For the past three years, I have been sitting with the idea that it is the questions that are important, not the answers.
Today I realized I have been waiting for an answer about joy and sorrow. I had the question in my heart, is my involvment with the Quaker community my answer to the sorrows that life brings us? Is it THE answer, i.e., just about the only thing that will help balance the sadness of losing loved ones to sickness and tragedy and working in a job market that seems to separate us from our humanity?
What then is my question?
And also, is this a signal that my focus is shifting back towards answers rather than questions?
Then I realize with a laugh that, in the process of exploring this, I have just asked four very important questions.
It is not enough for me to simply place more trust in questions than answers. I think that I must also ASK the RIGHT QUESTIONS.
So then I am exploring whether trying to ask the rights questions just brings me back to an ‘answers’ mindset. How could this be the case? Well, it all depends upon my intentions when I am selecting the ‘right’ questions. If I am trying, in a well meaning way, to ask questions that maybe more likely to achieve a specific desired outcome, then do I understand what that outcome is?
And if that is the case, how shall I value that outcome against other outcomes? If the outcome seems to solve a problem in an area of my life where I have decided I have a lack, then that is one way of prioritizing the outcome.
Do I truly understand which aspect of my life needs work most? When I look at the various parts of my life which I usually feel need work, again the question comes up, how can I fairly and with my highest good in mind choose one area over another? In priorizing and ranking them, do I risk solidifying my thinking too much about something which is constantly changing?
When I sit in silence among my Quaker friends, I often have lots of prayers ready in the front of my mind. They are kind of like a wish list for Santa, although a bit less materialistic. Still, I am noisily (in my mind) asking for specific, tangible, measurable objectives – ha ha! The business mindset creeping into spirituality! If your intention is to sit in expectant silence, is it not just as materialistic to pray for a full time job in a certain field with a certain salary as it is to pray for an Xbox 360?
If this is happening during prayers, and when deciding upon the best questions to ask oneself, then what space does this leave for divine intention to be understood and/or made real in my life?
How can one human being possibly come up with something they want to pray for which serves their higher good better than that which God can come up with? Even if you don’t believe in a god which knows what you need at any given moment, perhaps in your life you’ve sensed some sort of subtle guidance from time to time in the form of seeming coincidences, and you felt that those coincidences had some kind of greater meaning (or, as I felt as an agnostic a few years ago, there were random happenings from which I chose to take meaning for my life, thus leading to some of the same blessings).
This is a tough topic, because we have deadlines, priorities, family needs, personal goals, and lots and lots of obstacles. When these obstacles get especially tricky, sometimes our response can be to become callous, abrupt, thoughtless, cranky, and more.
Christmas season is tough for me anyway, with memories of my mom’s final decline (she died three days after her birthday, on Dec. 28) and doubts about the over-wrought complexity of American-style Christmas. A visit with my family was two years overdue and they were all living in Oregon for the first time in years, so I made travel arrangements to take Jim to meet my dad and stepmom before we get married. I combined some time off that I had saved up, plus company holidays, so that I could be off the last two weeks in December.
The company had planned in January to move me to the Internet group, a better fit for my skills and a way to make me more of a shared resource to all groups. I was excited about the transition and feeling optimistic about the strategic direction this was taking.
Going into Christmas season, one of the kids developed some pretty serious health issues and had to be hospitalized, which worried the whole family. At the same time, my dog Sophy was dealing with a recurring bladder infection and one vet had said we might need to check for bladder cancer. The last week before Christmas, I got some wonderful news on both fronts as both were feeling better and back at home with us – it seemed things were beginning to even out for us and I was full of gratitude.
Seeking to embrace hope, we managed to get the Christmas tree set up, plans went forward for family visits, and we purchased a few gifts.
A few days later, I was laid off from my job because of budget cuts related to the economy. Lots of people have gotten laid off during this economic downturn, but I have never been laid off or fired from a job in my life, so this took me by surprise. I made two decisions that day after filing for unemployment: I wouldn’t let this stop our plans to visit my father and family, and I wouldn’t let this discourage me about my own professional future.
I would have been off the week of Christmas anyway, but my time at home took on an almost feverish urgency as I began to do all I could to make sure my name was “out there” – I got my resume updated on three career sites and began applying for jobs that were suited to my skill set. I started thinking about contract work and freelance email marketing work, and this led me to realize something important: I was out of health insurance coverage. I either had to get COBRA or get added to Jim’s health plan.
Because he and I had planned to marry as soon as we could arrange it, deciding to move up those plans was easy, but figuring out when to fit in a marriage was the hard part. We’d be in Oregon for the last week of 2010 but we needed to do this right away – sort of a “shotgun wedding,” if you will! I did some research, and we ended up getting married in one day before a county clerk in Newport, Oregon, with my dad and stepmom there as witnesses. One I am employed again, we can plan a nice reception here in New Jersey.
The new year has brought with it some signs of hope. I’ve had several job interviews already and I am getting calls every day. I think it won’t be long before I am working again.
These challenges are opportunities for frustration or patience, despondency or hope, anger or humor, and so on. In other words, the important thing is to remain a human being, first and foremost.
I see so many people in New Jersey that are caught up in the grind, working hard and not really happy with their circumstances because the cost of everything keeps them from really having the freedom to explore in their lives. Many residents of the part of New Jersey I live in have families and all their decisions are in support of family needs and activities, understandably.
It’s hard for young people to strike out on their own in this state, because of how late they have to wait for driver’s licenses, the competitive job market, and the cost of rent and gas. They end up staying at home with their parents longer than they had planned, which can cause more frustration.
What I am seeing these days is examples of how people are still striving to be human, and to treat others humanely. They may still have gruff exteriors, but grocery checkers are occasionally unexpectedly kind and considerate, postal workers smile from time to time, bartenders remember my favorite ale flavor, and clerks of small shops still find the time to carry my purchases to my car. In fact, in the last month, a former employer recommended me on LinkedIn, many friends where I worked reached out to me to help me look for work, a family member sat with me in gentle conversation, another family member made us a wedding cake, former coworkers invited me to lunch, a toll booth attendant let me through without paying when I failed to exit in time, and recruiters gave me helpful advice on my resume. There are so many more examples I could include.
You can get wrapped up in your life circumstances and start asking “why me?” but the fact is, there are examples of grace being offered to me (and you) every day. When others are human with me, it’s an opportunity for me to stop, take a breath, and reset my emotional condition. Chances are, I wasn’t being human with myself. Maybe I was judging myself, trying to push myself too hard, or commit other unkindnesses. This just makes me frustrated and cranky with others, too.
A very wise man told me once to give myself more grace because we are all imperfect. Through his example, he taught me to keep placing myself back on my intended path even after I mess up. I don’t really want to be perfect – what I really want is to be human.
My mom died at the end of 2006, just after her 60th birthday. She died of a rare kind of small intestine cancer, but actually she died of kidney failure as a result of starvation after her innards refused to pass food for a while. She died in the manner she chose; no feeding tubes, IV lines or other heroic measures; the DNR (do not resuscitate order) was signed and posted on the side of the refrigerator. At the very end, she was living on oxygen, whipped cream and morphine.
I find that her journey, and the role I played in it, have colored my relationships with all the people I care about. I began to ask myself, how would I respond to my loved ones’ choices about what they want out of life? When should I sit quietly and try to just be a good companion and when should I take an active role in trying to bring about healing? It is so hard to watch people suffer and not do something, and yet there are times when there really is nothing we can do.
One of the hardest things I had to learn with Mom was how to just be there for her while she went about the process of dying. I wanted to FIX her, I wanted to SOLVE something that had gone so terribly wrong. She couldn’t take in food, something was blocking the way, I had to find a solution…and then again, I couldn’t. I read piles of books and scanned Web sites looking for answers; I mentally checked off a list of things that could be done for her to make sure nothing was forgotten. The surgeon had done what he could. The hospital did what it could. Her regular doctor visited her home and did what he could. They were in charge of cutting, medicine, therapies. What role did that leave me, the untrained and unprepared daughter?
Deep in my bitterness, I realized I could stand there and wring my hands, I could watch her puke and waste, I could try again and again to serve her food and drinks that might, this time, make it all the way through to nourish her body. And yet that was the only role I could have – it was uniquely mine, as her daughter. She didn’t seem concerned about what could be done for her; she seemed to accept the situation as it was in each moment. When I finally confessed to her that I didn’t know how to help, that I wanted to be of service but didn’t know what to do, she smiled and said just by being there with her, I was helping. I did precious little during my visits with her that year; and yet she said how grateful she was that I did so much. Mostly I tried not to scream and cry and tear out my hair every minute of every day that I witnessed her being squeezed dry by this relentless cancer that had her in its grasp. Meanwhile she said gentle words to me and squeezed my hand.
Now someone close to me wants to be skinny so badly that she has eaten almost nothing in the last two weeks. She ended up at the emergency room with dehydration and signs of kidney stress. For a completely different reason, she had been eating almost nothing; and yet it felt to me the same. If you give up on food; if you tell your body that it doesn’t need food, eventually it will believe you and you won’t be able to feed it any longer. I don’t know at what point this happens, but the very thought scares me so much. Here I am again, standing by helplessly, once again in a minor role of providing occasional comfort. I know better than to think that I can FIX this. Healing can happen, but it has to come from her and won’t be instantaneous. But why would she take her life so lightly that she could risk it this way? How could someone so beautiful to me think of herself as anything less than?
Still, as I try to settle in to wait, I wonder if this is the same situation or not. Before, Mom was clearly dying and had come to terms with that. In that case, I rightly accepted her choice and helped her stay comfortable. In this case, this young lady is not my daughter and I have no decision making responsibility for her. I must accept that this is true too. My prayer is to gradually understand how I may help with this; not from arrogance or false desperation, but from a true desire to be of service if my service is beneficial in some way. To feel this way, and be standing outside looking in, is the most painful thing I have ever experienced. This is life – there are so many things we are unable to change, such as illness and death; other people’s minds, the laws of our society, who our bosses are, and the weather.
My personal challenge is to find a way to accept those things and do what I can without succumbing to the temptation to give up and run off. That’s the faulty logic that if I can’t fix it, then I am going to get as far away from it as I can so that I might ignore it. But I cannot ever escape my own desire to make something better melded with my knowledge that there is very little I can actually do. That will follow me everywhere I go, because it’s embedded in my personality, my soul, my life’s path. I will encounter these helpless situations again and again as people and creatures I love suffer hurts and illnesses; what then is my role, and how will I be content with it?
I’m reading this book about anger called “The Cow in the Parking Lot – A Zen Approach to Overcoming Anger” and it’s written by a lawyer, Leonard Scheff (with Susan Edmiston) who felt that the Zen talks on anger sort of miss the mark with most Americans and he needed to explain it in a way most of us could grasp it.
In case you’re wondering, the cow in the parking lot stands for a way to visualize the person who just cut you off to take the parking space you had been waiting for. If you imagine it’s just a cow, and that cow had come to that spot every day for 3 years for a nap, your reaction might not be as angry. It’s all about the expectations.
The milling exercise he mentions is about how your anticipation of a good or bad interaction can cloud your perception of it during the interaction. I was thinking this is a great exercise for families, although he just describes doing it in workshops. In our family, sometimes what seems to be going wrong is more about family members’ perceptions of how others will treat them. This exercise helps you become more aware of the power of your expectations:
Step One: Everyone closes their eyes (no peeking) and mills about in a room that’s safe, with no sharp corners, etc. If you bump into someone, just set yourself another course and keep moving. Do this for about 5 minutes. Afterwards, talk about how you felt.
Step Two: Everyone should imagine that the other people are toxic and that they will get hurt if they come into contact with them. Then close your eyes and mill about just as in Step One for 5 minutes. Afterwards, talk about how you felt.
Step Three: Everyone should imagine that the other people are kind and loving and warm and that they will be happier if they come into contact with the others. Then close your eyes and mill about for 5 minutes. Afterwards, talk about how you felt.
In Step Two, did you notice more stress? Did you imagine someone had bad intentions towards you, or even malice? Did you feel fear or annoyance? In Step Three, were your nerves soothed? Did you find yourself smiling if you brushed someone’s arm?
Okay, maybe that concept is a little too abstract even for the most “zen” among us, but let’s try this:
What if we picked a day and, when asked for our preference/order/decision on something that day, instead described the outcome we’d prefer in more general terms?
We could call it the Flexible Wish Day. Or maybe Surprise Me Day. What would you call it?
Here’s how such a day might play out:
I’d wake up in the morning and do the stuff everybody needs to do to get ready for work. Instead of selecting the exact shampoo I want, I’d grab whatever’s closest. Instead of worrying about my outfit, I’d close my eyes and grab a shirt from my wardrobe, then select stuff to wear with it that matches.
Walking the dog, I’d let her go where she wants, wherever that might lead us.
At work, instead of listing all my “to do” items and ranking them by urgency/priority, I’d jot down 2 or 3 things that are foremost in my mind and then think, how do I want my morning to feel? If creative, I’d work on the thing that helps me feel that way. If social, I’d work on an item that required collaboration. If detailed, I’d work on spreadsheets and stats.
Instead of planning ahead and packing a lunch, I’d go to the grocery/deli and pick whatever attracts my eye first, without further deliberation over price or nutrition. I’d eat it with care and enjoy any surprise it delivered.
For my afternoon, instead of being pulled from task to task by urgent emails, phone calls and in-person interruptions, I would stop answering the phone and email, put on my headphones, and think, how do I want my afternoon to feel? Then I’d pick one of my priorities and work on that.
On the way home, I’d put on my iPod and hit Shuffle, even though I have 20 carefully selected podcasts saved which are exactly long enough for my drive home. Whatever played, that would be groovy. At stop lights, instead of thinking how I can get in front of the slow guy, I would look around at the faces of the other drivers and see if anyone is doing anything interesting, or better yet, if anyone would like to smile back at me.
At home, when one of my peeps asks me what I want for dinner, I’d smile and say, surprise me! If that throws them, I’d breeze into the kitchen and randomly put my hand on a box in the pantry or an item in the fridge, saying, why don’t we do something with that? Or, if the mood suits, I would say, I don’t care what I eat but I would like something spicy.
Or maybe we decide to go to a restaurant, only this time I am driving and my family does not yet suspect I am having a Flexible Wishes Day – great fun! I drive randomly until some restaurant catches my eye. I apply no criteria whatsoever to making the choice. We go in, and the waiter asks what I would like. I ask what he would like to bring me. He tells me the specials. I say, I want something warm and crunchy. And wait. Whatever comes will be a surprise! Yes!
Afterwards, the kids want to play a game. I say okay, and they ask which game. I say, surprise me! And they do.
This morning while sitting in silence with the Quakers, I began to explore the extent and impact of expectations in my life. What are the kinds of events/things/people/relationships we expect in our life? How do they steer our daily existence and our opportunities? Do they give us hope or do they limit our happiness?
We are a goal-oriented society; we all must to some extent have an idea of what we want, or we likely won’t get it. At least this is true for material things like jobs, cars, houses, or fitness. But is this the right frame of mind for experiences like relationships, people, and opportunities?
It seemed to me that the more detailed and complex my vision for my life was, the less space there would be for surprises (otherwise known as blessings) to occur. I explored that for a long time, thinking of each expectation, goal, or plan I had for my present life.
To me, blessings are a stealthy thing. They sneak up on you and wait for you to notice them. They probably won’t impact your life for the better unless you see them and let them in. And if you’re focused on the script for how your life is to play out, maybe you won’t see them at all. I visualized myself at the center, sitting cross-legged on a folded towel on a packed dirt surface. Blessings and love shone toward me from all sides, but between me and them was a round brick wall tightly encircling me. Each brick was actually an expectation of how my life should proceed, as in:
I will work for a marketing department.
My house should be clean.
There should be plenty of food in the fridge which everyone in the family can eat.
I should have friends.
My dog should behave herself.
My car should always work.
My man should treat me well at all times.
I should be a healthier weight.
My hair should not be gray.
Each of the kids should have a nice birthday with a cake I bake myself.
My cat should not puke on the floor or meow too loud.
The kids should always help clean the house.
New Jersey should be nice to me.
I should get over my mom’s death.
And so on – try this exercise yourself and you will begin to see how many you have too! I was amazed. It became clear to me that every expectation I had could obscure a blessing waiting to come to my life. And some of those blessings might actually help me with many of my goals and dreams, but what they required was serenity and trust.
I’m a type A from way back, so this is not an easy task for me. In fact, I immediately began to think of new goals that would help me get more blessings into my life. Aha. More bricks in the wall, not fewer. Okay, breathe, Sylvie.
Lacking in answers, I did a little positive visualization. I imagined myself punching out those bricks one at a time, after visualizing the expectation first. I give up my attachment to a constantly clean house. Kaboom. A little ray of sunshine sneaks in and bathes my shoulder with warmth. Another one – I give up my expectation that my man provide me with attention at every opportunity. Crunch. A little bird flies in through the opening and sings a pretty song to me.
I visualized punching out every brick and walking out into the world to be buffeted by chance and opportunity. I realigned my view of the world – now I was a leaf in a stream, spinning and swirling downstream past rocks and other obstacles, sometimes floating with other leaves and sometimes rushing past. Now it’s a journey and you take the impermanence of it along with the joys. I read that the Buddhists say change is the only constant. Also: If you can accept that inevitability, you can begin to be content.
So have I completely transformed my existence from this exercise? Heck no. That would be too easy. But this gives me some more information and some more questions to work on.
I feel as though I am waking from a long and troubled winter’s sleep. Christmas was a hard time for me though I do feel I injected some hope into the season which will help me have a better holiday next year.
I was not suicidal and I don’t need antidepressants, but just going through a catharsis about Mom being gone from my life. Her birthday was Dec. 25 and she died 3 days after her birthday in 2006. Christmas is just not the same for me. Plus the shallowness of the holiday really wears on me – it has no real meaning anymore. Just an occasion for giving people stuff they don’t need anyway. We all have too much stuff and it pulls our focus away from more worthy endeavors.
I had a sore back around the same time and decided to go to a chiropractor / sports doctor. I am feeling so much better and now doing exercises to avoid reinjury.
I restarted my yoga practice last week with Yoga for Restoration class. And just before Christmas I began visiting a nearby Quaker meeting, though I am not a Quaker (yet). I love their silent worship and how anyone can speak out of the silence. There is no pastor and the ugly issue of money hardly ever gets mentioned – they value simplicity as do I. I am meeting some kind souls there including one amusing older man who has invited me to a writer’s group at his house in Morristown.
There is a drum circle that meets once a month at the Quaker meeting house – not affiliated, just uses the space. But I intend to check that out as well. I am working to bring more positive energy and positive people into my life. And Jim and his family are a wonderful benefit for that.
I do have a new job as of Sept 09 and I am working to manage job stress better. It’s a pretty hectic scene sometimes. Sometimes I feel that I am actually an editor in a marketing manager’s clothing, LOL. I’d love to also have the chance to do more editing, esp. something related to my new life journey like health, spirituality, kindness, whatever.
And in the back of my mind is the comforting idea that I have with a friend from SEG – her name is Spring. We want to write and record meditations for podcasts. We are working on ideas and will be corresponding with each other about this as it develops. I hope to jump in and try one sometime in the first quarter.
I miss my friends and family who are scattered across the country – I am grateful to still be in touch with Dad, Lisa, Aline, Diane, Valerie and Julie and many others. I often get distracted and time slips by before I reach out again, but I always feel better when I do reconnect. I think about them all with gratitude and love.
Here is an update on my new intention to open my heart and learn to live life fully and with gratitude for the dear people in it. Having seized the day (Nov. 1, to be exact), Jim and I drive the moving van, with Subaru in tow and animals loaded, across eight states and more than 1300 miles in 2 days to arrive in New Providence, NJ in the wee hours of Nov. 3.
I had decided to quit my job and say goodbye to my dear friends to move to New Jersey, where I had seen great jobs advertised (for my field of Web Content/Online Editor) and where I had several new friends whom I met on Second Life. I also was volunteering for a discussion group in Second Life about meditation, and they were based in Princeton, NJ, and they had flown me up twice to work with the group on projects. All signs pointed to this area, as if I was sliding down a funnel and would inevitably end up going down the center hole into a bottle.
I am staying with roommates Jennifer and Rel in North Brunswick because Jim’s landlord doesn’t allow pets, but we are looking for a rental house in New Providence and expect to be moving in together in December. He has four kids (2 of which live with him all the time) and they all like me and I like them. I’m glad I am here and I am looking for a job. I’m meeting with a recruiter about doing some contract/consulting work in the Web Content area.
Jim and I both have talked about move to Portland someday. But for now I will enjoy seeing NJ and hanging out with my friends in the area. The NYC area is a 1-hour train ride away! Fun fun!
Jim took me to the New Jersey shore today (Island Beach State Park) and it was wonderful. My dog Sophy was so excited. She did the puppy bark thing for about an hour. After returning home, she crashed hard and has been sleeping it off.
I’ve changed almost everything about my life and I am excited about my future, which is great because it’s been a hard couple of years with Mom’s illness and then Randy’s dad’s illness. I could use some smooth sailing for a bit! Not that it’s going to necessarily happen starting this instant (LOL) but maybe gradually, bit by bit.
Here is a wonderful song by Blues Traveler, called “Fledgling” about a young bird who is being counseled to spread his wings and simply fall. That’s me.
People I am grateful for:
Jim, who flew to Tulsa to help me drive a grueling 1300 miles to get me safely to New Jersey, and who treated me like a valued and loved person the whole time.
Jennifer and Rel, who trusted me sight unseen and took me in as a roommate, and who helped me lug my stuff into the apartment.
Sophy and Meaghan, who as pets put up with many changes in their little environments and routines with good humor and flexible spirits, never losing their basic sweet natures.
DeAnna, for her hours of work helping me move boxes into the storage unit.
Jessie, for her kind acceptance and gentle spirit.
Laura, for her sweetness to Sophy who needed a friend.
Jamie, for being adorable.
Lynn, for reaching out to me and taking me to a local dog park (my first ever!) by way of welcoming me to New Jersey.
Steven, for checking on me every step of the way and helping me feel better about the changes.
Valerie, for being a fun and sincere friend who shows her love without reservation.
Julie, for sharing her troubles and hopes as I have shared mine, and walking with me.
Ceci and Will, for being great friends during the trying times (Ceci: wine-tasting Thursdays and Will: concerts that make me young again) and making me sincerely miss I could “fold the world” and easily give them hugs.
Sarah, for writing an amazing going away card and making me proud of my time as Web Content Manager at SEG.
So many other people who added to my joy and eased my burdens along the way.
I just returned from a wonderful experience at the Gathering of Circles, a camping and fellowship event held every year in Cloudcroft, New Mexico. My mom attended it for years and she was well known by everyone I visited with there. I also got to meet Carol WhiteWater Dawn, a medicine woman, mystic, and all around wise and wonderful lady. Mom had said many many wonderful things about her but they didn’t hold a candle to her personal presence. She looked calmly and directly into my spirit when Dave took me to meet her; she was totally focused on what I said (which wasn’t a lot because I was hoping to listen more than talk). I looked at her Web site and I was very interested in the fact that she quotes from so many spiritual teachings of different kinds. Obviously she is a versatile and intelligent thinker.
I’m still volunteering (helping with meetings and the wiki) with a discussion group in the 3D virtual world Second Life called Play as Being. It talks about exploring the nature of reality and perception using various multidisciplinary practices like meditation, prayer, etc. It brings together the most wonderful and diverse people to discuss things in a very open minded way.
In fact, my help and involvement with the Play as Being group may grow and my life is being enriched as a result of it. I am passionate about Second Life because I think the Internet is going to become a 3D environment before too long – maybe as soon as five years. The leader of the PaB group works at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, NJ, and I am flying out to meet him and some of the other volunteers this week to have a day of discussions on the group’s possible transformation into something bigger. I am so excited!
In addition, I invested in myself by booking travel and attendance at the Second Life Community Convention in Tampa the first week of September. I will meet many of the people I have been privileged to know in-world. I hope to learn a lot about education and business in Second Life. I am also in touch with another group, Metanomics, that runs discussions in Second Life about the economics of running a business based in a 3D virtual world. One member of this group, Beyers Sellers, is going to present during the educational session.
In my SEG job, I am working with the different departments (we call them ‘business owners’) to get changes made to their pages. The part of the site where we have total control is the News page. We also do an e-mail newsletter called the SEG Extra and help others edit and send out their newsletters too. We’re getting ready to change to a more versatile e-mail vendor and install some social networking tools on our site. Workflows are being built so that staff members can help enter new content and changes to content; the workflows help the review process happen seamlessly and efficiently.
So you could say I practically live online and you’d be right. But I did so enjoy the recent chance to be again in my favorite forest (Cloudcroft) with the lovely breezes and the rain and the nice firm earth. The people at GoC were so welcoming and kind, I felt right at home. I worried about being able to measure up to my mother’s legacy but decided it was impossible even to try. Luckily everyone seems to accept me on different terms than those they knew with Lou Dale. My first name means girl of the forest, by the way, which is ironic since I grew up in the deserts of El Paso, Texas.
One of the great things about the Gathering of Circles is their respectful use of rituals and ceremonies with Native American elements. These include sweat lodges, dances, drum circles, a womens’ bundle ceremony, feasts, and the give away ceremony. The give away ceremony allows participants to give away something that once was important to them and now they are ready to let go of. Many symbolic and emotional objects are given away in this manner. The items are placed in plain wrappers like paper bags, and laid on a blanket in the center of the circle of participants. There was a fire going near the blanket at this one. One by one, participants went to the center, talked about their Gathering of Circles experience thus far (optional), and selected an item. The person who gave the item came up and explained what it meant and why they let it go. There are a lot of really personal and wonderful sentiments shared during this ceremony and talk is formally controlled by the passing of a significant object indicating whose turn it is to talk, such as a walking stick in this case.
I talked about how Mom’s journey into the next world worked a peculiar kind of magic with me. I resolved early in 2005 to really be there when I was with Mom, and not to miss a moment of the experience, no matter how painful it was to witness such a beautiful lady suffering. I flew back and forth often to her home throughout 2005 and 2006 as we went through various stages of the process. We knew it was probably over in October 2006 but she was so brave about the whole thing. She did acts of service for others and was a warm and comforting presence at a time of great uncertainly for her. I did what I could to be her emotional support, although to tell you the truth, it was probably the other way around more of the time. When she died, we knew that she had chosen the time that was optimal for her. She gave a speech at her Christmas feast (on her birthday) and then quietly passed away in the morning two days later, after I had flown back to Tulsa. I dreamed of her several times, knowing in the dream that she was on the other side.
My husband’s father was sick with COPD and cancer in 2006 and died in Oct. 2007. He also was brave and unselfish about his journey, and I have dreamed of him, too.
Anyway, I sort of took a year off from feeling anything from about April 2007 through March 2008. Then I woke up. I suddenly realized the lesson from Mom – it’s time to LIVE and make those dreams happen NOW, not when it’s too late. I have so many things I still want to do before I die. I need to get started right this instant. And I have. I dove into making connections – personal and fulfilling friendships with others, including on Second Life. I started volunteering with Play as Being, and learning all I could about furthering the Web 2.0 stuff for my company’s web site and for other web sites. I realized I had put off plans to travel more and see the people I loved, because my husband had quit work to help care for his dad and start a business. I knew that my journey would take me out of Tulsa and to parts unknown, and that it was going to be an adventure but I would need my income to be more in the service of that. I want to go to India in less than 5 years, etc. We decided to split up amicably and are in the process of separating accounts, paying off debts, etc.
Though I have some sadness and certainly some loneliness, my life is taking off and I love the mystery of it all. I am already living part of my dream – traveling and getting to see people I care about more often, and nurturing my career path with attendance at conventions and seminars that interest me.
This post fits within the context of becoming more connected to others.
I feel like I am living so many days packed into each one now. I had no idea when I began writing about it that the act of writing about my experiences would show me how much I am actually living my life and spur me to have more experiences. Here is an experience I had with a little church in Menard, Texas.
I went to an Orthodox church with my stepmom Lisa in Menard, Texas, a totally unexpected experience from beginning to end. We picked up Mike on the way – a friend and fellow churchgoer from Eden who had had a stroke and recently lost his wife. Nice fellow – old rancher. It was a bit of a drive to Menard, and when we got there the church turned out to be a little white building no larger than a cabin. Several people of hispanic descent wore white robes and greeted us at the door. They turned out to be mostly of one extended family, and there was a comfortable easy familiarity in scene.
A warm and bubbly lady sat behind us – her name was Lisa too. She mentioned that she’d lived in the Chama NM area and wished us a lovely time. She was very touchy and huggy and I warmed to her right away. She put her hand on my shoulder before she’d even met me. Her look was of pleasant expectation that I would be introduced to her so she could begin to know my story. I would have liked to get to know her better.
We had these plastic binders with the various prayers and observances as our guide. Nowhere was there a list of people who help officiate the service. I forgot the pastor’s name almost as soon as he was introduced to me, but not his bearing. Bear is the right word – he was big and round and still rather powerful in his energy levels. Maybe mid 40s? some gray in his beard. Black hair – hispanic like many of the others. Twinkle in his eye, informal manner, plain spoken like the people in this area but thank goodness not dogmatic and holier-than-thou.
The congregation consisted of maybe 20 people scattered among 50 old-fashioned theater-style wooden folding chairs. The hispanic ladies wore the most wonderful silver jewelry that gleamed on their golden tan skin, big silver hoops, bracelets, rings, silver concho belts, and their hair was long and full, cascading across their shoulders. Many wore white, which further accented their lovely coloring. They seemed happy with each other in an easygoing way. During the singing as the pastor was sitting down, he playfully batted a plastic binder out of one of the ladies’ hands, but then grinned impishly and picked it up to hand back to her. I was struck by how big this guy was as he sat in the row. This was a substantial guy!
This church is different than many I have been to – I’ve been to Catholic, Methodist, Baptist, Southern Baptist (yes they are different), Buddhist, Unitarian, Unity, and Episcopalian. I guess this was a cross between Baptist, Episcopalian and Catholic in flavor. The informality of the Baptist church combined with the pageantry of the Episcopalian and the rituals of the Catholic. Of course, not having spent much time in any but the Methodist and Unity churches, I am probably not an authority on describing them. I had enough to keep up with just figuring out which way to cross myself, and I am embarrassed to note that I still couldn’t tell you. I didn’t want to be too conspicuous in watching others at first, so I lost the method after that.
They had the obligatory cheesy sentimental songs but added the twist of putting the words on an overhead projector (text was formatted badly and ran off the screen – I was itching to put that in InDesign or Quark for them) and the music was country western style devotionals. Almost no one sang, or if they did, it was in whisper. I couldn’t figure out which part to take because the loudest singer kept going from soprano to alto.
The sermon was about Jesus’ message that his yoke was easy and his burdens light, and how we can choose to set down our burdens or let God carry them for us while we walk with Christ in our lives. Okay, that’s the lingo, but what did it mean?? To tell you the truth, I didn’t get much out of the pastor’s explanation, or for that matter the deacon’s (a good looking young man who is still new to addressing the crowd). But he called on Lisa to elucidate, and there were two Lisas sitting in the same area, my stepmom and the Lisa I had met earlier, sitting behind me. My stepmom went first with a very nicely worded explanation of the wonderful lightness of heart you can experience when you let go of normal worldly concerns. I liked that her explanation was not too mushy or worshipful. She’s been to many churches and is in the Franciscan order, and she has many viewpoints including secular, and this serves her well for mixing with people of many faiths or none.
Her words flew right over the tops of the heads of some in the congregation (a shame!) but I liked them and the pastor was impressed. The deacon looked terrified that he’d met his match. Then Lisa behind us spoke, and she immediately worried that people were going to have to strain their necks to see her, so she walked up to the front and talked for a bit about the types of cares that can make us feel tired and depressed, like divorce, misfortune, the death of a child. She was near tears the whole time and I found my heart reaching out to her and my eyes welling up. My reaction to her made me feel angry at myself. But anyway, I struggled to breathe and listen. Prybar to the heart, yet again. She said that she liked to use a visualization of a forested road, and you are the weary traveler with many heavy burdens representing your worries, your disappointments, your sadnesses and regrets (maybe your guilts?). You come upon a cart and there is a double yoke at the front, with whomever you choose as your spiritual guide – Jesus, God, the holy spirit – in one of the yokes. You can put your burdens in the cart and put the other yoke on. You won’t feel the burdens at all because your guide is doing all the pulling for you, and as long as you walk with him your burdens will not trouble you – though sometimes you may forget and take them back on, or take new ones, when you remind yourself of your intentions to lay them down and walk with Christ, it will immediately free you again.
I personally don’t buy into the idea that a deity is going to carry my stuff as long as I subscribe to his approach. I think Jesus was really a good guy but no one needs to carry my burdens for me and I don’t need to focus on Jesus or God in order to be free of them. One can do the spiritual work of being free of one’s burdens completely without that divine help. They aren’t actually burdens, really – there is no weight or substance to them beyond what we perceive them to have. The trick is in how you see things. The work is to quiet the mind every day and learn to see things for what they are, so that your troubles get into perspective with the big picture. As your troubles melt away, your joy will bubble up. This is only my opinion, of course, and I have seen how belief in Jesus and God and the Holy Spirit can really help others. I want people to seek out whatever comfort works best for them and their families, just as I do. There is good in every gathering of people that sincerely meets to focus on becoming better humans. For that matter, there is good in every person who regularly focuses on becoming a better human!
Another part that always inexplicably chokes me up is the recitation of the Lord’s Prayer, which begins, “Our Father, who art in heaven….” It’s the part about forgiveness of others’ trespasses that always gets me in the heart. I don’t know why but it chokes me up, ever since I stopped going to church during my community college days. Maybe in my heart I have associated church services with being more forgiving and tolerant of people in general. This is a helpful observation for me because when you can get your judgments out of the way, you can truly connect with each person. Perhaps I have been angry with myself all these years for my slack observance of this important goal. To connect with others is everything – not merely a good idea. I am just now coming around to that and “getting” why this is so vital. When you truly work to understand someone without judgments, you see amazing things. You learn about life and love, and you get ideas for things you can try in your life, and your empathy or other emotional reactions provide you with important clues about things you may want to work on a little bit more from time to time. For me, judgments about people are burdens which I can choose to lay down, to be freer and happier. Sounds good to me.
I really liked the greeting part of the service. I can’t remember the name of the ritual but you approach someone with both your hands together in a prayer position, with fingertips facing the heart of the other person. You make eye contact and wait for them to put their hands in the same position outside yours, then slide them apart and say “grace” and then the other person puts his or her hands together and you put yours outside theirs, and you both say “and peace”. Then you hug, and look for someone else to perform the ritual with. There’s enough ritual for standoffish people like me to find something to do that doesn’t shine the light of connectedness to glaringly upon me. It’s new for me to connect with others and maybe it will always feel too intense to me. But I do like it.
Because I was baptized in the Methodist church when I was 14, I was allowed to take communion with these folks. You go to the front, put both your arms across your front like an X, as if to hug yourself or skydive, and then you say your name and open your mouth, and they put a cracker dipped in wine on your tongue, an oddly sensual experience. I honestly don’t remember what the pastor said. He has a very direct gaze and it blew out my thoughts. Sometimes you wonder if they can see in your heart, you know? Hee hee. Besides which, he was flanked by other officiants, all of which were looking lovingly at me. I love all that attention anyway. Why did they use white zinfandel for dipping? Pleh. Would prefer some nice Shiraz. What do you say when a strange man looks into your eyes and feeds you by hand?? Awkward! I shuffled off to the right and tried to observe others’ behavior for clues.
Other rituals included lighting a candle for someone, in the same way Catholics do, and the holy water by the door – wasn’t sure what to do with that since I haven’t been to many Catholic church services. I also loved the incense and the cool ringing noise the brass censor made when they waved it around, and the pastor kissed the four corners of the table while doing it. Later a helper did the same all around the congregation space. After the service we were invited to the front to take a drink of the leftover wine from the chalice (so as not to waste the blessed wine) while the cute deacon held it and looked into my eyes, then he wiped it off before the next person approached. To the right stood the pastor, waiting to give me a blessing. Amid this intimacy he saw fit to ask me where I was from. I almost couldn’t answer. I was thinking, hey, let me focus totally on this cool thing I am receiving. I got another hug and was sent to light a candle (or not).
Kudos to the officiants for not singling me out beyond simple welcomes at the appropriate times. I absolutely hate being greeted as a visitor, being asked for my address, being asked to sign up for a committee (Southern Baptists – scary), or being confronted about my personal beliefs or churchgoing habits (several of the more rigid faiths).
I got the feeling that family would have been fun to hang out with later – like there were some awesome cooks among them and they were going to have a monstrous feast with happy kids running around and people laughing and talking. Something weird about this area of the country – the land is desolate, so the people try to make up for it by being as cheerful and sweet as possible. And they succeed.
