creativity

So this time I don't even care if this is black or purple or green. This is my creative outlet and I feel such a strong need to express myself creatively that I don't care what it looks like. Sometimes it is OK to just be myself warts and all no matter what I imagine people will think of me. Imagine should be in bold and if my computer did bold it would be. So much of what I think other people are thinking is a story I made up about what other people are thinking. So much of what I think other people are thinking about me is what I am thinking about myself that I am projecting on to other people. When I can recognize this and acknowledge myself for noticing I can take back the projection and own it. I can imagine that you are thinking that anyone else would have been able to figure out how to get this blog to work like it used to. I can recognize the projection and take it back owning that thinking I am incompentent because I don't know what I don't know is my story and not yours. Then I can bring compassion to myself for my story and get underneath it to what I am feeling and show up for myself with loving awareness.
I see the little girl inside me who thinks if she only does enough she will prove that there is nothing wrong with her. If she only shows up for enough other people and is authentic enough and helps them enough she will feel she is worthwhile. If only I could make my parents be happy I would feel very special. I would also feel safe.
I love that little girl inside me so much. I love Andie for how hard she tried to prove she was lovable. I know she is lovable and always was regardless of what she did or didn't do, regardless of how fat she was, regardless of who was or wasn't happy around her. I am even lovable and worthwhile whether or not I express myself creatively and whether I write this blog or not. What I do or don't do doesn't determine my worth as a person. I love myself for who I am. I even love myself for not being loving with myself. I even love myself for thinking you need to think I am a really good writer to be OK. What if it was OK to love myself for all of who I am even the parts I find repugnant? Actually, I find the part that thinks parts of me are repugnant, repugnant. Ohhhh, I notice you master disser, passer on of repugnancy judgements and I see you.. I see you and I hold you in acceptance for who you are. I love the part of me that needs to be writing this and the part of me that is judging myself for not going to sleep because I am too exhausted to write well enough to even do this. I love that I used the word I about a gazillion times and I love the part of me that judges me for that. And I love all of you for reading this and appreciating me for who I am. I love that I wrote this and I am going to publish it and that I feel so much better than when I started writing. Thank you for listening and may you allow yourself to express yourself in whatever way lets you be in touch with your own precious aliveness. Or not.

what is is

Today I thought I would be in a workshop. I had planned to sign up for weeks. Something held me back everytime I went on-line to register. By the time I got around to registering yesterday the workshop was full. In the brochure it said "register early this workshop will fill up." I chose to think that was an advertising ploy. I was angry with myself for procrastinating and being naive about expecting the workshop to be available to me. I considered going to the workshop this morning and seeing if I could get in. I kept hearing my inner voice say, "Go to the workshop." That was confusing. Then I realized that I had set aside this whole day to attend this workshop and that was the only way I would allow myself a day with no plans. So now I have this whole delicious day to do what I want to do. What a luxury.
This blog is still not allowing me to write in color or make it bold or in italics. I asked for help from blogger and someone offered a suggestion which isn't working either. I notice the temptation to feel like a failure and use this experience to prove my core belief that there is something wrong with me. Woo hoo I noticed. What a gift to notice that I can use anything that happens to me to prove there is something wrong with me. I can be unkind and bully myself or I can notice that I want to be unkind and bully myself and celebrate my noticing. I want to say" You are sooo stupid anyone else could figure this out!" I feel the neural brain rut calling to me to complete one more circle continuing on automatic pilot doing what I've always done. Yet the witness is there now. She gently smiles and says, "Aw that must be so painful. " She gathers me up in her arms and holds me close. She tells me she loves me and that she understands that I am sad and angry and hurt and that it all makes sense to her. She lets me know that it is OK that I don't know how to do something and that doesn't mean I am stupid or there is something wrong with me. I go to pick my nails and realize I am doing it. I know this is what I do when I feel anxious. I can love myself for my anxiety. I was scared for a reason. I can bring compassion for myself when I start to pick my nails. That is the witness. She stands silently by noticing what is. She is there to observe what I am doing and support me in being all that I am. I am grateful to her. I am grateful to have her. I am grateful to be her. Whenever I can bring awareness to what I am doing that is the witness. She doesn't care if my blog is black or purple. She doesn't think that my worth as a person depends on the color of my blog. She notices what is and smiles kindly. The inner critic and the witness dance together with the witness noticing the inner critic and gently smiling. The witness doesn't need to judge the inner critic, feel threateded by it or make me wrong for it being there. She just notices and smiles kindly. She is the part of me that can love myself for hating myself. I have been able to be more compassionate with myself for hating myself. "Aw that must be so painful to believe there is something wrong with you." I can feel my own love for myself and for Andie, the little girl inside me. I am healing myself with my own love. I am so grateful. Right now Andie wants to go for a bikeride and I want to go meditate and do yoga. I am done writing for now. See if you can notice the witness gently smiling and saying yes, "I see you, what is, is."

Applause

I am on Gary's computer and the settings are working. I still haven't figured out how to get them to work on mine. I am happy to be able to write in blue. Colored words seem so much more joyful. I just returned from a weekend vipassana retreat with Peter Williams called contacting joy. It was a very powerful retreat experience. I am so blessed to be able to go on retreat for a whole weekend. I had misgivings about spending the whole weekend at a retreat because summer seems to be moving so quickly. I am glad I pushed through my ambivalence which was at least partly fear. I appreciate that Gary and I attended this retreat together. Our spiritual connection is the strongest value for both of us. It helps to counteract the areas where our relationship is not as strong.
Saturday was about looking at what we need to let go of that is in the way of happiness. We worked a lot with judging mind. I am always amazed that sitting for a long period of time makes such a big difference in the quality of my life. I had the opportunity to sit with some very strong emotions this weekend. I learned that I could. Peter gave us several practices which are similar to my work with myself and others and that was very validating. He spoke of the importance of awareness and compassion in working with our thoughts. One practice he presented was to celebrate bringing ourselves back when our mind wanders off. He stressed the importance of sitting with whatever comes up and going beneath the story to the body sensation.
Today was about focusing on the good. He shared about John Gottman's research that for couples it takes five positive comments to counteract a negative one. He shared about counting blessings and said that he and his wife do a nightly practice of counting their blessings with each other before bed.
He had us focus on someone we care about experiencing happiness and tune into them and say," May you always be happy, May your happiness continue to increase, I'm glad you are happy." I sat with this form of well-wishing with my daughter seeing her performing on aerial fabric being in her joy. By sending these messages of sympathic joy I could feel joy about her joy. It was uplifting for me. I also felt like I was supporting her in her goal to perform more. One of the most powerful practices of the weekend were one sitting meditation and one walking meditation focusing sympathetic joy on ourselves. We focused on a time we felt really happy and peaceful and said to ourselves," May I always be happy. May my happiness continue to increase, I'm glad you are happy" The goal of this practice is to become more open-hearted toward ourselves rather than to actually always be happy. Suffering can be a very positive growth inducer. Peter asked us how many of us came to meditation practice just because things were going so well and we wanted to check it out. Only one person raised his hand. The rest of us began meditation practice because of the intensity of our suffering in order to create change and growth. When I began practicing meditation regularly I was in the height of my compulsive eating disorder and was so anxious I could barely sit still. It's hard to imagine that I actually could even practice. I knew it was a last resort and I am grateful that I listened to my screaming soul. Meditation practice is a time to come to ourselves with an intention of connecting to the wellspring of love that is underneath all of our suffering. We can use the vehicle of our suffering to be with ourselves and bring love to ourselves in the midst of the suffering. When we can bring awareness and loving kindness to ourselves in the midst of our suffering something shifts. Even loving ourselves for hating ourselves is more loving than hating ourselves for hating ourselves. IThe retreat has helped me feel more access to the part of me that wants to focus on what I am grateful for. What I appreciate about my life seems clearer and stronger. I appreciate all of you who read this blog and who support me in my process with your attention. Thank you. What are three things you appreciate about your life? Would you be willing to give yourself a round of applause simply for being you. Hear my hands clapping for all of us as you clap yours.
Love,
Andrea

the sun and the north wind

I can't get the color and other settings to register. I guess this will be another black and white good enough blog. I am tempted to give up and do it tomorrow. Yet the cretive urge is here and my muse hasn't been visiting very often lately. Turning her away because the appearance of my blog doesn't fit my pictures seems so rude. My muse doesn't take well to rejection. When I'm not available to answer her call too many times she feels abandoned and shuts her heart down. I do the same thing when I feel abandoned by Gary. I shut down my heart and start making him wrong and think I need to leave our relationship. I am learning that my ambivalence is really a symptom of my unwillingness to be emotionally vulnerable. That has been the next step after accepting that I am ambivalent. I hate feeling needy. Gary has been out of town for 2 1/2 weeks and rather than allowing myself to miss him I have been plotting my case against him. Tonight I told him what was going on with me and he listened. He is getting very good at hearing my process and just getting it. He has had a lot of practice. When I am feeling abandoned and have shut my heart down it really helps for me to make myself vulnerable and tell Gary what I am feeling. It's hard to feel close to him when I am feeling flat and pissed. I am learning that bringing my attention to feeling abandoned and comforting myself heals the pain of abandoning myself when I feel abandoned by Gary. I can soothe myself for noticing what I am feeling and comfort myself that it is OK to feel it. When I can comfort myself it makes it safe to talk to Gary.
Today I read a story about the north wind and the sun. They were trying to see who could make a human take his coat off. The north wind went first and blew cold wind round and round the person trying to blow his coat off with blasts of cold. The man shivered and drew his coat around him tighter. Then the sun gently warmed the man until he opened his coat and then gradually took it off. The story is about how much better warmth works than cold blasts of wind. Bullying ourselves seems to me to be like cold blasts of wind. Comfort and compassion feel like the warmth of the sun. I think it is important to treat ourselveds with the warmth of the sun if there is something we want to change. I want to learn to go under my ambivalence to the insecure little girl crying for attention and bring lovingkindness to both of us. It is easy to make up a story about Gary and not get the benefit from looking within. As Michael brown says in the Presence Process, " Dissmiss the messenger and get the message." My message is to show up for myself and for the little girl inside me who feels neglected and be with myself with all that I am feeling. Is there a little person inside you who feels neglected? Would you be willing to slow down and give her or him some focused attention? Would you be willing to bring that little child the warmth of the sun?

Warts and all

Ah, I am up in Boulder this week. I am doing whatever I want. Gary is out of town and I decided to come up here and spend some time alone settling in. Living in two places I sometimes feel scattered and have difficulty focusing. Other times I am filled with gratitude to have two comfortable and lovely places to live.
Spending time with myself this week I have been very aware of my pattern of noticing what is missing and judging myself for it. I went to an enneagram class last night taught by Rene Rosario on core beliefs. Core beliefs get instilled in early childhood in an attempt to adapt and survive our family of origon. Core beliefs color our perception of the world and paint themselves over and over reinforcing themselves. They are usually an unconscious and automatic filter we overlay onto our world. The healing that is available is to begin to be aware of the core belief when it is proving itself true, and stretch to recognize it and open to other options. For example according to Rene who gleaned it from Helen Palmer,the core belief of the four is:
A painful loss of original connection leaves a terrible feeling of deficiency and a sense that something vitally important and special is missing which must be regained. Hence, my walking through life feeling like I am doing it wrong. Moreover, I am doing it wrong because there is something wrong with me. I don't have the (Fill in the blank- creativity, intuition, intelligence, strength,) to do what other people can do.
The good news is that when I notice how true this core belief feels and how my life seems to be proving it to me I can use that to acknowledge my suffering. If I can be kind to myself about my suffering it breaks through the haze of the core belief and reveals the shining present moment where I am free to chose. One thing that has been helpful is when I am bullying myself about doing it wrong I can use Byron Katie's question" Do I absolutely know this is true? " I have been bullying myself about my ambivalence about my relationship with Gary. Today I noticed how I use noticing that to judge myself as a loser and think there is somehing wrong with me. "Noone else has these kind of doubts after six years." Do I absolutely know it is true that noone else does that? No. The truth is I do. I held myself in love about hating myself. When I brought compassion to my suffering I could see that my ambivalence doesn't mean there is something wrong with me. It does mean that I am very challenged to accept another human being for who they are. It makes complete sense when I can see the pattern as a reflection of what I feel about myself. So, when I am lost in making Gary wrong and myself wrong for being with him I can see my suffering and show up for myself and chose myself warts and all. I do chose myself warts and all. I want to use my awareness to bring kindness to my perception of my own warts. What if my warts are the secret healers to my idea that I have a fatal flaw? What if I could start a practice of everytime I discover an unlovable wart I love myself for not loving it. I notice the judgement that I have excessively used the word "I" billions of times in this blog. I notice that I exaggerate and have a need to be dramatic. I see the path to self-hate looming as I decide whether to go down it or not. It is so well-worn and familiar. I pause, and ask for help. A gentle spirit wrapped in diaphonous purple robes meets me at the trailhead with a glass of cool water, a smile and a warm hug. She is so happy to see me and has been waiting for a long time. I allow her to hold me and I feel my heart begin to fill up with her love. It is contageous, much more than warts and I begin to feel my own love for myself slowly spreading out from the center of my heart. The colors green and violet, of the feeling I call "Thank you God" come into my field of vision. I feel them in my body. The salve of gratitude is a heart opener which leads to a wart melter. I am ambivalent and I deserve great love. I actually have great love from my partner Gary. His love for me has been so strong and solid. Although his preference would be that I am consistently rooted in undying admiration for him he loves me ambivalence and all. I can learn from him. We are committed to learning and growing together. What a blessing. I chose to use my ambivalence to love myself and Gary. Why not?
Do you have a wart that you have deemed unacceptable that you could use as a vehicle for bringing conscious kindness to yourself? Have at it! I send you love for the journey.

Practices

Last night, Gary, his friend Tom, I, and 1000 other people experienced Braco. (pronounced Bras-co) It was an event where this croatian guy stands on a podium and silently gazes out at the audience for what seemed like about half an hour. Everyone was completely silent. I felt a very strong sense of well-being and waves of energy moving through my body similar to creas or energy releases that sometimes happen in meditation. These sessions had been going on for two days. Ours was the last and the largest. It also featured the voice of Braco. As his voice began to be piped into the sound system I experienced strong anxiety because I couldn't understand what he was saying at all. I started to go off into a story about the woes of my hearing challenges. Aware of what I was doing, ( conscious incompetence- or the awareness of a habitual automatic behavior) I was kind to myself about being in mid-story and brought myself back to the present. I listened in a more focused way, trying to understand what he was saying and realized he was speaking in croatian. I had a giggle to myself and then hung out with the sounds.
I'm not sure how it works or what it was all about exactly and I felt very loving today. I am glad I followed my intuition to go to the event. When I listen to that still, small voice it is always validation to listen some more. I am living my life by honoring that voice more and more.
Two practices came to me this week that I would like to share with you:
One is the stay here mantra. First you draw your circle around yourself in the air- a symbol of sacred space that's made sacred by bringing yourself your own attention.
On an inhalation you say to yourself silently STAY
When you exhale you say to yourself silently HERE
You keep focusing on your breath and repeating stay as you breathe in and here as you breathe out. It is a way to gently call yourself home to this present moment and to being with yourself in your circle. I have been using it both as part of my meditation practice and in my daily life to call myself back when I wander off into a story or feel anxious. It has been very helpful. Tone of voice is important: the stay here is spoken in a kind inviting voice, rather than a voice you would use when training your dog.
The second practice is to place your hand over your heart and feel your love for yourself. Even if it is the size of the head of a pin. Breathe into that love and let yourself feel it in your heart, imagining your love growing and your heart filling. Say to yourself, "I love you and use your name. When I feel my own love for myself and say, I love you Andrea, I imagine that my love goes to the little girl inside me, too. I feel my love for her. In this way I connect to myself and to her and to love. This practice has been comforting and empowering to me. Doing this practice feels as if I am growing love. I hope you enjoy experimenting with these practices.
My computer is not willing to get different sizes, bold or italics or colors of printing right now. So this will be plain and simple and good enough. Blessings, Andrea.

Nature is my temple

Nature is my Temple. I just returned from a silent, camping, hiking meditation retreat in Rochy Mtn Natl Park. This was the second annual solstice vipassana retreat and Gary and I went last year, too. I was struck by how much has happened since last June. Last year I remember being really upset because the ending group sharing was in the darkness and I couldn't hear anyone. I felt very disabled and realized how dependent I was on lip reading. In general I had a good experience at the retreat enough to want to return this year. Little did I know at the time that Gary's house would burn down three months later and that he would loose everything. I had no idea that we would find our dream house in Boulder and that I would be living in two places that I love, that Gary and I would be engaged and that I would move my mother to Boulder. What an exciting and challenging year. I was so aware of my sense of gratefulness at the retreat. My friend Wendy told me at lunch today that she had seen a quote that said that gratefulness is great fullness. That is how I felt- filled with a great sense of fullness that moved like molten gold from my head to my toes. I also felt strong fear as it rained and thundered and lighteninged and we were in our new tent because the old one had burned up. We didn't know if it would hold up in all of the strong wind and rain and it did. The last night of the retreat there was a big rainstorm in the late afternoon and cold temperatures and rain and maybe snow were predicted all night long. We met as a group and decided to stay to finish out the retreat the next day. Half of dinner blew away and everyone managed to still get enough to eat. The cook was very skilled and her food was delicious. She said she had never cooked in those kind of conditions before and it really stretched her out of her comfort zone. It helped her a lot that everyone was really helpful. During the retreat she made special food for those of us with food allergies and placed them in a square made with blue masking tape on the picnic table. I felt very loved and cared for and realized that all of my worrying about what I would eat and all of the extra food I brought were unnecessary. I was aware of how much I worry and saw my worry as an overprotective misguided parent who wanted to protect me from imagined pain. I could be kind to myself about it and even laugh at my urgent attempt to be prepared for the worst only to have the best happen.
That night it stopped raining before dinner. We went out into our meadow surrounded by gorgeous mountain peaks to meditate and listen to a darma talk and meditate again. As the last meditation was finishing at 10pm the thunder and lightening started again and heavy rain continued all through the night. It stopped just after our morning bell rang at 5. We were able to return to our meadow to sit. We could see that where we had hiked the day before was now covered with snow. The retreat was about being in nature and allowing nature to teach us about impermanence, change and connection. She was a persistent teacher offering up many challenges with the weather. I am grateful to get to hang out in my nature temple and pray for a whole weekend with loving teachers and fellow members of this impermanent sangha or community. It's amazing to me how much love I felt for people I didn't speak a word to. I love not speaking because I don't have to worry about hearing. It is such a relief to eat in silence and really be able to taste food. It was inspiring to me to come home and eat more consciously. Although I came home and ate in front of the computer for one meal I do think the rest of the time I have been more aware of what I'm eating. I also decided to go to sleep earlier and get up earlier to allow more time for meditation. I did that last night and today did all of my disciplines before my group at 8:30 this morning. However, right now it is late and I am still writing and cooking and washing clothes. I guess my inspiration from the retreat is to accept that change comes slowly and to treat myself with kindness. It isn't about all or nothing. It is more like the changing from one season to the next little by little. Happy Solstice and a delicious longest day to you.