So the set-point theory basically states that we inherit our capacity for happiness and that external circumstances (such as whether or not you are objectively attractive, material success & other life events ) do not hold much weight. If you grew up with frowning parents, that’s bad news. BUT the NEW SHIT is that this set point only amounts for 50%, external events for 10%, and the other 40% we actually have some say about (at least according to Sonja Lyubomirsky, University of California-Riverside professor of psychology, who has studied happiness for the past 18 years and has written a book about it which I will surely check out at some point on my journey). If you still have doubts about set-point theory or the ability to change it or what have you—go on and google (or wait until I have the time to post book lists, video lists, blogs, etc).
I have heard enough through my studies at Naropa, and in the underground community of rebels like myself who are on the quest, not to mention personal life experience as a seeker to believe that up until this stage on my journey, I have been swimming at a certain level of happiness and dissatisfaction. And, it is only because I have felt a slight movement towards greater happiness—a new baseline, that I find this endeavor at all worthwhile.
Based on the research, it seems not only do I need to discover happiness (which hopefully is really just lurking sleepily behind my ribcage or an eyelid) for myself, but I have to for my children and their children and maybe one day in the future the babies birthed along my bloodline will be born happy (Viva le resistance)!!!
Now people, such as SL, have studied what we should do to increase our happiness and I will dibble and dabble in what most strikes me and report back. I think the first thing I admonish is to become more attuned to your inner wisdom-intuition-God voice- higher self. You have to be able to trust yourself and be honest with yourself to undertake such a quest. Ask yourself as Rumi asks, “do you pay regular visits to yourself ?” If you don’t, start today: write a bit daily in a journal, or take a walk, or close the door, or whatever it takes to start a conversation with yourself. There are no wrong ways to do it. But one thing we must begin to ask ourselves is “what do I want?” More on that next.
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
Monday, May 30, 2011
From here to there: the NEW SHIT!
Two years and more than half of another master’s degree later, I am at what feels like an existential crossroads or should I say that I am wondering again, really, if happiness is possible. I think this question emerges again and again throughout one’s life. I came here (to Naropa University in Boulder CO) in search of happiness. After 10 years “living the dream” in New York (fancy writing degree, great friends, super handsome and sweet boyfriend, trendy apartment in a trendy neighborhood, teaching writing, champagne for breakfast and whiskey for dessert), I wasn’t fulfilled.
For the past two years, I have gone through a subtle yet powerful shift in worldview that has certainly increased my capacity for happiness. I can recognize my thoughts as thoughts and I am less likely to identify with them (I no longer think my thoughts and feelings = who I am). I can watch how my thoughts become stories which lead to reactions which can cause me and others suffering, and sometimes I can interrupt the chain reaction. I have a greater capacity for compassion. I can sit with greater levels of discomfort. I think that at the bottom of my recurrent sense of dissatisfaction is a) a tendency to focus on the past or the future, rather than the present and b) a deeply conditioned belief that there is an “I”—a belief in the illusion that “I” have to protect “me” or make “me happy.” Two years of Contemplative education and countless hours of meditating has begun to weaken the links of my Western “me, mine” conditioning. But I still don’t feel joyful.
I still am curious about how to raise my happiness set-point.
There is a bunch of research out there (which I will discuss in the next blog) that says that we have a happiness set-point that we’ve inherited or subconsciously settled upon—it’s our baseline. And if we don’t fiddle with it, it will stay where it is, regardless of if we win the lottery or if our lover dies. We will return to this basic place. I believed I have moved my happiness set point an inch or two, but I do think I can cultivate a higher baseline. And there is bunch of research and advice on what we should do in order to raise our setpoint (which I will also talk about). But I want to know and feel it for myself. I think that perhaps this quest for happiness depends on wise discrimination-- knowing what to cultivate and what to refrain from. I guess the question is, what really makes a difference? We get so much advice on how to be happy and what really matters: it’s what we eat, how we look, how we feel, what we’re repressing, whether or not we pray, whether it’s yoga or pilates, how much we meditate what form of meditation we do, etc etc etc. I have some ideas of my own about what I need to be doing in order to find daily enjoyment in my life and I plan to document the journey. Stay tuned.
For the past two years, I have gone through a subtle yet powerful shift in worldview that has certainly increased my capacity for happiness. I can recognize my thoughts as thoughts and I am less likely to identify with them (I no longer think my thoughts and feelings = who I am). I can watch how my thoughts become stories which lead to reactions which can cause me and others suffering, and sometimes I can interrupt the chain reaction. I have a greater capacity for compassion. I can sit with greater levels of discomfort. I think that at the bottom of my recurrent sense of dissatisfaction is a) a tendency to focus on the past or the future, rather than the present and b) a deeply conditioned belief that there is an “I”—a belief in the illusion that “I” have to protect “me” or make “me happy.” Two years of Contemplative education and countless hours of meditating has begun to weaken the links of my Western “me, mine” conditioning. But I still don’t feel joyful.
I still am curious about how to raise my happiness set-point.
There is a bunch of research out there (which I will discuss in the next blog) that says that we have a happiness set-point that we’ve inherited or subconsciously settled upon—it’s our baseline. And if we don’t fiddle with it, it will stay where it is, regardless of if we win the lottery or if our lover dies. We will return to this basic place. I believed I have moved my happiness set point an inch or two, but I do think I can cultivate a higher baseline. And there is bunch of research and advice on what we should do in order to raise our setpoint (which I will also talk about). But I want to know and feel it for myself. I think that perhaps this quest for happiness depends on wise discrimination-- knowing what to cultivate and what to refrain from. I guess the question is, what really makes a difference? We get so much advice on how to be happy and what really matters: it’s what we eat, how we look, how we feel, what we’re repressing, whether or not we pray, whether it’s yoga or pilates, how much we meditate what form of meditation we do, etc etc etc. I have some ideas of my own about what I need to be doing in order to find daily enjoyment in my life and I plan to document the journey. Stay tuned.
Monday, November 23, 2009
Poem
I wrote this poem last week as a gift to my classmates in a class called community. Note: it is not about a specific person, but rather how all of paradoxically love and fear being loved.
This is not a love poem
This is not a love poem because you don’t believe in love
This is not a love poem
because I know you don’t want to be loved
At least, not by me
because I am not afraid to look into your eyes
If this were a love poem
Then love would be pouring out like holy water
from my mouth
Kissing your third eye
like a cross marked on your forehead
as you come to kneel
in the chapel of this poem
If this were a love poem
then it would feel like
invasion, it would feel
like when your mother would wake you
From sleep
after a long roadtrip in the car
If this were a love poem
maybe it would feel
like you first felt
When someone finally kissed you the way you longed to be kissed
and meant it
Maybe it would make you melt
Like the first time you ever went camping
and sat around the fire singing
your longing
and getting what you longed for
like smores Yes
like melting marshmellows and chocolate on graham crackers
in the middle of a long long winter
See
this is not a love poem
but if it were then you would know
How it felt for someone divine in their humanity
and busy as all hell
To take the time to learn
how to touch you exactly where and when and how
You long to be touched.
See if this were a love poem
then right now
It would be ringing and ringing and ring defiant
in its insistence
That you answer the fucking phone
If this were a love poem then for some it would sting
Like the back-handed smack of some god
across your face
demanding that you wake
Up and listen
And you in your insolent anger would turn your back
On her
because somewhere inside
you are so afraid that eventually
she will see you
As you really are
And stop
Loving you
But this is not a love poem so
you don’t have to worry about that No you don’t have to worry
about this poem reaching for you
In the dark of its loneliness
Or calling you by the name only your lovers know
Or putting its palm on your forehead when you don’t feel well
or making you chicken soup
Or trying to learn salsa to keep up with your footsteps
Or trying to carry you when you are too heavy for the world’s sidewalks
Or drawing you a map when you are lost
You don’t have to worry about any of that
Because this is not a love poem
But if this were a love poem
Then maybe here
When I only have a minute left
I would say to you:
Come. Come closer.
Here I can see the bruises
That love has left on your heart
The way in which you
Pull in
and away
and far from my reach
The reasons you are so afraid of me
Of this poem.
Of love.
Fret not. I will not pull you close. I promise.
But here is what I will do:
I will hold your heart in the palm of my hands.
I will not let anything that harms you harm you.
I will keep all things you find sacred sacred.
But this is just a poem.
All it can really do is confess:
I love you.
This is not a love poem
This is not a love poem because you don’t believe in love
This is not a love poem
because I know you don’t want to be loved
At least, not by me
because I am not afraid to look into your eyes
If this were a love poem
Then love would be pouring out like holy water
from my mouth
Kissing your third eye
like a cross marked on your forehead
as you come to kneel
in the chapel of this poem
If this were a love poem
then it would feel like
invasion, it would feel
like when your mother would wake you
From sleep
after a long roadtrip in the car
If this were a love poem
maybe it would feel
like you first felt
When someone finally kissed you the way you longed to be kissed
and meant it
Maybe it would make you melt
Like the first time you ever went camping
and sat around the fire singing
your longing
and getting what you longed for
like smores Yes
like melting marshmellows and chocolate on graham crackers
in the middle of a long long winter
See
this is not a love poem
but if it were then you would know
How it felt for someone divine in their humanity
and busy as all hell
To take the time to learn
how to touch you exactly where and when and how
You long to be touched.
See if this were a love poem
then right now
It would be ringing and ringing and ring defiant
in its insistence
That you answer the fucking phone
If this were a love poem then for some it would sting
Like the back-handed smack of some god
across your face
demanding that you wake
Up and listen
And you in your insolent anger would turn your back
On her
because somewhere inside
you are so afraid that eventually
she will see you
As you really are
And stop
Loving you
But this is not a love poem so
you don’t have to worry about that No you don’t have to worry
about this poem reaching for you
In the dark of its loneliness
Or calling you by the name only your lovers know
Or putting its palm on your forehead when you don’t feel well
or making you chicken soup
Or trying to learn salsa to keep up with your footsteps
Or trying to carry you when you are too heavy for the world’s sidewalks
Or drawing you a map when you are lost
You don’t have to worry about any of that
Because this is not a love poem
But if this were a love poem
Then maybe here
When I only have a minute left
I would say to you:
Come. Come closer.
Here I can see the bruises
That love has left on your heart
The way in which you
Pull in
and away
and far from my reach
The reasons you are so afraid of me
Of this poem.
Of love.
Fret not. I will not pull you close. I promise.
But here is what I will do:
I will hold your heart in the palm of my hands.
I will not let anything that harms you harm you.
I will keep all things you find sacred sacred.
But this is just a poem.
All it can really do is confess:
I love you.
Friday, October 23, 2009
transition to surrender
So much has happened in my life over the past couple of months that when I would think of blogging, it felt overwhelming. So it's a cop out a bit, but I have copied part of a paper that I just had to hand in for my class on "transition." It is a bit heady and out of context, so perhaps it won't make a lot of sense. But feel free to read it and take from it what you can. I promise my future post will be more down to earth.
"If I do what I really must, it will kill me; and yet if I don’t, I’ll die."
- James Hillman
My mother, sister, and boyfriend flew with me out to Colorado, helped me to furnish my apartment and then left. I was utterly alone in transitional space. I began what Bridges (1980) describes as ““the perilous passage across the ‘nowhere’ that separates the old life…from the new” (p. 14), and what Winnicott (1982) defines as “an intermediate state between a [person’s] inability and his growing ability to recognize and accept reality” (p. 3). At first, I did not mind this transitional space. It felt as if I were watching a film of my life. I mentioned this to a classmate and wondered aloud when would this transition feel real? She said it would feel real when I experienced pain. And as the life before Naropa made its gradual departure, the pain came. My boyfriend began to emotionally withdraw. He rarely called, he did not email. I met classmates, but when the events of the day were over, we all retreated to our separate caves. I had never been alone in this way in my entire life. I was deeply entrenched in what Hillman (1996) calls “the spirit of loneliness”. It felt as if “all the networking that [had] interlaced [my] extension into the world…seem[ed] to count for nothing.” I was “exiled” (Hillman, 1996, p. 54).
It was the terror of being born. I recognized the terror as a signpost of an I AM moment (Tuber, 2008), the moment when one comes to realize one is separate from the mother/other, and consequently, feels “infinitely exposed…timelessly vulnerable”(Winnicott as cited in Tuber, 2008). I needed holding and I needed it fast. I reached out to my classmates, I started vocal lessons, I reached out to my therapist from New York, and I started my daily meditation practice. These interactions became a good-enough mother’s arms. In particular, my meditation practice became a mindful attempt to create mini-I AM moments wherein I could practice tolerating the interplay between being alone and being held. I began to view meditation as a practice of re-mothering myself and becoming my own reliable “other,” thereby testing and strengthening the solidity of my True Self (Tuber, 2008). I recognized that perhaps if I could “pass” the test of being there for myself, if I could hold myself enough to realize that time and space are in fact tolerable and that I would not “fall forever,” then perhaps one day I could develop “a capacity to feel life as play” (Tuber, 2008, p. 121). This recognition did not assuage the day-to-day fear, anxiety, and what felt like intolerable loneliness. I found myself holding another paradox.
Levoy (1997) articulates the nature of my paradox clearly: “a calling…flings opposing energies into our lives: One part of us wants to awaken, another to sleep. One part of us wants to follow, another wants to run like hell” (p. 53). I was plagued with doubt. What had I done? Why had I exchanged a perfectly respectable comfortable life for chaos and uncertainty? This doubt was only intensified by the final dissolution of my relationship with my boyfriend. This man was the center of life as I understood it. Even though differences in values, communication styles, and emotional needs had reared their ugly heads time and again, we had built a life together and only a mad woman would destroy what she had built with her own hands. My life felt like it was spinning out of control. I felt utterly unable to wait for the mother/other (my new life), or to tolerate its delayed emergence (Tuber, 2008). According to Winnicott (1982), however, “this sense of loss itself [became] a way of integrating [my] self’s experience” (p. 120). Through the intensity of my grief and my struggle with the idea that “all I…got is what I have not got” (Winnicott, 1982, p. 24), I began to accept the “is-ness” of my experience. The speed with which the ground beneath me had disappeared, the excruciating pain of losing one of the most important relationships of my life, and the refusal of life to stand still long enough for me to hold it with both hands became “the unstoppable bullet hit[ting] the impenetrable wall” of my undeniable thirst to awaken. I recognized that if I could “[witness] their collision in full consciousness…juggl[e] them both… [I could] reconcile [myself]… make [myself] enormously resilient” (Levoy, 1997, p 56.)
I am not yet done cycling through the stages of my grief, but I surrender. I offer myself to this “divine progression” (Levoy, 1997, p. 56). I give the daimon (a personification of my purpose in life) permission to have her way. I make of myself the ultimate sacrifice required to follow my calling. Levoy (1997) believes “if we can let go of the trapeze platform and make our necessary surrenders, we may be liberated, but if, while still suspended in empty air, we can say thank you, we’re damn near enlightened” (p 283). I look in the mirror and see the daimon’s eyes looking back at me. We mouth the words in unison: "thank you."
"If I do what I really must, it will kill me; and yet if I don’t, I’ll die."
- James Hillman
My mother, sister, and boyfriend flew with me out to Colorado, helped me to furnish my apartment and then left. I was utterly alone in transitional space. I began what Bridges (1980) describes as ““the perilous passage across the ‘nowhere’ that separates the old life…from the new” (p. 14), and what Winnicott (1982) defines as “an intermediate state between a [person’s] inability and his growing ability to recognize and accept reality” (p. 3). At first, I did not mind this transitional space. It felt as if I were watching a film of my life. I mentioned this to a classmate and wondered aloud when would this transition feel real? She said it would feel real when I experienced pain. And as the life before Naropa made its gradual departure, the pain came. My boyfriend began to emotionally withdraw. He rarely called, he did not email. I met classmates, but when the events of the day were over, we all retreated to our separate caves. I had never been alone in this way in my entire life. I was deeply entrenched in what Hillman (1996) calls “the spirit of loneliness”. It felt as if “all the networking that [had] interlaced [my] extension into the world…seem[ed] to count for nothing.” I was “exiled” (Hillman, 1996, p. 54).
It was the terror of being born. I recognized the terror as a signpost of an I AM moment (Tuber, 2008), the moment when one comes to realize one is separate from the mother/other, and consequently, feels “infinitely exposed…timelessly vulnerable”(Winnicott as cited in Tuber, 2008). I needed holding and I needed it fast. I reached out to my classmates, I started vocal lessons, I reached out to my therapist from New York, and I started my daily meditation practice. These interactions became a good-enough mother’s arms. In particular, my meditation practice became a mindful attempt to create mini-I AM moments wherein I could practice tolerating the interplay between being alone and being held. I began to view meditation as a practice of re-mothering myself and becoming my own reliable “other,” thereby testing and strengthening the solidity of my True Self (Tuber, 2008). I recognized that perhaps if I could “pass” the test of being there for myself, if I could hold myself enough to realize that time and space are in fact tolerable and that I would not “fall forever,” then perhaps one day I could develop “a capacity to feel life as play” (Tuber, 2008, p. 121). This recognition did not assuage the day-to-day fear, anxiety, and what felt like intolerable loneliness. I found myself holding another paradox.
Levoy (1997) articulates the nature of my paradox clearly: “a calling…flings opposing energies into our lives: One part of us wants to awaken, another to sleep. One part of us wants to follow, another wants to run like hell” (p. 53). I was plagued with doubt. What had I done? Why had I exchanged a perfectly respectable comfortable life for chaos and uncertainty? This doubt was only intensified by the final dissolution of my relationship with my boyfriend. This man was the center of life as I understood it. Even though differences in values, communication styles, and emotional needs had reared their ugly heads time and again, we had built a life together and only a mad woman would destroy what she had built with her own hands. My life felt like it was spinning out of control. I felt utterly unable to wait for the mother/other (my new life), or to tolerate its delayed emergence (Tuber, 2008). According to Winnicott (1982), however, “this sense of loss itself [became] a way of integrating [my] self’s experience” (p. 120). Through the intensity of my grief and my struggle with the idea that “all I…got is what I have not got” (Winnicott, 1982, p. 24), I began to accept the “is-ness” of my experience. The speed with which the ground beneath me had disappeared, the excruciating pain of losing one of the most important relationships of my life, and the refusal of life to stand still long enough for me to hold it with both hands became “the unstoppable bullet hit[ting] the impenetrable wall” of my undeniable thirst to awaken. I recognized that if I could “[witness] their collision in full consciousness…juggl[e] them both… [I could] reconcile [myself]… make [myself] enormously resilient” (Levoy, 1997, p 56.)
I am not yet done cycling through the stages of my grief, but I surrender. I offer myself to this “divine progression” (Levoy, 1997, p. 56). I give the daimon (a personification of my purpose in life) permission to have her way. I make of myself the ultimate sacrifice required to follow my calling. Levoy (1997) believes “if we can let go of the trapeze platform and make our necessary surrenders, we may be liberated, but if, while still suspended in empty air, we can say thank you, we’re damn near enlightened” (p 283). I look in the mirror and see the daimon’s eyes looking back at me. We mouth the words in unison: "thank you."
Saturday, October 10, 2009
Monday, August 31, 2009
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
Pre- Orientation Boulder A.K.A. Isn’t this the coolest camp ever?
Pre- Orientation Boulder A.K.A. Isn’t this the coolest camp ever?
So I have been in Boulder for about 11 days. A mighty feat has been accomplished and pretty gracefully I might add. I came here with a team: Mama/Mommy/Mom, Sister/Rasha/BFF, and boyfriend/Jan/member under suspicion (jokes, baby, jokes…mostly). We did more in 3 days than a larger family could do in a month. Before my folks left, my apartment was fully furnished (thanks to some beer guzzling CU students and a lil place called Savers, with touches from Tar-zhay), my cabinets and fridge were bursting at the seams with all sorts of edibles, I had the nicest cushiest bed I have ever slept in, and I felt like I had lived in this very apartment for months. After the folks and I had a teary parting, Jan and I had another day and half to feel totally weird about living separately for who knows how long after a seven year stint of hardly ever being apart. Thank God for beer and altitude effects to soften that stretch of time. So people told me over and over that Boulder is beautiful— so much so that I was already rolling my eyes at this statement before I left New York. On my first visit out here, I must’ve stayed at a really weird spot where I just couldn’t see the entire expanse of the flatirons, and maybe something happens to the clouds and the sky in February BECAUSE BOULDER IS STUPIDLY BEAUTIFUL. I mean Lord of the Rings beautiful! I am sitting in my lil living room and I can see just a snatch of tree-covered mountain out my window. There are wild sunflowers and types of lavender growing alongside the roads, and the air feels like inhaling…. I don’t know fresh oxygen? BUT let me not hesitate to say that for every beautiful flower I see, there is a matching mini-mall. The streets just scream BUY BUY BUY from Tar-zhay to an APPLE store, from Marshalls to Patagonia, from the Boulder Running Company to the Hallmark store, you cannot walk or bike or do whatever you do ( I prefer the stroll) without wondering in a very deep and existential way, What do I need?
So I had 5 days here sans roommate where I finished unpacking, ate, drank and smoked a lot, hung out lots with my new pal, Ian, watched some Season 5 of The Wire, wrote a song, cried under a tree, went to a party, met Old Daddy Bruce*, saw an unimpressive show as part of the Boulder Fringe Festival, and went to the only black church in Boulder (also not too impressive). I stayed pretty active and felt pretty open, but it pretty much felt like I was at camp and my parents would be coming for me at the end of the week.
Sunday night my roommate arrived and me and some other newcomers helped to unload his car. I was already labeled a strategist/administrator because I used larger bags to group smaller objects to get them out the car. I have cried hard at least twice since I’ve gotten here. Grieving over my old life, missing my old apartment, all my friends, and especially the pitter patter of little Jan feet Oh I meant Bowie, and the heavy thumps of big Jan calves. And I have had doubts, and asked myself, What am I doing here? And there wasn’t an answer immediately. In fact, when people ask me “What brought you to Naropa, ” the pause has become longer and longer. But this morning, a lovely woman who I totally want to be like one day, opened our “Group process” meeting with a reminder. She said “you are here, not to become someone else, not to fix yourself, but to learn to be who you are, to journey to your center and live from there.” I know some of you are like, why would one have to learn to be who one is? She quoted Chogyam Trungpa, the founder of Naropa, as saying we are all clouded like the sun. The program clears the clouds so we can shine. So I remembered, ah yes, this is why I am here, to clear all the debris I’ve accumulated that has dulled the brilliance of who I am. Ah, yes.
So I have been in Boulder for about 11 days. A mighty feat has been accomplished and pretty gracefully I might add. I came here with a team: Mama/Mommy/Mom, Sister/Rasha/BFF, and boyfriend/Jan/member under suspicion (jokes, baby, jokes…mostly). We did more in 3 days than a larger family could do in a month. Before my folks left, my apartment was fully furnished (thanks to some beer guzzling CU students and a lil place called Savers, with touches from Tar-zhay), my cabinets and fridge were bursting at the seams with all sorts of edibles, I had the nicest cushiest bed I have ever slept in, and I felt like I had lived in this very apartment for months. After the folks and I had a teary parting, Jan and I had another day and half to feel totally weird about living separately for who knows how long after a seven year stint of hardly ever being apart. Thank God for beer and altitude effects to soften that stretch of time. So people told me over and over that Boulder is beautiful— so much so that I was already rolling my eyes at this statement before I left New York. On my first visit out here, I must’ve stayed at a really weird spot where I just couldn’t see the entire expanse of the flatirons, and maybe something happens to the clouds and the sky in February BECAUSE BOULDER IS STUPIDLY BEAUTIFUL. I mean Lord of the Rings beautiful! I am sitting in my lil living room and I can see just a snatch of tree-covered mountain out my window. There are wild sunflowers and types of lavender growing alongside the roads, and the air feels like inhaling…. I don’t know fresh oxygen? BUT let me not hesitate to say that for every beautiful flower I see, there is a matching mini-mall. The streets just scream BUY BUY BUY from Tar-zhay to an APPLE store, from Marshalls to Patagonia, from the Boulder Running Company to the Hallmark store, you cannot walk or bike or do whatever you do ( I prefer the stroll) without wondering in a very deep and existential way, What do I need?
So I had 5 days here sans roommate where I finished unpacking, ate, drank and smoked a lot, hung out lots with my new pal, Ian, watched some Season 5 of The Wire, wrote a song, cried under a tree, went to a party, met Old Daddy Bruce*, saw an unimpressive show as part of the Boulder Fringe Festival, and went to the only black church in Boulder (also not too impressive). I stayed pretty active and felt pretty open, but it pretty much felt like I was at camp and my parents would be coming for me at the end of the week.
Sunday night my roommate arrived and me and some other newcomers helped to unload his car. I was already labeled a strategist/administrator because I used larger bags to group smaller objects to get them out the car. I have cried hard at least twice since I’ve gotten here. Grieving over my old life, missing my old apartment, all my friends, and especially the pitter patter of little Jan feet Oh I meant Bowie, and the heavy thumps of big Jan calves. And I have had doubts, and asked myself, What am I doing here? And there wasn’t an answer immediately. In fact, when people ask me “What brought you to Naropa, ” the pause has become longer and longer. But this morning, a lovely woman who I totally want to be like one day, opened our “Group process” meeting with a reminder. She said “you are here, not to become someone else, not to fix yourself, but to learn to be who you are, to journey to your center and live from there.” I know some of you are like, why would one have to learn to be who one is? She quoted Chogyam Trungpa, the founder of Naropa, as saying we are all clouded like the sun. The program clears the clouds so we can shine. So I remembered, ah yes, this is why I am here, to clear all the debris I’ve accumulated that has dulled the brilliance of who I am. Ah, yes.
Friday, July 24, 2009
LIMINAL SPACE
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.
“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.
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.
Friday, February 27, 2009
For the traveler
For the Traveler
Every time you leave home,
Another road takes you
Into a world you were never in.
New strangers on other paths await.
New places that have never seen you
Will startle a little at your entry.
Old places that know you well
Will pretend nothing
Changed since your last visit.
When you travel, you find yourself
Alone in a different way,
More attentive now
To the self you bring along,
Your more subtle eye watching
You abroad; and how what meets you
Touches that part of the heart
That lies low at home:
How you unexpectedly attune
To the timbre in some voice,
Opening in conversation
You want to take in
To where your longing
Has pressed hard enough
Inward, on some unsaid dark,
To create a crystal of insight
You could not have known
You needed
To illuminate
Your way.
When you travel,A new silence
Goes with you,
And if you listen,
You will hear
What your heart would
Love to say.
A journey can become a sacred thing:
Make sure, before you go,
To take the time
To bless your going forth,
To free your heart of ballast
So that the compass of your soul
Might direct you toward
The territories of spirit
Where you will discover
More of your hidden life,
And the urgencies
That deserve to claim you.
May you travel in an awakened way,
Gathered wisely into your inner ground;
That you may not waste the invitations
Which wait along the way to transform you.
May you travel safely, arrive refreshed,
And live your time away to its fullest;
Return home more enriched, and free
To balance the gift of days which call you.
~ John O'Donohue ~
Every time you leave home,
Another road takes you
Into a world you were never in.
New strangers on other paths await.
New places that have never seen you
Will startle a little at your entry.
Old places that know you well
Will pretend nothing
Changed since your last visit.
When you travel, you find yourself
Alone in a different way,
More attentive now
To the self you bring along,
Your more subtle eye watching
You abroad; and how what meets you
Touches that part of the heart
That lies low at home:
How you unexpectedly attune
To the timbre in some voice,
Opening in conversation
You want to take in
To where your longing
Has pressed hard enough
Inward, on some unsaid dark,
To create a crystal of insight
You could not have known
You needed
To illuminate
Your way.
When you travel,A new silence
Goes with you,
And if you listen,
You will hear
What your heart would
Love to say.
A journey can become a sacred thing:
Make sure, before you go,
To take the time
To bless your going forth,
To free your heart of ballast
So that the compass of your soul
Might direct you toward
The territories of spirit
Where you will discover
More of your hidden life,
And the urgencies
That deserve to claim you.
May you travel in an awakened way,
Gathered wisely into your inner ground;
That you may not waste the invitations
Which wait along the way to transform you.
May you travel safely, arrive refreshed,
And live your time away to its fullest;
Return home more enriched, and free
To balance the gift of days which call you.
~ John O'Donohue ~
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
traveling
I am on my way to Boulder, CO to interview for a spot in Naropa University's Contemplative Psychotherapy program. I don't ever recall having traveled across the country alone before. Ok, maybe when I went to Toronto my senior year in college. Anyway I was terrified up until I woke up to go the airport at 4 this morning. But all the blessings indicated that this was a good move. I got money just in time, I made both my flights, and now I am writing from my seat in first class. God is good.
Monday, June 30, 2008
Rumi loves us
Open the window of your heart
Do not worry if our harp breaks
thousands more will appear.
We have fallen in the arms of love where all is music.
If all the harps in the world were burned down,
still inside the heart
there will be hidden music playing.
Do not worry if all the candles in the world flicker and die
we have the spark that starts the fire.
The songs we sing
are like foam on the surface of the sea of being
while the precious gems lie deep beneath.
But the tenderness in our songs
is a reflection of what is hidden in the depths.
Stop the flow of your words,
open the window of your heart and
let the spirit speak.
– Translation by Azima Melita Kolin
and Maryam Mafi
“Rumi: Hidden Music”
HarperCollins Publishers Ltd, 2001
Do not worry if our harp breaks
thousands more will appear.
We have fallen in the arms of love where all is music.
If all the harps in the world were burned down,
still inside the heart
there will be hidden music playing.
Do not worry if all the candles in the world flicker and die
we have the spark that starts the fire.
The songs we sing
are like foam on the surface of the sea of being
while the precious gems lie deep beneath.
But the tenderness in our songs
is a reflection of what is hidden in the depths.
Stop the flow of your words,
open the window of your heart and
let the spirit speak.
– Translation by Azima Melita Kolin
and Maryam Mafi
“Rumi: Hidden Music”
HarperCollins Publishers Ltd, 2001
Saturday, May 31, 2008
what had happened was
...I got an A in physiological bases of behavior, which was quite a feat. Now I know things I can use if I ever get a hold of your brain in a laboratory. Then I slinked off to St Martin/Saint Maarten with some friends. Ah...the beaches. We spent a lot of time on the nude side of Orient Beach. I am not a nudist by any means, but it did send me into a spiral of contemplation about my body.
What is the human obsession with the form of the body? Big ones, small ones, big on top, small on bottom, skin, flab, genitals... It has become quite perplexing to me that the body is a status symbol. I mean, I have just finished a research project on body image and so I have read quite a good deal of literature, and I did read an interesting article on how body image and body ideals can be influenced by socioeconomic factors and it makes sense that in less affluent countries, particularly those where women are relegated to reproduction, that a larger body image is more ideal. Similarly in less affluent countries, a larger body is a sign of affluence as it indicates the ability to eat well and buy food. To follow then, in a country like the US, where the availability of food is not an issue, and women are career-oriented, the ideal is thin. But uber-thin? Ultra-thin? What is that?
So thin is in and everything else is out. It confuses me, the amount of head space that thinking about my thighs, stomach, and clothing size takes in my daily life. The constant comparison: I am smaller than she is, if only I had her ass, her taut calves, her... It is a sickness, and I am not the only case. It is a nationwide epidemic that has us all counting calories, reaching for something besides food, besides self-esteem. I can be as smart, talented, driven, as I want to be. But my body says laziness, indulgence, grade B.
So now, I surrender. I too will hit the gym with fury and wrath. I too will join the army that counts calories in ounces and tablespoons. Because it is the only way to liberate myself from the obsessive bondage of comparison and never enough. Or is it?
What is the human obsession with the form of the body? Big ones, small ones, big on top, small on bottom, skin, flab, genitals... It has become quite perplexing to me that the body is a status symbol. I mean, I have just finished a research project on body image and so I have read quite a good deal of literature, and I did read an interesting article on how body image and body ideals can be influenced by socioeconomic factors and it makes sense that in less affluent countries, particularly those where women are relegated to reproduction, that a larger body image is more ideal. Similarly in less affluent countries, a larger body is a sign of affluence as it indicates the ability to eat well and buy food. To follow then, in a country like the US, where the availability of food is not an issue, and women are career-oriented, the ideal is thin. But uber-thin? Ultra-thin? What is that?
So thin is in and everything else is out. It confuses me, the amount of head space that thinking about my thighs, stomach, and clothing size takes in my daily life. The constant comparison: I am smaller than she is, if only I had her ass, her taut calves, her... It is a sickness, and I am not the only case. It is a nationwide epidemic that has us all counting calories, reaching for something besides food, besides self-esteem. I can be as smart, talented, driven, as I want to be. But my body says laziness, indulgence, grade B.
So now, I surrender. I too will hit the gym with fury and wrath. I too will join the army that counts calories in ounces and tablespoons. Because it is the only way to liberate myself from the obsessive bondage of comparison and never enough. Or is it?
Friday, April 11, 2008
March 12-New Orleans
Today was better, but students are a mercurial bunch. Again I thank GOd for his love, warmth, kindness, for keeping me so close. What more could I ask for beyond the many gifts I have been given. God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference. It is hard to be among them (the sutdents) and not be one of them; to feel your separateness as severely as the pain of growing wisdom teeth and knowing they myst be pulled. How to connect without wanting to immerse yourself in that connection, how to pull back and away without drowning in the space between spaces. How to be intimate without them feeling threatened by your realness, your willingness to be reveal. How to refuse connextion when it is at a cost you feel is too much to pay. How to deal with how the atmosphere changes when you walk into a room and still have the courage to enter and leave, enter and love, love and leave and enter.... again and again and again
March 11 cont'd
I love my job but I do want to move on in my life and to choose a path where the burden is not so heavy at least for a while or I guess I mean where at least for a while or I guess I mean where for at least a while the relationships are more reciprocal or perhaps-- what do I mean? This reminds me--on an emotional level of a trip I took back home to Maryland over Christmas Break-- how I had one set of expectations that quickly transformed into else. That I am learning so much about myself and who I am, but it is a very painful process. To deal with the fact that others are, and will continue, to constantly make assumptions about me that I have no control over. To be fragile & vulnerable at a time when I would like to be least so. It was an awful day, a blow to my ego and my spirit and still I know that God never left my side. being an adult is hard, it's scary, to have to make unequivocal decisions that no one else can make, to be no one else--unchanging. There is so much more I want to write, but I am growing tired. I thank God for his mercu, for the presence of the Holy Spirit. For the gift of Life, for his gift of my mother, and I pray that he contiue to watch over me. Amen.
Friday, March 28, 2008
Tuesday march 11 - new orleans 2008
Today was very difficult. Working on the house was fine but afterwards tension rose directly--over a trip to Walmart of all things. I didn't want to go and it wasn't the plan and I felt very nervous about being in the van, which I am solely responsible for. I think maybe one of the things I am learning is to trust my instinct. I made us turn around. Minutes later, we realized that we had nails in our tires, and maybe they would've blown. Luckily some nice "loacals" helped us to patch it up. But still I have been cast as a type of witch-bitch or a dark presence cast over the group and keeping them from their freedom.
(outcast unappreciated misunderstood overwhelmed)
I called my mom. and she brought home the importance of taking care of myself and of doing what's right. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't concerned about how this was going to play out in terms of how my students would perceive me, and how this would affect my reputatuion, risk my chance of being on their "cool" list. But at this point, the damage was done and all I could do is try to take the best care of myself and those who had been entrusted to my care.
(outcast unappreciated misunderstood overwhelmed)
I called my mom. and she brought home the importance of taking care of myself and of doing what's right. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't concerned about how this was going to play out in terms of how my students would perceive me, and how this would affect my reputatuion, risk my chance of being on their "cool" list. But at this point, the damage was done and all I could do is try to take the best care of myself and those who had been entrusted to my care.
Wednesday, March 26, 2008
Matthew Chapter 10
... And when he had called unto him his twelve disciples, he gave them power against unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to heal all manner of sickness and all manner of disease.
2 Now the names of the twelve apostles are these; The first, Simon, who is called Peter, and Andrew his brother; James the son of Zebedee, and John his brother;
...Philip, and Bartholomew; Thomas, and Matthew the publican; James the son of Alphaeus, and Lebbaeus, whose surname was Thaddaeus;
... Simon the Canaanite, and Judas Iscariot, who also betrayed him.
These twelve Jesus sent forth, and commanded them, saying, Go not into the way of the Gentiles, and into any city of the Samaritans enter ye not:
...But go rather to the lost sheep.
..............And as ye go, preach, saying, The kingdom of heaven is at hand.
Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out devils: ........freely ye have received, freely give.
.........Provide neither gold, nor silver, nor brass in your purses,
Nor scrip for your journey, neither two coats, neither shoes, nor yet staves: for the workman is worthy of his meat.
And into whatsoever city or town ye shall enter, enquire who in it is worthy; and there abide till ye go thence.
12 And when ye come into an house, salute it.
...And if the house be worthy, let your peace come upon it: but if it be not worthy, let your peace return to you.
...And whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear your words, when ye depart out of that house or city, shake off the dust of your feet.
...Verily I say unto you, It shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrha in the day of judgment, than for that city.
Behold, I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves: be ye therefore wise as serpents, and harmless as doves.
...But beware of men: for they will deliver you up to the councils, and they will scourge you in their synagogues;
...But when they deliver you up, take no thought how or what ye shall speak: for it shall be given you in that same hour what ye shall speak.
...For it is not ye that speak, but the Spirit of your Father which speaketh in you.
...And ye shall be hated of all men for my name's sake: but he that endureth to the end shall be saved.
... 24The disciple is not above his master, nor the servant above his lord. ...
...Fear them not therefore: for there is nothing covered, that shall not be revealed; and hid, that shall not be known.
... What I tell you in darkness, that speak ye in light: and what ye hear in the ear, that preach ye upon the housetops.
...And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body...
..Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father.
...But the very hairs of your head are all numbered.
...Fear ye not therefore, ye are of more value than many sparrows.
...Whosoever therefore shall confess me before men, him will I confess also before my Father which is in heaven.
...But whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I also deny before my Father which is in heaven.
...Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword.
...And he that taketh not his cross, and followeth after me, is not worthy of me.
...He that findeth his life shall lose it: and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it.
...He that receiveth you receiveth me, and he that receiveth me receiveth him that sent me.
...He that receiveth a prophet in the name of a prophet shall receive a prophet's reward; and he that receiveth a righteous man in the name of a righteous man shall receive a righteous man's reward.
...and whosoever shall give to drink unto one of these little ones a cup of cold water only in the name of a disciple, verily I say unto you, he shall in no wise lose his reward.
2 Now the names of the twelve apostles are these; The first, Simon, who is called Peter, and Andrew his brother; James the son of Zebedee, and John his brother;
...Philip, and Bartholomew; Thomas, and Matthew the publican; James the son of Alphaeus, and Lebbaeus, whose surname was Thaddaeus;
... Simon the Canaanite, and Judas Iscariot, who also betrayed him.
These twelve Jesus sent forth, and commanded them, saying, Go not into the way of the Gentiles, and into any city of the Samaritans enter ye not:
...But go rather to the lost sheep.
..............And as ye go, preach, saying, The kingdom of heaven is at hand.
Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out devils: ........freely ye have received, freely give.
.........Provide neither gold, nor silver, nor brass in your purses,
Nor scrip for your journey, neither two coats, neither shoes, nor yet staves: for the workman is worthy of his meat.
And into whatsoever city or town ye shall enter, enquire who in it is worthy; and there abide till ye go thence.
12 And when ye come into an house, salute it.
...And if the house be worthy, let your peace come upon it: but if it be not worthy, let your peace return to you.
...And whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear your words, when ye depart out of that house or city, shake off the dust of your feet.
...Verily I say unto you, It shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrha in the day of judgment, than for that city.
Behold, I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves: be ye therefore wise as serpents, and harmless as doves.
...But beware of men: for they will deliver you up to the councils, and they will scourge you in their synagogues;
...But when they deliver you up, take no thought how or what ye shall speak: for it shall be given you in that same hour what ye shall speak.
...For it is not ye that speak, but the Spirit of your Father which speaketh in you.
...And ye shall be hated of all men for my name's sake: but he that endureth to the end shall be saved.
... 24The disciple is not above his master, nor the servant above his lord. ...
...Fear them not therefore: for there is nothing covered, that shall not be revealed; and hid, that shall not be known.
... What I tell you in darkness, that speak ye in light: and what ye hear in the ear, that preach ye upon the housetops.
...And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body...
..Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father.
...But the very hairs of your head are all numbered.
...Fear ye not therefore, ye are of more value than many sparrows.
...Whosoever therefore shall confess me before men, him will I confess also before my Father which is in heaven.
...But whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I also deny before my Father which is in heaven.
...Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword.
...And he that taketh not his cross, and followeth after me, is not worthy of me.
...He that findeth his life shall lose it: and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it.
...He that receiveth you receiveth me, and he that receiveth me receiveth him that sent me.
...He that receiveth a prophet in the name of a prophet shall receive a prophet's reward; and he that receiveth a righteous man in the name of a righteous man shall receive a righteous man's reward.
...and whosoever shall give to drink unto one of these little ones a cup of cold water only in the name of a disciple, verily I say unto you, he shall in no wise lose his reward.
Why am I here?
Day 1 March 9 2008 New Orelans LA
It is my first day as a chaperone in New Orleams and it has been terifying. First, my worst fears came true at the rental car place in that I am assuming responsibility for something I deem to be a bit unethical and every time we get in the van, I am nervous. I pray to God that my fears are unfounded and that we navigate the city safely and without incident. The energy surrounding me is topsy-turvy and I find myself questioning my abilities as a leader. Perhaps I am not a great traveler. But why would my heart have a desire that I do no thave the strength to carry out? Again I pray that God will lead me through this shadowed valley that I find myself in. I can do all things through Chrsit who strengthens me. How can I be a leader when I am so afraid?
[ this verse came to my mind- see next entry for full chaper] 16 "Behold, I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves: be ye therefore wise as serpents, and harmless as doves."
Please Lord surround me and those who have been entrusted to me with your love, your light, your compassion, and your angels. Amen.
It is my first day as a chaperone in New Orleams and it has been terifying. First, my worst fears came true at the rental car place in that I am assuming responsibility for something I deem to be a bit unethical and every time we get in the van, I am nervous. I pray to God that my fears are unfounded and that we navigate the city safely and without incident. The energy surrounding me is topsy-turvy and I find myself questioning my abilities as a leader. Perhaps I am not a great traveler. But why would my heart have a desire that I do no thave the strength to carry out? Again I pray that God will lead me through this shadowed valley that I find myself in. I can do all things through Chrsit who strengthens me. How can I be a leader when I am so afraid?
[ this verse came to my mind- see next entry for full chaper] 16 "Behold, I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves: be ye therefore wise as serpents, and harmless as doves."
Please Lord surround me and those who have been entrusted to me with your love, your light, your compassion, and your angels. Amen.
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