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Archive for the ‘inspiration’ Category

Unravelling – The Story of the Mind

Posted in Healing, inspiration, Meditation, Yoga, tagged , , , , , , , on May 29, 2013 | 1 Comment »

cherry-mirror

 

As a single footstep will not make a path on the earth, so a single thought will not make a pathway in the mind. To make a deep physical path, we walk again and again. To make a deep mental path, we must think over and over the kind of thoughts we wish to dominate our lives. – Henry David Thoreau

I have had the beautiful privilege of having relationships with my grandparents well into adulthood.  My grandmother and I have known one another for 42 years, longer than so many relationships these days.  It is an awesome experience to move beyond the ignorance of youth and into a space where I can learn about my grandmother as a person, as a woman who has experienced many things.  It also means my mind has had more time to create troublemaking bullshit.

We are a rough, proud people with an independent streak that runs deep and wide, so the reality that age eventually brings with it fragility and a need for relocation and added support, comes as quite a surprise to a mind such as mine that prefers to live in denial around such things.  My mantra over the years has been that the only way I want to see my grandmother leave her house is in a box.  Not that I wished for my grandmother’s death, oh no.  On the contrary, I prayed over and over again that she be able to stay in that house until her last breath, and I convinced myself that it was what she wanted as well.

Imagine my shock when things began to play out in another way.  My grandmother, who has been on the waiting list for a retirement home for a number of years, finally got the call that a unit has become available.  And she accepted.  My grandmother will be leaving her house, but not in the way my mind had created, not in a box, but of her own free will!

Have you ever tried to take away a cherished toy from a young child?  It’s bedlam.  There are loud animalistic noises that sound like someone is being killed, and an obsessive, desperate grabbing, grabbing, grabbing for the one thing that is, “MINE!  MINE!  MINE!”  It’s very much like this in the mind as well when you try to take away the long-held story.

Quite simply, I freaked.  My mind was a roaring shitstorm running around from corner to corner screaming, “NO!  MINE MINE MINE!  MY NANNY!  MY HOUSE!  MY NANNY IN HOUSE!  MY NUMBER 27!  MY KITCHEN!  MIIIIIIIIINE!”  Oh my lord, it has been painful.  And ridiculous.

The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali speak of three types of mental afflictions that ultimately cause human suffering:  clinging, pulling away and denial. I have been suffering from all three as I hang on to a false story like a life preserver, pulling away from any possibility other than my false story, and shoving my head deep in the sand in order to avoid facing the situation altogether.

Running from reality is like trying to outrun your conjoined twin.  You can twist your head in the opposite direction all you want but that doesn’t change the fact that your twin, reality, is completely connected to you.  Best to stop, breathe, look and learn to live with this thing, right?  So, I stopped.  Stopping was hard, I won’t lie, but I did it.  I stopped and took this hysterical part of me to the yoga mat, to the garden, to the meditation cushion.  We spent a lot of time together.  There was a good deal of gut-wrenching crying that had me looking like this:

Bags_Under_Eyes_Secret_of_the_Puffy_Peepers-231x300It wasn’t pretty but, even though I could not see clearly from my physical eyes (due to unsightly swelling, of course  :) ), I could suddenly see from the eyes of my heart.  I could see that my grandmother was old, fragile, afraid and in need of help.  I could see she was ready and able to let go of the house in order to build a home somewhere else.  I could see her need for companionship and community, something she could no longer access at her current location.  I could see my grandmother having the strength to let go, to be free and to move on.  How incredibly selfish of me to ask her to stay, suffering deeply, for the sake of my mind’s story and my emotional comfort!  Suddenly the pathway of the mind shifted from “My grandmother is going to ‘the home’ to die,” to the new pathway of “My grandmother is going to this new place to LIVE!”  And with this shift has come a profound and solid peace.

My one teacher taught, “The mind is the cause of the problem.  The mind is the solution to the problem.”  No kidding!

If you have found yourself walking through your life disgruntled by some aspect or another, might I suggest you simply crack a bit of time in your world to sit with that feeling?  Just a few moments–in the car, in the bathtub, in the garden…Nothing laboured.  Not a project.  Not in an effort to change or fix things.  Just some soft, gentle time with the feelings, time to help you begin to familiarize yourself with the tapestry your mind has been weaving.  Often, all that’s really required to make a profound shift is this time.  It’s like walking into a dark room and turning on the lights; things automatically look different.

May you have the courage to stop, to stay, and to see.  May your afflictions, the things that cause you such great pain, simply drop away on the breath, with ease.  May your heart know space.  May your life be filled with love.

My Nan and me almost 7 years ago on her 80th birthday

My Nan and me almost 7 years ago on her 80th birthday

All my love,

Tabitha

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Slay the Dragon, or at Least Feed Him Some Pie

Posted in Healing, inspiration, tagged , , , , , on May 1, 2013 | 2 Comments »

Dragon-91

I had this dream, as a child, that my Grandfather and I were being chased by a fire-breathing dragon around the nursery school I attended.  We were running for our lives through the labyrinthine hallways, narrowly escaping the monster.  With the shadow of the beast reflecting off every wall at every turn, I could hear my Grandfather’s laboured breathing and I knew, in the end, we wouldn’t make it–the monster would win.

As an adult, this is how I’ve led my life, running from one dragon or another, only now the dragon has shifted from the green, scaly beast to invisible entities with names like Shame, Rage, Fear, and Love.  Any “large scale” emotion gets my feet feeling like hot potatoes and, before I know it, I’ve busted out along the road, running and wheezing, although not really sure why.

This past week delivered me to the shores of the poisonous lake of Shame.  Shame of my body.  Shame of womanhood.  Shame of aging.  Shame of sexuality and relationships and body hair and simple everyday thoughts.  Whatever it was that was going on in my life, it seemed to be coated in the corrosive slime of Shame.  I knew it was there, I could feel it in my body:

- rapid pulse

- shallow and quick breathing

- a sense of constriction in my chest

- interrupted sleep

- reduced appetite

- feeling a need to wretch

(Do you know any of these?)

And my mind followed after my body, becoming cloudy, with thoughts trying to move through a thick, pudding-like fog.

Shame.  Although it could have been Fear or Love or anything.

What do you do when you get triggered by large emotions?  Me, like I said, I run.  I run like crazy and I run in all sorts of different ways.  I become obsessed…with ANYTHING.  I feel the need to keep doing, and what I do tends to push my body to an unhealthy edge. I push too hard in the garden.  I push too hard in exercise. I feel it’s utterly necessary to dance, and then I push too hard once again.  I simply push too hard…in my relationships, in my body, in my mind.  All of this in the simple attempt to outrun the beast, the thing I don’t want to face, the thing I am convinced will kill me if I stop for even a moment to look around.

A person cannot run forever.  I, for one, am super tired.  Yesterday, as I was beginning to lose steam and was starting to think, “This thing is going to catch up with me.  I’m doomed,” a new thought entered my mind, “What if I just…stop?”  What would happen if I just stopped running?  If I know, in the long run, I cannot sustain avoidance, that avoidance will ultimately kill any joy and vitality in my life, what’s the risk in stopping?  If I don’t, I will lose everything anyway.

Many schools of martial arts teach that, instead of engaging in a conflicted relationship with an opponent by pulling away, soften the interaction, make connection by stepping towards the threat and into the situation.  Channel the energy inwards. Yesterday my friend emailed me this gem, “Shame only says these things because it fears that you will figure out how truly awesome you are and leave it behind for good.”  Something about that broke my heart.  Nothing likes to be abandoned.  Why, then, do I abandon that part of me, the dragon, that clearly wants to make contact, that is asking for something from me, that is asking for my time and my love?  Why not move inwards and make a connection with the thing I fear the most?

So I stopped.  I put on the brakes and fixed myself to the spot.  And the dragon stopped with me.  Soon I will drum up the courage to turn around, to sit down, and to observe this thing that chases me.  I will give it my time and my attention. Eventually, I hope to approach the beast (perhaps with a yummy slice of pie) and to give it a hug.  This is the woundedness in me that begs to be touched, to be comforted, to be heard, to be healed and there is no one in the world but me who can do this.  And there’s no one is the world who does not have this woundedness within them–we all have it; no one is alone in this experience.

I think we’re given these big emotions as tools to break open our hearts.  How can we shame someone else when we know the crippling pain of shame ourselves?  How can we actively threaten the safety of another when we know abject terror?  How can we not extend love freely when we’ve fully taken love into our own hearts?

So the next time you get the sense that you’re freaking out, that you’re running away from something that is making you uncomfortable, take out this tiny little note that I’ve sent along to you and with you:  This may be the tool, the opportunity you’ve been waiting for.  Stop, breathe, look, love…and offer it pie.

Maybe we’ll both get the chance to see that the dragon just isn’t all that scary.

cutedragon

If you catch sight of me the next time you’re running, screaming, down that road, stop and come grab a seat beside me.  We’ll breathe together.  Maybe we’ll do lunch.  Just know I will be there, that I have been there, and will, no doubt, wind up there again. This learning is forever.  ;)

May we be happy.

May we not suffer.

May we know peace.

All my love and blessings,

Tabitha

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Finding Centre–Standing on One Foot

Posted in Healing, inspiration, Yoga, tagged , , , , , , , on April 24, 2013 | 2 Comments »

manFallingOverSculpture

 

Standing yoga balances–the art of standing on one foot–are known to increase concentration, to strengthen the legs, knees, ankles and feet, to calm the nervous system, and to increase mental focus.  That’s what they’re known for but the reality, as I consistently witness in my classes, can often look like something else.  Nothing seems to get the majority of my students more riled up than standing balance poses.  This is where I most often witness anger, frustration, despair, and “giving up” as bodies teeter, with feet and legs working hard to keep an upright, balanced position.  This is where my students are more likely drop out of practice after only a few short moments by leaving the body and entering the realm of speech.  Instead of doing the pose and experiencing the challenge in the body, they will turn to me and exclaim in wonder at how hard it is, at how they simply can’t do it and don’t understand why; in short, they will run away.  And this is where it all gets interesting.

We humans hate like hell to feel off-kilter.  We don’t like to feel wobbly.  We don’t like to feel out of control.  We don’t like to feel vulnerable, especially when other people are around to witness our struggle.  So why, then, would we take a standing balance pose and purposely put ourselves in a position where we are constantly at risk of falling over?  For precisely the reasons we resist:  to feel wobbly; to feel out of control; to feel vulnerable, especially when other people are around to witness our struggle.  We take these stances and challenge our comfort zones in a contained way so we can learn more about ourselves, so we can understand our chronic responses to feelings we often label as “less than desirable”.  In trying to stand on one foot in a yoga class, we may discover that we get right pissed off when we lose balance and fall over, and this leads to us wanting to give up.  Or we may find out that when we feel vulnerable, we begin to talk…A LOT; we try to escape the feelings in the body by moving into distracting speech.

All of this acts as a signpost to how we behave out in the world.  Life is an endless stream of events that work to throw us off balance.  How many times have you had your day set with all the tasks perfectly spread out and timed, and then the curve ball came crashing in–your car has a flat tire, you get an emergency call about a family member, you wind up in bumper-to-bumper traffic getting nowhere fast?  Disorienting, isn’t it?  Can you come back to balance when things have thrown you for a loop?  Can you maintain your composure and stay calm?  Can you allow your mind and breath to settle before deciding on how to proceed?  Can you take a few breaths?  Maybe.  Maybe not.

I always hear the voices of my teachers when offering standing balances to my students:  Teacher One:  ”It’s not about whether you will fall out of balance, it’s about what you do when you get there.”  (Will you try again?)  Teacher 2:  ”Ah, not today.”  (Some days it’s just not working.  Some days you need simply to stand still…on both feet.)

Trying to find centre in the midst of the chaos that can erupt when thrown off kilter is an amazing way to break your heart open and to find compassion, both for yourself and for all the others out there who are working to do the same.  So the next time you fall over (and you will), whether it be physically or otherwise (like when you lose your composure and your temper), instead of scolding yourself for failing somehow, offer yourself compassion for your humanity; say to yourself, “Ah, not today.  Today, in this moment, I cannot achieve balance,” and take 3 deep breaths.  See how that one simple thing can change your life.

And when you’re out in the world and you witness someone else losing her balance in some fashion, feel your heart open up.  If you can, offer assistance.  If you can’t offer assistance, perhaps offer compassion in the same way you did for yourself:  ”Ah, not today.  Today, in this moment, she cannot achieve balance,” and take 3 deep breaths for her.  And if even that feels like a stretch, because sometimes people, in their loss of balance, can act in ways we just cannot understand or soften towards, just breathe and see how that one simple thing can change the world.

I’ll be seeing you, face-planted, on the mat and on the mat of life.  Maybe, when we lock eyes, we can smile at one another; we won’t be alone.

 

Until then, much love and many blessings,

Tabitha

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