Debra Basham

Living and Loving

Tag: Mooji

  • Waning Gibbous Moon

    I was restless at bedtime last night. It had been a pleasant day but late in the evening I got a text from a friend who had ended up at the ER over the weekend, John’s bedtime blood pressure reading was a bit elevated, and I read an email from a person who is asking something of me (again) that I am not comfortable with.

    The next email I read was from another friend. I did not respond to her before going to bed, but as I spent time answering her this morning it felt like a journal entry so I am sharing it here.

      What are some of the catalysts for you? I hope you are managing okay?

    D: The catalysts are feelings of being unsure, not trusting, afraid I will make a mistake that will bring about pain or loss. John has a primary physician; an endocrinologist for his thyroid condition; a neurologist because he had a TIA; two cardiologists because he had the quadruple bypass surgery (one in Michigan and one in Florida).

    They all have opinions about the medications and they make changes and he develops a side effect from the medication so they give him another medication to counteract that side effect. We end up constantly at the doctor’s office and living with our finger on his pulse instead of enjoying the quality of life we do have.

    The catalysts are always things we recognize from our practice: hindrances, worldly dharmas…. and we all have habit energies around grasping and aversion — things we want or don’t want.

      I have catalysts too 🙂 An ongoing deep sense of wanting to belong with a group I resonate with.

    D: Are you familiar with Maslow’s hierarchy of needs? From the bottom of the hierarchy upwards, the needs are physiological (food and clothing), safety (job security as well as physical or emotional safety), love and belonging needs (friendship or group affiliation), esteem, and self-actualization The idea is that the upper needs cannot be satisfied until the lower needs are. The sense of not belonging to a group blocks confidence and self-acceptance. It is an interesting way of seeing. Others are coming forth with more contemporary ways of looking at these with greater dimension, but they seem to follow this essential pattern.

    May you be happy; may you know love, may you know perfection and peace. That is the great prayer, isn’t it….

      There is also some fear, which I recognize is my lack of confidence and faith in the practice.

    I appreciate how some of the teachers of the direct path speak about it. Mooji and Adyashanti, for example. Seeking will keep us seeking.

    Perhaps because I am much older now I am more OKAY with what is. Even these current catalysts are gifts. I have watched John lose consciousness now twice, and both times in a doctor’s office!

    I had a dream MANY years ago. John had been hit in the head by a part of a boat, like a boom, while he was working at the dock. His head was bleeding profusely and I knew he was dying. I was sitting on the sand in shallow water holding him in my arms totally knowing he was dying and yet we were just present with one another in such deep love and devotion and gratitude for our lives together. It was beautiful.

    This summer I had the honor of watching a friend be held by his wife as he died in much that same way. Claudia held Wayne that way as he was dying.

    We are capable of living life and facing death with confidence that whatever happens it is OKAY.

    And in the moments when we are not feeling that it is OKAY we can let go of the grasping and allow our true essence to return. And it does. The moon is not always full in my sight but it is never larger nor smaller than it is…. And you and I are not always visibly awake in our thoughts and feelings and sensations (aggregates) but we are never more nor less awake.

      Have a good night 🙂

    I was a bit restless, but morning came and the windows are open and the air is fresh and my coffee is hot.

    Last night as John and I walked home after playing cards with Linda and Larry a beautiful waning gibbous moon hung low in the sky.

    “A waning gibbous moon phase is a time to look inwards and re-evaluate your goals. It’s a time to feel grateful for what has been this month and re-adjust your intentions moving forward.”


    I am grateful for you in the world, Dear Friend.

  • Grief 2 Growth: Planted, Not Buried

    One must have chaos in oneself in order to give birth to a dancing star.
    ~ Friedrich Nietzsche

    Recently I had a very tender sharing with a dear friend. It was tender because each of us is doing the best we can to love one another and that process isn’t always neat and tidy.

    Let the record show, the person I was sharing with would be considered one of the highest conscious beings you could meet. I hold that view of this friend as well.

    I also see places where I project onto her. In fact, I even said that to her: “I miss having opportunity to project onto you because I know when I do that I am afforded the honor of seeing my own self.”

    What we see is not a PERSONAL self.

    What we see is the universal SELF.

    Jerry Ashmore, dharma teacher at Empty Circle Zen Group in Hobart, Indiana, said, “Even before we practice it, enlightenment is there.”

    Jung wrote, “To confront a person with his shadow is to show him his own light. Once one has experienced a few times what it is like to stand judgingly between the opposites, one begins to understand what is meant by the self. Anyone who perceives his shadow and his light simultaneously sees himself from two sides and thus gets in the middle” (Jung, 1959, p. 872).

    One website suggested a simple process for working with shadow.

    1. Make a list of 5 positive qualities that you see yourself as having (e.g., compassionate, generous, witty, etc.).

    2. Look at each positive quality that you wrote down – describe its opposite (e.g., unfeeling, stingy, dull, etc.).

    3. Picture a person who embodies these negative qualities vividly in your mind. Roughly, this is your shadow.

    Mooji (Jamacian spiritual teacher from the UK) says, “Our ego is a Siamese twin, and we cannot put it somewhere else. It is important to recognize you are not it… To stop being what you are not there is something you must understand. Whatever you can see or experience, you are not this. You cannot judge your real weight by carrying a donkey on your back. When you cannot bear your self anymore, you are a good candidate for freedom.”

    The Basham family continues to experience the ripple effect of loss.

    Wednesday, September 29, 2021, at the exact time family was graveside with John’s brother, Jerry, in Michigan, we received news that our former sister-in-law had just passed in Texas. Her passing was not a surprise, and was in many ways a relief to her son, Jeff.

    One week to the day, October 6, 2021, news that Jeff’s sister passed in her sleep was a surprise, and anything but a relief.

    As long as we can be made to believe that one thing is good and another evil, we shall remain outside the Garden of Eden, and one day have health and another day disease, experience youth and vitality one day and age and debility another day because those are the pairs of opposites and they follow one another in cycles. It is only when we do not desire wealth or harmony any more than lack or discord, but seek only that which was original and primary in the Garden of Eden, that we rise above these opposites into eternal life.

    Joel Goldsmith, The Thunder of Silence

    As these additional conditions weave themselves through our psyche like summer weaves its way into fall, I am led to an interview by Brian D. Smith (Grief 2 Growth). Brian is sharing have said to his wife that he had not had signs for the 5th anniversary of their daughter’s passing, his wife pointed excitedly at a sign on a vehicle by them: I AM RIGHT HERE!

    Brian share that with Becky (Rebecca Austill-Clausen) during an interview about her 3 Secrets to Communicating with Your Deceased Loved Ones, in which she makes these points:

      Believe that the afterlife is real.
      Trust in your inner self.
      Recognize that love surpasses all boundaries (even physical death).

    Perhaps it is merely shadow (ego beliefs) that can separate us from fluent awareness of loved ones who have passed….

  • Kaleidoscope

    Last evening I attended my brother-in-law’s wedding. He has been a care-giver for many years for the woman who is now his wife. The hospice spiritual care coordinator performed the ceremony. Theirs is not young love, and the decision for them to marry is not something everyone will understand, but it is precious none-the-less. When I crawled into a warm bed last night yoga was the only thing on my calendar for today. As I moved into my day, however, opportunities popped up. Like the pieces of glass in a kaleidoscope, my schedule has kept moving and showing me life and love.

    I was able to have lunch with my dear friend and her two young children. Her son will be two in December and her daughter is almost three months old. You can imagine how wonderFULL her life is!

    My afternoon was spent sharing with a colleague in the healing arts I met for the first time today. It was tender to appreciate one another and to witness the divine movement that brought us together. She understands the privilege to work with another. As Ram Dass says, we are all just walking each other home.

    This evening I will share a letting go ritual with a mom and her adult child who is in hospice care.

    As I let myself notice, it is obvious that everything that occurs in our days is an unfolding of the highest interest of all.

    This morning I watched a video talk by Mary Reed, author of The Unwitting Mystic. I think I would have noticed the unfolding anyway, but I appreciated Mary’s starting my day with that expanded awareness. This afternoon I also watched a video where Mary led a box exercise about our attention and shifting out of mind constructs. She says to put all of our thoughts (including all of our past, fears, beliefs, memories, etc.) into a box so we can let our mind be in service to and in partnership with Divine Love.

    Our precious life can be lived not wanting to be where we are and not wanting to feel what we are feeling. Mary says Mooji tells us to find that place which is effortless at rest within itself and be one with that. It would be marvelous if we can all slip into this place as easily as slipping into a comfortable pair of jeans or listening to a favorite piece of music.

    It was raining here again today as I was out-and-about. I observed how I had a choice to resit the rain or just notice that the wet and the wind was cold against my face as I had a judgment: uncomfortable. My body contracted. From my meditation practice I remembered simply to note aversion.

    Grateful for that awareness.

    Grateful for the opportunities to be present in my own life.

    Grateful for teachers and learners.

    The phrase, “We are each a single piece of glass in a kaleidoscope” keeps coming to my mind. We are not together by chance. We are not fastened together. Life is not some random shaking of the glass. Purpose and meaning are inherent in everything, and the placement of each piece and the subsequent shifting yields yet another beautiful view.

    May all beings come to the end of suffering.

    Here is a photo of the sweet little one I was with today: