I was talking with my wise friend who told me that the bicycle in my dream was about finding or returning to the child inside of me. She told me that I never let myself be that innocent, vulnerable child and that I need to do that to become whole again.
I started to cry when she told me that I was the one who judged her as being bad...locking her away...keeping that part of myself imprisoned...because deep down I still think that somehow I was responsible for the abuse...that I deserved to be abused...because I allowed myself to trust and be innocent.
She hit a nerve...a raw enough nerve that I welled up with tears and felt in my core that she was dead on...
While she was telling me this I was paralleling what she was saying with the dynamics of abuse.
Isolate...control...hurt...I looked at her and said, "I am my own worst abuser. I have controlled that part of myself, imprisoned my heart for over 40 years. No one else is holding me hostage. I am abusing myself."
So your shamanic poem/quote is extremely timely. I need to sing, dance, trust, be intuitive and let myself play and see the world as a child.
I have tried to open myself up emotionally...and it terrifies me.
I feel like the line from Brene Brown's video about research...and pledging her life to control and predict all phenomenon...and I, too have found my way to vulnerability as the key to my wholeness. I am successful as a control agent...being flexible makes me uncomfortable...being courageous makes me panic...some courage...but at least I am on the edge of that cliff, looking to the next step...it will have to be a surrender... and I will have to trust that I won't perish.
I need time to allow all of this to happen...unstructured time....which isn't going to happen until May, at least...but I am aware of this and will remain aware that I need to carve out time for me...to sing, dance, walk, meditate and love.
On a different note...my oldest experienced deep disappointment last night...she called in tears when something she has worked months on did not come to fruition. Part of me wants to fix it....make phone calls...set it "right". But deep down I know that the lesson that she is learning through this disappointment will serve her far better in her life. She will to persevere and to try again despite not succeeding the first time. She will know how sweet achievement is because she has experienced this. She will come to know that kindness...for the sake of kindness....not for a reward...is a worthy endeavor. She is amazing...what a great role model for me.
love and blessings,
Maggie
Thursday, January 31, 2013
When did I stop dancing?
In many shamanic societies, if you came to a medicine person complaining of being disheartened, dispirited, or depressed, they would ask one of four questions: When did you stop dancing? When did you stop singing? When did you stop being enchanted by stories? When did you stop finding comfort in the sweet territory of silence? -Gabriel Roth
I saw this quote yesterday and have been thinking about it ever since. I wonder if I ever started dancing. Being a mother and grandmother, I know all toddlers dance. They all do. So why did I stop?
I did a yoga class yesterday, then I found a video - Dance Like a Child. My oldest came over while I was flailing and bouncing. She immediately asked, "Mom, what are you doing?"
Dancing like a child.
But today I have been singing. I feel like dancing. I feel like doing yoga. I think I have finally broken through that holiday depression. I don't know why...Maybe it's because I rescued my two black lambs...
Smiling, Clare
I saw this quote yesterday and have been thinking about it ever since. I wonder if I ever started dancing. Being a mother and grandmother, I know all toddlers dance. They all do. So why did I stop?
I did a yoga class yesterday, then I found a video - Dance Like a Child. My oldest came over while I was flailing and bouncing. She immediately asked, "Mom, what are you doing?"
Dancing like a child.
But today I have been singing. I feel like dancing. I feel like doing yoga. I think I have finally broken through that holiday depression. I don't know why...Maybe it's because I rescued my two black lambs...
Smiling, Clare
Wednesday, January 30, 2013
AVP
How do we teach respect? One suggestion I have is to use the AVP (Alternatives to Violence Project) model. My youngest is a facilitator, and I am an apprentice - although neither of us has done a workshop for years.
Roundabout story - I had an interesting exchange with a man who asked me if I was familiar with the work of Jane Elliott. She was a teacher in the midwest who taught racism by creating it in her classroom. She divided kids by eye color, and watched what happened to their behavior. She changed the hierarchy for the second day, then the kids debriefed the third day. It was powerful.
If you would like to watch a report: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/divided/
Her teachings really profoundly affected my acquaintance. In the course of watching the above report, I saw that the results of Jane Elliott's exercise was taken into prisons. Specifically, it was taken into Green Haven in New York State. I don't know if there is a connection, but soon after prisoners there wanted to start a program for local at-risk youth, to help them avoid ending up in prison. The first workshop was a failure, because the youth idolized the prisoners. So they asked for help from the local (did you guess...) Quaker meeting. Together they created an experiential workshop, which teaches us that there is transforming power in every situation.
This program has influenced many of my thoughts about violence.
Do you want to attend an AVP workshop? They are usually a weekend long, about 20 hours. I will find one for you. I will go with you.
But I can also share my youth training manual with you. All of the workshops I participated in or led were for youth. I would use this model for the work you are planning to do.
Reading about your feelings connected to the dream - I would say you are successfully processing something. You are coming home to something that will heal and warm you and make you happy!
I, on the other hand, had a very disturbing dream last night. A group of us were in the backyard of the farm I lived on just after I was married. We were sitting and talking and I saw a few goat kids came out to graze in the yard. I suddenly remembered I had not fed my sheep for a very long time. I went racing into a secret room in the barn (?) and saw bloated dessicated bodies of sheep. I was horrified, and I didn't want anyone to see how bad I was - I felt like such a bad person. I walked deeper into the underground room and I found two very weak black sheep. They were lambs, they were tied. They were lying down and as they managed to wobble to their feet, I saw they had bald patches on their sides. I frantically ran outside and started pulling grass to take to them. When I awoke, I stopped and thought, "Do I still have my sheep?" I was afraid that I had forgotten them. Then I remembered having them, and I remembered taking care of them and letting them all die of old age.
What have I been neglecting? Is it still salvageable? Sheep often mean conformity - but they way they died looked so brutal. Do I have such revulsion for conformity? They two that survived are small, weak, but they are black...nonconformity? I don't know if I am on the right track.
Before I slept I also held my new granddaughter in my heart, praying again to by the one (or one of the ones) who gives her the stability and acceptance to provide resilience and humanity. All night I felt like I had a baby with me. I woke up wondering if I was going to have a baby, where did the baby come from...then I remembered, we do have a baby coming into this household.
Strange night...Thanks for listening!
Love from Clare
Roundabout story - I had an interesting exchange with a man who asked me if I was familiar with the work of Jane Elliott. She was a teacher in the midwest who taught racism by creating it in her classroom. She divided kids by eye color, and watched what happened to their behavior. She changed the hierarchy for the second day, then the kids debriefed the third day. It was powerful.
If you would like to watch a report: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/divided/
Her teachings really profoundly affected my acquaintance. In the course of watching the above report, I saw that the results of Jane Elliott's exercise was taken into prisons. Specifically, it was taken into Green Haven in New York State. I don't know if there is a connection, but soon after prisoners there wanted to start a program for local at-risk youth, to help them avoid ending up in prison. The first workshop was a failure, because the youth idolized the prisoners. So they asked for help from the local (did you guess...) Quaker meeting. Together they created an experiential workshop, which teaches us that there is transforming power in every situation.
This program has influenced many of my thoughts about violence.
Do you want to attend an AVP workshop? They are usually a weekend long, about 20 hours. I will find one for you. I will go with you.
But I can also share my youth training manual with you. All of the workshops I participated in or led were for youth. I would use this model for the work you are planning to do.
Reading about your feelings connected to the dream - I would say you are successfully processing something. You are coming home to something that will heal and warm you and make you happy!
I, on the other hand, had a very disturbing dream last night. A group of us were in the backyard of the farm I lived on just after I was married. We were sitting and talking and I saw a few goat kids came out to graze in the yard. I suddenly remembered I had not fed my sheep for a very long time. I went racing into a secret room in the barn (?) and saw bloated dessicated bodies of sheep. I was horrified, and I didn't want anyone to see how bad I was - I felt like such a bad person. I walked deeper into the underground room and I found two very weak black sheep. They were lambs, they were tied. They were lying down and as they managed to wobble to their feet, I saw they had bald patches on their sides. I frantically ran outside and started pulling grass to take to them. When I awoke, I stopped and thought, "Do I still have my sheep?" I was afraid that I had forgotten them. Then I remembered having them, and I remembered taking care of them and letting them all die of old age.
What have I been neglecting? Is it still salvageable? Sheep often mean conformity - but they way they died looked so brutal. Do I have such revulsion for conformity? They two that survived are small, weak, but they are black...nonconformity? I don't know if I am on the right track.
Before I slept I also held my new granddaughter in my heart, praying again to by the one (or one of the ones) who gives her the stability and acceptance to provide resilience and humanity. All night I felt like I had a baby with me. I woke up wondering if I was going to have a baby, where did the baby come from...then I remembered, we do have a baby coming into this household.
Strange night...Thanks for listening!
Love from Clare
Tuesday, January 29, 2013
How do we teach respect?
To answer the dream questions...
I feel happy...
full of energy...I ride the bike over 100 miles if it were literally from there to home.
And the next day when I need to do it again there's no muscle pain...
just a beautiful sunny day.
I like that interpretation...thanks
So how do you teach respect?
I am trying to design or find an educational program fro adolescents to teach just that...
before the control, jealous and violence even begin...
but is it possible to teach respect in a few short lessons?
I think it takes a childhood of observing it around yourself...
and so many of us just didn't have that experience...
we saw people using and exploiting and hurting each other.
I can only hope that my children have learned some respect for others...and for the earth and its creatures.
If you have any ideas on how to teach this...I'd love to hear them.
I have to do a paper...
Love 'til tomorrow,
Maggie
I feel happy...
full of energy...I ride the bike over 100 miles if it were literally from there to home.
And the next day when I need to do it again there's no muscle pain...
just a beautiful sunny day.
I like that interpretation...thanks
So how do you teach respect?
I am trying to design or find an educational program fro adolescents to teach just that...
before the control, jealous and violence even begin...
but is it possible to teach respect in a few short lessons?
I think it takes a childhood of observing it around yourself...
and so many of us just didn't have that experience...
we saw people using and exploiting and hurting each other.
I can only hope that my children have learned some respect for others...and for the earth and its creatures.
If you have any ideas on how to teach this...I'd love to hear them.
I have to do a paper...
Love 'til tomorrow,
Maggie
R*E*S*P*E*C*T!
Let's sing it like Aretha!!!
Thank you for your sympathy. And you're right. Ultimately we need to teach respect to both sexes, both for self and for the other. No man wants to be a rapist. No woman wants to be a victim. It's only when we get lost in our own pain, and cease to understand that others are...others exist...others have hopes and dreams and feelings just like we do. We need to figure out how to stir up the gift of empathy that lies in every soul. Once we step out of our own pain and confusion, and see someone else, perhaps it is easier to do something else, to be someone else.
My youngest and her ex have to be respectful. That means no "bad-mouthing" the other, ever, but especially in front of their child. Ideally, they will establish a friendship. It's hard, though. When my marriage ended, I decided that part of me would always love part of him. I wanted my kids to always know they came from a loving place. And it has been one of the hardest things I have ever done in my life. It would be so much easier to hate him and to be furious. But it's not about me. It's about my kids.
...arriving on a nightmare...my fear for this next granddaughter coming into my life. May I be a constant, to give her the resilience to be full and alive and loving and courageous.
I think this dream is good. It shows progress. First of all, you are traveling. Secondly, you are powering yourself, the energy and exertion are yours. And thirdly, you are going home - back to your own heart? home to yourself? How do you feel in the dream? Are you aware of any emotions? Are you tired?
Still singing,
Clare
...just a little bit, just a little bit...
Thank you for your sympathy. And you're right. Ultimately we need to teach respect to both sexes, both for self and for the other. No man wants to be a rapist. No woman wants to be a victim. It's only when we get lost in our own pain, and cease to understand that others are...others exist...others have hopes and dreams and feelings just like we do. We need to figure out how to stir up the gift of empathy that lies in every soul. Once we step out of our own pain and confusion, and see someone else, perhaps it is easier to do something else, to be someone else.
My youngest and her ex have to be respectful. That means no "bad-mouthing" the other, ever, but especially in front of their child. Ideally, they will establish a friendship. It's hard, though. When my marriage ended, I decided that part of me would always love part of him. I wanted my kids to always know they came from a loving place. And it has been one of the hardest things I have ever done in my life. It would be so much easier to hate him and to be furious. But it's not about me. It's about my kids.
...arriving on a nightmare...my fear for this next granddaughter coming into my life. May I be a constant, to give her the resilience to be full and alive and loving and courageous.
I think this dream is good. It shows progress. First of all, you are traveling. Secondly, you are powering yourself, the energy and exertion are yours. And thirdly, you are going home - back to your own heart? home to yourself? How do you feel in the dream? Are you aware of any emotions? Are you tired?
Still singing,
Clare
...just a little bit, just a little bit...
Monday, January 28, 2013
History cannot be unlived, but with courage need not be lived again
What a situation...
I am sorry for your daughter, for the father and for you...
but mostly, as you've pointed out...I am sorry for the baby.
Your daughter has control while the baby is still inside...
but unfortunately, once its born, the father gets equal control.
States have begun to take violent behaviors into consideration in custody cases (PA started in 2010 I think)...
but she has to document abuse by reporting the stalking or threats or physical abuse, coercion, etc. S#3's daughter did not get a PFA because she never reported and abuse prior to the request.
I have been spending alot of time thinking about violence and domestic violence...
both of my classes have me working on developing a primary prevention program for domestic violence...it just seems to be too high a hurdle to succeed...
but then, listening to the TED talk, it is simply a matter of speaking out...
educating...
uncovering the secrets...
giving voices back to the victims...
and ultimately teaching respect to both sexes so they don't have these power struggles...
and try to control each other.
It's all about power and control.
I read a poem today that hit me...
On the Pulse of the Morning by Maya Angelou
(this is only part of it)
...You, the Turk, the Arab, the Swede,
The German, the Eskimo, the Scot,
The Italian, the Hungarian, the Pole,
You the Ashanti, the Yoruba, the Kru,
Bought, Sold, Stolen, arriving on a nightmare
Praying for a dream.
Here, root yourself beside me...
Lift up your faces, you have a piercing need
For this bright morning dawning for you.
History, despite its wrenching pain,
Cannot be unlived, but if faced
With courage, need not be lived again.
Lift up your eyes
Upon this day breaking for you.
Give birth again
To the dream.
we need to speak the truth of the past abuses...
societal and personal...
to avoid living them over and over again.
I've had a dream ever since I visited the woman last week...
I dream that I find myself in a neighboring state (her home state) with only a bicycle, so I ride all the way home...I've ridden my bike 3 different nights so far...
I wonder what that means?
I am sorry for your daughter, for the father and for you...
but mostly, as you've pointed out...I am sorry for the baby.
Your daughter has control while the baby is still inside...
but unfortunately, once its born, the father gets equal control.
States have begun to take violent behaviors into consideration in custody cases (PA started in 2010 I think)...
but she has to document abuse by reporting the stalking or threats or physical abuse, coercion, etc. S#3's daughter did not get a PFA because she never reported and abuse prior to the request.
I have been spending alot of time thinking about violence and domestic violence...
both of my classes have me working on developing a primary prevention program for domestic violence...it just seems to be too high a hurdle to succeed...
but then, listening to the TED talk, it is simply a matter of speaking out...
educating...
uncovering the secrets...
giving voices back to the victims...
and ultimately teaching respect to both sexes so they don't have these power struggles...
and try to control each other.
It's all about power and control.
I read a poem today that hit me...
On the Pulse of the Morning by Maya Angelou
(this is only part of it)
...You, the Turk, the Arab, the Swede,
The German, the Eskimo, the Scot,
The Italian, the Hungarian, the Pole,
You the Ashanti, the Yoruba, the Kru,
Bought, Sold, Stolen, arriving on a nightmare
Praying for a dream.
Here, root yourself beside me...
Lift up your faces, you have a piercing need
For this bright morning dawning for you.
History, despite its wrenching pain,
Cannot be unlived, but if faced
With courage, need not be lived again.
Lift up your eyes
Upon this day breaking for you.
Give birth again
To the dream.
we need to speak the truth of the past abuses...
societal and personal...
to avoid living them over and over again.
I've had a dream ever since I visited the woman last week...
I dream that I find myself in a neighboring state (her home state) with only a bicycle, so I ride all the way home...I've ridden my bike 3 different nights so far...
I wonder what that means?
Drama
I had the upset stomach/headache thing yesterday. I couldn't figure out why I just didn't have energy. Still feeling a little punk.
I can go for very long periods of time with a sort of serenity about the family. We are who we are. It is so hard to change. Then suddenly I am enraged by our lack of ability to take responsibility for what we have done. I know we did harmful, damaging things in response to the things that were done to us. But we still did them. And we still need to take responsibility and apologize.
Maybe I was reacting because I got an email from the father of my youngest's imminent child. She won't talk to him - mostly because she does not know what to say or to do. I told her that I received the email, and she asked to read it. Now she is upset and didn't want dinner. Both of these "children" are heavily engaged in drama. She needs to accept her fears and feelings, and go forward anyway. Of course, neither her father nor I set a good example of that. But she is going to be a mother, so she has to face the consequences of her decisions and grow up.
In compassion, I decided to answer him. He is concerned because his daughter from a previous relationship is upset because my daughter is no longer in their lives. I suggested that she is picking up cues from him. Although I didn't mention it, he lets his seven-year-old stay up until midnight, because she is his little buddy and he doesn't like being alone. Emotional incest. And I said that my daughter should not have been identifying herself as the child's stepmother after such a short time. He said my daughter's behavior now is not the girl he knew. I suggested that they did not have time to really know each other and that their behavior has now hurt two children.
Basically his response is that his daughter misses mine and that he doesn't do anything to remind her or trigger that. And he wasn't the first to use the word step-mom. So he is fine, everything he does is wise, it's everyone else's problem, he just wants someone to argue with.
I am so angry with both of them. Here is one more precious child being born into drama, conflict, violence. One more child who will not have a home because the courts will divide her like a possession. It breaks my heart that we consider the parents' wants and not the child's needs.
And I am frightened. The video we watched by Leslie Morgan Steiner showed the patterns. And this man is stalking my daughter. The fact that she is avoiding him and won't talk to him is adding fuel to the fire.
One more generation...one more generation of this crap. I hate this diminishment of community. It's an absolute loss of nuclear family and we have already lost extended family and neighborhood. The baby is on her own from infancy. What is wrong with us???? The part of the video that screamed at me was when Leslie said that the courts order children to go stay with the man that abused their mother. What is wrong with us?????? It all relates to male dominance, ownership of their wife and children. With the advent of women's lib, it has become increasingly difficult to force women to behave as chattel. But the kids still have no power, no say in their fate. They are simply possessions.
While I was writing, my daughter called and said she made a decision. She would like to be left alone - no more trying to contact her, no more driving past the house, no more checking - until after the birth. Then she will go to a mediator with him and try to work things out. I was the first to make this suggestion, because I know everything is more peaceful when courts are kept out.
Sorry. I know I am venting. But this is such a hard situation, and as the grandmother - I am powerless.
Exhaustedly,
Clare
I can go for very long periods of time with a sort of serenity about the family. We are who we are. It is so hard to change. Then suddenly I am enraged by our lack of ability to take responsibility for what we have done. I know we did harmful, damaging things in response to the things that were done to us. But we still did them. And we still need to take responsibility and apologize.
Maybe I was reacting because I got an email from the father of my youngest's imminent child. She won't talk to him - mostly because she does not know what to say or to do. I told her that I received the email, and she asked to read it. Now she is upset and didn't want dinner. Both of these "children" are heavily engaged in drama. She needs to accept her fears and feelings, and go forward anyway. Of course, neither her father nor I set a good example of that. But she is going to be a mother, so she has to face the consequences of her decisions and grow up.
In compassion, I decided to answer him. He is concerned because his daughter from a previous relationship is upset because my daughter is no longer in their lives. I suggested that she is picking up cues from him. Although I didn't mention it, he lets his seven-year-old stay up until midnight, because she is his little buddy and he doesn't like being alone. Emotional incest. And I said that my daughter should not have been identifying herself as the child's stepmother after such a short time. He said my daughter's behavior now is not the girl he knew. I suggested that they did not have time to really know each other and that their behavior has now hurt two children.
Basically his response is that his daughter misses mine and that he doesn't do anything to remind her or trigger that. And he wasn't the first to use the word step-mom. So he is fine, everything he does is wise, it's everyone else's problem, he just wants someone to argue with.
I am so angry with both of them. Here is one more precious child being born into drama, conflict, violence. One more child who will not have a home because the courts will divide her like a possession. It breaks my heart that we consider the parents' wants and not the child's needs.
And I am frightened. The video we watched by Leslie Morgan Steiner showed the patterns. And this man is stalking my daughter. The fact that she is avoiding him and won't talk to him is adding fuel to the fire.
One more generation...one more generation of this crap. I hate this diminishment of community. It's an absolute loss of nuclear family and we have already lost extended family and neighborhood. The baby is on her own from infancy. What is wrong with us???? The part of the video that screamed at me was when Leslie said that the courts order children to go stay with the man that abused their mother. What is wrong with us?????? It all relates to male dominance, ownership of their wife and children. With the advent of women's lib, it has become increasingly difficult to force women to behave as chattel. But the kids still have no power, no say in their fate. They are simply possessions.
While I was writing, my daughter called and said she made a decision. She would like to be left alone - no more trying to contact her, no more driving past the house, no more checking - until after the birth. Then she will go to a mediator with him and try to work things out. I was the first to make this suggestion, because I know everything is more peaceful when courts are kept out.
Sorry. I know I am venting. But this is such a hard situation, and as the grandmother - I am powerless.
Exhaustedly,
Clare
Sunday, January 27, 2013
Healing
Hello,
I was suddenly quite ill again this weekend, once again coughing and in pain from all of the coughing.
I've finally conceded to taking antibiotics...and must admit I do feel better.
The poem speaks volumes to the plight of all in the world...the reality is that no one is left untouched...and still silence persists...shame, isolation and secrecy...our own private hellacious prison.
I love the image of the iceberg...all of us frozen into silence...and yet some of us are melting free...swimming away...the key to this is speaking out in order to create the energy to melt the rest of those frozen souls captured within their own personal prisons. Me Too gives us that energy.
I was teaching the chakras today in First Day School...and spent a good amount of time exploring relationships and respect for earth, self and others with the two boys who were there. That's what we need to do...we need to speak truth to the young members of our communities...teach them the value of their power and that relationship is an equal sharing of power, not one overpowering another.
I am trying to develop a grant proposal for an educational program to teach adolescents about domestic violence, dating violence, and stalking...we need to prevent these from happening and stop waiting to punish those who get caught.
I love the image of the women drumming on their pots and pans...but it took me back to Center Street...back to the neighbors who used to beat pots and pans on New Years Eve but beat their children the rest of the year. I/we turned a blind eye and deaf ear to that pain...feeling discomfort...but believing that this was normal behavior...how sickly we were raised.
I am glad that you feel anger at the lack of apology by our siblings...I am furious that no one acknowledges me or this work that we are sharing...I have received several text messages on holidays from the sisters...I have heard nothing...not a f***ing Christmas or birthday card from the brothers. It is frustrating...it is infuriating...it is sad.
I am going to watch the TED talk that you shared.
I love you.
I am filled with gratitude for you.
Thank you from the depths of my soul.
Maggie
I was suddenly quite ill again this weekend, once again coughing and in pain from all of the coughing.
I've finally conceded to taking antibiotics...and must admit I do feel better.
The poem speaks volumes to the plight of all in the world...the reality is that no one is left untouched...and still silence persists...shame, isolation and secrecy...our own private hellacious prison.
I love the image of the iceberg...all of us frozen into silence...and yet some of us are melting free...swimming away...the key to this is speaking out in order to create the energy to melt the rest of those frozen souls captured within their own personal prisons. Me Too gives us that energy.
I was teaching the chakras today in First Day School...and spent a good amount of time exploring relationships and respect for earth, self and others with the two boys who were there. That's what we need to do...we need to speak truth to the young members of our communities...teach them the value of their power and that relationship is an equal sharing of power, not one overpowering another.
I am trying to develop a grant proposal for an educational program to teach adolescents about domestic violence, dating violence, and stalking...we need to prevent these from happening and stop waiting to punish those who get caught.
I love the image of the women drumming on their pots and pans...but it took me back to Center Street...back to the neighbors who used to beat pots and pans on New Years Eve but beat their children the rest of the year. I/we turned a blind eye and deaf ear to that pain...feeling discomfort...but believing that this was normal behavior...how sickly we were raised.
I am glad that you feel anger at the lack of apology by our siblings...I am furious that no one acknowledges me or this work that we are sharing...I have received several text messages on holidays from the sisters...I have heard nothing...not a f***ing Christmas or birthday card from the brothers. It is frustrating...it is infuriating...it is sad.
I am going to watch the TED talk that you shared.
I love you.
I am filled with gratitude for you.
Thank you from the depths of my soul.
Maggie
SilenceStagnationSwamp
Good morning little sister,
I hope you are having a relaxing morning, after your exciting week. Have you had time to process everything yet? Have you discerned direction forward?
Saturday is the day when I clean my house, and usually I listen to TED talks while I am working. Yesterday I listened to Leslie Morgan Steiner talk about domestic violence. I felt like I could understand my youngest after digesting the information. But of course, the info was chilling. One of her strongest messages, though, was that abuse/violence thrives in silence. Her way out of the violence was to tell everyone - friends, family, perfect strangers. It takes absolute vulnerability to tell, to expose the horrible things that happen in our private relationships.
(http://www.ted.com/talks/leslie_morgan_steiner_why_domestic_violence_victims_don_t_leave.html)
It hit me, suddenly, that our silence is the swamp. Nothing is said, and so nothing changes, and the situations are stagnate, they get deeper and murkier. Me too, talking about what happened is what agitates the swamp and gets the crap moving. It overcomes stagnation.
I saw a film recently where a man was beating his wife. They didn't show the beating, we just heard it. Other characters could hear it. One had tried to intervene and the violator was physically aggressive to her. It was frightening. In this scene, the woman who had tried to help was in her bed, listening, and finally just had to do something. So she got a pot and a spoon, started drumming and walked to the house, stood outside alone, drumming. The violator heard it and came out, threatening, she is afraid, but suddenly five or six other women are beside her with their pots. All of them looked him in the eye. He realized everyone knew what he was, and he brusquely pushed through the small crowd of women. He left.
It is almost impossible to go first. We don't have role models. We often don't know if we have the strength. For so many years I was complimented over and over for my strength. People were recognizing and commenting on my endurance and patience. We need to recognize the strength it takes to speak out, to stand up first, to say no, to tell our brothers we will scream if they don't get the hell out of our bedroom and hands off of our bodies! It is fractionally easier to be second or third - although that still takes an immense amount of strength. It is easy to join a movement.
So, let's sing. Let's tell our stories.
The world is a dangerous place, not because of those who do evil, but because of those who look on and do nothing. -Albert Einstein
Love from Clare
Rereading and furious with B#1 again. How dare he brush off his molesting you with saying he was drunk or using drugs. He was keeping the surface of the swamp calm and lifeless...we are so lifeless...why didn't apology occur to him? taking responsibility for the pain he caused? That would agitate the surface, though, wouldn't it. And we are so much more comfortable when it looks okay.
I hope you are having a relaxing morning, after your exciting week. Have you had time to process everything yet? Have you discerned direction forward?
Saturday is the day when I clean my house, and usually I listen to TED talks while I am working. Yesterday I listened to Leslie Morgan Steiner talk about domestic violence. I felt like I could understand my youngest after digesting the information. But of course, the info was chilling. One of her strongest messages, though, was that abuse/violence thrives in silence. Her way out of the violence was to tell everyone - friends, family, perfect strangers. It takes absolute vulnerability to tell, to expose the horrible things that happen in our private relationships.
(http://www.ted.com/talks/leslie_morgan_steiner_why_domestic_violence_victims_don_t_leave.html)
It hit me, suddenly, that our silence is the swamp. Nothing is said, and so nothing changes, and the situations are stagnate, they get deeper and murkier. Me too, talking about what happened is what agitates the swamp and gets the crap moving. It overcomes stagnation.
I saw a film recently where a man was beating his wife. They didn't show the beating, we just heard it. Other characters could hear it. One had tried to intervene and the violator was physically aggressive to her. It was frightening. In this scene, the woman who had tried to help was in her bed, listening, and finally just had to do something. So she got a pot and a spoon, started drumming and walked to the house, stood outside alone, drumming. The violator heard it and came out, threatening, she is afraid, but suddenly five or six other women are beside her with their pots. All of them looked him in the eye. He realized everyone knew what he was, and he brusquely pushed through the small crowd of women. He left.
It is almost impossible to go first. We don't have role models. We often don't know if we have the strength. For so many years I was complimented over and over for my strength. People were recognizing and commenting on my endurance and patience. We need to recognize the strength it takes to speak out, to stand up first, to say no, to tell our brothers we will scream if they don't get the hell out of our bedroom and hands off of our bodies! It is fractionally easier to be second or third - although that still takes an immense amount of strength. It is easy to join a movement.
So, let's sing. Let's tell our stories.
The world is a dangerous place, not because of those who do evil, but because of those who look on and do nothing. -Albert Einstein
Love from Clare
Rereading and furious with B#1 again. How dare he brush off his molesting you with saying he was drunk or using drugs. He was keeping the surface of the swamp calm and lifeless...we are so lifeless...why didn't apology occur to him? taking responsibility for the pain he caused? That would agitate the surface, though, wouldn't it. And we are so much more comfortable when it looks okay.
Saturday, January 26, 2013
break - clustered
Sobbing because I just heard the poet recite the following...
break - clustered
All holy history banned.
Unwritten books predicted the future, projected the past.
But my head unwraps around what appears limitless, man’s creative violence.
Whose son shall it be?
Which male child will perish a new day?
Our boys’ deaths galvanize.
We cherish corpses.
We mourn women, complicated.
Bitches get beat daily.
Profits made, prophets ignored.
War and tooth enameled salted lemon childhoods.
All colors run, none of us solid.
Don’t look for shadow behind me. I carry it within.
I live cycles of light and darkness.
Rhythm is half silence.
I see now, I never was one and not the other.
Sickness, health, tender violence.
I think now I never was pure.
Before form I was storm, blind, ign’ant — still am.
Human contracted itself blind, malignant.
I never was pure. Girl spoiled before ripened.
Language can’t math me.
I experience exponentially.
Everything is everything.
One woman loses 15, maybe 20, members of her family.
One woman loses six.
One woman loses her head.
One woman searches rubble.
One woman feeds on trash.
One woman shoots her face.
One woman shoots her husband.
One woman straps herself.
One woman gives birth to a baby.
One woman gives birth to borders.
One woman no longer believes love will ever find her.
One woman never did.
Where do refugee hearts go?
Broken, dissed, placed where they’re not from, don’t want to be missed.
Faced with absence.
We mourn each one or we mean nothing at all.
My spine curves spiral.
Precipice running to and running from human beings.
Cluster bombs left behind. De facto landmines.
A smoldering grief.
Harvest contaminated tobacco.
Harvest bombs. Harvest baby teeth.
Harvest palms, smoke.
Harvest witness, smoke.
Resolutions, smoke.
Salvation, smoke.
Redemption, smoke.
Breathe.
Do not fear what has blown up.
If you must, fear the unexploded.
-Suheir Hammad
break - clustered
All holy history banned.
Unwritten books predicted the future, projected the past.
But my head unwraps around what appears limitless, man’s creative violence.
Whose son shall it be?
Which male child will perish a new day?
Our boys’ deaths galvanize.
We cherish corpses.
We mourn women, complicated.
Bitches get beat daily.
Profits made, prophets ignored.
War and tooth enameled salted lemon childhoods.
All colors run, none of us solid.
Don’t look for shadow behind me. I carry it within.
I live cycles of light and darkness.
Rhythm is half silence.
I see now, I never was one and not the other.
Sickness, health, tender violence.
I think now I never was pure.
Before form I was storm, blind, ign’ant — still am.
Human contracted itself blind, malignant.
I never was pure. Girl spoiled before ripened.
Language can’t math me.
I experience exponentially.
Everything is everything.
One woman loses 15, maybe 20, members of her family.
One woman loses six.
One woman loses her head.
One woman searches rubble.
One woman feeds on trash.
One woman shoots her face.
One woman shoots her husband.
One woman straps herself.
One woman gives birth to a baby.
One woman gives birth to borders.
One woman no longer believes love will ever find her.
One woman never did.
Where do refugee hearts go?
Broken, dissed, placed where they’re not from, don’t want to be missed.
Faced with absence.
We mourn each one or we mean nothing at all.
My spine curves spiral.
Precipice running to and running from human beings.
Cluster bombs left behind. De facto landmines.
A smoldering grief.
Harvest contaminated tobacco.
Harvest bombs. Harvest baby teeth.
Harvest palms, smoke.
Harvest witness, smoke.
Resolutions, smoke.
Salvation, smoke.
Redemption, smoke.
Breathe.
Do not fear what has blown up.
If you must, fear the unexploded.
-Suheir Hammad
Friday, January 25, 2013
Fighting for our lives
I agree that many, if not most, men are not rapists. But the ones who are seem to be the ones in charge, or who take charge. Or maybe, they seem to be the top or the bottom of the pool. It could go back to that God-given right to possess by those at the top...
When my kids were little I identified their tendency toward the lowest common denominator determiner of behavior. All of the kids would adopt the behavior of the least in control. The kids who don't want to sink are the goody-two-shoes ostracized individuals. I think there are men who go along with violence, with disrespecting women, simply because of peer pressure. And many more remain silent.
When I read your response I thought, we are just the tip of the iceberg. I saw us sort of jumping around on the iceberg, trying to get someone to notice us. Then I saw us as part of a melting iceberg, we are part of the melt, we are swimming free. Then I realized that the iceberg is melting quickly and we are all swimming away from that frozen agony together. And as we go, others are able to melt and slip away. Maybe this is part of the effect of the heat of love
I watched a movie this evening, an indie, reality type film. I realized that when the female characters were alone with male characters, I was afraid. I think that deep inside I define everything as a potential rape situation. I think I am discovering that I am always afraid.
A couple quotes come to mind:
Whatever you do will be insignificant, but it is very important that you do it. -Gandhi
When my kids were little I identified their tendency toward the lowest common denominator determiner of behavior. All of the kids would adopt the behavior of the least in control. The kids who don't want to sink are the goody-two-shoes ostracized individuals. I think there are men who go along with violence, with disrespecting women, simply because of peer pressure. And many more remain silent.
When I read your response I thought, we are just the tip of the iceberg. I saw us sort of jumping around on the iceberg, trying to get someone to notice us. Then I saw us as part of a melting iceberg, we are part of the melt, we are swimming free. Then I realized that the iceberg is melting quickly and we are all swimming away from that frozen agony together. And as we go, others are able to melt and slip away. Maybe this is part of the effect of the heat of love
I watched a movie this evening, an indie, reality type film. I realized that when the female characters were alone with male characters, I was afraid. I think that deep inside I define everything as a potential rape situation. I think I am discovering that I am always afraid.
A couple quotes come to mind:
Whatever you do will be insignificant, but it is very important that you do it. -Gandhi
- Speak your truth, even if your voice shakes. -Bumper sticker...
- The pain we are in is staggering. Women are being destroyed by the minute - because we are never the same after a sexual assault or any kind of violent assault. Men are being destroyed as they participate in the violence or try to escape the violence. Children are being tossed in the tide of filth. How do we raise our sons to be noble and kind? These kind , gentlemen get laughed at, put in their place - their silent place, by ridicule and - you guessed it - more violence.
- I never thought it was a coincidence that the women's movement and the environmental movement arose at the same time. I feel like we are in the fight for our lives right now. One side is telling us we must accept rape, bear the children of rape, give visitation to rapists. They are telling us our bodies are not our own, our lives are not our own. We must protect ourselves against rape. This same side is fracking the deep layers of the Earth, destroying water tables, ignoring the fact that the wildlife and the human life are becoming extremely ill. The rapist are owning the livestock and forcing torturous lives, destroying the plants, dumping poison on the land, releasing it into the air. It seems as if they are intent on murdering the planet. I don't think they are so stupid they don't know it is happening. They can't be that stupid...
- On the other side, the icebergs are melting. We are redefining rape as a man's problem. There is something wrong with the violator. I loved the new rules for rapists - If you stop to help a woman when her car breaks down, don't rape her...If you feel unsafe in a situation, blow a rape whistle until someone comes and helps you resist raping women...If you plan to rape a women while on a date, tell her before hand, otherwise she might think you just want to go on a date. I love the fact that the world is waking up and realizing this is a man's problem. Women are victims. Women never deserve to be raped - even if a breast is showing. People are rebelling against the old definitions of rape and abuse. And people are saying no to fracking. And people are eating local, eating humanely grown meats, and even more - walking away from eating meats - refusing to be part of the carnage.
- We have to speak. We have to speak out, we have to sing, we have to cry, we have to be passionately joyful. Life and love will win. This planet is so lovely. It is worth saving. We save the planet, we save ourselves - and I don't think the order of occurence matters at all.
- Passionately,
- Clare
Speechless
That's staggering.
It makes me feel small and ineffectual...
How do we stop the violence?
How do we nurture respect?
How do we establish equality?
Being a white man definitely has privileges...
but not all white men take advantage of others because of those "god-given rights".
Some men are decent and respectful and value all life forms...
How do we teach our sons to love and respect others, particularly women who are part of their lives?
When I was in my meeting the other morning the woman asked me if i considered politics as a career option...I immediately said no...I could support a politician...working behind the scenes...but my ego is too frail to withstand the insults that women politicians are subjected to. That's a sad statement.
So we can pray...and we can lead by example...and we can speak out against this...
what else can we do?
I will think about this...knowing that Me Too is a much larger contingent than anyone imagines.
Until tomorrow...
I love you,
Maggie
It makes me feel small and ineffectual...
How do we stop the violence?
How do we nurture respect?
How do we establish equality?
Being a white man definitely has privileges...
but not all white men take advantage of others because of those "god-given rights".
Some men are decent and respectful and value all life forms...
How do we teach our sons to love and respect others, particularly women who are part of their lives?
When I was in my meeting the other morning the woman asked me if i considered politics as a career option...I immediately said no...I could support a politician...working behind the scenes...but my ego is too frail to withstand the insults that women politicians are subjected to. That's a sad statement.
So we can pray...and we can lead by example...and we can speak out against this...
what else can we do?
I will think about this...knowing that Me Too is a much larger contingent than anyone imagines.
Until tomorrow...
I love you,
Maggie
Thursday, January 24, 2013
A bit more about violence
You are amazing, and you are on the right track. Your moments of joyful magic show it. All is right with who you are and what you are doing this moment. Perfect.
The doors that are opening for you are valuable, because you have something valuable to say. I know you will be a driving force for change!
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rebecca-solnit/violence-against-women_b_2541940.html
I. on the other hand, read this article. One woman is raped every minute in the US. I read the statistics about the violence to women and children and felt like I was drowning. There is so much violence. There is so much violence we can't even see it, we can't even comprehend it.
I read about the honor killings in the mid-east. Women who have been raped have dishonored their families and so they must die. And I thought, "Yes. There should be honor killings. Any man who is so dishonorable as to attack a woman needs to be dealt with." We need to open our eyes to the violence. But it seems so impossible. The violence, the way we do things just seems so normal. How can we separate ourselves from this horrible culture and see the violence.........
I had an aha! moment today. I am not sure if it fits here, but since I am still thinking about it, I am going to share it here. Many people trace the source of our Aryan culture to the mountains in the north of India. I met a retired language professor years ago, a Basque woman living in the US. Her retirement project was to trace the common language that was the mother of European languages. She traced it to the same starting point.
One of my heroes is Gandhi. But he was part of, lived the caste system. I think that is the perfect example of not recognizing violence because it is so familiar, common, it's sneaky and hiding in plain sight in our culture. The caste system, my guess is it has the same origin, was genius. You are a specific rank, because God says so. You can never move. You can't argue. God has deemed your status. If you are Untouchable, you will always be untouchable. And I realize we have a caste system in the US. From the Puritans we carry the belief that if you have money, God loves you. That is how He shows his favor. If God does not love you, you do not have money. Look at your income and you have an idea of how God ranks you.
I started recognizing this when I saw how we fill our jails and our military with men in order to support an elite group of God-beloved men, and when I read about the glass ceiling for women. And, of course the rape statistics. And the child brides. God doesn't love possessions as much as he love the white men.
My moment today was realizing that I occasionally play the lottery. I am reading a book by Carl Hiaasen, and a character comments that the Indians are getting rich because of the white man's penchant to gamble. I realized that I/we think winning is a sign of divine favor. It sounds stupid, but I realized that way deep in my soul, I was waiting for the Divine to prove that I am worth rewarding. So now I am trying to step away from this whole mindset, and try to imagine how an indigenous person would see abundance and favor and the flow of love. Because the way it seems now - I feel expendable. I recognize the cultural conditioning and wonder what else is polluting my humanity.
So, if one woman is raped every minute in the US, and we add in the violence against women in all other countries, is there ever a single moment when women are not under attack? Is there ever one single moment where we are cherished and safe? Subconsciously recognizing this might explain why I never feel safe.
Love you,
Clare
The doors that are opening for you are valuable, because you have something valuable to say. I know you will be a driving force for change!
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rebecca-solnit/violence-against-women_b_2541940.html
I. on the other hand, read this article. One woman is raped every minute in the US. I read the statistics about the violence to women and children and felt like I was drowning. There is so much violence. There is so much violence we can't even see it, we can't even comprehend it.
I read about the honor killings in the mid-east. Women who have been raped have dishonored their families and so they must die. And I thought, "Yes. There should be honor killings. Any man who is so dishonorable as to attack a woman needs to be dealt with." We need to open our eyes to the violence. But it seems so impossible. The violence, the way we do things just seems so normal. How can we separate ourselves from this horrible culture and see the violence.........
I had an aha! moment today. I am not sure if it fits here, but since I am still thinking about it, I am going to share it here. Many people trace the source of our Aryan culture to the mountains in the north of India. I met a retired language professor years ago, a Basque woman living in the US. Her retirement project was to trace the common language that was the mother of European languages. She traced it to the same starting point.
One of my heroes is Gandhi. But he was part of, lived the caste system. I think that is the perfect example of not recognizing violence because it is so familiar, common, it's sneaky and hiding in plain sight in our culture. The caste system, my guess is it has the same origin, was genius. You are a specific rank, because God says so. You can never move. You can't argue. God has deemed your status. If you are Untouchable, you will always be untouchable. And I realize we have a caste system in the US. From the Puritans we carry the belief that if you have money, God loves you. That is how He shows his favor. If God does not love you, you do not have money. Look at your income and you have an idea of how God ranks you.
I started recognizing this when I saw how we fill our jails and our military with men in order to support an elite group of God-beloved men, and when I read about the glass ceiling for women. And, of course the rape statistics. And the child brides. God doesn't love possessions as much as he love the white men.
My moment today was realizing that I occasionally play the lottery. I am reading a book by Carl Hiaasen, and a character comments that the Indians are getting rich because of the white man's penchant to gamble. I realized that I/we think winning is a sign of divine favor. It sounds stupid, but I realized that way deep in my soul, I was waiting for the Divine to prove that I am worth rewarding. So now I am trying to step away from this whole mindset, and try to imagine how an indigenous person would see abundance and favor and the flow of love. Because the way it seems now - I feel expendable. I recognize the cultural conditioning and wonder what else is polluting my humanity.
So, if one woman is raped every minute in the US, and we add in the violence against women in all other countries, is there ever a single moment when women are not under attack? Is there ever one single moment where we are cherished and safe? Subconsciously recognizing this might explain why I never feel safe.
Love you,
Clare
A day of rest and awe
Today I am resting from my travels and adventures of yesterday. I feel as if I am really getting old if I have to rest (2 naps) because I pushed myself hard the day before...but my body demanded the naps and I complied...there is nothing more pampering than a long winter's nap.
I had a very successful and insightful day yesterday. I met people, learned some new things, and thoroughly enjoyed the journey.
So first I met with the social worker who is in a public health and human services position. What an opportunity to have met and spoken with her. She is intelligent and compassionate. She practices social work throughout her state and meets one on one with people who voice opposition to the public policies to gain understanding of their reasons. She gave me some good advice. She told me that I should work on a PhD, but to take my time. She took 9 years to earn hers and said that once she was in her program she began to have the connections necessary to do the work that she wants to do. So basically the doors open just from being in the program...not from having the degree. She asked me for my CV and asked me to consider working in the state capitol for one of her divisions...too bad its 2 hours away.
I checked in with my professor who is helping me with my research and she is cautiously optimistic that the results are truly significant. We need to run a few more statistical tests to check reliability and validity, and gather some demographic stats for comparison. She was getting excited though. She said once we get this checked out we have to get this information out there...and then quickly checked her enthusiasm and said not to rush into conclusions. So we are meeting again in 2 weeks to run all of those tests.
Then I drove 2 more hours and did the presentation on the connection between stress and disease...stressing to the participants the importance of interpreting unhealthy coping habits (food, alcohol, tobacco, etc.) as the person's attempt to treat themself. It was really well received. There were about 12 people there, all had questions, their faces were engaged throughout the presentation...and it was about 2.5 hours of learning. They loved Brene Brown's video, The Power of Vulnerability...none had seen her before. I felt privileged to introduce her to other social workers and encouraged them to check out her other TED talks. A Quaker Friend attended and asked me to meet with him...that he has additional information that will make this a stronger program. He suggested we collaborate on an article...I surprised him by telling him that I'd already submitted a manuscript on this subject, but told him that if it is rejected I would love to collaborate to improve it for resubmission.
While I was at both the first stop and the second I spoke with the public official and one of my professors about my upcoming presentation and they both asked for an abstract so that I can do the presentation at events that they plan. Who knows...this may be my springboard to speaking out against child abuse and prevention of it.
I have spent my day...when I was awake...filled with gratitude for being alive and having the opportunities that I do. I talked with my students about being open to inspiration and having the courage to pursue what seems like a curiosity that they observe...that this is how breakthroughs in science occur. We talked about recurring patterns in nature and the world...that intracellular structures are analogous to the body's organs and they are analogous to many of the machines and structures we've engineered...oftentimes engineered prior to visualizing and understanding the way that the body works...how the proteins mechanics work...I talked about collective consciousness and accessing wisdom that is available to all who seek it...and perhaps this is how we can explain "discoveries"...perhaps it's more about tapping into that universal wisdom. I think I freak them out a bit...I asked them if they meditate...I explained that when you shut off the brain chatter and just listen spontaneous ideas sometimes come into your brain...that's inspiration...that's the Ah-Ha moment that happen in great discoveries. But that takes letting go and trusting the unknown...not easy for anyone, but especially not for science majors. I sat in my car letting it warm up and just looked around me...it was barely snowing and you know how little the flakes are when it's 11 degrees...tiny little bits of snow...they were sparkeling as the fell...it was magical. I sat there mesmerized for a bit of time and just enjoying the show...and then reluctantly reentered the real world.
So now I have to figure out what's for dinner, so I will say good evening.
Love and Light,
Maggie
I had a very successful and insightful day yesterday. I met people, learned some new things, and thoroughly enjoyed the journey.
So first I met with the social worker who is in a public health and human services position. What an opportunity to have met and spoken with her. She is intelligent and compassionate. She practices social work throughout her state and meets one on one with people who voice opposition to the public policies to gain understanding of their reasons. She gave me some good advice. She told me that I should work on a PhD, but to take my time. She took 9 years to earn hers and said that once she was in her program she began to have the connections necessary to do the work that she wants to do. So basically the doors open just from being in the program...not from having the degree. She asked me for my CV and asked me to consider working in the state capitol for one of her divisions...too bad its 2 hours away.
I checked in with my professor who is helping me with my research and she is cautiously optimistic that the results are truly significant. We need to run a few more statistical tests to check reliability and validity, and gather some demographic stats for comparison. She was getting excited though. She said once we get this checked out we have to get this information out there...and then quickly checked her enthusiasm and said not to rush into conclusions. So we are meeting again in 2 weeks to run all of those tests.
Then I drove 2 more hours and did the presentation on the connection between stress and disease...stressing to the participants the importance of interpreting unhealthy coping habits (food, alcohol, tobacco, etc.) as the person's attempt to treat themself. It was really well received. There were about 12 people there, all had questions, their faces were engaged throughout the presentation...and it was about 2.5 hours of learning. They loved Brene Brown's video, The Power of Vulnerability...none had seen her before. I felt privileged to introduce her to other social workers and encouraged them to check out her other TED talks. A Quaker Friend attended and asked me to meet with him...that he has additional information that will make this a stronger program. He suggested we collaborate on an article...I surprised him by telling him that I'd already submitted a manuscript on this subject, but told him that if it is rejected I would love to collaborate to improve it for resubmission.
While I was at both the first stop and the second I spoke with the public official and one of my professors about my upcoming presentation and they both asked for an abstract so that I can do the presentation at events that they plan. Who knows...this may be my springboard to speaking out against child abuse and prevention of it.
I have spent my day...when I was awake...filled with gratitude for being alive and having the opportunities that I do. I talked with my students about being open to inspiration and having the courage to pursue what seems like a curiosity that they observe...that this is how breakthroughs in science occur. We talked about recurring patterns in nature and the world...that intracellular structures are analogous to the body's organs and they are analogous to many of the machines and structures we've engineered...oftentimes engineered prior to visualizing and understanding the way that the body works...how the proteins mechanics work...I talked about collective consciousness and accessing wisdom that is available to all who seek it...and perhaps this is how we can explain "discoveries"...perhaps it's more about tapping into that universal wisdom. I think I freak them out a bit...I asked them if they meditate...I explained that when you shut off the brain chatter and just listen spontaneous ideas sometimes come into your brain...that's inspiration...that's the Ah-Ha moment that happen in great discoveries. But that takes letting go and trusting the unknown...not easy for anyone, but especially not for science majors. I sat in my car letting it warm up and just looked around me...it was barely snowing and you know how little the flakes are when it's 11 degrees...tiny little bits of snow...they were sparkeling as the fell...it was magical. I sat there mesmerized for a bit of time and just enjoying the show...and then reluctantly reentered the real world.
So now I have to figure out what's for dinner, so I will say good evening.
Love and Light,
Maggie
Wednesday, January 23, 2013
impressive
I'm impressed. I hope that your very full day ended up being exciting and fulfilling and even fun. I feel accomplished when I make it to work on time and remain cheerful for the duration!
And I haven't been having any breakthrough insights lately...well, I had one. I had that "I must eat" compulsion yesterday, and monitored myself today. I know the culprit was the sugar in hot chocolate. I have been wheat free since New Years. I think I have blasted past the withdrawal and as long as I don't eat any, I am stable. I guess next is sugar. I have such ambivalent feelings about sugar. I remember taking a spoon full of sugar once, then a spoon full of honey. The honey was warm and alive in my mouth. The sugar was cold and dead. And I read The Sugar Blues when I went to college. I know it is poison, but I also want that sweetness. I know I crave sugar when there is nothing sweet in my life.
Starting next month I am going to try an allergen-id diet. I think the idea is to eat typically nonallergenic foods for several days, then introduce one typically allergenic food and monitor the changes. If this is successful, and I begin to understand my allergies/sensitivities/addictions better, then I will have to decide how to change my life. Our work here has absolutely convinced me that we can't use will-power to conquer addictions. We need our addictions to cover for some trauma or sustain the distance from the pain.
Your words about melting and shattering are very appropriate for today - when it is COLD outside. We have been warned to stay indoors, and if we go out to make sure all skin is covered. This is when I worry about the homeless the most. We live in such violence...
I am chilly and tired, so I think it's time for me to turn in. I can't wait to hear your account of your very full day.
Love you,
Clare
And I haven't been having any breakthrough insights lately...well, I had one. I had that "I must eat" compulsion yesterday, and monitored myself today. I know the culprit was the sugar in hot chocolate. I have been wheat free since New Years. I think I have blasted past the withdrawal and as long as I don't eat any, I am stable. I guess next is sugar. I have such ambivalent feelings about sugar. I remember taking a spoon full of sugar once, then a spoon full of honey. The honey was warm and alive in my mouth. The sugar was cold and dead. And I read The Sugar Blues when I went to college. I know it is poison, but I also want that sweetness. I know I crave sugar when there is nothing sweet in my life.
Starting next month I am going to try an allergen-id diet. I think the idea is to eat typically nonallergenic foods for several days, then introduce one typically allergenic food and monitor the changes. If this is successful, and I begin to understand my allergies/sensitivities/addictions better, then I will have to decide how to change my life. Our work here has absolutely convinced me that we can't use will-power to conquer addictions. We need our addictions to cover for some trauma or sustain the distance from the pain.
Your words about melting and shattering are very appropriate for today - when it is COLD outside. We have been warned to stay indoors, and if we go out to make sure all skin is covered. This is when I worry about the homeless the most. We live in such violence...
I am chilly and tired, so I think it's time for me to turn in. I can't wait to hear your account of your very full day.
Love you,
Clare
Tuesday, January 22, 2013
A quick hello
Sorry, I have a big day tomorrow and I was wrapped up preparing for it so I've neglected to stop by...until almost 10 pm which is close to my bedtime.
Tomorrow I am meeting with a public official from the dept. of health and human services to try to figure out what I want to be when I finally grow up...
then I am working the data from my research and see if my findings are correct...
then I am giving a 3 hour program on child abuse & neglect and their connection to disease and how important it is to treat the root cause and not just the symptoms.
I will probably not check in tomorrow as I am leaving the house at 7 am and anticipate getting back here about 10:30 pm. But I will meet you here on Thursday and tell you about my adventures.
Love and Light,
Maggie
PS I am reimagining the chakras...trying ti intentionally feel my connection to the earth and then to others...thanks for the reminder.
Tomorrow I am meeting with a public official from the dept. of health and human services to try to figure out what I want to be when I finally grow up...
then I am working the data from my research and see if my findings are correct...
then I am giving a 3 hour program on child abuse & neglect and their connection to disease and how important it is to treat the root cause and not just the symptoms.
I will probably not check in tomorrow as I am leaving the house at 7 am and anticipate getting back here about 10:30 pm. But I will meet you here on Thursday and tell you about my adventures.
Love and Light,
Maggie
PS I am reimagining the chakras...trying ti intentionally feel my connection to the earth and then to others...thanks for the reminder.
Monday, January 21, 2013
Verrrrrry interesting...
The allergy finding is interesting. Another piece I have read about, and which seems pertinent is that the more children a woman has, and the closer together she has them, the more likely the kids are to have allergies. It seems to have to do with depletion of the body. I always thought that I had the fewest allergies of our sib group because I was the oldest. I have some hay fever now, and I'm allergic to dust - housecleaning can be a chore, but it's nothing compared to some of you sibs. And I know we have quite a bit of asthma in the next generation.
My kids had some milk allergies. But I avoided dairy products and nursed them for a long time. Then I rarely gave them milk. When they had dairy, it was cheese or yogurt. And we definitely have a gluten allergy - especially and my first, second and last children.
Being abused, the stress of living with abuse, would have to do with having a depleted body. You are right, abuse causes more than emotional trauma and problems.
You said, "I believe that we are choosing joy by speaking out in this forum and through our lives." I don't know if we are picking joy. I think we are choosing to feel. I think we are choosing to thaw. Joy is that glimmer that touches in sometimes, just to keep us motivated, to leave us wanting more feeling - even if it means more tears. You say you are trying to learn how to cry. I am trying to learn how to laugh. You and S#3 are such great laughers. It takes me awhile to get on board. I have found that I laugh out loud at dog-shaming photos. So I'm a dork, but I have been reading a few pages a day. And laughing.
I want to reiterate what the flowers taught me about the chakras. I think it is very important. The first chakra is at the feet. The second chakra is at the knees. The sacrum, or maybe the perineum, is number three. We struggle to ground, because we are trying to ground from here. This is not going to work very well. We must ground with our feet, and experience flexibility with our knees. Then I think there is a breach between the yellow, number 5, and the green chakra number 6. Our mission in this time of great change is to heal, and to connect the heart with the will, to stop trying to control all details. We are supposed to learn to trust, to have faith, to be in the flow, and to gently direct ourselves. We are not supposed to make a plan and never veer. We are not supposed to hoard anything, but let it flow...Writing that made me consider that I hoard pain. What a stupid thing to collect!
I wanted to share a strange dream. I was in an airport, in a side room with my stuff, waiting to board my flight - I think I was going to London. After waiting for hours I realized I could not hear the announcements clearly and so I wasn't sure if they had called my flight, and I realized I did not have a passport. I knew I wasn't going, so I started to collect my luggage, which included a guitar, and my cat - but my cat was under some seats and wouldn't come out to me. Perhaps I am not ready to move on, but at least I am packed. Just a few more details to organize!
With love from Clare
My kids had some milk allergies. But I avoided dairy products and nursed them for a long time. Then I rarely gave them milk. When they had dairy, it was cheese or yogurt. And we definitely have a gluten allergy - especially and my first, second and last children.
Being abused, the stress of living with abuse, would have to do with having a depleted body. You are right, abuse causes more than emotional trauma and problems.
You said, "I believe that we are choosing joy by speaking out in this forum and through our lives." I don't know if we are picking joy. I think we are choosing to feel. I think we are choosing to thaw. Joy is that glimmer that touches in sometimes, just to keep us motivated, to leave us wanting more feeling - even if it means more tears. You say you are trying to learn how to cry. I am trying to learn how to laugh. You and S#3 are such great laughers. It takes me awhile to get on board. I have found that I laugh out loud at dog-shaming photos. So I'm a dork, but I have been reading a few pages a day. And laughing.
I want to reiterate what the flowers taught me about the chakras. I think it is very important. The first chakra is at the feet. The second chakra is at the knees. The sacrum, or maybe the perineum, is number three. We struggle to ground, because we are trying to ground from here. This is not going to work very well. We must ground with our feet, and experience flexibility with our knees. Then I think there is a breach between the yellow, number 5, and the green chakra number 6. Our mission in this time of great change is to heal, and to connect the heart with the will, to stop trying to control all details. We are supposed to learn to trust, to have faith, to be in the flow, and to gently direct ourselves. We are not supposed to make a plan and never veer. We are not supposed to hoard anything, but let it flow...Writing that made me consider that I hoard pain. What a stupid thing to collect!
I wanted to share a strange dream. I was in an airport, in a side room with my stuff, waiting to board my flight - I think I was going to London. After waiting for hours I realized I could not hear the announcements clearly and so I wasn't sure if they had called my flight, and I realized I did not have a passport. I knew I wasn't going, so I started to collect my luggage, which included a guitar, and my cat - but my cat was under some seats and wouldn't come out to me. Perhaps I am not ready to move on, but at least I am packed. Just a few more details to organize!
With love from Clare
Ambivalence
I am ambivalent today.
I have been running tests of statistical significance on my research and today stepped back to analyze the findings...these are very early findings but the correlations that are significant consistently are that:
1. If a person is abused or neglected their children have a significant chance of having food allergies.
2. The age of onset of those food allergies (for the child) is affected by the frequency, duration and severity of the abuse of the parent (the higher the frequency, longer duration and greater severity are correlated with earlier onset of food allergies).
Not only does abuse and neglect hurt us...put us at risk of unhealthy habits, high risk behaviors and early disease and death...it is also passed to our children. We, the abused, pass along the hypervigilance and lack of trust that we experience psychologically to our children as a hypervigilance to foods...food that is benign, nutritional and necessary for life...we pass along physiologic distrust to our kids...the message that the world is not a safe place is passed to them in utero...That makes me very sad.
From a scientific perspective I am excited to find that my ideas have merit...that I am onto something...and that something could be significant. Perhaps this will be the platform that will allow me to speak out against abuse in a more public forum. Perhaps this is how I can make a difference. It's too early to say if this research is truly significant, I am meeting with my professor on Wednesday to go over my work. I will let you know what she says.
Love and Light,
Maggie
I have been running tests of statistical significance on my research and today stepped back to analyze the findings...these are very early findings but the correlations that are significant consistently are that:
1. If a person is abused or neglected their children have a significant chance of having food allergies.
2. The age of onset of those food allergies (for the child) is affected by the frequency, duration and severity of the abuse of the parent (the higher the frequency, longer duration and greater severity are correlated with earlier onset of food allergies).
Not only does abuse and neglect hurt us...put us at risk of unhealthy habits, high risk behaviors and early disease and death...it is also passed to our children. We, the abused, pass along the hypervigilance and lack of trust that we experience psychologically to our children as a hypervigilance to foods...food that is benign, nutritional and necessary for life...we pass along physiologic distrust to our kids...the message that the world is not a safe place is passed to them in utero...That makes me very sad.
From a scientific perspective I am excited to find that my ideas have merit...that I am onto something...and that something could be significant. Perhaps this will be the platform that will allow me to speak out against abuse in a more public forum. Perhaps this is how I can make a difference. It's too early to say if this research is truly significant, I am meeting with my professor on Wednesday to go over my work. I will let you know what she says.
Love and Light,
Maggie
Sunday, January 20, 2013
insights
Thank you...for the words and the images.
I spoke in Meeting today...
I don't speak very often...but I was compelled.
Opening exercises were about paying attention to the small and the large and understanding the interdependence of life...
She read a poem that said something like, I don't know if i know how to pray, but I do know how to pay attention.
I spoke up about the interdependence of humans...that inescapable network of mutuality that you quoted...
that all choices have consequences...
our food choices effect world hunger...
our government policies worsen illegal immigration...
we can choose to resonate with the fear, scarcity and greed frequencies...
or we can choose love, abundance and joy.
I believe that we are choosing joy by speaking out in this forum and through our lives.
We choose not to live in disillusioned silence that consumes our family.
The MLK quotes are incredibly appropriate for our personal journey as well as that of our country.
The skewed perspective...seeing beautiful as ugly and ugly as beautiful slams into my psyche...
how misunderstood our actions are to our family...no one has the courage or the initiative to even read our words...even anonymously they haven't even read our work...it is painful to be misunderstood...but even more painful to think of that level of fear that paralyzes action. We all need to melt into love...to shatter that frozen, paralyzed state and begin to live fully.
Someone in Meeting said that God calls all of us into action against social injustices...
it is the few MLK's of the world who listen and act on the call.
I believe that we have acted after hearing that still small voice...
whether it is during prayer...in dreams of our ancestors...or intuitions...the call is there.
I wanted to share another of the observations from my book...
they wrote about the chakras...and said that everyone is in a rush to get to the highest chakras...to get to the head. They wrote of the importance of the lower chakras..those that connect us to the earth and to each other as being vital for health and stability. The suggested spending more time in the first and second chakras before attempting to journey upward. It is true of my life...I have attempted to bypass the lower chakras...convincing myself that I can proceed along my spiritual path without that connection...I am self-sufficient and trust only myself anyway...what I am missing is that interdependence...that trust...that love of others...I can go nowhere without establishing those qualities and relationships.
I love you...and do trust you as much as I am able to...
Maggie
So sorry about the dog...I am saddened by the loss.
I spoke in Meeting today...
I don't speak very often...but I was compelled.
Opening exercises were about paying attention to the small and the large and understanding the interdependence of life...
She read a poem that said something like, I don't know if i know how to pray, but I do know how to pay attention.
I spoke up about the interdependence of humans...that inescapable network of mutuality that you quoted...
that all choices have consequences...
our food choices effect world hunger...
our government policies worsen illegal immigration...
we can choose to resonate with the fear, scarcity and greed frequencies...
or we can choose love, abundance and joy.
I believe that we are choosing joy by speaking out in this forum and through our lives.
We choose not to live in disillusioned silence that consumes our family.
The MLK quotes are incredibly appropriate for our personal journey as well as that of our country.
The skewed perspective...seeing beautiful as ugly and ugly as beautiful slams into my psyche...
how misunderstood our actions are to our family...no one has the courage or the initiative to even read our words...even anonymously they haven't even read our work...it is painful to be misunderstood...but even more painful to think of that level of fear that paralyzes action. We all need to melt into love...to shatter that frozen, paralyzed state and begin to live fully.
Someone in Meeting said that God calls all of us into action against social injustices...
it is the few MLK's of the world who listen and act on the call.
I believe that we have acted after hearing that still small voice...
whether it is during prayer...in dreams of our ancestors...or intuitions...the call is there.
I wanted to share another of the observations from my book...
they wrote about the chakras...and said that everyone is in a rush to get to the highest chakras...to get to the head. They wrote of the importance of the lower chakras..those that connect us to the earth and to each other as being vital for health and stability. The suggested spending more time in the first and second chakras before attempting to journey upward. It is true of my life...I have attempted to bypass the lower chakras...convincing myself that I can proceed along my spiritual path without that connection...I am self-sufficient and trust only myself anyway...what I am missing is that interdependence...that trust...that love of others...I can go nowhere without establishing those qualities and relationships.
I love you...and do trust you as much as I am able to...
Maggie
So sorry about the dog...I am saddened by the loss.
Celebrating King
I have a lot of respect for Martin Luther King, Jr., and so I was rereading some of his words. In honor of his holiday, tomorrow, I decided to reflect on a few here. All blue quotes are his.
In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.
Sadly, when I read this quote, my mind replaced the word friends with family. It is the silence of our family that causes such pain and loss and distrust of ourselves and each other. So I am proud of us, you and me. for breaking the silence. Even if it seems we are casting a very feeble light, our words are public. We are speaking trusth to the power of silence. Maybe we are someone's small, still voice...
There is family silence where we avoid truths and history and each other, and there is Quaker silence where we wait in expectation for Spirit to provide Light. I think perhaps in bucking the family legacy, we found the proper Silence!
Like an unchecked cancer, hate corrodes the personality and eats away its vital unity. Hate destroys a man's sense of values and his objectivity. It causes him to describe the beautiful as ugly and the ugly as beautiful, and to confuse the true with the false and the false with the true.
I don't think I have ever been hateful. I don't hate anyone. I don't think I have ever hated anyone, personally. I have feared many...What I am is apathetic - which may be worse. Apathetic is heart-dead, as opposed to brain-dead...But I do know it's true that those of us who are raised in alcoholic dysfunction don't know what is true. We are taught that we are fine, when we know we are not. The facade becomes the truth and we completely lose the truth.
Hatred paralyzes life; love releases it. Hatred confuses life; love harmonizes it. Hatred darkens life; love illuminates it.
I have an apathy-paralyzed life - fear of moving forward, of getting in someone else's way, of stepping into a place where I am not welcome, or I am not suited. I am trying to recognize Light and Love and Passion in the small moments of every day. Then I'll see if this quote is true.
Man must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love.
And so I must recognize revenge, aggression and retaliation in myself, and reject it. I must decide not to be those things, to act upon them.
I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. That is why right, temporarily defeated, is stronger than evil triumphant.
Oh please let this be true, personally, nationally, environmentally, internationally...
All men are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality.
And this is the most basic of all truths. It is that golden rule we quote, but don't quite understand. It is the golden rule of all religions and for atheists, too.
And just to brag: With the help of Quakers, Dr. King traveled to India in 1959 to visit with Gandhi. The trip was the necessary push needed to galvanize Dr. King’s desire to employ a similar approach with non-violent disobedience protests Stateside. - D. L. Chandler (http://newsone.com/2139819/dr-martin-luther-king-jr-birthday/)
I agree with you...the tide is changing. And as that happens there will be great fluid rushes. We have to be able to ride the flow, trust the process.
Thank you for sharing the Aquinas quote. Maybe I need some passion to warm up those solid, stuck places. It goes back to melting, to being ooey-gooey. I like the image!!!
One last thought...grief, rage, sorrow...transcendence. I am not sure if I am in grief or sorrow. I tend to think my anger when my children were young was my rage. I will watch for glimmers of transcendence...
I hope you are having a lovely First Day. We will have a bit of family time. My eldest's dog was hit by a car, and the driver never stopped. She died instantly. We are going to finish burying her, and have lunch together this afternoon. It has been a sad week...
Smiles and hugs and love,
Clare
In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.
Sadly, when I read this quote, my mind replaced the word friends with family. It is the silence of our family that causes such pain and loss and distrust of ourselves and each other. So I am proud of us, you and me. for breaking the silence. Even if it seems we are casting a very feeble light, our words are public. We are speaking trusth to the power of silence. Maybe we are someone's small, still voice...
There is family silence where we avoid truths and history and each other, and there is Quaker silence where we wait in expectation for Spirit to provide Light. I think perhaps in bucking the family legacy, we found the proper Silence!
Like an unchecked cancer, hate corrodes the personality and eats away its vital unity. Hate destroys a man's sense of values and his objectivity. It causes him to describe the beautiful as ugly and the ugly as beautiful, and to confuse the true with the false and the false with the true.
I don't think I have ever been hateful. I don't hate anyone. I don't think I have ever hated anyone, personally. I have feared many...What I am is apathetic - which may be worse. Apathetic is heart-dead, as opposed to brain-dead...But I do know it's true that those of us who are raised in alcoholic dysfunction don't know what is true. We are taught that we are fine, when we know we are not. The facade becomes the truth and we completely lose the truth.
Hatred paralyzes life; love releases it. Hatred confuses life; love harmonizes it. Hatred darkens life; love illuminates it.
I have an apathy-paralyzed life - fear of moving forward, of getting in someone else's way, of stepping into a place where I am not welcome, or I am not suited. I am trying to recognize Light and Love and Passion in the small moments of every day. Then I'll see if this quote is true.
Man must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love.
And so I must recognize revenge, aggression and retaliation in myself, and reject it. I must decide not to be those things, to act upon them.
I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. That is why right, temporarily defeated, is stronger than evil triumphant.
Oh please let this be true, personally, nationally, environmentally, internationally...
All men are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality.
And this is the most basic of all truths. It is that golden rule we quote, but don't quite understand. It is the golden rule of all religions and for atheists, too.
And just to brag: With the help of Quakers, Dr. King traveled to India in 1959 to visit with Gandhi. The trip was the necessary push needed to galvanize Dr. King’s desire to employ a similar approach with non-violent disobedience protests Stateside. - D. L. Chandler (http://newsone.com/2139819/dr-martin-luther-king-jr-birthday/)
I agree with you...the tide is changing. And as that happens there will be great fluid rushes. We have to be able to ride the flow, trust the process.
Thank you for sharing the Aquinas quote. Maybe I need some passion to warm up those solid, stuck places. It goes back to melting, to being ooey-gooey. I like the image!!!
One last thought...grief, rage, sorrow...transcendence. I am not sure if I am in grief or sorrow. I tend to think my anger when my children were young was my rage. I will watch for glimmers of transcendence...
I hope you are having a lovely First Day. We will have a bit of family time. My eldest's dog was hit by a car, and the driver never stopped. She died instantly. We are going to finish burying her, and have lunch together this afternoon. It has been a sad week...
Smiles and hugs and love,
Clare
Saturday, January 19, 2013
love is melting
I have picked up a book, Natural Grace, and it is a dialogue between a theologian and a scientist...
they are talking about the soul...the soul is a vast field...
intended to be played in, danced in, sung in, drummed in...
instead we have de-animated our world and confined it to our brains.
I was just reading about how we resonate with what we know...our habits...
If we live with resentment and fear...we tune into those 'frequencies' within the field or morphic resonance field. But, conversely, if we tune into joy and grace we will tune into those frequencies.
As Ghandi said, "be the change you wish to see"...
I had an image while I was reading about all of the little things that I do...to help the planet and other beings...tapping into a greater well of those same intentions...growing steadily as each day passes.
I really do feel that the tide is changing...there is chaos now because others feel it too and are actively resisting the change...but change is inevitable.
Survival of the fittest isn't about the biggest and strongest...it's about being best suited for the changing environment...we are suited for that because we feel the destruction and dying of the planet and its inhabitants...people like us will survive and be equipped to adapt to the changes.
I also read about 3 stages of grief; rage, sorrow and finally transcendence...It is a process...and one that I need to work on.
The last point that touched me was a line by Thomas Aquinas that said that "love is melting"...perhaps those hard spots that you experience need to be melted away...melting is a change in state, becoming fluid, adaptable...better than being frozen by anger, hatred or resentment.
More tomorrow...lots to think about,
Maggie
they are talking about the soul...the soul is a vast field...
intended to be played in, danced in, sung in, drummed in...
instead we have de-animated our world and confined it to our brains.
I was just reading about how we resonate with what we know...our habits...
If we live with resentment and fear...we tune into those 'frequencies' within the field or morphic resonance field. But, conversely, if we tune into joy and grace we will tune into those frequencies.
As Ghandi said, "be the change you wish to see"...
I had an image while I was reading about all of the little things that I do...to help the planet and other beings...tapping into a greater well of those same intentions...growing steadily as each day passes.
I really do feel that the tide is changing...there is chaos now because others feel it too and are actively resisting the change...but change is inevitable.
Survival of the fittest isn't about the biggest and strongest...it's about being best suited for the changing environment...we are suited for that because we feel the destruction and dying of the planet and its inhabitants...people like us will survive and be equipped to adapt to the changes.
I also read about 3 stages of grief; rage, sorrow and finally transcendence...It is a process...and one that I need to work on.
The last point that touched me was a line by Thomas Aquinas that said that "love is melting"...perhaps those hard spots that you experience need to be melted away...melting is a change in state, becoming fluid, adaptable...better than being frozen by anger, hatred or resentment.
More tomorrow...lots to think about,
Maggie
ooey-gooey
I'm not debating Darwin's theory. I understand it is about adaptability. I am trying to verbalize my perspective that we were taught Darwin's theory in such a way as to convince us it is survival of the fittest - that the most competitive is truly the strongest and the one that will survive to propagate.
This theory was twisted to make us believe that some deserve more than others simply because they are stronger. We learned to be quiet, accepting, knowing we aren't the best, brightest, strongest, or even deserving. The theory has been twisted to glorify competition and hoarding. We are taught that these people, people who do not know how to share (somehow they were exempt from kindergarten, or more likely, already damaged by the time they got there...) and who have no compassion are the pinnacle of humanity. They are held up as icons.
I think they are not the best for this environment, but they have so much power, they control the environment to support them. And we are blind, raised to believe and accept. That is why we don't say anything when we are raped. In our family we learned silence and acquiescence early. Actually we may be the more flexible, those with the ability to adapt - because we survived. We may not be whole, but we are still here and functioning.
Where we are headed as a society...I think we have two choices. We can continue to be owned by the current culture - which is not our society. Fear limits our behavior and decisions, and so it is not true community. Or we can love. The land is being tortured, but I can love this land. I can make sure no one poisons this land. I can love this neighbor, this child, this wren, this puppy. And it will --- go viral. Love is contagious.
I laid in bed this morning thinking about my hard spots. I want to be warm and welcoming, but I get trapped in my circling thoughts and can't get out and be available and welcoming sometimes. I need a good role model for loving. I have two women friends who are like I want to be. And so I am cultivating that...I think.
Trying to change...trying to be adaptable!
Ooey, gooey love to you my sister!
Clare
This theory was twisted to make us believe that some deserve more than others simply because they are stronger. We learned to be quiet, accepting, knowing we aren't the best, brightest, strongest, or even deserving. The theory has been twisted to glorify competition and hoarding. We are taught that these people, people who do not know how to share (somehow they were exempt from kindergarten, or more likely, already damaged by the time they got there...) and who have no compassion are the pinnacle of humanity. They are held up as icons.
I think they are not the best for this environment, but they have so much power, they control the environment to support them. And we are blind, raised to believe and accept. That is why we don't say anything when we are raped. In our family we learned silence and acquiescence early. Actually we may be the more flexible, those with the ability to adapt - because we survived. We may not be whole, but we are still here and functioning.
Where we are headed as a society...I think we have two choices. We can continue to be owned by the current culture - which is not our society. Fear limits our behavior and decisions, and so it is not true community. Or we can love. The land is being tortured, but I can love this land. I can make sure no one poisons this land. I can love this neighbor, this child, this wren, this puppy. And it will --- go viral. Love is contagious.
I laid in bed this morning thinking about my hard spots. I want to be warm and welcoming, but I get trapped in my circling thoughts and can't get out and be available and welcoming sometimes. I need a good role model for loving. I have two women friends who are like I want to be. And so I am cultivating that...I think.
Trying to change...trying to be adaptable!
Ooey, gooey love to you my sister!
Clare
Friday, January 18, 2013
confusion and frustration
It is true, crystals do grow...
each has its own unique structure that it will form into...conform.
I never thought of rocks or crystals as being interactive with each other...I will have to think about this.
I understand competition...and the twist into negative Darwinian evolution...but the truth about evolution is more about being suited for an environment...about being flexible and adaptable to change or stress...it has nothing to do with being the best at anything...it has to do with fit...and being flexible enough to conform to changes...and then to make the most of new challenges.
Humans want an easy answer...
they want to believe that if I am superior in some aspect it is because I have some inherent strength...
God wants me to prevail...
what they don't realize is that today's strength is tomorrow's Achilles heel...
their downfall...
and it is generally because we stop trying to be flexible and just assume total superiority...
we just get lazy...
or until we've been traumatized so deeply that we shut most of our genome down just to protect ourselves.
I am so frustrated with human nature and yet at the same time in awe of the human spirit...
I hate the fact that people are fighting for assault weapons...but respect their strength and resolve...no matter if it is misguided.
I had a friend tell me today that I should allow my kids to shoot assault weapons so that they could develop a respect and appreciation for them...Sorry I just can't buy into that bull shit...but I do respect his tenacity.
I really wonder where we are headed as a society...
where is the compassion and the rational thought?
Why are we so influenced by big business and brainwashed to believe that we will lose our liberty if we concede our assault weapons?
FEAR BASED LIVING....
reactionary living...always wondering what bad stuff is going to get you next...the whole damned country is acting as if it has PTSD...hypervigilant and reactive to any threats, real or perceived...
Maybe that's the key...maybe we are experiencing societal PTSD. That's because we traumatize the land and each other on a regular basis.
sorry I am really tired...I will check in tomorrow to see if I am making any sense.
Maggie
each has its own unique structure that it will form into...conform.
I never thought of rocks or crystals as being interactive with each other...I will have to think about this.
I understand competition...and the twist into negative Darwinian evolution...but the truth about evolution is more about being suited for an environment...about being flexible and adaptable to change or stress...it has nothing to do with being the best at anything...it has to do with fit...and being flexible enough to conform to changes...and then to make the most of new challenges.
Humans want an easy answer...
they want to believe that if I am superior in some aspect it is because I have some inherent strength...
God wants me to prevail...
what they don't realize is that today's strength is tomorrow's Achilles heel...
their downfall...
and it is generally because we stop trying to be flexible and just assume total superiority...
we just get lazy...
or until we've been traumatized so deeply that we shut most of our genome down just to protect ourselves.
I am so frustrated with human nature and yet at the same time in awe of the human spirit...
I hate the fact that people are fighting for assault weapons...but respect their strength and resolve...no matter if it is misguided.
I had a friend tell me today that I should allow my kids to shoot assault weapons so that they could develop a respect and appreciation for them...Sorry I just can't buy into that bull shit...but I do respect his tenacity.
I really wonder where we are headed as a society...
where is the compassion and the rational thought?
Why are we so influenced by big business and brainwashed to believe that we will lose our liberty if we concede our assault weapons?
FEAR BASED LIVING....
reactionary living...always wondering what bad stuff is going to get you next...the whole damned country is acting as if it has PTSD...hypervigilant and reactive to any threats, real or perceived...
Maybe that's the key...maybe we are experiencing societal PTSD. That's because we traumatize the land and each other on a regular basis.
sorry I am really tired...I will check in tomorrow to see if I am making any sense.
Maggie
Alive!
I love when the universe presents a piece that fits. I read
something that hit me today, something that fit with what I have been
going on and on about for the last couple of days.
For Christmas my youngest son gave me a copy of The Old Farmer's Almanac Millenium Primer. I keep it in the bathroom...Today in the Fellow Creatures section I was reading an essay entitled Solving the Evolution Riddle Once and For All by Guy Murchie. I stumbled on the following passage which stopped me in my tracks...
For many rocks actually do grow, if very slowly. And they get around, eat in a manner of speaking, get ill (yet not without some capacity to heal their wounds), and even bear offspring through their own simple system of reproduction. Rocks are crystals, you see, and it is the nature of a crystal to maintain its molecular lattice structure, to restore any distortion, to gradually fill up any crack (in effect healing the wound), and to grow by natural tendency of passing molecules made of similar material to attach themselves to the crystals microscopic crevices, into which they exactly fit. The receptivity of these "friendly" molecules indeed amounts to an elementary attraction that, chemically speaking, approaches what could be termed "love".
We have been talking about everything being alive, everyone of us being related. And again, even rocks are in love with creation - and theirs is probably the most enduring love!
Love from Clare
For Christmas my youngest son gave me a copy of The Old Farmer's Almanac Millenium Primer. I keep it in the bathroom...Today in the Fellow Creatures section I was reading an essay entitled Solving the Evolution Riddle Once and For All by Guy Murchie. I stumbled on the following passage which stopped me in my tracks...
For many rocks actually do grow, if very slowly. And they get around, eat in a manner of speaking, get ill (yet not without some capacity to heal their wounds), and even bear offspring through their own simple system of reproduction. Rocks are crystals, you see, and it is the nature of a crystal to maintain its molecular lattice structure, to restore any distortion, to gradually fill up any crack (in effect healing the wound), and to grow by natural tendency of passing molecules made of similar material to attach themselves to the crystals microscopic crevices, into which they exactly fit. The receptivity of these "friendly" molecules indeed amounts to an elementary attraction that, chemically speaking, approaches what could be termed "love".
We have been talking about everything being alive, everyone of us being related. And again, even rocks are in love with creation - and theirs is probably the most enduring love!
Love from Clare
Thursday, January 17, 2013
Sine curve
And the root of all the power differential is competition. We are taught to compete from an early age. Sibling rivalry - competition for the parent's attention. We had to compete because our community, our village, our extended family, or nuclear family was pulled apart at the seams as our parents competed for seemingly limited resources. We get sent to school where we are taught to compete for grades, we are taught that sharing information is cheating and is a major crime. Why? Because it is a humane form of cooperation. We are all sucked into the interpretation of Darwin and his survival of the fittest, and again the total blindness our culture has for altruism.
Competition teaches us that there is not enough for all, so we must get enough for ourselves. Those who grab enough are "good." Greed is rewarded and applauded, but in such subtle ways that we would deny it forever. We define virtues through the lens of this violent, competitive culture.
That's why I believe we have to fall in love. When we are in love, our altruism shines through. I think we are most human/humane when we are in love. Someone else's needs, desires, comfort, safety, happiness is just a little more important than ours. We make sure the beloved is okay. And we allow the beloved to tend to us. And luckily, the beloved can be human or trees or the beach or the mountains or the dog. If we each take care of the beloved, trusting that the beloved will take care of us, then all competition disappears. We live in cooperation and peace and security.
This is just pouring out, and as I stop to consider, I think about my patterns of taking care of everyone else, and maybe taking care of me if there is anything left over. I don't love me and I don't trust anyone who does. I am dying to be taken care of, but I don't want to take anything from anyone else. I am so frozen. Writing this is making my heart hurt...
Excellent point about meeting. We value finances over children. I have long noticed that we really don't like children in our culture. We like our neat, quiet lives with children popped off somewhere else for someone else to deal with...and the elderly, too.
You see God as an inhalation and an exhalation. I have often seen love as a sine curve. We cycle through the highs and lows always knowing the other will come. I see it as warm vs cold and close vs distant. I think we are both getting to the yin/yang of Oriental philosophy...hmmm....
I need to be passionate about life. So often I just feel tired and overwhelmed. That is because of a struggle to survive in a competitive world, a world where we fear losing our jobs and our homes, and by working a lot to preserve that, we lose our health and vitality. I will think of ways to be passionate, little ways, and see if maybe I can set myself on fire with love for the planet and all of the species we are here to live with...
Lovingly,
Clare
Competition teaches us that there is not enough for all, so we must get enough for ourselves. Those who grab enough are "good." Greed is rewarded and applauded, but in such subtle ways that we would deny it forever. We define virtues through the lens of this violent, competitive culture.
That's why I believe we have to fall in love. When we are in love, our altruism shines through. I think we are most human/humane when we are in love. Someone else's needs, desires, comfort, safety, happiness is just a little more important than ours. We make sure the beloved is okay. And we allow the beloved to tend to us. And luckily, the beloved can be human or trees or the beach or the mountains or the dog. If we each take care of the beloved, trusting that the beloved will take care of us, then all competition disappears. We live in cooperation and peace and security.
This is just pouring out, and as I stop to consider, I think about my patterns of taking care of everyone else, and maybe taking care of me if there is anything left over. I don't love me and I don't trust anyone who does. I am dying to be taken care of, but I don't want to take anything from anyone else. I am so frozen. Writing this is making my heart hurt...
Excellent point about meeting. We value finances over children. I have long noticed that we really don't like children in our culture. We like our neat, quiet lives with children popped off somewhere else for someone else to deal with...and the elderly, too.
You see God as an inhalation and an exhalation. I have often seen love as a sine curve. We cycle through the highs and lows always knowing the other will come. I see it as warm vs cold and close vs distant. I think we are both getting to the yin/yang of Oriental philosophy...hmmm....
I need to be passionate about life. So often I just feel tired and overwhelmed. That is because of a struggle to survive in a competitive world, a world where we fear losing our jobs and our homes, and by working a lot to preserve that, we lose our health and vitality. I will think of ways to be passionate, little ways, and see if maybe I can set myself on fire with love for the planet and all of the species we are here to live with...
Lovingly,
Clare
Wednesday, January 16, 2013
More ramblings...but with gratitude
Thanks for the love...
I do need it, we all need it.
The main issue of any type of abuse is power differentials...
Who has it and how do they maintain it?
You can see this is personal relationships, in families, in communities, in our schools, in our governments...any movement is about shoring up one's power base...even at the expense of those less powerful.
I really believe that what you said about learning to love is the answer for our deteriorating planet.
Once, and if, we can learn to love and respect others (living and nonliving) we will be able to turn the tide of destruction. If we could just understand that there is an abundance of everything that is truly necessary then we can stop hoarding and fighting over it. Our planet presently produces 2700cal/day for each person alive on it and yet 950 million are hungry...We are killing our young to protect energy sources that are doomed to run dry and leave us environmental cripples in the wake...we protect our gun lobby more than we protect our children...
Even in my Meeting I am disturbed by the amount of energy that is spent on financial matters and who is qualified to be a trustee...but they allow the children to be taught by anyone that has time and is willing...where are our priorities?
I saw a movie that depicted people draining each other's energy and others sharing and amplifying the others' energies...
it's the concept of symbiosis- mutually beneficial, benefiting one without harm to the other, or hurting one for the benefit of the other...where do we, as a species, fit in...mostly parasites...but the tide is shifting...awareness is growing...and that is the beginning of change, real change.
I hear what you are saying about being careful what I wish for...
I used to pray for my 'daark night of the soul' because I knew that it would catalyze real change in me...
I've been walking through a dark night and it has been very difficult...although it is worth the pain.
I've explained my metaphor of God as an inspiring and expiring organism...inspiration pulls me deeply within, nurturing and teaching...expiration sends me forth into the world...cold and definitely not nurturing...well I am on the expiration and I miss that closeness and that warmth...
Enough rambling tonight...
I love you...
Thanks for the words of encouragement...
they are sincerely appreciated,
Maggie
I do need it, we all need it.
The main issue of any type of abuse is power differentials...
Who has it and how do they maintain it?
You can see this is personal relationships, in families, in communities, in our schools, in our governments...any movement is about shoring up one's power base...even at the expense of those less powerful.
I really believe that what you said about learning to love is the answer for our deteriorating planet.
Once, and if, we can learn to love and respect others (living and nonliving) we will be able to turn the tide of destruction. If we could just understand that there is an abundance of everything that is truly necessary then we can stop hoarding and fighting over it. Our planet presently produces 2700cal/day for each person alive on it and yet 950 million are hungry...We are killing our young to protect energy sources that are doomed to run dry and leave us environmental cripples in the wake...we protect our gun lobby more than we protect our children...
Even in my Meeting I am disturbed by the amount of energy that is spent on financial matters and who is qualified to be a trustee...but they allow the children to be taught by anyone that has time and is willing...where are our priorities?
I saw a movie that depicted people draining each other's energy and others sharing and amplifying the others' energies...
it's the concept of symbiosis- mutually beneficial, benefiting one without harm to the other, or hurting one for the benefit of the other...where do we, as a species, fit in...mostly parasites...but the tide is shifting...awareness is growing...and that is the beginning of change, real change.
I hear what you are saying about being careful what I wish for...
I used to pray for my 'daark night of the soul' because I knew that it would catalyze real change in me...
I've been walking through a dark night and it has been very difficult...although it is worth the pain.
I've explained my metaphor of God as an inspiring and expiring organism...inspiration pulls me deeply within, nurturing and teaching...expiration sends me forth into the world...cold and definitely not nurturing...well I am on the expiration and I miss that closeness and that warmth...
Enough rambling tonight...
I love you...
Thanks for the words of encouragement...
they are sincerely appreciated,
Maggie
Love from Clare
Be careful what you wish for, darling. You know what they say - you just might get it! Last year we were raw because our brother almost succeeded in killing himself. We were all open for a short time, and it seemed like we were going to burst forward, together, as a family. Instead.most of us buried our heads in the business and separatedness of the lives we have so carefully created. It will take another tragedy, or near miss, to open us again. But, not everyone burrowed back into the mundane and hid from the pain. We found each other, both willing to try on vulnerability.
Another image from birthing is two steps forward, one step back. We have breakthroughs, we settle back and process, preparing for another breakthough. And we can't program the breakthroughs. They just happen when our Spirits are ready.
I have been reading about, and feeling, what is happening to our species, to our planet. I keep coming back to - we have to fall in love. We have to fall in love with each other, with the trees, with the planet. If we simply fall in love everything will heal. We will treat each other and all beings as our lovers, in that pink cloud time of closeness and being open to possibilities. We have to see each other with delight...
I don't think I can fall in love with myself. So many advisors say this is the place to start. But I am so wounded, I don't think it is possible. Trying, alone, leaves me alone and silent, unworthy in the corner. Yet they tell me I am not ready to love another until I love myself. I have noticed that when someone sees something cool in me, then I see it in myself. I need others to serve as my mirror, to lead me to love myself...to teach me to love myself. This was mom's job, but she was too wounded and exhausted to do it. And I certainly didn't do a good enough job with my beloved children. But it's never too late! And so I think my job is to remind you of how amazing you are.
You do know you are amazing, don't you? Physically, you are one of the healthiest, most vibrant women I know. You look 10, 15, 20 years younger than your chronological age. You are also one of the brightest people I know. When someone talks to you, you gently go right to the core of what is needed to be said. And your laughter is infectious! Your intelligence is a sensitive, creative intelligence. You are such a gift!!!
You know, I see us each using all three ways of leading others, and each other towards enlightenment. We have both worked alone - going ahead of others and showing the way. You decided to be a physician, even though you came from our background - poor, told it was impossible and besides we weren't good enough. You said F*** that and did it anyway. I went ahead with my lifestyle choices - I certainly do things others won't - homebirthing, extended breastfeeding, homeschooling, living in an off-the-grid hand-built cabin for a decade, taking responsibility for my own health...I see us walking side by side as sisters and peers, fellow veterans of the war of alcoholism and family abuse - you know you can hold my hand whenever you need me. And as mothers, we both shepherd our children. I feel like a border collie with mine, some days!!!
So I am exhuming a Viking. I'll let you know what develops! Have fun in school!
Love from Clare
Another image from birthing is two steps forward, one step back. We have breakthroughs, we settle back and process, preparing for another breakthough. And we can't program the breakthroughs. They just happen when our Spirits are ready.
I have been reading about, and feeling, what is happening to our species, to our planet. I keep coming back to - we have to fall in love. We have to fall in love with each other, with the trees, with the planet. If we simply fall in love everything will heal. We will treat each other and all beings as our lovers, in that pink cloud time of closeness and being open to possibilities. We have to see each other with delight...
I don't think I can fall in love with myself. So many advisors say this is the place to start. But I am so wounded, I don't think it is possible. Trying, alone, leaves me alone and silent, unworthy in the corner. Yet they tell me I am not ready to love another until I love myself. I have noticed that when someone sees something cool in me, then I see it in myself. I need others to serve as my mirror, to lead me to love myself...to teach me to love myself. This was mom's job, but she was too wounded and exhausted to do it. And I certainly didn't do a good enough job with my beloved children. But it's never too late! And so I think my job is to remind you of how amazing you are.
You do know you are amazing, don't you? Physically, you are one of the healthiest, most vibrant women I know. You look 10, 15, 20 years younger than your chronological age. You are also one of the brightest people I know. When someone talks to you, you gently go right to the core of what is needed to be said. And your laughter is infectious! Your intelligence is a sensitive, creative intelligence. You are such a gift!!!
You know, I see us each using all three ways of leading others, and each other towards enlightenment. We have both worked alone - going ahead of others and showing the way. You decided to be a physician, even though you came from our background - poor, told it was impossible and besides we weren't good enough. You said F*** that and did it anyway. I went ahead with my lifestyle choices - I certainly do things others won't - homebirthing, extended breastfeeding, homeschooling, living in an off-the-grid hand-built cabin for a decade, taking responsibility for my own health...I see us walking side by side as sisters and peers, fellow veterans of the war of alcoholism and family abuse - you know you can hold my hand whenever you need me. And as mothers, we both shepherd our children. I feel like a border collie with mine, some days!!!
So I am exhuming a Viking. I'll let you know what develops! Have fun in school!
Love from Clare
Tuesday, January 15, 2013
Companions
I hadn't thought of the process of allowing the birthing process to proceed naturally...
I am usually in control of my own timetables...
you know me and the need to control.
I do value all that I have learned and I know that it has opened many doors in my mind.
I just have to remember to take time to just be...
That takes a near constant reminding...kind of like teaching myself to recognize my feelings and name them.
This semester I am taking an administration class...practical but not exciting.
I am also taking a social policy class...it is to motivate and help to to do basic community organizing...this is right up my alley.
My first assignment is to write an "autobiography of advocacy"...that should be interesting.
By the end we have to invest at least 20 hours into organizing some new initiative.
I think I am going to use a program that I have planned for First Day School...a Hunger Awareness Dinner...I have already laid the groundwork for it so I might as well reap some benefits.
I think I am frustrated by my apparent lack of progress with this healing journey. Last spring, when everything was raw, I felt as if I was taking giant steps every day almost. I know that that kind of raw-ness can't be sustained, but now it feels so distant and those feelings aren't easily accessible. I have to be patient and wait for the next 'wave'...just feel gratitude that I have come this far. I believe that the difference between us lies in the fact that you are alone alot more than I am and therefore able to access these feelings without constant interruption...but maybe that's just my excuse for falling behind...not that this is a race.
The book about science and Buddhism had an interesting image that reminded me of our journey...It was talking about those who incarnate in order to lead others towards enlightenment...it said that there are 3 ways this is done: a person can proceed alone towards enlightenment, leading by example for others .to proceed, they can walk side by side, helping companions and being helped along the way, or they can act as a shepherd and follow along with gentle guidance. I picture you and I as the second scenario...we've walked together at various times throughout our lives, helping each other to learn and grow...it's good to have a companion. Thanks.
I love the dream...
It was probably the bone of one of those viking ancestors...
keep digging.
I am tired and have to prepare for class tomorrow.
Love and blessings,
Maggie
I am usually in control of my own timetables...
you know me and the need to control.
I do value all that I have learned and I know that it has opened many doors in my mind.
I just have to remember to take time to just be...
That takes a near constant reminding...kind of like teaching myself to recognize my feelings and name them.
This semester I am taking an administration class...practical but not exciting.
I am also taking a social policy class...it is to motivate and help to to do basic community organizing...this is right up my alley.
My first assignment is to write an "autobiography of advocacy"...that should be interesting.
By the end we have to invest at least 20 hours into organizing some new initiative.
I think I am going to use a program that I have planned for First Day School...a Hunger Awareness Dinner...I have already laid the groundwork for it so I might as well reap some benefits.
I think I am frustrated by my apparent lack of progress with this healing journey. Last spring, when everything was raw, I felt as if I was taking giant steps every day almost. I know that that kind of raw-ness can't be sustained, but now it feels so distant and those feelings aren't easily accessible. I have to be patient and wait for the next 'wave'...just feel gratitude that I have come this far. I believe that the difference between us lies in the fact that you are alone alot more than I am and therefore able to access these feelings without constant interruption...but maybe that's just my excuse for falling behind...not that this is a race.
The book about science and Buddhism had an interesting image that reminded me of our journey...It was talking about those who incarnate in order to lead others towards enlightenment...it said that there are 3 ways this is done: a person can proceed alone towards enlightenment, leading by example for others .to proceed, they can walk side by side, helping companions and being helped along the way, or they can act as a shepherd and follow along with gentle guidance. I picture you and I as the second scenario...we've walked together at various times throughout our lives, helping each other to learn and grow...it's good to have a companion. Thanks.
I love the dream...
It was probably the bone of one of those viking ancestors...
keep digging.
I am tired and have to prepare for class tomorrow.
Love and blessings,
Maggie
and a mammoth too
Hi Maggie,
Are you recovered from the flu? How was your first day back in school?
I went for a walk today. It was clear and crisp and invigorating. I walked past a swampy area and noticed the downed trees. I started thinking about that image of downed trees around and sometimes through swamps. And I realized that swampland is water-logged and soggy. There is nothing firm for the roots to sink into, cling to. Kind of made me think about us. We are sort of adrift and rootless, because we were raised in the swamp. Then I thought about the willow tree that just rooted in my swamp. Willows are different. They thrive in wet areas, and actually dry an area out.
Just thinking...
And I was thinking about myself. I can't tell what I seem like to other people. I wonder if I seem negative. I can't tell...
In the swamp last night again. I was digging for ancestral bones and found big, gigantic bones - like a femur, maybe - thick and stout, exceptionally long. I couldn't get it out, so a mammoth came to help me. (I swear I couldn't make this up. It's too weird and illogical but it all seems perfectly normal...) I heard, "He was a big man." I have no idea who I am unearthing, or de-swamping!
Feeling a little headachey. I'm going to bed, and I'm going to pray it's stress and not the flu! I can't afford any time off.
Sleep well and love from,
Clare
Are you recovered from the flu? How was your first day back in school?
I went for a walk today. It was clear and crisp and invigorating. I walked past a swampy area and noticed the downed trees. I started thinking about that image of downed trees around and sometimes through swamps. And I realized that swampland is water-logged and soggy. There is nothing firm for the roots to sink into, cling to. Kind of made me think about us. We are sort of adrift and rootless, because we were raised in the swamp. Then I thought about the willow tree that just rooted in my swamp. Willows are different. They thrive in wet areas, and actually dry an area out.
Just thinking...
And I was thinking about myself. I can't tell what I seem like to other people. I wonder if I seem negative. I can't tell...
In the swamp last night again. I was digging for ancestral bones and found big, gigantic bones - like a femur, maybe - thick and stout, exceptionally long. I couldn't get it out, so a mammoth came to help me. (I swear I couldn't make this up. It's too weird and illogical but it all seems perfectly normal...) I heard, "He was a big man." I have no idea who I am unearthing, or de-swamping!
Feeling a little headachey. I'm going to bed, and I'm going to pray it's stress and not the flu! I can't afford any time off.
Sleep well and love from,
Clare
Monday, January 14, 2013
don't push too early
Thank you for worrying about me. I feel trapped in my life and I don't quite know how to reach out or to get out. I know I will survive, though. And there is a hopefulness that never dies inside me, something that believes it will get better. Is that part of my process, though, a relic of our young lives, the thought that keeps me trapped? Do I believe in a rescuer still? I think I plan to rescue myself, but it could be my lie that allows me to just sit here and wallow?
Creating chaos - I know chaos. We are long-time companions. I have always called it creating drama. I can usually tell when someone is from an alcoholic family. When life is calm and going smoothly, and there's time to think and feel, they get nervous. Then they create a drama to distract themselves. I watch the patterns, see the allies, the enemies - ever-changing, depending on the drama-of-the-month. I know there is great comfort in creating the pain of childhood, that soothing, comfortable discomfort. Aaaaah.
I never thought about keeping too busy as a form of drama, but yeah, that's me. I have traditionally said yes to any request to save the world. And it has been fun, though at times exhausting. But I don't have a car now. And so it has slowed me down, and isolated me. It has forced me to ask for help and to do without. I can't decide if this is a lesson from the universe or if I am just screwing myself.
Keeping too busy is also part of the pattern of Me, last. I will take care of everyone and everything else. If there's any time, money, energy left - I take care of me. Luckily we live in a culture that tells me I am noble because of this! Not only do I get to avoid being vulnerable and real, I get praised.
I had one thought when you wrote that: I have come to realize that while the education has opened up avenues of understanding that I wouldn't have accessed so easily, it is a distraction from the real work that I have to do. Perhaps you should also consider that school has given you the language to do the work. Many times you had access to just the right information or insight to push us both forward. We are both doing the work in our own time. Our general movement has been forward, every since we decided to go forward. Remember that pushing too early or too hard damages us. We rip. It hurts! Don't forget to praise yourself. I know that is so much more difficult than berating yourself.
What classes are you taking this semester? I hope it is challenging and exciting.
I love you,
Clare
Creating chaos - I know chaos. We are long-time companions. I have always called it creating drama. I can usually tell when someone is from an alcoholic family. When life is calm and going smoothly, and there's time to think and feel, they get nervous. Then they create a drama to distract themselves. I watch the patterns, see the allies, the enemies - ever-changing, depending on the drama-of-the-month. I know there is great comfort in creating the pain of childhood, that soothing, comfortable discomfort. Aaaaah.
I never thought about keeping too busy as a form of drama, but yeah, that's me. I have traditionally said yes to any request to save the world. And it has been fun, though at times exhausting. But I don't have a car now. And so it has slowed me down, and isolated me. It has forced me to ask for help and to do without. I can't decide if this is a lesson from the universe or if I am just screwing myself.
Keeping too busy is also part of the pattern of Me, last. I will take care of everyone and everything else. If there's any time, money, energy left - I take care of me. Luckily we live in a culture that tells me I am noble because of this! Not only do I get to avoid being vulnerable and real, I get praised.
I had one thought when you wrote that: I have come to realize that while the education has opened up avenues of understanding that I wouldn't have accessed so easily, it is a distraction from the real work that I have to do. Perhaps you should also consider that school has given you the language to do the work. Many times you had access to just the right information or insight to push us both forward. We are both doing the work in our own time. Our general movement has been forward, every since we decided to go forward. Remember that pushing too early or too hard damages us. We rip. It hurts! Don't forget to praise yourself. I know that is so much more difficult than berating yourself.
What classes are you taking this semester? I hope it is challenging and exciting.
I love you,
Clare
transitions
Clare,
Maybe you are at a transition point...
maybe you are about to give birth to a new life...
your own...
but, perhaps you aren't meant to go this alone...
I am here...
but not physically supporting you...
perhaps you need to reach out to someone closer to you to help you through.
I worry that this process might overwhelm and subsequently cause you to retreat without someone supporting you along the way...
I have my wise friend who I speak with on a regular basis...
she cuts through my bullshit and refocuses me...
just think about reaching out to someone for support.
I sat yesterday, in the quiet and tried to imagine a swamp...
I was able to reach a very calm state...
but unable to imagine the swamp...
perhaps it isn't my time to enter there...
Another interesting thing that I heard recently about compassion meditation is that there are several groups working with veterans with PTSD using compassion meditation with promising results. The brain can heal from trauma...it just takes patience and kindness.
So last week my semester began...
and then I got sick and took the past 5 days to recuperate...
tomorrow it begins, full force.
I am excited, but I have come to realize that while the education has opened up avenues of understanding that I wouldn't have accessed so easily, it is a distraction from the real work that I have to do. I need to give myself the time to work through all levels of my blockages and open myself to life.
I never realized that this journey would be so challenging...I did have a sense that it wouldn't be easy...but I failed to understand how my ego sabotages my efforts...by interesting me in projects and opportunities...all of which feed my intellectual appetite...but ultimately distract me from regaining my health.
I once had a counselor who told me that I, "create chaos"...I didn't understand him at the time but have realized that I take on so many challenges that I have no time for myself and reflection and truly walking the path...
Blessings,
Maggie
Maybe you are at a transition point...
maybe you are about to give birth to a new life...
your own...
but, perhaps you aren't meant to go this alone...
I am here...
but not physically supporting you...
perhaps you need to reach out to someone closer to you to help you through.
I worry that this process might overwhelm and subsequently cause you to retreat without someone supporting you along the way...
I have my wise friend who I speak with on a regular basis...
she cuts through my bullshit and refocuses me...
just think about reaching out to someone for support.
I sat yesterday, in the quiet and tried to imagine a swamp...
I was able to reach a very calm state...
but unable to imagine the swamp...
perhaps it isn't my time to enter there...
Another interesting thing that I heard recently about compassion meditation is that there are several groups working with veterans with PTSD using compassion meditation with promising results. The brain can heal from trauma...it just takes patience and kindness.
So last week my semester began...
and then I got sick and took the past 5 days to recuperate...
tomorrow it begins, full force.
I am excited, but I have come to realize that while the education has opened up avenues of understanding that I wouldn't have accessed so easily, it is a distraction from the real work that I have to do. I need to give myself the time to work through all levels of my blockages and open myself to life.
I never realized that this journey would be so challenging...I did have a sense that it wouldn't be easy...but I failed to understand how my ego sabotages my efforts...by interesting me in projects and opportunities...all of which feed my intellectual appetite...but ultimately distract me from regaining my health.
I once had a counselor who told me that I, "create chaos"...I didn't understand him at the time but have realized that I take on so many challenges that I have no time for myself and reflection and truly walking the path...
Blessings,
Maggie
Sunday, January 13, 2013
transition?
I hope you are feeling better. So far I have managed to avoid getting the latest flu making the rounds.
Last fall, I believe, I went for a walk through a swampy area near my home. In my memory it was a dreary, damp, raw kind of day. I sat in the dirt on a little hill next to the swampland and contemplated where I was. That is the seed, or root maybe of the swamp I have been exploring - the image I have been using to get into the swamp. Although, last night my grandson was here, and the night before I was exhausted and slammed into sleep before I even knew it. So the swamp has been elusive.
I am not as versed in brain anatomy and physiology as you are, so I had to read up on the amygdala and the limbic system - just a little. In the Wiki article about the amygdala, it said that Buddhist monks who do compassion meditation have been shown to modulate their amygdala during their practice. So, of course I went to an article about the compassion meditation, metta. Metta is loving-kindness, and love without clinging. Unfortunately, one starts with self, practicing loving-kindness without approval or disapproval. That is probably the hardest place to start...
I loved the image of the veils in the quotation you shared. I had one more thought. We learn to see through the veils, or allow them to blind us...or we remove them and stand naked. The idea of naked sends me to panic mode. Naked is absolute vulnerability. And the Catholic church taught us over and over that naked was shameful and bad.
I have been thinking about worst-case scenario. As long as we don't have the worst possible experience, we're alright. That seems to be the message of our culture.
What differences am I noticing? I am very emotional and very unhappy. I was feeling almost overwhelmed with unhappiness, and feeling like I can't take any more. My life has to change, something has to change. The the wiser words that emerge into my consciousness sometimes, reminded me that when I was birthing, that moment when I felt like I didn't have the strength to go on was the transition point. It meant that it was time to push, and that noting could stop me from pushing. I hope that is true in my life...
How are you feeling? Sening lots of healing light...
Love to you...Clare
Last fall, I believe, I went for a walk through a swampy area near my home. In my memory it was a dreary, damp, raw kind of day. I sat in the dirt on a little hill next to the swampland and contemplated where I was. That is the seed, or root maybe of the swamp I have been exploring - the image I have been using to get into the swamp. Although, last night my grandson was here, and the night before I was exhausted and slammed into sleep before I even knew it. So the swamp has been elusive.
I am not as versed in brain anatomy and physiology as you are, so I had to read up on the amygdala and the limbic system - just a little. In the Wiki article about the amygdala, it said that Buddhist monks who do compassion meditation have been shown to modulate their amygdala during their practice. So, of course I went to an article about the compassion meditation, metta. Metta is loving-kindness, and love without clinging. Unfortunately, one starts with self, practicing loving-kindness without approval or disapproval. That is probably the hardest place to start...
I loved the image of the veils in the quotation you shared. I had one more thought. We learn to see through the veils, or allow them to blind us...or we remove them and stand naked. The idea of naked sends me to panic mode. Naked is absolute vulnerability. And the Catholic church taught us over and over that naked was shameful and bad.
I have been thinking about worst-case scenario. As long as we don't have the worst possible experience, we're alright. That seems to be the message of our culture.
What differences am I noticing? I am very emotional and very unhappy. I was feeling almost overwhelmed with unhappiness, and feeling like I can't take any more. My life has to change, something has to change. The the wiser words that emerge into my consciousness sometimes, reminded me that when I was birthing, that moment when I felt like I didn't have the strength to go on was the transition point. It meant that it was time to push, and that noting could stop me from pushing. I hope that is true in my life...
How are you feeling? Sening lots of healing light...
Love to you...Clare
ramblings from my readings
I have been reading, what else can I do when I am sick on the couch?
I read a book about the brain....
and it talked about the connection between the ancient brain, the limbic system responsible for emotions...it seems that the amygdala acts as a gatekeeper of sorts...it is activated by fear and rage and then sends the brain into survival mode...if the amydala is calm then we can learn.
I think that, as children, we were trained and indoctrinated into life through fear and rage.
I think that now, as adults, we have to retrain our circuits to allow the limbic system to connect to the hippocampus which stores memory and learning...but it is a conscious effort to choose to not react with fear...and the nervous system reacts more quickly than we process the information so we are eacting and then registering conscious thought.
The catastrophisizing- or worrying about the worst case scenario- maintains that closed circuitry...keeps us constantly on guard...but precludes learning and growth. I wonder if I were able to bypass that amygdala's short circuit and train myself to trust the world if I could unlock my emotions and open my full potential. Think about it...that silly game may be enough to keep the doors closed.
Back to your dream/wake images...what differences have you noticed? Is delivering through the heart chakra enough to open the solar plexus? I am intrigued by the images... as I am unable to create or open to anything like them at this time. The swamp has been metaphorical to me, but it has become a place for you to experiment and grow. I need to enter into that space. Your observation that the tears may be the trickle of water necessary to clear the swamp hit me hard...right in the gut...I think you identified something real when you wrote that. Tears are so very difficult for me. And yet my greatest moments have involved tears. So what is the answer? Do I start crying until there's nothing left to cry? I know that I need to trust the world enough to feel...I am working on that. Slowly identifying emotions as I notice them...almost like teaching a child how to call each one. It seems silly, but it's the only way that I know.
I am also reading a book called The Quantum and the Lotus...comparing modern science to Buddhism...and there was a passage that struck me about suffering... the Buddhist monk stated, " The unique value of human existence is that it leads to suffering so great that we try to free ourselves from our condition, but not so crushing as to make it impossible to follow the spiritual path." He also wrote," we can either learn to see through the veils formed- by hatred, pride, and greed, or else be blinded by them...They deprive us of our faculty of judgement and destroy our mind's natural serenity."
Maybe those veils are the circuits that activate the amygdala...and send us into survival mode...instead of consciously learning from each experience.
Sorry this is quite disjointed...I hope that my ramblings aren't too off the path.
I will try to find my way to the swamp...perhaps we will meet there.
Maggie
I read a book about the brain....
and it talked about the connection between the ancient brain, the limbic system responsible for emotions...it seems that the amygdala acts as a gatekeeper of sorts...it is activated by fear and rage and then sends the brain into survival mode...if the amydala is calm then we can learn.
I think that, as children, we were trained and indoctrinated into life through fear and rage.
I think that now, as adults, we have to retrain our circuits to allow the limbic system to connect to the hippocampus which stores memory and learning...but it is a conscious effort to choose to not react with fear...and the nervous system reacts more quickly than we process the information so we are eacting and then registering conscious thought.
The catastrophisizing- or worrying about the worst case scenario- maintains that closed circuitry...keeps us constantly on guard...but precludes learning and growth. I wonder if I were able to bypass that amygdala's short circuit and train myself to trust the world if I could unlock my emotions and open my full potential. Think about it...that silly game may be enough to keep the doors closed.
Back to your dream/wake images...what differences have you noticed? Is delivering through the heart chakra enough to open the solar plexus? I am intrigued by the images... as I am unable to create or open to anything like them at this time. The swamp has been metaphorical to me, but it has become a place for you to experiment and grow. I need to enter into that space. Your observation that the tears may be the trickle of water necessary to clear the swamp hit me hard...right in the gut...I think you identified something real when you wrote that. Tears are so very difficult for me. And yet my greatest moments have involved tears. So what is the answer? Do I start crying until there's nothing left to cry? I know that I need to trust the world enough to feel...I am working on that. Slowly identifying emotions as I notice them...almost like teaching a child how to call each one. It seems silly, but it's the only way that I know.
I am also reading a book called The Quantum and the Lotus...comparing modern science to Buddhism...and there was a passage that struck me about suffering... the Buddhist monk stated, " The unique value of human existence is that it leads to suffering so great that we try to free ourselves from our condition, but not so crushing as to make it impossible to follow the spiritual path." He also wrote," we can either learn to see through the veils formed- by hatred, pride, and greed, or else be blinded by them...They deprive us of our faculty of judgement and destroy our mind's natural serenity."
Maybe those veils are the circuits that activate the amygdala...and send us into survival mode...instead of consciously learning from each experience.
Sorry this is quite disjointed...I hope that my ramblings aren't too off the path.
I will try to find my way to the swamp...perhaps we will meet there.
Maggie
Saturday, January 12, 2013
fear...
When I clean house, I like to turn on TED talks and listen as I do chores. Today I listened to a talk about fear by Karen Thompson Walker. She says fear is a story we tell ourselves. It has a plot and storyline development. We choose the most lurid stories and really buy into the drama. But the most lurid fears don't happen. What we should truly fear are the most subtle - the tiny changes that are not noticeable, yet they are happening.
I have been thinking about the whole process of understanding things from a different perspective. Listening to this talk, What Fear Can Teach Us, has led me to reevaluate and redefine my magic worrying. It also helps me understand Grandma better.
Just thinking...Clare
I have been thinking about the whole process of understanding things from a different perspective. Listening to this talk, What Fear Can Teach Us, has led me to reevaluate and redefine my magic worrying. It also helps me understand Grandma better.
Just thinking...Clare
Friday, January 11, 2013
I will always sing with you
I wasn't exactly dreaming. I wasn't exactly awake. I was sort of meditating on the swamp as I was falling asleep when I had the experience I described. And it did bring back a lot of Women Who Run With Wolves. And I am willing to sing if you are!
But there's more. I went back last night. The swamp was huge. I heard, "It's not the bones of your ancestors, it's the bones of all ancestors." Again, the muck was shallow, and I think I was directed to lie down in it. I did. Or maybe I chose to, since I am trying to merge with the swamp. I was in a cobra pose, with my shoulders lifted, and my knees bent, so the soles of my feet were facing the sky. I could feel sky energy coming into my feet and through my core. I guess I was resting on those piles of submerged bones.
So this is where it gets weird. I have a guide I have been aware of for many, many years. He was there. He was behind me, supporting my back, sort of. I started feeling pressure, and it was like I was delivering something, like childbirth, but through the front of my heart chakra. It felt like when I delivered the placenta after having a baby - big but soft. It was intense, and I feel weird writing this and trying to explain. So the big, soft mass was delivered into the swamp-muck, and a tree started to grow from it. It was a willow - I got to choose whether it was weeping willow or black willow. I chose black willow because the branches seem to embrace and support, which is good because I was instructed to climb into the tree to sleep.
I had a mystic experience years ago with a black willow. I could hear/feel sobbing from this tree. Last night, I climbed into the willow tree, and suddenly had the thought that our tears might be the gentle flow of clean water that clears the swamp.
I physically woke up and stood up to go to the bathroom, and fell back on the bed. The experience left me feeling so weak. It was so weird.
I had a different thought about the animals chewing the bones. I had a thought that they were freeing the specific ancestor, and if they freed enough of them, it could change our line or free us somehow. That was why I went back last night. I wanted to throw more bones on the shore. I think I will try again. My goal is to submerge become one with the swamp. I want to see what happens if I stop fighting it, stop cringing, stop feeling trapped by it.
The idea of drumming appeals to me. Maybe we are back to the shamanism thing. I checked youtube for some Saami drumming, thinking it might hit us deep since we have that in us. But I couldn't find anything that appealed. I did re-find something that I thought of awhile ago, and really wanted to share with you. You were talking about each living energy having a tone. Well.since you are sick and simply hanging out, you have time to listen to this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aZaokNmQ4eY
Heal quickly, take care of yourself, sending lots of healing love,
Clare
But there's more. I went back last night. The swamp was huge. I heard, "It's not the bones of your ancestors, it's the bones of all ancestors." Again, the muck was shallow, and I think I was directed to lie down in it. I did. Or maybe I chose to, since I am trying to merge with the swamp. I was in a cobra pose, with my shoulders lifted, and my knees bent, so the soles of my feet were facing the sky. I could feel sky energy coming into my feet and through my core. I guess I was resting on those piles of submerged bones.
So this is where it gets weird. I have a guide I have been aware of for many, many years. He was there. He was behind me, supporting my back, sort of. I started feeling pressure, and it was like I was delivering something, like childbirth, but through the front of my heart chakra. It felt like when I delivered the placenta after having a baby - big but soft. It was intense, and I feel weird writing this and trying to explain. So the big, soft mass was delivered into the swamp-muck, and a tree started to grow from it. It was a willow - I got to choose whether it was weeping willow or black willow. I chose black willow because the branches seem to embrace and support, which is good because I was instructed to climb into the tree to sleep.
I had a mystic experience years ago with a black willow. I could hear/feel sobbing from this tree. Last night, I climbed into the willow tree, and suddenly had the thought that our tears might be the gentle flow of clean water that clears the swamp.
I physically woke up and stood up to go to the bathroom, and fell back on the bed. The experience left me feeling so weak. It was so weird.
I had a different thought about the animals chewing the bones. I had a thought that they were freeing the specific ancestor, and if they freed enough of them, it could change our line or free us somehow. That was why I went back last night. I wanted to throw more bones on the shore. I think I will try again. My goal is to submerge become one with the swamp. I want to see what happens if I stop fighting it, stop cringing, stop feeling trapped by it.
The idea of drumming appeals to me. Maybe we are back to the shamanism thing. I checked youtube for some Saami drumming, thinking it might hit us deep since we have that in us. But I couldn't find anything that appealed. I did re-find something that I thought of awhile ago, and really wanted to share with you. You were talking about each living energy having a tone. Well.since you are sick and simply hanging out, you have time to listen to this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aZaokNmQ4eY
Heal quickly, take care of yourself, sending lots of healing love,
Clare
Sing over the bones
I will also try to enter the swamp in my dreams...
I am not effective at orchestrating my dreams...
or at least remembering ones that I ask for...
I dreamt last night...
but it was a chaotic dream...
that was driven by my viral illness.
I have rested well today...
barely gotten off the couch except to make another cup of tea...
surrounded quietly by my animals...
they come and go...
choosing to watch over me for periods of time...
I love my animals.
I had an interesting discussion with a teenager last Sunday at first Day School.
I am trying to create a board that compares the sacraments/rituals/principles of faith or spiritual traditions to show the commonalities.
We began with Christianity and talked about the sacraments...
the discussion kept coming to heaven and hell.
She asked my opinion of heaven...and I asked her to tall me hers first...
hers was a location, separate from here, but a place of beauty.
She was confused though because she had experienced 'ghosts' in her house and was concerned about their fate.
We talked about heaven as a state of mind...
and conversely hell as a state of mind as well.
I talked to her about energy and changing states of energy and how death is perhaps just a transition to another level...not lost...not gone...but not visible to most human eyes.
I wish I had heard that message from our cousin...
I did not attend his funeral...
I think I was tied up with my medical training at some level and couldn't stop trying to spread health in order to mourn the dead of my own family.
From your dream...
perhaps the animals consuming the bones was a path to rebirth...
everything that we consume becomes incorporated into our body on a cellular level.
What if by unearthing those bones and sharing them with creatures who consumed them you were reanimating them?
I am not sure what significance this has...it's just the imagery that's playing in my mind.
Perhaps we need to sink far enough into that emotion of fear...
totally submerge ourselves and see that it won't consume us...but give us the strength and courage to live life fully...to find heaven on earth.
The book that I read about the woman who survived a stroke said that heaven is just a thought away...
it's found in the right brain...
just waiting patiently for the left brain to give it a turn...
or for us to seek it there by consciously turning off the ego-driven left brain.
So let's sing over the bones that you have found...
I keep coming back to song as my voice and vehicle to wholeness.
I like the image of us singing...
My wise friend told me that she had a vision of me drumming as a path to health and integrity...
I have looked for opportunities to drum and have not uncovered any in my area...except a substance-recovery group that uses drums as part of their program.
Music is the voice of the soul.
I will sing again.
Love and blessings to you,
Maggie
I am not effective at orchestrating my dreams...
or at least remembering ones that I ask for...
I dreamt last night...
but it was a chaotic dream...
that was driven by my viral illness.
I have rested well today...
barely gotten off the couch except to make another cup of tea...
surrounded quietly by my animals...
they come and go...
choosing to watch over me for periods of time...
I love my animals.
I had an interesting discussion with a teenager last Sunday at first Day School.
I am trying to create a board that compares the sacraments/rituals/principles of faith or spiritual traditions to show the commonalities.
We began with Christianity and talked about the sacraments...
the discussion kept coming to heaven and hell.
She asked my opinion of heaven...and I asked her to tall me hers first...
hers was a location, separate from here, but a place of beauty.
She was confused though because she had experienced 'ghosts' in her house and was concerned about their fate.
We talked about heaven as a state of mind...
and conversely hell as a state of mind as well.
I talked to her about energy and changing states of energy and how death is perhaps just a transition to another level...not lost...not gone...but not visible to most human eyes.
I wish I had heard that message from our cousin...
I did not attend his funeral...
I think I was tied up with my medical training at some level and couldn't stop trying to spread health in order to mourn the dead of my own family.
From your dream...
perhaps the animals consuming the bones was a path to rebirth...
everything that we consume becomes incorporated into our body on a cellular level.
What if by unearthing those bones and sharing them with creatures who consumed them you were reanimating them?
I am not sure what significance this has...it's just the imagery that's playing in my mind.
Perhaps we need to sink far enough into that emotion of fear...
totally submerge ourselves and see that it won't consume us...but give us the strength and courage to live life fully...to find heaven on earth.
The book that I read about the woman who survived a stroke said that heaven is just a thought away...
it's found in the right brain...
just waiting patiently for the left brain to give it a turn...
or for us to seek it there by consciously turning off the ego-driven left brain.
So let's sing over the bones that you have found...
I keep coming back to song as my voice and vehicle to wholeness.
I like the image of us singing...
My wise friend told me that she had a vision of me drumming as a path to health and integrity...
I have looked for opportunities to drum and have not uncovered any in my area...except a substance-recovery group that uses drums as part of their program.
Music is the voice of the soul.
I will sing again.
Love and blessings to you,
Maggie
Thursday, January 10, 2013
wild=free?
Went to bed last night determined to submerge myself in the swamp and see what happened. And I tried. But I couldn't submerge myself. Instead I found I was being blocked by something hard beneath my feet. So I started rooting through the muck with my hands and found bones.
I heard, "These are the bones of your ancestors." which made sense. They were abused, then they abused, with violence and dysfunction pushing onward and upward through the generations.
I freaked out a little and began tossing the bones away from myself. They were landing in the grass next to the swamp. Wild animals came out of the trees and started tearing the bones to shreds. They were snarling at the bones. And I was afraid...really afraid. But a quote I read recently sounded in my mind:
If the white man had never come here this country would still be like it was. It would be all pure here. You call it "wild". But it really wasn't wild. It was free. Animals aren't wild, they're just free. And that's the way we were. You called us "wild". You called us "savages". But we were just free!
-Leon Shenandoah, Tadodaho
Six Nations Confederacy
I was afraid of the wild animals, but maybe I am really afraid of freedom, of being free. Maybe I feel safer here in the swamp - because in my vision the swamp is not too very big any more. From last night's perspective, I should be able to climb with no problems at all. But I haven't...
So I will go back again tonight and see if there's any more progress to be made.
Love you, Clare
I heard, "These are the bones of your ancestors." which made sense. They were abused, then they abused, with violence and dysfunction pushing onward and upward through the generations.
I freaked out a little and began tossing the bones away from myself. They were landing in the grass next to the swamp. Wild animals came out of the trees and started tearing the bones to shreds. They were snarling at the bones. And I was afraid...really afraid. But a quote I read recently sounded in my mind:
If the white man had never come here this country would still be like it was. It would be all pure here. You call it "wild". But it really wasn't wild. It was free. Animals aren't wild, they're just free. And that's the way we were. You called us "wild". You called us "savages". But we were just free!
-Leon Shenandoah, Tadodaho
Six Nations Confederacy
I was afraid of the wild animals, but maybe I am really afraid of freedom, of being free. Maybe I feel safer here in the swamp - because in my vision the swamp is not too very big any more. From last night's perspective, I should be able to climb with no problems at all. But I haven't...
So I will go back again tonight and see if there's any more progress to be made.
Love you, Clare
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