strayed away once on a solitary walk, but did some contemplative work, often interrupted as I sat near the fire ring, not very far from the cabin. Yet it was often a welcome break as people were genuinely interested in what I was doing. It was thoughtful and caring. Perhaps because it seemed I was the only one doing "work."

In between laughs and stories, there was some intimate sharing.

It was the right amount of time: three nights and four days. I returned home physically wiped out, however. Everyone else in my family was buoyed by the trip.

Why is that? On some level, it's frustrating. But I have learned that my introversion (ok, I am just over the introvert line in Myers-Briggs profiling and can do the extrovert-thing quite well) is so finely linked to my energy levels and how I feed myself.

Summer is one of those times with kids home 24/7 that zaps me. Also countless snow days and long holidays with continual family visiting. All joyful events and occasions, but a painful physical reality for me.

It's the silence and being with myself in that space that balances all of the rough-and-tumble of group dynamics. Yet in the vortex of the contagious activity, I forget to take that time.

Sometimes I wonder if it's a mask I wear in groups that tires me. I often think I have dropped my masks for the most part. [Someone recently said to me about myself that "what you see is what you get" and that is how I intend to live.] Perhaps, I haven't entirely.

What is that remaining mask? One that doesn't want to disappoint, create waves, leave the circle? Or one that has always drawn its identity as the helper (my enneagram type) and can't quite be shed that even if it would free me?

Takes a lot of energy to wear that particular facade.


• How does my introversion/extroversion work in community?
• How have I learned to balance that with my personal needs?
• Am I aware of how that affects others as well as their own dynamic or similar struggle?
• What masks do I continue to wear? Especially in community?
• Which ones can I put down?


It's so effortless
and automatic
that I don't even
see it happening

Flipping
that "on" switch,
getting the
mask off
the shelf

It's worked so
well in the past,
I am
unconsciously
reluctant to
permanently
pack it
away

What if I could?