and this too ... thank you ... (HeartFull living)

Once the door is open, the lessons in HeartFull living just roll right in ...

Yesterday was a snow day and I sheepishly confide: I may be a weather witch.

No, truly ... I've noticed this, ahem, talent of mine. Not so much changing the weather as it is connecting with the possibilities of storm or sunshine and coaxing them in.  I wanted snow (we need the moisture) and I silently urged it on.  Now we have 10 inches on the ground and more snow in the forecast. All wonderful for a days of shoveling, sledding, building snow tunnels, and communing around hot tea and soup.   

Not so fun when one of us goes down ...

What can I say?  And this too ... thank you?

Well, that was going to be my newly acquired mantra.  That my resolve is being tested right out of the gate seems cruel but I suppose necessary.  Like trying on a new pair of boots and determining whether the pinch is due to an off fit or stiff leather. 

Last week I donned my well-suited cowgirl boots and headed off to the barn for my second session volunteering as a sidewalker for the equestrian therapeutic riding program.  I am scheduled to assist in three session although my first week the third rider had cancelled.  So the first two riders I had gotten to know last week.  

I say know, but the gift of these sessions is that all matters for me - and I assume for the riders - is this day. The rider's history is unknown to me. I am not told the cause of their injury or their illness; I am informed only of what they need this day. Even that changes as we make our way around the ring, the therapist responding to what is manifesting for the client. While  I am directed to give more or less support, to adjust my hand or body position, the therapist also checks in with what I may notice about the rider.  Witnessing shifts and changes and adapting moment by moment. 

Feeling more relaxed (in terms of what to expect) from my first week, I was happily unprepared for the third rider.  We are asked to protect the privacy of the clients, so while I will call her Gaby, that is not her real name.  Gaby arrived for her riding session in her wheelchair wearing sparkly tights, gold hoop earrings and a sunbeam smile.  Unlike the previous clients who are not vocal, Gaby was cooing with excitement. She spoke in Spanish to her family and softly repeated the therapist's English directions. Up, down, and go sounded like a Pablo Neruda love poem coming from her lips.  When she would get confused, she would let slip a shy laugh.  If she could have, she would have galloped the horse right out of the ring and into the open fields beyond the barn such was her enthusiasm and joy.

After the session, she returned to her wheelchair. Her therapist then pointed to each volunteer and said our names in turn while Gaby repeated "Lisa ... thank you." The horse was led over and dipping his head down to her lap she felt the warm air from his nostrils tickling her hands, making her erupt into her sparkling laugh.  Then stroking his face and gazing into his eyes she repeated over and over "Smokey ... thank you ... thank you ... thank you ..." 

That moment has stayed with me all weekend.  I keep revisiting the image of a girl with such tenderness in her eyes gently stroking the horse while repeating thank you. 

thank you thank you thank you ...

It sounds like a mantra, a love offering made with utter and complete gratitude and awe. It strikes me as the best way to live life with an open and receptive heart.  It is what I want to express through HeartFull living.  Gratitude, joy, surrender, welcoming, honoring, trusting.

It is easy to say thank you to the things I knowingly want to welcome into my life. Sunshine, an extra day of family time, acts of friendship and being witnessed, understood.  It is much harder to welcome that which approaches in a more threatening manner: illness, hardship, struggle, death.  But there is always choice, isn't there? 

To proceed forward or forge my own path; to dwell in the darkness or to behold the light; to focus upon what is missing or to acknowledge what is; to bash against what I cannot do or embrace what is possible.  

On this bitterly cold, winter day I can lift my face to the unexpected beams of sunlight,   don sparkle tights, and serve tea in bed to my sick girl.

For all this and all that I have yet to realize: thank you thank you thank you ... 

Care to join in on the conversation around HeartFull Living?  A truly glittery tights group is forming with special guest contributors ... 50% of the proceeds benefiting the horses in the therapeutic riding program I mentioned above ...   all the details can be found HERE.

to just STOP

One lesson I try to embody for my girl is the importance of being self-sufficient when it comes to getting one's needs - and desires - met and in tending to  total (mind, body, spirit, soul) self care.  "Be a good friend to yourself," that's what I remind her and myself frequently. I own that I can be indulgent as a mother and as my own BFF.  Like crow, I have a hard time resisting shiny, pretty things.

Sometimes what may seem like an indulgence is actually a vital piece of soul medicine.

I am immersed in Elizabeth Duvivier's course The Magic of Myth.  We don't even have one week under our belts, but oh sisters!  Already it is yielding a lifetime of themes, models, and insights as we examine the story of Psyche and Amor.  This is The Story of stories; the model for so many fairy tales and archetypal struggles and journeys and is proving to be the template for the Heroine's Journey.

Inspiring stuff in the best of times ... and vital metaphor for the dark, dank and boggy passages we - okay, I - find myself in.

fighting the fog - interesting I added leaves falling from my hands

I'm not even sure I can explicate the emotional/psychic/energetic tangle I find myself inhabiting these days.  And I can't totally blame the constipation of the seasons for my torment. 

Somehow my energetic GPS got set to funk.  And I cannot fathom how to change the bloody thing!

I know myself and I know from experience that the only way through some patches is straight through them.  Chin up, eyes forward, march. My problem is rarely do I just walk straight on through.  No, I wave my machete, attempt a few tricky maneuvers, and otherwise flail, grasp, grab and push away.  All the gestures the Buddha has proved lead directly to pain and suffering.

So what am I learning from Psyche's journey?  It is such a rich story and really, we need to sit over pots of coffee or tea to discuss all the juicy metaphors but the core of the story is a young woman's transformation from mortal to goddess (and wife of a god and future mother of Joy.)  On that path she is given 4 tasks or challenges by Aphrodite (the goddess of Love and Beauty can be a vicious and bloody bitch, but that's another theme!) which are downright daunting, dangerous and overwhelming.  What is Psyche's initial reaction to each challenge?  To throw up her hands in despair and look for the nearest cliff to fling herself from.   

I know, not what we might want in a heroine figure.  But each time SHE gives up, a force (ants, an eagle, the voice of the reeds) comes in to assist her. Her first impossible task is to sort a jumbled heap of seeds - lentil, chick peas, millet and poppy seeds - into separate piles.  Hello?!  Sound familar?

In total despair, Psyche sits "motionless, gazing at the stupendously disordered mass." She does nothing; she just sits there.  But then an ant, taking pity upon her, rounds up all his ant buddies and while she sleeps they tackle the job.  

Now, if it were left to me, I would have probably ended up rolling around in that seed pile in a fit of total derangement making the mess even worse.  The gift - the insight - from this tale for me is to recognize when it is best for me to just STOP.

Do nothing.  By not taking action, action (the sorting of the seeds) occurs at a different level.  A level, I might add, which lies outside of our sense of control.  

I find myself at the point in my journey where I am to forge a new pathway.  On my journey, there have been no clear cut routes, no lovely forks in the road and a choice between the left or the right.  No, I appear to be bushwhacking my way through and the trick is intuit which direction calls to me, is leading me further and deeper towards the heart of my forest. 

To hear, I've got to quiet all the voices, the chattering of the inner mob; to know and recognize MY truth, my fortune cookie wisdom, I've got to be still. Wait. Allow. Trust.

And most of all - stop thrashing about.  Cease and decease.  Raise a white flag and offer peace to myself.  The very best kind of self care and comfort.

Weaving in here a current project with my girl - our Comfort Tin (or a wise soul has dubbed it - heart-aid kit) 

When overwhelmed, it can be a source of inspiration and wise guidance ...

new coordinates for one's energetic GPS

And following my own advice, I'm taking time now to re-program my settings, fill in the gems ...

After pausing, it will be time to clear space, check soil conditions, gather my tools and prioritize what exactly I want to grow - and harvest - in the coming months.  Thinking clearly about the seasonality of my own life ...

Longing has its own secret future destination and its own seasonal emergence from within, a ripening from the core, a seed growing in our own bodies. It is as if we are put into relationship with an enormous distance inside us leading back to some unknown origin with its own secret timing indifferent to our wills, and gifted at the same time with an intimate sense of proximity, to a lover, to a future, to a transformation, to a life we want for ourselves, and to the beauty of the sky and the ground that surrounds us.

(from David Whyte, Longing)

heart mantra

  

 

What words do you need to hear today?

Can you offer them to yourself?

♥