I went to sleep late on Monday night. I lay awake in bed at 1:45 a.m. with the reading light on overhead. I still think of it as Ted's reading light... on his side of the bed. As I readied myself for sleep, I noticed the light was acting up. It was dimming lighter and darker, lighter and darker. When I would stop and look, the light seemed to stop. And when I looked away, it would dim again. Freaked out, I called Kevin to come look at it. While we both thought it was strange, we passed it off as a electrical glitch and turned off the light. I went to sleep.
Late in the Summer of 2014, I was making coffee in the kitchen when I got a call from my mother. I sensed heaviness in her voice immediately, or maybe she had sent me a cryptic text so I expected bad news before even answering the phone, I can't remember the details but I knew it was bad. She informed me that our dear friend, essentially family, Jennifer Rockwood had been terminally diagnosed with cancer with maybe just months to live. This news was sudden and shocking. I had been blessed with living a mostly grief-free life up until that year. First my grandmother in the Spring of 2014, and now this news. I was devastated.
Jennifer was without a doubt the most "alive" woman I knew. How could she be dying? I cried. Ted held me. And then, just a couple months later, Ted died. I went home to Toledo for the holidays, cloaked in grief and confusion. And Jennifer held me.
Jennifer and her husband John have been two of my parents closest friends since sometime in the 1970s. My mom, Jenny, and Rayna were all pregnant at the same time, two or three times in a row. Decades of family potlucks, vacations, swim meets, school plays, and summer camps ensued. Between the three families, there were 7 boys... and me. Long before Jennys' sons Ian and Julian married beautiful women and Jenny finally had daughter-in-laws, she claimed that I was her 'adoptive' daughter. I remember her telling me that when I was very young. Jenny was the coolest, so obviously I was beyond honored that she wanted ME as the 'daughter' she'd never had. Ever since then, I felt a kindred spirit with Jenny – like we had a secret. I continued to always admire her unabashed glamour, her robust personality, her dramatic presence, her rockstar edginess, and her automatic role as the life-of-the-party. I sought to be like her as I grew up.
When I went home to Toledo last winter after Teddy passed, much of me resisted going, yet a huge pull towards home was that I needed to see Jenny. On my first night back, despite my own spirals, I met Jenny for dinner. You could hardly tell she was sick, her thinness was the only sign. As usual, she was vivacious and full of spirit (and spirits)! During dinner that night, while watching her throw back vodkas and hearing her belly-laughs echoing through the dark room, I remember feeling an ounce of nostaligic happiness. You see, I didn't feel happiness back then; so when I felt the emotion creep up, it was painfully hard to ignore.
Also that night, Jenny told me me that she did not believe in life after death. She did not believe in energy continuing on. She believed that death was the end of it all. So, she would live big until her end. Jenny's perspective was hard for me. My whole life had just been crumbled and I was rebuilding it on the faith in something bigger. I needed that faith. And, in my opinion, so did she. I bought Jenny a book to change her mind. I don't know if she ever read it. But in truth, as I look back, it was my own fear that felt the need to make her believe. I didn't want to hear her doubting, because what if I doubted?
Despite the difference of opinions, I asked Jenny a huge favor.
I asked that if she was wrong, and that when she passed she learned that indeed there was something after this realm, to let me know. I asked her to find Ted over there, wherever 'there' was, and to send me a sign. She agreed; although I knew it was just to be nice, because she didn't believe.
I woke up Tuesday morning with the news that around 1:45 a.m., the same time that my lights had been flickering, Jenny had passed away. I called my mom. Our conversation was brief because a call came in. My phone acted weird and I missed the call. I set my phone on the counter and before I could turn away the screen started to move. Buttons were pressed as if someone was operating the screen, but nobody was. The search page pulled up and letters were typed in as I stared, "W. A. L..." Then, the imaginary hand scrolled the cursor down, clicked on something and iTunes popped up. I don't use iTunes, and have almost no music synced to it, but somehow a song appeared that I didn't own, "Walking Far From Home" by Iron & Wine started to play. I stood and listened. I felt tears on my cheeks. I felt a knowingness. I felt a shiver of energy. I felt like I was getting a hug.
In the early days, weeks, and months after Ted passed many strange things happened – lights flickering, TVs turning on, electronics acting up, songs playing, animals appearing at opportune moments, weird things showing up in photos... the amount of occurrences was so large that I simply could not overlook them as coincidence or happenstance. Also, I didn't want to. It is often discovered that after a loved one passes on, they hang around for a while. They show their presence in different ways. I remember being scared by the way the energy appeared sometimes, like when I would feel it while lying alone in bed. I remember deciding that Ted didn't really know how to control his new state and that his ways of communicating were awkward or creepy. But I was still thankful that he was communicating.
As time has apparently continued (though my perception of 'time' is a whole other subject in itself) I have become less aware of these energetic happenings. Maybe Ted's place in the realm he is in now is more settled. He no longer has as much of a pull towards tinkering with where I am. Also, perhaps I am less open to noticing his paranormal tickles. I'm hardened. And my sadness has progressed to a constant numbness, versus a frantic hysteria. I now live with sorrow, instead of for sorrow.
Time creeps towards the anniversary of Ted's death, now just a few weeks away. I don't care what calendars and clocks and scientists say, this year was without-a-doubt shorter than all of my thirty other years. On Monday night, when the lights began to dim, and the next morning, when my phone played that song, I again felt that familiar bittersweet nostalgia. I again felt that rush of lively, effervescent, unseen energy. I was reconnected to my own faith in the deeper web between us and the others. Jenny, in her playful exit from this place and her stubborn realization that perhaps she was wrong and there was more, reopened a door that I had turned my back to. She sent me the sign I had asked her for, and she reminded me of the beautiful magic that coincides with devastating loss.
The house feels particularly energized now. It's as though if I touch something, I'm more likely to get a static shock. A year ago, it felt eerie. But now, it feels comforting.
While I am heartbroken by Jenny's passing and particularly for those who now feel consuming loneliness without her, I also find comfort in knowing that the cosmic web just got a whole lot more charged. When a big life leaves here, that energy is consumed by what see as 'empty space' – but what is actually a plenum of the exact opposite.
So now, as I continue my countdown towards the sad anniversary that I am trying so hard not to anticipate, I will be more open to the magic. Jenny has unblocked a channel that allows me to feel closer to Ted. Her death and continuing life has helped cleared of the filter of judgement and doubt that I contend with in my ego-mind and my humanness. I find a sense of solace as she wraps her energetic, mother-like arms around me, her 'daughter,' allowing me to see into the eyes of my soulmate, and my truth.
Walking Far From Home: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fg5403yj4II
In loving memory of Jennifer Rockwood (1951-infinity)
Showing posts with label connection. Show all posts
Showing posts with label connection. Show all posts
Glacier
The path I walk these days is not only dark, but it’s also foggy. I can’t see much, and when I can make something out – it’s usually covered in a looming haze. Maybe a candle is lit along the way or a window opens and the sun shines into my tunnel. Sometimes I can make out the lightness: a gloomy warmth. Sometimes I shield my eyes from the lightness; it’s become comfortable to stay buried in the dark. And occasionally, I see the light – and I allow myself to bask in its warmth.
I am a vastly different woman than I was seven months ago... My head cocks to the side inquisitively as I typed that sentence. ‘Am i? Or am I the same woman?’
It’s more like I am a new version of the same woman I was seven months ago.
Imagine the Self like a glacier: a huge floating chunk of frozen, yet transformable solid. Sometimes, our glacier floats high in the water and other times, very much submerged in darkness. It’s always changing. Our mass floats high, low, or somewhere between, depending on circumstance. But at the center of the glacier, is our source. I truly believe that the core of each human is intrinsically good. Our source is the innocence that we possessed in the womb, and at the same time all the wisdom in our universe and the divine. It is the subtle body's access to Ananda (bliss).
But our glacier is huge and our source is buried deep, deep within. When we are aware, we can sense our source – it feels like a moment of enlightenment. When we start to remove the layers of ourselves, there is a knowing. Our source is far beneath the superficial layers of our day-to-day lives – the schedules, the stressors, the static rush of our society. It’s beneath our core values – our human desire to love and connect. It is even beneath the deeper, challenging components of our being – our fears, our shame, our judgements – the ailments that cloud our core values. Beneath all of our layers, all of our shadow, all of our questions, all of our ignorance, all of our anger, all of our trauma... that is where our source lives: like a shining sun inside of a dark cave.
We spend many lives chipping away at our glacier. Sometimes the chipping feels good – we hit a vein and out bubbles a glittering glimmer of our inner radiance, a hint of what’s beneath. Sometimes the chipping is incredibly painful – we remove a rock and uncover something we have been hiding for a very long time. We are given a choice: put the rock back on and run away, ignore what we see, or study it. Eventually, after going backwards, sideways, or being still – we keep digging. At times, along our individual journeys, we take each choice. Some of us are more comfortable with running, some of us with ignoring, some of us with sitting, and some of us with digging. And we learn the lessons we are supposed to be learning through every one of those choices. They are all right. They might not be the fastest, or the safest, or the healthiest, or the easiest – but they are all right.
We learn lessons when we run away, when then find ourselves further from our goal – alone and lost. We have to begin a trek back along a new path – which uncovers new rocks. We learn lessons when we ignore and numb ourselves – maybe it’s here where we learn about disconnection and loneliness. We learn lessons when we sit – maybe it's here where we learn about self-love and acceptance. And we learn lessons when we keep digging.
When you died, a monstrous chunk of my glacier was fractured and ripped out. I was left on my knees: the wind knocked out of me and heart cracked open, wallowing in a crater of raw wounds.
It has forced me to study all that was upturned and revealed. I have run away. I have hidden. I have numbed. I have sat. And I have dug. All while being encased in darkness and fog. In the deep depression of my glacier lies ugliness – parts of my being that are hard and humbling to face; there lies trauma – which is alarming and unfamiliar; there lies grief – which is unpredictable and harrowing; but there also lies beauty – which is often disguised. But from within the dark fog, I see bits of bliss bleed from my source. The knowing is there.
So yes, I am a new version of the same woman you loved.
And while I have been sitting in darkness and fog for over six months, I have had more moments lately when I see the haze lifting and showing me the landscape – sometimes barren, sometimes lush, often somewhere in between. My wound is beginning to heal in some places. In other places, it’s gaping more than ever. But as I’ve sat in this cavity of my untethered self, I’ve been forced to really look around. In a courageous (because fuck yes, it is!), vulnerable, and confusing way – I’ve questioned many parts of my being. I’ve realized things that I thought were important to me, maybe are not at all. I’ve begun to understand what shapes my reactions and why. I’ve started to be OK with stillness and solitude. I have addressed the darker side of my spirit. I've begun forgive myself. I've noticed the presence of anger and allowed it to vent (even though it's through ways I can't yet control and don't think are pretty). I have felt inspired and not let myself feel guilty or run back into my comfortable cave of gloom. I have recognized ways in which I cause harm to myself and gently decided they aren't serving me for now. I’ve understood a need to actually love myself, rather than offering my love to others and hoping it reflects back to myself. With self-love comes opening up to the possibility of healing – through my own digging and also from teachers I meet along my path.
I know I have come closer to my source; maybe just centimeters in a journey of thousands of miles, but closer still. And I am bound to a knowing that within me is truth and light.
The path is rocky. But I will forge.
I am a vastly different woman than I was seven months ago... My head cocks to the side inquisitively as I typed that sentence. ‘Am i? Or am I the same woman?’
It’s more like I am a new version of the same woman I was seven months ago.
Imagine the Self like a glacier: a huge floating chunk of frozen, yet transformable solid. Sometimes, our glacier floats high in the water and other times, very much submerged in darkness. It’s always changing. Our mass floats high, low, or somewhere between, depending on circumstance. But at the center of the glacier, is our source. I truly believe that the core of each human is intrinsically good. Our source is the innocence that we possessed in the womb, and at the same time all the wisdom in our universe and the divine. It is the subtle body's access to Ananda (bliss).
But our glacier is huge and our source is buried deep, deep within. When we are aware, we can sense our source – it feels like a moment of enlightenment. When we start to remove the layers of ourselves, there is a knowing. Our source is far beneath the superficial layers of our day-to-day lives – the schedules, the stressors, the static rush of our society. It’s beneath our core values – our human desire to love and connect. It is even beneath the deeper, challenging components of our being – our fears, our shame, our judgements – the ailments that cloud our core values. Beneath all of our layers, all of our shadow, all of our questions, all of our ignorance, all of our anger, all of our trauma... that is where our source lives: like a shining sun inside of a dark cave.
We spend many lives chipping away at our glacier. Sometimes the chipping feels good – we hit a vein and out bubbles a glittering glimmer of our inner radiance, a hint of what’s beneath. Sometimes the chipping is incredibly painful – we remove a rock and uncover something we have been hiding for a very long time. We are given a choice: put the rock back on and run away, ignore what we see, or study it. Eventually, after going backwards, sideways, or being still – we keep digging. At times, along our individual journeys, we take each choice. Some of us are more comfortable with running, some of us with ignoring, some of us with sitting, and some of us with digging. And we learn the lessons we are supposed to be learning through every one of those choices. They are all right. They might not be the fastest, or the safest, or the healthiest, or the easiest – but they are all right.
We learn lessons when we run away, when then find ourselves further from our goal – alone and lost. We have to begin a trek back along a new path – which uncovers new rocks. We learn lessons when we ignore and numb ourselves – maybe it’s here where we learn about disconnection and loneliness. We learn lessons when we sit – maybe it's here where we learn about self-love and acceptance. And we learn lessons when we keep digging.
When you died, a monstrous chunk of my glacier was fractured and ripped out. I was left on my knees: the wind knocked out of me and heart cracked open, wallowing in a crater of raw wounds.
It has forced me to study all that was upturned and revealed. I have run away. I have hidden. I have numbed. I have sat. And I have dug. All while being encased in darkness and fog. In the deep depression of my glacier lies ugliness – parts of my being that are hard and humbling to face; there lies trauma – which is alarming and unfamiliar; there lies grief – which is unpredictable and harrowing; but there also lies beauty – which is often disguised. But from within the dark fog, I see bits of bliss bleed from my source. The knowing is there.
So yes, I am a new version of the same woman you loved.
And while I have been sitting in darkness and fog for over six months, I have had more moments lately when I see the haze lifting and showing me the landscape – sometimes barren, sometimes lush, often somewhere in between. My wound is beginning to heal in some places. In other places, it’s gaping more than ever. But as I’ve sat in this cavity of my untethered self, I’ve been forced to really look around. In a courageous (because fuck yes, it is!), vulnerable, and confusing way – I’ve questioned many parts of my being. I’ve realized things that I thought were important to me, maybe are not at all. I’ve begun to understand what shapes my reactions and why. I’ve started to be OK with stillness and solitude. I have addressed the darker side of my spirit. I've begun forgive myself. I've noticed the presence of anger and allowed it to vent (even though it's through ways I can't yet control and don't think are pretty). I have felt inspired and not let myself feel guilty or run back into my comfortable cave of gloom. I have recognized ways in which I cause harm to myself and gently decided they aren't serving me for now. I’ve understood a need to actually love myself, rather than offering my love to others and hoping it reflects back to myself. With self-love comes opening up to the possibility of healing – through my own digging and also from teachers I meet along my path.
I know I have come closer to my source; maybe just centimeters in a journey of thousands of miles, but closer still. And I am bound to a knowing that within me is truth and light.
The path is rocky. But I will forge.
Supple Beings
The human mindbody is profound. Our capacity for growth, connection, love, pleasure, joy, grief, and a plethora of other human experiences can occur simultaneously and often without us even being aware of them.
The mind. Yesterday, an incredible woman guided me through a past-life regression. I didn't think I would succumb to hypnosis. The left side of my brain is bossy. And yet, easily, I dropped into a channel of higher intuition. I regressed through a doorway and into a past life. I was able to speak and see my way through powerful and memorable events in the life I visited from five-hundred years ago. My body and soul, craving healing, knew I needed to see you. So when I accessed my past life, I saw you. You were my true love and my partner. I got to see your eyes. I got to see your soul. I saw that indeed we had experienced one another's love in the past. Through the power of the mind, I preserved the moment I recalled yesterday for centuries. It was written into the highlight reel of my soul. And when I needed hope, when I needed faith, when I needed answers, when I needed to see you – my mind offered it.
The body. Nine years ago, I was riding on the back of a motorcycle in flip flops, a mini-skirt, and a helmet with no chip strap. It was dusk and began to rain. As we took a sharp left turn, the driver lost control of the bike and swerved into oncoming traffic. We struck a Chevy Silverado head on. Both vehicles were traveling about 45 mph. Upon impact, I flew into the air and over the truck. I recall those three seconds in flight as if they lasted a lifetime. I saw what was in the bed of the truck as I flew over it. I realized I was upside-down. I felt the helmet fly off my head. I decided I was going to die. Then, I decided I was not going to die. I cradled my head in my arms and twisted my body to avoid landing on my spine, where I'd had a previous back surgery. Before hitting the ground, I remembered hearing about how drunk drivers often survive accidents because they don't tense up their bodies. I had not been drinking, but in a valiant effort to save myself, I loosened every muscle of my body and literally bounced off the asphalt when I struck the ground. I also felt the energy of being carried and set down softly by some higher power. I had the distinct knowledge that a dear friend, who'd passed away recently, was helping to save me. Adrenaline on high gear, after hitting the cement, I stood up immediately. I gathered my things that were strewn about. I saw the blood on my hands, feet, and back from the road rash. I spoke with the first responders. I checked on the driver, who had flown forward and impacted his groin on the gas tank of the bike. Within about twenty minutes, the pain settled in. EMS loaded me onto an ambulance. I had fractured my tailbone, pelvis, and hip and was in the hospital for a week. I had a six-inch screw inserted into the left side of my back to stabilize my hips. I didn't walk again for five-weeks. I was told that I may never be able to give birth to children naturally because of the fixed screw. I was told never to do impact sports again. Then, came yoga. For nine years I have practiced yoga to heal my body, to sooth my hips, and to open up (literally) to the possibility of being able to have children naturally some day. Now, I can do the splits in every direction. I can put my feet behind my head. I also have run a triathlon and a half-marathon since then. The accident taught me about the capacity for the human body to heal itself through trauma.
The connection. Now, I am witnessing how the human body can support the soul, when it needs to heal.
I was talking to one of my best friends last night about loss. I've known this friend for over half of my life. He lost his mother just over a year ago, suddenly and unexpectedly. The grief, though impossibly painful and unwarranted, has brought out a gentleness in him that is truly beautiful. It is a side of him that I had never seen before. And while I'm sure he'd rather have his mother back rather than access this alternate aspect of his being (and I wish that were possible), it's really a remarkable thing to witness a person change so profoundly. Grief made him grow. It makes me wonder what your death will bring out in me. How will I change for the better? I imagine it will bring out suppleness. It already has. Hard edges, aggression, and disbelief don't make coping easier. Suddenly, you just have to trust in something bigger, something unexplainable, and open your heart to connection – in whatever way that is, however fleeting.
Grief shines light onto priorities. The things that were important three months ago are nearly nonexistent to me now. The chatter that consumed the vast ocean of my mind is still. I don't have the energy to over-analyze. I am not concerned with drama. I am not provoked by lustful excitement. Day-to-day irritations and to-dos are meaningless. I am not caught up in appearances. I mean, I'm still human – but I've been forced to soften. My body and mind work on healing full-time. I have lost control of life. Or rather, your death made me realize I never had control of it in the first place. I thought I did; I thought I could manipulate life to make it go my way. But that was a false assumption. What I can do, is be present in this moment. What, in this moment, right now, will bring me peace? And that's where I go.
Today I spent about thirty minutes pacing back and forth in my living room. In that moment, pacing was the only thing that I could muster, it was a constant. Also today, I spent thirty minutes swimming laps. So essentially, pacing back and forth, but just in a pool. It gave me steadiness to balance out the uncertainty that has clogged my perspective of future. In my yoga practice tonight, I ended with Yoga Nidra, a guided svasana/meditation. During the practice, the teacher spoke about how our nervous system does not allow the human body to cope and to heal at the same time. We must focus on one. When the parasympathetic nervous system is dominant, the body is in rest and digest mode. This means its priority is to recover, to heal, to deeply nourish and restore itself. The body knows how to do these things, but we get so caught up in our busy lifestyles that we often live in reactive sympathetic nervous system mode, where the body’s priority is coping (fight or flight), not healing. I can no longer operate reactively. I must be gentle. I must heal. I don't know what the right way of doing that is, or if there is one at all, but I am living in the moment. That's all I have.
Now, I pace, I meditate, I sooth my mind and my body in whatever way I need. I am listening to her. I am honoring her needs. I've learned that she, my body, is the only thing I have even a touch of control over. And yet, by softening, I also relinquish that control and admire her power over me.
The mind. Yesterday, an incredible woman guided me through a past-life regression. I didn't think I would succumb to hypnosis. The left side of my brain is bossy. And yet, easily, I dropped into a channel of higher intuition. I regressed through a doorway and into a past life. I was able to speak and see my way through powerful and memorable events in the life I visited from five-hundred years ago. My body and soul, craving healing, knew I needed to see you. So when I accessed my past life, I saw you. You were my true love and my partner. I got to see your eyes. I got to see your soul. I saw that indeed we had experienced one another's love in the past. Through the power of the mind, I preserved the moment I recalled yesterday for centuries. It was written into the highlight reel of my soul. And when I needed hope, when I needed faith, when I needed answers, when I needed to see you – my mind offered it.
The body. Nine years ago, I was riding on the back of a motorcycle in flip flops, a mini-skirt, and a helmet with no chip strap. It was dusk and began to rain. As we took a sharp left turn, the driver lost control of the bike and swerved into oncoming traffic. We struck a Chevy Silverado head on. Both vehicles were traveling about 45 mph. Upon impact, I flew into the air and over the truck. I recall those three seconds in flight as if they lasted a lifetime. I saw what was in the bed of the truck as I flew over it. I realized I was upside-down. I felt the helmet fly off my head. I decided I was going to die. Then, I decided I was not going to die. I cradled my head in my arms and twisted my body to avoid landing on my spine, where I'd had a previous back surgery. Before hitting the ground, I remembered hearing about how drunk drivers often survive accidents because they don't tense up their bodies. I had not been drinking, but in a valiant effort to save myself, I loosened every muscle of my body and literally bounced off the asphalt when I struck the ground. I also felt the energy of being carried and set down softly by some higher power. I had the distinct knowledge that a dear friend, who'd passed away recently, was helping to save me. Adrenaline on high gear, after hitting the cement, I stood up immediately. I gathered my things that were strewn about. I saw the blood on my hands, feet, and back from the road rash. I spoke with the first responders. I checked on the driver, who had flown forward and impacted his groin on the gas tank of the bike. Within about twenty minutes, the pain settled in. EMS loaded me onto an ambulance. I had fractured my tailbone, pelvis, and hip and was in the hospital for a week. I had a six-inch screw inserted into the left side of my back to stabilize my hips. I didn't walk again for five-weeks. I was told that I may never be able to give birth to children naturally because of the fixed screw. I was told never to do impact sports again. Then, came yoga. For nine years I have practiced yoga to heal my body, to sooth my hips, and to open up (literally) to the possibility of being able to have children naturally some day. Now, I can do the splits in every direction. I can put my feet behind my head. I also have run a triathlon and a half-marathon since then. The accident taught me about the capacity for the human body to heal itself through trauma.
The connection. Now, I am witnessing how the human body can support the soul, when it needs to heal.
I was talking to one of my best friends last night about loss. I've known this friend for over half of my life. He lost his mother just over a year ago, suddenly and unexpectedly. The grief, though impossibly painful and unwarranted, has brought out a gentleness in him that is truly beautiful. It is a side of him that I had never seen before. And while I'm sure he'd rather have his mother back rather than access this alternate aspect of his being (and I wish that were possible), it's really a remarkable thing to witness a person change so profoundly. Grief made him grow. It makes me wonder what your death will bring out in me. How will I change for the better? I imagine it will bring out suppleness. It already has. Hard edges, aggression, and disbelief don't make coping easier. Suddenly, you just have to trust in something bigger, something unexplainable, and open your heart to connection – in whatever way that is, however fleeting.
Grief shines light onto priorities. The things that were important three months ago are nearly nonexistent to me now. The chatter that consumed the vast ocean of my mind is still. I don't have the energy to over-analyze. I am not concerned with drama. I am not provoked by lustful excitement. Day-to-day irritations and to-dos are meaningless. I am not caught up in appearances. I mean, I'm still human – but I've been forced to soften. My body and mind work on healing full-time. I have lost control of life. Or rather, your death made me realize I never had control of it in the first place. I thought I did; I thought I could manipulate life to make it go my way. But that was a false assumption. What I can do, is be present in this moment. What, in this moment, right now, will bring me peace? And that's where I go.
Today I spent about thirty minutes pacing back and forth in my living room. In that moment, pacing was the only thing that I could muster, it was a constant. Also today, I spent thirty minutes swimming laps. So essentially, pacing back and forth, but just in a pool. It gave me steadiness to balance out the uncertainty that has clogged my perspective of future. In my yoga practice tonight, I ended with Yoga Nidra, a guided svasana/meditation. During the practice, the teacher spoke about how our nervous system does not allow the human body to cope and to heal at the same time. We must focus on one. When the parasympathetic nervous system is dominant, the body is in rest and digest mode. This means its priority is to recover, to heal, to deeply nourish and restore itself. The body knows how to do these things, but we get so caught up in our busy lifestyles that we often live in reactive sympathetic nervous system mode, where the body’s priority is coping (fight or flight), not healing. I can no longer operate reactively. I must be gentle. I must heal. I don't know what the right way of doing that is, or if there is one at all, but I am living in the moment. That's all I have.
Now, I pace, I meditate, I sooth my mind and my body in whatever way I need. I am listening to her. I am honoring her needs. I've learned that she, my body, is the only thing I have even a touch of control over. And yet, by softening, I also relinquish that control and admire her power over me.
Empathy
I believe that we are all sent to this physical realm to learn a lesson. Each incarnation of our life offers us a new opportunity to learn something about our true nature – something that will bring us toward the light, reality, or nirvana – different words for the same theory. If we learn our lesson, we move forward towards an easier life that will offer us the opportunity to learn another great lesson. If we fail, we will have to take our issue with us into the next life, it will bear down on us, and cause us to live out that life karmically.
As I am confronted with this devastation, I wonder what my lesson in all of this? What is my lesson in this life? And what was yours? Did your death have to do with you learning a lesson, with mine, with someone else's lesson, or with them all? What can I do to prevent further suffering in the future? Was your death a matter of free will or destiny? Had you done everything you needed to do to learn? Were you leaving this incarnation so you could come back as my child, like you promised me you would, just days before your death? Will I ever know?
I have been meditating on the question, 'What is my lesson in this life?' I've run through a gamut of options: guilt, self-worth, desire, patience, and will continue to search and discover. My learning is no where near done in this life, as far as I know. My demons are present within me, just as your demons were there until your last breath (and who knows, maybe beyond).
We both wore our weaknesses on our sleeve. I think that's one reason why we fell in love with one another so deeply. Even though we were transparent with our emotions, we treated each other compassionately. We never used those weaknesses as weapons. We were gentle with one another's soft spots. But while we each had our struggles – we both shared deep empathy and compassion.
Thank god for empathy. Thank god for the compassion that you taught me and others, and that you're still teaching. Thank god for the support I've received over the past two months. Thank god for the love your family has gotten over the past two months. The empathetic source in humankind is beautiful. It's the tears that you get in your eyes when a kitten is saved from a tree by a fireman. It's the lift in your chest you feel when you see a man meet his wife at the airport with a bouquet of flowers. It's the increase in your heartbeat when you see a solider arriving home from war to his young daughter. It's the nostalgia that arises when you sing the national anthem. It's the excitement that breeds when you watch a video of an animal struggling and then another animal comes over to help. Scientifically, this act of empathy can be triggered by the mirror neuron, which allows the observer to feel as though they're in the role of the observed. Experientially, this is compassion – a beautiful side effect of being human.
While I wouldn't want anyone to feel the pain I have been dealing with over the past two months, at the same time I'm so thankful that others are witnessing the pain that's taken shape. Maybe it's self-preservation, I'm thankful other people are helping me make sure I'm safe. Maybe it's cooperation, being able to see the goodness in people, despite our world of competition and domination. Maybe it's truth, allowing myself and others to witness that the true joys in life are the simple ones, life and love.
Without love, we as humans, will be lonely. No matter how much 'stuff' we pad ourselves with to try to avoid feeling emptiness, it won't help. We will suffer. And when one person suffers, others will too because we are truly connected at the root of who we are. The pain of one person will ripple out onto a community or even global level. The offering, 'You are hurting. Let me love you,' is intrinsically good. Empathy is a true and divine power within humanity. It should not be only adapted for a grieving widow or family, but used for helping mankind at large. As Darwin said, 'Sympathy is the strongest instinct in human nature.'
As I am confronted with this devastation, I wonder what my lesson in all of this? What is my lesson in this life? And what was yours? Did your death have to do with you learning a lesson, with mine, with someone else's lesson, or with them all? What can I do to prevent further suffering in the future? Was your death a matter of free will or destiny? Had you done everything you needed to do to learn? Were you leaving this incarnation so you could come back as my child, like you promised me you would, just days before your death? Will I ever know?
I have been meditating on the question, 'What is my lesson in this life?' I've run through a gamut of options: guilt, self-worth, desire, patience, and will continue to search and discover. My learning is no where near done in this life, as far as I know. My demons are present within me, just as your demons were there until your last breath (and who knows, maybe beyond).
We both wore our weaknesses on our sleeve. I think that's one reason why we fell in love with one another so deeply. Even though we were transparent with our emotions, we treated each other compassionately. We never used those weaknesses as weapons. We were gentle with one another's soft spots. But while we each had our struggles – we both shared deep empathy and compassion.
Thank god for empathy. Thank god for the compassion that you taught me and others, and that you're still teaching. Thank god for the support I've received over the past two months. Thank god for the love your family has gotten over the past two months. The empathetic source in humankind is beautiful. It's the tears that you get in your eyes when a kitten is saved from a tree by a fireman. It's the lift in your chest you feel when you see a man meet his wife at the airport with a bouquet of flowers. It's the increase in your heartbeat when you see a solider arriving home from war to his young daughter. It's the nostalgia that arises when you sing the national anthem. It's the excitement that breeds when you watch a video of an animal struggling and then another animal comes over to help. Scientifically, this act of empathy can be triggered by the mirror neuron, which allows the observer to feel as though they're in the role of the observed. Experientially, this is compassion – a beautiful side effect of being human.
While I wouldn't want anyone to feel the pain I have been dealing with over the past two months, at the same time I'm so thankful that others are witnessing the pain that's taken shape. Maybe it's self-preservation, I'm thankful other people are helping me make sure I'm safe. Maybe it's cooperation, being able to see the goodness in people, despite our world of competition and domination. Maybe it's truth, allowing myself and others to witness that the true joys in life are the simple ones, life and love.
Without love, we as humans, will be lonely. No matter how much 'stuff' we pad ourselves with to try to avoid feeling emptiness, it won't help. We will suffer. And when one person suffers, others will too because we are truly connected at the root of who we are. The pain of one person will ripple out onto a community or even global level. The offering, 'You are hurting. Let me love you,' is intrinsically good. Empathy is a true and divine power within humanity. It should not be only adapted for a grieving widow or family, but used for helping mankind at large. As Darwin said, 'Sympathy is the strongest instinct in human nature.'
Labyrinth
This past year at Burning Man, Kevin, you, and I took a ride out to Deep Playa. We were searching for nothing and everything at the same time. We had no plan, which was your favorite way to journey. Far away from the lights and bass of the city, almost to the trash fence, we stumbled upon a labyrinth carved into the earth. It was camouflaged, a facade amongst the clay earth. We headed to the entrance of the maze and began to walk.
The network of paths was narrow and we moved forward in a single file line. At first we moved in silence, one foot in front of the other, moving slowly. Then, we began to talk about unique experiences of our own life-wanderings. We shared, we laughed, we cried, and we walked within the web for a long time.
The labyrinth's network was unclear. We couldn't tell where we were in the system – at times we'd laugh and ask, "Are we even halfway through this?" The mid-point was unrecognizable from our place in the midst of the web. "Is this the beginning, middle or end?" I would ask, impatiently. "It doesn't matter," you would respond, "It could be anything." We continued on our pilgrimage.
Do we ever really know the end from the beginning? What I thought was the beginning for us, turned out to be our last day together. And yet, maybe that terrible night was just the beginning, or maybe a dot within the middle of our own odyssey together through consciousness.
As I sat on Natalia's patio for la comida (a leisurely lunch) this afternoon, the sound of the waves crashing on the shore blended in the distance with Nati's partner, Jaime's classical guitar melody. As I heard the sounds I felt a sense of clairaudience. You are here even in your absence. It's all connected. I suddenly knew. It's all one and the same. As clear as it is that you are not here, it is also clear that you are here.
I heard you in the soulful conversation at lunch. I heard the ideas that you loved to discuss. I heard the music that you loved to create. I saw something out of the corner of my eye and it reminded me of the dream I had last night where you appeared and we had a new adventure together. I saw you in the love of Nati and Jamie. They met not long after we did, but after Natalia told me she was inspired by our love. So, in some ways, we helped foster their love, and therefore, you are inside of them. And I felt it absolutely.
The morning after your death, as I clung to your Aunt Ginny's mattress, trying to ground myself and understand this new emotion – grief – my friend Amirah was the first person to arrive. Her face stained with tears and mind aghast at the tragedy, she simply held space for my devastation. She brought her baby, Sora, with her to the house. As she entered the bedroom, she apologized for bringing the baby. She hadn't been able to find someone to watch her on such short notice. I told her not to worry. I was glad Sora was there, but I didn't know why yet.
As Amirah sat with me, in essence she cradled both her baby and her friend. All of a sudden, Sora, with huge brown eyes of innocence, looked into my grief-stricken eyes and reached out towards me. She grabbed your necklace, which was on my neck. It was the necklace you wore beneath your shirt every day – a wrap that contained both sides of an ammonite nested within a alkaline dust of gold, silver, and burning man ash. It was the necklace that only a few hours before, in the hospital, I'd removed from your neck and placed on mine. The baby reached for the necklace, grasped it in her tiny hand, and looked into my eyes, and I gasped. "Ted is inside of Sora," I told Amirah, "I'm so glad you brought her." It was the first time I saw your spirit in something other than your physical self.
William Blake wrote:
To see a world in a grain of sand
And heaven in a wild flower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand
And eternity in an hour.
We are all connected. You are here. You are in the ocean. You are in each grain of sand. You are in my voice. You are in the dog's tongue that kisses my cheek. You are in the conversation I'm having and the one the strangers down the beach are having too. You are in a star that makes up the farthest constellation away from this place. You are in your friends' rituals. You are in the love I offer to myself. You are in your mother's heartbeat.
Quantum physicist, Michael Talbot, who authored your favorite book, The Holographic Universe, says that the energy of a trillion atomic bombs is in every cubic centimeter of space. Space is not empty, as we often see. Instead, it is full. It is more dense than any other matter – a plenum as opposed to a vacuum. So when your soul ascended from your body that night and I watched your spirit leave its physical habitat, you became a part of the fabric of the universe. You became the light. You became time. You became space.
So I continue on my journey. What I thought was the beginning of our life was redefined by the Universe's lesson. Is it the beginning, the middle, or the end? It is all three. Am I alone or among all? I am both. I have learned that placing faith in the future is fruitless. I cannot trust the future – not even this very breath. Though expectations and plans are not entirely futile – they are an important exercise in patience and uncertainty.
For now, I walk with myself on this journey. Myself – which is the sum of everything I am and have been, all I've learned, all my memories, all I love, all I've touched – and I honor this very moment in my understanding of time, this very lesson in my own pilgrimage, and seize an openness to the connectedness of us all, you included, within this labyrinth of consciousness.
The network of paths was narrow and we moved forward in a single file line. At first we moved in silence, one foot in front of the other, moving slowly. Then, we began to talk about unique experiences of our own life-wanderings. We shared, we laughed, we cried, and we walked within the web for a long time.
The labyrinth's network was unclear. We couldn't tell where we were in the system – at times we'd laugh and ask, "Are we even halfway through this?" The mid-point was unrecognizable from our place in the midst of the web. "Is this the beginning, middle or end?" I would ask, impatiently. "It doesn't matter," you would respond, "It could be anything." We continued on our pilgrimage.
Do we ever really know the end from the beginning? What I thought was the beginning for us, turned out to be our last day together. And yet, maybe that terrible night was just the beginning, or maybe a dot within the middle of our own odyssey together through consciousness.
As I sat on Natalia's patio for la comida (a leisurely lunch) this afternoon, the sound of the waves crashing on the shore blended in the distance with Nati's partner, Jaime's classical guitar melody. As I heard the sounds I felt a sense of clairaudience. You are here even in your absence. It's all connected. I suddenly knew. It's all one and the same. As clear as it is that you are not here, it is also clear that you are here.
I heard you in the soulful conversation at lunch. I heard the ideas that you loved to discuss. I heard the music that you loved to create. I saw something out of the corner of my eye and it reminded me of the dream I had last night where you appeared and we had a new adventure together. I saw you in the love of Nati and Jamie. They met not long after we did, but after Natalia told me she was inspired by our love. So, in some ways, we helped foster their love, and therefore, you are inside of them. And I felt it absolutely.
The morning after your death, as I clung to your Aunt Ginny's mattress, trying to ground myself and understand this new emotion – grief – my friend Amirah was the first person to arrive. Her face stained with tears and mind aghast at the tragedy, she simply held space for my devastation. She brought her baby, Sora, with her to the house. As she entered the bedroom, she apologized for bringing the baby. She hadn't been able to find someone to watch her on such short notice. I told her not to worry. I was glad Sora was there, but I didn't know why yet.
As Amirah sat with me, in essence she cradled both her baby and her friend. All of a sudden, Sora, with huge brown eyes of innocence, looked into my grief-stricken eyes and reached out towards me. She grabbed your necklace, which was on my neck. It was the necklace you wore beneath your shirt every day – a wrap that contained both sides of an ammonite nested within a alkaline dust of gold, silver, and burning man ash. It was the necklace that only a few hours before, in the hospital, I'd removed from your neck and placed on mine. The baby reached for the necklace, grasped it in her tiny hand, and looked into my eyes, and I gasped. "Ted is inside of Sora," I told Amirah, "I'm so glad you brought her." It was the first time I saw your spirit in something other than your physical self.
William Blake wrote:
To see a world in a grain of sand
And heaven in a wild flower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand
And eternity in an hour.
We are all connected. You are here. You are in the ocean. You are in each grain of sand. You are in my voice. You are in the dog's tongue that kisses my cheek. You are in the conversation I'm having and the one the strangers down the beach are having too. You are in a star that makes up the farthest constellation away from this place. You are in your friends' rituals. You are in the love I offer to myself. You are in your mother's heartbeat.
Quantum physicist, Michael Talbot, who authored your favorite book, The Holographic Universe, says that the energy of a trillion atomic bombs is in every cubic centimeter of space. Space is not empty, as we often see. Instead, it is full. It is more dense than any other matter – a plenum as opposed to a vacuum. So when your soul ascended from your body that night and I watched your spirit leave its physical habitat, you became a part of the fabric of the universe. You became the light. You became time. You became space.
So I continue on my journey. What I thought was the beginning of our life was redefined by the Universe's lesson. Is it the beginning, the middle, or the end? It is all three. Am I alone or among all? I am both. I have learned that placing faith in the future is fruitless. I cannot trust the future – not even this very breath. Though expectations and plans are not entirely futile – they are an important exercise in patience and uncertainty.
For now, I walk with myself on this journey. Myself – which is the sum of everything I am and have been, all I've learned, all my memories, all I love, all I've touched – and I honor this very moment in my understanding of time, this very lesson in my own pilgrimage, and seize an openness to the connectedness of us all, you included, within this labyrinth of consciousness.
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