a.k.a I am That
“Liminal Space is a term that applies to those uncertain times in our lives when we stand in the "threshold" between the "old" which may no longer work and the "new" which is not yet clear.” (http://liminalspace.typepad.com)
“Psychologists call \"liminal space,\" a place where boundaries dissolve a little and we stand there, on the threshold, getting ourselves ready to move across the limits of what we were into what we are to be.” (http://parole.aporee.org)
My friend has been using this term for the past couple of weeks. He was using it in a theatrical way— as a physical place between categorized places—for example, we were having a glorious happy hour, with oysters and clams and sparkling wine— and we had opted to sit by open windows that looked out onto the busy corner of 3rd avenue and 13th street, and so we were neither outside nor really all the way in. Liminal Space.
I had a packed box, but it was neither in my packing nook, nor in my to-be-shipped space, but rather under the table in our kitchen. So he says to me, is this permanent, or is it in liminal space?
Finally, as we had cocktails in 20s garb ( I wore a fabulously ridiculous hat, btw), I finally looked up liminal space on my bberry, and realized it had quite apropos psychological implications, and that I have been and am now exisiting in liminal space.
A place betwixt places, a space betwixt spaces. I am neither a resident of New York, nor an ex-resident. I do not yet attend Naropa, but I am considered a new student. I am neti-neti, not this [and] not this. I am neither here nor gone. Neither Buddhist nor Christian.
I am not who I was, nor who I will be.
I guess in some ways I have always existed in liminal space:
I have been neither white nor black.
Neither proper nor street.
Neither mother nor child.
Etc. etc. etc.
So I should be used to both the discomfort and the pleasure that comes from being nowhere and in two places at once. For holding the space that the people around me don’t even realize exists in this particular moment. But it must exist for here I am. Or maybe more accurately, I am that.
Friday, July 24, 2009
Saturday, July 18, 2009
ARE YOU EXCITED?
A question that everyone has been asking me for the past several months and one which is not answered easily. In May and June, the answer was no. No, I was not excited to leave my job that I had devoted myself whole-heartedly to for eight years. I was not excited to leave my students who I had grown as attached to as if they were a part of my own family and especially those who I questioned their progress towards graduating on time and felt still needed my particular presence and guidance. No, I was not excited to lose a monthly paycheck that I felt had just reached the threshold of adequate income. No, I was not excited to leave my network of close friendships and social gatherings. No, I was not excited to leave my boyfriend who I have been dating for the past 7 years and who is not coming to Boulder. So why do it then?
Because I was passionate about what I felt was a calling on my life. It was what spirit had instructed me to do. Because this “life” that I had built for myself was not enough. I was operating as a “wounded healer,” helping people but not as much as I could if I had training in recognizing and dealing with my own issues and being truly present and available to others. Because I was growing tired and bitter and fearful that I would never realize my true potential. Because I had come to realize that no one was coming to save me, no one could save me, no one would make me take responsibility for my life, for my happiness, for my intelligence, for my talent. I had become aware of my confusion, my divine insanity, that I was doing the same things over and over and expecting different results. I was plagued with a divine discontent. I was tired of talking the talk, but not walking the walk. Telling others to take risks in their lives, to face their fears, to find a way to fall in love with themselves and that all else would come. Yet in my own life, I was so deeply entrenched in my habitual patterns, I could barely breathe. I wanted a personal and spiritual transformation so badly but I was so lazy about it. Yes, my library of self-help and spiritual books was unparalleled, but what was I actually doing? I rarely went to church, I occasionally meditated, I prayed a lot, but mostly I writhed around in self-pity and self-absorption. I realized as Rilke says, “I must change my life.”
Aren’t you afraid? Isn’t it a big change? I am afraid, terrified, some days scared shitless. But I was afraid before. Fear is a part of life. One of my favorite spiritual teachers, Pema Chodron, spoke of a silent retreat where she was sure that one of the other participants hated her, but of course, there was nothing she could do about it, no conversation she could have. She said that the feelings she had around that experience were excruciatingly painful, that she tried all of the meditation techniques she had ever learned to try and work with her feelings, but to no avail. She couldn’t sleep so she just had to sit with those feelings all night and at one point she realized that she had spent her entire life, that her entire personality was built around not wanting to go to that very place, not wanting to feel those very emotions. My decision to do this comes from a similar place, I don’t want my entire life and my entire personality to be built around avoiding the things I am bound to face on this journey. I don’t want my life and personality to be built around running from the things I find most difficult: loneliness, alone-ness, fear, rejection, isolation, you can probably think of many more. I don’t want it to sound as if I expect no joy, or friendship, or love, or one of the most spectacular learning communities in the country, obviously, that will be part of the journey too. But for me, a large part of the decision was to confront myself face-to-face. Not just by moving across the country, but also in daily meditation practice and through the focus on meditation that the program is based on.
It is July now. AM I EXCITED? Day by day, my answer has grown into a quiet yes. Yes I am.
Because I was passionate about what I felt was a calling on my life. It was what spirit had instructed me to do. Because this “life” that I had built for myself was not enough. I was operating as a “wounded healer,” helping people but not as much as I could if I had training in recognizing and dealing with my own issues and being truly present and available to others. Because I was growing tired and bitter and fearful that I would never realize my true potential. Because I had come to realize that no one was coming to save me, no one could save me, no one would make me take responsibility for my life, for my happiness, for my intelligence, for my talent. I had become aware of my confusion, my divine insanity, that I was doing the same things over and over and expecting different results. I was plagued with a divine discontent. I was tired of talking the talk, but not walking the walk. Telling others to take risks in their lives, to face their fears, to find a way to fall in love with themselves and that all else would come. Yet in my own life, I was so deeply entrenched in my habitual patterns, I could barely breathe. I wanted a personal and spiritual transformation so badly but I was so lazy about it. Yes, my library of self-help and spiritual books was unparalleled, but what was I actually doing? I rarely went to church, I occasionally meditated, I prayed a lot, but mostly I writhed around in self-pity and self-absorption. I realized as Rilke says, “I must change my life.”
Aren’t you afraid? Isn’t it a big change? I am afraid, terrified, some days scared shitless. But I was afraid before. Fear is a part of life. One of my favorite spiritual teachers, Pema Chodron, spoke of a silent retreat where she was sure that one of the other participants hated her, but of course, there was nothing she could do about it, no conversation she could have. She said that the feelings she had around that experience were excruciatingly painful, that she tried all of the meditation techniques she had ever learned to try and work with her feelings, but to no avail. She couldn’t sleep so she just had to sit with those feelings all night and at one point she realized that she had spent her entire life, that her entire personality was built around not wanting to go to that very place, not wanting to feel those very emotions. My decision to do this comes from a similar place, I don’t want my entire life and my entire personality to be built around avoiding the things I am bound to face on this journey. I don’t want my life and personality to be built around running from the things I find most difficult: loneliness, alone-ness, fear, rejection, isolation, you can probably think of many more. I don’t want it to sound as if I expect no joy, or friendship, or love, or one of the most spectacular learning communities in the country, obviously, that will be part of the journey too. But for me, a large part of the decision was to confront myself face-to-face. Not just by moving across the country, but also in daily meditation practice and through the focus on meditation that the program is based on.
It is July now. AM I EXCITED? Day by day, my answer has grown into a quiet yes. Yes I am.
Saturday, July 11, 2009
Enlightenment is A Gamble
The journey- Step 1
Every journey must begin with a single step. Followed by another single step and then another. I guess my first steps began at least 4 or so years ago, when while working full-time being an academic counselor and teaching introductory college courses, I realized that though I loved parts of my job, there were parts I didn’t like. For example, having a boss. I have had some great bosses in my day, but I have always had a streak of insubordinance as well. May both God and my former employees forgive me for that. Anyway, I asked myself, as most career books tell you to, what part of my job do I love the most and would I do for free?
Suprisingly, it was not the teaching. I am, without a doubt, a teacher by nature, but not, at least at this point in my life, a real ‘professor.’ I don’t like the traditional lecture format of a typical college classroom. I am more interested in talking about how to make it through the day than I am in talking about literary theory or a specific short story. I like to talk about what lurks beneath the surface of what appears to be an ordinary life, about taking risks and non-conformity, about waking up. So I realized it was more the counseling aspect that got me. And I hadn’t been writing. Which I still tend to blame on time, though I know in my heart of hearts it is lack of discipline. Regardless, I began to try and plot a way that I could have a profession that would allow me to continue my calling as a ‘healer’ in some way— and by healer I mean someone who makes people feel less alone in the world— because to me, that is the most important healing one can do—and also a profession that might one day allow me blocks of time and energy to write.
I also wanted respect, so for the past 4 years or so, I took the undergraduate pre-requisites that would allow me to pursue a PhD. Then at the finish line when it was time for me to take the GREs and choose programs, after I had done research with faculty, etc., I came to the understanding that I didn’t really want to do research exclusively for the next 5-7 years. That I wanted training that would allow me to be a therapist and that it had to incorporate the spiritual because in the end, that connection to the divine is all that allows us to feel less alone in the world. I had happened upon Naropa years ago, but a friend of mine had talked to me about how expensive it was, and how unrealistic that made it. And it is expensive, and unrealistic, but I guess that depends on how you view money, and how you define reality.
People ask me how do you uproot your entire life and move it across country and the answer is, I don’t know. All of us come to points in our lives where we know it’s time. Time to start over, time to try something new, time to risk all that we are for the person we want to be. My time has come. Here is a poem by spiritual teacher, Adyashanti:
Enlightenment is a Gamble
Time to cash in your chips
put your ideas and beliefs on the table.
See who has the bigger hand
you or the Mystery that pervades you.
Time to scrape the mind's shit
off your shoes
undo the laces
that hold your prison together
and dangle your toes into emptiness.
Once you've put everything
on the table
once all of your currency is gone
and your pockets are full of air
all you've got left to gamble with
is yourself.
Go ahead, climb up onto the velvet top
of the highest stakes table.
Place yourself as the bet.
Look God in the eyes
and finally
for once in your life
lose.
Every journey must begin with a single step. Followed by another single step and then another. I guess my first steps began at least 4 or so years ago, when while working full-time being an academic counselor and teaching introductory college courses, I realized that though I loved parts of my job, there were parts I didn’t like. For example, having a boss. I have had some great bosses in my day, but I have always had a streak of insubordinance as well. May both God and my former employees forgive me for that. Anyway, I asked myself, as most career books tell you to, what part of my job do I love the most and would I do for free?
Suprisingly, it was not the teaching. I am, without a doubt, a teacher by nature, but not, at least at this point in my life, a real ‘professor.’ I don’t like the traditional lecture format of a typical college classroom. I am more interested in talking about how to make it through the day than I am in talking about literary theory or a specific short story. I like to talk about what lurks beneath the surface of what appears to be an ordinary life, about taking risks and non-conformity, about waking up. So I realized it was more the counseling aspect that got me. And I hadn’t been writing. Which I still tend to blame on time, though I know in my heart of hearts it is lack of discipline. Regardless, I began to try and plot a way that I could have a profession that would allow me to continue my calling as a ‘healer’ in some way— and by healer I mean someone who makes people feel less alone in the world— because to me, that is the most important healing one can do—and also a profession that might one day allow me blocks of time and energy to write.
I also wanted respect, so for the past 4 years or so, I took the undergraduate pre-requisites that would allow me to pursue a PhD. Then at the finish line when it was time for me to take the GREs and choose programs, after I had done research with faculty, etc., I came to the understanding that I didn’t really want to do research exclusively for the next 5-7 years. That I wanted training that would allow me to be a therapist and that it had to incorporate the spiritual because in the end, that connection to the divine is all that allows us to feel less alone in the world. I had happened upon Naropa years ago, but a friend of mine had talked to me about how expensive it was, and how unrealistic that made it. And it is expensive, and unrealistic, but I guess that depends on how you view money, and how you define reality.
People ask me how do you uproot your entire life and move it across country and the answer is, I don’t know. All of us come to points in our lives where we know it’s time. Time to start over, time to try something new, time to risk all that we are for the person we want to be. My time has come. Here is a poem by spiritual teacher, Adyashanti:
Enlightenment is a Gamble
Time to cash in your chips
put your ideas and beliefs on the table.
See who has the bigger hand
you or the Mystery that pervades you.
Time to scrape the mind's shit
off your shoes
undo the laces
that hold your prison together
and dangle your toes into emptiness.
Once you've put everything
on the table
once all of your currency is gone
and your pockets are full of air
all you've got left to gamble with
is yourself.
Go ahead, climb up onto the velvet top
of the highest stakes table.
Place yourself as the bet.
Look God in the eyes
and finally
for once in your life
lose.
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