Posts Tagged 'author'

Walking towards joy

Published 05/01/2019 Counsciousness , Death , Growth , Life , Philosophy , teaching , Uncategorized , writing 1 Comment
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2018 I am glad to see you go.

You nearly got the better of me. You tried hard to break me, along with 2017, 2016 and 2015. All of you went on rampages of preposterous proportions to see if you could be the one to wear me down and make me admit defeat. You nearly did. Each of you in your own way did your best. Throwing at me whatever you could muster. Digging deep to maintain the deluge.

I’ll admit you brought me to my knees a few times…. more than a few….but I am made of more than the sum of all of your excruciating pain and heartache. I am made of stardust and little bits of warrior woman. I have fueled myself with love and hope and I have rebuilt myself on a foundation of strength and softness. I stood up to your storms and swayed in your wind. I am still here. I am still rooted. You did not win.

These years came with heartache, immense loss, death and betrayal on a scale I hope none of you ever come remotely close to experiencing. I have mourned and cried. I have shuddered under the weight of worry and surrendered to the storms. I have extended grace where I could and wrapped those I love in all the light I can find.

I am still doing the work. I am still fixing and healing and soothing my soul. There is always work to be done.

Listen carefully 2019. I have set an intention. My intention is simply to move towards joy. I seek joy. I seek light and love and laughter. Work with me universe. Work with me. It is a simple and unassuming request. I do not ask that you provide it, for I can find it for myself. I only ask that you do not stand in my way.

Do not block the light I seek so desperately. Do not stand in front of love.

2019 I ask that you hold my hand and walk with me towards joy.

Tree stumps and emotional concussion

Published 11/11/2018 Counsciousness , learning , Life , Philosophy , teaching , Uncategorized , writing , Yoga Leave a Comment
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Here I am doing some sort of crazy balance on a tree stump. Why? Because I can and because I’m damn strong and it’s a whole lot of fun.

That stump – well it feels like it resembles my old life. The one I used to have before the universe decided that I needed some fucking big challenges and some real time growth.

Thanks universe.

It came along, pushed me out of the tree and chopped the whole bloody thing down, right down to the stump. Off went all the branches of my life. Left me with a sorry seeping stump and no place to call home. So, after a bit of confusion, (I like to call it emotional concussion), I found a new tree. Took me a while but I found a new tree and that emotional concussion is wearing off.

But this story is not about a tree or a stump. It’s about this thing that happened right about the time I fell out of the tree.

I had a friend. A best friend. We met in 1999 and for 17 years we were partners in crime. She was my person. I didn’t make a decision without speaking to her. She knew my moods, my thoughts, my troubles and my joys. This friendship saw us through some tough times and we shared all the stories that ran deeply through our intertwined lives. She was the family I didn’t have. The sister I always wanted. She was my home from home and my first port of call. I would always hold space for her no matter what load I might be carrying. If she called I put down my shit and listened. She had a big place in my heart and I would step up in an instant if she needed me.

Then I fell out of my tree. Actually I didn’t fall out of my tree I was pushed but that’s for another day. Where do you go when you are bruised and broken? You go home. Ahh yes, but I had just fallen from there so I went to my second home. To the home of my best friend.

I had a life to rebuild, a new home to find and an urgent need to find a way to support myself. I was drowning in a shit storm so I wept for a while then I started to put myself back together. The logistics of which can not be underestimated. This was a herculean task. Whenever I could catch my breath, and as I had always done, I would knock at her door to connect and hear her stories. To hold space for each other as we had done for seventeen years……but she stopped answering.

She stopped answering my calls.

She stopped replying to my messages.

Then one day I saw that she had unfriended me on Facebook. Good god I did not see that coming.

I never even got to tell her why I fell from the tree.

The wounds from that fall run deep and will take a lifetime of healing, and my person……she doesn’t even know why.

On food and how I move.

Published 10/04/2018 Body , Growth , learning , Uncategorized , Yoga Leave a Comment
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I promised this some time back but – well you know – life kind of gets in the way of life sometimes.  Curve balls, commitments and chores seep their way into all the spaces of your day and all those things that are not so important on your todo list take a bit of a backseat.  This blog has had to take a bit of a demotion to my not so important list for a while but hopefully a revival is on the cards

This particular post has taken it’s sweet time in coming to fruition.  Some things just have to mull about in the brain for a while before they are ready to be committed to the big wide world.  Prompts and prods over the last week or so have given me the push to put pen to paper (which isn’t really the case but you know what I mean)

I regularly, and by that I mean probably twice or more a week, get asked what I eat and what I do to look the way I do at 53.  Well thank heavens these poor people only see me prepped and ready for class in yoga pants that I swear put everything back in it’s proper place.  However, they all want to know so I’m going to tell them and anyone else who is listening.

Firstly I move. A lot!  I do yoga 7 days a week.  I teach classes 6 days a week and you will find me on my mat doing my own practice every day unless work gets in the way.  If that happens I just do as much of my class as I can.  Over the week this probably works out to between 1 and 3 hours per day.  Not every day is three hours but an hour is my minimum.  Personal practices vary between vigorous (inversions and arm balances ) and just rolling about on my mat stretching this way and that depending on current curve balls and state of being.  I teach vinyasa and when it comes to yoga you don’t get much more vigorous than that and classes will leave you in a happy sweaty heap.

So I’m strong and flexible but mostly I get on my mat because it fixes my head and my heart…. both of which need a whole lot of fixing.

What do I eat….

A lot of potatoes….and pasta.

When I say a lot of potatoes I really mean it.  Potatoes – good old fashioned Irish white potatoes (Irish on my father’s side) are the foundation of my diet.  I love them baked, wedged, roasted, chipped – just not mashed! I will cook three or four medium sized potatoes just for myself at most meals. It is possible I will come back as a potato in my next life!

At home I am predominantly plant based.  This means that 80% of what I eat comes from plants).  I don’t eat meat at all and don’t have any dairy at home.  Eating out I’m a little more relaxed and don’t cry if there is some feta in my salad.  I do have one general rule.  If it needs to tell me on a packet what it is I don’t eat it.  I eat real food. A carrot is a carrot and it doesn’t need a label.  Processed food is a no no!

So average day – actually every day – starts with sugar and wheat free muesli with added seeds, raisins and rice milk.

Then around 9 (I might have a small coffee addiction) I’ll often be found having a croissant at VovoTelo to keep me going.

Lunch time varies depending on classes and meetings.  Favourites are pasta with mushrooms and tomatoes from VovoTelo or a baked potato and curried lentils from Nouriti.

I often get in late from class so tend to make things that are either quick or can last a few days.  Three bean chilli is one of my go to meals.  I’ll have this with two or more baked potatoes or rice.  Sometimes I’ll make a quick pasta dish with tomatoes, peppers or mushrooms depending on what I have in the house. Always plenty of onion and garlic and a healthy helping of pesto.  Lentil stuffed peppers with wedges is another firm favourite but my all time best meal is an abundantly large tray of roasted vegetables (including lots of potatoes of course).  Best things to add to this are brussels spouts, carrots, beetroot, cauliflower, broccoli and sometimes I’ll throw in a can of lentils at the end.  Saturday evenings are made for trays of roasted veg and Netflix!  I have a few apps on my phone for recipes.  Forks over Knives and Yummly having proved themselves to be the best for me.

….I love coffee, matcha green tea and try to drink plenty of water.

….I drink alcohol rarely, if ever, and don’t drink any soft drinks.  Water is my soft drink.

….I don’t have a sweet tooth.  Dislike cakes of any sort and ice cream but you might find the odd ginger biscuit in my house.

At the end of the day you have to put good stuff into your mouth and you have to move your body. Potatoes and other carbs are not your enemy.  Being lazy is your enemy and eating rubbish is your enemy.

Get moving and eat real food people…oh and meditate!

 

It doesn’t have to be this way…

Published 07/02/2017 Counsciousness , Death , Growth , Life , Philosophy , teaching , Uncategorized , writing Leave a Comment
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In my little world right now I have people close to me who are suffering the unimaginable – stuff we can’t even dream up.  Worlds being turned so upside down that the simple act of breathing becomes impossible.  Heartbreaking, excruciating stuff.  The life is not fair kind of stuff.  The cry for three days and still not catch your breath kind of stuff.

They are not doing this to themselves.  It is forced upon them by the universe for whatever lesson it is they have come to learn in this lifetime.  It is out of their control but it is also out of everyone’s control.  It is just the way it is.  The universe’s plan.  It’s unbearable, but it is the universe’s plan so we catch our breath and move forward as best we can.  It is not in anyones’ control so we breathe and move.  Step by step. Day by day.  Knowing we are doing our best.  All of us doing our best in every moment.

Also in my little world I have other people close to me who are suffering due to the choices of those around them. I have been in that place.  I know how it feels.  I know every single desperate inch of how it feels.  It’s equally heartbreaking….but it’s different.  It’s different because it doesn’t have to be.  It’s the ‘choice’ of the other person.  It can be fixed.  It may take courage but it can be fixed.

Do something once and it is an accident.  Do it again and it’s a choice.  Didn’t have to happen.  Didn’t have to go down that road.  Didn’t have to hurt the people around you.  Didn’t have to do that.

Do it again and it becomes selfish.  It becomes weak.  It lacks integrity and soul.  It becomes pathetic. It becomes deliberate.  The deliberate cause of suffering to others.

Addictions are a disease they say.  Perhaps.

Choice is not a disease.

Addictions are selfish and destructive.  They are harmful and hurtful.  They cause pain wherever they go….and they go everywhere.  They are everywhere.  They are all around me causing immense suffering to people that I love dearly and so many people I don’t even know.  People I have yet to meet.  Addictions are selfish and they are a choice!  I am astonished at the prevalence of them.  I am astonished at the quiet whispering voices as they tell me their stories.  Their stories of breaking hearts and loss of hope.  Stories of broken families and suffering children.  Stories.  So many stories.  I am over whelmed by them.

I do not understand despite a lifetime of being in this place.  I do not understand someone making that choice.  I do not understand the destructive selfishness of it all.

I watched my father destroy his family unit. Destroy his job, his friendships and eventually destroy himself.  Done and dusted and pushing up the daisies by the time he was my age.  He knew what he was doing.  As a child I knew he had chosen his addiction over me.  His selfish destruction of everything around him was more important than I was.

And then I watched it again….

It was a choice.  It was not a disease it was a choice.

It simply didn’t have to be that way.

It never does.

 

 

A new year…..with a suitcase from the past.

Published 09/01/2017 Life , Philosophy , writing Leave a Comment
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There is something wonderful about a new year.  A vast horizon of some three hundred and sixty odd days of emptiness waiting to be filled.  Pages and pages of days anticipating the arrival of stories.  Stories of summer nights and life changing experiences.  The sweet blankness of the unfamiliar.  So many new chapters of a book yet to be written.  Each of us with our own blank book and our own empty pages.

Somewhere, in the dark corners of my mind, I imagine that I am able to shed all the unwanted parts of myself and leave them, tattered and rejected in the past of the old year.  That I can begin the new year as a new person.  Glowing and unafraid with just a beautiful sunny horizon beckoning me to step forward and take the deep unhindered breaths of a fresh new start.

But it is not so…

All those tattered and intolerable parts of me step into the new year along side me.  Shadows.  The darker parts of my character dragging themselves along for the ride despite my deep desire to leave them, crushed and discarded on the forgotten side of midnight.  Is it that I did not work hard enough on myself?  Did I not fill the last 365 pages with stories of being good enough?  Did I not try hard enough to peel away the layers so that a new me, a me without the shadows, can start writing those magnificent stories.

I thought that perhaps I could step into 2017 unafraid.  I thought that my work there was done.

But it is not so…

In the first few silent hours of this brand new year I read this quote  ‘ There is great value in being fearless.  For too much of my life I was too afraid.  Too frightened by it all.  That fear is one my biggest regrets’.

I sat sullen in the guest room of my friends house and decided that if I am ever to cast off this murky war I have with myself I need to understand it.  I  need to break it down into little pieces.  Manageable bites.  I need to wrestle with the individual parts of it for as a whole it is too strong for me.  Otherwise it will win.  It will always win.

So I take out my brand new journal.  The one with the delightful, creamy, empty pages waiting for my pen to fill them with exquisite tales of bravery and success.  I think of this thing….this fear.  Of how it bears itself to me.  For I am not afraid of real things.  Snakes or spiders are not my demon.  I do not fear death or deadly disease.  I do not fear open spaces nor being alone.  Being alone is my friend.  No my fears are not so simple.

And so I write on those new velvety pages…

I fear I will disappoint myself.  I fear that I am not as strong or as brave as I think.  That I am not really the sum of all the intelligent parts and that the result will be breathtakingly short of all the infinite possibilities.

….. and so I fear that I am, after all, not enough, even for myself.

I fear my lack of courage.

I fear that trust is too big a mountain for me to climb and…

and I fear that this broken heart will never mend.

 

I’m so out of my comfort zone I can’t breath.

Published 10/10/2016 Death , Life , teaching , Uncategorized , writing 5 Comments
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That quote, you know the one that goes like this…..  ‘Life begins at the end of your comfort zone’.  Well does it? Does the magic really happen when you are pushed to your edge? Does life really begin when the proverbial rug is pulled out from beneath you?  Does it really begin when you have to start again.  When you have to do it all over but you are tired and afraid.

I’m waiting life.  I am waiting for you to show me.

It seems I have spent the last two years being terrified.  Two years of grappling to find comfort in the unfamiliar. Searching for the path back to comfort.  Back to that comfort zone where life felt safe and I had a plan.

I continue to have my daily conversations with my mother, as I have done for the last fifty one years.  She no longer answers.  There is no comforting reply.  No sound advice from the email address that was once hers.  No Sunday Skype and reassuring smile.  No ‘I can come if you need me’.  I need you.

I tell her that nothing is the same.  I tell her that I wander around this ‘edge’ in search of home but I have yet to find it.  I tell her that a blind man does not use his cane to see where he can go but rather where he can’t.  I tell her that I have lost my cane.  That I don’t know where it’s safe to tread and I have no one to tell me.  I tell her that I can’t see the road ahead.  That it is all blurry and misty where I am.  That there are no white lines or cats eyes showing me where to go.   I tell her of opportunities that come my way but that I don’t know if I should.  That I need her  to tell me that I should.   I tell her that I have no place to call home anymore.  Either here or there.  That I have lost my secret place where I could hide from my fears and from the world when it all got too much.  I tell her I do not know how I will survive this.

I tell her that I am having to do things differently and I’m not sure that I am doing it right.  That there were people I believed in, totally believed in that let me down.  That there were new people I thought were honest and kind but they were not.  That I told them my stories and now I realised I should not have.

I tell her too of all the beautiful friends I do have that listen endlessly to my why’s, what if’s and how’s.  I tell her that all the little gifts she gave me over the years are my new familiar.  That I can see her everywhere because of those things.  I tell her that it is from her that I learnt the real meaning of unconditional love.  That her exceptional friendship is what I hope to emulate with my own girls.  I tell her I’m trying.

I tell her of the days that are magical and happy and of the dark days when I can’t even remember how to breathe.

I tell her that it is all down to me now.

I tell her I am scared that I am doing it all wrong.

I tell her I am alone but never lonely.  That she taught me that art of being alone.  I am eternally grateful for that.

I tell her I am so out of my comfort zone I can’t breathe.

Does life really begin in the unfamiliar?  Does it begin with a new front door of a home that is not mine? Does it begin with the loss of friends there were supposed to be there for a lifetime ? Does it begin in the space of starting again.  Does it begin in the not knowing of how this is supposed to work?

I do not know. I think by now I am supposed to know but I do not.

Life will break you..but..

Published 16/05/2016 Counsciousness , Death , learning , Life , photography , teaching , Uncategorized , writing , Yoga 1 Comment
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In all my work I am incredibly privileged.  I get to meet and spend time with an amazing variety of people.   With my camera in hand I meet newborn babies and happy people.  I get to photograph people doing what they love with the people they love.  There is often laughter,  there is often joy and I get to capture it and give it back to them so that they can look at it forever.  Life however is not just filled with happy smiling moments.

There is laughter in my yoga classes too.  Lots of it.  There is laughter and joy but there are also tears.  There are tears and great moments of fear.  There is anxiety and anger and for some reason yoga brings it all out.  People come to class for all sorts of reasons.  The come in search of something, often not knowing what that thing is.  They come thinking they want to do a few asanas, touch their toes and sit in relaxation.  This happens, oh yes this happens, but shit happens too.  Last week a student touched her toes for the first time in her life and along with that moment came floods of tears.  Tears of joy.  Tears of release. Tears of achievement.  In that same class a student who could not find her balance instead found floods of tears in savasana (relaxation).  I held her head as her body shook with the weight of it all.  I watch as people release deep sighs in meditation.  I get to be part of their process of peeling back the layers of themselves.  I get to witness their ahh-aha moments.  I get to be part of their journey and it’s beautiful.

A while back I was asked if I would spend some time doing relaxation and meditation with a lady who was terminally ill.  The sweet, kind, beautiful person was understandably very anxious about the road that lay ahead of her. Once a week I would go to her apartment and for an hour we would talk and then we would sit in quiet meditation with me guiding her to find just a few moments of complete peace.  We would talk of life and death, of fear and trying to really live in the few moments she had left.  I witnessed her sorrow and pain.  I held her hand when she cried and helped her breathe through moments of unease.  I was witness to her most intimate fears.  I heard her stories and sat with her when she needed to find space in those stories and it was a beautiful thing.

Life will break you.  We come into the world devoid of fear or judgement, but life will break you.  Along our journey we bump headfirst into heartache and pain.  We suffer intolerable sickness.  We loose people we love and are brought to our knees by uncertainty.  We fix ourselves with pretend plasters and glue.  We hold it all together with imaginary layers that we think will keep out all the pain….but it won’t.  Life will break you.

I had the incredibly privilege of getting to know a person intimately in the last months of her life.  During our hours together I got to ask about living.  I got to ask her where her breaks had been and where she had built her walls.  I got to see where she had put her plasters and glue and I got to see her layers peel away.

At the end of the day all those layers of ours will come undone.  In the last days of your life each and everyone of those plasters will come unstuck and the glue will melt.  We put them there because we don’t want anyone else to see our pain.  We don’t want to be vulnerable.  We want others to only see the happy pretty parts of ourselves.  What people don’t realise is that underneath all the pretend fixing is where all the real beauty is.

When I see the layers fall and the personal first aid fail I smile.  When I watch in class as the quiet person in the corner finally lets go, I smile.  I smile because the real beauty of a person is in their vulnerability.  The real beauty of the human race is in our connection and when we are vulnerable we connect deeply.  Our beauty is in the layers of who we are.  It’s in our stories and not just the good ones.

It’s hard though.  Taking off the plasters is hard and it hurts.  Something happens though when we do.  When we show another person our pain we free them up to do the same.  When we gut vulnerable we let them get vulnerable too.

Here is the best part of it all.  Like a baby or a person in their last hours where there is a serenity and grace that is breathtaking, a person without all their plasters and glue is the most beautiful thing.

 

 

Happiness is……a secret

Published 05/04/2016 Body , Life , Uncategorized , writing 4 Comments
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I made a promise to myself a year or so ago when my life fell apart and all that I knew was no longer.  I promised myself that I would be open to possibilities.  That what landed in my lap was perhaps meant for me, despite my own curious dubiousness, and that I would explore what ever came my way.  That I would let life unfold just as it wanted. That I would release my resistance to outcomes and live in the moment. That I would enjoy those moments and treasure each and every one of them however heavy or light they felt.

I am proud to say that I have done just that.  I have braved weddings on my own, seen more movies than ever before, flown around the country visiting friends and agreed to work that I never, ever, imagined myself doing.  The rewards have been great and I am thankful for each and every opportunity to explore both the external world and my own inner self.

So when a week or so ago a dear friend messaged and asked me if I would like to go to Secret Sunrise I agreed, without even a moments hesitation and without even being fully aware of what it was.  I then moved on with my days and having marked the event in my calendar let it rest far in the back of my mind. I had just returned from a long weekend away in the far off provence of Limpopo when she messaged to remind me that out outing was imminent.  I have to admit I did emit a rather large sigh.  Despite my efforts to move out of all my self imposed comfort zones I am still a lover of routine and am deeply attached to my own personal space and alone time. I had just spent five days away with people and had a deep desire to sink back into the coziness of my world.

With a certain amount of weariness my alarm was set for four thirty in the morning and rise I did on an extremely hot and humid morning at the end of March.  We arrived at the city centre location only divulged the day before (hence the name Secret Sunrise) and were each presented with a set of headphones and guided to some stairs leading to the roof of the building.  There on that roof was a veritable wonderland of vegetables and flowers.  A rooftop garden so sweet it would take your breath away.  Recycled items turned into glorious flower containers, a giant chess board, a bus stop and fruit tress abundant with their offerings.  A fairy tale world in the most unexpected of places.

Headphones on we were guided though an hour of dance, meditation and unbridled joy.  To begin with I found myself hesitant. Unsure and self conscious. After all here I am on a rooftop at six o clock in the morning, dancing to music no one else can hear, waiting for the sun to make it’s easy way into the day.  Then I remembered my promise to myself.  To just let life unfold and enjoy all the moments that came my way.  I looked around me and saw nothing but sweet smiles.  The energy and joy was infections and it took only one or two breaths before I too found myself floating around the garden in a state of pure happiness.

I was breathless.  Something that started out with a sigh of regret at my eagerness to say yes turned out to be one of the happiest hours of my life.  The sheer pleasure of moving my body without a care in the world was exhilarating.  Catching my breath as the sun showed it’s sweet face over the roof tops I was deeply grateful to be there in that moment.

So this is how the story goes.  Be open to everything. Release your resistance to the outcome.  Let life unfold.  This was a true lesson from the universe and a very sweet reminder that pure joy comes in the most unexpected ways.

Traits of conscious living

Published 07/03/2016 Counsciousness , learning , Life , teaching , Uncategorized , writing Leave a Comment
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I recently saw an article in which were words written by the actor Keanu Reeves. Keanu had written about how he did not like living in a world where people did not seem to value either themselves or each other. I agree.  The fact that millions are obsessed with the inane daily existence of a family that seem to pride themselves on the size of their butts rather than the depth in their hearts breaks my own into a million pieces.   Where is our deep commitment to the human race, our planet and everything that resides in our environment?  Why the desire to hurt and why the ludicrous obsession with things that have no meaning or depth.

His article reminded me of notes I had written in the back of an old journal and so I rummaged around until I located those tired scribbles. There in my tatty moleskin I found the list I had made some time ago on what I believe are the traits of people who live a conscious life.

They are dedicated to personal growth. 

By this I mean that they put effort into being a better person that they were yesterday.  The seek to expand their minds and are open to constant learning.  They understand that there is always room for improvement and are willing to work on the space between who they are and who they want to be.

They understand that they are more than a physical body.

Our physical body is home for our soul.  Perhaps we will never understand just what our soul is but we do get that it is vital to who we are.  Both our body and our soul are energy.  Our body vibrating atoms of energy and soul the deep conscious energy that makes us who we are.  They understand this about themselves and equally of others.  They are prepared to meet others on both levels and are respectful of another’s journey here on our planet.

They take care of themselves

Living a conscious life means taking care of the home their soul resides in. Attending to all the physical needs of the body.  Making time for exercise, drinking lots of water, eating quality food and avoiding the perils of sugar, alcohol and drugs. It means taking care of your own emotional needs and stepping out into the world knowing that if you take good care of yourself you have more to offer others.

Embracing their beauty

This really boils down to being comfortable in their own skin.   Taking the time to love themselves, who they are and what they offer to the world.  This is no mean feat. Even liking ourselves seems impossibly difficult in a world that tells us we are not enough.  Conscious people tune out from the media perception of beauty, physical or otherwise and embrace all that they are.

Care for others

Conscious people understand that we are all connected.  That we are all part of this universe and that we are all made up of the same energy at a deep cellular level. This understanding guides them to treat others as they would treat themselves.

Care for the earth

It is pretty obvious isn’t it that if you have conscience at all you are driven to treat this plant with the utmost care.  Reducing your consumption and lowering your carbon footprint are just the tip of the iceberg.  Care for the earth means caring for our environment and everything in it.

Emotionally mature

This doesn’t come easy to some but it starts out by engaging in personal growth.  All the work done there provides the basis for emotional stability and maturity.  This has nothing to do with physical age.  I know young people who’s emotional maturity knocks the socks of people twice their age.

Lives with integrity and doesn’t settle

A conscious person approaches all that they do with grace.  They are true to their word and uphold their own code ethics and morals.  They know their boundaries and expect others to treat them with the same honour as they themselves treat others.

Opens even when it hurts

It is not easy to stay soft and open in a society that wants to beat you with it’s own brand of harshness but this one is essential.  Staying open means not closing down ones heart.  It means understand that the energy of love really is what gives meaning to our lives. It means being tender even in the moments when it is hardest to do so.

Receives elegantly

I struggle with this.  I find myself very uncomfortable with the process of receiving gifts but to not receive with grace denies the other person all the joy of giving.  Of course it is not always a gift from another person.  Receiving also means accepting and loving your talents and anything else that makes you special.  It is understanding that you are deserving of this and being brave enough to go out into the world with that knowledge.

Is brave and courageous.

In the words of Gandhi ‘Be truthful, gentle and fearless’.  Being brave and courages does not denote being hard.  It means be courageous enough to be gentle and be brave enough to stay open.  Stand sweetly in your own power and respect that others do the same.  Move fearlessly out of your comfort zone when required and help others in their quest for growth.  There is a beautiful sanskrit word ‘Shraddha’.  It means learning to rest in complete uncertainty without moving into fear.  For me that just sums up beautiful the ability to be brave and courageous.

I truly believe that we all have the ability to be highly conscious people.  That every single person on this planet has the depth and character to do the work required, and just imagine if they all did.  What a wonderful world it would be.

On the art of letting go.

Published 26/01/2016 learning , Life , Uncategorized Leave a Comment
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‘How do I let go of stuff’.  This is a question I have been asked time and time again over the last few weeks.  I have been asked by students after class, by friends and even by people I hardly know.  All of these people weighty with emotional baggage that we as humans tend to carry around.  Heavy loads of history.  Perhaps it is the new year that makes us want to shed these carry on cases.  Maybe we want to step into this new year without all the stuff we carried with us last year and all the years before.  We talk a lot in yoga class of letting go.  Of opening up our bodies, minds and hearts.  We work hard at making space in our bodies.  We work hard at opening up our joints and in doing so we work hard at releasing all the tension and stuff stored there.

Most of the time we are hardly aware that we have stored this garbage away in our emotional piggy bank.  We don’t open the doors there much.  We don’t really like to look into that dark and dusty cupboard overflowing with souvenirs from past relationships.  We save trashy emotional memento’s from events not worthy of remembering and allow them to settle somewhere within us.  We invite them in and let them stay.  We make room for them.  They take up space within us.  Space that could be open and inviting for new and beautiful things.  Yet here we are, storing old things and carrying them around trying desperately not to look at them or even to remember that they are there.

We store them all over our bodies.  Our hips and solar plexus are the usual willing victims.  Our hips get tight and our lower backs suffer under the weight of all the gritty garbage.  There are other places though.  We are ever so adept at making space for all this stuff.  Our whole bodies can be used for storage.  No part of us can escape this dusty trail.

So how do we let it all go?  How do we brave the opening of those dusty doors?  How do we pull out those unwanted emotional trophies one by one and toss them away forever?  After all its going to hurt isn’t it?  There is only one way to let it out and that is through the heart.  Thats the way it came in and that’s the way to let it out.

Here is how you do it.  You open one door at a time.  You find that memento.  Take a look at it.  You are carrying it around with you, all day, every day.  Its heavy and dirty. You don’t want it and you know that if you toss it aside you will have space. Beautiful fresh open space.  For some reason this is the point where we get fearful.  We are nervous of that space.  We are used to the weight of it and there is a comfort in that.  It’s what we know.  It’s who we are.  It hurts to look at it.  Our chest tightens and our heart starts to close.  Don’t let it.  Right at this point take a deep breath and open the heart and let it go.  Get behind the pain and throw that thing away.  Release it with one big beautiful breath.

Yes it will hurt for a moment but then that moment is over and it is gone.  Surely that is far better than carrying it around for another few years.  That is all you have to do. Open your heart and let it go.  It will hurt for just a few moments and then it will be gone.  Surely that is far better than the pain of carrying it around forever.  So why don’t we do this.  Why do we insist on holding on to this detritus.  Why to we litter our bodies with the leftovers of our own personal history.  For one reason only and that it is because it is what we know and what we know feels safe.  It keeps us in our comfort zone and we are spectacularly bad at moving out of that.

So go ahead and drag that stuff out of those dark and dismal corners.  Let it go and move on.  You will be richly rewarded in ways you can only begin to imagine.  Just breathe and let it go.

 

 

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