Debra Basham

Living and Loving

Tag: Deep Spring Center

  • A Holy/Wholly Holistic Alliance Reunion

    The meeting of two personalities
    is like the contact of two chemical substances:
    if there is any reaction, both are transformed.

    ~ Carl Jung

    It’s been said that no one comes into our lives by accident. It might also be said that no experience we have is by accident either. The conditions of our lives are simply arising and ceasing out of conditions.

    On Friday morning we were driving from Port Charlotte to Naples for a follow up appointment with Dr. Steven Deutsch, the cardiologist that diagnosed John’s cardiovascular disease and referred him to the surgeon who did the quadruple bypass surgery. I had a flashback of the 7-Eleven cashier who came from behind her counter to put her arms around me and pray for us, saying, “Lord, let all of the news this woman gets today be good news.” Accompanying this cellular memory was the guidance for me to bask in the years of “Sacred Stories” that have been published.

    Seated in the way-back seat, I asked Linda to send back the small notepad. She said, “I have the addresses if that is what you are after.” I wanted the pad because I felt the need to journal. Pad in hand, I noted a subtle trying to anticipate another person’s needs and wrote: Another habit energy I see, bless, and release.

    We picked up Nancy Green and Claudia Mierau and then proceeded to Naples where we met Pat Jordon and all enjoyed a fabulous lunch at True Foods. It was truly a holy Holistic Alliance Reunion!

    As we were driving from the restaurant to the doctor’s office, I asked Linda (who was in the front seat navigating for John) if John was going to turn left or right when we got to the address. Linda said to John, “Does she not think I would have told you?”

    I said out loud, “Even if he knows where he is going to turn that doesn’t mean that I not also like to know,” and then added, “Am I pissing you off today, Linda?”

    She did not respond, but we had opportunity to talk about all of this the following morning and Linda confessed she and John had previously shared some of his energy about my backseat driving. I understand his frustration with that behavior. I also understand how challenging it is to be in the way-back as he is driving — even though I totally trust Linda’s navigating. It is nothing personal — for almost 57 years now I have been the one navigating EVERY time John and I drive somewhere together.

    I have been noticing what I would say is Linda’s subtle tendency to try to anticipate some one else’s need. Of course, this habit energy is within me! Oh, my….

    I open the Daily Reflection from Deep Spring Center:

      Look at that part of you that feels you should be able to do everything for everybody. Can I be spacious with myself with any guilt, with that little voice that says I should be able to do it all? Why? Why should I? ~ Aaron

    Nancy asked about another Holistic Alliance friend who has for a number of years lived on a boat at Marathon Key after having lived quite near Claudia in Michigan. I have been able to reach out to Shirley and let her know we had been wondering about her. She is now living in Clearwater and was very glad to know she was being thought about by her Holistic Alliance friends.

    We are so fortunate to have one another….

    I am so glad Nancy Green was willing and able to go with us on Friday. It was wonderful to have Claudia staying with us for a couple of days. It is always so special to be with Pat Jordan. And the opportunity to have things amplified by our living together for three months is a holy alliance with Linda which I am wholly grateful for.

  • Out of Control

    Hearing Barbara Brodsky speak candidly about her husband, Hal, being so very vulnerable in the nursing home. What if the facility goes on lockdown and he can’t have the therapy so desperately needed. She wonders if she should bring him home. “I want to know. I don’t know. Does anybody know?”

    Barbara hears Aaron, “Come back into your heart. What does your heart tell you? What is the most loving thing in this moment? How can you do what you need to do without panic?”

    We are in a place of “DON’T KNOW.”

    This is the sympathetic nervous system, and this system has no “immune” system. This is the most vulnerable space during the global crisis related to COVID-19, because it is the most vulnerable space related to everything.

    Life feels out of control. But is it really any more out of control than life itself simply is? Nothing inner has really changed, even though many outer conditions have changed.

    Hand sanitizer is difficult to find. Rubber gloves are out of stock. Even medications necessary for survival are in short supply.

    These conditions are current.

    School closings, restricted travels, stock market reactions, global focus on COVID-19…. these conditions are current.

    You cannot directly change the outer conditions.

    As my fingers float across the keyboard I am watching the video of our Dharma Path class from March 10, 2020. I am including some of Aaron’s words in quotations below.

    “Everything will change and again and again….”

    “Your attitude, your energy—you have control over that much…”

    “When you are honest with yourself, this is where you have control…”

    What is out of control is the fear. This is not a new condition for humans. Fear is so familiar it feels natural, but it is neither natural nor healthy.

    “What can one person do? Look at the fear…. beyond fear, almost panic…”

    “Unconscious fear is just adding fuel to the fire….”

    “Talk about your fears in a nonjudgmental way….”

    My dear friend and yoga teacher, Kathy, and I were sharing such gratitude for our yoga practice. Yoga is mindful movement. The body is different every time you come to the mat. Your practice is to stay aware and to move from within.

    Earlier this morning, upon the draw, the poker machine gave me a straight.


    “We all want certainty….”

    “Everybody wants to be healthy and have their loved ones healthy….”

    “It is one world…. You wanted the problem to be their problem.”

    “Whatever is happening to a baby on the other side of the world is happening to you….”

    Life is a poker machine. You can only play the cards you are dealt. You know the game. You know what to save.

    “How can I handle this in the most loving way….”

    “Any virus is still a sentient being in some degree. It may not speak your language but it works with energy just as you do….
    When enough of you come together and say, ‘No, you may not take over and kill.’…. Start speaking to the virus. ‘If you attack us and we die, you will die….’ Said in love, not in hatred and disgust. ‘Every sentient being deserves happiness.’ Praying for this virus. Is anybody here praying for the virus that it may have well-being without destroying others? This is where it starts…. The next step for the higher conscious of humans….”

    The following poem was written on 3/11/2020 Lynn Ungarhttp://www.lynnungar.com/about/ Barbara Brodsky sent the poem to our class. It is timely, poignant, and clear.

    Pandemic

    What if you thought of it
    as the Jews consider the Sabbath—
    the most sacred of times?
    Cease from travel.
    Cease from buying and selling.
    Give up, just for now,
    on trying to make the world
    different than it is.
    Sing. Pray. Touch only those
    to whom you commit your life.
    Center down.
    And when your body has become still,
    reach out with your heart.
    Know that we are connected
    in ways that are terrifying and beautiful.
    (You could hardly deny it now.)
    Know that our lives
    are in one another’s hands.
    (Surely, that has come clear.)
    Do not reach out your hands.
    Reach out your heart.
    Reach out your words.
    Reach out all the tendrils
    of compassion that move, invisibly,
    where we cannot touch.
    Promise this world your love–
    for better or for worse,
    in sickness and in health,
    so long as we all shall live.
    –Lynn Ungar 3/11/20

    “Unless you do not take care of the world’s population, you cannot take care of yourself and your family….”

    “Holding hands with your comrades and asking where is love here…. Thank you for coming as a teacher…. Now we are learning what we need to learn….”

    “You are here to help the consciousness of earth to a higher consciousness….”

    “I cannot destroy with hate to support love….”

    “You are capable of this….”

    “You have the ability to handle whatever comes with love….”

  • Ambiguous Loss

    Last week was a week with loss. Good Friday, the husband of a client/friend/colleague passed. Holy Saturday, the father of a business acquaintance passed. Easter Sunday, a loyal member of Saint Joseph Buddhist Sangha passed. A Buddhist teacher invited me to use the 49 day ceremony.

    49 Day Ceremony

    When someone passes away, in addition to a funeral service that usually occurs three or seven days after the death, we have a ceremony on the 49th day. Traditionally, the period of 49 days after someone dies is seen as a time for that person to check their consciousness and digest their karma. According to Buddhist teaching the bodhisattva Ji Jang Bosal helps the deceased during these 49 days to perceive their karma so when they return they are reborn to help this world, rather than continue in the cycle of birth and death. Buddhism teaches that there is a life in this body, then a time of investigation or consideration, and then a new life …

    Loss is such a raw part of human life.

    Listening to a TED talk by Nora McInerny, I was moved to laughter and to tears. McInerny is the author of The Hot Young Widows Club: Lessons on Survival from the Front Lines of Grief.

    McInerny said something members of our Grief Journey Group have said to one another over and over for over twenty years: We don’t move on from grief, we move forward with it.

    The next day, opening the May 2019 Guideposts, I see, ‘A Different Kind of Grief’ by B’ette Schalk. Schalk felt she lost her husband to anxiety and depression, writing, “Gone was the vibrant man I’d fallen in love with 24 years earlier, the man who liked going to parties and playing cards.” The article closes with a single page with 5 headings of great wisdom for caregivers: How to Cope With Ambiguous Loss.

      How to Cope With Ambiguous Loss

      Put a name to it.
      Use “both…and” thinking.
      Accept that good enough is enough.
      Manage your mixed emotions.
      Imagine new hopes and dreams.

    Ambiguous loss is what my friend is living as her husband is in a facility for those with Alzheimer’s disease.

    Ambiguous loss is felt by students afraid to be at school for fear of a mass shooting.

    Ambiguous loss is felt in the aging and staging of life.

    On the light side of 40, she recently shared with me she had read on a website about cancer that having cancer was like living with a loaded gun pointed at your head. You did not know when it would go off, but you knew it would.

    Ah, ambiguous loss….

    Whether it is our youth, our goals, our jobs, our homes, our health, our strength, our courage, or our loved ones, or our memories, we all navigate the waters of ambigious loss.

    The best way I can think to close this post is with this Deep Spring Center Thought for Today:

    “Your loved one is not dead, only he has left his human form. He is now expressing himself through you, through your growing open heart that can allow itself the experience of grief and allow that grief to become a catalyst for compassion. He is expressing himself through you in all the ways he spoke to you in your life, the joys and the sorrows. He is expressing himself through every human that he touched in this lifetime. And he is in the soil and the stars and the rain and the sun. You cannot lose him.” ~ Aaron

    Whatever has the nature to arise has the nature to cease and is not me nor mine.

  • Milarepa’s Muses


    I am in a poetry writing group. We are working our way through The Crafty Poet: A Portable Workshop by Diane Lockward. Craft Tip #12 is about the uses of myth. “Milarepa’s Muses” is based on The Non-Duality of Coming to Know the Light Within the Darkness; Age of Kali , a talk given by Aaron on Saturday Morning, December 3, 2016, at a retreat in Seattle. Aaron is channeled by Barbara Brodsky. You can read Aaron’s entire talk at the Deep Spring Center Archives. I have included a clip of just the story of Milarepa at the end of this post.

    Milarepa’s Muses

    Demons on the doorstep
    Demons outside, Milarepa inside
    Duality

    Delighted demons destroying
    Property and Milarepa’s
    Peace

    Always there, those demons
    Doing their demon things
    Determined

    Dogging his footsteps
    Dodging his arrows
    Dastardly

    “Eat me,” mouthed as
    Milarepa puts his head inside the demon’s mouth
    Victory

    The demon disappears
    Light merging with darkness
    Oneness

    Debra Basham 7-17-2018 (WC 53) based on The Non-Duality of Coming to Know the Light Within the Darkness; Age of Kali by Aaron

    It seems one of the most common demons visiting humans is the demon of the fear of death. I just finished reading Frank J. Cunningham’s, Vesper Time: The Spiritual Practice of Aging. On page 131-132, Cunningham writes that when the Dali Lama was asked if he feared death, he replied, “It’s just a change of clothes.”

    Ending the duality and recognizing the truth that death is just a change of clothes is putting your head inside the demon’s mouth and watching the demon disappear.

    The Non-Duality of Coming to Know the Light Within the Darkness; Age of Kali
     
    December 3, 2016 Saturday Morning, Seattle Retreat;
    Combined retreat opening talk and morning instruction with Aaron

    Some years ago, I offered the group at this retreat the second Milarepa practice. Not the serving tea practice, that’s Part 1. First we serve him tea. We get used to the demon. We stop running from or denying the demon. We open our hearts to ourselves and the demon. We serve him tea and say, “Shh, no dialogue. We’re not going to talk, but you may be here. I’ll let you be present.” To let him be present there must be a deep sense of, not your power, the power, when you rest in connection with the light. It is that connection that allows you to permit the demon to sit before you. But there’s still separation: me here, the demon there.

    The second Milarepa practice. He comes back to the area of his cave carrying firewood on his back. As he approaches his home he finds it’s overrun by demons. His first impulse is to grab a stick of firewood. He starts chasing them with one big club. Of course, they’re delighted; they laugh. They were really getting to him! “Look how much anger! Ooo! More! More!” So the more he chases them, the more they take delight in his fear and anger.

    Finally he realizes this isn’t working. He sits, he meditates, he thinks, “What can I do? I’ll send loving wishes to them.” They laugh. They don’t care about his loving wishes. They’re busy destroying his home. “What else can we do? How can we get him more riled up?” and proceed with their destruction. Finally he looks around. He thinks, “maybe they’ve always been here and I just never noticed them before. I’ll just be here and present with them”. Most of them get bored when he’s no longer agitated, and they leave. But there’s one fierce demon with bulging eyes, big teeth, a huge, gaping mouth, and he follows Milarepa everywhere, 6 inches behind him, always right there, sometimes coming around face to face.

    The days pass, the weeks pass. Finally, Milarepa understands there’s only one choice here. He approaches the demon, looks him in the eyes, says, “Eat me,” and puts his head in the demon’s mouth. What happens then? The demon disappears. Why?

    Q: The demon has no power over Milarepa.

    Aaron: Even more than that. Thank you, but one more step.

    Q: Non-duality.

    Aaron: He ends the duality. This is what we’re doing here, not just at the retreat, but this is what your world has invited you to. This is the whole image of Kali, the destroyer, destroying the duality. Fully embracing not only the light, but the darkness. Instead of clinging to the light and in any way trying to push the negative away, as we embrace the darkness and merge the light with the darkness, they dissolve into one. I use the image here of a huge dark cave; if you light one match the whole cave is lit even if dimly. You can’t see into the darkest corners, no. But as soon as there’s light, there’s light. It’s no longer dark.

  • It is Time!

    “When you can bring your own energy forth to truly hear others in a compassionate way
    and can create compassionate dialogue,
    then you give them a model to bring forth to others who have a more opposite view.

    It is this steady expansion of the loving heart we all share that is the greatest hope towards peace.

    But even if peace does not come at this time,
    still that loving heart is expanding.
    When it expands far enough, there will be peace.

    Yes, there may be a lot of death and destruction before.
    But hatred will never lead to peace.
    Fear will never lead to peace.

    Fear of fear will never lead to peace, and hatred of hatred will never lead to peace.
    Trust your capacity for love.”
    ~ Aaron,
    Deep Spring Center
    Thought for Today

    Our plans were to attend a colleague’s “laughter yoga” presentation but the three of us arrived at the venue only to discover the presentation had been cancelled due to a death in the family. I live very nearby, so soon we settled around the kitchen island, sipping tea in such a sisterly fashion.

    Your guess is as good as mine how the conversation settled around her seemingly life-long dissatisfaction with her birth sister. The stated question was about her desire to block her sister’s text messages. We tossed, we tangled, we slogged through decades of sibling turmoil before going our separate ways.

    It felt restless, almost tragic. In my heart it was so much more…

    I opened email to read:

    June 19, 2018
    Tenderness Tinged by Sadness

    Fear does not allow fundamental tenderness to enter into us. When tenderness tinged by sadness touches our heart, we know that we are in contact with reality. We feel it. That contact is genuine, fresh, and quite raw.

    Excerpted from:

    “Overcoming Doubt,” in Smile at Fear: Awakening the True Heart of Bravery
    by Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche,
    page 58

    That was it! Where was tenderness? Where was the true heart of bravery needed to love someone who is behaving in an unloving manner?

    I opened my next email:

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

    … that if you become ruffled with every comment that
    you consider a ‘slight,’ you will never find peace.

    Nor will you find it by always separating yourself from
    those who ruffle you. You can only end so many
    friendships before you find yourself very much alone.
    You can keep making new friends, of course, but
    sooner or later they will ruffle you — and then what?

    Perhaps the better course might be to let the ruffle
    go. People rarely mean it when they do that, and a
    touch of gentle tolerance and easy forgiveness every
    day is even better than an apple…

    Love, your Friend …
    Neale Donald Walsch

    Craft Tip #11 (p. 92-98), from The Crafty Poet: A Portable Workshop by Diane Lockward, clevely rewriting “You Are Tired” by e.e. Cummings, I have discovered my own “voice.” Writing this allowed me to finally experience peace around all the pain that family members can inflict upon one another without ever meaning to. I trust you will agree, “It is Time!”

    It is Time!

    It is time
    (We know)
    Possibilities lie beyond this moment now;
    You are ready.
    Let us join hands
    Go to a place where new dreams are born-
    (Listen. Our names are being called!)

    We can go
    (I hope)
    To a place where the forlorn gather
    When the heart yearns for relief;
    Done with things as they are-
    Just that.
    We are done.

    Travel to heaven comes not without peril
    But the path is clearly written within your own chest-
    Just say yes!
    Your feet will find their way, one sure step and then the next
    For it is time
    We will be safe, rest assured.

    Let’s set off now
    Sail the seas of satisfaction to the shores
    Of eternal serenity;
    Hear the sounds of true solace
    No more singing the dirge;
    Music made from the instrument of sheer joy
    Resonating with each precious soul
    Suffering no more (Pray tell!) not we
    We who know it truly is time.

    Debra Basham 6-22-2018