New buds

I was parking the car the other day as I returned from a meeting and my flu was beginning to kick in. I was preoccupied with it and its effects. As I got out of the car I noticed the snow had gone from the rockery. And there they were, peeking up through the soil, the first signs of snowdrops and crocus planted to greet the Spring. I noticed also the willow beginning to bud. And seeing these little unexpected gifts my heart was warmed, I felt joy, and realized how life and love can break though our most selfish considerations and the times we would like to close our hearts.

At times nature gives us teachings which we can need in our daily lives. Open up to new life and hope for the future. A lot is going on that we do not know about. Trust growth to take its own path in its own mysterious way.

I like to garden and have a plan for its development over the next years. However sometimes nature has its own plans. This winter a mole has come to take up residence in the field next door and from time to time he decides to visit the garden, messing up my neat lawn with his untidy hills. It ruins the order but surely is as much a part of nature as the formal beds I have put down. Who I am to say that my plans are best? Every week we get examples of how the natural world doesn’t behave in a predictable way, so we shouldn’t be surprised that natural upheavals occur in both our gardens and in our private lives. Maybe the small wild flowers that grow along the fence have as much right to be part of the garden as the ordered planting in beds? We often think we know what is best and in doing so often do not recognize what is. Sometimes, out of fear, we prefer to impose our order on things when in fact nature, and life, proceeds with its own mysterious lack of order. In doing so we risk losing the small and beautiful gifts which give joy to the heart. There is so much in life that is unexpected and unplanned for, but often these are the things that make all the difference.

The splendour of the rose and the whiteness of the lily do not rob the little violet of its scent nor the daisy of its simple charm. If every tiny flower wanted to be a rose, spring would lose its loveliness.

Theresa of Lisieux

Fear and relationships

I find it an ongoing challenge to live and authentic and compassionate life. I often screw up, choosing selfishness rather than genuine care for others. I notice that this selfishness is often rooted in fear.

And my work with people over the years has shown me how often their fears are activated in their relationships with others, and this leads them to act in defensive ways and protect their heart. Relationships have the capacity to trigger a person's deepest fears, which often reflect patterns established in their childhood. We notice this when a strong emotional reaction is triggered, and automatic deeply believed, often fearful, thoughts dominate, which are very easy to take as the truth. When this happens people tend to maximize distance to protect themselves and act as if the other person can threaten the security of their inner self. Relationships open our hearts and expose our needs and feelings. Sometimes we clearly feel that is not safe. And when that happens we all follow some strategy to escape feeling the fears that silently run our life.

However, the truth about relationships is that they reflect closely our relationship with ourselves and reveal a lot about the clarity or confusion in our inner life. In fact our relationships can never be better than the relationship we have with ourselves. We often project on to the other what is going on inside ourselves, often what we are unable to manage properly, and this is at the root of our fears, and the reason they are so strong. Thus we can blame the other for confusion which is actually inside ourselves.

I notice this often in myself. Therefore I find that when strong fears are triggered it is good to try and turn towards them and let the fears in, looking on it as 'what' instead of as 'me'. Even if the fear triggered is strong, if I manage to do this soon afterwards, I notice the fear loses its power quickly and a more open response can emerge. The fear thus becomes a teacher which strengthens rather than paralyzes.

"Fear tells us to stop, to stay within the boundary of our protected cocoon-world. Yet when we feel fear, if we take even one small step toward it rather than yielding to our habitual pulling away, we move one step closer to the vast mind that lies beyond. When we feel fear instead of saying 'I'm afraid,' thus reinforcing our identification with our fear as who we are, we can simply say, 'Fear is present.' Thus fear's power gradually dissipates, and we begin to free ourselves from it. When we simply experience fear just as it is — without our opinions, judgments, and reactions — fear is not nearly so frightening."

Ezra Bayda, Saying Yes to Life (Even the Hard Parts)

On not blaming.

We erect a barrier called blame that keeps us from communicating with others, and we fortify it with our concepts of who's right and who's wrong. We do that with the people who are closest to us. It is a very common, well-perfected device for making us feel better. Blame others. Blaming is a way to protect your heart, trying to protect what is soft and open and tender in yourself.

Pema Chodron, In the Gap Between Right and Wrong.

When things go wrong we have a natural tendency to protect ourselves, even when it is our own fault. One way to do this is to look to blame. Sometimes we blame ourselves; more often we blame others. However, whenever I blame others I notice that it tends to harden my heart and makes me focus on myself. Remaining in that frame of mind tends to lock me in a state of victimhood, making me almost dependent on the perpetrator. It too easily simplifies the complexity which marks relationships in this world. In other words, it does not allow that things in this world can simply go wrong and that it does not always have to be someone's fault.

Real relationships challenge us to stay open to the soft centre of the heart. How often do we form an opinion of another only to meet them and realise that our opinion was based on defending ourselves rather than what the person was really feeling. Fear makes us close down. At the end of the day it costs us precious energy. I find increasingly I ask myself: "Am I willing to waste my energy further on this matter?" and that helps me to move on.

All blame is a waste of time. No matter how much fault you find with another, and regardless of how much you blame him or her, it will not change you. The only thing blame does is to keep the focus off you when you are looking for external reasons to explain your unhappiness or frustration. You may succeed in making another feel guilty about something by blaming them, but you won't succeed in changing whatever it is about you that is making you unhappy.

Wayne Dyer.

The Choices we make

We like to think that we have a substantial core to ourselves, some type of identity which lasts. However, it is proabably better to see ourselves as continually defining ourselves, each day and each week, by the choices which we make. And as I said in a post yesterday, even a week can open up a completely different reality, in a world which changes like our one does.

Each day we are faced with a multitude of choices. And as St Thomas Aquinas reminded us, every choice is a renunciation. In fact it's a thousand renunciations. Simply put: If you choose to take one path, you give up on another path, if you choose to spend your time and energies in one direction, you can't spend them somewhere else. We can't have it all. Each choice serves to eliminate some possibilities. Thus, in a real sense, we become the being we are, by choosing certain directions, and communicating that choice to others. Often the choice made by us or by others allows a path to open which otherwise would not have been possible. Life is indeed rare and unique, and not a rehearsal, but lived moment by moment, this breath arises and passes away, this chance comes and goes away.

Kindness

“Wherever there is a human being, there is an opportunity for a kindness” – Seneca

It is easy to be kind when the recipient is someone we like.

But to be kind when someone is difficult or has hurt us takes a lot of strength and compassion.

Being sick and Impermanence

Struggling with a flu these last few days. Yesterday had a temperature most of the day, and I noticed the mind adding impatience and fear to the body's experience of illness. Today started brightly, but the early promise faded and I find it still here, with its aches and pains, its fever and tiredness.

A lot of things can change in a week, and this one has shown me how fragile and unpredictable this world can be. Some certainties which I felt I could rely on are not there. It reaffirms the wisdom of the First Noble Truth found in Buddhist teaching, which states that the essential reality of life is that it is challenging. Our physical bodies, our health, our relationships, all of the elements in our lives, are fragile and subject to change. However - as we were reflecting on in the MBSR class this week- these difficulties, and these changes, are inevitable, but suffering is not.

In other words, as the Second Noble Truth goes on to say, suffering is caused when we find our mind resisting or contending in response to life. We have a choice: we can struggle with life or we can accept it. Acceptance does not mean passivity, but accomodating to what is beyond our control. Being sick is useful because it means I see that there is not much I can do and am forced to let go. For someone with a character like mine that is not always easy to learn, as my preferred way of dealing with the uncertainties of this world is to do things, especially for others. Sometimes, one has to be weak, and there can learn much about the changing nature of life and of people, of care for oneself as well as insight into what really matters.

There was never a dawn, regardless how beautiful or promising, that did not grow into a noontime. There was never a noon that did not fall into afternoon. There was never an afternoon that did not fade toward evening. There never was a day yet that did not get buried in the graveyard of the night.

In this way transience makes a ghost out of everything that happens to us.

John O'Donoghue

Underneath

Meditation is one of the keys
to unlocking the natural generosity of the heart.

Underneath the greedy
and selfish thoughts and feelings
that are part of the human condition
lies a pure desire to help.

We experience this in our mindfulness practice.

When we let go
there is a natural acceptance
and feeling of care.

Noah Levine

The imperfect is our paradise

Clear water in a brilliant bowl,
Pink and white carnations.
The light In the room more like a snowy air,
Reflecting snow. A newly-fallen snow
At the end of winter when afternoons return.
Pink and white carnations - one desires
So much more than that. The day itself
Is simplified: a bowl of white,
Cold, a cold porcelain, low and round,
With nothing more than the carnations there.

Say even that this complete simplicity
Stripped one of all one's torments, concealed
The evilly compounded, vital I
And made it fresh in a world of white,
A world of clear water, brilliant-edged,
Still one would want more, one would need more,
More than a world of white and snowy scents.

There would still remain the never-resting mind,
So that one would want to escape, come back
To what had been so long composed.
The imperfect is our paradise.
Note that, in this bitterness, delight,
Since the imperfect is so hot in us,
Lies in flawed words and stubborn sounds.

Wallace Stevens

Defense Mechanisms

As the previous post reminds us, mindfulness practice essentially simplifies space, drawing together the scattered parts of our mind and our life and helping us in the process of integrating our lives. It does this by holding in awareness all the parts of our lives, even those which we find frightening or threatening. We try to sit with events in our lives - or parts of our selves - that are difficult and we work on the mind's tendency to flee. It seems that personal growth happens more quickly if we are open to working with difficulties rather than trying to constantly run away from them. Mindfulness helps us to see that whenever we feel that we are really stuck, it is because we have not looked deeply enough into the nature of the experience.

However, simply looking at things can be difficult, especially in times of crisis or turbulence. It is in these moments when we feel overwhelmed, that we are most likely to judge ourselves or others most harshly. We have a tendency to identify with a difficulty and that affects how we see ourselves or how our life is going.One way of dealing with feelings provoked by this is to split the world into "good" and "bad", them and us, solidifiying our sense of self, maximizing distance in order to increase a sense of safety. Splitting is a defense mechanism which can be activated when we are threatened, and means that we are unable to see complexity in the situation or the person, rather seeing them as all bad. There is no grey area, histories are frozen into a moment and we let that moment define us or the other person. We solidify the most negative core beliefs about ourselves or others and let them define our life, seeing it as threatened or hopeless.

Mindfulness practice can help us be aware of these defense mechanisms arising, see fear and anger forming, and help us notice the desire to withdraw appearing, normally accompanied by a kind of defensive story-line. If we can spot this happening we may have enough of a gap to see the whole drama transparently. If so, we can question what is feeling threatened, whether it is really actually me, or some story which I have about myself and my life. If we can resist the tendency to split or identify we can come to see that everything is workable. We can then experience for ourselves that it is ultimately possible to work with everything, and to keep a compassionate heart open to others and to all that occurs in our lives

Simplifying Space

Sitting [in meditation] is essentially simplifying space. Our daily lives are in constant movement: lots of things going on, lots of people talking, lots of events taking place. In the middle of that, it’s very difficult to sense what we are in our life. When we simplify the situation, when we take away the externals and remove ourselves from the ringing phone, the television, the people who visit us, the dog who needs a walk, we get a chance to face ourselves.

Charlotte Joko Beck

Being Happy

There are many competing ideas in the world today as to how to be happy. The prevailing model in the Western world tends to equate it with success in career or material terms or to project our desire for happiness onto another person and seek it in a relationship. The difficulty with this is that it makes our happiness contingent on external events or on other people.

Another model, which is at the heart of mindfulness practice, sees happiness as coming from within, when we remove the conditions in our lives that lead to suffering. This happens when when the mind is not in contention with what is going on in our lives at that moment. Happiness thus comes from the minds ability to meet all circumstances, whether desired or not, with compassion and openness. It is related to what is already in our lives, often unnoticed, and not to what we wish we could have, or wanting other.

Happiness is the cessation of suffering. It is well-being. For instance, when I practice this exercise of breathing in, I'm aware of my eyes; breathing out, I smile to my eyes and realize that they are still in good condition. There is a paradise of form and colors in the world. And because you have eyes still in good condition, you can get in touch with the paradise. So when I become aware of my eyes, I touch one of the conditions of happiness. And when I touch it, happiness comes.

Thich Nhat Hahn

Love

Absolute love is not something that we have to — or that we even can — concoct or fabricate. It is what comes through us naturally when we fully open up — to another person, to ourselves, or to life. In relation to another, it manifests as selfless caring. In relation to ourselves, it shows up as inner confidence and self-acceptance that warms us from within. And in relation to life, it manifests as a sense of well-being, appreciation, and joie de vivre.

When we experience this kind of openness and warmth coming from another, it provides essential nourishment: it helps us experience our own warmth and openness, allowing us to recognize the beauty and goodness at the core of our nature. The light of unconditional love awakens the dormant seed potentials within us, helping them ripen, blossom, and bear fruit, allowing us to bring forth the unique gifts that are ours to offer in this life. Receiving pure love, caring, and recognition from another confers a great blessing: it affirms us in being who we are, allowing us to say yes to ourselves.

John Welwood, The Perfect Love We Seek, The Imperfect Love We Live

Solvitur ambulando

"It is resolved as we proceed"



The true traveler has no destination
and no fixed time of arrival

Lao Tzu

We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.

T.S. Eliot

A mindfulness and Tai Chi project in a Boston school

There are not too many studies which look at the effect of mindfulness on young children in a school setting. Therefore it is interesting to read about a Boston School which designed a clinical project that used Tai Chi and mindfulness-based stress reduction as an educational program.

The 5-week successfully showed that sustained interest in this material in young boys and girls is possible, even though it may have been presumed beforehand that children would find the requisite capacity for sustained concentration, precision, mechanical exactness, and the essential slow execution of movements in Tai Chi find less interesting once the novelty wore off. However, statements made by the boys and girls in the process suggested that they experienced well-being, calmness, relaxation, improved sleep, less reactivity, increased self-care, self-awareness, and a sense of interconnection or interdependence with nature.

As a result of their work, the reserarchers state that Tai Chi and mindfulness-based stress reduction may be transformational tools that can be used in educational programs appropriate for school–aged children.

Wall, Robert, "Tai Chi and Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction in a Boston Public Middle School" Journal of Pediatric Health Care Volume 19, Number 4, July/August 2005

Locus of Control

Within psychology, the notion of Locus of Control refers to our perception about the causes of the events in our lives. If we have a high internal Locus of Control we believe that our behaviour is mainly influenced by our own personal decisions and efforts. If we have a high external Locus of Control we believe that external circumstances - such as luck, destiny, fate, the stars, an external god, or our boss, or other people - have the greater influence.

Studies have shown that the understanding we have of locus of control has a significant impact on our motivation, expectations, self-esteem, and even on the actual outcome of our actions. A high external locus has been associated with depression and with lower motivation. It also shapes the way in which we deal with setbacks. A key element in our inner life is how we explain to ourselves why a negative event occurs. People with high external locus of control tend to attribute setbacks to stable internal and global factors, which will not change. In other words, setbacks tend to be seen as being caused by elements inside me that will not change - "I never succeed, I am not good enough" combined with factors outside which are stacked against me - "That college, job, person is way out of my league". If bad, this can lead to a sense that nothing I can do will make a difference and I will feel powerless to change my own circumstances.

On the contrary, it has been noted that high internals expect to succeed more, are more motivated and are more likely to learn from their setbacks. They believe that their approach and attitude contributes significantly to what they achieve in life. If something goes wrong they tend to see it as due to non-stable factors that can be overcome in the future - "Ok, I got refused this time, but I will work harder and reapply". In other words, the story the person tells themselves allows them not to over-identify with the setback and see it as the whole story. It has been found that a high internal locus of control leads to behaviours that cope better, that are more flexible, purposive and open, are less defensive, and are cognitively more complex, differentiated, and sensitive. They tend to realize that they have choices to change their situation, even if that only means working on internal factors, like attitude and motivation.

Many people fail to distinguish between their true nature and their personality traits, particularly their less desirable traits. The fact is you are not the worst characteristics of your personality. It is the nature of the untrained mind to want what it perceives as advantageous and to fear or hate what seems painful. Discovering how your heart and mind can work together to use these feelings allows you to move beyond them. You may feel overwhelmed by the circumstances of your present life or bound by past traumatic events. Again, this is a failure in perception. They are just mind-states which can be known. They can be seen as impermanent and not belonging to you and, therefore, they do not ultimately define your true nature.

Philip Moffitt

Teachings all around

Every day
I see or I hear
something
that more or less
kills me with delight,
that leaves me like a needle
in the haystack
of light.
It is what I was born for--
to look, to listen,
to lose myself
inside this soft world--
to instruct myself over and over
in joy,
and acclamation.
Nor am I talking
about the exceptional,
the fearful, the dreadful,
the very extravagant--
but of the ordinary,
the common, the very drab,
the daily presentations.
Oh, good scholar,
I say to myself, how can you help
but grow wise
with such teachings as these--
the untrimmable light
of the world,
the ocean's shine,
the prayers that are made out of grass?

Mary Oliver Mindful

Experience everything

Have patience with everything that remains unsolved in your heart. Try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books written in a foreign language. Do not now look for the answers. They cannot now be given to you because you could not live them. It is a question of experiencing everything. At present you need to live the question. Perhaps you will gradually, without even noticing it, find yourself experiencing the answer, some distant day.

Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet

Being Grateful

Gratefulness is the key to a happy life that we hold in our hands,
because if we are not grateful,
then no matter how much we have we will not be happy -
because we will always want
to have something else or something more.

Br David Steindl-Rast

Always adjusting

Since Erik Erikson's work on the eight stages in life development, the notion of a progression through a series of different periods in one's life has become widely known. Erikson felt that each stage presented its own particular task and that, by adjusting to the challenges of each age, we developed psychological maturity. His insights are rich and have helped us recognize that life is not fully finished by the time we reach young adulthood.

Erikson reminds us that we are contunally a "work in progress" and that life presents itself to us as an unfolding mystery to which we can respond or, in the face of which, we can shut down. The last stage of our journey, which we are in at the end of life, reflects this choice. We can arrive at either integrity or despair. One reason for despair is the fact that we can look back on our life and realize that we did not take all the opportunities presented to us. He also believed that failure to live fully at one stage led to accumulating difficulties in later stages.

One thing that this stage theory of life can help us see is that we are somewhat always in transition. As well as the developmental stages which present their challenges and tasks, we all have unique situations which present us with choices. We are called to respond to a challenging work situation, a medical report, a new addition to the family, a challenging travel schedule, or moving apart from a best friend. We are always between the situation which was yesterday and today's new situation. Thus we have to develop a spirit that is open, that is at ease with always adjusting. Adjusting means that we are not always 100% sure of who we are, and that we have to make choices based on where we find ourselves. And sometimes the choice is whether we dare to take a risk based on a deep awareness in our heart or whether we play it safe.

What is needed then is an openness to what life - as a journey - presents in each stage, and in each moment. In some ways this is our only moment of being alive. As Erikson reminds us, living this moment and this opportunity to the full will lay the basis for a full life and develop a philosophy of celebration, removed from worry and too much concern about a fixed destination. It is better to live these instants fully than lose them in an attempt to manage life in its entirety. We need to dream, and live in a way that produces astonishment rather than predictability.

Each day, and the living of it, has to be a conscious creation in which discipline and order are relieved with some play and pure foolishness.

May Sarton

How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives.

Annie Dillard

On not being afraid

Live life fully while you're here. Experience everything. Take care of yourself and your friends. Go out and screw up! You're going to anyway, so you might as well enjoy the process. Take the opportunity to learn from your mistakes: find the cause of your problem and eliminate it. Don't try to be perfect; just be an excellent example of being human.

Anthony Robbins

Real life or following an idea

Sometimes we can be fixed on our notion of how a thing should be and be in danger of throwing away the richness of how a thing actually is. What we need at times is the courage to embrace life as it is actually unfolding, and not try and shape it to some idea which we think it should be.

The idea of love is not love
The idea of the ocean is neither salt nor sand;
The face of the seal cannot rise from the idea
to stare at you,
to astound your heart

Mary Oliver

Lent

The word Lent, as I said before, comes perhaps from the Old English and refers to the lengthening of the days in Spring. However, the latin name for this period is quadragesima meaning "forty", and reminds us that one of the inspirations for this period is the forty days that Jesus spent in the desert. So one way we can regard this period is that it reminds us to simplify, in a more focused way, in order to reflect upon the real priorities in our lives. Remove clutter, spand less time in front of the TV or internet, set aside time for reflection, writing, and walking.

“It seems to me that the strangeness and wonder of existence are emphasized here by the comparative sparsity of the flora and fauna: life not crowded upon life as in other places but scattered abroad in spareness and simplicity, with a generous gift of space for each herb and bush and tree, each stem of grass, so that the living organism stands out bold and brave and vivid against the lifeless sand and barren rock. The extreme clarity of the desert light is equaled by the extreme individuation of desert life-forms. Love flowers best in openness and freedom.”

Edward Abby, Desert Solitaire

Smile

Sometimes your joy is the source of your smile,

but sometimes your smile can be the source of your joy.

Thich Nhat Hanh

Lent and Fasting

Today is Ash Wednesday, traditionally the start of Lent - the season of preparation for Easter - and a day of fasting. The word "Lent" comes from the Anglo-Saxon word "lencten", referring to the lengthening of days in the Spring. These periodic fasts, linked to the development of the inner or spiritual life, are meaningful, symbolic actions that most wisdom traditions prescribe, so it seems to correspond to some common human need or insight.

It is ironic that the notion of fasting seems somewhat alien today, even though the Muslim period of Ramadam has increased awareness of this type of practice greatly. We have become quite comfortable with the latest diets and slimming fads - similar rituals but without the same link to something deeper in the unconscious. Fasting, like the silence and stillness of meditation, removes us from some of the normal routines of each day and allows us see what then arises in the mind. Ceasing some activities which have become second nature can be a useful "mindfulness bell" which reminds us to drop into our inner life rather than distracting ourselves from it. This simplification of our day brings us face to face with some of the "stories" which we have about our lives and allows us see more clearly what our priorities are.

"In our crazy world, silence and stillness are two of the true remaining luxuries. You have to work hard to create those sacred pockets of stillness for yourself.... More than anything, I needed peace. And modern life, for all its conveniences and all its opportunities, doesn't offer that. We almost have too many options."

Elizabeth Gilbert, Eat, Pray, Love

Pancake Tuesday

This Tuesday is Pancake Tuesday in Ireland and England, the day before Ash Wednesday. It marks the end of the Carnival period of celebration. The practice of celebrating carnival probably began in ancient times when the Sunday a week before the beginning of Lent was called Dominica Carnevala, or "farewell to meat Sunday" - referring to the upcoming Lenten fast from meat and animal products.

When I was young this was one of the great yearly traditions and an evening of great excitement; on just one day of the year pancakes were made and eaten,usually with lemon juice and sugar. We would rush home from school as if about to particpate in the greatest of feasts. It was not really the food which created the excitement. It was the rareness of something celebrated year on year in the family.

Rituals like these, which mark the passing of seasons are very important, especially in this modern age which blends each day and each season into periods of work and shopping. We need to ensure that there are real moments of non-work in our lives where we celebrate other realities and other rhythms, not just evenings where we crash, tired from work, trying to recharge before it starts again the next day. In some real way our work has to be part of a greater meaning. In the traditional Christian sense, this came from seeing work as contributing to the development of creation and as part of a social function. It is hard to see that in our modern office setups and in large corporations. Family rituals celebrated together remind us that there is more to life than what the markets dictate. Family customs bring mindfulness to even mundane activites. They are occasions together which raise the ordinary parts of life into signs of life's deeper blessings and celebrations, and allow grace to touch our inner selves.

How our work has meaning

I came across this nice story set in the Middle Ages: A man sees a worker passing by with a wheel barrow and asks what he is doing. “Can’t you see, I’m pushing a wheelbarrow,” the man replies. Another wheelbarrow man comes by doing the same thing and he too is asked: “What are you doing.” He replies, “Can’t you see, I’m building the Cathedral at Chartres.”

The same activity, but with different levels of insight.

The second man has connected his work to something inside himself or beyond himself – has understood the difference between purpose and meaning – and thereby made his life meaningful.

At Mid Way

Nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita
mi ritrovai per una selva oscura,
ché la diritta via era smarrita.

In the middle of the journey of our life
I found myself astray in a dark wood
where the straight road had been lost sight of.

Dante, The Divine Comedy

The opening words of one of the greatest classics in world literature: Life as a journey, as is portrayed also in Homer's the Odyssey and Joyce's Ulysses. In Dante's version of this journey he descends into the underworld. Jung interpreted this as indicating our need to descend into our unconscious - to integrate all parts of our deepest selves in our journey through life. He believed that the first half of our life is spent learning how our world works and establishing ourselves in it, often in response to the demands of external forces, such as the family, society, religion or our need to establish a role in the world. However, it is in the second half of life when the real work of individuation, of becoming more the whole person we were meant to be, can begin. Often people can feel like Dante, somewhat lost, despite having built up successful careers or working hard all day. There can notice an underlying discontent, even boredom, even with all the hours they work and all that they have "achieved". Just as Dante turned inward towards the meaning of life and interpreted the various levels of his inner life, we too need to do the same if we wish to develop our full selves as we journey through life. The journey is essentially a journey to the center of oneself, an inner journey to wholeness and real contentment.

The power of the mind

“One of the most intriguing aspects of both hysterical and psychosomatic disorders is that they tend to spread through populations in epidemic fashion, almost as if they were bacteriological in nature, which they are not. Edward Shorter, a medical historian, concluded from his study of the medical literature that the incidence of a psychogenic disorder grows to epidemic proportions when the disorder is in vogue. Strange as it may seem, people with an unconcious psychological need for symptoms tend to develop a disorder that is well known, like back pain, hay fever, or eczema. This is not a concious decision.”

Dr. John Sarno, The Divided Mind

February 14th

We can develop a love that is steadfast and universal. We develop it not because we force ourselves to love so fully. Rather, we discover that loving unconditionally is the greatest source of joy, and that we are the loser for any hesitation or interruption in that love, such as “I would really love you if you would just do your share of the cooking, if you would just do this, if you would be like that.”

Whenever we hesitate like that, we lose. This helps me remember not to mortgage away any of my days by having a grudge or a grievance or making myself distant. That would simply cause a rupture in that steadfast, universal love that is so joyful.

Sylvia Boornstein

The unconscious must out

The psychological rule says that when an inner situation is not made conscious, it happens outside as fate. That is to say, when the individual remains undivided and does not become conscious of his inner opposite, the world must perforce act out the conflict...

Carl Jung, "Christ, A Symbol of the Self",

Sometimes we can see repeating patterns in our own lives or in the lives of others. We find ourselves in similar situations to before, or saying the same, self-defeating words, often based on deep-seated, limited, views of our own capacities. For example, some people say "I always end up in rotten relationships", or even "life has it in for me". Despite the painful nature of such experiences, these people do not gain the insight that would help them understand, for example, why they always end up in relationships that end badly. They continue to make choices based on patterns laid down in their own early relationships, which can end up running the show despite their best efforts. One way of dealing with this is to blame life or the other person and put the responsibility onto them.

However, the quote from Jung seems to suggest that the person needs to look inside themself for the real solution to this problem. He suggests that this can be due to unconscious parts of the self, the individual remaining unaware of his or her unconscious patterns and attitudes. He suggests that what we do not face inside ourselves will come into our lives from the outside, as "fate". Unconsciously we will attract the parts of us that we deep down, unconsciously, know that we need. In other words, life will bring us into situations where we are asked to look at our unconscious or shadow side and bring it out into the open, in order to grow to our full potential.

He further seems to suggest that when we come to an important period in our life for growth, this new potential inside us does not always simply go from the unconscious to consciousness. Rather, it comes to full consciousness through outside circumstances or with the help of another person who comes into our life. This can then mean going in new directions in work or relationships, as we move from old patterns and things that once seemed important.

Thus, a person who spent a significant part of their life investing their energies into their work or their family may find that they neglected other aspects of themselves in the process. Jung suggests that they will be brought face to face with these unlived parts and given the possibilitiy of integrating them. He suggests that to be fully happy we need to bring to light those parts of ourselves that have been repressed or neglected.

Talking to God

The grass beneath a tree
is content and silent.

A squirrel holds an acorn
in its praying hands
offering thanks,
it looks like.

The nut tastes sweet;
I bet the prayer added
to its taste somehow.

The broken shells fall on the grass,
the grass looks up
and says
"Hey"

And the squirrel looks down
and says
"Hey"

I have been saying "Hey" lately too,
to God

The formal way was just not working

Rumi

On getting older

A lovely poem on getting older:

Men at forty
Learn to close softly
The doors to rooms they will not be
Coming back to.

At rest on a stair landing,
They feel it moving
Beneath them now like the deck of a ship,
Though the swell is gentle.

And deep in mirrors
They rediscover
The face of the boy as he practices tying
His father's tie there in secret

And the face of that father,
Still warm with the mystery of lather.
They are more fathers than sons themselves now.
Something is filling them, something

That is like the twilight sound
Of the crickets, immense,
Filling the woods at the foot of the slope
Behind their mortgaged houses.

Donald Justice Men at Forty

At times it is necessary to let go of the past as one moves on in life. Doing so, the ground may not feel so solid; it moves, as the poet says, "like the deck of a ship". However, that movement is gentle, partly because of the wisdom, experience and skills built up over the years. There is something beautiful about the use of the word "softly" at the end of the second line. Moving on can be done with full acceptance, with a face turned toward future adventures, with an understanding of the passing of time.

Mindfulness meditation and alcoholism

A new report suggests that mindfulness meditation may be a useful tool that helps alcoholics in their fight against addiction.

Dr. Aleksandra Zgierska, assistant professor of family medicine at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, led a 16-week pilot clinical trial with 19 participants recruited from addiction treatment clinics. He initially met with some scepticism as to the possibility of people in recovery from recent addiction being able to meditate

“When we started the project, it was met with some concern,” she says. “Some people said ‘You’re going to have alcoholics meditate?’ That’s why we did the pilot study—to show that it could be possible and helpful for them. We thought meditation could teach people new skills to cope with life challenges and create an emotional and intellectual “platform” to tackle not just drinking by itself, but also other problems that may increase relapse risk.”

The trial showed that meditation was possible and could be a useful supplemetary tool for people alongside conventional treatments. Because of the trial results she is now conducting a larger study.

Her work was supported by Michael Waupoose, program manager for Gateway Recovery, an addiction treatment center, who suggests that meditation may assist in those moments of increased anxiety which would normally trigger the urge to drink:

“Mindfulness meditation would teach that person how to be present in that situation, how to be conscious of what’s happening to their body, and how to deal with it without reacting to it automatically. It teaches people how to be conscious of their feelings or thoughts without having to follow them all the way through.”

Friday Work - and life sometimes

I was sad all day, and why not.

There I was, books piled
on both sides of the table, paper stacked up, words
falling off my tongue.

The robins had been a long time singing, and now it was beginning to rain.

What are we sure of?
Happiness isn’t a town on a map,
or an early arrival, or a job well done, but good work
ongoing.

Then it began raining hard, and the flowers in the yard
were full of lively fragrance.

You have had days like this, no doubt. And wasn’t it
wonderful, finally, to leave the room? Ah, what a
moment!

As for myself, I swung the door open. And there was
the wordless, singing world. And I ran for my life.

Mary Oliver, Work Sometimes

Being Seen

In some of the tribes in Natal, in South Africa, the words used for saying hello, for greeting, are sawu bona, which means "I see you". The other person responds by saying sikkhona "I am here". As a greeting it affirms the real presence of the other, by letting them know that they are seen, and allows them to be fully present.

I know that, at a deep level, one of my needs is to be seen and acknowledged. I - like everyone, I suppose - want to have the freedom to reveal my true self, to relax, and not to be worried about the other's response. "Seeing" does not mean cognitive recognition; rather it is rooted in the heart and is the awareness of my deepest self and my deepest needs are felt by another person. I need someone who has the space to see me and who is able to hold what they see.

This process begins when we are babies. The young baby needs to be seen and acknowledged by its parents, and when this does not happen it can cause great distress. We are born with a need for mirroring - for having what is happening in us seen and mirrored back to us. The English Psychologist Winnicott wrote that the parent needs to have enough space - and not be caught up in their own needs - so that this mirroring reflects back to the child an accurate picture of what the child is feeling inside. This allows the child feels that its needs are being taken care of and gives the child enough trust in the safety of the world to want to see more of it. In this way the child can minimize any anxiety about the threat of the world and develop independence in exploring it.

It is only under these conditions that the infant can have an experience that feels real. A large number of such experiences form the basis for a life that has reality in it rather than futility. The individual who has discovered the capacity to be alone is constantly able to rediscover the personal impulse and the personal inpulse is not wasted because the state of being alone is something which always implies.... that someone else is there
The Capacity to be Alone

However, when the child does not feel its needs being seen and reflected back, or that the caregiver is not attuned, it learns to become more cautious in order to protect itself from the inconsistency of the carer. The child can learn then that it is dangerous to let its true self be seen and that it should to keep its needs hidden. The capacity to be alone is not as strongly developed and this can lead in later life to an dependence on external activities, such as work, or to an instability in relationships. There may be links here with the practice of meditation. If it develops the capacity to be alone with ourselves it has the potential to heal some of these early life experiences.

Many babies, however, do have to have a long experience of not getting getting back what they are giving. They look and they do not see themselves...The baby gets settled in to the idea that when he or she looks, what is seen is the mother's face. The mother's face is not then a mirror.
Play and Reality

It would seem from this that real listening, real mirroring, is one of the greatest gifts we can offer to another person. If we can attune to what is really going on inside them, and not let our needs and our internal chatter predominate, then we allow them to be fully themselves and they can grow.

Walking helps

In my room,
the world is beyond my understanding;

when I walk I see
that it consists of
three or four hills and a cloud.

Wallace Stephens, Of the Surface of Things

Instructions on how to live

Instructions for living a life:

Pay attention.
Be astonished.
Tell about it.

Mary Oliver, Sometimes

A soft day

In Ireland the term " a soft day" is used to describe a day with very light rain. Traditionally people would say "It's a soft day, thank God", even if it had been raining for weeks and was miserably cold ...which probably demonstrates that - or maybe explains why - the Irish are entirely mad. Today, there has been gentle snow falling all day, an alpine equivalent of the Irish soft rain. It falls gently, persistently, on top of the snow already lying on the garden, without a sound, snow on snow.

When we practice we try and take a light touch, not taking ourselves too seriously. We also try to lightly use the breath as an anchor, not thinking of the breath but gently dropping in on it, like the gentle touch of this soft snow. We also soften our posture as we sit, not needing to force or strain, as sitting is dropping into the natural and gentle calm that exists inside us. We just let ourselves settle gently.

It is good to work in this way; It is so easy to be harsh with ourselves, in practice and in life.

Worrying

The roots of the word "worry" comes from an old Anglo-Saxon word, Wyrgan. It originally meant to strangle, choke, or tear at the throat with teeth. It was used of animals who would attack other animals, such as dogs biting the throat of sheep. We can still see this use when we speak of a cat worrying a mouse. Cats play with their prey before they kill it, sometimes throwing it up in the air or slapping it back when it seems about to escape.

Yesterday morning, bright and early, our cat Barney proudly brought a big mouse into the house and let it free in the hall. Having safely confined Barney in another part of the house I was surprised to see the mouse sitting on a shoe, licking itself, apparantly unbothered. Without too much difficulty I managed to catch him in a plastic container and release him outside, much to Barney's disappointment.

Our modern use of the word worry started out life in a similar way to this animal meaning, as "to cause mental anguish". It later developed into its more common modern days sense of "to feel mental anguish". Reflecting on the early morning cat and mouse tale, I felt that the original sense has much to tell us. We frequently worry ourselves, cause ourselves mental anguish. We have a lot of input into the process, and can sometimes return to an issue, just like a cat playing with a mouse. We can generate negative thoughts, imagine catastrophies, increasing our anxiety by developing scenarios which may never actually occur. In this way we "play" with a situation which may be simply registering in the body as a physical feeling and refuse to let it just be that.

As one meditation teacher reminded us, we should always notice the "add-ons" - the stories we bring to an experience. We may be feeling nervous about starting out on a new process, but then we add on stories about our worth or how our past has developed. We may be shy making friends, but then we add on a commentary as to how we will never be happy. We may have made a mistake and then exaggerate it into something that reflects our whole life and conduct.

One way to do this is to try and stay in the present, with the raw experience of the situation, and not add to it by remembering past qualities or mistakes, or move to the future by picturing certain outcomes. We can try and stop "playing" with our problem, like the cat does with the mouse, stop returning to it again and again, stop worrying it. We can try and let the situation just be, rather than returning to it, mistakingly thinking that this is a better way to "fix it". We can let it go free.

We need to examine that notion of “fixing” ....... We need to question our concepts about how we want things to be and what we want people to become. If we can let go of some of that, we can see more clearly what we can and cannot do. We can learn not to obsess about all the problems we cannot solve, but to sort through them to find the one or two things we can actually do that might be helpful. It is better to do one small helpful thing than punish yourself for the many things beyond your power and ability to change or affect. Some problems can be solved, some cannot, and some are best left unsolved.

Judy Lief, The problem with problems

Stress and worry

Researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health have found that high levels of worry and anxiety in older men may increase the risk of coronary heart disease.

This problem is probably likely only to get worse, as worrying seems to be increasing due to many different factors in present day society. A study done done by Jean Twenge, Ph.D., between the 1950's and the 1980's seems to indicate this. In it children between 9 and 12 were asked to rate statements such as "I worry about what is going to happen". The study found that normal samples in the 1980's outscored psychiatric populations from the 1950's, meaning that our everyday anxiety now matches the diagnosed fears shown by those suffering from anxiety-related conditions back then.

The School recommends a number of steps which greatly reduce risks, including regular exercise and changes in diet.

On achieving results

Sometimes the reason why we do not acheive something, or even set out to achieve something is that we are afraid of failing, or that we imagine a possible conclusion even before we have taken one step. In other words, we are already in the future when we need to concentrate on the present and the little first steps we can do here-and-now. This form of "all-or-nothing” thinking is a very common trap that people, including me, like to fall into. It essentially says, “If I can’t do it all, then why bother?” or "it is obvious I will not succeed so let me give up already"

In his book Excuses Be Gone! Dr. Wayne Dyer identifies this as one of the main reasons people do not pursue their goals. He names this the “It’s too big” excuse. He goes on to say that we tend to think of successful people as “big thinkers” when, in actual fact, successful people have a knack for thinking “small” or breaking down their big vision into small, manageable pieces.

Once you get started, you only have to do one step at a time.
Often, getting started is by far the hardest part.

Sunday morning

Calmness
comes from the ability
to let the mind
be at ease and relaxed
in whatever the situation.

Internet generation

There is no doubt that the internet brings the capacity for connection with others; however, there is an equally important downside of this phenomenon:

If boredom is the great emotion of the TV generation, loneliness is the great emotion of the Web generation. We lost the ability to be still, our capacity for idleness. When we live exclusively in relation to others, what disappears from our lives is solitude."

William Deresiewicz, "The End of Solitude", The Chronicle of Higher Education.

Let go

The river flows rapidly down the mountain, and then all of a sudden it gets blocked with big boulders and a lot of trees. The water can’t go any farther, even though it has tremendous force and forward energy. It just gets blocked there. That’s what happens with us, too; we get blocked like that.

Letting go at the end of the out-breath, letting the thoughts go, is like moving one of those boulders away so that the water can keep flowing, so that our energy and our life force can keep evolving and going forward. We don’t, out of fear of the unknown, have to put up these blocks, these dams, that basically say no to life and to feeling life.

Pema Chodron,

More mindfulness research

Some people have wondered whether the effects of the MBSR programme could be due to other factors, such as the presence of the group, people simply taking time to reflect on their lives, or whether just listening to relaxing music would have the same effect. However research at the University of Tilburg in the Netherlands found support for the effectiveness of mindfulness meditation. They looked at 40 women and 20 men who were experiencing distress, separated out different factors, and found evidence for the effects of mindfulness as an individual stress reliever in its own right, independent of other stress reduction factors in the intervention. This gives research backing to what many people have found - the practices of mindfulness are effective against the stresses which modern life can throw at us.

Nyklíček I, Kuijpers KF. "Effects of Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Intervention on Psychological Well-being and Quality of Life: Is Increased Mindfulness Indeed the Mechanism?" Annals of behavioral medicine, June 2008.

Happiness in our own hands

Whether we are on the busy streets of New York or in the solitude of a mountain cave in Nepal, our happiness and contentment are completely in our own hands. Sitting meditation enables us to rest our mind in a present and cheerful way. When we sit, we make a direct relationship to the source of happiness. At the base of that experience is a quality of happiness, which is not a sense of giddiness, but of relaxation. Wherever we are, life is going to be coming at us. But if we use our lives as an opportunity to develop and enhance our mind, we will always be able to acknowledge that we are in a precious situation.

Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche

Mindfulness and ADD

We all can suffer from a lack of ability to focus or pay attention, especially when we are stressed. However, for some people, such as children and adolescents with Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD), focusing is a much greater problem. Symptoms for the disorder include impulsiveness, hyperactivity and poor concentration. The number of cases of ADD has increased significantly in recent times, which may partly be due to the way modern society has developed: Our current way of living puts a very high demand on attention while, as we have noted in a recent blog entry, encouraging a significant amount of distraction and multi-tasking.

There are concerns with some of the medications used to treat ADD so alternatives to medication are highly sought after. A very interesting study of mindfulness meditation as a treatment for adults and adolescents with ADD was published in the Journal of Attention Disorders (Zylowka, et al.,2008). The study took typical mindfulness training and adapted it to make it more user friendly for people with ADD. They called this eight week programme 'Mindful Awareness Practices for ADHD’, or MAPS. They found improvement in self-reports of ADD symptoms. In-attention and hyperactivity improved significantly – as measured before the class, at the conclusion, and 3 months after the training was completed. Indeed, they found that there was actually even more improvement at the post 3 month mark than right after the training itself. As Dr Zylowka noted "We always think that our brain makes our mind, but it may work the other way. You can have an impact on your biology"

Mindfulness meditation has three basic steps. These are, firstly, bringing attention to an “attentional anchor” such as breathing. Then noticing when distraction occurs and letting go of the distraction and, finally, refocusing back to the “attentional anchor”. As such it can be seen as a form of “attention training” programme, and as such, examining the impact of such training on ADD becomes a very interesting question to pursue.


"Mindfulness meditation training in adults and adolescents with ADHD". Journal of Attention Disorders, 11, 737-746.

A fresh start

Abba Poemen said Abba Pior
made a fresh start every morning.

Sayings of the Desert Fathers


Each Morning we are born again.
What we do today is what matters most

Jack Kornfield

Light

In the Christian Calendar today is the feast of Candlemas. While not as old as the Celtic feast of yesterday, it does date from the 4th Century in Jerusalem, and reflects the same need to mark this period of winter with light and hope. Traditionally it was celebrated by a procession of candles and the blessing of candles for use in the home.

From time to time difficulties occur in our lives which can then seem dark and without hope. Bringing awareness to what is going on inside us at those moments can allow light to shine in the darkness. Simply sitting, seeing what arises and passes away in the mind and body and naming it, allows what we experience to become something known and understood, rather than something shaped entirely by invisible, unconscious conditioning.

Within our darkest night, we kindle a fire that never dies away.

When we meditate, we’re not idly passing time. In following the breath and learning to deal with our thoughts, we’re laying the foundation for a shift in attitude that has the power to change our lives in a truly meaningful way. There’s a lot of darkness and aggression in our world. Developing our best qualities has an immediate effect on ourselves and others. When we apply ourselves in practice, we’re not only doing something very present; we’re also creating the conditions for how our lives can move forward.

Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche

Bits and pieces

God is not all in one place complete,

God is in the bits and pieces of everyday,

a kiss here, a smile there,

and sometimes tears.

Patrick Kavanagh

Lá Féile Bríde

Today in Ireland is celebrated Lá Féile Bríde, St. Brigid's Day, the second patron of Ireland after Saint Patrick. In Pre-Christian times on this day was celebrated the Celtic festival of Imbolc which announced the beginning of Spring, the beginning of new life. It was connected to the fertility of animals and of the earth and the ancient mother goddess in her maiden aspect. The Irish Church took aspects of the ancient feast and applied them to St. Brigid who was looked for on this day to bless animals and crops. She was renowned for her generosity and hospitality, two of the principal characteristics of the Celtic church. On this day the tradition was to bake fresh food and send some to neighbours who were needy.

Today was celebrated because it is the midway point between the winter and the spring solstice, and was seen as the time when hope begins to stir because Spring will soon be here. You would not think so here this morning when temperatures dropped to minus 10. However the ancient wisdom reminds us that new life is not far away even if the earth or our lives seem barren and cold. It was a day for lighting a fire, for announcing warmth and light in the dark time of winter. Hope returns. An old Irish poem says of this day Anois teacht an Earraigh beidh an lá dul chun síneadh, - Spring is coming back and the days start getting longer. New life, warmer days, growth, hope, hospitality and generosity. An ancient message relevant for us on this day.

Monkey mind

The biggest hindrance to (mindfulness) is constant intrusive thoughts.

This is normal for everyone and from the beginning you should expect it. The nature of our mind is to think, and it is childish to imagine that we can simply turn that process off when we wish to.

Our minds have been almost completely out of control for most of our life.

Recognizing this can help us to be practical and patient—it may take us some time and a lot of skillful practice to tame the crazy “monkey mind.”

Bob Sharples