we are the lover living in front of things...

Jacques Lusseyran, a young blind French boy observes, "It is more than seeing, it is tuning in...allowing the current to connect...like electricity. To put it differently, this means an end of living in front of things and a beginning to live with them...for this is love."

In life coaching, people ask, "How do I love myself?" Yesterday I was having tea with an acquaintance. She was showing me photos of two beloveds -- a child who had passed and a beloved who had not. Then she told me of the "great love" she feels when looking at their  pictures.  Her eyes were alive when explaining that she now knows what true love really is. "I feel it." she exclaims. Earlier in the conversation, she revealed, "I can't feel love for myself.", then added a list of personal short-comings. Yet to her family, children, friends, and pet she is an ocean of caring.

Here, sitting across from me is a gifted, creative, intelligent person telling me that looking in the mirror, saying loving things to herself hasn't worked.  She offers herself little compassion and scant understanding. And true, it is difficult to stimulate feelings of warmth and radiant acceptance about one's wrinkles, scars, or regrets. How many situations have I not been perfect in, how many mistakes do I make, how many of those geraniums have I neglected to water? Yet I am the love (as is everyone) that is doing the loving and through which this great river flows. Then little things get taken care of somehow and the big things release a larger understanding and compassion to this little ego-self called, me.

Responding to how she can love herself I observed, "When you look at those pictures on the coffee table, I feel that "great love" you mentioned coming from you not from their images. You are the one emitting that feeling in this room." I suggested she close her eyes, try to feel love (without the pictures or the good memories), wait, allow its warmth to expand in her chest. Continuing I added, "Let yourself down into it, feel it with your ears, your toes and with your breath -- it is you. There is no intermediary, no object outside yourself needed. Let the love that you are, love your wonderfully imperfect self,  let it release its compassion, its larger understandings in you and for you -- allow it space, depth and place.

"Even if love is experienced as grief, a loss of a child or beloved, it is pure love and you are the one doing the loving. Once you wear the path here you will not need to love the self in the mirror, as you are part of the universe loving itself.  Not separate but one, not outside or inside as ultimately there is no outside, inside. We are like mason jars full of ocean set in water with the tops off. Where does the ocean begin or end? Our hearts are every heart, even our own."

As the young blind boy so wisely observed when asked how he "sees" in order to maneuver his dark world, "It is more than seeing, it is tuning in...allowing the current to connect like electricity...(which) means an end of living in front of things..." And this is the love that keeps moving us back into wholeness, ....** Then like the boy, we stumble into undivided living and know we are, indeed, the lovers doing the loving.


** paraphase source, Mark Nepo

photo source: fotolia.com

the birthday of life, love, wing and loss...

i thank You God for this most amazing
day...and for everything
which is natural which is infinite which is yes

(i who have died am alive again today,
and this is the sun's birthday; this is the birth
day of life, and of love and of wing...)   e.e. cummings

My cousin's funeral was yesterday. Having been diagnosed a year ago (two former writings*), she achieved the year she so wanted as she had more life to live, family and friends to love, and business to attend.

In the service, the minister told us she called a couple of weeks prior, asking him if he would conduct her funeral which would be imminent. This request by the person, plus the "matter of fact" time-estimate was a  new experience for him. He wanted to meet with her.  She apparently was not too interested but agreed, adding, she did not want an eulogy. "People already know what I do. I don't want it about me, I want it about God." On such visits he usually tried to make a person's transition easier, offering comfort but not this time. She had it "well in hand" and heart. Responding to her request he spoke about her "joy de vive, tour de force" and her aliveness -- in other words her god-ness.

A few decades ago, working in hospice, I walked with people on that transition-part of their journey, held numerous hands, looked into misty eyes through my own mist. However, I never walked this courageous path with anyone who engaged dying so boldly, selflessly and factually. My cousin, I am sure, had her dark nights, walked through her garden of Gethsemane,** fell to the ground as others have done when considering the loss of earth-hardness, the softness of a cheek and a look from an eye that sees.  Then one might ask as Jesus did, "let this cup be taken from me."

Yet, God bless the flesh. It has been our habitant, our reference point all our lives.  We see through it, experience who we are in it.  And ultimately, we have to let go, deeply knowing/hunching there will be new reference points, new awareness and a larger consciousness to be entered. Thus, at the end of another beginning, may I "raise the bar" as my cousin did and also witness to that "which is natural which is infinite which is yes."

* Two previous writings: "the crossroad" - 06/09/2013 and "death as an advisor" - 29/11/2013

** Christian Scriture: Matt 26: 36-46

photo source: fotolia.com

spreading our sails on the sea of light...

This is what the heart knows (under, through, and above) all words: that beyond our small sense of things a magnificent light surrounds us. Mark Nepo

Summer in Nova Scotia,  I love it.  Through our new screen door a lovely freshness wafts down the hall tinged with the aroma of wild roses, continuing on past this desk, by the piano and out onto the deck. We have a postage stamp front lawn edged with rainbow-summer divinity, flowers. Looking up, I catch the yellow finches, as delighted in the new summer sun as I; criss-crossing in the air as they seemingly play tag around the bird feeder  -- spreading their "sails on the sea of light." *

Summer emits an aroma of lightness, I can feel it, I am lighter. Birds saturate the air with song. I know when they wake and when they sleep. A friend arrives. Her dress is flowing in the breeze, arms wrapped in velvet-warmth. She is happy, laughing easily. My son arrives in shorts emitting a vacation-feel yet he has just worked ten hours. Finches, flowers, friend and child arriving, indeed, the light does dance, "my darling, striking the chords of my love."* I feel it in my bones, in my eyes, in my skin. Even the clouds are edged in this warmth of summer sun -- inside and out.

Imagine, all, at essence, at core, at heart is light. Leaders of the great religions fill millions of libraries around the world with this message. Everyone of them witnessing it while walking in and with their personal tragedies. Jesus stated clearly, "I am the light of the world." When Buddha was dying his student wept feeling the light on earth would be extinguished -- yet the reply was, "Anan, Anan, be a light unto yourself." Mohammad after his experience of enlightenment observed, "To the light I have attained and in the light I live."

I know I am light, that we are all essentially light. I know that beyond my small sense of things a magnificence does surround me, is me at core. Yet, the problem is, rather than catching glimpses of it, I want to be living in the feeling of it, having that as my "home base" rather than catching it on the wing different times of the day. I want to know how I can thin my veil, wear a path, awaken my senses enough to experience the trickle of joy, a warmth that begins to thaw me in the moment.  I want thoughts that spread my wings on the sails of light, and like Tagore, shatter into gold every clouded thought.

Then comes a luminosity, a caring, an awareness of exquisite Presence. I feel a smile, a laugh, a giggle birthing. Mirth, "my darling, is spreading from leaf to leaf."* And, I take some hope as my grand daughter who is four asked me the other afternoon, "How come you are "laughy", Grandma? I might reply, "It is the reflection of your own light, Grand daughter."

photo source: fotolia.com
* Gitanjali by Rabindranath Tagore, Novel Peace Prize, 1913

Whatever you can do or dream you can, begin it...

"Whatever you can do or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius and magic and power..." Goethe

My dream is to play a little rag-time, jazz, and honky-tonk on the piano. No slow stuff please. However, the joy, rhythm and swing surging through me was thwarted, with my knowledge restricted to three notes to a chord, my fingers had no hope. I needed a music teacher -- someone relaxed enough to let me make mistakes while walking the line with Johnny Cash, keeping pace with Nova Scotia fiddlers and chording a little soft jazz with Nora Jones.

Thus, two years ago the search began in Halifax and Tucson. Then last fall I happened to look in a small local paper, read the ad twice, and there she was, hopefully, my music teacher. Arriving at the lesson, only a mile down the road, I wondered, would she be the one? I came out of the lesson dancing in the sunshine.

My first concert was last Sunday. I had three pieces to chord: Five Foot Two, Squid Jigging Grounds, and Uncle Milton Milks the Cow.  The first piece was to begin the concert. I had it memorized for months.  My teacher had added some swing, style and a jazzy beat. I loved playing it. The other two pieces came later in the program but their timing gave me "no end of trouble."

Concert Day: My family is in the audience. A pianist entertains us a half hour before it begins.  He is a master performer. I am spell-bound. He plays with the ease of an angel; his fingers jumping, dancing over the keys just like I want to do. Yet the more he plays, my great rendition of Five Foot Two seems to shrink and so do I.

My turn. A young guitarist is to do the introduction. In practice, we have always made eye contact, now I am looking at her back. The accordions were closer, too. My music teacher whispers, "Don't go too slow." I am worried about going too fast. The audience quiets, everyone is ready. I play a strong C chord (only three notes). Oh my, what comes next? Is it A7th, E7th or D7th? Where is my head?

Thank goodness for my teacher pointing out where I was in the song. Thank goodness for accordions and any other instrument drowning me out. Painfully, I get through it but the spirit of Five Foot Two didn't -- no swing, no jazz, no me. I had succumbed, apparently, to "stage-fright".

However, I still have two pieces yet to chord and they are trouble. I cannot go back up on that stage. Then a tempting thought, "Maybe my teacher will play them." Yet a pesky inner-voice cautions, "You can't quit in the middle of a concert, Augusta! Play softly, concentrate on the sheet music and whatever you do, don't look at the audience."

Now it's my turn again. I eye the piano. My head seems to be sitting on someone elses shoulders, leaving me ending at the neck. The teacher -- my support and "Linus blanket" is kneeling next to me because someone has taken her chair. My non-existent musical balance rest entirely on everything being perfect. Yet looking down on the top of her head, a thought, "It's appropriate, as she is probably praying, like myself, that I was anywhere else but on this piano bench."

Two weeks later: Amazingly, I did haul the squid in, managed to milk Uncle Milton's cow without mishap. I was grateful and relieved -- two out of three. I thanked my music teacher and the next day she emailed me, " Wasn't it truly a great day. You were fantastic (generous but not true), gave it your all (true) and we are looking forward to enjoying more music together."

Hmm, maybe she will let me chord Five Foot Two again next year with my music-head on my shoulders. And best of all, the dream of playing my joy-spirit with rhythm and swing survives in its boldness, magic, and power...

image resource: fotoloa.com

beyond coincidences...

"Everything has a purpose. There are no mistakes, no coincidences -- only blessings from which to learn."  Elizabeth Kubler-Ross *

I always believed in coincidence as being a curious chance interaction until spending a week at one of Elizabeth's "Death and Dying" workshops some years ago.  She announced the first day, "There are no coincidences in life." I didn't believe her. I was to discover through the week and following years that my meaning for the word had no more depth than a shallow puddle.

People in the workshop were in deep emotional pain and some where much too young to die. Their struggle was heart wrenching. People came from across North America and Europe, yet the woman I sat next to lived fifteen miles from me and we became important friends. She died within five years (early thirties). I could no longer say, "Oh, just a coincidence, a mere chance encounter."

Coincidences come big and small. I became aware one day I had neglected an acquaintance, she didn't tell me but her actions did. The same afternoon I dropped my favorite vase. Still feeling badly and looking at the shards of glass on the floor, I knew what it was telling me. The sun comes in the window and crosses my page just as my pen catches a significant learning. Ah, another confirmation. The printer adjusts itself just at the moment when a thought imprints me with meaning. Little coincidences, I wonder?

Then there are the big coincidences. I have been bothered about the images I have put on this blog for the last year, slowing moving out of my ignorance about copy-write, and excuses, "Everyone does it so it must be 'ok'." Three mornings ago, the proverbial "jig was up." Nothing particular had happened but it was no longer "ok".  Yet, I had just finished a writing called "the solitary bird" and was ready to post but needed a picture of a eagle or hawk high in the sky. I was sorely tempted -- so easy to pop into Google for one more.   An hour later, talking on the phone on the deck, I noticed a bird in the sky hovering over the river, probably hunting. I kept talking. Then it turned and flew my way. I stopped talking.

"Ah,there's the bird-image I want for the writing." I thought, watching the under-feathers, a dark and light pattern, skim over my head. I have never been this close to a hawk and started to tell my friend on the phone but  she stopped me saying softly, "I heard the swish of its wings." Here was my picture but no camera, yet more importantly, here was my confirmation, information, and direction.

I am too old, too experienced to ignore the messages carried on such bold wings. I know the universe talks back.The physicists and mystics know there is a pattern, a divine intelligence, a divine matrix to this life. This force speaks through the wind, the printer, the vase, which teaches, guides, and leads us into the magic of the moment, to an invisible companion who is as close as my finger tips on these computer keys. Elizabeth knew who she was working with, could depend upon and she was right. There are no coincidences.

* Kubler-Ross wrote the ground breaking book, Death and Dying.
   She was an inductee into the American National Women's Hall of Fame in 2007.

Maybe our abundance...

What gift can we hope to bring to dying?
Maybe our abundance...?

Her daughter's voice is stressed as she tells me on the voice mail the chemo is no longer working.  The doctor gives her mother, my cousin, two weeks to three months. I replay the message, the date was three weeks ago! It's hard to draw my breath.  She was doing well when I had talked to her several weeks before I left Tucson.

I dread making the call. Her daughter answers. "How is your Mum?" I ask.
"She is right here do you want to talk with her." Surprise, she was in hospital at the time of the phone message. My cousin's voice is strong. I hear gladness and caring as she ask in her matter-of-fact way, "How are you, Augusta?"

Turning the conversation back to her, she tells me the doctor's news. Then she observes softly, intimately,  "And we both know where I am going." I hear the love in her voice and her deep knowing.

"I agree." I respond. "However, as we've talked before, it is 'this side' that is hard to leave."
"It is." She quietly asserts. I hear the passion. We need say no more. We both love the physicality of life. We have had numerous discussions about the "other side" through the years and share the same knowings and guessings.

She then tells me of the wonderful visits she is having with family and dear friends. Plus, she is almost through her business files which she was working on with her daughter when I called. (One of her goals when finding she was ill.)

On hanging up I tell her I will be up within the week (another province). Knowing her house is full -- a drop-in visit but no meals. She insist I stay over night. I balk. She states in a voice that rings truth, "I feel fine. I am not sick. " She may die before night-fall from illness but she is not sick. She is offering her abundance... I agree to lunch.


* image source:fotolia.com
** a continuing journey from the writings "the crossroad...",  September 9, 2013, "death as the advisor"..., November 29, 2013

meeting Mrs Thor...

"There are an infinite number of parallel realities co-existing with us in the same room."
Steven Weinberg, Nobel Prize for Physics (1979)

Last night, walking up a grassy hill, each blade of spring green caught the sun light. Then suddenly I "bi-located" and was standing in this living-room that had a 1940's feel to it. A woman was walking toward me. I wondered who she was. Looking directly at me, she reached up with both hands and held me (as if in place) by the upper arms, stating, "I am Mrs Thor." My body felt the greatest sense of largeness.

I knew I was asleep yet here I was awake, in two places at once.  She began to talk on "such neat stuff," expanding me beyond my own limited consciousness. Excitedly, I kept telling her, I will remember this and "take it back." Then in the middle of her talk a thought interrupted my resolve.

Earlier in the day, I had been puzzling about how real are we without our skin and bone bodies? Are we still in human form when these fingers typing become dust or ash? As a kid I would look down at my toes, stomach and think I feel much bigger than this little body. Now here was my chance. Interrupting her, and feeling the solidity of her hands on my arms, I asked, "Do you have a human body?" She paused, gave a little laugh, shook her head slightly, looked directly at me and said distinctly, "No, I do not." In glee, I lifted off the floor and did the funnest, air-born 360 degree back-flip.

I woke wondering how come the bed wasn't levitating as I felt so much zing and caring-essence. Then the thought, "Oh my gosh, this must be the start of going 'down the rabbit hole.'"* As science now tells us we live in a multi-dimensional universe. The world-view has changed since I went to school, even since university -- the world is no long round in it's non-physicality. Matter and spirit are one. Ultimately, there is no solidity, merely denser or finer energies, faster or slower frequencies.

Modern science invites us to go "down the rabbit hole" beyond logic and reason. My grandchildren via Skype or I phone instantly, after pushing a button, walked down my deck steps last week to see the blooms on the prickly pear cactus growing in my Tucson yard, 3800 miles away. An unthinkable feat of energetic transference ten years ago. And what will be next?

Maybe we are 99.9 % star stuff -- dancing energy. Maybe certain (lucid) dreams are actually visits to parallel realities as some scientists suggest.** In my limited-everything view, I can only guess. Yet in essence, I am not bones, toes, fingers, or any other organ. The more dense (anger, fear, etc) I am the slower my frequency. Rocks have a slower frequency than air.

However, my vibration feels finer when I am connected to source and consciously in spirit. Through meditation, joyful purpose, laughing, loving and even soul-full sadness the denser me changes into "light and wing" accompanied by an inner ability to do a leaping back-flip. Thus, when this human, seemingly solid-body becomes dust maybe my frequency will be finer, faster so I can go "down the rabbit hole" again and visit Mrs Thor.

photo source: fotolia.com

*Reference from "What the Bleep Do I Know?"... a movie about the recent discoveries in quantum physics

**Fred Alan Wolf, a physicist specializing in the relationship between consciousness and science