Debra Basham

Living and Loving

Author: Debra Basham

  • Missing Metformin

    It was odd that he would doze off while they watched a bit of TV after dinner. He had done that a lot before being diagnosed with and treated for sleep apnea — but not since he had begun using a CPAP. He was faithful using it every night and even for his afternoon naps.

    This dozing had been happening for a few days. She thought back over the dinner menu, wondering if it been too heavy on carbs as he was also being treated for Type 2 diabetes.

    Saying softly, “You are dozing off again,” resulted in an emotional reaction. He was normally mind-mannered, so she stayed calm as she told him that reaction, too, might indicate something was going on. She suggested he test his glucose level to see and it was a little high but not alarming.

    During the dozing after dinner the previous evening they had considered having him take the Metformin with dinner rather than at bedtime with the rest of his medications and supplements. He got the bottle of Metformin out of the medicine cabinet to identify it in his PM dose but there was not one in the cup. Checking the two-week medication dispenser he discovered there was no Metformin in the following week either.

    How could they have missed the Metformin when they filled his two-week supply? As a precaution, they fill his meds together….

    They were both so thankful her “nagging” sense had led them to discover the missing Metformin.

    Note* One of the ways to harness intuition is to notice some of the signals of intuition. Signals are emotions like fear and anxiety, but also physical sensations—like feeling tense and persistent thoughts, dreams, and suspicions.

  • The Homecoming

    One of her dearest friends died suddenly of a brain aneurysm. She received the news of his transition while she was at the carousel in St. Joseph, Michigan, with her two children and their young families. She truly had never before known such a moment of great joy juxtaposed with such profound grief. A couple of mornings later she thought of Joni Mitchel singing “The Circle Game” with its lyrics saying we are captive on the carousel of time.

    Her friend liked the poetry of Carmelite nun, Jessica Powers. When Powers transitioned, he was one of her pallbearers. The morning after he passed, while she was getting a trivet out of a kitchen cupboard, a piece of paper fell and wedged in a very narrow space between the refrigerator and the cabinet. She had no idea what it was.

    As she fished the piece of paper out she found herself moved to tears realizing she was looking at the opening stanza of “The Homecoming” by Jessica Powers…. sent to her by a friend 18 1/2 years earlier when her husband transitioned!!!

    The Homecoming
    by Jessica Powers.

    The spirit, newly freed from earth,
    is all amazed at the surprise
    of her belonging: suddenly
    as native to eternity
    to see herself, to realize
    the heritage that lets her be
    at home where all this glory lies.

    About a year or so ago, while navigating life conditions with her hundred-year-old father, her friend had shared this thought with her:

      Being really present to physical decline and physical diminishment of those we love can bring on strong feelings of helplessness and the desire to try and fix something we cannot fix or change…. we can only share in the seemingly helpless moment. On a spiritual plane we realize that what is happening is normal/human and ultimately transformative if one draws on inner resources.

  • Agitation and Imagination

      Agitation is interesting.

      Instead of trying to make it go away, allow it to be fully present, so that you can watch and learn its nature clearly.

      ~ The DailyTejaniya

    It is difficult to recall how long ago now I saw so clearly the futility of speaking about a situation that is causing agitation. Any idiot can speak about the problem, but only someone with imagination has the wisdom mind to see solutions.

    You are the only one who knows the conditions in your own life that are currently playing this dynamic out clearly, however, everyone has something going on right now that invites feeling helpless and perhaps even a bit hopeless.

    I have previously mentioned my friend having SERIOUS health conditions in Florida over the winter and since returning to Michigan. (See Anxious Feelings – Power of Presence)

    Well, conditions continue….

    Last week I spent the morning with them at the hospital. She was having the long-awaited cardio version to return her heart to a normal sinus rhythm. We had opportunity to laugh at ourselves and one another. She had been desperate for a hair cut. The day before the cardio version she had an appointment, but when it came time to leave the house she refused to put her slippers on, going to the car instead in her bare feet! Helpless to reason with her, he drove her to the salon only to have her unable to navigate the unbearable heat of the blacktop parking lot. (Plus, with all the shenanigans they were already too late for her appointment!)

    While the three of us waited in pre-op they were both willing and able to confess to and laugh at the absurdity they had collaborated. Unfortunately, we are all prone to mind states and habitual attitudes and unconscious catalysts that augment agitation and interrupt imagination, robbing us of the peace we truly are.

    We talked about how counter productive human behavior can become when conditions prevent us from being able to have or do or be what we desire most — and sometimes actually need. You only have to think for one moment about the political or environmental or institutional climate crisis we are experiencing on this planet to understand fully the feelings leaning toward helplessness or hopelessness. Add as backdrop the layer of the inevitability of old age, illness, and death (from Buddhism: This body is subject to breaking up, subject to being laid down).

    So, this morning I am allowing agitation to be fully present.

    I am remembering how consistent I had to become with taking John’s vitals EVERY DAY and reporting them to his doctor EVERY WEEK for over two years now. You can watch and learn agitation’s nature clearly. The doctors’ agitation with the insurance stranglehold is not other than my own. The agitation with delay in getting access to what we want or need. The agitation that is precariously leaning toward helplessness or hopelessness, but also can open us up to imagination.

    This comes from the preface of Imagine Healing: Guided Imagery to Help You Heal, by Debra Basham and Joel Bowman.

    Woven into the fabric of your illness or health crisis, are the emotional, mental, and spiritual dynamics of both “dis-ease” and well-being. That simply means what is in the way, is the way. The use of your imagination can help you heal now.

    By activating your imagination, you will not only be healing the physical ailment, you will be healing on all levels—body, mind, and spirit. Why settle for healing that is just skin deep, when you can activate your innate healing capacities. Although we cannot “unhappen” history, you are able to experience relief from painful memories, beliefs, attitudes, behaviors, even as you physically heal

    Agitation is interesting.

    Blessed be.

  • Retreat Musings June 12, 2024

    Retreat Musings June 12, 2024

    Today is the last day of this retreat with Barbara Brodsky and John Orr. I was blessed to stay in the guest quarters at the home of my dear friends, Delcy and Tom Kuhlman.

    The title of this week is “Living Our True Nature as Love: Vipassana, Pure Awareness and Practices of the Heart” and this morning I wrote in my journal:

    What has it meant for me to be present in this retreat? Nothing more or less than what it means for being present in any place and any time.

    Two things that seem to want to be shared.

    1) What is in the way is the way.

    2) Practice with the everyday things of life, called the mundane. Years ago we learned an exercise to take a small amount of water into your mouth and just hold it as you watch an urge to swallow arise. When the urge begins to lessen, consciously swallow. Absolutely everything is arising and ceasing out of conditions. Perhaps there is a third thing that wants to be shared🤪

    Everything in the mundane sense realm goes in totally. You may only be aware of aspects, but your experience includes everything: what you see, what you hear, what you feel (the kinestetic cluster includes what you taste and smell) as well as what you know. The sense realm that you are least aware of consciously often has the greatest influence.

    It has come to be my experience that the same can be said of what are called the supramundane. Each mundane sense has a corresponding higher sense realm, because it is the consciousness with which we are perceiving that shifts what we perceive. These supramundane sense experiences are also always present, whether we have awareness of them or not: Nada is always there. Luminosity is always there. Chi energy is always there. Spaciousness is always there.

    In Buddhism, however, nada refers to the sound of silence. To detect the nada sound, turn your attention toward your hearing. If you listen carefully to the sounds around you, you’re likely to hear a continuous, high-pitched inner sound like white noise in the background. (Article The Sound of Silence, published in Lion’s Roar.) Interestingly, nada is also the Spanish word for “nothing.”

    According to Wikipedia, luminosity or clear light is the innate condition of the mind, associated with Buddha-nature, the realization of which is the goal of meditative practice. It can seem that everything is more brilliant than physical light, illuminated, almost glowing. Think about images of halo’s you may have seen.

    Chi energy can be thought of as the bridge between your form (meaning your physical body, your thoughts, emotions, sensations) and the formless part of you which is your true essence — soul, spirit, or consciousness itself. Science might speak of the bio-electric magnetic field, energy that emanates from your organs.

    Spaciousness is a bit more challenging to define but is likely the most basic. Think about it this way: The spacious mind has room for everything. It is like the space in a room, which is never harmed by what goes in and out of it. In fact, we say “the space in this room,” but actually, the room is in the space, the whole building is in the space.

    The Daily Quote from Deep Spring for June 12, 2024 says, “There is no duality. Anything that is born of love also carries darkness and fear. These are not the essence; these are conditioned expressions. You cannot fully express love until you face fear. You cannot fully express light until you live in darkness and learn how to move through and transcend the darkness, transcending it by the light within you.”

    The Daily Tejaniya tied right in: “Let things unfold naturally. As you watch an experience continuously, you will begin to recognize patterns. Later, you will see the whole picture. The value of meditation becomes more apparent with dedicated practice over long stretches of time.” (Article Noticing Space published in Tricycle.)

    One of the most active points of this retreat was Dharma Sister who as the result of a brain bleed is having difficulty navigating the technology to access Zoom. It has taken a village to assist this beloved one to be able to have the experience of study, sharing, and meditating with others dedicated to the path. In thanking those who were physically there to offer the necessary support I said, “I am confident that if you had been with us on our closing Zoom circle to see and hear her read with such skill and depth of understanding of the Dharma her sections of the Mala Recitation I know you would share now in that joy completely.”

    So many things shared by those on the retreat still resonate in my heart. Here are a couple of things that may also touch you deeply:

      The Path of Love
      by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer

      And here I thought the path of love
      would look like love. Like kindness.
      Like generosity. Like gentleness.

      Instead it looks like me being bothered
      by the sound of loud chewing. Me
      wanting praise. Me needing to feel
      loved. Hello me. How elegantly love
      has arranged for me to meet
      all the parts of me that would stand
      in love’s way. How easily
      it shows me I’ve thought of love
      as a destination. But here is love
      with no expectation. Here is love
      with no name, no locus. Here
      is love with no face, no shape, no
      promise, no vow, no hope.
      Here is love as itself, surging
      and flowing, love as itself insisting
      on love, love as itself eroding
      all those layers of me that still
      think they know something about love
      (and love holds me while I rail
      and love throws me back in the stream
      and love is what is still here when I am not).

    “Today, like every other day, we wake up empty and frightened. Don’t open the door to the study and begin reading. Take down the dulcimer. Let the beauty we love be what we do. There are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground.” ~ Rumi

    Yes, there are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground, and love is what is still here when I am not.

    Blessed be….

  • Glenaire

    They were both attending a meditation retreat via Zoom.

    The attendees were asked to share a bit of where they are in their practice and/or in life in general.

    “We left our home we had lived in for forty years,” he said. “We moved into a community called Glenaire. It is a huge adjustment, but with all of us living here dealing with age-related dynamics, we take care of one another.”

    Although the guidelines of the retreat discourage speaking directly to another attendee about what he or she has said, she was so strongly moved she had to share.

    “We moved out of the home we had lived in for forty years, too, and into a community called Glen-Aire,” she excitedly said. “I would expect it to be very meaningful that we are here at this retreat together,” she concluded.

    She lives in Michigan. He lives in North Carolina.

    Daily the world grows smaller, leaving understanding the only place where peace can find a home. ~ Huston Smith

    Notes*
    Huston Cummings Smith was a scholar of religious studies in the United States, He authored at least thirteen books on world’s religions and philosophy, and his book about comparative religion, The World’s Religions sold over three million copies as of 2017.

    Glenaire is a continuing care retirement community (CCRC) located in Cary, NC.

    Glen-Aire is a family-owned business established in 1958, located in Lincoln Township, Michigan, about halfway between St. Joseph and Stevensville — approximately three miles from the shores of Lake Michigan.

  • Birthday Beach Frog

    She was walking the beach early in the morning on her birthday June 6, 2024…. conversing with her husband in spirit as she always does…. especially on beach walks. It is always so peaceful for her, and one of their favorite activities together collecting beach glass and rocks.

    Lo and behold! A frog jumped out of Lake Michigan, hopped up the beach, passed where she had stopped suddenly, turned and hopped back into the lake.

    She dropped to her knees. Stunned, although at this point why should she be?

    See Tree Frogs! posted December 1, 2018.

    She is so grateful she has opened her heart and been guided forward on this journey of life without her husband in his physical body next to hers.

    She says, “He is with me always.”

  • Shipshewana Card Fest with Ray

    My renewed interest in collecting and trading sports cards began when I woke up one morning with the thought that I must go look through my old cards. I messaged my mom asking if she could put them on the porch where I could grab them. She immediately called me saying, “I looked at the cards when I was going down the stairs this morning, but actually really looked at them, and remembered how much you enjoyed collecting them.”

    As she said this, I looked down at my feet and saw a small sticker pineapple. This pineapple was given to me at my grandpa’s funeral for being a pallbearer. I had placed this pineapple on the back of my phone as a symbol of my grandpa. Through my work with construction and factory work, the pineapple fell off. I had not seen that pineapple for more than 6 months before it fell at my feet that morning!

    I ended up getting the cards that day and began going through them. It was quite an experience handling the cards I bought when I was 9 years old. It was something my grandpa and I had done together. He showed me how to organize and categorize the cards to complete the set.

    I reached out to my grandma, telling her about my experience and how I had nice memories going through the cards. She told me about his collection and invited me to come out and look through them with her. It was nice getting to talk with her and have the opportunity to see how much thought he put into collecting. She let me take the BOXES of cards home so I could go through them.

    As I was bringing the cards into the house my neighbors and I crossed paths. I shared my story with them and asked if they knew anyone in the hobby. “My dad has been a collector for 50 years!” one of them said. I asked him to put me in touch with him.

    Later that day as I went through the cards (some dating back to 1980!) I thought it was so cool they are almost double my age and that my grandpa was flipping through them that long ago. It was just neat to picture that. I was wondering what he was thinking of at that time as he was going through them.

    After making it through one of the 23 boxes I found myself overwhelmed! I knew I wanted to connect with someone in the hobby, so I reached out to some community pages on Facebook. A guy named Ray commented on my post saying he’d be willing to help me. I began messaging with Ray, along with a couple other people, including my neighbor’s dad.

    Ray and my neighbor’s dad turned out to be the same guy!!! There are no coincidences. Ray helped me go through the cards, letting me know what’s valuable from each brand and era. He told me he was going to a show the following week and asked me if I wanted to go.


    Ray and his son and I went to the Shipshewana Card Fest today. It was a very enjoyable experience. There were so many people and cards!!! I ended up making a trade with a guy for a couple of his cards and I bought quite a few. In November I plan to go with Ray to Chicago to the next show. I am excited to see what comes next….

    I’m glad I listened to the signs from the Universe. The Universe is always speaking to us. It has helped me reconnect with my grandpa, with the joy of card collecting, and with the my younger child-self.

  • Memorable Memorial Day Message

    About 8:30 this morning she saw a post on a friend’s Facebook page. It was a beautiful image with this saying:

    “And it will be our love,
    not our anger,
    that heals the world.”

    The words and image were attributed to Lauren Fortenberry, writer.

    She posted Lauren’s words and image on her own Facebook page.

    Early this afternoon, she opened an email from another friend who shares daily inspirations from a twelve-step program and read this corresponding message to Fortenberry’s words:

    “Soldiers fight not for the hatred
    of the enemy in front of them,
    but for the love
    of the men behind them.”

    These powerful words were attributed to Don E., U.S. Army, 1967–1970.

    A memorable Memorial Day message worth mentioning.

  • Lord, Help Us

    Themes seem to emerge into awareness while I am doing things other than looking for themes. Like peeling potatoes for potato salad for today’s Memorial Day meal to be shared with my sister, Janis, and my brother-in-love, Larry. Or while I was out riding my bike and meeting a breed of dog that looks a lot like a hyena (Korean Jindu). Sometimes when I stop doing and put my feet up.

    Of course, everything is connected so last evening’s phone conversation with a Dharma Sister was already active in awareness. My friend had just attended a 10-day retreat where they were working with mindfulness of breathing. “Know the long and short breath.” She said it was not about the length of the breath but about what you think is a long breath or short breath. She went on to say that we are to know the whole breath body. You need to pay attention to the beginning, the middle, and the ending. They were also contemplating impermanence.

    It seems impermanence is perhaps the only true constant!

    This morning’s awareness was also shaped by my having listened to Tara Brach after the call with my friend. Tara was speaking about Inner Fire, what she also referred to as Spiritual Aspiration.

    I noticed (and after number 2 I kept count) my friend’s repetitive use of a 3-word phrase: LORD, HELP US.

    It seemed significant so I mentioned to her that she had used that phrase five times during our conversation. She had not been conscious of using it even once. I asked what the phrase means to her. She had no sense of connection to it.

    Make sure you know this blog post is not a criticism of her, or even a comment about her personally. It likely is, however, vital to her and to all of us.

    So, immediately following that conversation, it really caught my attention when Tara Brach (about 5 minutes into the talk) told of a man who was searching for something important and began to pray, “Lord, help me,” saying he would dedicate his life to service, he would be faithful, clear, true, strong – if God would answer his prayer. Moments later, the man found the item and quickly prayed again, “Never mind, God, I’ve found it.”


    A search for the phrase “God, help us” produced an interesting post by Collins Dictionary: If you say God help us, you mean that you have negative feelings about the person or situation you are talking about.

    Other ingredients in this mental stew include a draft I am working on for my next Insights article. The working title is “As a Child” and encourages looking at how experiences humans have while growing up shape beliefs that continue to operate long after they would not hold up to the light of day at an adult stage of our development.

    I did find a reference online clarifying that “Lord” in the Old Testament merely refers to someone of a higher rank. Further down the Yellow Brick Road we may look more closely at that nuance.

    Looking for an image of the phrase “Lord, Help Us” lead me to a sermon. Listening to part of the sermon, I heard how we sometimes wait a long time before we ask for help, staying in a problem that could have been been taken care of sooner, had we asked for help.

    There may not be rock solid answers provided in this post, but these ideas touch me deeply today. Lord, help us may be an invitation for all of us to benefit from greater awareness.

  • Red Flowers and Strength

    She was visiting her friend in the hospital as the beautiful red vase of cut flowers from the church secretary arrived. Moments later the friend was to be taken for an emergency surgery and then to ICU, where no flowers could follow. As hospital transport stood waiting to take her friend, the friend was sending an email about getting the flowers to the church so the secretary could enjoy them.

    When her friend was stable following that surgery, she gathered the flowers, but delivery was not made because of church office hours. The secretary called the following day saying she should keep and enjoy the flowers rather than worrying about getting them to the church. The arrangement still looked beautiful when her friend was back in a room where she could have them, so she was taken them back to her friend.

    She got onto the elevator with two hospital staff. The woman said, “Those flowers are beautiful.”

    “Bringing flowers to a friend?” the man asked.

    “Well, actually I am bringing them BACK to my friend,” she said. “They were delivered a couple of days ago just as my friend was being taken to ICU where she could not have them. She is back on the 4th floor now.”

    As the elevator door opened to let the man and woman off at the 3rd floor, the man turned and looked at her, “I hope your friend has a very good day today.” As the door closed — touched deeply by his caring comment — a few tears formed just behind her eyes. Her friend has been through so much, and the latest was a collapsed lung, complication from the insertion of a pacemaker.

    When the pulmonologist entered her friend’s room a bit later the woman and man from the elevator were part of her friend’s “lung team.”

    And it was the man from the elevator who came to tell them the team had been successful inserting a chest tube to reinflate her friend’s lung. As they walked together out of the waiting room the man said, “Your friend is strong. She is going to get through this just like she has gotten through everything else she has been through.”

    The symbolism of red flowers is said to include passion, love, desire, romance, beauty, respect, admiration, courage, and STRENGTH….