Nancy Lankston
Today I’m grateful for sun, blue sky, mountains in the distance and snow on the horizon…
Spirit dances with Fire, Air, Earth and Water and somehow the amazing alchemy of Life flows forth Today I’m grateful for the dance of elemental Fire, Air, Earth and Water all around me. What a beautiful dance it is!
We Live in a World of Duality
Form / Formless
Life / Death
Light / Dark
Physical / Ethereal
Earth / Heaven
Moon / Sun
Female / Male
Shakti / Shiva
Love / Hate
Sorrow / Joy
Yin / Yang
The energy of our Universe flows and dances constantly between tangible form and formless energy. We are part of an intricate weaving of light and dark, form and formless, growth and decay. Duality is woven into the very fabric of our Universe. And duality is a natural part of the miraculous dance of Spirit within earth, air, fire and water.
How do I keep my balance within this ever shifting duality?
Pain and problems arise when I turn duality into polarity – when I attach an emotional charge to a person or event. For example, I might label something bad and reject it… or decide someone else is wrong and I am right… or push an experience away as bad and unwanted… or desperately crave something I don’t have. Pain and disconnect are inevitable when I polarize my experiences.
Judging and labeling EVERY single experience as good or bad
only makes me crazy and miserable!
What if I stop judging and labeling every aspect of Life as good or bad, right or wrong? What if I stop living in a state of charged polarity? What if I choose to actually live by the wisdom of the Tao?
“If good happens, good; if bad happens, good. ”
~Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching
☯
One of my favorite parables about good and bad:
A farmer had only one stallion. One day, the horse jumped a fence and ran away. All the neighbors came by saying, “Oh no! Such bad luck! You must be so upset.” The man just said, “Maybe good, maybe bad – too soon to tell.”
A few days later, his stallion came back and brought twenty wild mares with him. The man and his son corraled all the horses. All the neighbors came by saying, “Wow! This is such good news. You must be so happy!” The man just said, “Maybe good, maybe bad – too soon to tell.”
A few weeks later, one of the wild horses kicked the man’s only son, and broke the boy’s leg in 3 places. All the neighbors came by saying, “I’m so sorry. This is such bad news. You must be so upset.” The man just said, “Maybe good, maybe bad – too soon to tell.”
The country went to war, and every able-bodied young man was drafted to fight. The war was terrible and killed many young men from the region, but the farmer’s son was spared; his broken leg prevented him from fighting. All the neighbors came by saying, “You are so lucky! Your son didn’t have to go fight” The man just said, “Maybe good, maybe bad – too soon to tell.”
~Author Unknown
☯
What if I stop judging myself and all my experiences? What if I meet EVERY experience with the energy of, “Maybe good, maybe bad – too soon to tell”?
God already has everything under control, no matter how it looks in this moment. Maybe I should just open up and embrace the natural and inevitable duality of this world.
Can I stop judging and polarizing everything that happens to me? What if I allow my world to just be however it is today? To allow is not polarized; to allow is a loose, easy state where I am open to possibilities. When I relax and allow my life to unfold, peace fills me. And balance follows.
——
Al·low v.
al·lowed, al·low·ing, al·lows
Rivers hardly ever run in a straight line.
Rivers are willing to take ten thousand meanders
and enjoy every one
and grow from every one.
When they leave a meander,
they are always more
than when they entered it.
When rivers meet an obstacle,
they do not try to run over it.
They merely go around
but they always get to the other side.
Rivers accept things as they are,
conform to the shape they find the world in,
yet nothing changes things more than rivers.
Rivers move even mountains into the sea.
Rivers hardly ever are in a hurry
yet is there anything more likely
to reach the point it sets out for
than a river?
by
James Dillet Freeman
Me·an·der v.
1. To follow a winding and turning course: Streams tend to meander through level land.
2. To move aimlessly and idly without fixed direction: vagabonds meandering through life. See Synonym wander.
—————————
[From Latin maeander, circuitous windings, from Greek maiandros, after Maiandros, the Maeander River in Phrygia, noted for its windings.] From http://www.thefreedictionary.com
We call upon the waters that rim the earth, horizon to horizon,
that flow in our rivers and streams, that fall upon our gardens and fields,
and we ask that they teach us and show us the way.
~Chinook Blessing
Water flows through its day
Water meets whatever is in its path
And then it flows on
Water is never stoppable for long
Resistance is met with allowance
And water flows on.
Can I flow with liquid allowance?
As thoughts and emotions create inner ripples and waves
Can I meet and greet them kindly
And then just flow on
no matter where they take me?
Change is inevitable. Nothing stays the same for very long.
I take the same trail beside the St. Vrain river almost every day, and yet it is never quite the same path two days in a row. One morning last week on the trail, I was surrounded by tree branches filled with fiery autumn leaves. A few mornings later, snow completely blanketed the flaming trees and the sights and sounds of winter engulfed me.
Life is filled with cycles and shifts. From the passing of seasons to the aging of my body, change surrounds and engulfs me. And life continues to shift and change every day, every month, every year. Grasping at the old form, resisting change, makes today hurtful rather than joyful. I learned this lesson the hard way; years ago I owned a property south of Kansas City that I loved. I adored every inch of those 3 acres – every tree, every bush, every blade of grass was special to me. The property was so significant and special that I wrote an entire book about the place (my first book, A Still Place).
And there was nothing bad or wrong about my love of that little parcel of land. The only problem was I clung to it and vowed to live in that spot until I died. Silly, silly woman! Well, life happened; I got divorced from one man and married another. I had a second baby and still I held onto that property. I refused to even think about moving. Then my husband’s job dried up and we faced a move cross-country to Chicago. And I had trouble letting go; I resisted leaving my lovely little property. But we needed to move! The only thing my resistance caused was a slow, slow house sale and a ton of pain and angst.
We eventually sold the property and moved to Chicago. I was so sad, missing my little plot of land, wishing things were different, wanting to roll back the clock and undo the move. But gradually, I let go. And when I finally stopped holding onto my past, I “woke up” and discovered that I was living in an amazing spot. I found myself LOVING this new place and my new life. All it took was letting go of the old life.
That experience left me knowing that my life is WAY less painful when I allow things to change and shift without resisting or pushing against the change. Resistance is futile! Resisting change only leads to pain and misery.
I seem to periodically have to revisit this lesson in letting go and allowing life to unfold organically. I can still make myself miserable trying to force today to look like some “perfect” day long past – or some fantasy day that I’ve never even experienced. I can be so stubborn! But when I remember that little piece of land that I adored so many years ago, I remember the value of letting go.
It’s odd; I have so many fond memories of that land south of Kansas City. 🙂 But now, I also remember all the amazing and wonderful stuff that happened to me when I let it go and moved on with my life. And you know what? Today, I live in a space that is even more amazing! And I would have never ended up here, if I hadn’t let go of that old place.
Life is a river; it keeps flowing and changing and moving. And in every moment I have a choice; I can cling to the riverbank and wear myself out trying to stay right here in this spot. I can fight and resist moving downstream. Or I can let go and allow the flow of life to take me. I can let go and trust that life can be even better around the next bend.
☾☽
Can I stop resisting and be grateful for change?
Can I let go of my urge to control and push and grasp?
Can I allow life to unfold and shift organically?
Can I just breathe and allow today to be?
Emotion is as natural for humans as breathing.
I don’t make my breathing right or wrong, so why do it with my emotions?
It’s been an interesting week; I have spent more time than I care to remember in my swamp. By swamp I mean a sticky, tangled, mess of uncomfortable emotions within myself. I don’t like my emotional swamp much – a lot of what I experience in the swamp sucks – it hurts. And then I add to my pain by judging myself for feeling this sticky, yucky crap in the first place. I would love to avoid my swamp.
Isn’t life supposed to turn into bliss and pure joy when I open up to more consciousness? Have I failed because I still get triggered after all these years of mindful awareness training? Am I doing this consciousness thing wrong if I still get pissed and sad and scared?
But, wait a minute! All humans emote about their experiences – even beings as aware as Gandhi and Jesus felt emotions. Our bodies are wired to flow with emotion. Emotion is as natural for humans as breathing. I don’t make my breathing right or wrong, so why do it with my emotions?
Every experience I have can trigger emotional reactions, not just the yummy experiences. Where did I get the idea that becoming conscious meant never being triggered, never feeling “yucky” emotions? Isn’t that just a really sneaky way to judge myself and find myself lacking? Just what I need – another way to beat myself up and make myself bad or wrong. NOT!
And what if being more aware in each moment elicits even more emotion within me? All those sensations about this moment that I used to block or ignore are now available to me in my new state of awareness. What if those sensations trigger MORE emotions as I respond to all the new information I am now aware of? Is that somehow wrong?
And isn’t it just another form of judgment to label emotions good or bad, acceptable or repulsive? How is it going to help me to label my emotions as OK and not OK? Can I let go of the idea that some human emotions are a sign of unconsciousness or inferiority?
We are emotional creatures. Trying to stop emotion is like trying to halt the flow of water. Can I allow my emotions to flow without stuffing them? And can I stop judging myself right or wrong for feeling the way I feel in each moment?
What happens if I embrace it all – my grief, my anger, my fear? Can I allow my emotions to be waves washing through me? What happens if I embrace ALL of me – even the parts I don’t like – in every moment?
“It’s not that you won’t be triggered anymore.
It’s that you won’t have a problem being triggered anymore.”
–Panache Desai
“May what I do flow from me like a river,
no forcing and no holding back, the way it is with children.”
~Rainier Maria Rilke
When I get impatient with myself or the world, I try to pause long enough to remember the river, the flow of the river that I love so much. When life does not instantly present me with the exact and perfect outcome – the perfect and glorious outcome I had all planned out in my head in excruciating detail – at those times, I try to remember to just breathe and flow with how things ARE, rather than how I wish they would be.
Resistance is futile; life is NEVER perfect. And life unfolds in its own wild and wonderful way, no matter how hard I kick and scream and struggle and fight against what IS, trying desperately to get the exact future I had imagined and dreamed of.
Sit and breathe. And breathe some more…
until I can stop whining and fighting against what is unfolding right here and now in front of me.
How horrible to miss out on today because it doesn’t look exactly like my dream of it yesterday!
Life is not the way it’s supposed to be. It’s the way it is.
The way you cope with it is what makes the difference.”
~Virginia Satir