Monnya

Today I got to spend time with my daughter Monnya. She is doing some work for me at my house. It is such a joy to spend time with her. Her resourcefulness and creativity contribute so much to my life. So far she is painting and organizing. I have a lovely bright new upstairs hallway and a partly reorganized art room. One prerequisite to doing art projects is to be able to find the stuff needed to do them. Now at least there is more of a chance that my artist soul can be expressed. I need to set aside time and follow through. My yoga training is over tomorrow so some space will be created. I am grateful that it is over. I will be glad to have the time and energy returned. Eight weeks of Thursday nights, Friday nights and five hours each Saturday has been a huge time committment. I have learned to be much more mindful of my body and not to take strength and health for granted. I am more relaxed about my spiritual practices- trusting more in the big picture and worrying less about day to day. It has been very satisfying to be part of a learning community and to feel safe and close to my fellow students. Something clicked into place in my brain and I understand much more about how hips and knees work- anatomy makes sense to me now. I think I will be a better yoga teacher and a more aware person having done this training. It has been very difficult and challenging and doing another advanced yoga training in its present form is probably not a good idea for my body. Pretzel poses and my non-pretzel body are not a good mix. It is humbling to accept and honor my physical limitations. I do want to age gracefully. Part of that is realizing that my body is changing. At least I feel wiser. Wisdom is a nice bennny of aging. Speaking of aging I have been feeling kind of old and dried up partly from the effects of the surgery and partly from jumping into this training so soon after the surgery. I have been thinking about cutting my hair to lighten up. Monnya cut my hair today. It is short and sassy.
I feel lighter and younger. It is just what I needed. She did a great job. She cuts her own hair and her fiance Issac's hair and I trusted she knew what she was doing.We did it in the backyard and I surrendered control without looking in a mirror. Monnya inspires me to be spontaneous and to take risks. She is a good teacher. All the dead hair is gone and I emerge a new woman ready for the next era of my life.

Shoulds

It is late and I spent too much time reading about teaching yoga and answering e-mails. I'm not sure I can write anything intelligible. (or even that I can spell intelligible) Usually I use a dictionary to check my spelling which can be an area of great challenge. I don't want to look up the word right now, so I'm not going to. Allowing myself not to look up the word intelligible in the dictionary made me curious enough to see how to spell it and look it up. This is a good lesson. When I try to bully myself into doing something with my "shoulds" (shoulding on myself by saying," You probably spelled that word wrong. You are too lazy to see how to spell it right. Don't you care enough to do it right?") I meet with resistance. I dig my heels in and drag my feet or avoid doing it at all. When I allow myself to not do what I think I should and speak to myself kindly about it, space is created for my natual desire to bubble up. How is that true in other areas? In my home yoga and medition practice I used to do an hour of each in order to feel good about doing enough. Before my yoga training started I realized that my spiritual practice had become a should. It became harder and harder to do. During my yoga training, after injuring my knee, I gave myself permission to do only what I could and only what felt right to me in my home practice.
Cross-legged meditation was out and so were many of my regular poses. I learned to sit in a chair for shorter periods of time and to do poses more mindfully and gently. I have worked back up to a half hour of each. I want to let go of my tendency to be rigid about this and expect myself from now on to do an hour of practice. If I move the shoulds out of the way my natural desire to do yoga and to meditate gets to bubble up and I engage in my spiritual practice being more present. Isn't that the point? Each day will look different informed by what my body mind and spirit want that day because I am listening to what that is. That is surely the point. Can you relate? What would it be helpful for you to look at about any of your shoulds?

Play

Today I went for a walk in the rain. A fine mist was falling and it felt like getting a facial. My skin drank it up like a cool drink on a hot day. It was delicious. I imagine the plants and trees and flowers liked it too. When it is overcast colors seem so much more vivid. As I walked through the park the greens of the grass and trees and the pinks purples and reds of the flowers seemed to jump out into my outstretched eyes. I felt childlike and carefree walking in the rain. It felt easy to greet strangers because they were part of the tribe of rainwalkers. As I approached my street two boys who looked about ten and twelve were playing on a pogo stick. I stood and watched and the little girl inside me was very excited. I had a pogo stick when I was growing up and I spent hours on it. A great deal of concentration was required to keep jumping and not go flying off it. I got so I could stay on it for many jumps. This was something I could be good at even though I was overweight and not very athletic. Seeing these boys jumping in the middle of the street brought it all back to me. I screwed up my courage and asked if I could try their pogo stick. They were very generous and said sure and didn't even roll their eyes at each other. I climbed on and started to jump and the rhythm came back to me. I jumped about ten times and then jumped off. They were impressed and that was fun. I thanked them warmly and said goodbye and continued on my way. It felt wonderful in two ways. One was that I put myself out there and asked for what I wanted. Two was that I did something I wouldn't normally do that the little girl inside me was excited about. As I walked on I could feel waves of pleasure-walking in the rain having jumped on a pogo stick. One of the reasons it was so much fun to be a Mom to a young child was because I got to do playful things a lot.
Now that Monnya is grown up once a year I hang out with my ten year old friend Danielle and we play. Even though I am usually exhausted when she goes home I so enjoy keeping up with her boundless playfulness and creativity. I think it's one reason people love to be with grandchildren so they have another opportunity to play. Today was different.I let myself play without the excuse of having another kid around besides me. In the future I'd like to look for opportunities to be playful just because it's fun. I bet Andie (the little girl inside me) has lots of great ideas. I want to expand what I think of as fun and bravely risk being foolish even more than I already do. Laughter yoga is a great opportunity to be silly and playful. The group I love meets Mondays at noon at the Unitarian Church on 14th and Lafayette in Denver. www.Denverlaughs.com Come and give it a try if the spirit moves you. It's a great way to practice letting go and laughing for no reason.
What will give your inner child a chance to play? Maybe it would be good to ask and see what your inner little boy or girl would like to do that sounds like fun. Then take a deep breath and let yourself do it.

Keep going

I had a problem jaw. It cracked and popped and the muscles never relaxed. When I am sleeping I clench my teeth. I also have had a strong intuitive feeling for a long time that my tight jaw and my difficulty with hearing were related. The chiropractor/healer I have been working with has supported me on my quest to find a dentist that could help me. We were looking for a dentist who could create a plastic splint for my mouth that could balance my jaw and not harm the rest of my body. In the past dentists were unwilling to listen to Dr. Allen Berger's expertise about integrating the whole body in the creation of a devise for the jaw. About six months ago I realized my current dentist couldn't help me with what he had to offer. This was the forth dentist in five years and altogether involved a huge investment of time and money. At first I was dicouraged . Then I decided it was important enough to me to keep pursuing my vision of a balanced jaw in a healthier body with the possibility of clearer hearing. I did an internet search for Holistic Dentists and interviewed all of them. I chose Dr. Eileen McGinty because she seemed real and knowledgeable and open to the idea of each body part effecting the whole.
(Even though I looked them up in the dictionary the difference between effect and affect alludes me. If you have any ideas about when to use each of them please let me know.)
Dr. McGinty made me a splint that tightened up my back and neck. I couldn't wear it and I asked her to speak to Dr. Berger.When they talked on the phone the professional collaboration I had hoped for wasn't created. I felt hopless about getting a splint that would help my jaw. Dr. McGinty's assistant adjusted my splint and my neck and back were even worse. Then I asked Dr. McGinty if she was open to Dr. Berger coming to her office. When I explained that he could muscle test my body to see how it was being affected by the splint and help her to adjust it accordingly, she was willing. The three of us met today. Everyone was openhearted toward each other. When I closed my eyes went into my circle and checked in with myself, I felt that everything would be O.K. By the way if my definition of O.K. is broad enough, everything is always O.K. The collaboration between the two doctors was heartwarming. Both of them were advocating for my well-being rather than for their own egos. It was thrilling to me to walk out of there with a splint that actually helps my body relax and let go. I am glad I kept going even when I was afraid it wouldn't work out. Is there something in your life that you have given up on or pulled your energy back from that could use another round of your attention? It could be worth it. It was for me.
Tomorrow is Gary's 60th birthday. I will be up in the mountains and will write again Sunday or Monday or Tuesday. I hope you enjoy yourself on this Memorial Day weekend.

Body

I just erased a half done blog about an article I read about Tantra, an ancient eastern philosophy. It was starting to sound pedantic and heady. Since Tantra is about embracing experience fully and seeing everything as divine I decided to delete what I had written in honor of Tantra. The article is helping me to understand that different parts of me are not beter or worse than others. In non-dualistic Tantric philosophy the body and physical experience are seen as an aspect of the spiritual whole, not a second class citizen to be transcended in order to be holy. Today I was aware of the gorgeous warm sunny day and the movement of my body through space within it. I was so grateful to be in a body to be able to have this physical experience. This is very heightened right now because my body has been in pain from various injuries for the past few weeks. Walking through the park I felt grateful to be moving without pain. I realized how much I take for granted that my body doesn't hurt when it doesn't. When my body isn't in pain I am free to think about other things and forget I have a body.I want to start appreciating my body when it isn't screaming for my attention. Through my injuries I have learned to be more mindful of what my body is doing so I don't unconsciously hurt myself. This is the next step- to begin to honor my body because I have one. What would that look like? Some people who really enjoy making love understand paying attention to being aware of sensation and focusing on the body. I am a beginner in this area. It is very challenging for me to relax and get out of my head. I look forward to becoming more skillful at surrendering distractions sexually and being able to be more present. I have had glimpses in my life that making love can bring me closer to a sense of oneness with all there is- being in a body is a prerequisite. Gary is a good teacher. I am grateful. More later on sexuality. That's about as vulnerable as I can handle being right now.
Getting regular body work would be another way to honor the body. It is easy for me to get body work when I am hurting and I rarely get a massage or other body work when I just want to relax and treat my body kindly. Yoga and walking or any kind of physical exercize done with the idea of honoring the body rather than whipping it into shape also shows appreciation.
Noticing the things I do that aren't kind to my body would be helpful. What do I feed my body and how much sleep do I give it? Do I push myself beyond my energy instead of resting?
What is your relationship with your body like right now? How could you use your daily life to consciously honor your body?

Desperate Housewives

I have a confession to make. I am watching the season finale of Desperate Housewives, a two hour parade of worst-case scenarios. I was attempting to write a blog about spending the day at Shoshoni Yoga Retreat. I went up there as part of my yoga training with other four students. I was going to write about what a healing day I had. I was writing during the commercials. I would come in here after some horrible violent scene (I think they make the finales more violent to hold your attention until next season). In my defense, this is the only show I watch and I have seen about six of them. Gary loves this show and we have been watching it together. However, the responsibility doesn't fall on his shoulders. I watched Thirtysomething every week for years. Then I made my daughter watch Sisters every Tuesday night for most of her childhood.
I am hooked by soap operas that have a psychological bent. This one tonight had a scene where a troubled husband who had to give up his step-daughter because she lied and said her step-mother burned her, let go of his seething anger enough to declare his undying love for his wife to save a gay couple who were in danger of cancelling their committment ceremony. There was love between a mother and a daughter and a life reclaimed from terror based lies- high drama.The show was intense violent and riveting. Now I get to go to sleep with all of this on my mind. I often tell people who have trouble sleeping to do something calming and soothing before they go to sleep. This show was definitely not that. Maybe there is a twelve step group for people who want to give up soap operas. Maybe I can attend enough meetings to avoid watching it next season. What a day. A yoga retreat filled with a gorgeous mountain hike, healthy food, meditation, a gentle yoga class that soothed and stretched my aching body, and then two hours of Desperate Housewives. I wish I could think of something wise and useful to say in conclusion. I guess the important thing is to embrace it all without judgement. Or maybe the best I can do is to be present with the judgement and know I am doing the best I can. You are too.
It's all a part of this dance we call life. I'm going to go meditate and go to bed. Sweet dreams.

Food

I had blood tests today as a follow up to my surgery. I fasted and I am still a little spacey and lightheaded. I was aware of how much simpler my life is when I don't have to deal with food. There seemed to be so much time for me to do what I wanted to do without being distracted by meal planning, food preparation and eating. Yesterday when I knew I was going to fast, I was focused on food and eating all day. In the height of my eating disorder in my late twenties and thirties I would fast for a week and break the fast with a pizza or a cheesecake. I have come a long way in releasing my attachment to food as love. However, I am aware that I still am very fearful of gaining weight and being fat.
I take a moment to go into my circle and say to myself, "I can understand that you feel that way. I care about your suffering. May you be free from suffering." Then I go down inside my body and breathe into the fear. I am aware of the fat little girl inside of me who medicated her pain with food. I feel compassion and love for her. It has taken many years for me to forgive myself for being fat. I blamed that little girl for years and felt strong aversion toward her. I couldn't look at a picture of myself as a kid without cringing. As I was more willing to feel the pain that I stuffed under food I began to see her strategy as a brilliant survival solution. As a child, I learned to soothe myself with sweet treats when I felt strong emotion. This protected me from feeling anxious and unloved. As I faced that old pain with the help of good therapists, I could release the pattern of coping with my feelings of abandonment by abandoning myself to overeating. As my willingness to be present with my pain expanded so did my ability to tolerate the anxiety that tells me to eat when I'm not hungry. I have a picture myself at age eight in my office. When I look at her I feel her sadness and I am grateful to her that she went through what she did to help get me to where I am now.
Fasting last night let me see how far I've come in my relationship with food. I also notice I've been falling into some old unhealthy patterns of eating when I'm not hungry. I want to bring kind alert attention to myself to be more mindful about what is going on with me that I've been thinking needs to be medicated with food. Then I want to be with whatever that is instead of knee-jerking to eat on top of it. In that way I can show up for myself instead of using food to stuff my feelings.
What is your relationship with food like lately? Would it be useful to pay attention and see what you notice?