mirror image

I had a strong dream a few nights ago.  So much so that the image has stayed with me day after day.

In the dream I am in the changing room of a large upscale department store.  I am getting ready for a date and when I've changed my clothes, put on some lipstick and tousled my hair, I look into the mirror.  I do not recognize myself.  I look like a Frida Kahlo self portrait except my mouth and lips are larger and more deep red, my eye brows do not touch and I have no facial hair.  The colors are so similar to an older portrait of Kahlo's, it is eery.

I try to remove some of the paint, but then my teeth show with no lips so I realize I can't rub it away.  When I look closely in the mirror I see hairline fractures, tiny cracks, on the surface.

The paint colors are bold and I have no subtleness or beauty.  I am rendered harshly and without care, love.

I remark to myself in the dream that the solid color of my skin is unnatural, there is no brown shade like that in nature.  None of it is real.   Bold stokes, flat lifeless colors, and unrealistic.

I am not sure why the dream's image bothers me so.   I find it ugly…grotesque and it disturbs me.

I had this dream 2 days before I left for a week long trip to my mother's for the holiday week.   It also come to me as I am reading a new Buddhist book and my thoughts are often in deep places trying to figure out what is what.  I had an idea the other day that I cannot use my mind to figure out my mind.  That stopped me thinking!  hahaha

I am at my mom's and very conscious of being grateful to her, my two sons and life.  It feels as though I am going through a shift, a change and all I can do is go for the ride.  Thinking of a river, I am floating along and seem to be coming upon rapids.  Somehow I know I'll be okay and yet, something also tells me that I won't be the same when all is done.

We'll see.

receiving

I went to my newest meditation group on Monday. It is only 5 miles away and living in rural VT, that's like saying it is right outside my front door.

I like it because the lights are very low with a candle in the middle of our circle.  There are about 8 of us, men and women.  A nice balanced group.

So now I attend Mondays and Thursdays.  The groups couldn't be more different and yet, I love them both.

After 40 min of meditation, we do a very brief walking meditation.  So, I did the slow walk thing and then sat back down on my cushion/stool thing, but rather than do my normal hands together posture, I opened them up, palms down and rested them on my knees.

My mind told me that that is not right.  "This is how meditation is done!"  I ignored the meditation commando in my mind and just sat.  I sat.  I breathed.  I let me hands remain open.

I have been thinking about that all week.  Why the shift?  I don't know.

At Thursday's meditation, I couldn't get comfortable.  I starting moving...then nothing felt right.  I was not being peaceful and I was aggravating myself.   (So much so, that 2 people down from me, the guy who kept swallowing loudly, but pissing me off too.)

What finally helped?  Opening my hands again, this time one holding the other as though I was waiting for it to be filled.  Hmm...

I am not an experienced receiver.  I am a professional giver.  I can caretake with the best of them.  My innate ability to sense people, that lovely highly developed intuitiveness of mine, well it never got a lot of practice in figuring out to stay still and open up.   It feels too vulnerable because what would I do if nothing came?  What if I just sat there with my hands open and no one filled them or even noticed?

This concept of emptiness has been rolling around in my mind like a marble stuck in a small toy.  Why do things need to be full?   Why don't I appreciate emptiness?  Those spaces in between.

I put 2 tiny empty bowls on a shelf in the living room.  Normally I would find something to full them up with but not this time.  They are empty.  I find that beautiful.

My experience of meditation has been similar.  I have been emptying out ideas, thoughts, beliefs that no longer are true for me.  I've been looking at my hard-wired core and asking simple questions, like, "Is that true?"  "Do I believe that anymore"  "Who told me that anyway?"  

We are changing all the time.  We see it in children most easily but all of us are changing.  It is easy to get stuck in old stories, beliefs, thoughts.

I am letting go of things that no longer serve a true and healthy purpose.  I am allowing them to die so they may recycle/transmute/whatever  into something else.  I am opening my hands to let go.

No more grasping, it doesn't make me stronger anyway.  I am fine without holding on.

Look!  I'm standing all on my own.   It's okay.  I'm okay.  How nice is that?

writing

I emailed this to a friend a week or so ago:

"I find a lot of people have long ago buried their passion, their bliss, their truth.  Now is the time to take it up again and have it be enough.

I, for one, am tired of waiting for permission.  I am misaligned because I don't remember who I am or what my bliss is.  It is my responsibility, to myself, to the universe really, to claim myself and run with it."

I seem to pouring out with words online of late.  I don't know what is going on but I am going with the flow.

It was really cold, bitter cold in these parts last night.  Oh, I remember cold now.  I woke up at 5am, put wood in the stove and made a cup of tea.   I sat in the darkened room with only a short string of white lights for illumination.  The sky slowing showing herself in contrast to the trees.  I stretched out on the couch, warm, dreamy and content.  I feel asleep.

When I woke up, I knew it was a running day.  I was up and dressed and out the door by 8:30.  It was a happy run.  I didn't have a lot of energy (even though I ate 1/3 of a banana) but I was joyful.  I must of broken out in a smile, grin or giggle a dozen or so times.

My favorite part of my run is the last 1/4 miles.  I am on a side street with trees and I think there is a slight decline in the road.  As I was running (gingerly still, the knee is far from 100%) I thought. "I am not running through space, reality and time, I am moving with everything.  The ocean swells, we do not say the swell is moving or cutting through the ocean"

Yes, these are the type of thoughts I have throughout the day, whether running or driving or washing dishes.  I am a thinker, dreamer, seeker...I am always wondering about deep things.  I am becoming less and less ashamed of this nature of mine.  I don't know a lot of people similar to me.  Perhaps that is why I never embraced it.  I wanted to fit in.

I am learning to fit in with nature, my nature, reality's nature, nature's nature.  I find I am more able to accept other people's nature too.

I have no one to fight or push.  There is nothing standing in the way of acceptance and fully embracing what is.   I am less moved by the rush of life. I am turning in, tuning in, to what feels natural for me at that moment.

I don't have to run, hide, or bargain.   Breathing, all is well.

On my run today I felt free and yet there was no me, just the running, the joy, and the peace in knowing it's other than we think.  Heaven is indeed spread upon the earth.  We are part of earth and she is us. Nowhere to go, no one to be, nothing to say.  Listen.  Ah, the beauty of home, everywhere.

food is food...aha!

I wrote this this morning. I reread it tonight and thought "Wow, did I write that?"  Here it is: (lots going on with me today)

I ran this morning!!!!!!!  I took it slow.  I woke up to 2 inches on snow here at 7am and my body/soul were itching to go run through it.  Ah nature, how serene and beautiful.

I had one of thos 'aha' moments this morning while enjoying tea by the woodstove.  The rest of the house was sleeping still.  It was this...

Food is not my mother  (love)
not my lover (comfort, fullness)
not my father  (stern, judgmental, punishing)
not my friend (connection)

It is food.  It is neutral.  What I bring to it, I make it.  When I hate myself it is a weapon to beat myself with.  When I am bored, it it a playmate.  When I feel empty, it fills me up so full I can't feel anymore.  When I am happy, I gift myself with it.

Yet...it is just food.  It goes in my mouth, gets digested (or not) and I poop and pee it out.  Those are the facts mam.

Funny eh, what I have projected on food?  What I have done to a neutral substance?

I have been fully enjoying my food, as per suggested in 'Yoga of Eating' book.  What a difference to be aware and awake while eating.  It is so simple.  Where have I been all these years?

I am coming home to myself.  I don't care to beat myself.  I don't care to judge myself.  I don't need constant watching.  I am not in prison.

I am me.  Just me.   A wave on the ocean on life.  In a form so I can reach and connect to others.  This wave is here for a limited time.  I see other waves, yet we are all ocean.   Rest in the womb of ocean/mother.   We are not just a wave...we are the ocean too.

May peace be upon you. 

Snowy Sunday Morn

(an email i sent to my brother)

Good morning,

I had time to sit by the wood stove and drink my tea.  I cried as I felt so at peace with myself and the world.  What more do I need?

These following thoughts about you came pouring through me...so I am sharing them:

Matt, You have more love inside you that you can imagine.  It is all squeezed into a tiny room.  You only need to turn the handle and open the door.
Yes, you are all the things you have done and said but you are also still the innocent child who wants his mother to love and protect him.  The boy who wants his father to be proud of him and show him how the world works.

Unleashing the love you hide and protect will help you forgive yourself.  Forgive yourself for hurting yourself, for ignoring yourself, for beating yourself up, for the yelling, the silence, the running away, the blaming everyone else, blaming the world.

Sitting with yourself, remembering your kindness and your tender heart, you can let your love fill you up.  You can love yourself like a mother loves their baby.  You can love yourself like a proud pappa as he holds his tiny son in his big arms.  You can love yourself like a brother, a sister, and a friend.  You are more than capable of this.  You have just forgotten that what you are so frantically searching for is already inside you.  You never lost it.  It nveer went anywhere, it cannot die.

That tiny grain of sand of love, that tiny light is to be found in you.

Ask for forgiveness from the universe and it is immediately given.  You do not have to push, pull, debate, and bargain with yourself.  Stop.  Breath.  Look.
You are nature, you cannot be separated.

You don't have to hid, run away, distract, exhaust yourself anymore.  You are not alone.  It is not possible.

Embrace the boy who loves his mother, father, sisters and brother.   You didn't do anything wrong.  You've been searching in the dark and have been confused, lost and bumping into things.

Make a list of all the things you have done or said that you no longer want to carry.   Read it aloud to the ocean or something. Then, let it go.  Burn it, bury it...let nature take care of it for you.

Let it go.   Start fresh. You have so much to give.  It is by helping others that we truly feel alive.  Why else are we all here if not to be ourselves and share that incredible beauty/talent/skill with others.

I see beautiful things in you Matt.  Forgive yourself, embrace yourself and live for the love of a child.  That child is you.

Love, Patty  xo

Saturday pumpkin

I had a craving for pumpkin so off I went to the store to buy organic pumpkin in a can.  I stirred in ginger, nutmeg, cinnamon, cloves, eggs, organic cream and maple syrup.  I cooked it on the stove.

YUM.

On my second bowl, I realized I was feeding myself babyhood.  ha!  I needed it.

Yesterday was my first day feeling like ME again.  I am still shocked at how hard my ass was kicked from the surgery.  I did not see that coming.  I was THAT tired.  My body was THAT tired.

Today the bandages came off and it was not as bad as I had feared.  It's about an inch and a half long and still has healing to do.  I still get zingers of pain here and there but it is getting better.

I woke up last Monday morning and cried most of the morning.  I don't know why.  It was too big to put into words so all I could do was cry.  I cried walking into the bathroom, brushng my teeth, making my bed, getting dressed.  I was upset, sad, and depleted of energy.

I walked outside and went right up to my former husband and said, "I can't live like this anymore,"  and then I said some other things-while crying-that I can't remember.  There was something about asking him why he is so mad all the time and another thing about the boys being upset.

The end result was that he agreed to move back into the addition so I can move back into the main house,   EUREKA!

How that happened, I do not know.  It was not my intention.  I just couldn't stand the tension in the house anymore.  It was filled with silent angst.  The family was fragmented.

I was so grateful that I hugged him and thanked him several times.  He seemed shocked.

Since Monday, I have been content.  It took me 5 days to put all my stuff away and fix up the kitchen, living room, sunroom and bathroom but I did it.

I am happy to cook in my kitchen.  I am happy to be home.  I know this is not forever but for now it is bliss, plain and simple.

He is not paying for me at all and I have money for another 2 weeks but somehow, someway, this will work out.  I have faith.  Faith in life.  Faith in people.  Faith in myself.

Life is good.   May it also be with everyone else too.