Debra Basham

Living and Loving

Tag: Aaron

  • Two Wings of Mindfulness

    Deep Spring Center
    Thought for Today

    If one never were to experience this
    dark night of the soul,
    one’s compassion
    really would be limited.

    One may have a belief,
    ‘I can be compassionate
    with that which is light
    and beautiful and loving
    in myself and others’
    but one has never tested it
    to see if
    one can also extend that compassion,
    even to the utmost of darkness.

    ~ Aaron

    This morning I did something I rarely do. I followed a link and read an article after the headline caught my attention: Deadliest place in America: They shrugged off the pandemic, then their family and friends started dying.

    Dinkel says too many people are refusing to do their part to protect the elderly from COVID-19.

    “To sit there and say they are old that they will die of something,” she says, “Well, they wouldn’t have died of the flu. My dad wouldn’t have been in the hospital for a month if this was the flu.”

    Despite the efforts of local public health officials and experts, many residents aren’t taking the deadly pandemic seriously. Bearded farmers stride defiantly down Main Street past signs requiring them to wear masks. School is still in session and churches are open. Someone threatened to blow up the home of a pro-mask county commissioner.

    Nicholson, the ambulance worker, is also co-owner of a restaurant and brewery on Main Street, and she’s had customers swear they’ll never come back after she reminded them to wear a mask when picking up food. She doesn’t want to wade into the middle of a political dispute. She just wants her neighbors to live.

    But this post is not about COVID-19, even though four of our high-school classmates died of the coronavirus in just one week at home.

    This post is about how mindfulness is like a bird — both need two wings to fly. The two wings of mindfulness are wisdom (clear seeing) and compassion.

    Compassion is a result of seeing life’s experience clearly, therefore not everyone’s experience generates compassion. Life’s experiences reveal our world view.

    The people in the deadliest place in America justify not wearing masks by saying the people who are dying are old, and people die in God’s time. The kernel of truth in not only toxic, it is deadly.

    Sunday morning I went to the only grocery store here on the island. I had read “masks required” on the ad, and I checked out the website of the company to read the same thing. “Masks required” was also on the entry doors. However, customers were coming in and shopping and getting service without a mask.

    Numbers in this small community on the south end of the island are climbing, yet, the Ragged Ass Saloon still hosts live music and welcomes wall-to-wall (if you can use that term about a parking lot) patrons not wearing masks or maintaining safe distancing.

    As human beings, we all try our best to bring about a world based on kindness and compassion. What seems to go wrong, however, is that what I want, what I personally would like, becomes more important than the benefit of the whole community.

    Yes, death will come to each of us. That is not failure. The bloom is the bud’s undoing…

    We are capable of spreading our wings and soaring to the heights of wisdom and compassion.

    As the Buddha said, “If it were not possible, I would not ask you to do it.”

  • Grateful

    Even a wounded world is feeding us.
    Even a wounded world holds us,
    giving us moments of wonder and joy.
    I choose joy over despair.
    Not because I have my head in the sand,
    but because joy is what
    the earth gives me daily
    and I must return the gift.

    ~ Robin Wall Kimmerer

    WORD FOR THE DAY from Gratefulness.org

    My meditation this morning included listening to Ho’oponopono, chanted by Celeste Yacoboni, author of “How Do You Pray?”

    Listening and chanting along inspired a poem:

    How Do I Pray

    Prayer is so much more than bowing our heads or folding our hands. We pray by breathing in the life force our Earth Mother offers and releasing all that blocks that. Like evergreens, we pray by growing upwards. Like potatoes, we pray through roots deep down in the soil. Gratitude for our life, kindness toward all beings, generosity of spirit; wisdom, honesty, integrity, joy — each an example of prayer. As gravity holds us safely on our earth home, prayer holds us securely in the universal heart.

    Daily Aaron Quote for November, 26, 2020

    It’s very helpful to wake up each morning with the commitment, or even consecration, “I consecrate this mind and body to the light, to service to all beings for the highest good. Today may I be of service to others and do good for others and for myself. May I be loving to all beings with whom I am involved today, including myself.”

  • “Keeping Quiet”

      Deep Spring Center
      Thought for Today

      When you stay in the relative reality box, you create the kind of fights with each other, ‘I’m right.’ ‘No, I’m right.’ ‘No, I’m right.’ You can’t hear each other. You become more and more polarized. And this of course is consonant with the lower stages of consciousness, the magical consciousness that believes that somehow it can prove to everybody that it’s always right. I think you all know that one! If you don’t remember it in your own experience, go and find a 2-year-old. It’s very much engrossed in the magical consciousness and very certain that it’s always right. Slowly you begin to open out, and as the stage of consciousness rises you move more into the openness that can view infinite possibilities. ~ Aaron

    From my journal this morning:

    D: I fully recognize the thought, “when I make a choice that is right for me, it is right for everyone,” as a relative reality thought. The thought holds a subtle distortion because of the separate self.

    What is whispering to me is awareness of the interconnection of everything. Like waves in an ocean.

    So how do I navigate?

    V: The awakened heart knows one person is planning a picnic — a big event serving lots of people. A “thank you” event to many, for great service to humanity. That heart also knows the farmers in the region need rain. The time is crucial. The seed has been planted but rain is needed to bring forth the sprout. Many will feed upon the bread made from the farmers’ wheat.

    What happens to support highest good for all beings?

    D: This is exactly what I am asking!

    V: In relative reality, a conflict-of-interest seems to exist. This is not real.

    Imagine an all-night, slow, steady rain. Imagine the rain nourishing the soil and causing the conditions that bring forth a healthy harvest. Now imagine the sun coming up, a light breeze blows over the face of the earth, drying up the surface moisture. The picnic takes place now on a ground that is well-watered.

    When you are drawn to notice a seeming “conflict-of-interest” simply greet the situation with an open heart, saying, “Hello, Teacher.”

    All of the elements: earth, air, fire, water, and energy — they all know how to collaborate. You are made of these elements. You do know what to do for the highest good of all beings, and harm to none.

    As Aaron says in the opening quotation, slowly, you begin to open out, and as the stage of consciousness rises you move more into the openness that can view infinite possibilities.

    From Neale Donald Walsch:

      On this day of your life I believe God wants you to know that most dramatic conflicts are perhaps those that take place not between men, but between a man and himself.

      What are you battling with right now? What unwanted habit? What undesirable behavior? What old pattern? Claim victory over these, and your entire life can change.

    Last evening I looked up and saw a soft pink haze in the western sky. I stepped out on the front porch and saw a rainbow out to the north. I grabbed my phone and took a photo, and as I turned around the western sky was ablaze with color.


    On May 11, 2020, the poem of the day was “Keeping Quiet” by Pablo Neruda. Please go to Duke Trinity College and read the entire poem. Pablo Neruda, a Chilean poet-diplomat and politician who won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1971. He transitioned from this earth plane in 1973, but “Keeping Quiet” is his perfect gift for us at this time. Sharing here the next to the last stanza:

    If we were not so single-minded
    about keeping our lives moving,
    and for once could do nothing,
    perhaps a huge silence
    might interrupt this sadness
    of never understanding ourselves
    and of threatening ourselves with death.
    Perhaps the earth can teach us
    as when everything seems dead
    and later proves to be alive.

    You will want to visit Duke Trinity College to read the entire poem.

    Michigan has gone back under stay-safe-at-home orders as the numbers of coronavirus cases from community contact skyrocket. This is happening across the globe as the second wave of the pandemic crests.

    Humanity is invited by this “teacher” to view infinite possibilities as we are keeping quiet….

  • Lone Dove

    At the end of our Zoom dominoes game last night I asked if anybody knew what was going on with the election results. John said, “Biden won.” I was shocked. Linda clarified that results have not yet been declared because of laws suits.

    John’s first comment when I asked him if he was OK with Biden’s being elected: “I can’t do anything about it. All I can do is live my life, be the best person I can be.”

    David R. Hawkins said, “Make a gift of your life and lift all… by being kind, considerate, forgiving, and compassionate at all times, in all places, and under all conditions, with everyone as well as yourself. This is the greatest gift anyone can give.”

    I could see in sadness in John’s face and feel his concern as he added, “Biden won’t be president long because his cognition is failing.” He spoke of the good that Trump has achieved as President and gave as example stopping the U.S. giving money to Germany to protect them from Russia while Germany was buying natural gas from Russia instead of buying it from us. I know nothing about that stuff, but I can respect that John does.

    I encouraged John to hold a view of humans acting out of positive character.

    “If Trump had won there would have been riots in the streets tonight,” he said quietly. I told him it had been surprising and distressing to me that my dharma friends were so unskillful about Trump over the past 4 years. I spoke of it like a teeter-totter, of our taking turns being up in the air.

    In the light of day, I see it more as taking turns carrying a burden. We are all working toward a higher vibration on the planet (a better world; John’s ‘America is a great country’), and it is like we are having to ‘tack’ along the way.

    Tacking is a sailing term. When the wind is not in your favor, you can still get to your destination. You have to turn your bow toward the wind so that the direction from which the wind blows changes from one side to the other. This maneuver allows progress in the desired direction.

    Perhaps President Trump’s winning in 2016, and Joe Biden’s winning in 2020 is humanity’s tacking — the wind blows changing from one side to the other.

    Recently Aaron had this to say:

      For the Earth to reach shore, in other words to move into a higher density, to move into a higher consciousness, there is going to have to be a wave or a series of waves. When that wave comes in—picture the water on the ocean, the ocean floor, and the water from the first wave rolling out and the new wave rolling in so they meet at this point. Crash into each other. There’s a contraction there where the outgoing wave meets the incoming wave, and that’s part of what lifts the incoming wave and gives it its height and power to make it all the way up onto the shore. If there is not that contraction, you just float. Bobbing up and down on very little waves that will not carry you to shore.

      The challenges of your present world, while unpleasant and in some cases, deeply concerning, are also part of what is necessary for the shift, the transition to higher consciousness.

      We don’t talk about this as good or bad. We can talk about it as pleasant or unpleasant. But if you choose to make any kind of transition, there’s going to have to be something that blocks you a bit, creates challenges that allow you to move into a higher vibration and move forward, expand outward, and overcome those challenges.

    I wrote in my journal this morning: What would you have me know? (my most frequent question!)

    V: You can feel your heart open. You know you are holding the intention for our way to a world that is truly in service to all beings and lives from the intention to harm none. Aaron spoke of the least harm. It would not have been kind to have rioting. It would not be kind to deny benefits that this President has brought forth. It is time to transcend any sense that “the means justifies the end” and bring about successes that are undergirded by spiritual values.

    What an image this lone dove sitting on the edge of the birdbath with all the fallen leaves made this morning shortly after the sun came up.

      Doves are messengers of God and their message usually is: no matter what is happening, peace will always follow. When doves appear, it is a sign of your innocence and grace. Know and trust that your loved ones are watching you always. Dove totem animal brings peace, joy, and harmony. ~ Dove Totem Meaning

    My heart holds the melancholy feeling I had seeing the lone dove; I am unwilling to project this onto my fine feathered friend.

    Give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.— Luke 1:79

    P.S. When I shared this all with John, because of the dove and the message of peace, he added that President Trump negotiated peace in the Middle East for the first time in decades….

  • Spiritual Victory


    The willingness to consider possibility
    requires a tolerance of uncertainty.

    ~ Rachel Naomi Remen

    Sitting in meditation recently I became the yin/yang symbol, flowing back and forth from a sense of form to knowing myself as nonform, experiencing a momentary flash of luminosity at the tipping point as the endless flow of black flowing into white, white flowing back into black. I had a brief thought this might be a another full-body dissolution (where ego dissolves into awareness). This is a practice in meditation. One does not cease to be, but one does cease to be identified as a body or a thought or an emotion or a sensation.

    Imagine the yin (the dark swirl with the white dot) as being associated with femininity and our shadow side; the yang (the white swirl with the dark dot) representing brightness, passion and growth.

    Each contains the “seed” of the other.

    You know you are this fluid AWARENESS.


    The thought for today from Aaron is also related our identity: “The self that aspires to be perfect while loving itself as imperfect moves from a place of love. The self that strives to be perfect because it hates itself as imperfect moves from a voice of fear.”

    I have been considering the possibility of registering for an upcoming weekend retreat November 13-15. Today is the registration deadline. Wanting to always be generous with dana (offering) for the teachers, knowing our seasonal rent is coming due in a few weeks, and John’s $2,500 dental appointment this past Tuesday, the financial aspect of attending the retreat has been dominating my mind.

    I decided to draw a card asking, “What is true about my attending this retreat?”

      Beyond mind, there is an awareness that is intrinsic,that is not given to you by the outside, and is not an idea… This state only happens if the master inside of you is awake… When your awareness becomes a fire, it will burn the whole slavery regime that your mind has created. No happiness is more precious than freedom or becoming a teacher of your own destiny. (excerpt from p. 47 Osho Zen Tarot: The Transcendental Game of Zen)

    I love that card, and the truth that The Master is not a teacher for others, but he a teacher for himself, without personal purpose nor desire for anything, but always letting thing happens as it should be – knowing truly there is nothing to strive for.

    One of things that has been pulling me to attend this retreat now is the generous offer for me to use a friend’s cottage.

    I can feel a sense of uncertainty about leaving my space here that has been my womb since April 6. I can also feel the possibility. This would be the first retreat since October 2019 where I could truly be in noble silence the entire time. Noble silence is a central part of knowing the mind, and letting go the identification with all the suffering caused by the mind.

    I picked up my phone to look at the date. Saturday, November 14, 2020 is Diwali.

    Diwali is the Indian festival of lights, one of the most popular festivals of Hinduism, but with slightly different emphasis also celebrated in Sikhism, Jainism, and Buddhism.

    Diwali symbolizes the spiritual “victory of light over darkness, good over evil, and knowledge over ignorance.”

    Now that is a true spiritual victory!

  • Common Sense: Common Good

    Just when all the chips are down,
    the chins should be up.

    ~ Neale Donald Walsch

    This morning I could feel a subtle pull to look at media, but everybody knows as soon as a winner of the Presidential election is resolved, that news will be widely known. So, why participate in any of the drama?


    Yesterday morning, during the post-election 24-hour meditation event Deep Spring Meditation Center was hosting on Zoom, the fifty-fifty nature of the polarization of our country came up. I asked Barbara about the information SCS calls the Drama Triangle, Cognitive Triangle, and Transrational Pyramid.

    Here is a section of Aaron’s response:

      We are in the midst of a major shift in consciousness on the earth. The loyal opposition is pushing the negative polarity as much as they can. Knowing that this time was coming on Earth, not only old souls have come, to support the transition, but also, strongly negatively-polarized souls have come to try to defeat this transition, to hold the earth into the lower density.

      This is playing out on all the spheres and on all the levels including, of course, the human level. You are not pawns in some game of chess. You have enormous power. You have advisors on the spirit level, but you humans are the ones that can control whether, when, and how this transition will happen.

      Along with those of you who are of a much higher consciousness, there are those who are of high intelligence, with a lot of power and understanding of power, but with intention to use that power in service to the self. This is really what this shift is about—power in service to self, or power in service to all beings.

    The Roman games come to mind. Roman games, called ludi, were probably instituted as an annual event in 366 BC. Might common day sports be the current iteration? Or perhaps politics? Red, white, green and blue teams inspired great loyalty. Wondering if the red and blue of the political parties somehow also originated with the Roman games.

    In 532 AD rioting sparked by the disputes of chariot fans destroyed half the city of Constantinople!

    Augustus only banned fighting to the death due to a shortage of gladiators. It has been estimated that 500,000 people and more than 1 million animals died in the Coliseum, Rome’s great gladiatorial arena.

    Human history is rife with dark times.

    Dagnabbit, we have more common sense to use for the common good!

    One source attributed ‘dagnabbit’ to Elmer Fudd. His twisted version of “dang rabbit” was sputtered while stomping his foot on his hat, after the rabbit that always outwitted him when he was hunting did it again.

    In The Long Linguistic Journey to ‘Dagnabbit’ linguists say humans are afraid of speaking the True Names of enemies so we create taboo deformations. My grandmother would say flitter, in the exact same situations my dad would say $*@#….

    All too often, people go through life being cautious in the name of being careful, when it is, in fact, a matter of fear. Moving ahead boldly is a better indicator of self-assurance and has a much better chance of ending in success. ~ David J. Bloyd; MS, CMP Emeritus

    One of my dharma sisters shared a mantra composed by the Vietnamese monk, Thich Nhat Hanh, known as a philosopher, teacher of peace, and all things positive. The mantra loosens the grip fear can have on you.

    While silently breathing in, say the first line of the two-line phrase; while silently breathing out, say the second line of the two-line phrase:

      Breathing In, “I’m aware of the fear,”
      Breathing Out, “I smile to the fear;”
      (Yes, these are the appropriate words!)

      Breathing In, “I recognize fear as Energy,”
      Breathing Out, “I express Gratitude for Energy;”

      Breathing In, “Energy and Fear are Power,”
      Breathing Out, “I can safely hold Power;”

      Breathing In, “Power supports Wholesome Change,”
      Breathing Out, “I Invite That, which is for The Highest Good!”

    F.E.A.R. (false evidence appearing real) may be the true name of humanity’s only true enemy, but fear has myriad names: greed, anger, cruelty, vengeance, hatred, bigotry, sexism, racism, impatience, insecurity, shame, blame, ignorance, meanness. The list is long.

    For sure, common good is common sense….

    Breathing In, “Power supports Wholesome Change,”
    Breathing Out, “I Invite That, which is for The Highest Good!”

  • Awaken the New Species

    We must not wish
    for the disappearance
    of our troubles
    but for the grace
    to transform them.

    ~ Simone Weil

    Yesterday John did not mention my blog post, so I did not share it with him. I watched the choice points for stories to arise: he doesn’t really care; he still does not value what I write and share; I won’t bring it up unless he mentions it…. on and on and on the ego drives us away from peace, if we allow it.

    Last night I turned on my heated mattress pad and was heading to the shower looking forward to crawling into bed early before I realized just how early it was. If I set the manual clocks to the end of daylight savings at that moment, I would have been going to bed at 6:45 pm!

    Ugh…

    So, I came into the office and surfed for something enlightening, settling on a talk by Barbara Marx Hubbard, an American futurist, author and public speaker. In Awakening the New Species in You, Barbara opened shared how she recognized her life purpose as — “I am helping the noosphere to get its collective eyes.”

    Barbara’s vocation was/is to be a communicator and teacher about the history of this planet, the current events, and our opportunity for conscious evolution.

    (According to the World Wide Fund for Nature’s 2020 Living Planet Report, wildlife populations have declined by 68% since 1970 as a result of overconsumption, population growth and intensive farming, which is further evidence that humans have unleashed a sixth mass extinction event.
    ~ NationalGeographic.com )

    Barbara’s message prepared me for a good night’s rest and for today’s post:

    “We are at a vital shift point where our own actions could lead to greater extinction, or our own actions could lead to greater evolution, or conscious evolution.”

    We are at choice to help the nervous system of humanity devolve or evolve! What we do with our energies each moment makes a contribution.

    “Our crisis is a birth. We are one living system and we have come to the limit of one phase of natural growth on a finite planet We must learn ethical evolution quickly As we seek to facilitate a gentle birth, a graceful and nonviolent transition to the next stage of our evolution, we will discover a natural pattern, a design of our birth transition, and develop a plan to cooperate with this design.”

    This morning, I read the transcript of Dharma Path class from Tuesday, October 27, 2020. From Barbara Brodsky and Aaron:

      Let’s start at the end, what you hope to bring forth this year: To learn how to co-create with love. To co-create in your own body, mind, spirit. To co-create in the world. To do this work can only happen from less of the ego self and more of the awakened heart/mind, as I like to call it. You cannot co-create for the highest good of all beings and still be centered in the ego. It doesn’t mean there will be no ego, but there will be ways of bypassing that ego, not getting caught up in the ego’s stories.

    This brings to mind The Four Agreements: A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom by Don Miguel Ruiz:

    Agreement 1: Be Impeccable With Your Word.
    Agreement 2: Don’t Take Anything Personally.
    Agreement 3: Don’t Make Assumptions.
    Agreement 4: Always Do Your Best.

    These agreements are a pathway we can all walk making room for the ego, without getting caught up in the stories.

      … the ego self is the outer clothing. We don’t say, “Barbara is a blue vest.” It’s just something she’s wearing today. The ego, the thoughts, the body, all of these attributes of the self are precious, but they are not your essence.

    “Our crisis is a birth. We are one living system and we have come to the limit of one phase of natural growth on a finite planet We must learn ethical evolution quickly As we seek to facilitate a gentle birth, a graceful and nonviolent transition to the next stage of our evolution, we will discover a natural pattern, a design of our birth transition, and develop a plan to cooperate with this design.”

    The last section I highlighted from Tuesday’s Dharma Path class:

      My dear friends, as humans you are not meant to 100% glitter. You would burn each other’s eyes out! You need to have a bit of dimness, it’s okay. You teach each other patience, compassion, generosity of spirit.


    Barbara Marx Hubbard speaks well the opportunity: “If we continue to grow separately and in competition with each other we could self destruct.”

    Or we could awaken the new species!

  • The Things that Frighten Us

    Denial and lies are
    almost an intrinsic
    part of an epidemic.
    ~ Nicholas A. Christakis

    On the heels of the previously expressed idea that John and Debra (and you and yours!) truly are the macrocosm and microcosm, soon after my blog was posted yesterday morning I saw a post John made Tuesday on Facebook: The Dems and the media are so corrupt. Vote Red and encourage your friends to vote Red.

    I grabbed my journal and wrote: “I feel the tension in my body.”

    As I sat with that tension, I could see my listening to the Rabbi’s talk and choosing to include it in my blog. I had not acknowledged the Rabbi’s admonition but I knew he had one, and I included the link to his talk.

    When John and I walked later in the morning, I told him I could see where my choice — my action — was spinning the karmic wheel. I asked him if he had realized how he could have agreed with the sentiment of the post he was commenting on, but without adding to the poisonous political climate plaguing our nation by singling out the “Dems” and liberal media as liars, and going even further by telling others how to vote. He said he had not been able to see that at the time.

    As we walked on together, we articulated more skillful ways of commenting. For example, “I saw the interview. I’m praying for all the lying to end.” As we explored further we also saw opportunity to speak a more wise world into being, “We all need to work together and support ourselves. The fighting is such a waste of energy and resources.”

      Deep Spring Center
      Thought for Today

      All of you, as you come through this series of human lifetimes, are going to find yourselves as teachers of compassion in the universe. So don’t minimize what you are doing. It’s not about you. It’s not even about your country or your world. It’s about love and the transformation of everything through love. And you are at the heart of this. There are so many beings that appreciate the efforts that you make and support those efforts. ~ Aaron

    John and I grew up in a world of double standards nobody questioned and few even recognized. In 1966 when he and I conceived Stacey and got married, he was allowed to finish high school. I was banned. It took both of us to get pregnant, but only one of us was held accountable….

    Often the most subtle of distortions have the most toxic ripple effects.

    This post’s opening quote is by Nicholas A. Christakis. He says, “Everywhere you see the spread of germs, for the last few thousand years, you see right behind it the spread of lies.” You can listen to a 47-Minute NPR interview with Christakis about his book Apollo’s Arrow: The Profound and Enduring Impact of Coronavirus on the Way We Live. Warning: It is not easy to hear the possible impact.

    Christakis says the coronavirus has come at a time when we are very vulnerable because of the polarization. He encourages us to let the science do it’s job. Either masks help or they don’t. He says, “Let’s get the science straight first.”

    The things that frighten us just want to be held.
    ~ Mark Nepo

    Mark Nepo, author of The Book of Awakening.
    In 1987 he discovered a lump on the back of his head that was eventually diagnosed as a rare form of lymphoma.
    He is now a two-time cancer survivor.

    The interview closes on an encouraging word:

    We are a remarkable species…

    We have so many wonderful qualities, we humans.

    These include the capacity for love, the capacity for friendship; that we cooperate with each other; that we make sacrifices even to benefit strangers.

  • Compassion is Not a Luxury

    We live in a time when science is validating
    what humans have known throughout the ages:
    that compassion is not a luxury;
    it is a necessity for our well-being,
    resilience,
    and survival.

    ~ Roshi Joan Halifax

    This morning I saw a headline “How Next Door Neighbors With Different Political Views Have Stayed Friends.” The photo shows a driveway with a Biden sign on one side and a Trump sign on the other. By each of the political signs was a sign of compassion.

    Handmade yard signs with arrows, reading ‘We (Heart) Them,’ stand alongside opposing political signs in the Mitchell and Gates front yards in Mt. Lebanon, a suburb of Pittsburgh.

    Last evening my dharma buddy said John and I are the macrocosm and microcosm. Macrocosm and microcosm refers to a realization that a part reflects the whole and vice versa. Think about a wave in the ocean.

    The Mitchell and Gates households are also the macrocosm and microcosm.

    I received an email of cartoons about President Trump this morning. A wave of nausea arose as I saw the depth of unkindness of the content. In Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith, Anne Lamott writes, “Not forgiving is like drinking rat poison and then waiting for the rat to die.”

    You may have heard that same sentiment expressed about anger: anger is like eating the poison and expecting the rat to die.

    We can add: lack of compassion is like eating rat poison and expecting the rat to die.

    If you wonder how you can allow compassion to arise, especially in those times and circumstances where it is clear we do not see things the same way, search Quotes Disagreement. Here are a few helpful hints:

      Bertrand Russell:
      “Love is wise; hatred is foolish. In this world, which is getting more and more closely interconnected, we have to learn to tolerate each other, we have to learn to put up with the fact that some people say things that we don’t like. We can only live together in that way. But if we are to live together, and not die together, we must learn a kind of charity and a kind of tolerance, which is absolutely vital to the continuation of human life on this planet.”

      Friedrich Nietzsche:
      “He who cannot put his thoughts on ice should not enter into the heat of dispute.”

      Criss Jami:
      “Together, we form a necessary paradox; not a senseless contradiction.”

      Jonathan Swift:
      “That was excellently observed’, say I, when I read a passage in an author, where his opinion agrees with mine. When we differ, there I pronounce him to be mistaken.”

    These are not new concepts. However, all that is happening in the collective calls forth a need to live these values humanity holds in common, even when we have very different opinions: Judge not, that ye be not judged. For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you. Matthew 7:1-3 (KJV)

    I just posted a link to a very timely article titled, “No Time For Self-Care? Try These Snack-Size Habits,” on the Imagine Healing Facebook page. For those who do not have access to Facebook, trust me (or follow the link to scan the list of great suggestions for yourself) this is doable. Take a nap. Breathe slowly. Watch a favorite movie. Take a bath. Write in a journal. Exercise. Sing.

    Self-care — like compassion, is not a luxury….

    And a lovely reminder at the close of the article: You don’t have to do everything, but doing something small each day can and will have a cumulative effect on your capacity to deal with “the new normal,” “tremendous uncertainty,” and “unprecedented times.”

    Deep Spring Center
    Thought for Today

    We do not state with an initial ego intention, ‘I’m going to save the world,’ but rather we start with the loving intention to see how we can dance with others and with the Earth and with spirit to co-create deeper peace and well-being for all sentient beings. We invite ourselves to be open and listen, to be guided, rather than having the ego dictate, ‘No, it should be this way.’ When you do this you find there truly are no limitations.

    We need the comfort
    and solace
    of each other’s
    presence!
    ~ Joan Borysenko

  • On the Shark’s Terms

    Like my parents taught me,
    ‘There are no monsters in the sea,
    only the ones we make up in our heads.’
    ~ Christina Zenato

    A friend shared an amazing video of a woman swimming with sharks. But this woman is not just “swimming” with the sharks. Christina Zenato, a professional diver, is removing fish hooks caught in their flesh!

    Christina says, “It’s done on the shark’s terms, not mine.”

    Amen!

    Christina has a box containing over 300 hooks….

    I wrote in my journal earlier today:

    Dear Holy Spirit,

    I am so impatient with John. What will help me be kind?

    (Note* The catalyst for this latest round of impatience was him wanting to use the tablet Stacey gave him instead of lugging around the huge 3-ringed binder. He went the home of a music friend who has software he likes a lot. John returned minus his tablet, excited that his friend was going to set it up for him. Soon, John’s friend came, unable to complete the download without my email address. I get triggered into frustration at having to manage John’s technology as well as my own, especially when it is something I am not fluent in. True confession: I do not know how to work this Android tablet, nor do I know anything about this software….)

    The VOICE in my journal responded:

    V: The impatience is not with him, it is within you. Like so many humans currently, strong emotions around the helplessness related to the pandemic are arising. Are you providing enough space for all you are experiencing? We know you are navigating a lot, but so was Viktor Frankl.

    Man’s Search for Meaning is a 1946 book by Viktor Frankl chronicling his experiences as a prisoner in Nazi concentration camps during World War II. Living through horrific happenings, Frankl was able to find purpose and positive feelings using his psychotherapeutic method.

    A quick search brought up this quotation:

      Between stimulus and response there is a space.
      In that space is our power to choose our response.
      In our response lies our growth and our freedom.

      ~ Viktor Frankl

    During the Oakwood Retreat, John Orr shared having asked Aaron why human incarnation is so difficult. Aaron said we choose incarnation because the catalysts for growth are so readily available on this heavy density plane. Aaron said there is a plane on which soul growth can happen without so much difficulty, but without a physical or emotional body (only a mental and spiritual body), the soul growth is soooooo slow, like millions of years. Aaron said, “Soul’s who are impatient for growth choose the earth plane!”

    Between stimulus and response there is a space….

    You can watch for “divine” themes in each day. Howard Thurman’s Word for the Day from Gratefulness.org : Whatever may be the tensions and the stresses of a particular day, there is always lurking close at hand the trailing beauty of forgotten joy or unremembered peace.

    In that space is our power to choose our response….


    And the Deep Spring Center Thought for Today from Aaron:
    Perhaps as you sit there by the water, let’s use a big sloppy wet dog as example, the dog comes running along and jumps across your lap. You’re wet, you’re covered with sand. You have a scratch where his claws dug into the flesh. He’s licking your feet and it’s an unpleasant feeling. Ultimate reality has not gone anywhere; pure awareness hasn’t gone anywhere; but for the moment you can’t access it. Your mind and body come back to a lower vibration. You breathe a few times. A friend comes over and dries you off with a towel. You open up, see the dog frolicking so happily, catch his joy a bit, and you open back up into pure awareness.

    In our response lies our growth and our freedom….

    May all beings experience the beauty of forgotten joy or unremembered peace.