During a two-day continuing education training, a couple of times the instructor mentioned Heraclitis, a philosopher born in the Persian empire.
A couple of days later, about three pages into the book he bought to read while waiting for his flight to Florida to visit his grandparents, he saw the exact quotation his instructor had been referencing:
Heraclitus, a philosopher born in the Persian Empire back in the fifth century BC, had it right when he wrote about men on the battlefield. “Out of every 100 men,” he wrote, “ten shouldn’t even be there, 80 are just targets, nine are the real fighters, and we are lucky to have them, for they make the battle. Ah, but the one, one is a warrior… “
Here in Southwest Florida things are heating up, and I am not just referencing this week’s 80 degree temperatures. Following two deaths in Fort Myers—confirmed coronovirus—many are practicing voluntary social isolation with an eye toward protecting those most vulnerable.
A Michigan colleague, Jane Oelke, N.D., doctor of homeopathy, just published a great newsletter article. Please take time to read the entire article as “What’s in Your Cupboard?” provides some very wise steps we can all easily take.
The simple things are often most powerful.
For example, keep your mouth moist. We have all heard to “drink plenty of liquids” but did not know viruses thrive in a dry mouth.
That makes perfect sense as a dry mouth is one of the first signs of stress or anxiety.
We love the doTERRA Breathe drops, but sucking on a lemon drop or hard disc is good because your body being in parasympathetic nervous system helps your immune system stay strong. See Debra’s Wellness Tip “Vagus Nerve Stimulation” for more about that.
The closing paragraph in Jane’s article is very significant:
Most important – Stay positive!
Recently I read a mind-body manual that states viral outbreaks come at times of mass negativity. Do you think we have too much fear and other negative messages going on right now?
Rise above any negative thoughts you may have and take positive action toward believing in your own healing ability and support it with your activities.
Focus on the blessings in your life and create positive conversations.
Yesterday, while out riding my bike I saw a yard sign: FOR THE LOVE OF GOD ANYONE BUT TRUMP IN 2020. This is not a political commentary, it is a vital truth: Supporting anyone but anyone for anything is insane.
Can you imagine going to a restaurant and ordering anythingbut anything?
FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, you have a heart and a brain and a gut for good reason.
And you have an immune system to keep you healthy.
Whoa…. fear can spread like wildfire. We can put that fire out.
A friend/colleague is part of several groups I attend here in Florida. She has cancelled the meditation group she hosts in her home and has reached out to another of our mutual groups suggesting the meetings be cancelled because “at least one, and possibly two, deaths in the county from corona virus.”
Her closing line in the email message is quite telling: I’m sorry to miss the group if you do go ahead and meet on Monday.
Admittedly, her husband is an epidemiologist, and we do not yet know the extent of risk.
Lama Surya has asked that we lend our energetic support tomorrow morning. He will be leading a prayer ceremony in Northampton, Massachusetts, and has asked that, if possible, we take the hour from 9 AM to 10 AM EDT (Sunday, March 8th) to chant or pray with the clear and specific intention of pushing back on this destructive coronavirus, COVID-19, and purifying and supporting all those who have been / will be infected or otherwise impacted.-19,
He has specifically asked that we practice where we are, rather than trying to participate in person.
We look forward to holding the energetic space with you tomorrow as we lift our body, speech and heart-minds in unison, in support of our beloved Lama, on behalf of all beings.
Don’t forget to put your clocks forward tonight before you go to bed if you are in a place that uses daylight savings time. Oh, and don’t forget to wash those hands!
Warmly,
The Dzogchen Center and Foundation
I got up in plenty of time to chant for the hour with this group. I have recorded voice memos of many of the chants we do on retreat. Hari Om is one of the chants I did this morning. In Sanskrit, “Hari” is a mantra to remove troubles and pain. In Hindu, Hari references the god Vishnu, remover of bondages.
Omniscience (/ɒmˈnɪʃəns/) is the capacity to know everything. In monotheistic religions, such as Sikhism and the Abrahamic religions, God is omniscient. “God” has the capacity to know everything. In Jainism, omniscience is an attribute that any individual can eventually attain.
Since the 6th century BC, and continuing today, Jainism has three guiding principles: right belief, right knowledge, and right conduct.
Here is another of the chants I sang this morning: Seems like such a long time, Holy Spirit, waiting, since I’ve drawn your breath in, silent and all pervading.
It is important that we DO something with the energy of fear that can get stirred up. We can sing, pray, chant. We can dance. I clean. My sister sleeps.
It is vital to remember we are able draw in the breath of the holy spirit and extinguish the raging wildfire of fear.
Life depends on us….
If you have requested email updates for posts, click on the image below to listen to the audio of the Hari Om chant:
Chanting GATE GATE PARAGATE PARASAMGATE BODHI SVAHA from the heart sutra for 49 days to-the-day of transition is a significant act of love in the Buddhist tradition. PARASAMGATE means completely gone to the further shore. The prefix SAM is intensive in meaning: completely, thoroughly, altogether.
She had been chanting for the husband of a close friend.
“Saturday is the 49th day,” she told her friend.
“Saturday? Saturday is March 7. March 7 is his birthday!” her friend exclaimed.
They were both brought to silent awe realizing the perfection of the date of his transition positioning the 49th day of chanting to be on his birthday.
Leaves are falling down
autumn of my life this is
I must choose to live
Watching baby breathe
innocent and fresh new start
coming from the heart
Hands wrinkled from work
burdened by beliefs not mine
wake before too late
She is blind but sees
his deaf ears hear love’s true call
death’s doorway beckons
I stand numb yet here
garden gate gapes wide with pride
flowers sing welcome
Rich soil grows wisdom
rain settles the dust at last
soon all will be past
Debra Basham 03-06-2020 (WC 84)
One month from today we expect to arrive back in Michigan. It would be denial to say the mold saga has not given birth to worry, fear, and concern. Is it gone? I am not just questioning the mold, but referencing also the freedom turning ever-so-surely into curiosity that has momentarily replaced the worry.
Putting multiple thousands on my credit card, writing checks for more multiple thousands. Grateful access to what we need. Thoughts, too, of those families helped financially by our plight.
It is said we do not fear death, but we fear dying as the great unknown. Yet, truth-be-told, we have been practicing living with dying since our first breath. We outlived puppies and kitties, and uncles and aunts. Cars and clothes, and friendships. All these no longer are the way they were.
Fragile at best, this bed of impermanence upon which we rest.
Mind goes to the blowing of the wind outside the window. Wondering when it is not blowing, where or what wind is.
Before I was “I,” what was I. And long after, hereafter.
Suddenly the idea! I can spend all of my earthy accumulations to run a full-page ad in the newspaper telling of the inner journey.
Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, hardly anyone reads newspapers any more. Trees are relieved. So am I.
News is depressing. Of course, the really good stuff gets ignored.
Disaster and doom, debauchery and damage—this is what people read.
All arises from the conditions. When the conditions are present, wind will arise.
Death, too, arises—like the sun—when it is time.
I write an open letter to the tiny house:
To whom it may concern,
The problem was more extensive than we anticipated, but we have done what we can. We are optimistic what we have done is enough.
Love,
Debra
My goodness, that is perhaps the words for the ad in the newspaper: WE ARE OPTIMISTIC WHAT WE HAVE DONE IS ENOUGH….
She had traveled a distance, while wintering in Florida, to be evaluated for an intervention for relief from chronic back pain.
She sent her friend an update via text message: “We made an appointment for the treatment tomorrow! And it just happens that Stacey and Courtney helped us out with the schedule.”
FYI – Stacey is the name of the daughter of her friend, and Courtney is the name of Stacey’s daughter.
She recognized the significance of the coincidence. Omens are everywhere….
But God has blessed you, because your eyes can see and your ears can hear! Matthew 13:16
Her husband had recently transitioned. The friend she was talking to on the phone asked if she had noticed communications from him. Initially she said she had not noticed anything, then she remembered something that might be!
“Last week when I was down with the flu, I was lying on the sofa with the dog. Something happened that has never happened before or since. That blown glass globe hanging from a cord in the living room started moving. It just started swinging back and forth and I had a thought, ‘I wonder if that is him.’”
Even though she was curious what could have set the globe in motion, she was not feeling well and she did not give it another thought until her friend asked her about her experiences of her husband’s visiting.
“That globe is a substantial object—and the cord is no flimsy thing either. I made that cord…” she continued.
All of a sudden, she burst out, “It’s swinging again!”
Her friend exclaimed, “Hello! Thank you for visiting! We love you!”
She was so excited. “I am going to hang up and take a video of it swinging. I will send it to you so you can see it too. I want to keep this to remind me….”
Soon after, a video was received in which you can clearly see the beautiful globe swinging back and forth. Here is a still shot from the video of the swinging globe:
A text message titled “Ailing” came to the yoga group:
… “I woke up yesterday with a dry cough; made it though Thursday’s yoga class. Today this is a full-blown, achy, stuffy ailment. So sorry, (sad face) but I need to cancel our Saturday morning yoga.”
One of the students who attends Saturday’s class by phoning in while out of state wrote: “Sending cyber Chicken Soup for the Body and Soul….”
“Ailing” responded:
… “I have chicken noodle soup in the refrigerator ready for later. Thank you for your good thoughts.”
Having noticed the teacher’s under-the-weather voice, about to walk out of the door, one of the Thursday students felt guided to offer to make the teacher some chicken soup. The offer was graciously received and the soup was made and delivered later that day.
In Sunday School children are told God has no hands but ours. Compassion and love produced a strong intention of that offer of chicken soup. The healing soup was lovingly prepared, delivered, and received by God’s hands.
LOVE ignited is not limited by proximity, and it is not limited to chicken soup….
My mind is so busy. I pull myself away from the Tapping Summit to join my Friday morning writing group, and the group seems so focused on the mundane I want to leave. I want to be inside where it is safe.
I hope you will read this poem. You will relate. We all have human feet.
I begin to write:
Loss and Gain
Searching for safety and security we wander aimlessly through the lostness of our own minds, opening door-after-door only to look into a mirror. Caught in the haze of a maze, thinking the same thoughts year after year without so much as questioning where they are leading us.
A few tell-tale feathers lay on the ground outside the window
A ghost-like image where they wiped the dust upon impact
Beak, wing, and silence now where the THUD had been
Heart breaking loneliness hits my mind the same way the bird hit the window: suddenly and without malice of forethought. An old friend, this feeling of not being wanted, loved, or safe. I open another door. Perhaps this time something else will be there.
Eyes grow dull
Search for a stress-free environment begins
Danger results from well-meaning help
Snakes shed their skin to allow for further growth. The process is natural and happens throughout their lives, but it is not an easy process. Being human is not an easy process either, and I, too, search for a stress-free environment in which to shed.
Nigger
Negro
African America
Black
Words reveal our progress
Slogans from mindfulness t-shirts I have seen come to mind: Meditation is not what you think, You Have the Right to Remain Silent, Don’t Believe Everything You Think.
Perhaps hopeful, trusting, and calm will be the result of my new skin.
P.S. The Deep Spring Dharma Path Study Group with Barbara Brodsky is finishing our two-year commitment. We are finding the light within Sacred Darkness. Whatever the conditions in your life right now, you in your human feet are never alone.
