Drawn in so deep by more magical sf experiences…a movie theater with couches and loveseats where the food comes to you and it’s a surprise…just kinky enough kink films…a meeting of the minds…intoxication and connection…worlds opening up…hearts opening up….posh surroundings…rubbing shoulders with hard edges…smart and barefoot and happy and centered, and a little manic but at least mindful of it…supportive and questioning and raising the roof on awesome and what ifs and what can we do…pioneers on the leading edge of what is and what is not…and loving each other’s company…diving deep into pleasure and what vibes our own souls no matter what we were told…leaving behind cults and sniffing the groupthink…lots of time apart and just enough together…barely remembering to be women and mothers and friends in a playland of gogogo…dododo…bebebe
Category Archives: Uncategorized
Loving Each Other With Words and Silence
Not feeling well today, a sore throat, I left the house for the first time after 5pm. Although I support the germ theory of disease to some extent, this one seems too coincidentally psychosomatic, at a time a loved one has decided not to let me express myself any further with him.
I couldn’t find the restaurant I wanted to go to so I ended up at the Tibetan restaurant I had never eaten at before. I hadn’t wanted to go in, having heard rumors of bad reviews, but thought I might as well investigate for myself. After waiting quite a long time to have my order placed (apparently I was the first customer of the evening), I found the eggplant chips (fries) were wonderful, and the vegetable soup was very bland and the chef had forgotten to add the roasted pumpkin seeds, which my waitress, who arrived after I did, went back to remedy.
After my okay meal, I went to leave, and noticed a spinning circular box on a table. There was a laminated card which explained that it was a mantra, beginning with OM, and that chanting, reading, or looking at a spinning mantra could relieve many troubles. The waitress suggested that whatever my faith, if I was sad or upset or angry, I could benefit from picturing my spiritual leader and using the mantra.
She was right, of course. And it was a nice reminder about keeping your internal peace.
It occurred to me that it is so difficult to sit with your own pain and not try to harm others to show them how much you are hurting by being passive aggressive or just plain aggressive.
After dinner I went to a tea house down the block, and heard these lyrics over the sound system, “Don’t think about all those things you fear, just be glad to be here.” Except I heard “feel” instead of “fear”, and it hit me harder: “Don’t think about all those things you feel, just be glad to be here.”
I don’t think it’s wise not to ever think about what you feel or what you fear. The body’s signals help us navigate away from what makes us shut down or feel dead toward what makes us feel alive.
But I feel I’m being reminded of subtle skills that my parents could not teach me, one who was aggressive and one who tended to be passive-aggressive to compensate (chicken or the egg?).
I’m meditating on the depths of what communication can and should be. Silence can be the *most* passive-aggressive form of manipulation and control, and god knows I’ve tried it and every other tool in my toolbox to try to get my way, though I tend to be more verbally aggressive than passive.
I think the lesson here is that heart-to-heart communication is the most difficult, time-consuming, and potentially rewarding journey that lovers can commit to. Imagine the ability to love not just with your bodies and your hearts, but also with the flow of your words and the spaces between your words, and the words you use about your lover when they are not around. That would be truly sublime and a real accomplishment.
“All really great lovers are articulate, and verbal seduction is the surest road to actual seduction.” Marya Mannes
So what prevents heart-to-heart communication?
I am reminded of something I asked my ex-boyfriend on our third date, in Miami. He told me he was divorced, and I asked him why, or rather, what did he think ended the relationship. And he told me “communication.”
“Lessons in life are repeated until learned.”
Ok…so if I’m still having relationship issues around communication, clearly the Universe is still trying to tell me something.
I think a failure to communicate comes down to trust:
Not trusting that one can get one’s needs met. This sabotages all communication, because if you start a conversation with that energy of being a victim of limited resources, the other person will sense it emotionally immediately and run from it instinctively in self-protection.
But we all have needs, and we have to have mutually beneficial relationships. I suppose it is important always to assume you are going to get your way, and start EVERY conversation with that confidence. That way you stand in your own power. It really does take courage and imagination to picture getting your way every time, especially when it feels like you’ve been shot down so much in the past, or that someone doesn’t want to listen to you.
*************************
I got a chance to practice this tonight on the way home from hiking barefoot up the Berkeley Hills to see the sunset. On the way back, three skateboarders ripped down the hill next to me. The first one came so close, so fast, he nearly touched my body and ran over my foot. My heart started racing. They stopped at the bottom of the hill, so I decided to call out to them: “Hey, you guys! Hey!”
Once I had their attention, I said, “I totally respect your right to skateboard around here, but your friend came waaay too close to me. I’m not wearing shoes and he almost ran over my foot.”
The friend came over. “You were way too close to me, man. Even if I had my flip flops on that could have really hurt me, it was really scary. I need like *this much* space.”
One of them said, “Well it’s really hard to control how close you come when you go that fast.”
I said, “Yeah, it is, that’s why it’s important.”
“Are you a law student here?”
“No.”
Then one said to me, “Why aren’t you wearing shoes?”
I explained I don’t wear shoes very often, and that I go barefoot for my health, for stronger feet and legs. One of them offered me a fist bump for this.
Then one guy said, “Can I give you a compliment without you getting offended?”
“Compliments don’t offend me,” I offered.
“You have a nice chest.”
This was a rare compliment indeed. I should have advised him that complimenting a woman’s sexual parts right up front won’t get you that far in life, but I let that one go. “Thanks, that’s nice of you to say. See you guys later.”
“Be careful about stepping on rocks and stuff!”
“Thank you,” I smiled, walking away, happy that they might think twice next time before ripping down a hill so close to another person.
This was a small step for me toward better communication, and speaking up when something is not working for me. I definitely felt resistance to saying anything, but I’m glad I did. If not just for the flattery ;-) thanks Universe :-p. Small steps, and practice makes perfect.
Some great communication tips: How Can I Communicate Better?
Panic Attacks
While nannying the other day, the baby was especially fussy. He is teething, was overdue for his nap, and none of the usual tricks were working: more crawling practice to tire him out, putting him in front of his favorite art piece, feeding, chewing on everything, dark room, white noise, light room, stimulation, toys…
He was crying so loud on my hip, in a panic, and I spotted a light blanket. I scooped it up, sat in the rocking chair, and covered him up completely. In the dark, small, lower-oxygen environment, he immediately calmed down, closed his eyes, and started sucking his thumb. Then, mercifully, he went to sleep.
I’m realizing that I’ve been doing the same thing lately, but no one has been there to throw a blanket over my head, hold me close, and lower my oxygen:carbon dioxide ratio so that I am forced to breathe out more than I breathe in.
As adults, we’re expected to monitor and adjust our own stimulation exposure so that we stay calm and balanced. I realized I had been putting more stimulation on myself than I could handle: Trying to start a new career path while navigating a new relationship, financial pressures, and building new community and hobbies. Then throw in a few hours of missed sleep, and you have a recipe for a panic attack and no one to pull the blanket over your head but you, no matter how loud you scream.
I now have much more appreciation for panic attacks. Thanks, baby.
My Orchids are Blooming
Today I noticed my orchids had bloomed flowers. I waited over three years.
See poem of July 15, 2010 that I wrote when I came home after my first date and magical first kiss with PM (below).
I could not seem to keep my orchids alive when I had my massage therapy business. I kept having to buy more and throw them out. I think this is some kind of metaphor for what I’m doing better/differently with my life. I am feeling more hopeful for my future, better about the way I can run a business. It brought me to tears today:
“There’s a white-hot fire
Stoked by my heart
It dances
Cautiously
As I lie down
Lighting the room with a soft glow
And then there’s me
Basking in the cool warmth
Hoping the orchids around me will grow.”
The Environmental Theory of Love
Love is a cycle of meeting needs. I’ve said you can’t actually love someone without knowing what they need. In this case, love is a verb. Many times, we use love in a more selfish way. I “love” him means I feel good around him, my needs are being met, etc.
But love is really the dance of having a mutually beneficial relationship with one’s total environment.
Your house benefits from you living there because you take care of it and keep it from rotting or being abused or taken over by weeds and nature. It loves you back by providing the structure you need for privacy, to keep you comfortable from the elements, etc.
When we become unbeneficial to the people or things in our lives, we start draining the “trust” account. Reciprocity is the sign of a thriving relationship. Both parties are cared for. When the scale tilts too much in one direction, and needs are not being met, the relationship approaches an empty trust and the brink of failure.
Some relationships are designed to end. Mothers stop producing milk, and children move on to new relationships.
So what’s love got to do with it?
When we find ways to nurture our environments and relationships, we build them better for ourselves. Real love is inherently also self-care, as none of us lives without relationships.
Devotion/commitment is the energy that makes love keep cycling. Trust is the currency of love.
Tired Social Media Behavior
It takes more energy to interact with a single person than with a social media platform (or simply just being on the receiving end of pushed information). Posting something often requires much less thought than engaging a single person. And when a person is tired, it takes less energy to just post something generally and respond to the reactions to that post. It, then, could also be considered lazier, cheaper, and less valuable.
Wondering-Class Inequality
Things I’ve been wondering about…
Class inequality, rich vs. poor.
Are the poor complicit in keeping themselves poor? Or is the power and education differential too great?
What are the responsibilities of the wealthy to support the community and its infrastructure?
In a world of international trade and resource movement, how does loyalty work? Do you care for your home country or let it fall into chaos? Who are the caretakers? What’s in it for them? Who supports them?
Balanced Activism – Making Change Effectively and From the Heart
My notes, thoughts, and paraphrased information from a talk at the San Francisco Sivananda Yoga Vedanta Center tonight, entitled: Spiritual Activism: Awakening the Heart to Transform the World with Swami Ramananda
Yoga helps us access the part of ourselves which is connected to all of nature.
Act with that feeling of connectedness—brings peace and compassion to our actions.
If you protest with the feeling of separateness, the “other”, hatred, you will only be adding to the divide and the unrest. Not helping solve the problem.
It’s important to keep a regular practice of re-centering yourself, so that you can keep your peace, and respond peacefully.
When you interact with the world, it helps expose your weaknesses, so you know where to improve.
EASEFUL – PEACEFUL – USEFUL
It’s important to bear witness and be present to what’s happening in our world. Not to pacify, or isolate ourselves.
It’s important to experience the emotions of loss, etc. without getting lost nor letting the behavior be governed by them.
BE INVOLVED – BEAR WITNESS – BE TOGETHER (NOT SEPARATE)
Resist the urge to judge or blame anyone – the fault and good lie in all of us collectively.
Have compassion – know that those who are causing suffering are suffering themselves.
Bury insult & injury. Forgive.
Chant and pray. Prayer is an underestimated force in the age of science. Send your peaceful energy into the world daily.
The workplace is where Got put us to cultivate our spiritual values.
Do small things with great love (Mother Teresa).
When you listen to someone, they don’t need to fight anymore.
Lasting change does not come from wars or treaties, but from small groups of dedicated people all over the world who are committed daily.
1. Grow our roots with spiritual practice – so that we can be aware of ourselves, know when to extend and when to withdraw.
2. Practice spiritual principles (non-violence, compassion) in every day life (eating, sleeping, traffic, work, etc.)
3. Look for ways to be of service & take action.
Makes as many mistakes as you can as quickly as possible. We learn by doing.
Keep Writing…
In keeping with the reason I started this blog – to write down things I discover that are kind of neat/worth remembering – I figure I ought to recommit myself to daily blogging.
I’ve reached another very interesting junction in my life. I asked a student I met on the Amtrack last weekend to tell me about the sun. He explained that every 6 years, the sun completes a kind of cycle of the interplay of its double magnetic fields. The fields become sort of gradually twisted and warped, and every 6 years they “snap” back into place dramatically. This year, 2013 is a fresh start for the sun. And it feels like a dramatic and fresh start for me too.
I’m recently playing around with the idea of “Want nothing, and everything will want you.” (-some Yoga Swami). It’s a continuation on my last year’s decided theme of “Stop Striving, Start Thriving.” As of a couple weeks ago, I decided I have had enough of the “piece it together & try a bunch of part-time things” lifestyle. I’m ready for a whole ‘nother chapter. And I think this chapter will be an education in really using community to get stuff done, rather than “look what I can do!”
It’s also about manifesting what has been now a couple years in the making…my intention to stop living in survival/crisis mode and instead experience vast wealth and abundance. This, of course, is not an overnight process, because one does not shift 30 years of thinking overnight without any fallback into old patterns. Let’s suffice to say I’m making great progress on some of the key principles so far, which I ought to start writing down if I know what’s good for me.
My housemate complimented me on my bold sexuality again today, and let me know that I ought to be passing it on to empower other women. I shall attempt to do so, with the full understanding that many will not understand. He met me about 3 years ago, on a day that I chose to wear mascara, maybe even eyeliner. Perhaps this is significant given my profession at the time as a track & field coach. My “putting myself out there” had such a profound impact on him that he monitored me the next 3 years, as I navigated dating anew, just as a 9-year relationship had ended.
Now that he has had a chance to live with me for several months, and sees my lovers come and go, he tells me his is struck by my boldness in “choosing whom to sleep with.” That is, I think, not accepting society’s (outdated) norms for how a lady “ought” to conduct dating relationships. I’ve certainly learned to follow my own instincts rather than relying on shoulds/should-nots, though that has been a constant process of evaluation and soul-searching. Whevener one takes their world from following black and white standards to navigating shades of grey, they take on a very large burden of responsibility for their actions, choices, consequences, etc. I have found that I can get my needs for physical touch and sexual experience and intimacy and partnership (and reproduction!) met in several ways, all the while maintaining respect for myself and for others. I do not claim to be good at it. I’m still learning. But it’s nice someone notices the effort I guess ;-) I’m still not quite ready to write about more specific experiences, but I trust it will all come out in due time as needed.
I’m also feeling caught in this weird space between eras, like we are all heading toward one superbrain, where we all have access to each other’s thoughts (at least the ones we choose to upload onto the internet). The only thing that makes me want to express myself at all in writing is the fact that, even though I feel very (almost too) interconnected and eternal and one with the universe, that there are thousands and thousands of years of human experience before me, and may be thousands and thousands after me. And there have lived characters, such as Jesus, who have affected many generations with his thoughts and words.
It is true, that, no matter where we come from before we have consciousness in our human bodies, and no matter where we go after, that at least it matters to other humans what we think and feel and experience. I know this because I care about what others think and feel and experience. It helps me orient myself in the cosmos, on this planet, etc. It lifts my mood. It entertains me.
I have to say that my limited psychedelic exposure really challenged me in terms of what we are capable of experiencing with the chemistry and electricity that make up our bodies and consciousness. The hyper-intense feeling of being totally separated from “myself” (body/mind/etc.) was unnerving, to say the least, and ultimately drove me to wanna camp out in “myself” in a sober way and just live my “self,” as silly as she can be at times, more fully and presently and gratefully. Every once in a while, I am tempted to slide into the apathy and oblivion that accompanies feelings of ONENESS. We are all so, SO similar to one another – we are, at the core, a piece of DNA that just happens to look and act slightly different depending on how we find ourselves replicated in a new body. We have a lot of the same thoughts. We bathe in the same seas of oxygen, emotions, and energy. While the feeling of being a totally independent and separate creature in my ego is so strong, my experiences have revealed to me just how inaccurate of a worldview that is. I am not promoting drug use in any way, btw. It is very, very dangerous and I believe in living 99% sober. But in the end, I have gained a little in perspective, and think I’m coming back into a place where writing things down seems fruitful again. We are not ONE just yet, in access to each other’s thoughts, and perhaps someone, someday, will find something I said or thought of interest or use. Even if that’s just the kids/grandkids!
I know I sure enjoy looking back and seeing what I was thinking 6 or 7 years ago…on the last sun cycle :-)
Onward…
The Little Things – Journaling and Allergy
I put my project manager hat back on today for my new consulting gig, and came across something I did at Chevron that I had forgotten about: Daily Journals. Every day, I would take the time to summarize the day’s activities. We had an internal calendar, so this was a duplication+expansion of that.
This is something that has been sorely missing from my “professional life” the past few years. I got as far as making excel task sheets for my various ventures, but not the simple act of daily journaling/reflection, which is probably more important in the long run, as it informs the tasks and makes you take stock on a more regular basis, giving you opportunity to learn and adapt.
I also took another 3 hour nap today, as I did on Sunday. Since my trip to Turlock, I started experiencing what I think others would call “allergies”, where my throat and nose close up so that I can’t take in a full breath. I wonder if it’s because we took a side route through almond orchard country between manteca and ripon, and I got a ton of pesticide/ag chemical exposure due to having the AC on full blast for the heat last week. Anyway, I did not enjoy the feeling of not being able to breathe. Not one bit. Our athletic trainer’s eyes were red and watery the whole trip too. I am feeling much better now that I’m back in Berkeley, and I find that eliminating gluten, lactose, and caffeine seems to make it get better, and makes me feel more healthy (I started to store more fat over the weekend as well).