Whine and Complain
I’d like to take a few moments to enjoy whining and complaining.
Has it been your experience that most things take much longer to get done,
and we have to check behind each step along the way?
What’s with that?
If we order food delivered, there will most likely be something wrong with the order.
If we order something on line, it takes 3 times longer to arrive
and may be missing pieces or just plain be something other than what was ordered.
Again, what’s with that?
If I’m centered and rested and not frustrated trying to keep up with all the million dangling pieces, I can just smile and shrug it off realizing that companies had to lay off other workers and the rehire didn’t mean the same people were put back where they were. Plus, the quantity of things ordered must be completely overwhelming.
But really!!
I’m not centered right now and I’m not rested and I’m frustrated!
I’ve waited for new windows to be installed in my house for 6 months,
and then they finally arrive but would it be a reasonable install?
OH NO! OF COURSE IT WOULDN’T GO SMOOTHLY!
The windows arrived too small!
So now I have plywood in the three holes where I used to have windows.
And how long will it take this time?
UGH!
Life is challenging right now.
And that is only one incident.
Can the people not read?
Or measure? Or don’t they know how to program the machine that makes the windows for them?
The order was typed so it wasn’t handwriting.
And it’s a four inch difference in width!!
What were the installers supposed to do? Just cover the holes so they won’t show?
Then I would wonder why the new windows didn’t save on the electric bill and seemed smaller.
Whew!
Having a rant about it makes me feel better. Meanwhile, the truck to pump out the septic tank didn’t show up and the mosquito squad has rescheduled 3 times because of all the rain.
Too bad we can’t take some of the excess water and send it out west where the fires are burning out of control. When I think about the heartbreak that those people are experiencing and the heat and burning, the bad air for folks to breath, the hours of backbreaking work, my window problem doesn’t seem so bad.
I remember being in Arizona once where the fires were burning just north of town. I was on the south side several miles away but the smell of burning was always present. And did I mention that firefighters were camping out in tents on the football field at the high school?
Come on people. Let’s put a little more into the quality of our work like those fighting those fires are doing with every passing day.
How’s your week going?
AM I FORGIVABLE?
What would it be like to lie and believe that all is well?
I don’t mean just say it because it seems like what I should say, but to really believe it.
Even in these days of Covid and social distancing, of wondering how I can stand it for one more day,
what if the world is needing to learn a lesson from all the events happening.
To believe there is a purpose in the world events gives me hope.
We are not flung out to chance
but carry the ability to make positive change.
We must consider others as we go through our days.
I had some objections to the Golden Rule from the Bible
when I see other not remembering to give to themselves.
Each of us matters in this world.
Each of us is worth caring about.
And as we learn our value, we have more to give others and the world.
Sometimes the best we can do is pray for someone,
some group,
some country to heal from the years of
neglecting and focusing on punishing.
Where is forgiveness? Are we forgivable?
Being Real
How can I risk being real?
I want peace and connection with another person.
I want to love and be loved.
I want to connect more to Spirit.
I’ve tried using my defense systems and that
left me either attacked or abandoned.
My next decision was to give up on what I want and be alone.
At least then I’ll be safe from being hurt.
And even though I’m safe, it’s lonely.
What else can I do?
I guess I’ll try opening up and being real,
feeling what is inside me in the moment.
But the moment I open up, the moment I get real,
all the feelings from the past come roaring to the surface.
What can I do?
The Pathwork gives me a roadmap through the feelings into the Higher Self,
into more spiritual connection, into being the real me.
My life improves!
I have spiritual guidance that is present,
that let’s me know my next steps.
I find I resist that guidance sometimes (ok, lots of times)
but when I feel it from inside me and do what I’m supposed to do,
my life is easier, happier, and more connected.
You can have that too.
Destructive Patterns 2
MORE DESTRUCTIVE DEFENSES
What do we do when we find ourselves
in one of our destructive patterns?
We’ve spent time identifying and understanding where they come from.
But that doesn’t make them go away. We can think about it, analyze it, pray about it.
And still we find ourselves back in that same destructive pattern.
And the destructive pattern doesn’t work!!
It doesn’t get us what we want.
Other people can feel the energy of it.
They react to that energy even if we believe that we hidden it.
Since our defense systems were designed to keep us safe, the other person should understand, right?
But NO!! Instead they go into their own reactive defense systems and either withdraw or attack!!
What! Wait!
That’s not what I wanted.
Now I must protect my innermost self even more when what I wanted was love and connection.
Maybe if I explain to them what they are doing, then they’ll stop and love me.
Maybe if I sob and cry and beg, they’ll come closer to me.
Maybe if I yell at them, they’ll want to stay.
Sound familiar?
These teachings come from the Pathwork and can help us really see what we are doing including deeply in the unconscious.
And seeing it is the most difficult step in healing and change.
Next time we’ll continue to walk through the steps to healing.
Meeting the Pain of Destructive Patterns
Meeting the Pain of Destructive Patterns
I’ve been reading Pathwork Lecture 100:
“Meeting the Pain of Destructive Patterns”
and thinking about how we are affected by our own
negative way of defending ourselves.
Here’s the way I think it works.
We are born.
Eventually something happens to us—we don’t get fed or changed immediately,
Mom has to go out to the grocery store or to work.
We feel abandoned or rejected—in danger!!—or we are actually in a potentially dangerous situation.
We feel feelings but believe (true or not true) that we can’t show what we are feeling.
We shove those feelings down below the surface of our awareness.
Now what do we do?
We develop a defense system that we believe (hope?) will protect us.
The Pathwork Guide tells us about 3 different defense systems that we might use:
aggression, submission, and withdrawal.
Defense system #1:
Aggression. We demand, snark, bark, blame, let fury loose, incriminate—all to keep us safe. All in the hope of bringing love.
And the other person reacts whether to our words or to the aggressive energy stream coming at them. Then they either attack back or withdraw and leave.
That’s not what we want.
Defense system #2:
Submission. We prostate ourselves before the other person, will do anything for them, cling to them, beg and plead, humiliate ourselves, deny ourselves, be “nice”, be “good”. We will do anything to make the other love us.
Once again, the other person can feel and see what we are doing, can feel us plastered on them clinging for fear of dying.
And they attack or leave.
Defense system #3:
Withdrawal. We retreat into thinking, figuring it out, explaining, showing how much we know. We are the experts in diverting any indication of feelings down the track of reasoning. We live with fear of showing our emotions lest we be ridiculed or rejected.
The recipient can feel our hiding and will try to bring out our feelings but continuing to get more and more frustrated until they will (can you guess?) either attack or leave.
These defenses don’t work
because they continue to bring us abandonment or attack.
They don’t bring us closer together;
they don’t foster love;
they don’t even keep us safe.
We can slip from one of these defenses to another easily
Each defense system feels negatively about and/or judges the other two.
They can even work in direct opposition to each other.
Can you imagine trying to stay above the feelings at the same time we are begging and pleading for love?
I’d like to hear about how your system works.
Next time we can talk about what to do about it.
What About Anxiety?
WHAT ABOUT ANXIETY?
Many people these days are dealing with depression
Or is it sadness?
Perhaps we are feeling grief?
Or maybe depression and/or sadness is really
covering a different emotion.
In any case, how do we deal with it?
How do we continue to function when the heart feels like it could break at any moment and life as we know it will never be the same?
I think back to the past and wonder about surviving without electronics, refrigeration, or communication. They believed that wearing those masks with the long, pointed noses would protect them from the plague. We know now that it was fleas on rats from ships that brought it in. Back then they didn’t know the science about what happened.
What do we still not know?
How much about life is still a mystery?
How did those Chinese bats get this virus anyway?
In observation, this virus has united the globe.
Everyone is trying to stay safe. Or resisting.
Or being what the Pathwork Guide calls a Law-breaker or Law-upholder.
The issue of anxiety has been with us long before Covid arrived.
Many of us need medication to function.
Many wake up each morning to anxiety.
I believe that anxiety began for us when we were so little that our reasoning skills had not developed yet.
We were angry about what was happening to us but couldn’t express it.
Perhaps we knew it would be dangerous to express.
So we did the only thing possible; we turned it on ourselves.
And we still carry that anger inside, buried deep, until we can go back to feel and express in a safe way that doesn’t hurt us or others.
Let’s all do our work on this topic and stop blaming others or committing violence toward others.
Let me know what you think about this idea…
Spring’s Blessings
Spring is here!! The Sun Is Shining!
By the time spring shows up with
its glorious colors I’m so used to
the dreary, starkness of winter
that I seem to have forgotten
how much the yellows and
pinks of spring stand out.
My eyes are feasting
and anticipating even more to come!
I’m wondering what renewal is going on
inside of me??
It’s a time to begin to focus outward again after spending the winter months going within while outside is darkness and cold.
I feel myself breathing deeply of
the fresh warm air and rejoicing in spring!
We have a cooper’s hawk couple that returns to the woods in our neighborhood each year. We can see the parents circling each morning and then returning to their nest to feed the babies nestled there.
There’s a red-headed woodpecker that rat-a-tats nearby. And we have a breeze blowing—even the rain coming down washes the pollen out of the air for us to enjoy.
This is the time for us
to feel the blessings of rebirth of life in
the outer world and of opening our
hearts to the wonders of
the world around us.
Can you feel the sap rising?
Can you feel spirit all around us?
HUMILITY
MY INSIGNIFICANCE
As a result of Hurricane Michael’s passage through the Richmond, Virginia area many were without power
many tornadoes wreaked havoc
within a few miles of our house.
Being without power set up a negative reaction in me
of disappointment and
the desire to pout
about the inconvenience even though we were well prepared and safe.
We’ve learned what is needed after living in the woods for twenty plus year, what it means to have a well that requires electricity for bathroom flushing.
Our electricity returned two days later so that we were able to leave for a week’s vacation only a day later than planned. Off we headed to Myrtle Beach where we enjoyed ourselves and got the rest that was needed, basked in the sun, soaked up Vitamins in the warmth. The hurricanes had swept away much of the salt in the air, the sun was out, the temp was perfect…
Then on the drive home (a different way from how we arrived) we began to see
the devastation that people had experienced from these storms.
- Whole houses gutted,
- crops blown flat,
- furniture and appliances, insulation and carpeting pilled out at the street for removal…
- empty chicken houses
It was a lesson in humility for me
- seeing mile after mile of the after affects of the storm while
- feeling for those who were caught in the water,
- or those animals trapped,
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for the ruined livelihood of the farmers… What is Mother Earth trying to tell us?
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How do we cope?
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How can we help? HOW CAN WE HELP???
Must we continue to be a nation that is insensitive to the suffering of others?
While driving the car in front of us ran over a dog who had ran out in the road. They just drove off… that poor dog dying in the road…
I’m also aware of what is happening in the outer Boston area with the gas explosions—more of the same of having lives shaken to the core with cold weather coming…I pray for those people, as well.
We need to WAKE UP! I’m calling you to WAKE UP MORE!
Let me hear from you.
ARE YOU PREPARED?
Headlines from the news:
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75 people shot in Chicago this past weekend
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Hurricane Florence–Category 5, heading toward US
I must prepare!!
HOW???
Physically: I look outside my window to see the sun shining and the temperature down to manageable. How could a hurricane be coming my way? We live in the woods which makes the possibility of no electricity an issue. Fortunately, we have generators and have learned, over the years to live through hurricanes and tornadoes coming through.
Emotionally, I can feel something new bubbling up to the surface. It’s not there yet, but I need to prepare myself for emotions. What could the emotions be? Will I need to wallow for a while? Or will I be ready and willing to feel whatever is there and then let it go?
Mentally, I need to stop trying to figure it all out—something I take great pleasure in doing. I’m almost always wrong but sometimes still get caught up in it. There’s something about what the Pathwork calls negative pleasure—a phenomenon that does not necessarily feel good but gets my juices stirring. There’s a place in me that likes that sometimes…
Spiritually, I am continuously wanting to open up to the spiritual realm, to more and deeper connection with those positive and benevolent beings who are out there ready to give me assistance. All I need to do is ask…open myself to their presence and receive from the universe. This is the place of connection with all, a place where I are one with the universe. It deepens my understanding and my love for all beings.
This I know: the world is safe.
I am no longer attracted to danger.
I recognize how danger and negativity feel and remove myself from it.
How does that work for you?
In The Presence Of Miracles
Do we recognize a Miracle when we see it?
Is there a Burning Bush?
I was recently at our Sevenoaks Retreat Center, Home of the Pathwork, leading a personal quest called an intensive. With each intensive that I have led, I come away feeling like I have witnessed miracles unfolding right in front of me. It breaks open my heart and touches my soul.
Because each person’s journey is individualized and personal, each intensive is completely different with those same miracles can blossom. Spirit has a way of entering the space and opening us to the energy of healing. When we are willing to go to the deepest, darkest part of us, we make tremendous progress on our spiritual journey.
It is mind blowing to me!
I feel so in awe and blessed as I watch it unfold.
Over the years I’ve led quite a few four or five day retreats where I have had the honor to facilitate the beginning steps to transforming a piece that is ready to be transformed. Certainly the person must continue their own spiritual journey afterwards, but they have the possibility to change something in their lives that has been troubling them, holding them back from rmanifesting the kind of life they want.
Looking at myself, I am led to questions about my own spiritual journey.
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Am I willing to change?
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Am I taking the steps I need to step more into the light?
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What holds me back?
The emotion of fear keeps me stuck in the same old rut.
It fuels my negative reactions to life and enables me to continue to stay where I am.
More questions than answers arise
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How do I know I am doing what I am meant to do?
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How do I recognize my spiritual journey?
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Are there miracles that happen in my life?
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Can I slow down enough to see them?