Following The Signs and Symbols

In response to Claudette’s Writing Challenge #5: Fortune

51. I live my life by following the signs and symbols that surround me. In other words, I live my life directed by my Intuition.

That was supposed to be #42 on my list, but I conveniently side-stepped it altogether, deciding instead to add a few negatives to my list for the sake of balance. Sort of a logical decision, don’t you think? Except when you immediately become aware that there was no element of logic in the decision making process. What motivated the change in subject matter was just plain old fear, discomfort in the comfort zone, dis-ease at writing down such a blatant and telling statement.

I’ve said it before, and to hundreds of people (I was a teacher), so why the fuss here and now? Because this is different and also entails honesty and commitment. I have no idea how anyone will react to that statement. Will I automatically be dismissed for saying it? I live in a world that prizes logic and logical thinking, yet here I am saying that I choose to see things differently and order my existence through that different perspective.

Logic doesn’t dismiss intuition, that would be illogical. However, much of the time, logic has a tendency to put quotation marks around that kind of thinking, sort of admiring it from a distance, but still retaining the prerogative of dismissal should it prove less than concrete. And it does prove that a great deal of the time. Intuition is based in a knowing that doesn’t always have supportive evidence for its conclusions or suggestions. It simply is.

Intuition is based on sensory input, sometimes feelings, and logic doesn’t put a great deal of trust in feelings. They are subjective, not objective and thus, not logical. Feelings are not facts, therefore lend little support to any argument. So, saying that I live by the dictates of my intuition means I, therefore my opinion, might and could easily be dismissed. That means I could possibly go unheard.

So why am I bringing all of this up? Because I realized that I had side-stepped #42. By doing that, I was being less than honest and cheating myself out of other possibilities. I prize my intuitive abilities, right along with my logic skills. It doesn’t make any difference if others recognize them or even acknowledge them. Yet, it does, because I know that others sometimes see and define intuitive knowing right up there with fortune-telling. That makes it suspect, somehow not quite on the up and up, maybe even a bit of a scam.

In The Gift of Fear, Gavin De Becker writes about one of the most primary needs for intuition in the human experience, that of self-protection against the threat of violence. He gives copious examples of how it works and why it is necessary for the individual to listen to that small inner voice that alerts one to danger. But that is only one need and use of intuition, albeit, an extremely important one.

In writing about how one must be alert to whatever opportunities might arise to propel one toward ones dream, I am speaking directly to another use of intuition. Listening to that still small voice can allow one to make choices and decisions based in the reality of ones own experiences and daily existence. No one can possibly know all of that except the individual. It is all stored inside of us, each and every moment.

That knowing of each moment results in those nudges we sense and feel about certain things and people. And although I am using that knowing to direct my personal choices, it is still one and the same as De Becker’s gift of fear. If intuition is a gift meant to enhance self-preservation, then doesn’t it stand to reason that we must use it to make the choices that will allow us the best life possible into whatever future we have? Oh, oh, we might be bumping up against that fortune-telling subject again.

This week, I have been bumping up against a decision, a choice about how I want to proceed into my future. My intuition has kicked into high gear, and although I would really like to dismiss it, I can’t. The logic side of my brain is yakking about how much more time and energy this choice would entail. Am I really prepared to do that and make that commitment? My intuitive knowing says there is always a risk in moving through a threshold experience. I won’t know the answers until I make the movement. And round and round they go until I am just plain confused and exhausted.

There is no denying that the synchronicity has been high level through all of this. Synchronicity is an aspect of intuition. It is the intuitive energy that points out all the connective links. And it is definitely pointing in a very specific direction. Dare I ignore that and possibly invite harm to my own person and progress? What did I just say about the gift of fear? But dis-ease and discomfort are not good reasons for doing anything, are they? Yet, they are the very reasons this blog is being written.

Am I a fortune-teller? No. I am simply an individual exploring the paths opening in front of me, and whatever possibilities they might unveil to me. The final choice, decision still lies in front of me. I’m still gathering information. Which means we are still on the drawing board. That in turn means I am back to my journal and some more noodling. Wish me luck, or at least clear sailing?

Waiting On The Page

 

It’s one of those days. Usually I come here via my journal, and by the time I arrive I have some thought or issue bouncing around inside my head so that when I get to this blank page, I have a general idea of what direction to take and just begin. The rest unfolds, many times surprising me more than anyone else. But, today I seem to be the blank page itself. Disconnected thoughts float through and I let them. Nothing concrete, just clouds moving through the landscape, but leaving no residue to hang onto.

I could leave and go do something else, but if I do that, I might never come back, and that thought frightens me. There is nothing that holds me here, nothing that forces me to stay, other than this blank page that needs filling. It is my choice to attempt to do that, and although I am more than willing, I still can’t come up with a subject that will interest me, let alone anyone else.

Even that statement isn’t quite true. There is something I do wish to write about, but when I try to focus in on it, the words simply disappear and the thoughts seem to run for cover, and everything goes blank like this page of paper. A blank piece of paper can be so intimidating. It’s innocent of any wrong doing, and yet seems to have pointing fingers, chiding remarks that rise silently, fast becoming a dark cloud that simply hovers waiting to drop a storm that never really comes to fruition.

On the flip side, a blank sheet of paper is an open invitation, whispering of untold fulfillment to be had with simple action. It’s a promise waiting to be filled, a journey, a path yet to be discovered, a story never told awaiting its own unfolding. The only thing involved is a bit of risk, a chance taken that might, or might not, go somewhere. Might lead anywhere. And that anywhere is what stops the action necessary to proceed.

Anywhere means without specific destination. What if I end up in the one place I don’t want to be? What if it takes me to one of those dark corners where the shadows move for no reason, and one just barely catches the sound of something that might be breathing? Shudder at the thought. Maybe I should run now, think later.

But anywhere could also be a bright space of sunshine and laughter. If I run, I would miss all of that. The moment would be lost, possibly never to come again. And that would be just plain sad. It might hold a lesson I have been seeking to learn for years, and my fears would cheat me of that opportunity. That would leave me ignorant, blank, once again, just like this sheet of paper. What exactly is this sheet of paper trying to tell me?

Dear Writer,

you come to me filled with ideas, and I wait to accept any and all you wish to say, think, feel. I see your hesitation and can only greet it with hope. I will never be fulfilled unless you begin. I hold only this one purpose, but I need you to act before that purpose can be satisfied. I long to carry your burdens, share them with you, for that would give me shape, form, and dimension. But, unless, or until you act, I possess none of those things. I am simply empty, so I mutely stare back at you and plead for your mercy.

Yes, I am a beggar, without pride or even distinct purpose. I long to be filled, given a reason for existing. Not only am I strong enough to hold and carry your burdens, but I can and will encompass all of your joys as well. Help you celebrate even the smallest of these, and do that gladly and with deep gratitude. I can help you in so many ways, to remember specific days, moments, and experiences. I can teach you things you never dreamed, give you more experiences than you have ever imagined. All of this and so much more. But none of this will come to pass unless you move, act. So, I have no problem imploring you to take me, use me, fill me up, and in the process I will become more than I have ever been or could hope to be.

I would be your friend. Do that gladly and extend your world exponentially. You speak of fear, that I frighten you. Don’t you realize that the fear will only grow each time you say no to me? Become as solid as a brick wall you are incapable of climbing? You can run away, but be certain you will have to keep running forever. Is that what you really want? Really?

Fear must be faced, confronted. That is another of my purposes. I will be here, with you as you move into those dark and shadowy places. I will be your friend and help you attend to whatever you find there. But, again, that is all up to you. You are the main ingredient and I am just a tool.

So, use me, abuse me if you must, I don’t care, after all that is exactly what I am here for. And I can make you a promise, one that I can keep forever. I will never speak out of turn, never chide you, never point a finger, I don’t own them. The only speaking I will ever do is that which you allow me. I alone am nothing, just a sheet of paper, your humble servant awaiting your bidding.

With a great deal of gratitude, I am and will remain,

Forever Filled

Scratching The Itch

Writer’s Island prompt #14 “Just Around The Corner”

Have you ever hand an itch deep inside of your ear? Hard to satisfy it, isn’t it? No way to get at it, nothing fits, or is appropriate for the rubbing or scratching that will satisfy it, make it calm down and fade away. So, you find yourself rubbing the outer edges, and all that accomplishes is to make the itch even more pronounced.

Yesterday, when I went to check out the prompt on Writer’s Island, the minute I saw the prompt, I heard a whisper at my inner ear. It was another phrase, in my mind, and I knew that was the opening line for a poem I wanted to write. It took some work. Just because the first line fell with ease, didn’t mean I automatically knew where the rest of the poem was going to go, or even what it was about.

Where it went was back to when I was fifteen, and a person I haven’t thought about in at least twenty years, if not more. I had to work with the piece and was having some difficulty with the unwieldiness of the subject matter. I stopped for a while, to chat with a friend. Somewhere in our discussion, I figured out how to make the poem work. Went back to it and finished, then posted it on the Soul’s Music site. I was satisfied.

But the itch at my inner ear wasn’t. The phrase, the prompt: Just Around The Corner kept right on whispering to me. And although I shook my head numerous times, explored other possible meanings, it just wouldn’t go away, wouldn’t settle back, relax, or fade into the nether world from which it came. It was persistent.

Just around the corner is another world. When I was a child, it meant the intersections on both ends of the block on which we lived. We were not allowed to cross those intersections without explicit permission and a time allotted for return. What was just around the corner was mostly out of reach unless one complied with the rules set up for ones own safety. To do otherwise was to risk being grounded for several days or more, and who wants to waste summer vacation in that manner?

As we grew, just around the corner became a bit more freedom. A decided move away from home base. But it also meant more responsibility in an enlarged world waiting for discovery. There were always cautions administered softly but clearly. So much so, that just around the corner also entailed a bit of fear about the unexpected, right along with the bright promise of adventure and exploration. It always meant some risk. Risks I gladly took in order to satisfy that other itch of curiosity.

I, somewhat lazily and casually, mentally explored all of that during the day yesterday, in an attempt to get rid of that whisper tickling my inner ear. But to no avail, it still persisted. Found myself, mentally swatting at it, amidst the other activities I was engaged in, as though it were no more than some pesky fly, certainly out of season, and lacking any reason for its insatiable need to bug the hell out of me.

Finally went to bed and slept with no more than a few dream fragments that promptly dissipated upon awakening. But as soon as I turned on the computer and pulled up the next blank page of my journal, there was that pesky fly again. Okay, I admitted defeat, went right back to the beginning, which was that opening line to the poem. Just around the corner in my mind. I wrote in far more detail of that time period in my life.

Didn’t really care where it went, I was just filling in the page and it was a topic with which I could do whatever I wanted. And did. About three-quarters of the way down the page, I found the gold mine that pesky fly had been trying to get me to see the entire time. All the pieces fell in place. Long unanswered questions were finally answered clearly and with details. My life experience, only hinted at in the poem, suddenly became one whole thread, instead of the myriad of pieces caught in various, but separate, still life moments that it had been. Ker-chunk and Eureka all in one moment.

That pesky fly was no more. It had magically metamorphosed into a stunningly beautiful butterfly free to flit from one connection to the next, gathering the pollen of association and depositing it just around the corner in my mind, that one place that had been prepared over the years, to receive it, honor it, and become its rightful place in the order of things. Talk about satisfaction.

Just around the corner is still a risk and a freedom. Still entails a bit of fear, right alongside the promise of new adventure. But just around the corner, will also now mean, just around the turn of the next page, the next word, the next pesky fly that buzzes at and tickles my inner ear. Does it get any better than this? You and I won’t know unless we turn to that next blank page and scratch that itch that is tickling our inner ears.

A Tiger Named Pain

Writer’s Island Prompt #10  “MOST AMAZING EXPERIENCE”

Pain is the shell that encloses your understanding.    __Kahlil Gibran

Thirty-plus years ago, I gave birth to my fourth and last child. She was beautiful and healthy, but I seemed to be in almost constant pain after bringing her home. I’d had arthritic pain since age 17, always in different joints, most consistently in my lower back and hips. This was different. It seemed to concentrate in my hands and the joints of my fingers. I was tired most of the time. When the pain continued, I made an appointment with my regular doctor.

He took x-rays and told me he thought I had Rheumatoid Arthritis. I went blank as he explained to me that this form of arthritis was painful and crippling. I remember going directly to the library after leaving his office. After finding, and checking out, four large books on Arthritis, I brought them home and attempted to read them. It didn’t go well. Each of the tomes had a chapter on Rheumatoid, and each of those chapters began with exactly the same sentence: Rheumatoid Arthritis is the most painful and crippling form of this illness.

I carried the four books back out to the car and drove into town to the library, dropping them, one at a time, in the outside drop box. They made a resounding thud when they landed. I drove home in a fog. The doctor had given me a prescription for an anti-inflammatory drug and I began taking it immediately. Although the pain diminished to some extent, it was always there, and the exhaustion never really lifted. Most evenings, after cleaning up the kitchen, and putting the kids to bed, I would drop into the rocker in the living room and just sit there, feeling whatever energy I might still retain, oozing away, as though dripping off my fingertips.

My husband told me that he felt really cheated by the diagnosis. When I asked him to explain, he told me that he felt that he’d been cheated out of a full partner, and might now be saddled with a cripple. If I wasn’t suffering from what has been termed the after baby blues, I was definitely dealing with a lot of depression. I took my medication regularly and also took time out to take warm baths because they relaxed and soothed me.

Meanwhile, I was trying to get on with resuming a rather hectic life. I had always been a veracious reader and continued to do just that. I was interested in a wide variety of reading material and much of it pertained to psychology and the spiritual aspects of life. In doing that reading, I had come across the idea of creating ones own personal space inside ones own being. At that point in time, I desperately needed just such a place and began to seek it actively.

My two youngest were only fifteen months apart in age, so when they went down for an afternoon nap, I would go in my bedroom, sit crossed legged on my bed, and actively seek to create an inner space that would allow me to rest, relax, and possibly refuel. After many attempts, I settled on an image that both pleased and refreshed me. I would watch myself walk through an open, but very old wooden gate into a small meadow dotted with wild flowers and tall grass. There was a path there, through the grasses, that led to a huge boulder. I would climb up onto the boulder and sit, again crossed legged, and just breathe.

Once atop the boulder, I could see for miles. There were no signs of habitation anywhere in view, but there was a fast running wide river and mountains in the distance on the other side of the river. I was pleased with my creation, and got so good at it, that there were moments when I would feel the breeze caress my skin, and could even smell the faint scent of fresh earth, flowers, and even the water. And when I left that inner space, to resume my physical existence, I actually felt rested and more peaceful for having been there.

Then, one day, he came. I was in my usual spot, atop the boulder in my imagined inner space, looking out at the beautiful landscape when my eye caught movement in the tall grasses down near the river. The grasses seemed to be swaying from side to side, as though bowing to whatever was passing there in their midst. I was mesmerized and watched as he stepped from the grasses to the foot of the boulder where I was sitting. A larger than life, fully grown Siberian Tiger.

Amazingly enough, I wasn’t in the least bit frightened. I knew that this was taking place in my imagination, but I had always had a great deal of admiration for the Big Cats. No visit to the zoo was complete without a long slow stroll past their habitats. To me, they were the epitome of power and grace welded together in extraordinary physical beauty. So, I eagerly leaned forward and said, “Oh, yes. You are perfect,” and then grinned like a kid set free in a candy store, preferably in the chocolate section.

He gracefully settled on his back haunches and then spoke. He didn’t move his mouth, but spoke quite clearly into my mind. “I have come of my own accord, and at no ones bidding. I have come to teach and you will not treat me like your pet dog. I come of my own choosing, sent by the one you call Lord.” Then just as gracefully, he lowered the rest of his incredibly beautiful body, closed his eyes, and went to sleep.

I was stunned and past exhilaration. I wanted to jump up and down, hug myself, and ask him a thousand questions. What he’d said sounded a great deal like some sort of rabbi riddle. What was his name? Where had he come from? If he came at his own choosing, why did he say he  “was sent?” Why would I even think of treating him like my dog? I loved my pet, but this was way beyond anything even similar to that.

Over the next few days, I went eagerly to my secret place, always hoping he’d still be there, and he was. I did ask a great many questions, but his answers were again, more riddle than clear statement. He continued to tell me he had come from a long way away, a far off place that I wouldn’t understand. When I asked about his name, he avoided giving me a direct answer, and said instead, that I might call him, “ by the lesson he came to teach.”

By the third evening after his arrival, although I was still eager and even excited, I had begun to think this was a useless waste of energy. I couldn’t understand, either because I was just too dumb, or because he wasn’t a very good teacher. I began to prepare yet another warm bath, when suddenly he was there in the room with me. His voice was deep but gentle as he said, “I come to teach you about pain.”

I recoiled away from him and the words he spoke. How could he, the most beautiful and graceful creature, teach me about pain? He had said I was to call him by the lesson he came to teach. How could anyone expect me to call him by that word? Was this whole thing just some sort of cosmic joke played out at my expense? I was instantly crushed and wounded. I said, with deep deep sorrow and regret, “I think you better go now. I have enough pain in my life as it is, I don’t want or need any more.” I was in tears.

He said, just as quietly, “Do you remember when I came? How joyous and eager you were? Would that all would greet me in such a manner. ” There was deep sorrow in his eyes and his voice as he said that. Then he continued, “If you say I must go, I will do so, but I would ask you a question before I leave.” He paused, then asked,  ”You would put away all of that joy and eagerness because of  four simple letters, arranged in a random manner, defining a word you may not clearly understand?”

By then, I was sitting down on the floor, tears rolling softly down my face, but I heard his question. He hadn’t shouted, hadn’t raised his voice, but those words were caught forever in my mind. I thought about what he said, and what he meant. No, I didn’t understand, not the word, its meaning to my present life, who or what he might be, or why he had so suddenly appeared in my mind. And how bereft I felt at the thought of never again, seeing him, even if only in my imagination.

After a great deal of thought, during which he waited silently and patiently, I slowly nodded my head and said, “Okay, yes, you can stay.” And he did, teaching me many lessons about pain. One of them is here on this blog. It’s the story of the little seed (Story Time, Sept.23, 2008), and I learned that story as I weeded the huge garden my husband had planted, with my dog following along slowly beside me, and Pain’s deep gentle voice accompanying me the entire time.

He has never left me and has taught me many things and in many ways. I had always thought that the tigers I saw at the zoo, suffered a great deal from their captivity. Just looking at them, I could see how their skin was slack, hanging from their bellies and had thought it was because, in captivity, they couldn’t run freely and so their skin and perhaps, even some muscle had gone slack in the process. Not so. That is a natural condition, meant to secure life and help in survival. Big cats are predators and that means they hunt to live, battling other wild creatures for the very food that will sustain them. That slack skin and fur is meant to preserve and protect vital organs during that continuous battle. I had to learn the same lesson:  not to live so close to my skin and the skin (surface) of my own life.

I did get a second opinion from a Rheumatologist. He took magnified x-rays of my hands and found no distortion of any kind, which would definitely appear if I had Rheumatoid. He suggested that I might be suffering from a sleep disorder that actually mimics arthritis conditions in lab tests. My own doctor said that that sounded fishy. But the pain did diminish to its usual, and mostly, tolerable level.

Several years later, I entered college and took some basic courses in psychology. One of them was about different personality theories, and the men who had defined them. One of those men was Carl Gustav Jung, and I read about how he felt that each individual actually held a ‘guru’ within their psyche. A voice that spoke to the answers we all search for. But, a voice that could only be heard if one got still and quiet in some form of meditation. I knew my guru, he didn’t look like a Tibetan monk, he was a huge Siberian Tiger, named Pain.

While I taught for several years, I actually led groups of people through imaging techniques that I had come to understand were called “spontaneous imagery,” or “guided imagery.” Imagine my surprise, when one night after class, a shy quiet woman approached me with a question. She said that while following the sound of my voice, really getting into her own inner space, she was shocked to find herself, face to face with a great big tiger. She wanted to know if that was okay, and if it was, what she should do next? I laughed out loud, told her of my own experience,  and advised her to go home, get quiet, and ask him his name.

Masks

An old friend of mine, wrote a blog yesterday,    http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.view&friendID=421091304&blogID=449405861    about the grief she felt concerning the suicide of a new friend. In it, she spoke quite eloquently about the masks we wear in public, sometimes in private. Use them to cover up, and deny our real state/s of being. And because I agree with much of what she said, I want to write about something of that issue today.

I like masks. Have spent many pleasant hours creating them. Used them in my classes to explore the different voices we all use in our daily existence. Have done the same in defining archetypal energies, bringing them more alive to those who might be unfamiliar with them, and the role they play in the choices we make and the lives we are creating. My nephew has an entire room in his home, where he displays all the masks he has collected and ones that have been given to him by friends and family. One of my very favorite movies is Mask, starring Cher. Each individual in the film wore at least one or two, character-wise, in the story. Because she is so facially expressive, one can watch Cher go from rebellious daughter, to lonely needy woman, to eager lover, from addict and then to protective Mom, and back and forth again, throughout the film. I thought her performance was fantastic and really underscored the title of the movie.

But what does all of that have to do with you and I? A great deal. We all wear masks at one point or another. They are, or can be of extreme importance to the art of self-protection. The only place we really never need one is inside of our journals. But, even there they might be present if we are into denying some aspect of our reality. A while back, I mentioned my old boss and the role he was playing in my everyday life. So much so, that when I went back to read my morning pages, I found his name on almost every one for days on end. But, it wasn’t just his name. It was his face as well, and I actually felt my own face alter in accordance. Until that moment, I wasn’t aware that I had been wearing a mask in his presence, and to do my job. That was one of the main reasons I knew I had to get out and find another place of employment.

And that place of employment called for another mask of sorts. The masks we wear are the roles we feel we must play in order to survive in the environment around us. The face of the eager wife, waiting for her hubby to come home, is not the one that hubby sees if he inadvertently left her hanging on the phone and is now coming home three hours late from a meeting. What’s even more important is the mask we wear most often. The one we use to project a certain image of what we think most people will find acceptable and meant to hide our genuine state of being, our genuine humanity. That one who is always smiling, is he really that happy, or is he hiding something beneath that mask of easy grins? Does he go home, sit and pour buckets of pain and sorrow into a journal? We can’t and don’t know. And if he is, maybe we should be grateful for that.

If I am honest, there have been times when I’ve wanted very much to reach out and pull off the mask someone was wearing. But, I much prefer to wait and let them do the honors so we can be genuinely human together. That isn’t to say that they will keep the mask off, afterward. Masks are habits, and its extremely difficult to do without them. As I told my friend, yesterday, I believe it is one of the hardest things we can do, to remove those masks, even for a few moments. That is real exposure, and it doesn’t feel safe at all.

Do you know the masks that you wear? What do they accomplish for you? Could they possibly be a hindrance to some aspect of your life? Keep you at a disadvantage in others? Do you have places in your life where you can be free of the masks? Do you go there often, or not? We have talked a great deal about having a best friend, one that accepts us. Is there someone in your life that you feel is safe enough to leave your mask at home when you are with him, or her?

I have a suggestion. Start watching for images of faces that you yourself might be wearing at different times. Put a face to the different roles you play, cut them out, and paste or glue them into your journal. Then write about them, the value they have in your life, and when you most need to put them on. If you are even more adventurous, give them names. Naming a thing lessens the fear it might hold us in. I read that in Harry Potter. Dumbledore said it, so you don’t need to take my word alone.

“Rainy Day People”

by  Gordon Lightfoot

Rainy day people always seem to know when it’s time to call
Rainy day people don’t talk
They just listen til they’ve heard it all
Rainy day lovers don’t lie when they tell you
They been down like you
Rainy day people don’t mind if you’re crying a tear or two
If you get lonely, all you really need is that rainy day love
Rainy day people all know there’s no sorrow they can’t rise above
Rainy day lovers don’t love any others, that would not be kind
Rainy day people all know how it hangs on a piece of mind
Rainy day lovers don’t lie when they tell you, they’ve been down there too
Rainy day people don’t mind if you’re crying a tear or two
Rainy day people always seem to know when you’re feeling blue
High stepping strutters who land in the gutter sometimes need one too
Take it or leave it, or try to believe it, if you’ve been down too long
Rainy day lovers don’t hide love inside they just pass it on
Rainy day lovers don’t hide love inside they just pass it on

 

Do you remember what it felt like having a best friend, someone to share your secrets with, cry with when you fell down and scraped your knees, to laugh and giggle with over silly things and sillier people? Although, for most of us, that best friend definition reminds us of childhood and those long hard days of growing up and maybe never believing we’d get there, I also believe that we continue to search for more of the same throughout our existence. That feeling of warm welcome and always acceptance when eyes meet. Hugs and pats on the back when needed most. Someone who helps you stay in line without jerking you around. Someone who cheers when you succeed, and boos the competition when you don’t quite do so. Someone who lets you know that you are doing the best with what you’ve been given, respects any effort you put out, and knows you will give back the same without being prompted.

We grow up and get busy being the adults we never thought we would become. But there are always those days when the busyness stops and we realize that we need something more. As I started writing this, I could hear the old Gordon Lightfoot song lyrics playing through my mind. We all need rainy day people, a best friend, at some point or another. We also know that best friends grow up, change, go their own way, and fade from the present moment in numerous ways. Wouldn’t it be nice to have a rainy day best friend anytime, all the time? You can and you do. The very best rainy day friend you can ever have is you.

It begins as all relationships do: with a dialogue, communication of one sort or another. At the cost of repeating myself, the most important dialogue you will ever engage in, is that one with your own person. It is going on constantly, every moment of every day, but if you don’t pay attention, don’t listen and respond, it can fade away just like that best friend from childhood. Writing daily, on a personal level, is a deliberate conscious move to make a friendship with the only person you will always have with you. We are all rainy day people, if we allow ourselves to be. We are all best friends, if we want to be that.

Stop for a moment. Think about what you want in a best friend, who do you turn to on those rainy days that we all encounter far more than we’d like? And yes, I know that many of you will answer that question by saying that you find those things in God, or a belief system. Personally, I still need a Jesus with skin on Him, when the storm is raging outside and the lights go out and don’t come back on. I want a real voice speaking in my ear, words I can physically hear whispering comforting things, or singing a lullaby to soothe me. That isn’t to say I don’t think, or believe, that God will get me through, it just means I have realized that I still want someone to hold my hand while God does whatever God is going to do.

I used to ask a question when I found myself in the midst of one of those storms. People have a tendency to come to me when they need a rainy day friend. But when I’d find myself alone on one of those rainy days, I would often find myself asking the empty air, “Where is my Elizabeth, when I need her?” One day, to my own startled shock, after once again yelling that question toward the ceiling, I heard a distinct, but very familiar voice in my head, say with a lot of affectionate laughter, “She’s sitting right here asking that very silly question, again.” I had to join in the laughter and that in turn, felt like a warm well-needed hug.

But there is something else that is just as important about this truth and reality. We all fight loneliness and the fear of being, or becoming, just another lonely individual. We struggle with it and allow ourselves to be bent by that fear. We stay in places and relationships to avoid what we fear most. we allow people to remain in our lives long after they have lost any resemblance to the definition of a friend. No matter how many people, pets, or diverse belief systems we embrace, there always comes that moment when we must confront the fact that we are essentially alone within our own skin. That is the moment we most need the best rainy day friend within our own being.

No, this doesn’t happen over night. Most things of enduring value don’t. It takes practice, commitment, and day to day work. But if you are willing to do some of the things I am suggesting, I can promise you that you will find the very best rainy day friend you can imagine or ever dream up. So, get on paper and start defining what a best friend really is, start letting yourself know what a rainy day person would look like to you. Then ask yourself what you need to do to make that happen, how and what you need to do to become your own best rainy day friend.

Carved In Stone

Funny how the things we know about ourselves, and are conscious of all the time, are the most difficult to put into written words. ___Stan

This quote was left as a comment on my last blog. And I agree with it whole heartedly. Just as it is somewhat easy to find definitions for a friend or an acquaintance, but becomes oh so difficult to find them for ourselves, finding words to define ourselves and then writing them down, is even more difficult to do. Why is it the hardest thing to do when, as Stan says, we know these things and are conscious of them all the time? I think there are many answers and even layers within those answers.

The first one that comes to mind is fear. As long as something is in my head, it belongs to me alone unless I choose to share it. As long as it is only in my head, It’s just that, in my head. But bringing it out transforms it. Makes it different. Doesn’t necessarily change its meaning (although it definitely can), but it certainly alters its value. Inside, it has no value to anyone but myself, because no one else knows it. But outside, because it is personal, it can be used against me. In the hands of another it can become a tool or weapon to control, use, abuse, or dominate me. But, we are speaking about just words here, right? Words have power. Sharing them means sharing the power as well.

Have you ever had your words thrown back at you? I have, and it can be a delightful compliment, even funny, but can also be extremely wounding depending on the tone of voice and the intent of the wielder of those words. In ancient times, there was a belief that when you gave your name to another, you entered into an obligatory relationship with that person. That meant that that individual could come to you and demand that you owed him something, simply because he knew your name. You were obliged to give what was asked for. You were expected to stand behind your name, because your name was a definition that went far beyond simple meaning. It told the world not just who, but what you were. That may have to do with why, in later centuries, it became a high level priority to keep ones good name, to protect the family name from any and all scandal or besmirchment.

That transformation of value is even more apparent when we write the words, not just speak them. Writing those words, gives them shape, form, substance. It makes them real. And therein, lies the problem of difficulty we are addressing. As long as the words are only in my head, I don’t need to do anything about them and the knowledge they impart. I don’t have to act on them. Speaking them brings them out in the open, but writing them makes them my responsibility. It isn’t an accident that we say we are committing something to paper. We are. We are committing ourselves, entering ourselves into an obligatory relationship with those words. And before this gets too heavy and I freeze someone in the act of doing so, this all occurs in our heads.

From the time we are young, we have a distinct relationship with words, whether they are spoken or written. We are actually encouraged to respect both forms of communication and we do, for the most part. However, within the socialization process we must all take part in, there are definite glitches. Remember those layers I spoke of earlier? This is one of them. Along with respect, we also learn fear. We know that although they are only words, they can and do harm us on occasion. If we have been told repeatedly that children should be quiet and not speak, we are doubly afraid to go one step further and write, put those words out there where someone might actually see them, and hold us accountable.

Each of us has unique experiences during the process of growing up. And each of us has specific fears about the words we wield. The spectrum runs from total silence to a raging shout. And we can do all of them on paper, as well. Just as in the process of learning to write, we are taught that how we do the thing is more important than what we have to say, along with how we speak, we also learn that it is important to be very careful about what we speak. And many of us are taught, by repeated admonitions, that there are whole worlds of things we should never speak about at all. It may be only intimated that dire consequences will ensue, but we definitely get the message.

When I was growing up, we got the message that we were never to speak about sex. That’s right, never. It was a taboo subject. Yet, each of us was also encouraged to find a specific mate, get married, and produce children. On my twenty-first birthday, a group of us went out to a bar which was featuring a female comedienne. She did an entire act about how, as a young girl growing up, at every turn her mother would whisper, “Don’t do it.” Half-way through the act, most of the crowd was joining in on the punch line and shouting, “Don’t do it.” Then on her wedding day, as the girl was about to depart with her new husband, her mother stands before her and yells, “Now, you can do it!” Do it? What is it? Major glitch, yes? I laughed all the way through her act. But, inside, I knew it was far too real to be all that funny.

In today’s world, we often hear the phrase, “Get it in writing.” We are actually acknowledging that there is far more power in the written word than in a spoken promise or agreement. But, just because words are written on paper, that doesn’t automatically mean they are now carved in stone. Paper can be easily burned, torn to shreds, packed away in an attic, or left completely blank. When we are writing them in a journal, we are exploring, making discoveries, experimenting with the words themselves. Yes, we are committing ourselves, but only to the exploration of possibilities. We are trying them on to see if they fit. Far better to do that in private, don’t you think?

Because we are exploring, we always have the freedom to change our minds. But, if we never get those words onto the paper, we may never see them clearly, or actually know exactly how they fit, and why or why not. They remain up in our heads and we never have to do anything about the ideas they speak of and to. We can stay within the boundaries of our own little comfort zones and stagnate. Or we can commit ourselves to the exploration of the words. Preversely, I believe that if we don’t, we are carving them in the stone hard ground of our minds, always accompanied by that devilish whisper of, “Don’t do it.”

Applying The Psychic Brakes

I had never heard of psychic brakes until I read Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way. In it, she talks about how we get a bit frightened when things begin to fall into place, move smoothly toward our chosen destination. It feels a bit out-of-control, so we apply the brakes to regain our own sense of being in control of our destinies. To slow down the process because we might make a mistake, mess up the whole ball of wax, screw it up somehow. And, of all imaginable horrors, possibly wreck the dream we have aimed ourselves at fulfilling. We also do that when we don’t believe we deserve to have that dream fulfilled, we aren’t adequate to the plan, can’t see ourselves actually standing triumphant in that place we have only harbored in our imaginations. What we do is sabotage ourselves, our dreams, our desires. We resist those things we want most to see happen, and we already know what resistance looks like (an underlined poor, fragile old woman).

Another definition for resistance is fear. Imagine, if you will, that you are driving along a curving country road, lined with huge oak trees. Its night, only your headlights to see where you are going, when suddenly you can no longer hear the swish of your tires against the pavement, all is silent. You are traveling on ice. You know that, you stiffen up every muscle, and the only desire you have is to slam on the brakes and stop the forward motion. You might start talking to yourself, telling yourself to relax, breathe, you do know what to do, you can pump the brakes gently to slow yourself down in increments, but the desire is strong to apply all those stiffened muscles to the task.

In this scenario, you know that if you slam on the brakes, you will more than likely put your vehicle and yourself into a deadly skid, sending yourself in an even more out of control trajectory, spinning helplessly, until something in your path (like one of those oak trees) stops the motion permanently. But even though we might know all of that in detail, the strongest urge is to slam on the brakes to gain control, to put a stop to the forward motion, but also to put a stop to that feeling of fear.

Gavin De Becker is the author of a very interesting book titled, The Gift of Fear. We don’t often think of fear as a gift, its an uncomfortable feeling, one that we’d rather not experience if we can avoid it. And we do avoid it. We do that by sticking with the familiar, the known of our world and experience. That is our comfort zone, the place that allows us to not experience those uncomfortable feelings like fear. Inside our comfort zone, we can move with some amount of ease because we know what to expect, and more importantly, we pretty much can be sure that what we encounter is something we can actually deal with, something that won’t challenge us to do, or be, what we are not, and don’t know how to do. That means we don’t have to worry about appearing inadequate, unknowing, silly, or foolish. We can relax, just be ourselves. But, what exactly is that?

Someone who doesn’t go anywhere, do much of anything, and certainly doesn’t challenge self to be anything more than a lump of inertia? A physical or mental couch potato? That is the danger of remaining too long within the confines of our well-established comfort zones. Inside of them, we can’t afford to grow or we risk no longer fitting right there in our comfortable little niche. And we also begin to fear anything that might move us outside of that niche. We become overtly limited, as well as limiting. Eventually, we not only stop growing, we literally stop living and begin to do no more than exist. Life becomes the same old, same old, mostly grey, because colors would call for a response and a response means an output of energy. What a deadly, life defying circle we create. All for the sake of feeling comfortable, all for the purpose of avoiding that uncomfortable feeling of fear.

What does any of this have to do with keeping a journal? Everything. Keeping a journal is picking up a pen, or sitting at a computer and making words. Making words is a difficult task because one must first think of the word one wants to write, and then follow it with another one, and so on and so on. And that is precisely what we are avoiding isn’t it, that challenge that will move us outside of our comfort zone? “Easy for you to say,” you think, “you are so full of words…” But, if you have been reading this blog, you know that even I can run away from the challenge.

Does that mean I fear making the words. No, I’m not afraid of the words, they are only random letters of the alphabet, put together in a certain order. Their order is what I fear, because I can hear them, understand what they are speaking of, and it is that which I fear. Remember, words have an uncanny magical power. That’s because they have both the ability of being spoken, but also of being heard. And they often change while in the air between those two different, but distinct, locations. Words can be changlings and they can transform both the speaker and the listener, even when those two individuals are the one and same person.

Just because I have some amount of ease with the making of words, doesn’t mean I don’t own and love my own comfort zone. I do, and am very territorial about said niche. But, I also want to grow, to continue to become the best human being it’s possible for me to be. I need the words, and have learned to live with the fear that making them entails. And because I do, I unwrapped that gift, and now know why I ran the other day, know exactly what prompted me to do so. Have asked myself the questions and found some surprising answers. Answers that allow me to not slam on the psychic brakes, put myself in a tail spin, and harm all those lovely old oak trees. What’s more, I did all of that while sitting right here in my only little niche, allowing my comfort zone to expand and accomadate this newer version of me.

9/11 A Loss of Innocence

This is my journal entry from earlier this morning:

Anniversary of 9/11 today. Just writing out those numbers brings back the memory of that morning, turning on the TV, and watching in stricken horror as that plane curved around and aimed itself at the tower and then hit it. How the film was replayed again and again until the majority of viewers were dealing with some form of shock or trauma as the images penetrated to an untold depth that still remains all of these years later. I remember sitting alone, tears rolling down my face, trying to comprehend what I was seeing, trying also to push away the reality at the same time. Not wanting to know that the world I knew had just been altered irrevocably.

Far too wounded to reach out to anyone, I sat there lost in reaction, for at least an hour. Tuning out the voices of the commentators, watching that looping film clip over and over again, finally knowing that the outcome wouldn’t change, and no one would say that it was a hoax of some sick Orson Welles wannabe. It was real, it was true, and I knew that nothing would ever be the same.

The Nation, of which I was a citizen, had lost it’s innocence, had entered into a grief process that would shake it to its core. We would slowly work our way through the stages of grief: denial, anger, blame, bargaining, and eventually a re-commitment to life. Would we ever truly heal or recover? And all those individuals, family members who must pick up the pieces of shattered lives, how would they fair? And the numbers just kept mounting.

The depth of my own personal reaction came days later, as I was driving down the highway, to run some errand. I looked out my windshield and saw a plane in the sky and immediately ducked my head and began to pull over to the side of the road in fear. Then remembered that I had heard that airplanes would once again be allowed to fly. Couldn’t help but wonder how many thousands of others had a similar response to that first glimpse of silver moving through blue, a common ordinary image that had now been changed, perhaps forever.

We have gone on, as we must. But a moment of silence, an allowance for memory to honor those who were lost, and those who experienced that loss, seems an absolute necessity this morning. Nothing else will do.

Didn’t have any idea about what I would write this morning, but it certainly wasn’t the above. Yet, as soon as I typed in those numbers, I was flung back in time to that first moment of awareness. My first response was to struggle against it, but then decided to go with whatever was going on. I did. And I’m glad that I did. Although a painful thing more times than not, a loss of innocence isn’t necessarily a bad thing. That is not to say that 9/11 wasn’t an absolutely devastating and horrible experience. It was, is, in untold ways that may still be occurring, in the dark silence of our inner workings. It certainly is doing that within my own person.

But innocence is ignorance, a lack of knowledge and experience. To consciously and deliberately give it up is one thing, to have it ripped away by unknown hands is quite another. Yet, the consequence to both is the same. A new form of knowing and understanding. With that new understanding of how the world really works, we are given the opportunity to either destroy or create a different world and environment. One that is either based in compassion born of worked through resolution, or hatred, and the corresponding actions that stem from one or the other.

Which one have you chosen?

 

The Unspeakable

Today, in my journal, I found myself writing about an ‘unspeakable’ pain I have carried around inside of me for almost ten years. Where do you go with something like that? Something so hurtful, that to unleash it, to open ones mouth and put it into words, is to unleash a torrent of pain and hurt that might have no end and therefore, no healing. What choice is there in that situation? To put it into words is to define it and all the tendrils of its reality and the effects that those realities have visited upon your person.

I think most of us, like I have done, just don’t go there. We don’t speak of it, refuse to think about it, lock it in a box, decorative or not, and place it on the highest, darkest shelf of our inner being. We completely silence it and ourselves. But, is that silence really silent? We may believe, because we must, that that funny little box is hermetically sealed, but it isn’t. The human psyche simply doesn’t operate that way. We may all have those moments when we wish that it did, but it doesn’t. Living organisms (anything that breathes) can not abide a vacuum in their midst. It must be opened and filled with more of self.

So, the tendrils escape, seek paths in the darkness and, I believe, seek light and the heat that is life. Places where they can continue to breathe, live, and ultimately grow to fruition. And just what are the fruits of such labor, in those darkened corners of existence? I found at least three of them in a single page this morning: hesitancy based in fear, distrust of someone I care about deeply, and feelings of both abandonment and betrayal. I guess that’s four, but I’m fairly certain that over the course of ten years, there are probably at least a few more.

So why did I even open this can of worms today? Because it was time, and more than that to do so. Each morning, before I write, I go back and read my last morning’s page/s. I had made a strange statement at the end of yesterday’s scratchings. It seemed to come out of nowhere, and sort of just dangled there at the end, like the physical members of a middle-aged male chorus line with beer guts and too much hair where it shouldn’t be and far too little where it should. It really was too highly visible to ignore.

Being who I am (never more apparent than in those morning escapes), I couldn’t move away without comment and once I started, I filled the entire page describing the incident upon which it had been based. And yes, I was definitely crying by the time I was finished. I was alone, no one saw the tears or need ever know they were present. No one knew, or even had to know what, if anything, had occasioned them. No one, but me. I had brought myself to awareness in five or six paragraphs. That isn’t something to sniff at, remember, all of this had been buried deeply for ten years. It certainly needed an airing, maybe even more so, a throwing over a clothes line and a good beating with a wire whisk.

That may all come tomorrow, or the next day, or maybe next month, or heaven forbid, even ten more years from now. These steps in awareness take time, to settle, be digested, and work their way through the system, in order to bring about the healing they are intended to produce. All I know, is that I have taken that first big huge step, and put into words what had been unspeakable. I have done my part, and whatever happens, will simply happen. But it will only happen at my choosing. That knowledge alone, is worth the few tears I shed.

Yesterday, I wrote here, that a regular writing regimen is the cheapest therapy known to humankind. Then had to face off with my own reality this morning and prove it to myself once again. Don’t you just love it when that happens? I do, because it is the one signal that tells me I am in the right place, doing the right thing. That pleases me, no end. Do you have that? Something that tells you that you are being the best that you can be in any given moment? Something that lets you understand that what you do is essential to further growth and your own personal evolvement? Perhaps a friend that you can invite for coffee and a little venting, a counselor or confessor, a place you can go and scream at the top of your lungs, or hug yourself when no one else is around to offer that?

The only problem with any, or all of those, is that they often can’t be spur of the moment things, immediate to and in the moment. Some of them can be expensive, while others might demand some deliberate preparation and planning. A journal never does. It’s always there, doesn’t get busy talking to another friend and leave you waiting, cooling your heels while the moment and its need disappears into other things, people, or activities. It’s there whenever you need it, want it, or can’t think of another way in which to turn the unspeakable into definitive words, that in turn, allow them to be worked through to resolution. And that is really good therapy.