Faking the Funk

One of the people I work with works with homeless people. She cares for children in homeless families providing housing and other services. She described to me about her meeting with an African American client who told her about faking the funk. Faking the funk is a term used when a person is being less than real. I loved the idea that realness is valued and the lack of it is called out. In the Jewish middle class suburban culture I grew up in, realness was not valued. Presenting an image that would be impressive to other people was highly valued. Everything else was a secret which was not ok to be talked about within the family let alone shared with outsiders. " Don't air your dirty laundry." I was told growing up.
Since I heard about faking the funk I have been noticing how much I am afraid to be real with other people and that strength in the mainstream culture is defined as not showing your feelings.
Gary and I have recently joined a meditation sangha (community)where we meditate for an hour with a group of about a dozen people in one of the participants' homes. Then we pass around a talking rock and each person shares what is going on with them. Everyone is very real and I feel close to these people in a way that is disportionate to how long I've known them. Sitting together with the same group of people for an hour once a week creates an atmosphere of safety in which intimacy can grow. The person who is speaking and holding the rock speaks uninterrupted until they bow to the others and pass the rock to the next person. There is the option of passing and not saying anything. One women did a dance for her sharing that was so vividly emotionally expressive. Her sharing inspired me to think outside the box. Before the rock gets to me I work with the urge to prepare what I will say. I bring myself back from my compulsion to plan, presenting a certain image, to giving my total attention to the person sharing. I am working with my tendency to fake the funk. I notice when I feel relaxed and safe it is easier to share something I would really like support with. Soothing myself about wanting to fake the funk and being kind to myself about it fuels my courage to make myself emotionally vulnerable. I have always wanted to be part of a community. Various religious communities I have been a part of for short times end with me feeling that I am up against the dogma. The shoulds have felt like a constraint. It is refreshing to me to be part of this group.
I think my ego or personality strategy is faking the funk. I decided who I needed to be in my family to survive and then I pretended to be that person for so long I forgot I was more than that pretense.
Today I was talking with a client about pleasing. Pleasing behavior at its worst is faking the funk. It is imagining that we have to ignore what feels right to us and do what we think will make the other person love us and stick around. Then when the person we are pretzeling ourselves to please does stick around it proves to us that we aren't lovable as we are. Pausing and taking a breath when faced with another's desires gives a moment to move beyond automatic pilot to our own authentic desire. For those of us who tend to pretzel ourselves, Asking ourselves, what do I want or need here? can be very helpful. For" my way or the highway'"people who have a hard time taking other's wants into consideration taking a deep breath and really listening to what the other person wants can be very healing. I notice myself pretzeling and also sometimes pushing aggressively to get my way. I think there is an element of fear in both stances of not getting what we want. We pretzel or demand instead of being emotionally vulnerable by asking for what we want clearly and directly. It is my intention in writing this blog to let go of faking the funk as much as possible and to be kind to myself when I notice I am. Does the concept of faking the funk resonate with you? How?

This is the practice

I listened to a teleconference call this evening with Doug Bentley, a oneness trainer from India. He spoke about suffering and surrender. He said to remember in the midst of suffering that what is happening in each moment is the practice of moving toward awakening to all of who we are. Experiencing what is, is the path. Surrendering to what is in each moment is the practice.
Driving to teach yoga today I thought, I am so glad I have never locked myself out of the studio. One teacher forgot her keys and had to cancel her class. After that a lock box was installed.
Last Wednesday I had four people in my yoga class and I thought I was OK with that. Then I went to another teacher's class on Thursday and there were 22 people. I compared myself to her and decided that people weren't coming to my class because it wasn't as good as hers. I dreaded going to class today because I believed the story I had made up and was sure very few people would come. Fourteen students arrived and I got to see the power of my negative stories. I was able to forgive myself for clobbering myself with my story and realized again that judging my worth by how many people show up to my yoga class leaves me very vulnerable to outside validation. My intention is to enjoy teaching my class whoever shows up to take it. This process is ongoing. I was chuckling to myself about my process when I deftly locked the door to the office with my purse and keys in it. I had a momentary sinking feeling because my car key was also in my purse. I breathed and tapped in to the growing part of me that trusts that everything is OK. I found the lock box and tried the number I had written in my class folder. It didn't work. I had to climb up on a high ledge to reach the lock box and I fell and skinned my knee. I started to get very scared that this wouldn't work out and I would be stranded in the pouring rain without a car, unable to lock the studio. Luckily I had my appointment book with the owner's cell phone in it. My cell phone was in my purse but the insurance office downstairs was open. I reached the owner of the yoga studio and got the correct number for the lock box and relieved, went outside to open it. It didn't work. I called the owner back and repeated back to her what I had done. It turned out I had heard the number wrong. Sometimes it is such a challenge to have a hearing loss. The owner was very loving and the woman in the insurance office was very supportive. Now the box opened. The feeling of trust that everything is OK was nourished and grew. I am starting to see more and more after my almost flat tire of last week and my lock-out this week that the more I can include in what is OK
the more OK I am and life is. This is the practice.

inspired tire

Today I feel blessed. Yesterday I noticed my tire pressure light was on. I went to the gas station, found my tire pressure gauge and and checked my tires. For some people doing a task like checking their tire pressure is simple and easy. For me it represents a triumph. We all have different gifts. I am learning that if I push through my "I can't " pattern and tackle a mundane task I gain confidence in my ability to cope with the material plane and its challenges. My tires all seemed fine. Sometimes the tire pressure symbol comes on when the weather changes so I waited until today. When I drove to teach my yoga class it was still on. I decided to go to a service station I like on my way home from teaching.
Four people showed up for my class. Instead of feeling disappointment, as I have in the past, I celebrated that I had an even number of people and a small enough group to practice partner poses. The class was a welcome change for me and I think my students had fun. I could see that it represented a shift from my personality strategy of taking everything personally. Surrendering control and resisting blaming myself for what is, certainly allows me to enjoy myself more.
When I left the class I headed for the service station to get some help with the tires. The attendant found a stick embedded in and protruding from one tire. He said I would probaly need two tires and he couldn't order them and get the job done until tomorrow. It was raining hard so I didn't want to walk home from there. He filled the tire said I needed to handle it immediately as it would go flat very soon and recommended a nearby tire place. As I was driving there I remembered a tire place I had gone to previously and liked that was farther away. I took the chance and headed there. I was scared that my tire would go flat and I would be stranded in the pouring rain. Every light was red and I breathed and trusted that everything would be OK. Even the anxiety I was feeling was OK. I arrived at the tire place and they had my exact tire and said it would be fine to just replace the punctured one. The guy said he didn't work on commision so he could recommend what would really work the best. He said he could finish the tire in an hour. I had a client in an hour and called her to see if she could meet thirty minutes later. I reached her and it worked better for her to meet later. I had a delicious lunch at one of my favorite restaurants which was a short walk away. If I had to have a punctured tire this was the best case scenario. I was grateful it had gone so smoothly and people had been so helpful and that I had the money to buy a new tire. It also helped to expand the feeling that everything will be OK no matter what happens to me. Even though many challenges present themselves being OK is a constant. I notice that the more I am willing to include more things in what OK is the more OK I feel. Is there something in your life that in the past you wouldn't have known you were OK when it happened that you now know you are OK? Earned secure attachment is about being able to show up for ourselves in ways we couldn't before. It's knowing that we can comfort ourselves in the midst of what used to be intolerable. To me it represents a growing ability to contain and be there for myself instead of reacting. Self-soothing begets feeling safer in the world and the skillset of knowing what is really a threat and what isn't. Do you notice any ways the world feels safer to you than it used to? The challenge is to embrace this job of reparenting ourselves in a way that includes being present with more and more of what is in our experience. The little kids inside of us are learning to respond to love and acceptance. Maybe we are getting that more and more of all of who we are is OK. Maybe that makes the world feel more OK? As the world feels more OK the sense of the oneness that connects us all becomes more apparent. Maybe the awareness of that sense of oneness in our own small way is helping to transform the planet. I feel blessed to have this forum to share what I am learning. Thank you for listening.

mission accomplished

This blog is in purple. Purple was my Mom's favorite color when she remembered she had a favorite color. She had purple clothes and purple stuffed animals and a bumper sticker on her car that said,"I love purple!" Monnya and I went to Alamagordo, New Mexico last weekend to pick my Mom up and bring her to her new home in Boulder. We planned the trip to include a little side trip first to Ojo Calleinte hot springs and Sante Fe. It was so much fun to have that time for mother daughter bonding. Our love for each other is fierce and supportive as we push each other to stretch beyond our ideas about who we each can be. We went on a hike as it was getting dark that I think either of us would've been afraid to do on our own. I am so blessed to have her for a daughter and a friend. We have done the work to move into the role of adult friends with each other and it is very satisfying.
Then we headed toward Alamogordo where my mother has lived for four years. For the last year I have been feeling more and more dissatisfied and uncomfortable with the way the place was run. The caretakers are overworked and underpaid. They cared and had no time to really hang out with my Mom. It was a locked alzheimer's unit with no stimulation. I had the feeling that given more loving contact she would deteriorate less quickly. When I found Anam Chara, which means soul friend, I was so excited. It is in a house in a neighborhood and their intention is to nurture the residents in body mind and spirit. The director is passionate about his work and the contribution he is making. The people who work there really like working there. It is set up to feel like a family, not an institution. They have healthy real food and a beautiful yard with rosebushes and a pond.
When we arrived my sister had packed up all my Mom's stuff. She worked really hard for four years to manage my Mom's care. She resisted the move initially and then realized she was really ready for a break.
I woke up on Saturday morning with the word "grueling" drumming in my brain as I thought about leaving at 6am on Sunday and doing the trip in one day. For several weeks I had been going back and forth in my mind about whether to make the trip back to Boulder in two days or one. I went to see my mom early that morning and feeling her sweetness I wanted to make the trip be an adventure rather than a grueling attempt at transporting her as quickly as possible. Even though she is sometimes very out of it, her humanity shines through. She is much sweeter than she was before she lost her memory. She no longer cares that Gary isn't Jewish. She doesn't even know that she is.
We stayed in a nice motel and Monnya and I took care of her. The gods were with us and I didn't have to change one poopy diaper. I am willing to because she certainly did it for me and I was very relieved.
That morning when I woke up early to do my disciplines Monnya and my mom were each sleeping in their respective beds in the same position. I felt an almost unbearably deep tenderness for the two of them that brought me to tears. We are a sandwich the three of us and I am the filling in the middle.
It was so moving to watch Monnya feed my Mom. She said she was getting a baby fix which was really satisfying for her. Monnya went to walmart and bought Mom purple accessories so she could make a fashion statement upon her arrival. Mom looked so cute in her new purple knitted cap.
We arrived in Boulder and moved Mom into her new welcoming home. We decorated the room together and mom had dinner. It was healthy and delicious and I had some too. I left to go back to my Boulder house satisfyed that we had found Mom a place to live out the last stage of her life with dignity and even some fun. I feel such a sense of peace and joy. Rescue mission accomplished . Thanks for listening.

Moving Mom

It is good to be back to writing. I am adjusting slowly to having two houses and two lives. I am slowly building a life for myself in Boulder. Gary and I are both challenged by living together and we seem to be able to work most things out. The love between us seems to be deeper than our personality selves. It is helpful to bring ourselves back to that connection when our egos butt heads. The newest development is that on April 21st my daughter Monnya and I are going to Alamogordo New Mexico to pick up my Mom and move her to Boulder. I found a lovely, holistic place for her called Anam Chara. Anam Chara means soul friend. My Mom is in an advanced stage of Alzheimer's. It was a challenging time for my sister and I as we worked through the decision making process about whether to move Mom or not. The place she is isn't a bad place. Her body is maintained and the people who work with her are generally caring. They are also underpaid and overworked. There is little time to interact with the residents and my Mom gets very little stimulation. They have recently hired a part time activities director and things have gotten a little better. The new place is in a home and the people who work there consider themselves a family. They value the last stage of life and the passage from this life. The director is a conscious loving man and my fellow laughter leader is a caregiver. It is a not- for- profit organization that attracts lots of volunteers who come and spend time with the residents. This process has been a validation of trusting in my intuition. Although I was scared to pursue this move with my sister it felt so right to me from the beginning. Gary and I went to meet with the director. It was so helpful to have Gary's support. Right away I was struck by the director's kindness and his passion for running a sustainable business that would actually help people. I knew that if I had dementia Anam Chara is where I would want to be. I wanted that for my Mom. I know that even though my mother sometimes doesn't recognize me that she is still a being in there. I want her to be surrounded with people who get that. I want to be closer to her. This move is also for me. There is some kind of a circle of completion about me caring for my mom. Even though her parenting was often wounding she loved me the best she was capable of. It's good to have a concrete way to give back. I am so glad that Monnya will be driving down with me to get Mom. We will have some connecting time together and I so appreciate her help. My sister will help us pack Mom up. This process has been very healing for my sister and I. We have come to a better understanding of each other and there is more space for us to express our love now. We are very different and are also great teachers for each other. She is a master of the material plane where I am often challenged. I am afraid and excited about how this will impact my life. My life feels so full. I want to use the feeling of overwhelm to know that I need to ask for help from my family and friends and also from my spiritual support. I want to remember to use the burning in my chest and the shortness of my breath and the tension in my shoulders to know I need to draw my circle around myself and breathe deeply and soothe myself. I need to say 'of course' to my feeling overwhelmed and hold myself tenderly. I need to speak to myself gently. I know that the way I speak to myself or my self-talk influences how I feel about myself and how I see the world. I am learning to speak to myself as I would to my daughter rather than as how my mother spoke to me. I am reparenting myself. What do you notice about your self-talk? Can you use the awareness of bullying yourself to remember the need for compassion? What would be a compassionate way for you to speak to yourself? Imagine you are a being filled with compassion that could actually shift your neural pathways with comfort. Ask for help if you don't know what to say.Would you be willing to set a conscious intention to practice conscious kindness?

Of course

Tomorrow is my birthday. I am not working except for teaching yoga. It feels good to have the morning to myself. I have no set plans. I'd like to meditate and do yoga and maybe go for a walk. I will teach my yoga class at noon and then Gary is coming to Denver for the afternoon and evening. I really appreciate that he is coming down here given that he is not a fan of the big city. I am glad to spend my birthday with him. The women in my singing group encouraged me to ask for what I wanted rather than not ask. He was happy to come down to Denver to be with me for my birthday. It was validating for me to ask for what I wanted even though he might be annoyed. I grew up associtating anger and displeasure with love being withdrawn. I am learning to tolerate my anxiety about my imagined level of Gary's displeasure and to do what I need to do to take care of myself. I am getting much more skilled at firmly and kindly saying what I want to do and inviting him along rather than sacrificing the activities that bring me pleasure and blaming him. This weekend we did yoga and went hiking which I wanted to do and went to a cello concert and Rumi poetry reading which he wanted to do. It is getting easier to have time to myself without picking a fight to get it. I genuinely want Gary to be happy and I am realizing more and trusting more that he wants me to be happy too. I am starting to feel less threateded by his personality patterns, except when I do. I think becoming more forgving of myself makes it easier to be less reactive with him. I have been practicing noticing when I am being reactive with him which usually means I will begin fantacizing about how to get out of the relationship. When I notice this I acknowledge myself, Woo hoo. you noticed. That moves me from unconscious incompetence to conscious incompetence. Although it is painful to be in that loop of obsession about feeling trapped and wanting to run, noticing the loop helps ease the pain and makes it easier to comfort myself. I imagine once again that loving grandmother person saying to me, "Of course Of course when you are threatened by something Gary does you want to run away. That means you are scared and triggered about something and you need your own attention. Could you be curious and ask yourself what really is going on here?"
Soothing myself and exploring what is really going on is a plan to become consciously competent. Often I am afraid about something from the past. When I want to run I am often triggered back to a time when I got small instead of asking for what I wanted. I felt trapped and powerless because I never knew what to expect from my mother. Sometimes she would be loving and kind and generous and other times she would be mean and angry. My task is to learn to comfort myself when I feel afraid rather than criticize myself. In that way I can be the mom to myself that I know what to expect from. Wanting to run is a pattern I developed in response to my fear. When I was a teenager at a social function where I felt awkward and uncomfortable I would go outside and run until I was exhausted. I literally would run away. In my adult life I have often threateded the bond by threatening to leave a relationship when I am afraid that I can't get what I want. I have made progress in that I no longer vent this to Gary. He feels much safer in our relationship since I'm not threatening to leave.
Can you notice what you do when you feel threatened? Could you become aware of that automatic pilot behavior, imagine that loving grangmother being holding you and saying of course and gently and lovingly ask yourself, "What is really going on here? What needs my attention?"

shoulds

When my singing group got cancelled for tonight my first thought after, ah shucks was woo hoo I get to write my blog. It is exciting to see the energy that comes when I let go of a should and allow the organic flow of creative desire to express itself. A time in the past when I had a clear letting- go- of- should lesson was when I realized how much I hated doing laundry. I was making myself do laundry once a week and I always dreaded it. So I bought a whole bunch of underwear and gave myself permission to wash my clothes when the spirit moved me. Before my underwear was used up or maybe after I had washed some out by hand, the unfamiliar desire to wash my clothes emerged. I washed them with enjoyment. Since then I actually like doing laundry. There's something about having the freedom to say no that allows a yes to emerge. It is so much fun to have this evening with no plans that I am considering working in the evenings
as little as possible. It feels like a luxury to have the whole evening to myself.
Today someone I work with was speaking about being in a challenging period in her life and that she felt strong enough to know that feeling yucky was only temporary. She has developed enough comfort with her emotional self to know that being on the verge of tears a lot doesn't mean there is something wrong with her. She is letting the experience of what she is feeling right now be an opportunity to show up for herself with compassion. Comforting ourselves with compassion rather than bullying ourselves when we are feeling uncomfortable feelings heals the part of us that thinks we need to be someone different than we are to be OK. Another person is noticing when he is criticized he tends to criticize himself for how he reacts. He feels small and shrinks himself and feels inadequate, like the critisism coming from outside of him means there is something wrong with him. Instead he can learn to show up for himself and say to himself, "I am here for you. I care about your suffering. I love you just as you are even in the face of the energy of external criticism. Criticizing ourselves for how we react to criticism is two steps away from compassion. We can start with comforting ourselves and soothing the scared little boy or girl inside who may still think that someone else's displeasure means we aren't loved. In close relationships people get triggered and express displeasure. The challenge is to expand our window of tolerance for the anxiety that having another person be pissed off at us engenders. We have to allow ourselves to be uncomfortable and allow other people to be uncomfortable so we can grow. So when Gary is mad at me I need to soothe myself. I need to let myself know I am proud of myself for hanging out with the discomfort without getting defensive. Or when I do get defensive to acknowledge myself with compassion for noticing I am withdrawing or attacking. I notice tone of voice has so much to do with skillful anger. I work hard in my relationship to keep contempt out of my voice even if my insides are dripping with it like an ice cream cone on a hot summer day. Contempt is an attack and it is natural to respond defensively to an attack. I notice when I am feeling contempt it usually masks fear. I go one-up and look down on Gary instead of being vulnerable about what is really going on with me. It is easier for me to focus on what's wrong with him than it is to clearly and directly express what I want. I had plenty of time to practice on our trip to Mexico. I am grateful to have had eleven days to be together in such a beautiful place. This is a different font and I can't find the one I was in. ( I should find the right font.I can't just change fonts in the middle of a blog. Even after I looked I can't- another opportunity to let go of a should.) Oh well........In general although Gary and I were challenged by having to make decisions every day about how to spend our time alone and/or together we were mostly respectful with each other. I allowed myself to notice my shoulds and to be conscious of what I wanted and to take Gary into consideration too. It seemed like he did the same. The thing I love about our relationship is that we work on things until we at least come to a place where we can validate each other's truth. We can come to a place where each of us can get where the other is coming from and have some understanding of why even if we don't like it. It has meant letting go of a should I have had about processing until resolution no matter how long it takes. Issues may not resolve themselves right away. Some things really take time to get clear how both people can get their needs met and require tableing for the moment.
What do you notice about your own shoulds. Are you willing to ask one familiar well-used should to step aside for a while to allow the shyer elf of desire to venture forth?