In this culture, we are typically taught to understand the body as the ultimate biological machine in which the brain functions as a kind of "control" switch board. Over the past decade of my life, I've been questioning this irreverent attitude towards the body in a really persistent and ongoing way. My questions are largely intuitive and typically require more experiential learning than theoretical learning. However, once in a while I have the good fortune to stumble upon some fascinating theoretical information about the body that deepens the way in which I experience my own.
Apparently, there are five basic types of human movement that make up something called "The Satisfaction Cycle": Yielding, Pushing, Reaching, Grasping, and Pulling. All five of these movements are fundamentally important for human survival and interaction. BUT - and here's the amazing teacher within this concept - yielding is the foundation for every other movement possibility in this sequence. In other words: without being able to first yield into something, you cannot push off from it, reach out from there, grasp hold of anything, or pull things back towards yourself.
Why is this so fascinating to me?! Because what's true in the body is also true in the mind and in the heart, of course! See if you can make this analogous connection with me: we must first yield into our own authentic desires if we want to be able to move towards, reach out, grasp hold of, and pull them back into ourselves. I don't know about the rest of you, but I certainly got the message from this culture that being soft and open about what I really wanted to experience in my life would make me an easy target for disappointment. In recent years, however, I've been able to slowly (sometimes painfully!) unlearn this defensive habit, and experience many tender and beautiful things as a result. It now absolutely stuns and delights me to discover that the movements of my physical body were there all along, revealing this truer picture of things.
So what is yielding and how do we do it? I imagine we each have to explore this question in our own personal hearts and minds to some degree. Yet, it's equally interesting to note that Merriam-Webster defines yielding as "lacking rigidity or stiffness; flexible", "disposed to submit or comply", or "productive" (as in "high-yielding wheat"). That's right; yielding can mean "productive"! As the cornerstone of all other movement possibilities, this makes perfect sense to me. A seed must be willing to submit to the earth and the rain if it wants to be able to then push, reach, grasp, and pull in all the nourishment it requires to become the fullest (most productive!) expression of itself. We, ourselves, are no different.
Here's how Rumi might also say it: "Let yourself [yield and] be drawn by the stronger pull of what you really love. It will not lead you astray". I wonder if your heart - or mine - is softening into it's own gravitational pull yet?
Sunday, September 30, 2012
On the nature of Love.
"But to love another as a person we must begin by granting him his own autonomy and identity as a person. We have to love him for what he is in himself, and not for what he is to us. We have to love him for his own good, not for the good we get out of him. And this is impossible unless we are capable of a love which ‘transforms’ us, so to speak, into the other person, making us able to see things as he sees them, love what he loves, experience the deeper realities of his own life as if they were our own. Without sacrifice, such a transformation is utterly impossible. But unless we are capable of this kind of transformation ‘into the other’ while remaining ourselves, we are not yet capable of a fully human existence". -- Thomas Merton
This is my wish for all persons who experience love in its many extraordinary forms. Today, however, I wish this experience of love for my sister and her groom on their wedding day! May they be transformed by one another while remaining themselves, and may we all benefit from their personal and shared radiance as a result.
This is my wish for all persons who experience love in its many extraordinary forms. Today, however, I wish this experience of love for my sister and her groom on their wedding day! May they be transformed by one another while remaining themselves, and may we all benefit from their personal and shared radiance as a result.
Saturday, September 29, 2012
Hearing the Whole.
"It's an incredibly interesting risk, and you've got to trust that when you have surrendered, you will hear clearly. The Tao says the truth waits for eyes unclouded by longing, and your longing to have it different than it is, is ultimately a trap, because it keeps you from hearing the whole gestalt, the whole way things are. And as you hear the totality of it, you trust that out of that will come an appropriate action, a dharmic action. That's the trust of dharma, that's the trust in the wisdom of the universe that is greater than your own personal egoism. So there is certainly an exquisite risk in it. We're so used to working out of "I ought to do it, I should do it" -- getting behind ourselves and pushing. The whole idea of trusting, that if we didn't push something would still happen, is very interesting to explore in people." -- Ram Dass
Thursday, September 27, 2012
The truth can hurt...
... and yet it's the truth which also offers us opportunities to experience profound relief and healing. And despite how much we avoid encounters with the truth for fear of hurt, we also know that it will indeed set us free. In my life so far, I've discovered that becoming conscious of whatever is most honest is always ultimately beautiful. Maybe this is what Spinoza means when he says that suffering ceases to be suffering as soon as you get a clear and precise picture of it. Or perhaps it's as Jean Genets suggests: "acts must be carried through to their completion. Whatever their point of departure, the end will be beautiful. It is because an action has not been completed that it is vile". However, Rumi remembers to say something important that the other two forgot: "There's [so much] courage involved if you want to become part of the Truth. There's a broken open place in a Lover".
I think it's worth remembering that the word courage comes from latin and originally meant something like, "to speak one's mind by telling all one's heart". Lately, I've been trying to live from within the very center of my own open heart. Rumi is right about needing courage for this journey. I can only hope that Jean Genets continues to be right as well.
I think it's worth remembering that the word courage comes from latin and originally meant something like, "to speak one's mind by telling all one's heart". Lately, I've been trying to live from within the very center of my own open heart. Rumi is right about needing courage for this journey. I can only hope that Jean Genets continues to be right as well.
Deep Calls Out to Deep.
I had something like an enlightenment experience the other day. I'm choosing the words "enlightenment experience" simply because the light of my own consciousness touched something that was previously unknown to me. The words I've written below are an attempt to describe the revelation within the experience:
A human heart beats to a contracting rhythm of in and out, honoring the pattern of union and separation and union again. Cells do this same dance when they divide from one another, in order to only return to each other again. We remember to let our lungs fill up again with our breath only because we first notice how it has gone out. I marvel at these movements and wonder if this is the whole creative pattern of the Universe.
Love once told me that it disconnects from Itself in order to get an experience of Itself. And of course it would! Love wouldn't be Love if it didn't want to Love itself too. Similarly, John O'Donohue once reminded me that one of the real excitements of being a human is that we are the place where the Universe can become conscious of Itself. The alchemists seemed to understand this when they tried to channel this precise dynamic in order to turn base metals into gold. Plato, too, suggested that a similar psychological movement pattern would increase our own awareness of ourselves. And God told us it was Good when He parted Day from Night. Perhaps Adam and Eve had to experience their own shame in order to encounter their True longings. What then, really, is shame? Perhaps shame is simply BELIEVING that our separateness is fixed instead of mutable.
Maybe we have also been given the same set of initiation rites as our ancestors in Eden. If so, it might be helpful to recall how their redemption arrived through a being that could remember his full Divinity and full humanity too. Perhaps we too must be initiated into our own sense of separateness, experience our deep longing to return, in order to find our own authentic way back to this remembering.
But, why all this trouble? I have no idea. Nonetheless, this experience of disconnection and reconnection appears to be the life-generating movement pattern of the cosmos. Perhaps it's like this: by the time we start remembering our connection, we've already been deeply initiated into the experience of our separateness, which enables us to become powerful messengers of the Truth of both realities. I think John O'Donohue was right about one of the real excitements of being a human. We really can learn how to be the place where the Universe can become conscious of Itself.
A human heart beats to a contracting rhythm of in and out, honoring the pattern of union and separation and union again. Cells do this same dance when they divide from one another, in order to only return to each other again. We remember to let our lungs fill up again with our breath only because we first notice how it has gone out. I marvel at these movements and wonder if this is the whole creative pattern of the Universe.
Love once told me that it disconnects from Itself in order to get an experience of Itself. And of course it would! Love wouldn't be Love if it didn't want to Love itself too. Similarly, John O'Donohue once reminded me that one of the real excitements of being a human is that we are the place where the Universe can become conscious of Itself. The alchemists seemed to understand this when they tried to channel this precise dynamic in order to turn base metals into gold. Plato, too, suggested that a similar psychological movement pattern would increase our own awareness of ourselves. And God told us it was Good when He parted Day from Night. Perhaps Adam and Eve had to experience their own shame in order to encounter their True longings. What then, really, is shame? Perhaps shame is simply BELIEVING that our separateness is fixed instead of mutable.
Maybe we have also been given the same set of initiation rites as our ancestors in Eden. If so, it might be helpful to recall how their redemption arrived through a being that could remember his full Divinity and full humanity too. Perhaps we too must be initiated into our own sense of separateness, experience our deep longing to return, in order to find our own authentic way back to this remembering.
But, why all this trouble? I have no idea. Nonetheless, this experience of disconnection and reconnection appears to be the life-generating movement pattern of the cosmos. Perhaps it's like this: by the time we start remembering our connection, we've already been deeply initiated into the experience of our separateness, which enables us to become powerful messengers of the Truth of both realities. I think John O'Donohue was right about one of the real excitements of being a human. We really can learn how to be the place where the Universe can become conscious of Itself.
From Kabir.
Inside this clay jug there are canyons and pine mountains,
and the maker of canyons and pine mountains!
All seven oceans are inside and hundreds of millions of stars.
The acid that tests gold is there, and the one who judges jewels.
And the music from the strings that no one touches,
and the source of all water.
If you want the truth, I will tell you the truth:
friend, listen: the god whom I love is inside.
Why should we two ever want to part?
Just as the leaf of the water rhubarb lives floating on the water,
we live as the great one and the little one.
As the owl opens his eyes all night to the moon,
we live as the great one and the little one.
This love between us goes back to the first humans:
it cannot he annihilated.
and the maker of canyons and pine mountains!
All seven oceans are inside and hundreds of millions of stars.
The acid that tests gold is there, and the one who judges jewels.
And the music from the strings that no one touches,
and the source of all water.
If you want the truth, I will tell you the truth:
friend, listen: the god whom I love is inside.
Why should we two ever want to part?
Just as the leaf of the water rhubarb lives floating on the water,
we live as the great one and the little one.
As the owl opens his eyes all night to the moon,
we live as the great one and the little one.
This love between us goes back to the first humans:
it cannot he annihilated.
Monday, September 24, 2012
The intelligence of humility.
“I’ve seen how you can’t learn anything when you’re trying to look like the smartest person in the room.” -- Barbara Kingsolver
Friday, September 21, 2012
Remembering the Body.
“Human skin is porous; the world flows through you. Your senses are large pores that let the world in. By being attuned to the wisdom of your senses, you will never become an exile in your own life, an outsider lost in an external spiritual place that your will and intellect, have constructed.” - John O'Donohue
Much of my professional practice involves trying to teach people how to come home to the intelligence of their physical bodies. In our culture, this can be an extraordinarily difficult task for most people. It seems that at some point (perhaps around the Renaissance) we began to devalue the body and glorify the intellect. You may notice this inheritance in many of our cultural, philosophical, and religious ideals such as "mind over matter", "I think therefore I am", "the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak", etc.
There are many implications and consequences for this devaluation of the body's wisdom, which is easily noticeable in our modern society. I imagine that we can all think of many times when we have mistreated or shamed our own bodies or the bodies of others. However, I also believe that much of our personal and collective suffering is related to this pervasive sense of cultural disembodiment (mistreatment of the earth, improper allocation of resources, oppression, war, chronic pain, auto-immune diseases, addictions, eating disorders, diabetes, and other habitual self-destructive patterns).
This is a hard pattern to change because once we believe we are our minds, we become convinced that the stories we generate in our minds are absolute truths. In order to avoid threat to our sense of self that any sort of cognitive dissonance would inevitably produce, we then feel compelled to act in ways that will reinforce the stories we're so busy telling ourselves. Example: "no one will ever accept me for who I really am" becomes a devastating self-fullfilling prophecy when we let that belief convince us to keep secrets and tell lies.
But, what if we didn't have to believe all of our thoughts? What kind of personal freedom would we experience if we weren't married to our own stories? I think it's hard for us to imagine this in a cultural context that tells us we ARE our thoughts. In fact, I think that the split between body and mind is so deeply rooted in our ideas about ourselves that we cannot address this chasm by simply "thinking" about it. Einstein first famously suggested that we cannot solve problems on the level in which they were created. Following that logic, I believe we must address this split by turning towards what has been split-off (i.e. the body) in an embodied way.
I've found that one of the most accessible ways for people to re-discover the body's wisdom involves practices that pair conscious physical movement with a simultaneous unknown goal. This revelation is something that I've stumbled upon by accident after many blind leaps into body practices like yoga, thai massage, authentic movement, conscious breathing, rolfing, energy medicine, somatic experiencing therapies, etc. etc. I'm not sure why I've never bothered to try to understand these things with my mind before I do them, but the gifts I've received as a result of "not needing to know" (i.e. figure out) what's happening have been immeasurable. Chiefly, I have discovered this: embodied presence feels like Love. ALL OF THE TIME. Even when there's an experience of pain and discomfort, a larger field of loving awareness seems to permeate and contain it simultaneously.
Note: I'm not suggesting that the mind is not engaged in this, but that it is simply free to stop trying to control and predict my experience, and can instead become open to some new possibilities. In fact, it's precisely because the mind reflects the body and the body reflects the mind, that we can begin to understand how habitual physiological posturing is connected to habitual psychological posturing. Consequently, when we start to notice how changes in the body predict changes in the psyche, a really miraculous thing can happen: reconnection! (Fun side note: the word "religion" comes from the latin root re-ligamentus (i.e. ligament), and literally translated means "re-connection"). The reward for this kind of reconnection is a renewed access to one of our greatest sources of natural intelligence. I have noticed that when we are able to reconnect to this embodied intelligence, we are then immediately drawn back into a deeper connection with our natural belonging. As John O'Donohue reminds us, "our bodies know they belong; it is our minds that make our lives so homeless".
Much of my professional practice involves trying to teach people how to come home to the intelligence of their physical bodies. In our culture, this can be an extraordinarily difficult task for most people. It seems that at some point (perhaps around the Renaissance) we began to devalue the body and glorify the intellect. You may notice this inheritance in many of our cultural, philosophical, and religious ideals such as "mind over matter", "I think therefore I am", "the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak", etc.
There are many implications and consequences for this devaluation of the body's wisdom, which is easily noticeable in our modern society. I imagine that we can all think of many times when we have mistreated or shamed our own bodies or the bodies of others. However, I also believe that much of our personal and collective suffering is related to this pervasive sense of cultural disembodiment (mistreatment of the earth, improper allocation of resources, oppression, war, chronic pain, auto-immune diseases, addictions, eating disorders, diabetes, and other habitual self-destructive patterns).
This is a hard pattern to change because once we believe we are our minds, we become convinced that the stories we generate in our minds are absolute truths. In order to avoid threat to our sense of self that any sort of cognitive dissonance would inevitably produce, we then feel compelled to act in ways that will reinforce the stories we're so busy telling ourselves. Example: "no one will ever accept me for who I really am" becomes a devastating self-fullfilling prophecy when we let that belief convince us to keep secrets and tell lies.
But, what if we didn't have to believe all of our thoughts? What kind of personal freedom would we experience if we weren't married to our own stories? I think it's hard for us to imagine this in a cultural context that tells us we ARE our thoughts. In fact, I think that the split between body and mind is so deeply rooted in our ideas about ourselves that we cannot address this chasm by simply "thinking" about it. Einstein first famously suggested that we cannot solve problems on the level in which they were created. Following that logic, I believe we must address this split by turning towards what has been split-off (i.e. the body) in an embodied way.
I've found that one of the most accessible ways for people to re-discover the body's wisdom involves practices that pair conscious physical movement with a simultaneous unknown goal. This revelation is something that I've stumbled upon by accident after many blind leaps into body practices like yoga, thai massage, authentic movement, conscious breathing, rolfing, energy medicine, somatic experiencing therapies, etc. etc. I'm not sure why I've never bothered to try to understand these things with my mind before I do them, but the gifts I've received as a result of "not needing to know" (i.e. figure out) what's happening have been immeasurable. Chiefly, I have discovered this: embodied presence feels like Love. ALL OF THE TIME. Even when there's an experience of pain and discomfort, a larger field of loving awareness seems to permeate and contain it simultaneously.
Note: I'm not suggesting that the mind is not engaged in this, but that it is simply free to stop trying to control and predict my experience, and can instead become open to some new possibilities. In fact, it's precisely because the mind reflects the body and the body reflects the mind, that we can begin to understand how habitual physiological posturing is connected to habitual psychological posturing. Consequently, when we start to notice how changes in the body predict changes in the psyche, a really miraculous thing can happen: reconnection! (Fun side note: the word "religion" comes from the latin root re-ligamentus (i.e. ligament), and literally translated means "re-connection"). The reward for this kind of reconnection is a renewed access to one of our greatest sources of natural intelligence. I have noticed that when we are able to reconnect to this embodied intelligence, we are then immediately drawn back into a deeper connection with our natural belonging. As John O'Donohue reminds us, "our bodies know they belong; it is our minds that make our lives so homeless".
Thursday, September 20, 2012
Enlightenment
Today, I heard someone describe spiritual enlightenment like this: finding just enough freedom from our habitual patterns of thinking, that we are able to simply explore other ways of relating to our human experience.
Sunday, September 16, 2012
Chase your bliss, already!
“Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.” - Steve Jobs
Have you ever noticed how the notion of "chasing your bliss" sometimes gets a bad rap from our stern fathers or worried mothers? Of course, they're supposed to do that because they need to make sure we don't chase the kind of bliss one might stumble upon while participating in drugs, sex, and rock-n-roll. However, I think we can also trust ourselves to know the difference between ephemeral feelings of ecstasy and genuine heart-soaring wonderment. And there's many, many reasons to chase after that latter feeling. One of the most compelling justifications for that kind of bliss-chasing might be this: it's only through the genuine expression of our deepest longings that we can begin to find authentic belonging.
Have you ever noticed how the notion of "chasing your bliss" sometimes gets a bad rap from our stern fathers or worried mothers? Of course, they're supposed to do that because they need to make sure we don't chase the kind of bliss one might stumble upon while participating in drugs, sex, and rock-n-roll. However, I think we can also trust ourselves to know the difference between ephemeral feelings of ecstasy and genuine heart-soaring wonderment. And there's many, many reasons to chase after that latter feeling. One of the most compelling justifications for that kind of bliss-chasing might be this: it's only through the genuine expression of our deepest longings that we can begin to find authentic belonging.
Thursday, September 13, 2012
Hidden Singer
The gods are less for their love of praise.
Above and below them all is a spirit that needs nothing
but its own wholeness, its health and ours.
It has made all things by dividing itself.
It will be whole again.
To its joy we come together --
the seer and the seen, the eater and the eaten,
the lover and the loved.
In our joining it knows itself. It is with us then,
not as the gods whose names crest in unearthly fire,
but as a little bird hidden in the leaves
who sings quietly and waits, and sings.
-- Wendell Berry
Above and below them all is a spirit that needs nothing
but its own wholeness, its health and ours.
It has made all things by dividing itself.
It will be whole again.
To its joy we come together --
the seer and the seen, the eater and the eaten,
the lover and the loved.
In our joining it knows itself. It is with us then,
not as the gods whose names crest in unearthly fire,
but as a little bird hidden in the leaves
who sings quietly and waits, and sings.
-- Wendell Berry
Wednesday, September 12, 2012
Choosing your stories.
"'The real secret of magic is that the world is made of words,' said Terence McKenna in Alien Dreamtime, "and that if you know the words that the world is made of, you can make of it whatever you wish." Here's my version of that hypothesis: What world you end up living in depends at least in part on your relationship with language". -- Rob Brezny
Tuesday, September 11, 2012
Breaking the shell.
Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses
your understanding.
Even as the stone of the fruit must break, that its
heart may stand in the sun, so must you know pain.
And could you keep your heart in wonder at the
daily miracles of your life, your pain would not seem
less wondrous than your joy;
And you would accept the seasons of your heart,
even as you have always accepted the seasons that
pass over your fields.
And you would watch with serenity through the
winters of your grief.
Much of your pain is self-chosen.
It is the bitter potion by which the physician within
you heals your sick self.
Therefore trust the physician, and drink his remedy
in silence and tranquillity:
For his hand, though heavy and hard, is guided by
the tender hand of the Unseen,
And the cup he brings, though it burn your lips, has
been fashioned of the clay which the Potter has
moistened with His own sacred tears.
- Kahlil Gibran
your understanding.
Even as the stone of the fruit must break, that its
heart may stand in the sun, so must you know pain.
And could you keep your heart in wonder at the
daily miracles of your life, your pain would not seem
less wondrous than your joy;
And you would accept the seasons of your heart,
even as you have always accepted the seasons that
pass over your fields.
And you would watch with serenity through the
winters of your grief.
Much of your pain is self-chosen.
It is the bitter potion by which the physician within
you heals your sick self.
Therefore trust the physician, and drink his remedy
in silence and tranquillity:
For his hand, though heavy and hard, is guided by
the tender hand of the Unseen,
And the cup he brings, though it burn your lips, has
been fashioned of the clay which the Potter has
moistened with His own sacred tears.
- Kahlil Gibran
Internal Energy Medicine: An Imaginal New Approach?!
I believe rather enthusiastically that imagination is one of the more creative human intelligences. I also agree completely with Brenda Ueland who suggests that "the imagination needs moodling -- long, inefficient happy idling, dawdling and puttering". The following personal anecdote is written with the intention of illustrating one example of the genius of personal reveries.
Starting with a sensory awareness of chronic inflammation in my physical body, I wandered around aimlessly through dozens of personal reveries. Somewhat spontaneously, this wandering helped me understand (or maybe to remember?) that the inflammation was an expression of personal "resistance". Becoming curious about what exactly I might be resisting, my subsequent inefficient, happy, idle dawdling and puttering allowed me to discover how a viscerally felt sense of unconditional love dissolved the energy of resistance (manifesting as inflammation). But, seriously. The painful stagnant energy was released and moved out of my physical body via the antidotal influence of unconditional love. It felt - and still feels - quite miraculous to my own sensibilities!
Here's the fun part: the twists and turns in this happy, idle dawdling were all so seemingly disconnected when they first rose up in my own reveries. It amuses me to know that the myth of Saturn, images from a Tim Burton movie, the psychological concept of Need Theory, and the principles of Einsteinian physics played a significant role in this happy, idle wandering towards the eventual cessation of physical discomfort in my body. I'm not quite sure how to describe this process, but it felt like I was first learning the imaginal, energetic language of my own dis-ease, and then similarly the imaginal, energetic language of what might offer me relief. When I then applied what I was learning to my immediate experience, something shifted in my physical body almost spontaneously.
It's so wildly non-linear and non-rational that it's almost incredible. But it's true! And it worked! And I am so relieved! Yet, here's the catch: I needed to find the time to idle and dawdle and wander aimlessly. This particular process had several small interruptions, but by and large it took an entire day. I wouldn't have given myself that kind of time if I did not first believe in the potential wisdom in the aimless wandering reveries of my own imagination.
Starting with a sensory awareness of chronic inflammation in my physical body, I wandered around aimlessly through dozens of personal reveries. Somewhat spontaneously, this wandering helped me understand (or maybe to remember?) that the inflammation was an expression of personal "resistance". Becoming curious about what exactly I might be resisting, my subsequent inefficient, happy, idle dawdling and puttering allowed me to discover how a viscerally felt sense of unconditional love dissolved the energy of resistance (manifesting as inflammation). But, seriously. The painful stagnant energy was released and moved out of my physical body via the antidotal influence of unconditional love. It felt - and still feels - quite miraculous to my own sensibilities!
Here's the fun part: the twists and turns in this happy, idle dawdling were all so seemingly disconnected when they first rose up in my own reveries. It amuses me to know that the myth of Saturn, images from a Tim Burton movie, the psychological concept of Need Theory, and the principles of Einsteinian physics played a significant role in this happy, idle wandering towards the eventual cessation of physical discomfort in my body. I'm not quite sure how to describe this process, but it felt like I was first learning the imaginal, energetic language of my own dis-ease, and then similarly the imaginal, energetic language of what might offer me relief. When I then applied what I was learning to my immediate experience, something shifted in my physical body almost spontaneously.
It's so wildly non-linear and non-rational that it's almost incredible. But it's true! And it worked! And I am so relieved! Yet, here's the catch: I needed to find the time to idle and dawdle and wander aimlessly. This particular process had several small interruptions, but by and large it took an entire day. I wouldn't have given myself that kind of time if I did not first believe in the potential wisdom in the aimless wandering reveries of my own imagination.
Monday, September 10, 2012
Task of Love.
"Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it". - Rumi
What is 'IT'?
Men are not free when they are doing just what they like.
Men are only free when they are doing what the deepest self likes.
And there is getting down to the deepest self!
It takes some diving.
Because the deepest self is way down, and the conscious self is an obstinate monkey.
But of one thing we may be sure.
If one wants to be free,
one has to give up the illusion of doing what one likes, and seek what IT wishes done.
-- D. H. Lawrence
Men are only free when they are doing what the deepest self likes.
And there is getting down to the deepest self!
It takes some diving.
Because the deepest self is way down, and the conscious self is an obstinate monkey.
But of one thing we may be sure.
If one wants to be free,
one has to give up the illusion of doing what one likes, and seek what IT wishes done.
-- D. H. Lawrence
Sunday, September 9, 2012
The Art of Therapy
I believe in therapy. In fact, I believe in it so much that I am both a practitioner and a client of the craft. Consequently, I've had the tremendous fortune of being initiated into really beautiful processes of transformation from both positions. My own journey through this somewhat mysterious phenomena has often let me to wonder exactly why therapy "works" when it does.
In light of that confession, I'd like to link you to this lovely little essay about the potential gifts of good psychotherapy: The Folk Art of Therapy. This piece gives one of my favorite explanations about why and how therapy can be so powerfully transformational. If reading it stirs your curiosity at all, I'd like to also recommend another reading assignment: The Gift of Therapy by Irvin Yalom. This book does a beautiful job of exploring the subtleties of healing that the therapy relationship aims to facilitate. If, however, you're a person who needs empirical evidence in order to believe in anything your five senses can't immediately recognize, you might want to look into this book: The Neuroscience of Psychotherapy. And if you have the supremely good fortune to live in the beautiful city of Chicago, and want to attend something that guarantees to facilitate a more provocative conversation than any of the above sources combined, then consider attending this lecture: The Love Cure given through the CG Jung Institute of Chicago in early December of this year.
(Disclaimer: while I enjoy much of what each of these authors posits about the process of therapy, their beliefs about mental health and best practices do not necessarily reflect my own).
In light of that confession, I'd like to link you to this lovely little essay about the potential gifts of good psychotherapy: The Folk Art of Therapy. This piece gives one of my favorite explanations about why and how therapy can be so powerfully transformational. If reading it stirs your curiosity at all, I'd like to also recommend another reading assignment: The Gift of Therapy by Irvin Yalom. This book does a beautiful job of exploring the subtleties of healing that the therapy relationship aims to facilitate. If, however, you're a person who needs empirical evidence in order to believe in anything your five senses can't immediately recognize, you might want to look into this book: The Neuroscience of Psychotherapy. And if you have the supremely good fortune to live in the beautiful city of Chicago, and want to attend something that guarantees to facilitate a more provocative conversation than any of the above sources combined, then consider attending this lecture: The Love Cure given through the CG Jung Institute of Chicago in early December of this year.
(Disclaimer: while I enjoy much of what each of these authors posits about the process of therapy, their beliefs about mental health and best practices do not necessarily reflect my own).
Friday, September 7, 2012
Not mad, just human.
"We are not mad, we are human.
We want to love and someone must forgive us for the paths we take to love.
For the paths are many and dark,
and we are ardent and cruel in our journey."
-- Leonard Cohen
We want to love and someone must forgive us for the paths we take to love.
For the paths are many and dark,
and we are ardent and cruel in our journey."
-- Leonard Cohen
Thursday, September 6, 2012
Self-Acceptance
Sometimes other people say things so well that it feels unfair to try to paraphrase it:
“The acceptance of oneself is the essence of the whole moral problem and the epitome of a whole outlook on life. That I feed the hungry, that I forgive an insult, that I love my enemy -- all these are undoubtedly great virtues. But what if I should discover that the least among them all, the poorest of all the beggars, the most impudent of all the offenders, the very enemy himself -- that these are within me, and that I myself stand in need of the alms of my own kindness -- that I myself am the enemy who must be loved -- what then?” - CG Jung
“If you try to avoid or remove the awkward quality, it will pursue you. The only effective way to still its unease is to transfigure it, to let it become something creative and positive that contributes to who you are. Nietzche said that one of the best days in his life was the day when he rebaptized all his negative qualities as his best qualities. Rather than banishing what is at first glimpse unwelcome, you bring it home to unity with your life. In a sense, you are called to be a loving parent to your delinquent qualities”. - John O'Donohue
“Those who are willing to be vulnerable move among mysteries" - Theodore Roethke
While I don't think I can articulate this sentiment any more clearly than the above minds have done so, I will add this: learning how to practice genuine self-acceptance is not for the faint of heart. It is a grievous error to assume that this concept belongs to some kind of cute, cuddly, warm and fuzzy experience. It's equally grievous to dismiss the notion of self-acceptance as a means for justifying passive denial of personal responsibility. Instead, real self-acceptance requires an honest and ongoing encounter with our own sources of shame. That is an extraordinarily brave quest! Yet the potential reward for this kind of inner courage is something like Wholeness. In fact, Carl Jung believed that our darkest inner landscapes often hold our greatest creative potentials.
So, onward brave friends! I think we owe it to ourselves and to each other.
“The acceptance of oneself is the essence of the whole moral problem and the epitome of a whole outlook on life. That I feed the hungry, that I forgive an insult, that I love my enemy -- all these are undoubtedly great virtues. But what if I should discover that the least among them all, the poorest of all the beggars, the most impudent of all the offenders, the very enemy himself -- that these are within me, and that I myself stand in need of the alms of my own kindness -- that I myself am the enemy who must be loved -- what then?” - CG Jung
“If you try to avoid or remove the awkward quality, it will pursue you. The only effective way to still its unease is to transfigure it, to let it become something creative and positive that contributes to who you are. Nietzche said that one of the best days in his life was the day when he rebaptized all his negative qualities as his best qualities. Rather than banishing what is at first glimpse unwelcome, you bring it home to unity with your life. In a sense, you are called to be a loving parent to your delinquent qualities”. - John O'Donohue
“Those who are willing to be vulnerable move among mysteries" - Theodore Roethke
While I don't think I can articulate this sentiment any more clearly than the above minds have done so, I will add this: learning how to practice genuine self-acceptance is not for the faint of heart. It is a grievous error to assume that this concept belongs to some kind of cute, cuddly, warm and fuzzy experience. It's equally grievous to dismiss the notion of self-acceptance as a means for justifying passive denial of personal responsibility. Instead, real self-acceptance requires an honest and ongoing encounter with our own sources of shame. That is an extraordinarily brave quest! Yet the potential reward for this kind of inner courage is something like Wholeness. In fact, Carl Jung believed that our darkest inner landscapes often hold our greatest creative potentials.
So, onward brave friends! I think we owe it to ourselves and to each other.
Wednesday, September 5, 2012
Sleeping in the Forest
This poem feels like a beautiful metaphor about how a deep and viscerally felt sense of belonging can be so transformational:
I thought the earth remembered me,
she took me back so tenderly,
arranging her dark skirts, her pockets
full of lichens and seeds.
I slept as never before, a stone on the river bed,
nothing between me and the white fire of the stars
but my thoughts, and they floated light as moths
among the branches of the perfect trees.
All night I heard the small kingdoms
breathing around me, the insects,
and the birds who do their work in the darkness.
All night I rose and fell, as if in water,
grappling with a luminous doom. By morning
I had vanished at least a dozen times
into something better.
-- Mary Oliver
Beyond metaphor, however, the earth does literally hold you. It's safe to yield into her natural pull, and remember your belonging.
I thought the earth remembered me,
she took me back so tenderly,
arranging her dark skirts, her pockets
full of lichens and seeds.
I slept as never before, a stone on the river bed,
nothing between me and the white fire of the stars
but my thoughts, and they floated light as moths
among the branches of the perfect trees.
All night I heard the small kingdoms
breathing around me, the insects,
and the birds who do their work in the darkness.
All night I rose and fell, as if in water,
grappling with a luminous doom. By morning
I had vanished at least a dozen times
into something better.
-- Mary Oliver
Beyond metaphor, however, the earth does literally hold you. It's safe to yield into her natural pull, and remember your belonging.
Tuesday, September 4, 2012
The mistake of envy.
“No one else has access to the world you carry around within yourself; you are its custodian and entrance. No one else can see the world the way you see it. No one else can feel your life the way you feel it. Thus it is impossible to ever compare two people because each stands on such different ground. When you compare yourself to others, you are inviting envy into your consciousness; it can be a dangerous and destructive guest.” -- John O'Donohue
I think this idea is one we should really try to hold onto while traveling through this ephemeral human experience. In the above quote, John O'Donohue compassionately reminds us how the misperceptions of envy can be dangerous and destructive. Following his lead, I'd like to remind us that this destructive quality often manifests in subtle, insidious, and/or nearly imperceivable ways. I think we have to be conscious of the ways in which envy can simply distract us from pursuing our own authentic paths. This feels important to me because it suggests that even in the most passive manifestations envy can have very personally tragic consequences.
I think this idea is one we should really try to hold onto while traveling through this ephemeral human experience. In the above quote, John O'Donohue compassionately reminds us how the misperceptions of envy can be dangerous and destructive. Following his lead, I'd like to remind us that this destructive quality often manifests in subtle, insidious, and/or nearly imperceivable ways. I think we have to be conscious of the ways in which envy can simply distract us from pursuing our own authentic paths. This feels important to me because it suggests that even in the most passive manifestations envy can have very personally tragic consequences.
Monday, September 3, 2012
Forgiveness
Listen.
Slide the weight from your shoulders and move forward.
You are afraid you might forget, but you never will.
You will forgive and remember.
-- Barbara Kingsolver
Slide the weight from your shoulders and move forward.
You are afraid you might forget, but you never will.
You will forgive and remember.
-- Barbara Kingsolver
Human Hearts
I learned something miraculous recently while listening to an interview with Richard Bartlett about a healing technology he developed called Matrix Energetics. There's a whole lot of remarkable content within this concept and you can listen to the whole interview by clicking the link I provided. However, the single most impressive thing I learned from this conversation was about the nature of the human heart.
By describing this healing technology and how it works, Dr. Bartlett also explained a concept from quantum physics called a "torsion field". To borrow his words exactly, a "torsion is just a spin or a twist. If you think of a tornado or a hurricane, that’s a torsion field. You’ve got this intense spinning energy, and then at its center, you’ve got a null point where there’s actually a change in the way the laws of physics behave". Here's the exciting part -- Dr. Bartlett goes on to explain that the human heart is actually a torsion field. Apparently, the first thing to form in an embryo is a 72-beats per minute pulse. That pulse is driven by a whirling vortex - or spinning field with a null point - that eventually develops into the physical human heart.
His point? Inside the field of the heart, there is this null or zero-point in which the laws of physics do not apply. Consequently, Dr. Bartlett believes that there is this powerfully creative place in all of us where miracles can be conceived and then spun outward into this time-space reality. He's not speaking metaphorically or philosophically here, however. In fact, Matrix Energetics attempts to teach people how to get into the literal field of their hearts - which is apparently 5,000 times stronger electromagnetically than the field of the brain - and then tap into the infinite and lawless creative potential of their own torsion fields.
Dr. Bartlett makes two compelling claims: One) getting into the field of your heart can be done. Two) miracles, signs, and wonders do manifest as a result. According to him, the source of this possibility is related to that neutral zero-point within the heart's torsion field. Neutral, lawless, personality-less, empty, creative space: that's where the miracles are sourced from! He goes on to suggest that we can learn to return to a point in our hearts where there are no thoughts, no feelings, no emotions, no time, no space, and no rules. He argues that when we get to that point, we have actually arrived at the point of our being that transcends all rule sets. Dr. Bartlett calls this grace. If this is true - I think it is - then we could conclude that the manifestation of Grace is the divine creative potential of the human heart.
Throughout this interview, Dr. Bartlett makes references to the person and miracles of Jesus Christ, as well as the transcendent experiences of monks, saints, and other mystics. I can't remember if he then made this connection directly or only implied it, but I'm going to boldly suggest that these people knew how to get into that precise point of their being, and therein experience literal communion with that Grace. There's a follow-up conversation I want to have about the body being the literal temple of the Holy Spirit, but I'll save that for another time.
By describing this healing technology and how it works, Dr. Bartlett also explained a concept from quantum physics called a "torsion field". To borrow his words exactly, a "torsion is just a spin or a twist. If you think of a tornado or a hurricane, that’s a torsion field. You’ve got this intense spinning energy, and then at its center, you’ve got a null point where there’s actually a change in the way the laws of physics behave". Here's the exciting part -- Dr. Bartlett goes on to explain that the human heart is actually a torsion field. Apparently, the first thing to form in an embryo is a 72-beats per minute pulse. That pulse is driven by a whirling vortex - or spinning field with a null point - that eventually develops into the physical human heart.
His point? Inside the field of the heart, there is this null or zero-point in which the laws of physics do not apply. Consequently, Dr. Bartlett believes that there is this powerfully creative place in all of us where miracles can be conceived and then spun outward into this time-space reality. He's not speaking metaphorically or philosophically here, however. In fact, Matrix Energetics attempts to teach people how to get into the literal field of their hearts - which is apparently 5,000 times stronger electromagnetically than the field of the brain - and then tap into the infinite and lawless creative potential of their own torsion fields.
Dr. Bartlett makes two compelling claims: One) getting into the field of your heart can be done. Two) miracles, signs, and wonders do manifest as a result. According to him, the source of this possibility is related to that neutral zero-point within the heart's torsion field. Neutral, lawless, personality-less, empty, creative space: that's where the miracles are sourced from! He goes on to suggest that we can learn to return to a point in our hearts where there are no thoughts, no feelings, no emotions, no time, no space, and no rules. He argues that when we get to that point, we have actually arrived at the point of our being that transcends all rule sets. Dr. Bartlett calls this grace. If this is true - I think it is - then we could conclude that the manifestation of Grace is the divine creative potential of the human heart.
Throughout this interview, Dr. Bartlett makes references to the person and miracles of Jesus Christ, as well as the transcendent experiences of monks, saints, and other mystics. I can't remember if he then made this connection directly or only implied it, but I'm going to boldly suggest that these people knew how to get into that precise point of their being, and therein experience literal communion with that Grace. There's a follow-up conversation I want to have about the body being the literal temple of the Holy Spirit, but I'll save that for another time.
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