I went running out today to erase the guilt of Greek indulgence last night and started my usual route on Lafayette past the little shops and the little people walking – but too embarrassed to turn around at the end of the street and head for home I quickly shot left and ran (into oncoming traffic) until I hit the park.  The park, or what I thought was the park, was where I had brought my cat rufus in the mourning years before during the week off I had allotted myself to ‘accept’ my brother’s sudden death.  I thought about a scene from a movie, my movie, where – there I am sitting on that bench with rufus and the cardboard box I used to smuggle her out of my apartment – and the next minute here I am four years later, running past, the loud groan of cars behind me.  I kept running on this road – traffic to my right, creek to my left.  And stared.  Why had I never come this far before?  Why, when people asked if I had been to the park had I responded without thinking?  I crossed a bridge just to stand over the water for a minute and stopped to see it crash over the dam.  Two geese sat atop, oblivious to the raging water, one honked hello and I smiled and waved.  My grin remained…I began to run, skip, laugh…paused on a rock to watch the water under a new bridge and with a giggle and a thank you sent into the abyss I was off.  “this was all I ever wanted…and it was right here all along.”  I was thinking that it was a metaphor for finding where I fit in this world…I always wish, hope, want – never SEEK.  GO.  FLY.  OFF!

I laughed.  Remembering my dad’s old army sack stuffed with brushes, my sketchbook, a gourd filled with more sunflower seeds than I could ever eat, and ‘Indian paint’ (the Windsor Newton acrylics I got for my birthday) running out of my house and as the screen door slammed behind me shouting ‘I’m going on safari mom!” only to trek down into the backyard to sit by the lake and paint symbols on the trees.

I ran on the path with a squish to every step.  I laughed at the sound and I laughed because I didn’t care about getting wet.  The ground here scattered with hardened snow and ice half melted had water lines like the sand ‘down the shore’ at low tide.  Perfect, random, orderly, shapes and lines.  The path drifted away from the creek and I thought, what a silly thing to do…walk on this path…wondering to the edge I stumbled onto a double date of sorts.  At first I thought the ducks were flying away out of the fear my presence must cause, but saw one male duck chasing a female in the water and learned differently.  I smiled – still smiling – and leaned on a tree.  I felt a little like I imagine St. Francis might have felt – such love, such childish delight in creation.  Climbing back up I almost – oops! – stepped on the home of a beaver or some kind of animal but caught my balance elsewhere.  My momentum kept me moving forward, faster, galloping almost, and thinking of St. Francis and my brother I smiled brighter and faster and…here I go…did a cartwheel in the mud, thinking, I wish I had a pen.

Two teenagers came into view and I tugged at my shirt and hid my smile.  You can’t let anyone know you’re mad.  But insanity’s giddy stare shown through the thin veil of social pretense and I strolled by broad-shouldered and broad-smiling gaping at the water.  The boy had a camera slung around his neck and a smiley “good morning” he offered before being corrected by the girl who reminded his own mad self “it’s nearly two…”

As I found my street I noticed the trees.  The bark, having endured wintry havoc, had splotchy splatters of brown, green and tan.  Exactly like camouflage – and I laughed thinking here’s the only place camouflage would actually be undetectable.  I felt the trees.  And as cars passed I knew they must think some hallucinogen was the cause of my wonder – my curiosity for the trees.  And so I laughed.

The development of language is a huge accomplishment and an amazing tool we have. It seems I’m always stuck in the middle and in awe at how far we’ve come and how far we have to go as a species.

Of course, this all seems like old news, too. But just maybe there’s a reason for all the recycling of old ideas. Maybe I have to relearn everything I thought I knew from a different perspective. And again, and again. Round and round we go…

Now, I have been cynical lately. I have been taking my vow to ‘not believe anything’ too literally. Perhaps. It has taken me away from the place I first felt at home. Yoga. I began reading about and practicing yoga as a child and sustained mediocre interest through my high school years and thereafter. I would take a class and feel an amazing connection. Sometimes. Connection to what? I didn’t know. and I certainly wasn’t about to ruin it by giving it a name. Then weeks or months might go by before I practiced again. A few years ago I enrolled in a year-long teacher training program; spending several thousand dollars of the small amount I’d saved to do so. The experience granted me knowledge about yoga’s history, the hindu religion, breathing, sanskrit chanting, and of course asana, or physical poses. Some of it I loved and some of it I wrote off completely as being just another bullshit religion. Fair enough. But I teach now, once a week. Sometimes I feel like I’m channelling this very powerful and amazing love. Other times I feel like I’m a fraud, or that I’m talking to a wall, or even being ridiculed by my students.

Today I decided to take the kundalini plunge. The 11.11.11 date is coming up tomorrow and that got me excited. My teacher would be there, sharing her love of yoga, her voice in chanting, her body for use as a channel of that great energy. I hadn’t been there in almost two years, but was greeted with a flash of her gorgeous motherly smile and the warmest hug. Ahhh relief. For some reason I get afraid that I’ll be forgotten by her. I am always wrong. She told us a story of Yogi Bhajan (the yogi who supposedly brought the secret kundalini practice to the masses despite the threat of death from his peers) and how he stated that on November 11, 2011 we would officially enter the Aquarian Age. That each one of us will wake up and rise to the calling to be what the world needs. It’s our turn to be the teacher, the mother, that ‘god-like’ figure to others. This was either the first I had heard this, or the first time I let it sink in. Very cool idea. And a very hokey one. I was ecstatic to be practicing with my teacher again, but I wasn’t by any means sold.

Yet when we practiced the kriya, I felt it again. That connection. As I breathed it moved through me. It was not subtle. I began tearing up a just few minutes into the practice. I did not let myself cry but surrendered to it, allowing myself to be a channel, a vessel for this energy. It come on strong and it lingered. It was blissful.

And I realized again what I had forgotten. Kundalini is powerful stuff.

It’s been so obvious to me lately that the world is changing at an incredibly a rapid rate. I feel it. The number of ‘coincidences’ or odd connections that I’ve noticed in the last few years, months, days have been increasing in quantity and magnitude literally exponentially. Really. I’ve been paying attention, trust me.

Maybe it’s just me. I’ve been more awake and so I’m aware of them. My filter is fading ever so slightly and I can finally begin to see. All of these coincidences were happening all along. But no. Recently it’s been people that I’ve had these experiences with. People who come in and out of my life in a cyclical fashion. People I keep running into. It’s not just me who’s feeling it. And it’s not just my new age-y friends, either. It’s the uptight cardiologist at work. It’s the flakey friend of a friend I never took seriously. It’s the guy I run into at the grocery store. It’s the estranged friend I’d all but given up on. All of these individuals are talking about the very same things I am thinking about. Energy, plants, time, space (outer and inner), vibration, sound, a bigger, brighter love.

And at the same time speaking about it is less and less necessary. I find myself wanting to talk to my husband about this amazing thought I had one moment to silencing myself the next; realizing that I know he already knows it and that words could only begin to scratch it’s surface. I’m doing this more and more as I realize that language has become perhaps the least effective communication method, as by the time the words come out the message feels like old news.

People are waking up a little more and noticing, too. People whom I never thought would admit to having been asleep. And each time I’m amazed. But I shouldn’t be. I never thought I’d admit to having been asleep either.

Is this the “Dawning of the Aquarian Age?” It is whatever we want it to be.

I wrote this a long time ago.

Our stoop

i am daydreaming
in the dark
on the perpetually crowded highway
making my way home
to another pondering night.

and sirens go by
so i say my little prayer
as ‘The World Has Turned and Left Me Here’
graces my car
the same way his music permeated my days
when i was young and stupid.

hopefully he still likes kerouac
and sings and plays guitar
with his scruffy beard and long hair
brushing his reassuring eyes
when he smiles down on me.

i think if there were any place
i could be
i’d be sitting on our stoop
playing ‘Uncle John’s Band’
happily oblivious to what lies ahead.

or riding on the turnpike
in our ’83 volvo
the wind blowing tangles in my hair
smoking secret cigarettes
and learning appreciation for The Dead.

“Life is holy and every moment is precious.”
-Jack Kerouac

So far I find it extremely interesting.  I’m staying positive and trying to open my mind up as much as I can to absorb all the new information.  I am growing weary as I start each new job as a nurse (this is my 4th since 2007) and deal with this by experiencing secret mini panic attacks a throughout the day, my mind flooded with all the reasons I will hate the job (weekend hours, being on call, too much excitement, too little excitement, etc.)  On Thursday though, I had an interesting experience with a TEE patient (an ultrasound of the heart via the esophagus) that soothed my nerves.  Well, for a few minutes anyway.

When patients wake up from anesthesia a wide range of emotions can occur.  I’ve been hugged, kissed, swung at, reprimanded, cried on, hit on, and asked tentatively, “Are you an angel?”  The guarded patient who a few minutes earlier gave one word answers during my interview can open up to reveal horrible tales of death, disease, and misfortune that they have endured.  Many are delighted and, depending on which drug they were given, ask repeatedly if they can have some to take home.  The experience can make one comfortably vulnerable, confident, refreshed, nauseous, upset, or confused.  Most are awed and amazed at the mystery of being “Put Under,” as they should be.  It’s a pretty amazing thing.

But this particular patient popped her eyes open, looked right through me and said, “Stay in this department, you’ll learn a lot here.”

She was probably responding to something she heard while asleep about me being new to the unit.  Still, this struck me as odd.  Patients are usually pretty consumed with themselves at this stage (when first they wake up) but this one continued to elaborate on how great of an oppurtunity I was for me to work with the “older nurses” and learn from them.  Despite my cynical outlook on nursing, I took it as a good sign.

I took a deep breath and begged myself to believe that at least.  I feel myself getting older and wanting to settle into a position for a couple of years.  Sequentially.

We’ll see how it goes.

“Happiness consists in realizing it’s all a great strange dream.”
- Jack Kerouac

3-6-09

1- Breath audibly – it is the sound of life.

2- Wear bright colors; they are much more uplifting.  Why do we try to look so damn serious?

3- Appreciate the fun and beautiful little things in life, like soap bubbles.

4- Take care of your body, it the only vessel you have.  Without it you can’t experience all of this!

8-13-09

1- Don’t judge people on their appearance.  Some of the smartest, wisest people with the most experience to share may first look like idiots to you if you’re not careful.  Don’t write anyone off – everyone has something to teach.

2- Things that happen, decisions we make in life effect our reactions and future decisions.  Each prior experience affects the next.  But like pressing a stamp into clay, each new one makes the last one disappear.   We are essentially the writers of our own destiny.  The burdens we are born with do not predetermine our future.  Stop perpetuating them.

3- Do not live life as if there is a camera watching.  No one really cares all that much and it’s much less anxiety inducing.

4- Stop defending the ego.  Let the ego rest – think objectively.

5- Be friendly to people.  We are all in this together.  Don’t be so self-absorbed.

6- If you let go, things are not as scary.  Just give in to the thing you are afraid of and it loses all it’s power…shrinking like a deflated balloon.  There is really nothing to be afraid of!  Everything is an experience – get on the ride.

7 -Everyone likes to be touched.  Stop keeping everyone at such a distance.

There are days I forget that I am not alone.  There are days I think I am the only on in the world feeling lost, awkward, stupid, unsure of myself.  But every once and awhile I am reminded we are all battling the same demons.  Take away the gory details and we all basically have the same feelings from time to time.   Still, there are days when I’ll be damned if you’re going to know that I don’t have all the answers.  (The worst part about this phenomenon is that once started, it becomes a full blown epidemic of Madness.  Example: Person A spews some BS about how wonderful her life is  because she’s to scared to admit that she’s feeling totally lost and person B feels so insecure about Person A’s seemingly perfect husband, kids, job, emotional disposition, etc. that person B’s response is to repeat the bullshit back to person A in an attempt to present an equally put-together persona, leaving neither with any sense of camaraderie or connectedness, and even less hope for finding a solution to the unspoken dilemmas of both person A and person B).

Why, when asked about any aspect of my immediate future for instance, do I quickly respond with some conventional and seemingly well thought out plan without even thinking?  Why not simply say, “actually I have no plan, thank you, and am just bumbling along here and hoping something comes to me, and you?”  Now, it’s easy to say “I never do that, I’m always extremely honest!”  I’m quick to say the same thing.  But if I take the issue to a deeper level is this really the case?  Do we really present ourselves exactly as we are to the world?  I’m not suggesting that we regress emotionally and let loose on the gas station attendant who gives us a full tank even though we asked for $10 worth  because we are upset about a fight we had at home.  I’m asking if we can really be honest and look at everyone around us with an open mind and an open heart.  Am I accepting of the idea that we are all connected?  Do I believe that everyone out there can feel/has felt what I’m feeling in here?  Or do I think that everyone is so damned caught up in the mirage of perfection that they will reject me if I crack open and let a piece of my true (imperfect) self out?  I have to start giving people a chance.  In an effort to protect my rawest, most vulnerable parts, I have formed a prickly shell of judgments for others.  I once heard someone say, “You know all those terrible things you think about other people – when you are really angry?  Break them down and you will most likely find that those are the things you think about yourself.”  Ha!  That silly old saying about loving yourself before you can love others is true?  Who the hell knows?

So, here we go!

I am starting a full-time job next Monday that I am actually excited about (no, for real) for a few different reasons.

Reason #1

I think it will be good for me to have a consistent group of people I see everyday so that I can feel like I am a part of something.  Totally corny I know but I’m realizing that it is indeed important.  Who knew?

Reason #2

I need to make more $ because although I enjoy teaching yoga, it does not pay well and unfortunately I have not come up with another way to survive just yet that my fiancé will agree upon.  (Joining a commune or farming community and living in the woods were a few past suggestions). Plus, the whole getting married thing apparently costs quite a bundle even with our minimalist charm stirred into the mix.

Reason #3

I need better health insurance.  I have a little bugger of a cyst in my brain and although this is “not a cause for worry” now I have to keep an eye on it which involves more MRI’s than my crappy EPO plan will afford me.  Phew, isn’t growing up fun?

and Reason #4

I need some more structure.  Seriously?  Yes I think so.  In order to feel confidant and productive, I think I need a kick in the pants.  It’s hard to wake up early and be creative when you don’t have to.  It’s hard not to sleep in and indulge in things even you despise, like TLC or processed foods.  (Yes, even I, the great yogi-vegetarian-nurse watches “What Not to Wear” while eating frozen cheese-filled soft pretzels I cooked in the microwave).

So here I am, standing (well, sitting)  before all of you – faults and all.  I am just trying to be better, like everyone else.  I want to remember the things about myself that I cherish, and to embrace those things, help them grow.  Instead of giving  into the easy and convenient way of doing things, I want to hold myself to my high standards.  Who gives a crap about registering for expensive plates we’ll probably break and a new microwave to cook more frozen processed food when all I can think about is “Where did I go?”  “Where did that innocent and naïve girl with no intention of buying into this materialistic style of living run off to?”

Ahhhhhhh exhale…I am here.  It feels good to take a breath and relax knowing that it’s okay to be me.  It’s okay not to do what everyone says I have to.  It’s okay to be different.  It’s okay to be me.  I’m thankful to have a wise and loving (I may never tell him I think he’s wise – but hopefully he knows)  partner to reel me in when I start having nightmares about wedding favors (Seriously?!?  You need a freaking goody-bag to come to our wedding?!?) and the like.

That’s what we’re supposed to do for each other; not lie to one another to save face.  Reel our brothers and sisters in – bring us back a little closer to our true selves.  Help each other navigate the windy path ahead so we don’t get off track.

“When you’ve seen beyond yourself, then you may find, peace of mind is waiting there.”
-George Harrison

The opening quote and idea for most of the first paragraph was stolen from the book: Broken Open, How Difficult Times Help Us Grow by Elizabeth Lesser.  A friend of mine, Jil, suggested I read it as a comment on an ambiguous status update of mine on one of my “lost” days and it almost became just another strip of blue in the self help section of our living room library but has instead joined the ranks in my “nightstand collection.”  Meaning, no I haven’t finished it yet.

I wrote this a few years ago when I was working the night shift at Chilton Hospital just out of nursing school.  As I contemplate yet another job change and I am reminded of the mania I felt as it poured out one morning when I returned to my little apartment after a long night…phew.

Birds of ridiculous sunlight

So i started parking in the back of the hospital so i can see the birds fly overhead and the sun setting in the WEST as i smoke my final cigarette and take my last breath of sanity.  From Good Homes was blasting in my car this time and it was all i could do to keep myself seated and refrain from dancing in the lot…i wonder how these shoes would do for dancing – pretty good i bet.  WAIT A SECOND though.  why do i have to conform to this ridiculous social rule of “No Dancing”* and being a Professional – a term i see now has no meaning whatsoever – why can’t i fucking dance if i feel like it?  who knows just how many people are out there walking the streets, sitting at their cubicles, delivering their packages, just wanting to fucking dance?  moments move people.  ideas, BIRDS, sunlight, life, LOVE, contentment, joy all MOVE people.  inside i am screaming BE MOVED!

i made a decision.  i never want a job where i will be looked down upon for dancing.  i’m at my worst when feeling constricted.  the bars and bars and this mask of composure leave me wanting.  wanting freedom, happiness, excitement, wanting forever – i want to FLY.  to be one of the tiny black birds that are there in an instant – taking OVER the sky by the sheer number of them – and then are gone the next.  i want to know where they are going.  i want to follow them in my car if i can’t fly with them.  i want to drive across the fields and the painted black lines we are supposed to obey as The Road and go be with them.  but i’m getting off topic.  it’s this dancing thing…but not only dancing.  how many times have i been walking down the perfect-for-cartwheeling hallway and stopped myself because i’m a Professional and i can’t do things like that or because there are germs on the floor and hospitals are dirty?  or been sitting in traffic and just wanting – no NEEDING to jump out of the car and sing at the top of my lungs to all the angry and impatient folks.  i want to sing to them and tell them they are not LATE – they are right THERE right NOW.  and i think of them all busting out of their little cars with me and climbing over them and standing on top to better see the beautiful and yet incomprehensible sky that surrounds us.  and then we all abandon our cars and off into the day we dance – enjoying where we ARE and never thinking about where we are going.  and i realize that it takes courage and it takes numbers for people to let the status quo change and knowing this i imagine all at once the little people in their cars joining the greater purpose and having the strength from each other just start BEING what they feel.  nobility does not come from surviving each day doing something i hate or spending my time with people i don’t particularly admire because i have an Obligation..i wonder if the catholic church made that word up…(oh hell, who made up the word Nobility anyway?)  what i mean is we are not angry, selfish beings – all this is a product of FEAR.  let it go, let me go, let us dance.  but all the language and the words are deceiving.  we don’t need to be LET go.  we are already there.  numbers mean nothing.  i have this chance to LIVE, not survive, LIVE.  i am dancing.  they can drug test me or fire me if they need to.

*[even scarier is the reality that there is no "rule" against dancing;  it's in the infinite category of actions that are unwritten, yet inappropriate.  this means i exist in a state of mind where  (thanks to good social training from our educational system and various other sources) there are so many rules that they all couldn't even be written down].

]]> http://comeallwithin.wordpress.com/2010/01/21/from-the-archives-1/feed/ 0 comeallwithin http://comeallwithin.wordpress.com/2010/01/19/hello-world/ http://comeallwithin.wordpress.com/2010/01/19/hello-world/#comments Tue, 19 Jan 2010 14:18:55 +0000 comeallwithin ]]> I woke up this morning with a strange feeling of dread and by the time I got out to my car was thoroughly convinced it had been rigged with a bomb while I slept.  A burning smell permeated the air outside and I was sure that when I put the key in the ignition and turned it gently, I heard an unfamiliar “click”.

Of course, there was no such bomb and another catastrophe has been successfully avoided.  I began to wonder as I drove, a calm returning as the fear inside me crouched back into a dark corner once again, why do we play with the notion of death?  It’s a heavily watered down version of a suicidal fantasy – but I urge – I am anything but suicidal.  My life is just beginning.  This is really a human condition.  We toy with the idea of death often, if not daily, to try and get a grasp of what it really means.  We jump out of planes, ski down enormous mountains, hike into the wilderness alone, speed down the Garden State Parkway talking on our cell phones, expose ourselves to communicable diseases (if you work in medicine),  or perhaps we just spend a thoughtful moment gazing down at the train tracks before the subway arrives to snap us back to the present.  We are dying (excuse the pun) to know what this death thing is all about.  What will happen to me?  Will I feel it?  Will I know IT’S happening?  Will my “soul” stick around invisibly watching over my loved ones or will it be trapped up in the clouds watching from afar, unable to help?  If we allow ourselves to feel even this much, then we may ask the deeper, quieter questions – Is there such thing as a soul at all?   Will I just disappear?  One bright flash and that’s it?  Will it matter that I was ever here at all?  Does my life mean anything?

And that is the one real question we have a shot at answering.

But we need some help.  We acquire a book by an inspiring author, take a yoga class, get a massage, speak openly to a friend, enlist the help of our elders. We are a sponge, absorbing every bit of advice with fervor and gratitude.   This is wonderful, necessary, and makes us feel positive and empowered.  After we patch up the gaping whole inside us with plenty of wise words and good vibes, we emerge with new perspective.  We will be kind and gentle to our brothers and sisters here on earth.  We will exercise, eat right, and exercise some more.  We will take up knitting, or painting, or playing a new instrument.  We will be a better husband, girlfriend, brother, daughter, father.  We wonder why we didn’t think if this sooner.  Finally we are living!

And then it happens…it starts slowly with an innocent  peak over the edge while driving over a bridge.  Before you know it, WHAM.  A bomb scare on a Tuesday morning makes you question everything all over again. And what’s worse is that you realize you never really came up with an answer in the first place.  You stood at the edge of a magnificent canyon and confidently threw a book and a yoga mat at the bottom.  Figuring it was filled, you never looked back down to see your stupidity.

Perhaps this is the way it goes.  Maybe humans, as we currently stand in evolution, are so incredibly lazy and forgetful that we need to be woken up out of our slumber with a smack in the face every once and awhile.  The cosmic forces are constantly urging us to question more, discover more, uncover more of the mysterious of this earth, this time, this space.  Yet we are shutting down, falling asleep, walking around with even less wonder and awe than we had before.  The cycle is incredibly numbing.  But I think we can break it.  I think we can stand up once and for all and say “Ah-ha!”   “We are all part of something larger than our individual selves!”  “I am capable of so much more!”  We realize that we are indeed able to further our own evolution.   We control our destiny, not our bosses, our families, our circumstances.  We just have to get down to business.

But where do we start?

One of my teachers once told a story of a spiritual leader who came to give a talk at her yoga studio. (I am paraphrasing, but here is the gist of it).

After a moving speech there was a question and answer session.  The students asked with sincere desire, “How can I achieve a higher consciousness?”  “How can I fully understand non-attachment in my life?”  “How can I stop judging others?”  “How do I learn better self-discipline?”  “How do I understand the sacred teachings better?”  “How can I be rid of negative emotion and nurture the positive?”

He thoughtfully and patiently responded to each and every question with the same answer.  “Meditate.”

Though I think this story needs no interpretation, I feel the need to point out that the spiritual leader didn’t suggest that the student read a book, talk to a friend,  or listen to an elder.  Not that these are negative tools.  The most important thing I take from the story is that the answers are already inside all of us.  We already come equipped with everything we need.  We are reaching out further and further to a world we don’t really understand instead of reaching in to the depths of our even less understood consciousness.

I will try to quiet down my mind.  Listen to the cosmic vibrations.  Perhaps they have been trying to guide us the whole time.

“The way is not in the sky.  The way is in the heart.”

-Buddha

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