Roots, by Frida Kahlo

“Listen. To live is to be marked. To live is to change, to acquire the words of a story, and that is the only celebration we mortals really know. In perfect stillness, frankly, I’ve only found sorrow.”
— Barbara Kingsolver (The Poisonwood Bible)

“When we traded homemaking for careers, we were implicitly promised economic independence and worldly influence. But a devil of a bargain it has turned out to be in terms of daily life. We gave up the aroma of warm bread rising, the measured pace of nurturing routines, the creative task of molding our families’ tastes and zest for life; we received in exchange the minivan and the Lunchable.”
— Barbara Kingsolver (Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life)

“Close the door. Write with no one looking over your shoulder. Don’t try to figure out what other people want to hear from you; figure out what you have to say. It’s the one and only thing you have to offer.”
— Barbara Kingsolver

Tucson Sunset, photo by Licia Berry 2007

As I’ve said in the previous entry, every new cycle is an opportunity to look back and celebrate how far we’ve come.  I don’t like the idea of beating ourselves up because we didn’t accomplish certain things (although I am guilty of doing that with some frequency).  What I DO like is taking an inventory of the life lessons I’ve learned, because that tells me I am alive.

2009 is one of those years I am hearing plenty of folks ready to say goodbye to.  As one reader put it, “2009, don’t let the door hit you where the good lord split you.”  I understand, it has been a banner year for hard lessons, an intense alchemical cauldron, a trial by fire.  What is left after the purifying flames?  What will emerge from the ashes?

I am still discerning the answers to those questions…and so far, I am very excited with what I am discovering.  The “me” that is emerging is the one I have been wanting to get to know.  May she continue to come forward in grace. 

In the mean time, I have compiled the short list of lessons I have been taught (and am incorporating) by the great teacher of the year of 2009.  I offer them here to inspire you to acknowledge your own lessons of this last year, and to thank the year for the reminder that you are alive, too.

~Licia’s 2009 Life Lessons~

2009 Lesson #1-When I align with what is right for me, change goes very smoothly because I am so supported by the larger energies of the universe.

2009 Lesson #2-Even when something happens that looks absolutely awful, I am still being supported. I will know this if I am open to this possibility. If I approach the “awful” thing with an open heart and ask to know the lessons, they will be given to me.

2009 Lesson #3- Love is all that matters. Love illuminates the path, makes life a joyful adventure, full of meaning. Absence of love breeds uncertainty and fear, makes the journey a scary, unpleasant question.

2009 Lesson #4-  Receivership. I was forcibly disabled, kind of a “Sit down and be quiet!” My usual running around, trying to be in control of various aspects of my life, was taken out in a hurry. My inability to do for myself + for others created an opening for me to receive assistance, to practice being taken care of.

2009 Lesson #5- Things don’t always happen in my time frame….in fact, they often don’t. There is a larger reality at work than the one I think up with my own mind and desires….and that reality will be the one that has the last say. In the end, it will be for my highest good.

2009 Lesson #6- Go where invited.  If you are not wanted, seen or appreciated, leave.  Go to where the love is.

2009 Lesson #7-  Some decisions need to be made that defy logic.  It may not “make sense” to follow a course of action, but truly supportive, growthful and loving decisions frequently don’t fit into a rational model for life. 

2009 Lesson #8-  Community has become very important to me.  Whereas I have been fine to be a loner and independent before, now I feel a strong pull to give and receive in community, seeking and finding and relishing my soul tribe.  Allowing myself to be “part of” is related to how willing I am to open up and be human with other humans.

2009 Lesson #9-  Deep rearranging, sloughing off, gathering and healing is happening for me this year.  So much subconscious process, the evidence of which is in my dreams and in the sensation of being underwater or in deep caves…a reminder for me that there is a whole lot more going on than meets the eye or than I am aware of consciously.

2009 Lesson #10-  In the past I have been hung up on “evidence”.  This has been a way for me to deny my inner wisdom.  Evidence does not have to look like something I can see, feel, touch or remember consciously.  It can include what emerges in dreams, the feelings and the body…these are also evidence.

2009 Lesson #11-  There is a collapsing of worlds occurring within me, and it is happening faster and faster.  This brings me great bliss when I align with it, and anxiety when I resist it.  I feel I am getting closer to cohesion within, Sacred Union Within.  The lesson for me?  All is in order….Let it be. 

Thank you for the lessons, 2009, and a blessed 2010 everyone!

cells

“You will never be happy if you continue to search for what happiness consists of. You will never live if you are looking for the meaning of life.” -Albert Camus

Why am I always asking the question “Why?”

I have done that since I was very young, apparently.  The impression that I received from my mother is that I was constantly asking the question “Why?”, but that if the tables were turned and I was asked a question, that my response was frequently, “I don’t know.”  In my 44 years of searching for the meaning of life and why I am here, I have come to realize that the latter is the most truthful thing I can sometimes say.

Having it all figured out is an illusion, that much seems clear.  We can play with spiritual concepts and try them on, and sometimes they make sense to our fragile egoic minds.  Certainly there are a myriad of religions and traditions out there to choose from that claim to have the corner on reality.  But sometimes those spiritual concepts don’t seem to hold up, or they seem to be so harsh when considering what humans can do to each other.  Living through the experience of being powerless to someone else’s violence is something that will test every bit of faith and spirituality you have.

I came across the above quote this morning while considering the plight of people who are victimized by violence.  The desire of my contemplation was to find meaning in why these things happen.  I can consider that we choose to be in a certain place at a certain time, and that by some interesting combination of choices a man can rape a woman, and forever alter both their lives.   But going down that path seems to be akin to going down the rabbit hole….there is madness at the center of the illusion that we can know why things happen all of the time.  Perhaps the search for meaning comes out of our desire to control what cannot be controlled.

Life is a great mystery….it’s way bigger than can be conceived of by the human mind; I think it’s safe to assert that.  Yet we continue to search for the answers to our existence in a relentless pursuit of some shred of knowing.  When we find an answer, any answer that makes sense in the moment, it makes us feel better for a little while, more in control.  But what does it cost us to be in this constant chase?  If we are always asking questions, does that mean we are not BEING in our life?  Is the meaning of life just to live it?  And does looking for the meaning of life prevent us from doing that?

Notes as we are changing….

Peter comments this morning that he feels himself remembering what he has always known…that he is a part of the All That Is.  I see him feeling and looking similar to when I first met him…soft, open, and connected.  It is thrilling to see this!

We are talking about how we have chosen to do the awakening process; we are reading the Dan Millman books (Way of the Peaceful Warrior) and I am turned off by the completely upside down-ness of his life as he learns to be different.  It is like the years spent running off to find oneself and people being left hurt in its wake.  We elected to do it differently.

Many folks do the inner work after they have had their children…we are doing it before and DURING raising our children.  We have elected to live a fully 3-D life while doing our spiritual work.  This makes us somewhat different than a lot of people.

The fact that we are mixed up mashed up with our kids and that there are so many demands in our 3-D life is part of the sacred juggling act that all of us face.  If we are here in 3-d, it is because we are meant to be here….and to bring all parts of ourselves into the grounding of physical life.  I am not suggesting that everyone tackle inner spiritual work while having babies and jobs and PTO presidencies and such as we did; but I do think it is important to share this model so others can examine whether it is something they are waiting for permission to do in their own lives. 

This might be the reason to write the book about our family journey.

 “He who would learn to fly one day must first learn to stand and walk and run and climb and dance; one cannot fly into flying.”   Friedrich Nietzsche  

Like most babies, I learned how to walk the first time by the age of 11 months.  I crawled successfully at 8 months (seems a little late, but I’ve always been on my own timing), pulled up to standing at 8 ½ months, then the world was my oyster before one year old.

I say that I learned to walk the first time by 11 months because I am learning to walk a second time at the age of 44 years.  Yep, you read right; after 44 years on this earth, this girl is learning how to walk again.

Due to a violent and (pretty gross) compound fracture and severe dislocation of my right ankle in February, I experienced surgery, metal plates and screws, and 8 weeks of weightlessness; for me, a new meaning to the word “stillness”, and the sudden and complete absence of forward motion in my life.

Well, not entirely; the movement that I have been experiencing since my injury has been on the inside, and lots of it.  What I’m noticing is that the movement on the outer world can sometimes be a distraction from the movement in the inner world.  I discovered that I sometimes used physical movement to help me run from feelings that I didn’t want to feel.  Feeling powerless or afraid?  Go for a run or a bike ride.  Feeling angry?  Go clean something.  Feeling anything uncomfortable?  Go MOVE, do anything, but don’t sit still or else it might catch up with me.

I’m exaggerating a bit here; for the last 10 years, I have been working consciously on myself to wake up, and much of that has been about getting more still and paying attention to my feelings.  In my house, I am the one who is most vocal about her feelings, and the one who is most actively reflecting on what I am feeling.  But I live with three guys (one husband and two sons) and a cat.  Well, okay….maybe the cat wins the most vocal about how she feels award…

But all the work I’ve done had taken me only so far; then my ankle met with a series of metal stairs on a rainy day in California, and my knowing of being still so I could feel my feelings got a whole lot deeper.  That’s how it works in process, doesn’t it?  We go so far with something, then find stasis and equilibrium, then a new expansion experience is introduced and we get to grow again (oh goody!)

I am happy to say that I chose to go for it with this experience; I know that when things happen, there is the opportunity to relate to it as a victim or as a choice maker.  I wanted to harvest all of the AHAs and lessons and insights that I could from this experience.  I sure never want it to happen again!  And I haven’t been disappointed; the amazing healing and awarenesses have been profound and bountiful during my weeks of convalescence.  I can look back on it with just a little perspective now, and it feels like a precious gift to be allowed to be so vulnerable. 

I was given the okay to bear weight on April 27, “letting pain be my guide”.  I took off my “Darth Boot” (my affectionate name for my big, black, kick-ass removable cast) and started learning to walk with the aid of my crutches.  Within a couple of days, I noticed that I started to forget where I left them; that’s a good sign!  By the end of that week, I was hobbling around without any help from my rickety metal friends.

But the hobbling is a little troublesome; I look like Frankenstein, arms flailing out in my attempt to keep balance.  All that’s missing is the metal bolts in my neck and the mantra, “FIRE BAD!”  The scars are not pretty, my ankle gets swollen quickly when I am up on it, and it does hurt a bit when I come down on it.  But it’s a good pain, or so I think.  It is the pain of learning to use something in a new way.

Amongst my reflections and ruminations during this time of forced stillness, I have wondered if I was walking in a way that was not good for me.  Maybe not the physical way I walked, but from a symbolic standpoint, where was I leading myself?  How was I getting there?  Was I being forceful or was I being discerning?  Was I afraid of moving forward, or was I walking in balance and ease? 

And now that I have the opportunity to walk again, I also have the opportunity to learn to walk in a different way, perhaps a way that serves me and the world community better.  How do I want to walk in this world?  Confidently, in balance, knowing that I am supported…at ease in my own power, looking forward to my future, knowing I am part of this world and that I have something to offer…with grace, strength, discernment, wisdom, and love. 

I can’t help but reflect on what it must have been like to learn to walk the first time; I can’t remember, although I wish I could.  What would it feel like to feel the inner impulse to move, to get up on one’s feet and take a first step forward?  What kind of innate trust is there in all children as they fly through their developmental stages?  What kind of crazy motor drives the impulse to get off your knees and start walking?!  How amazing is it that we go from being born helpless to moving around at light speed in under a year’s time?  I seriously doubt that we could handle that kind of rapid growth as adults…if I picture me trying to assimilate so many changes in one year as a new baby does, I think I would explode!

I say this because I am a grown woman, in her mid forties, and I have learned to be afraid.  Life has taught me about people and things and events that hurt, and that I must be protective and watchful and wary, lest something bad happen to me.  Even when I am all of those things, sometimes bad things still happen.  That innate trust we are born with can slowly erode over time, to the point that it seems quite unbelievable we ever possessed this gift.

However, I am hopeful.  When I put my injured foot to the floor, I am in essence saying, “I trust that this leg will hold me up”.  When I choose to engage my body with the earth by walking, I am saying I WANT to trust again.  I WANT to be part of the earth walk again, I WANT to move and run and dance and play.   

As I learn to put my foot down and do the careful dance of rolling my heel and pushing off with my toes, I wonder what kind of a little girl I was when I took that first step.  Was it a joyful and exciting adventure?  Was it a feeling of complete trust and knowing that I was supported?  Can I harness that level of trust again as I learn to walk this time?  I pray that I can.   

Wendy and Ruby 2008

Well, my last biological grandparent has left this earth and become one with the All That Is.  I wish she had realized that while she was living!  Ruby died this morning around 3:00 a.m. mountain time in Tucson. 

It was not an easy death…my Aunt Wendy has willingly bourne the brunt of caring for Ruby in her last months, so she got to watch, up close and personal, as Ruby struggled to let go.  

It was back in August that I got the first call that Ruby was “on her way out”.  Her heart had stopped, but then restarted.  Everyone flocked to Tucson to see her and to say goodbye.  Much ado was made.  But Ruby had other plans.

I would receive 5 calls in the next 6 months, all saying the same thing….”It looks like she is heading out.”  But Ruby, an actress right to the end, could not resist another curtain call. 

Truly, though, what Ruby wrestled with was her fear of letting go and moving forward, as is the case with so many humans, in death and in life.  It is a hard, hard thing to watch.

In this time of crashing and burning for so many of us on the planet, we have a choice of whether or not to let fear rule us.  Just like Ruby did.  There are times when our spine is tested and it is good to stand against what touches us.  But there are times when we are facing a tsunami and we simply cannot hang on.  Do we face the inevitable with dignity and choose to cooperate with it, or do we succomb to fear and resist change, clinging to what cannot be sustained any longer?

Sometimes it is the right course of action to SURRENDER.

Some things got confirmed for me as I witnessed this struggle:

• Life flows much better if you don’t resist
• The same is true of death
• It is good to get your earthly life in order before you are making your exit
• It is good to live your life AWAKE and fully present, not in FEAR and in a triggered place of the past
• Drama does not do anyone any good, except in the case of entertainment 
• In facing death (as in facing challenges), we are revealed for our truest essence
• Ruby is exactly who I perceived her to be in my wisest moments

I am grateful for seeing her twice before she died; in these last months, she seemed to get clearer and clearer.  She said kind things to me that she did not ever say before; I felt that she saw me for the first time in my life.  What a gift for me to feel her acknowledging eyes upon me, and to hear her say she now understood some things.

I assisted in the ways that I know how; praying that she release her fear, asking for the angelic spectrum to assist her passage, and yesterday, doing polarity work to ground her in her body so she would know that the earth would take care of it for her. 

I pray for my sweet Aunt Wendy that she easily release the emotional energy that she has not allowed herself to express that has built up over these months.  I pray that the trauma of watching someone struggle in terrible fear will be a wise learning and a healing.  I pray that she will take care of herself now, and selfishly.  I pray she does not allow this to cost her too much in her life.  And I pray for her to now get some rest. 

I pray that my death is graceful and in integrity with my heart and soul, and that I continue to make peace with myself and my life so that I leave feeling clean.  I strive to live a good life; perhaps I can hope for a ”good death”.