An Integrated Life

Joy

I’ve been noticing how much of the everyday tasks I do (filing, paying bills, washing
clothes, etc.) tends to feel not only automatic, but like something done to satisfy some
external manager.

The other day I made up two lists: “need to do” and “would like to do” and through the
day chose what I felt like from either list. At the end of the day I had done seven out of
eight and enjoyed the whole day!

It made me very aware of the importance of ownership (my day, my life, my choices).
So I decided to make a formal intention to do what brings me joy and to find the joy in
whatever I am doing.

Which led me to consider joy. Why is joy important?

1. It feels good.
2. It feels “right” (as in natural, genuine, of the soul).
3. It is my response to the Holy.
4. It is a sign of grace.
5. It is grace.
6. It points me in the direction I need to go.
7. It reminds me life is good, regardless of beliefs to the contrary!

So why am I not always joyful?

1. I forget.
2. I let myself get sucked into old beliefs.
3. Life can be hard at times (even Jesus had bad moments!)
The trick is to be grateful for all of it, even when I’m not.



© 2012 Lynne Tolk.

Resurrections We Have Known

We celebrate both liberation and  resurrections this month,  as Easter and Passover come the same weekend.    And in the temperate zone of our hemisphere, plant  life which had died or gone dormant for the winter is starting to show abundantly again.   How can we not celebrate?

We feel intuitively that any release from slavery or the lifeless state (and there are many forms of each), is a triumph over despair.  It can be hard at times to remember that neither death nor negativity is the whole picture.  What a blessing to have the miracle of Spring, and our great stories to remind us! 

There are four major resurrection stories in the Western world that I know of: the Babylonian queen Inanna, Isis/Osiris/Horus, Demeter/Persephone, and Jesus.

Queen Inanna descended to the Underworld, where her sister, Ereshkigal, ruled.  Inanna was stripped of every trapping of earthly prestige and came to her sister naked.  Ereshkigal was not feeling well, so judged her sister harshly and condemned her to remain in the land of the dead.  Inanna’s corpse was hung on a peg.  But a couple of spirit helpers who had accompanied Inanna proceeded to tend Ereshkigal with compassion and caring.  Ereshkigal, feeling better, relented and allowed Inanna to return.

In Egypt, the god Osiris was murdered by his jealous brother, who then dismembered and hid the pieces of the body.  Osiris’ wife, Isis, searched ceaselessly until she recovered all the pieces and managed to bring Osiris to sufficient wholeness that he was able to impregnate her.  The resulting child, Horus, was a god of great wisdom.

The ancient Greeks told of the goddess Demeter, who dearly loved her daughter, Persephone.  The two spent much time happily together, until Persephone was abducted by Hades and taken to the Underworld to be his queen.

Demeter was so grief stricken, she could not continue to give her gifts to the world, which created a crisis situation.  So Zeus intervened and Persephone was returned.  A compromise was finally reached, since Persephone felt such compassion for all the dead souls in the Underworld that she insisted on going back there for a part of every year.   (This explains the change of seasons!)

Our best known story is of Jesus, executed for his insistence on challenging the bigotry and injustices of his day.  His body was placed in a tomb, but on the 3^rd day was resurrected.  After showing himself to his disciples and preaching a last time, he ascended to a state transcending both life and death.

In every story, love is the force which frees, transforms and resurrects.  You just can’t keep goodness down (and we all partake of goodness)!  The thoughts that would deny this truth are all, to use a Buddhist frame of reference, delusions.

Happy Easter, Passover, Spring, Life and Love!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

© 2012 Lynne Tolk.

Springing Into Transformation

Spring is suddenly upon us!  In spite of Winter’s seeming attempts to hang on, I’ve noticed the crocuses blooming, leaf buds swelling, weeds growing (well, nothing’s perfect!)

Whether I’m affected by the season or identify with it (or both), I seem to feel that same sort of expansive urge in myself to create.  As a friend of mine complained recently, there is an excitement of many possibilities, combined with the frustration that, like the seeds in the ground, not all can become whole and bear fruit.  I tried to console her by saying that if it’s an important idea, it will return, and you can’t possible do them all, anyway.  This was a waste of breath, I realize now.  That’s all true, but doesn’t relieve the pressure many of us (and not just “artists”) feel with this dilemma.

For creativity is not limited to the aesthetic realm. I have always been drawn to music, art, and poetry, and have dabbled in all of these at one time or another.  But any form of innovation can qualify, from experimenting with a recipe to designing a new flower bed to changing things around in the office to starting a new business.  Or maybe a relationship now just calls for a creative response.

In my experience, once the creative urge calls a project into being, my pleasure in the dreaming phase gives way to no end of anxieties around old personal issues, usually having to do with the thought, “It won’t be good enough” (a variation on the old “not enough” refrain).

I’m currently well into a portrait I’m doing of a granddaughter.  After three attempts, I finally caught the essence I was after.  Then came the thought, “This is good so far, but if I touch it again I might ruin it!”  I was stopped in my tracks.

Many of my artist friends have related similar experiences.  One of them suggested I set this piece aside for a while and start working on something new.  I like that idea, but I really internalized the childhood teaching that I must finish something before starting anything else (no dessert until you finish your dinner!).

I’ve been dealing with it so far by using the “baby-steps approach.  I work for very short periods (how much damage can happen in a short time, right?), and only when I’m feeling relaxed and confident.  Even for just a hobby, though, this is lengthy and tedious.  I begin to want to be “done” so that I can move on.  And if I lose the joy of doing, the picture will suffer, too.

I decided to re-engage with what it was in the photo that motivated me to do this portrait in the first place.  Focusing on the process then, rather than outcomes then got me back into the work.  Then I saw the eye was out of alignment.  Devastation.  I walked away for a couple of hours.

When I returned to it, I remembered the same thing had happened on my last piece.  I had just erased the eye – and it worked!  (It will be a while yet, before I know whether that will take care of the problem here, but at least I’m excited and having fun with it again.)

This was a piece of visual art.  It could be anything.  I know someone who started a business that was just not taking off the way she had hoped.  In this situation, just as with my picture, there is a choice to make, whether to do nothing and hope for the best, give up, or take a risk by doing something different (which might not work!)  She did some basic restructuring and saw her profits take off! 

The risk is always real.  What do you choose?

Whole Life Integration

I’ve enjoyed thinking and writing here about integration of the parts of the self.  But there is more to an integrated life than the self.  Once the inner parts have come together consciously and are functioning relatively well, we’re able to pay more attention to what wants a response from us.  This self we have nurtured is, itself, part of a larger whole of family, community, nature, the whole world we live in.

In a manner of speaking, “my” life is a particular perspective on the ever changing/evolving life made up a whole multitude of perspectives.  As some of these end, new ones come into being.   We can never see the whole fabric, being one of the strands within it.  But whatever we do (or fail to do) affects all the other strands.

Just as integrating all the lost repressed and denied pieces into myself is critical to my well-being, so does the proper functioning of the whole require that we all pull together, recognizing our kinship.  This has always been true, but for the first time in our history we are able to see that our survival depends on it.  We all have work to do.  The next step after individual health and wholeness is service.

Wise woman and teacher, Jen Louden, has been devoting energy lately to exploring the concept of “Savor and Serve.”  There is  much to digest here!  I’ve found that forcing myself to serve, or serving because I “should” is neither sustainable nor all that useful.  In order to express myself through service, I must first know and accept (savor) all of who I am.

Beyond that is a need to savor all I experience.  This has to do with appreciation and love.  And it applies to everything.  It’s easy to savor a sunset.  Much harder to find appreciation for a cold, smelly inversion (one of the downsides to the climate where I live!) 

To savor doesn’t necessarily mean to like (the same is true for loving).  But like it or not, whatever is real in any given moment is what there is.  Wishing otherwise is futile.  Savoring is both affirmation and acceptance of life, itself.  It’s a profound practice, developing muscles of humility and compassion.  This makes a solid foundation for service!

Emerson Challenge #1 - What Matters

I signed up for the #trust30 challenge in celebration of Ralph Waldo Emerson's birthday.  The Domino Project is sponsoring this to highlight their republishing Self-Reliance.  There will be a prompt a day for 30 days to which you may respond by blogging, journalling or creating something (Here to sign up yourself!)  Today's prompt, from Gwen Bell, said I had 15 minutes to live, so write in that time the story that must be written.

The "story" I had to write was what I had learned in my life that I wanted to pass on to my children and grandchildren.  This is what came out.

What Matters

What matters is the feel of air on your skin, smelling what the wind brings (even if it wrinkles your nose), loving these children who grace your hands with theirs. 

What matters is breathing knowing every breath is new, eating with deep appreciation and respect. 

What matters is that you got out of bed this morning, never mind if the joints hurt a little.

What matters is the cat digging her claws into your leg for the love of it and you, the dog wanting just one more throw of the ball. 

What matters is this one's smile, that one's hug. 

What matters are all the memories packed into the cells of your body. 

What matters is singing because it feels good, stretching and feeling gravity where you are on the earth. 

What matters is the miracle of being alive, now, able to notice all these things, and knowing you are, too.

 

Creativity and Meditation

I recently tried putting together a class in which I looked for ways to increase the resilience of our inner lives as a way to better survive and even thrive within the stresses of living in a world that is changing much too rapidly for comfort.  I know the major changes in my own life, many moves, marriage, children, divorce, and death of my parents caused some big challenges to who I thought I was at the time.  Each time, I had to recreate myself, in a sense.

I looked at the things that have hleped me the most. They turned out to be a strong spiritual base (I don't mean beliefs here, more like trust) and the ability to be flexible and open.  I associate that ability with creativity.  And that's just what's needed for the process of recreating oneself!

I set out to look for the connection between the spiritual (specifically, meditation) and creativity.  I discovered a lot and became very excited about the possibilities here.  I also have realized that I cannot help others experience what might work for them just by telling them about it.  I must set up pathways that could lead people to their own discoveries, their own ways of living creatively.

So that is my work right now, creating the ways in which others may work and play and create, themselves.  Stay tuned.

On the Path to Living Creatively

On the Path to Living Creatively

More thoughts on the class I am designing.  This is not a lecture class, though there is explaining involved.  It is an exploration of ways each person’s innate creativity can help deal with the increasing complexities of our world.

Leisure is becoming a luxury for all but the very young and the retired.  Most artists have day jobs, or they teach (also a day job).  They must use every leftover minute to do their art.  But I am not talking about creativity, here, in terms of doing “art,” whatever that creative work may look like.

I am talking about the creativity that comes up with a way of responding to toddlers that actually reduces conflict between them.  Or that finds ways to approach a team project at one’s job that clears away unnecessary hassle and stress for everyone.  I’m talking about ways of enhancing the ability of each of us to live creatively.

There are tools to use, skills to develop that can help us learn how to do that.  Some time is necessary to acquire those skills.  But how much, when, and what to do with that time is, itself, open to a creative approach.  The most basic skill to being open to your own creativity is presence, the art of being fully with whatever is happening.

This is not easy in a world filled with distractions, but ways can be found.  I use the time on my exercise bike to pay attention to my breathing and to what my body is feeling.  A red light at an intersection can be a reminder to come into the present and breathe.  I’ve seen trees, birds, sunsets, other people that way.

My daughter often uses her two year old’s nap time to stop and spend some time being fully present the four year old.  (And when he is at preschool, the little one gets a turn.) Life has all the material in it for a full practice.  It just takes awareness, and reminders.

Exploring Creativity

I am preparing a class on enhancing creativity, little knowing what bottomless topics this touches on!  Being by nature metaphysically inclined, I waded into such areas as What is Art?  What is Reality?  Possibly relevant, certainly fascinating, but Oh, my!

First, we perceive, then we strive to communicate what it was we saw (or heard, smelled, tasted, felt, or thought about).  For no one else will see quite the same thing in quite the same way, nor will we, again.  To do this we need a symbol, with some commonly understood meaning.

We are perhaps the only Earth species to base our lives and our being on meaning – which we create (or accepted from others’ creating).  It’s like seeing through filters we have placed over the lens.  Where, what is the reality?  By asking the question, we see more, we create more meaning (new filters).  Are the filters real?  Or the world beyond the filters? 

The answer, according to Zen master John Daido Loori, is yes.  To both.  They are different and they are the same.   Absolute and relative constitute one reality of time ad space and emptiness.  This is the Non-dual understanding, which goes beyond a dismissal of the everyday and the symbolic as not “real.”  Actually, it’s all good, all one, Art and Life, and the Still Point where they meet and creation can happen.

I can say this and believe it abstractly.  I even (once in a blue moon) can experience it.  But I cannot understand it!  According to Loori, this is as it should be.  It is the truth that passeth understanding.  Process is all.

Which brings me back to where my mind took off, thinking of art, perspective and creativity (but with much more humility!).  We can maybe never see completely (as Paul said, only through a glass darkly).  But we are compelled to keep looking, and through this, creating.  This would appear to be our job on this planet!

A Post-Christmas Thought

The day came and went, whatever the meaning of it.  Perhaps its meaning, like all meaning, is an infinity of possible meanings, all true, none true.  As a koan, it has succeeded in shattering my mid into confusion, incomprehension, almost surrender.

Christmas day arrived, passed over and turned to night.  We came together, shared food, gifts, conversation.  We tried our best to be real, to give of ourselves and our love.  And, being human, we felt ourselves a bit short at times.

Just now the sun is shining, after clouds and rain.  I feel I have learned something profound, but can’t quite figure out what it was.  Perhaps it’s enough to know that I love all of us, myself included, with all our wounds and imperfections.

What's In A Christmas?

What is Christmas, anyway?  A solstice celebration appropriated by the early Christian church, A cultural memory of traditions cementing bonds of family and friendship, the original trilogy of mommy, daddy and baby, an emphasis on peace and good will, generosity, giving, and most of all love.

 The question was prompted as an exploration of my desire and need, this year in particular, to hang on to the traditions of my childhood.  Christmas was a huge, extended family event.  I loved the music, the decorations, the tree, the food.  Most of all, I loved the early morning hours, before others arrived, with just me and my parents.  There was intimacy and abundance and all really was right in my world.

 This Christmas, with both parents gone, has brought up lots of grief and loss and all the old memories.  Then life proceeded to shake me up a bit.  I am not in charge of the dinner this year, and suddenly I find out the menu has been changed!  No turkey, no dressing, no cranberries, no mashed potatoes and gravy – the first Christmas in my whole life without these things!  I was devastated and outraged.  So I listened and sympathized with that outraged little girl, and told her I would make sure it didn’t happen next year when I would cook the family dinner.

 Then, two days before Christmas, I heard that some people I know only slightly had been invited to dinner.  Another change, another shock, and another chance to look at all my assumptions and expectations.  ‘It won’t feel like Christmas!’  (Hence the above question, ‘What is Christmas, anyway?’

 I noticed that, at an early age I had created my own religion around Christmas.  I did have a real sense of the vertical dimension cutting through horizontal time at that still point when God enters the world again and again, bringing the promise of peace and safety and love.  Looking at it from this perspective, what I eat and who shares the meal are incidental so long as I remember and live within that promise.

 Merry Christmas (or whatever your particular promise is called)!