Debra Basham

Living and Loving

Tag: Barbara Brodsky

The One Heart We All Share

I just attended a 3-day Vipassana retreat with Barbara Brodsky, Aaron, and John Orr, “The One Heart We All Share.” This was the online description:

What is this one heart we all share? It is our true nature, the essence of our being, which is love and light. Meditation is one effective way of coming to know this inner light of our divinity that is infused with love and pervades everything. Once we come to know our true nature, we develop, through practice, the ability to rest in it more stably. Then we can live more continuously from this heart of wisdom, love and compassion and truly come to know it as the One Heart we all share.

I have previously mentioned the saying, “For those who understand no explanation is necessary. For those who do not understand no explanation is possible.”

Some research indicates the saying came from Thomas Aquinas. Saint Thomas Aquinas believed that the existence of God could be proven in five ways, mainly by:
1) observing movement in the world as proof of God, the “Immovable Mover”;
2) observing cause and effect and identifying God as the cause of everything;
3) concluding that the impermanent nature of beings proves the existence of God.

The original quote was not about ‘understanding’ but about religious belief, specifically “faith.” The original quote is, “To one who has faith, no explanation is necessary. To one without faith, no explanation is possible.”

It is amazing to me how perspective differs, but what is does not. For example, this cartoon that Linda B/G shared recently.

At the retreat, the teachers spoke about the nature of karma.

I remember the nature of karma;

I am born of karma, I am heir to karma, I abide in karma, and I am supported by karma.

When I act with intention, I am the owner of my actions and inherit their results.

My future is born from such actions, and their results will be my home.

All actions with intention, be they skillful or harmful, of such acts will I be the heir.

While karma is not a term used in Christianity, it is certainly there in Galatians, Chapter 6, Verse 7: “Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap.”

One of the mystical experiences common to retreat for me, regardless of the theme, is that I will have a foreshadowing of a teaching point to come. I will write in my journal an insight, then hear the teacher/s speak that to the group.

Sharing (with permission) the words of one student:

In all the years I had been practicing, it was suddenly like, “Oh, oh….” because I was in that place.

I realized grief isn’t just an intense feeling, it is actually a REALM. I was in this place, and it wasn’t here and it wasn’t the other side. I was somewhere in between and this portal kept opening up, and when it did my heart would just explode out.

I knew, too, that the process of grief for me was a rite of passage, it was something that was changing me.

In our culture, we are encouraged to sort of get over grief and get back to our lives. That this is a measure of our mental health – how fast you can get back as if nothing has happened. I knew intuitively that this was just nonsense. That I did not want to be the same person I was before my father died. I wanted to be different in the world going forward after that.

This student and you and I, like Mary Reed, are likely becoming unwitting mystics…

In a recent interview Mary Reed was asked to name three things she wished everyone could experience before we die. The interviewer did a short animation video of her response, which added a fun, unexpected dimension to Mary’s answer. See: Three Things to Be Experienced Before We Die

The first day of the retreat was the 49th day since Jerry Basham passed. In Buddhism, we chant that person’s name along with gate, gate, paragate, parasamgate, Bodhi Svaha! Gone, Gone, to the other shore, the shore of liberation.

When I came out of silence and caught up on messages and social media, my sister-in-law had posted this:

Your Loved One in Heaven
by Sean Dietrich

Hi. This is your late loved one speaking. I don’t have long, so listen up because I have a lot I want to tell you.

First off, I get it.

Ever since I left this world you have missed me, and I know you’re bracing for the holidays without me. No matter what anyone says, this year’s festivities are going to be really tough.

In fact, let’s be honest, this festive season will probably suck pondwater. But then, Thanksgiving and Christmas are tough holidays for a lot of people. You’re not alone.

See, the misconception about the holidays is that they are one big party. That’s what every song on the radio claims. Each television commercial you see shows happy families clad in gaudy Old Navy sweaters, carving up poultry, smiling their perfect Hollywood teeth at the camera. But that’s not exactly reality.

In reality, fifty-eight percent of Americans admit to feeling severely depressed and anxious during November and December. In reality many folks will cry throughout the “most wonderful time of the year.”

Well, guess what? Nobody is crying up here in heaven. This place is unreal. There is, literally, too much beauty to take in. Way too much.

For starters—get this—time doesn’t even exist anymore. Which I’m still getting used to.

Right now, for all I know, the calendar year down on Earth could be 1728, 4045, 1991, or 12 BC. It really wouldn’t matter up here. This is a realm where there is no ticking clock, no schedule. Up here there is only this present moment. This. Here. Now. That’s all there has ever been. And there is real comfort in this.

I know this all seems hard to grasp, but if you were here you’d get it.

Also, for the first time I’m pain free. I feel like a teenager again in my body. You probably don’t realize how long I’ve lived with pain because I never talked about it, I kept my problems to myself because I was your loved one, and you needed me to be brave.

But pain is a devious thing. It creeps up on even the strongest person, little by little, bit by bit. Until pretty soon, pain becomes a central feature of life.

Sometimes my pain would get so bad it was all I thought about. No, I’m not saying that my life was miserable—far from it. I loved being on earth. It’s just that simply waking up each morning was getting exhausting.

But, you know what? Not anymore. In this new place, I am wholly and thoroughly happy.

But enough about me. I don’t have room to describe all the terrific things I’m experiencing, and you don’t need to hear them. Right now, you’re grieving, and what you need is a hug.

Which is why I’m writing to you. This is my hug to you. Because you’ve lost sight of me. And in fact, you’ve lost sight of several important things lately.

Death has a way of blinding us. It reorganizes the way you think, it changes you. You will never be the same after you lose someone. It messes with your inner physiology. It reorganizes you’re neurons.

But then, there’s one teensy little thing you’re forgetting:

I’m still around.

Yes, you read that correctly, I’m right here with you. No, you can’t see me. No, you can’t reach out and hold me. But did you know that one of the things I’m allowed to do as a heavenly being is hang out with you?

It’s true. I’m never far away. I’m in the room with you now, along with a big cloud of ancestors, saints, and witnesses. I’m shooting the breeze alongside you, watching you live your life, watching you raise your kids, watching your private moments of sorrow.

Here, in this new realm, I am in the perfect position to help you learn things. Which is what I vow to spend the rest of your earthly life doing, teaching you little lessons, lending you a hand when you least expect it, and desperately trying to make you smile. Actually, I’ve already been doing this stuff, you just don’t realize it.

What, you don’t believe me?

Well, wake up, pal. You know that tingle you get in your spine whenever you think of me? That’s me.

You know how, just yesterday, you had a beautiful memory when you were driving and it made you cry so hard that it actually felt good and you began to laugh through tears? Also me.

You know how sometimes when you’re all alone, preoccupied with something else, suddenly you get this faint feeling that someone is standing in the room with you? Hello? Me.

You’re not alone on this earth. You never were. You never will be. So during this holiday season, when cheerful families are getting together and making merry, and taking shots of eggnog, I’m going to be clinging to your shoulder, helping you muddle through somehow.

I’ll be making your spinal column tingle a lot, and I’ll be sending plenty of signs. Each of these signs—every single one—is code for “I love you.” So start paying attention to these hints.

Because this was one.

Well said, Sean. The one heart we all share….

November 15, 2021
And Now A Warning!

From the 1992 film, “Death Becomes Her”:

[Lisle (Isabella Rossellini) hands Madeleine (Meryl Streep) the vial of potion.]

Madeleine: “Bottoms up.”

[She drinks the potion.]

Lisle Von Rhuman: “Now a warning.”

Madeleine: “NOW a warning?”

This information may feel a lot like that. It has been an intense yet slow-moving past few months, with many of us feeling very out of sorts, even to the point of having difficult and painful experiences. But there’s a reason, according to the stars. The five outer planets (Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto) have ALL been retrograde. When a planet goes retrograde, everything related to that planet goes wonky.

If everything related to all of these wasn’t enough, Mercury also went retrograde September 27 until October 18, with a “shadow period” that lasts a few weeks before and after the actual retrograde.

Now a warning…. This will be a very intense time, as we are reflecting upon all the partnerships, relationships, and friendships in our lives to understand where we fit in. Is there balance and peace between us? Do we feel at home with these people?

See: Why You Might Be Feeling Off Lately.

I have certainly been experiencing this, as have the people in my life.

In the Tuesday, October 26, Dharma Path class we were guided to reflect on the following, with the guidance of realizing, “If we can’t hold ourselves in our hearts we can’t hold each other.”
Of what am I dismissive in myself?
What part/s of myself do I not hold in my heart?
What needs my loving attention?

I wrote in my journal:
wounded sexuality
left hip/knee/foot
inner worrywart

To begin this difficult process we were to reflect on a part of ourselves that we do embrace. That was easier. I love that I am a hearth-keeper, baking cookies, making meals, helping and supporting. I love being a nurturer.

We were gently reminded, “These parts are real. When we are dismissive we can’t bring them into our heart. We have all lost something dear to us. We all have a community within us. It is time to invite ourselves back into our hearts.”

We were instructed to look into the camera and really allow ourselves to see ourselves and to be seen through the eyes of unconditional love.

It was powerful.

At one point, the eyes literally became the eyes of my dad! I could see clearly how I had stepped in to the wounded sexuality when my dad’s indiscretion resulted in him passing syphilis to my mom while she was pregnant for me. Then my having been sexualized at a young age; my getting pregnant at 15, married at 16, at a time when females were not allowed to stay in school. Loss of libido and intimacy with the hysterectomy in 2012. Such loss…. Dismissive? Lord, yes.

But suddenly I could see this all having come from conditions – this line of wounded sexuality did not begin with me!

A flood of appreciation washed over my soul.

I wrote in my journal:
I have healed the line of wounded sexuality. I did not start it. I stepped into it.

As I was working on this post, a friend sent the perfect “Inspiration” from a Network For Grateful Living Gratefulness.org:

Place your hand on your heart. Feel what surfaces in the fullness of that space. Joy, sorrow, anger, contentment, sadness, delight, vulnerability. Perhaps an unnameable tone. Whatever you notice, allow it to simply be. Let it be okay. Let yourself soften.

When we hold ourselves and others tenderly, we nurture the relationships that make life possible. Tending is the embodiment of tenderness and so a direct path to shared belonging. We stretch toward and from the heart, extending to others and ourselves expressions of humility, compassion, and care. As Trui Snyman says in the short film Tenderness: “People are hard on each other, people are hard on themselves.…We could all do with more tenderness.”

In moments of difficulty, tenderness can serve as a starting place, offering fertile ground for the cultivation of gratefulness. Soften, and open up to the unending gifts of the great mystery in which you belong. Soften, and feel yourself fortified. Soften. Stretch toward and from your heart.

Like the weather, moods change.

Soften….

And now another warning: Venus goes retrograde on December 19 until January 29, 2021.

October 28, 2021

Free!

From my journal:

Dear Holy Spirit:

I wrote to Barbara Brodsky confessing that I was not feeling drawn to the Deep Spring Center for Meditation fall program and expressing some confusion and concern. Aaron incorporated to clarify, and I listened to the audio last evening. This morning, I read the transcript Barbara sent to all of the Dharma Path students.

Immediately after reading that, I opened Aaron’s Thought for Today:

I had many teachers, including Jeshua. Each one served a purpose, but each one was temporary, even the greatest teachers simply pass through to remind you of something of which you need reminding, something you already know but had forgotten. When you have awakened to that, that teacher passes, and then the next teacher will come.

Then I logged onto Facebook and see a post by Pamela Johnson on her page: Supernatural Love and Life After Death. She writes: “It breaks my heart to see so many people, literally thousands upon thousands (more like millions according to Alan) grieving the loss of a loved one when I know they are literally standing right there next to them….”

I know my frequency is with this message!

Then I open the Daily Word from Unity:

Free!

I am free to be the best me I can be… an exciting future awaits me, and I boldly take my place in it. I am ready to live my life to the fullest.

You will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.

~ John 8:32

I don’t get a commission from Facebook, and I am not in denial of the downside to this platform, but people can figure out how to access the best without the rest. One friend named a page after her dog and that allowed her to log on and read/see posts about her grandchildren.

Pamela and Alan Johnson will have a book out next spring, but I wish every one who wants to be free NOW could see all of the post that I read this morning. I took these screen shots. You might have to save the photo and enlarge it to be able to read it, or just soak in the truth.

You will know the truth, and the truth will make you Free!

August 19, 2021

Pondering Fathers

I cannot swear that Tami Simon, the founder of Sounds True, which produces Insights at the Edge had pondering fathers on her mind when she shared “Fierce Intimacy” with Terry Real. Now, I have to confess, I devoured two of Terry’s books — I Don’t Want to Talk about It : Overcoming the Secret Legacy of Male Depression and How Can I Get Through to You? Reconnecting Men and Women — long enough ago that he was going by Terrence Real.

Perhaps being a teenage wife (to an equally teenage husband) was part of the motivation of my avid interest, but I am honestly assuming the relationship of my own mother and father as I was growing up played an even more significant role.

In the interview with Tami Simon, Terry answers her question about how he developed the core skills he teaches with brutal transparency:

Bloodily. [and he laughs] People have asked me how I became a family therapist and I jokingly always say, “I started about four years old in my dysfunctional family.” I come from a violent, dysfunctional, depressed family and I was pretty messed up for most of my life. I write about it in I Don’t Want to Talk About It. That’s autobiographical in part. There’s this old joke that therapists are people that have to be in therapy 40 hours a week.

I had never heard that line about therapists being people who need to be in therapy 40 hours a week, but it resonates. I had also never heard of using the parallel of becoming relationally fit to becoming physically fit.

The New Rules of Marriage

To become physically fit, this is something I’m going to do on my own. And I know that if I’m not physically fit, it’s because I haven’t been to the gym. I’ve been eating ice cream. Whatever. I take responsibility. I know inside, I’m not physically fit. I haven’t been doing it. But relational happiness, this is going to take a miracle outside of my own energy and effort because there’s this other person involved. And this other person’s really difficult.

Terry responded with, “Yes, isn’t that amazing the way the other person is always so difficult and we’re all so nice?”

Last week during the Dharma Path Intensive, we heard an amazing teaching from Aaron, channeled by Barbara Brodsky, about bringing beautiful flowers up from the deep crevasse of darkness. That certainly seems to fit with becoming relationally fit. Here is an excerpt from the transcript of a talk given by Aaron on June 1, 2021.

Now let us brave the long ladders that we find. Going down, and down, and down into the darkness.

Your feet finally touch the bottom. Firm ground. But what is there around you? Is it safe? But there is a sweet scent in the air.

Just as you get your footing, the sun crests over the edge high above you and shines straight down and illuminates a land filled with flowers and beauty. Just a few seconds, because the crack above you seems so narrow, so high above, and then it passes and you’re in darkness again.

Can you imagine this? You came down the ladder with courage and fear. You land on your feet, not knowing if you’d be attacked by something that wanted to destroy you, to eat you. And there in the darkness were radiant flowers with a beautiful scent.

You have large baskets on your backs. You ask the flowers, “Who will come with me?” And so many of them shout out, “Me! Me! Take me!” So you begin to fill the baskets with flowers. You carry them up. Some of them you cut; some of them you actually dig out by the roots and put in small pots. You climb back up.

Now instead of just your heart carrying the light of the Dharmakaya onto the bridge and out into the nirmanakaya, instead of just reaching for those who are able to come on the bridge and directing them toward the Dharmakaya, you have something of substance.

You carry it across the bridge. You do not set it on the nirmanakaya end of the bridge. You do not set it off of the bridge, but you set it on the edge of the bridge, so that people must take one step into the sambhogakaya to reach this wonderfully-scented offering.

Picture the beings who come and take these flowers, beings living in a nirmanakaya realm who have never seen anything except the most mundane flowers, and those still being beautiful, the dandelions and such. But this is something with such an exquisite scent and beauty…

Feel yourself there on the end of the bridge, holding out these flowers and asking people to simply take one step up to reach the flower and to receive their flower. Inhale the heavenly scent. See the radiant colors, colors so much more vivid than anything in the nirmanakaya realm.

But to reach this you had to have the courage to move off the safety of the bridge and into the darkness. There are flowers there. There are also tigers with enormous fangs, and huge snakes. This is not a realm only of light.

But as you brave the darkness and bring up the flowers, who say, “Take me! Take me!” and offer them out to the world of suffering, that world also can become transformed.

Janice Keller has transcribed Aaron’s teaching for decades. When she sent this one, she included an image and the precious line: bringing beautiful flowers up out of the crevasse.

You will know it is significant that you are reading this. I only know it is significant I am writing it as I am pondering fathers….

June 20, 2021

The Path to Peace

If it happens, it needs to occur.
~ Neale Donald Walsch

Jerry Ashmore, senior dharma teacher at Empty Circle Zen center in Hobart, Indiana, said simply, “If we don’t clear our stuff how can we help others?”

But how do we know what our stuff is? We can pay attention to the tendency we have to “perseverate” — meaning when we repeat or prolong an action, thought, or utterance after the stimulus that prompted it has ceased.

We have an interaction that triggers something. Thoughts pop into mind over and over and over again. For example, guilt or resentment might arise because we are looking at past actions not recognizing the experience as a moment of unconsciousness. (We don’t need to personalize it.)

Forgiveness is when we bring presence (consciousness) to the thought as it pops into our mind yet again. We can notice that something has not yet been undone.

This is not a new idea. Epictetus, a Greek Philosopher who was born in 50 AD and died in 135 AD, said: “Don’t hope that events will turn out the way you want, welcome events whichever way they happen: This is the path to peace.”

Suffering is simply arguing with the way things are. Sokukoji Buddhist Monastery broadcast a dharma talk with a very interesting phrase: Path of Zen starts at the mountain top and goes up.

Grandson, Adam, while he was in Europe.

Jerry Ashmore went on to say that all practice starts by releasing tension in the body. He said, “We can be OK. Don’t discount OKness… the more you experience things as they are rather than how you want them to be, you are on your path.”

Yesterday, The Mother (channeled by Barbara Brodsky) spoke this Darshan (blessing) to me:

Dear Friend, you are making a difference. Let go of the ten thousand (this is a reference to the person tossing stranded starfish back into the ocean) and stay focused on whatever is present in front of you and let your heart sing with joy for the difference you have been able to make in that presence.

Will you try to do that? And if the mind goes to the ten thousand, just, “Shhhh…. Stop.”

Contracting.

Fear.

Ahhh…

Right there with fear is the heart of love. And the heart of love must be allowed to be free to continue making the difference.

Today, I took a friend for cataract surgery and received such a lovely confirmation in her thank you card:

The opening quotation by Neale Donald Walsch concludes with this comment about path: “Whatever experiences the universe brings your feet are a part of your path, inviting you to consciously engage in a process of becoming the highest version of you.”

May 17, 2021

What Else Is

The definition of complaining is the expression of dissatisfaction or annoyance about something.

A popular phrase is to speak of an undesired state (for example, complaining) as your eating rat poison expecting the rat to die. It is not always obvious, but our emotional state has myriad influences on US.

Often, John and I remind one another of the valuable awareness to not waste our creative energy complaining about what is. Any moron can do that.

Real wisdom arises as you devote your creative energy to what else is.

This morning, a short poem came through which articulates this so well:

Stewing or fuming
about what is
such a waste
of energy

Open heart
open mind
open up to
what else is

Debra Basham 05-13-2021

Sometimes it is helpful to be willing to see in what ways what is might be protecting you from what else is. Feeling anger might protect you from feeling powerlessness. Feeling impatience might protect you from feeling worry. Feeling boredom might protect you from feeling discouragement. A handy way to explore all of this is to be aware of an emotional guidance scale, such as the one described by Abraham-Hicks:

1. Joy/Appreciation/Empowerment/Freedom/Love
2. Passion
3. Enthusiasm/Eagerness/Happiness
4. Positive Expectation/Belief
5. Optimism
6. Hopefulness
7. Contentment
8. Boredom
9. Pessimism
10. Frustration/Irritation/Impatience
11. Overwhelment (feeling overwhelmed)
12. Disappointment
13. Doubt
14. Worry
15. Blame
16. Discouragement
17. Anger
18. Revenge
19. Hatred/Rage
20. Jealousy
21. Insecurity/Guilt/Unworthiness
22. Fear/Grief/Desperation/Despair/Powerlessness

Thought for Today

Sometimes you repeatedly find yourself faced with an unpleasant situation, until the mind begins to obsess with it. You may begin to ask the question, why am I so attracted to this obsession? It’s not a conceptual question. One begins then to investigate the nature of obsession itself.

Different of you have different patterns of obsession. For example, some go into old stories, casting blame on others or on yourself. Others may look for a way to solve it, planning. Others of you may just feel anger and helplessness and move into a state of depression.

You each have your own patterns. This is part of understanding the nature of obsession, to understand the habitual patterning with obsession. When mind becomes obsessive, what do you gain?

~ Aaron

Aaron, as channeled by Barbara Brodsky, refers to emotions as “aggregates.” Aggregates are non-self. Aggregates are impermanent. Aggregates arise because of the senses, triggered by smell, touch, taste, sight and hearing.

Aggregates rise up out from the sense experience and subside when the sense experience of our life changes. We feel worry when a person we care about is experiencing a health challenge. But worry (each emotion) is an aggregate, so YOU are not that worry.

In fact, the one who is aware of worry is not worried. That one is aware.

This is not about trying to not worry. In fact, as our friend, Yoda, says, “Do or Do Not. There is No Try.”

Hmmmmm, if there is just do or do not that makes me really appreciate what else is….

May 13, 2021

R-E-S-P-E-C-T

This post might be considered “The High Road Part 2.”

I learned to think of re-spect as the willing to look again and again.

I am not attending an eight-day workshop Healing and the Everhealed with Barbara Brodsky (January 23-30). It was very odd to not be guided to attend, especially given that my life’s work is just this.

In fact, it was more a matter of my having been guided not to attend.

I watched the mind games: “I will miss out,” or “I already know this stuff,” or “I should attend to support others,” and even, “This is all just ego.”

Fortunately, I have the privilege of sending out the audio recordings from the workshop, so I am benefiting by the teachings!

Even the introductions of those attending the workshop was humbling. It is an amazing group of individuals with such diverse experience in the healing arts. Great love and sincere commitment to path. I bow to each….

Perhaps this “birds-eye-view” of the workshop is allowing just the right space for integration. Meanwhile, notice the amazing synchronicities!

Aaron’s Daily Quote the opening day of the workshop was, “Remember that at the deepest level there is nothing to heal. The ever-perfect is always there. We move through the distortion, to reveal the ever-perfect. In another articulation, the human uncovers the light body template for the ever-perfect and shines it into the body, asking the etheric and physical bodies to pick up that image, and to replicate it. All the healer is doing is holding the mirror.”

Note* Aaron’s Daily Quotes are selected randomly by a computer program from a pre-loaded field of hundreds. No human being has the ability to select from that field.

Yesterday morning I had a phone conversation with John’s cousin. I asked about her brother following a stressful interaction we had with him about masks (conspiracy) before we left home. She and her husband will be vacationing on Sanibel Island in a few weeks and wanted to know also about Pine Island for some friends. I had to admit to her I am not a good one to ask because it does not yet seem wise to live life as though there is no coronavirus.

Aaron’s Daily Quote for today:

If you get into a situation with somebody where there’s a lot of anger and verbal clashing, and you start to hear a little voice inside that says, ‘But he’s wrong and I’m right!’ do you think that voice is just from you? A lot of it’s from you. And then there’s your negative polarity cheering team that says, ‘Ooo, here’s a place to wreak havoc. We can make a mess here!’ So it’s egging you on, ‘Yeah, you’re right and he’s wrong! Tell him!’

~ Aaron

And then I open today’s teaching from Neale Donald Walsch:

On this day of your life Debra, I believe God wants you to know …

… that negative passions may run high, but they do not
have to rule you.

Your inner peace, and the sanctity of your being, are
not worth trashing because of some negative feeling
you have about something. Just let it go, and return to
the knowing and experiencing of who you really are.

Try not to abandon the self. Try very hard. In the end,
your soul will be so grateful.

A subtle cue that I am releasing some long-held cherished ego position and integrating awareness is how EVERYTHING IS ALWAYS SAYING THE SAME THING.

Also from this morning’s inbox:

Respect toward yourself is more significant than any respect from others because you know yourself better. When you practice patience, for example, you must know why you’re doing it and how it benefits you. If you value self-respect and do virtuous things that are unknown to others, you will naturally gain self-confidence, strength, and freedom from your neuroses. You will feel more and more inspired to develop your tsewa and shed the eight worldly concerns because of the benefit and freedom you personally experience by doing so. Your heart will be at peace, and eventually others will respect you as a person who has truly been transformed.

~ Peaceful Heart
The Buddhist Practice of Patience

by Dzigar Kongtrul, Edited by Joseph Waxman, page 39

* Vihiṃsā (Sanskrit; Tibetan phonetic: nampar tsewa) is a Buddhist term translated as “malice”, “hostility”, or “cruelty”. It is identified as one of the twenty subsidiary unwholesome mental factors within the Mahayana Abhidharma teachings.

Over and over and over in this workshop comes the gentle reminder there is nothing to fix. Trying to fix anything thwarts availability to have every thought, word, and action guided by the open loving heart.

Abraham Hicks joins the integration today:

It may sound odd, but the fastest way to get to a new-and-improved situation is to make peace with your current situation. By making lists of the most positive aspects you can find about your current situation, you then release your resistance to the improvements that are waiting for you. But if you rail against the injustices of your current situation, you hold yourself in Vibrational alignment with what you do not want, and you cannot then move in the direction of improvement. It defies Law. In every particle of the Universe, there is that which is wanted – and the lack of it.

Excerpted from The Vortex on 8/31/09

Our Love
Esther (Abraham and Jerry)

And just one more synchronicity from my inbox: They may not deserve forgiveness, but I do. ~ Anne P.

Now, this is R-E-S-P-E-C-T.

January 25, 2021

It’s Perfect!

It is only with the heart that one can see rightly;
what is essential is invisible to the eye.

~Antoine de St. Exupéry

Yesterday afternoon I attended Remembering Wholeness with The Mother, a divine feminine being channeled by Barbara Brodsky. The opening comments tied right in with a previous evening’s conversation about some ongoing pain. I had asked my friend to identify any way she has not befriended her body. She spoke right away: pushing her body when it was trying to get her to stop.

Interestingly, the message I received from The Mother addressed the same dynamic for me on the emotional level.

What is there in your heart that you have pushed aside feeling it may prevent you from coping; feeling it may diminish your strength if you hear this or that?

The evening my dad died I went to my client’s home and did an art show.

The afternoon my mom died I went back to Holistic Alliance and saw clients.

The Mother closed her words to me with this phrase: It’s perfect. Perhaps not always pleasant, but perfect.

She reminded me that nothing the heart speaks is good or bad. It is all simply movements of the heart — some more grounded in fear, some more grounded in love. “Unless you hear it all, there is not wholeness.”

She offered encouragement: There is still some confusion that’s coming out of not deeply listening to and trusting your heart — your heart’s love, your heart’s wisdom.

Even quoting lyrics from a Walt Whitman poem, “I Celebrate Myself, and Sing Myself,” over and over, person after person, the theme of the day was the importance of learning to cherish yourself, hear yourself, love yourself.

As I walked alone in the dark last evening, I allowed tears to flow, saying to my heart over and over, “It’s perfect. Perhaps not always pleasant, but perfect.”

Today, it is great-grandson, Jackson, who has my heart singing Karen Drucker’s “Gentle With Myself.”

January 11, 2021

2021 – A True Spiritual Path

Deep Spring Center
Thought for Today
December 31, 2020

So often beings have a
limited view of spiritual life
that creates a duality in themselves,
so that they only see themselves
as ‘being spiritual’
when they’re being kind and loving.

When painful emotions arise,
then they think,
‘I am no longer being spiritual.
I should fix or get rid of these emotions
and come back to kindness and
then I will be spiritual.’

But this dualistic thinking only
enhances the fragmentation of the self and
enhances negativity and suffering.

To open the heart to the self,
just as it is in this moment,
is the true spiritual path.

~ Aaron

As we turn the page on our calendar to 2021 at midnight tonight where ever you are, hindsight will be 2020. New Years has held a nostalgic space in my heart and mind for as long as I can remember, but just as 2021 offers unlimited possibilities, tomorrow is also just another day.

What will you remember most from the past year? High on my list is the consistent kindness and generosity of our friends, Linda and Larry, consistently doing our grocery shopping for us. First, using InstaCart, and then going to the grocery store, just so we could limit our exposure to the coronavirus.

I will remember the blessing of Zoom bringing the meditation hall into my home.

I will also feel the sting of not going to Tennessee to visit Stacey’s family on our way home in April. Or having to tell Melody I could not do an in-person ceremony for her mom, my friend and colleague, who contracted COVID-19 while in the hospital with acute pancreatitis. Bonnie passed without Melody or Dan, Bonnie’s husband, having opportunity to be with her.

No service of celebration of life for Fred Gibby yet either. They say it will be an ultimate hug-fest when the time is right. and Fred loves that idea!

It is otherworldly to not have gotten to Kalamazoo to see Joel and the kitties; and very hollow that I did not unpack the office when contents were moved to the beautiful new space at Lakeshore Acupuncture.

Immense gratitude for Barbara Brodsky and John Orr and Aaron and Jeshua (and all who help me remember who I really am) seeps deeply into every day.

The take-out dinners and dominoes by Zoom.

And now, Jackson Taylor Yarber, born December 28, 2020, has joined our family, and I am loving my first great-grandchild fully from Southwest Florida as he is in Tennessee. Fingers crossed it will be safe to hold him and smell him on our way back home in the spring.

In the spring — the spring of 2021!

It feels otherworldly to say that…

2020 is ending.

2021 is beginning.

Suddenly, I am hearing a song from the musical Godspell in my head: Where are you going? Where are you going? Can you take me with you?

Last December I was fixated on accessing a Magic Eye Wall Calendar! When I found one, I decided to gift a bunch of folks! Janis and I have ritualized the turning of the page on the first day of each month, letting the image come into view, noticing how some are very easy and others quite challenging.

Interestingly, there will not be a Magic Eye Wall Calendar for 2021, as announced on the website: Our calendar publisher has asked us to wait until next year to publish a Magic Eye 2022 wall calendar, as printing, shipping and distribution channels have all been disrupted by Covid-19. We will not be releasing a Magic Eye 2021 wall calendar. Wishing everyone a happy & safe year!

Janis and I have agreed to go back through each month of the 2020 Magic Eye Wall Calendar, enjoying again in 2021 what we learned in 2020.

The missing and longing, and seeing and being. It has all been here all along.

Here’s to 2021, a true spiritual path. It, too, has been there all along….

“If you can see your path laid out in front of you step by step, you know it’s not your path. Your own path you make with every step you take. That’s why it’s your path.” ~ Joseph Campbell

December 31, 2020

What Remains is Enough

There’s going to be pain that feels overwhelming.
There are going to be situations
that come up where
we just suddenly freeze up and say,
“I don’t know how to do this.”

~ Barbara Brodsky

This is certainly a time of accepting what is and knowing that what is, is enough. The current version of this process began for me last March when Lee County, Florida, experienced it’s first fatality from a confirmed community-transmitted case of the coronavirus.

As John and I began to self-isolate, I would gently remind myself of the truth: we can live with what we have for a long time. We can hold the desire for something else with compassion. We can notice the voice inside that habitually insists, “I want it this way!”

I was naïve enough at that time to see everyone doing what was quite difficult for a short period of time, so together we could quickly move through this pandemic with grace and ease.

Of course, I notice subtle judgment about those who continue having big gatherings, “We could be done with this if THEY would do what is needed.”

I watch mindfulness to conserve.

I still move a new sheet of paper towel from “use with food” to “use to clean,” rather than grab a clean sheet and then toss it. In the toilet, I limit most wipes to four squares, if you know what I mean.

Okay. I don’t know how to do this.
Can I give myself permission
not to know how to do it?

And then finally
I can come to the part that says,
“Yes, I do know how to do this.”

~ Barbara Brodsky

As we traveled from Michigan to Florida this past weekend, we took what we learned from our trip home last April. We had food, water, and potty preparations in the van with us. I used safe protocol when we had to stop for fuel.

We opted for a Zoom Thanksgiving with my sister, Janis, and brother-in-love, Larry.

We chose to stay in a hotel near Stacey, and to wear two masks while visiting with Stacey and Doug, Brad and Christina, and Adam — and Baxter and the cats!!!

Later today I will make a sign for the lanai door here on Bounty Lane saying we are safe-sheltering. Not at all our normal, not at all our desired — but enough.

I have some curiosity about those who have tested positive and are navigating the virus but have requested that information not be shared. My wondering about it is, “Are they experiencing guilty feelings about having contracted this virus?”

We played our first Zoom dominoes game last evening with Linda and Larry while we are here on Bounty Lane and they are still at Lot 101 at home in Glenaire. While our location has changed, much remains the same.

The theme of our meditation retreats has been about what remains.

What remains in my cupboard? What remains as we continue to navigate a global pandemic? What remains when a loved one passes?

What remains is LOVE. What always remains is LOVE. And LOVE is enough.

It was great to take Michigan apples to Stacey. It was wonderful to deliver her favorite sauerkraut casserole. We loved seeing the beautiful improvements to their home. It was sweet to share homemade caramel corn with Christina.

The ego doesn’t
know how to do this,
but the deeper self does.

The heart mind,
the wisdom and compassion heart,
knows how to do it.

~ Barbara Brodsky

We have already started getting mail here. In addition to having sent John his usual insulting (it’s a game they have played for years!) birthday card, Lee Mapes sent us a very impressive Christmas card, appropriate for snowbirds!

And he gifted us with an Echo Show 8!

Lee is a loyal friend, but it is not about what he buys (although he is generous that way too). Lee remains. Lee’s love remains.

Lee navigated Stacey’s adolescence with us as John was on the road for Morton Shoes. Early one Sunday morning he went to our house in Saint Joseph, broke into our garage to get the suitcases that were inadvertently left there, and drove them to Midway Airport in Chicago.

I took him to the hospital when he had hernia surgery. I brought him to our home and cared for him until he was able to go home. Stacey is Lee’s legal and medical representative.

There is enough love, enough generosity, enough wisdom and kindness to get through this with grace and ease, regardless of how long it takes, because what remains is enough….

December 3, 2020