Yes is Peace (and Love)

Shenanigans and Synchronicity
Everything happens at the perfect time. 

I was thinking about you today.  Last night my friend Julie put up a Facebook post about how NBC reported the US getting the bronze in bobsledding.  Apparently, the first thing the newscaster did was ask, "Are you disappointed that you didn't get the gold?"  

We live in a culture where winning bronze at the Olympics isn't good enough for immediate congratulations.  It's no wonder, Julie posted, that so many people struggle with issues around self-worth.   

We have been taught to look outside of ourselves for happiness - good job, big paycheck, other people's admiration, financial security, access to recreation and awards.   Looking to the outside for happiness is a trap; the lack of appreciation for bronze is a perfect example.

As I was wondering about sharing this with you, my stepfather called to tell me there was a ted talk about happiness on NPR.  If you listen to it, or already did, you'll hear the various Ted Talkers say that self-awareness and being present are essential happiness practices.  

Making the shift from focusing mostly on the outside to focusing equally, if not more, on the inside can be challenging. After all, when you pay attention to what is happening internally you'll likely notice: 

• compulsive negative thinking about certain people or experiences
• obsessive worry about the future
• ruminating over the past
• unpleasant feelings in the body
• uncomfortable emotions

All of this is completely normal; these mind patterns are the result of conditioning.  Please be compassionate with yourself by being the Loving Awareness of seeing of how your mind operates.  

Today I ate a ginger chew. As I was chewing it, my throat started closing.  I would have wondered why except my throat kept closing. My throat couldn't have picked a better time for this shenanigan; earlier in the day I listened to a talk about fear by Mooji. As all of this was occurring I could hear Mooji say "tell your discomfort to give you its best shot.  Say yes to the discomfort.  No problem."  

I felt calm but my throat was closing so I laid down on the floor.  I felt completely at ease; I knew this was temporary.  My throat closed entirely.  I was not breathing for 2 seconds.  And I was not panicked; there was a complete absence of drama.   Then my throat opened again.  

Love is yes. 
Love is not a literal yes.
Yes doesn't mean doing what people ask you to do, necessarily. 
Yes can include plenty of no.   
There are no rules for what Yes looks like.    

Yes is a willingness to be in the moment rather than fight it, run from it or manipulate it. 

• I laid down on the floor. 
• Julie wrote a Facebook post. 

There are no rules for what Yes looks like. 

Loving Awareness practice gives us the courage to be with ourselves.  There is no discomfort, no crappy situation, that cannot be transformed into something beautiful:  

No matter who you are
what you're going through
where you've been
what you think you know
you have a light in your heart to transform all pain into Love.   That light turns on each time you remember you are the Loving Awareness of your experience. 

Keep practicing.  
You are essential. 

Will Smith's Advice Is: Love Like That

Keep Loving People
I doubt anyone reading this post questions the value of loving people.  As for keep:  

(Have you ever seen this quote before?)

My guess is that most of us simply struggle to find a balance between loving ourselves and loving others.  We think, "so and so wants me to do this but I am so tired. I've got to choose, love me or love her." 

Whenever we find ourselves framing experience as an either-or, win-lose situation, we are in a contracted state of awareness.  When we are perceiving experience like this we are looking through the eyes of ego.  

Loving Awareness does not require that people act in certain ways to "prove" that they love someone; egos think like that.  While egos are helpful and entertaining at times, they are not designed to Love.  Egos are designed to look after number one.  To access the Love Will Smith is talking about, we each have to connect with a more expansive perspective of who we are than our likes and dislikes, our goals, past, achievements and bank balances.  

Without a Loving Awareness practice of some sort, we will find ourselves loving from our egos which is like loving from a measuring cup, a limited supply.  

Your Art
Your "art" can include anything.  Your art may be your work, drawing, parenting, talking to people on the sidewalk, listening, organizing, driving or tidying.  Your art may be paying the bills on time, telling funny stories, washing the dishes, finding the coolest hats, sending cards or making wildly inappropriate comments at the perfect time.  Your art may be speaking the truth kindly, stacking wood, cooking, reminding or kissing.  Likely, your art is a combination of many of these things and more!

However your art looks, it does not need to be white-washed.  In fact, there is no light/love without dark/pain:  

• This story of cross-country skiing in the Olympics.
• This story of how a 3-legged dog and a boy with Schwartz-Jamel syndrome. 
• This 19-year-old discovering how to clean the world's oceans in 5 years time. 
• These celebrities reading mean tweets about themselves.
• This Love Ninja teacher. 

In every case above, pain was transformed rather than transmitted. 

Practice seeing and transforming your pain with the practice of Loving Awareness.  This will give you a shirt to share.  And if you let other people see (seeing is not transmitting) your pain, the shirt you share may be giving another person the honor of assisting you.    

If you are interested where the Will Smith quote came from, 

watch this conversation between Will Smith and Jimmy Fallon 

on the first Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon.  

the most important thing

Remember when your child, your nephew, your pet was a baby?  Remember how much love and compassion you felt for that life?  The baby cried, the dog had an accident, and there was no blame.  Sure, you may have been thoroughly inconvenienced and angry and even thought wretched thoughts, but you "knew" it was not that baby or animal's fault. 

What would it be like to love everyone with this tone?  To see everyone with that much tenderness?  To forgive everyone for being involved in situations where you feel upset? To be responsible for your own happiness rather than ask someone else to be?

Mind-blowing.                   Transformative.                    Blissful.  

Love makes teachers great, 
lawyers fair, 
bankers wise, 
surgeons precise. 
Love makes students passionate, 
leaders humble, 
politicians honest, 
police officers kind. 

Everything is Enriched by Love 
There is nothing beyond the influence of Loving Awareness.  If you're in a tight spot

• a job that feels like drudgery,
• a relationship that feels like imprisonment or
• a situation that feels lonely,  

practice saying the mantra "I am the Loving Awareness of the situation and the feelings and thinking that accompany the situation":

• I am the loving awareness of being bored to tears with my job 
• I am the loving awareness of being in a relationship that feels restrictive
• I am the loving awareness of feeling lonely when I spend time with myself  

Giving the Practice a Chance. 
Yes, make plans to change your job, leave the relationship, spend time with people who celebrate you, but don't skip being loving awareness.  Otherwise, you are simply "fixing yourself up" again.  You don't need any fixing up.  

(Remember?  You are the Loving Awareness of the thought - unconscious or conscious - of fixing yourself up.)  

Being the Loving Awareness of your tight spot will illuminate your path to release, to liberation, to opening, to flow. 

And, you don't have to feel loving.  You don't have to feel all Mother Theresa for the person or situation.  You might gag when you think of their name.  You might secretly wish that they would experience public humiliation.  No problem.  Practice saying the mantra "I am the loving awareness of the thinking that I would delight in so and so being publicly humiliated."  Or you might feel so much resentment for that person that you think to yourself, "I am a total phony to pretend like I have one morsel of compassion for so and so." No problem. Practicing saying the mantra, "I am the loving awareness of the thinking that I am a total phony to pretend like I have one morsel of compassion for so and so." 

Feel what happens next.   

Give the practice a chance.  You deserve it.  The world can use it.  You make a powerful difference.  

Be Love Now
In my opinion, Ram Dass has some of the most accessible teachings on Love.  Being Love describes his practice of looking at a picture of a politician with whom he intensely disagrees every morning as a way of reminding himself to keep opening his heart.

Whose face or name would you look at to remind you to keep dancing?

Your Loving Awareness transforms pain to light.  This affects everyone on the planet.  

Keep Dancing

Keep dancing. 
Keep practicing. 
Practice makes practice.  
Practice is perfect.  

Be open to discovering what keeps you dancing.  (Hint: if what inspires you to keep dancing is something outside of you, dig deeper.)

In several traditions, facing death is a technique to help uncover what is so precious that you would practice until it appeared.  For example, Pema Chodron poses this question: 

Since death is certain,

and the time of death is uncertain.

what is the most important thing?

  
The most important thing, for me, is to create space for love, acceptance, empowerment, joy and trust - with my family and friends, with my beloved and irritating acquaintances and with the people I have not yet met.    

The more I practice being loving awareness of experience, the more I experience being loving awareness of experience.  

This is the link to the Deepak Chopra video.  

I am the loving awareness of being me in this moment - tired, grateful and ready.   

Driving with Emma

Holding a grudge, blaming someone else and withholding forgiveness is a triage approach to pain and suffering.  It is not meant to be a long term solution.   

Sometimes, people experience something excruciating and decide that the pain they feel is a sign that something is hella effed up.  With this point of view, there is nothing to forgive.  For example, when I was 20 years old I went to Nicaragua for a month.  I had never witnessed that kind of poverty and suffering before.  (Haiti is the only country in the western hemisphere that is poorer than Nicaragua.)  I was devastated: 
What kind of effed up world do we live in that resources are so unjustly distributed and people like me could be completely unaware of this? 
There was nothing to forgive.  There was a problem to fix.  So, I became a social justice activist.  

Driving with Emma
During a long car ride today, Emma told me she heard someone say that solitary confinement is not good for prisoners.  Emma told me that is not the point.  The prisoners have a toilet, food, and a bed.  If they are bored, tough luck.  

This was a heavy conversation. 

I am not down with crime.  But neither do I support the social structures and systems in place to deal with crime.  I told Emma that.  

Emma:  So, what do we do instead?  Let people who have killed other people roam around?  How are you going to feel when that person comes to our house and hurts me?  

Me:  I am not saying that I have the answers.  I am saying that the system that is in place is not adequate. 

Emma:  Who are you to say when you don't know what you would do instead? 

Me:  Emma, don't let anyone ever tell you that you have to have the answer.  Sometimes, there are no answers.  That doesn't mean that you cannot stand in forgiveness and compassion and trust the answer will emerge.  

I mentioned these examples while we talked: 

• Amish of Nickel Mines
• Imaculee Ilibagiza
• Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa
• Marianne Williamson's run for Congress

(I could write a separate post on how grateful I am for a daughter who has these kinds of conversations with me.)

Me:  Emma, I cannot change the prison system.  I can create an internal landscape, relationships, attitude and behaviors that make  violence and resignation less likely.  

Emma:  Mom, if I die because someone hurts me and you forgive them, I will come back and haunt you.  

Serenity
The world is filled with suffering; violence, disempowerment, confusion and resignation abound.  There is a lot to forgive: 

• rape, homophobia, sexism, molestation, hate language
• taking more from the earth than is necessary or safe
• war, assault, the death penalty, violence of any kind, an economy dependent on war and prisons
• racism, segregation, oppression, stereotyping, classism
• the myth that other people need to change for someone to be happy 

When I came home from Nicaragua, I was mad at myself and everybody else for the state of humanity.  Why haven't we evolved further as a species? Why are we still killing each other?  How can we regard someone else's suffering as acceptable?

Honestly, it's a wonder we don't all just stay in bed.  

Where is serenity in the face of so much suffering?  

Forgiveness

For a long time, my barrier to the serenity prayer was thinking acceptance was condoning and that forgiveness was endorsing.  This is not true.  Acceptance simply means there is clarity that something exists independent of judgments about it existing.   And forgiveness is recognizing that:

Pain that is not transformed is transmitted. 

In other words, people who are transmitting pain are in pain themselves.  This understanding is the gateway to forgiveness.

And this understanding was my gateway to the serenity prayer.  I cannot change other people's pain, I can transform my own.  

Emma wasn't impressed by my perspective.  Which was and is fine.  I trust Emma.  She is working things out in her own perfect timing.  She does not need to look at the world the same way I do.  Emma teaches me things all the time.   

What Emma Taught Me
Think of a couple people who you think have wronged you. They may have been rude, selfish, stupid, stubborn, mean, weak, aggressive, etcetera.  You may be on your list.  You have not completely forgiven whoever is on this list.  Otherwise, you would not regard them as having wronged you.
  
Consider that not forgiving these people made it possible for you to live in a world filled with suffering, for you to wake up and make breakfast, go to work, return emails, enjoy an americano, laugh with friends and watch television while atrocities occur. 

Consider that consciously facing the full extent of suffering in the world was too much for you to bear.  Consider that your personality helped you deal with the discrepancy between reality and your ability to keep your heart open in the face of this reality, by not forgiving people who 'deserve' to be blamed.  Consider that blaming them gave you a way to (unconsciously) channel all your anger and resignation and grief.  Consider that this may have been adaptive for you at some point and time.  

Consider you are at a different point now and that you don't need to forgive yourself for learning.  

You cannot end war.  

You cannot change other people. 

You cannot remove injustice by judging it. 

You can:

• live your life in a way that makes war impossible 
• be a sustainable steward of resources 
• extend compassion to everybody
• transform pain sooner rather than later 
• be 100% responsible for everything in your life - your perceptions, feelings, relationships and circumstance
• ask people to help you when you struggle with any of the above
• assist others who could use some help

And you can practice the serenity prayer. 

Animals in Space 2

This is the set my nephew and I constructed for the film "Animals in Space 2."  We made the original Animals in Space this summer.  Benjamin, who is 6 years old, so enjoyed making the first movie that before we had aired it he began planning the sequel.  We filmed Acts 1, 2 and 3 six weeks ago.  Days after doing that, Ben called local family and friends to announce that the premier of Animals in Space 2 will be Sunday March 9th at 2:40 pm.

These are exciting times!

Relating with Others

Animals in Space is 20 minutes long; this seemed excessive for those of us kind enough to watch it.  However, for months Ben wanted the sequel to be even longer.  He thought that if we made the sequel 30 minutes, it would capture the attention of millions and we might even get famous. 

Me:  Ben, if we made a movie about watching the grass grow, would it be better if it was longer?

Ben:  Nooooo.

He didn't mention time today and neither did I.  We have 5/6 scenes filmed and it's only 8 minutes long.  It's possible we may cap this movie at 12 minutes!

In addition to shortening the film, my mom suggested that Animals in Space 2 will be more interesting to watch if family members are included as characters. Agreed.

(The above family puppets are made from photographs, file folders and straws.)  

I've been thinking a lot about my mom's suggestion.  I am like my nephew in that we are both independent and have vivid imaginations.  It's easy for me to make movies with him because, as you all know, I do the same thing! 

Seeing Ourselves 

We sat on the couch for half an hour tonight.  On his end, with markers and paper, he made up a computer game with 10 levels.  Every so often he'd engage me with something like, "Auntie Anna, level 4 is going to be called Galaxy Busters.  You can get there at 172 points."  On the other end of the couch, I read Divergent by Veronica Roth:

For most people, it's not hard to learn, to find a pattern of thought that works and stay that way... But our minds move in a dozen different directions and can't be confined to one way of thinking and that terrifies our leaders.  It means we can't be controlled.  And it means that no matter what they do, we will always cause trouble for them.

I can barely contain my excitement when I read this because it so closely parallels this quote by Krishnamurti:

Society does not want individuals who are alert, keen, revolutionary, because such individuals will not fit into the established social pattern and they may break it up.  That is why society seeks to hold your mind in its pattern, and why your so-called education encourages you to imitate, to follow, to conform.

Ben is on one end of the couch entertaining himself by making up video games and I'm on the other end entertaining myself by noticing the connections between young adult dystopian fiction and the teachings of world leaders.  

I'm not going to say any more about those connections because I imagine that most of you do not share my interest in dystopian young adult fiction.  And, I am much more interested in connecting with you than I am interested in a diatribe about socialization and freedom.  

Love Like That is a communication structure to support each of us moving from wherever we are to the next place with less resistance, aggression and strain.  No matter where we are and where we are going, we each want more freedom, more happiness, more love.   

The access to that freedom, happiness and love is remembering who you are - the loving awareness of all that is.  Don't believe me, try it out for yourself!

Love in a Van Down by the River

If you do not recognize the photo above then you are in for a treat! This is a link to the van down by the river skit.  I think these skits came out while I was in high school because I remember Chris Farley as Tommy Boy in college. Tommy Boy blew my mind.  I wasn't expecting it to be so freaking hilarious! Like Bridesmaids, except less sophisticated and intelligent.  If you don't know what I'm talking about, don't worry about it.  Tommy Boy cannot be discussed; it can only be experienced. 

Like Love. 

Love is an experience.  And like maps can only represent locations, words can only represent Love.  Love is a state of being. 

The Energy of Destruction 
Today I was super relaxed in one moment and then Emma began talking about how we live too far out and she wants to move. Honest to God, from one second to the next my body, mind and spirit went into fight or flight mode.  My chest tightened, muscles in my arms and legs tensed, my breath became shallow.  I felt anger and an urge to destroy something.  Really.  For some reason the idea of a huge pile of something to set fire to came into my mind and it was not unpleasant.  
  
I could feel all this happen, and was even the awareness of all this happening.  However, I am not sure I conjured up loving awareness; it was probably a trimmed down, no muss no fuss, awareness: 
Emma, I am not available for this conversation.  I am managing a couple other balls in the air and I'll be honest with you, I don't know how to put where we live up in the air without wanting to kick something.  I need a couple days. 

Later in the same ride she complained about how long the ride was taking.  I pulled the car over. I pulled the car over.  That's how on the edge I was. I pulled the car over, turned to her and said, Emma.  I can. Not. Deal. with moving now. I am closed about it.  I will open up but I am not yet.  This is not the time.  Lest you wonder, I said all of that in the "don't fuck with me" key.   

Where does that energy - the energy of destruction, of fire, of raging rivers, of avalanches and mudslides, of tornados and blizzards - come from and who trains people to wield this energy well? 

The Alchemy of Destruction
I've always felt this energy.  My sister can tell you that when we were growing up I was processing a boatload of anger and fear; she was often at the receiving end.  I've written before about anxiety and I; anger is also my bedfellow. For years I would provoke my sister - teasing her, manhandling her and disrespecting her things.  This provoking was an unconscious expression of anger and because it was unconscious, was sometimes mean. I was bored and angry and anxious.  I was also happy, loved and safe.  But that's not what this post is about. 

Fortunately, by high school I had an awakening that I wanted to be a supportive sister.  It became so clear to me that I would not be mean to my sister.  At that time, I had no idea what was going on with me only that whatever it was had nothing to do with my sister. I'm not saying I haven't been a royal pain in the ass since then or hurt her feelings.  What I'm saying is that I made a conscious decision not to be mean.   

That experience changed my life.  Because I was so young when all this happened, forgiving myself was not as challenging as it could have been.  Also, perhaps because I was young it was quite easy to change my behavior.  Third, my sister forgave me at various levels and allowed us to shift gears in our relationship. Looking back now, that experience imbued me with confidence in transformation:  at any moment any of us can transform anything.  

Destruction can seed transformation.  Just like fire is a powerful ally when the nature of fire is seen and respected.  We don't light fires in dry fields then turn our backs and walk away.  Awareness and respect for any experience cause transformation.  

After I gave Emma the Mafioso instruction not to speak of moving again, I felt post anger remorse. My mind wondered - was I responsible with my anger, is there anything I need to do now, did I disrupt the flow of love, is that even possible? Remembering that I am the Loving Awareness of my mind's wondering, I relax into a different point of view where destruction can co-exist with love:  

...You cannot make an omelette without breaking eggs. 

Destruction before creation...

from In the Field by Joseph Campbell

Love Is In the Air. Literally.

Edgy Valentine
February 14th 1995 I was in Esteli, Nicaragua.  My friend Carol and I wore black and made jokes about romance all day.  That was an edgy Valentine's Day.  Edgy is what I call any experience that I don't quite embrace.  When I label the experience edgy, or punk rock, I can bring whatever is happening closer to me.  Entertaining myself is a stepping stone to acceptance.  Rather than being angry and miserable, I can be punk-rock pissed and have some fun.  You see?

It works for me.  I don't entertain myself as a way of avoiding my suffering.  But, I seem to have copious amounts of anxiety, grief and anger to experience.  Honestly, it doesn't let up.  And I'm not always in a moment or mood to pause and feel my body, breathe consciously, meditate or recite a Metta Prayer.   Instead, I'll have something I am ready to do and I'm just going to do it with an edgy insecure style.  Take it or leave it. 

Love Anyway
So, if the anxiety and resistance haven't disappeared why am I still practicing yoga, meditating and questioning my thinking?  What's the use?  

I feel better.  When anxiety comes, it goes; it doesn't hang around.  And because it doesn't hang around, I am not accumulating any additional tension in my shoulders, neck, jaw or head.  For a lot of my life I was piling tension into my muscles like it was going out of style.  I had a tension habit.  

A mantra is anything that breaks up habits and creates neural plasticity.  Remember neuroplasticity?  Neuroplasticity is essential for happiness.  Practice choosing what to think.  And if you're all, "I do chose what I think," you could use more practice.   

Meta-Mantra of Loving Awareness
I am practicing with the mantra I am the loving awareness of experience.  The mantra is re-wiring my brain in a positive direction.  I am training myself to pay attention to Love.  It works!

Case in point: I began writing this post and then it occurred to me to get some shoveling done.  We already had 10 inches of snow and it was still coming down.  

I went outside and felt love from and for the night sky and snow. Beautiful, open and clear.

I grabbed the shovel and felt love for and from my stepfather who gave me the shovel and countless other items to prepare me for winter in the country.  

As I was shoveling I remembered my Dad asking me one afternoon last week,  why don't you go out before it gets dark and smooth things out in the driveway.  You know, so there aren't any lumps once this freezes.

Despite having no idea what he meant, I went outside with a shovel and smoothed out lumps. Shoveling tonight, I felt love for my dad who would have made the driveway spotless if he hadn't just had hip surgery. I felt love from my dad who I know will love and appreciate however I shovel.  

The plow guy arrived. He asked me if I needed him to come over early tomorrow morning for the second round of plowing.  Do you need to get your car out to get to work on time?  I loved the plow guy.  

I felt love from Emma who recommended I focus on shoveling out the car before the pathways.  Her sound advice made it possible for me to move my car when the plow guy was at the house.  

What could have been a drudgery was an experience with a whole lot of Love.  It's no accident. It's no miracle.  It's practice.  

If I don't practice paying attention to Love in my life, who will?  

I mean, who is reminding you that you are the loving awareness of all that is?    

My wealthy fractal self (this is a reference that Michelle might say does more to scare people than share with people) not only has a cook but a Pause and Love Assistant who reminds me.  However, I have not evolved to the point where fractal selves are anything other than entertaining ideas. So I create my life to include reminders - yoga practice, meditating, reading and listening to teachers and communicating with you. 

The Bottom Line
You are the Loving Awareness of all that is. 
You are never alone. 
When you eat, you eat with all the people who grew, packaged and shipped the food.  You eat with their children, too. 
When you sit on the couch and the sun gets in your eyes, you sit on the couch with everyone being touched by the sun.  You sit on the couch with all their friends, too.
When you drive in your car, you are on the road with everyone else. You are on the road with all the people they come from and are going toward, too.  
When you cry, you cry with every human who has grieved. And you cry with the people impacted by their grief, too.  
You are never alone. 

There is no separate self.  Imagine an apple on a tree believing it's alone and separate.  Ridiculous!

Love is always present and it's not something we have to get. Imagine someone waiting for permission before breathing? Ridiculous!

Finale
Growing up, my family vacationed at our grandparents lakeside cabin in Mount Vernon.  The cabin had a loft with a window, one foot square.  This little window was right above the bed where my sister and I slept, on the wall that separated the loft from the downstairs living space.  

During that time of sleeping in the bed with my sister by the loft window, Placido Domingo and John Denver released the Perhaps Love album.  I can remember hearing the songs as I fell asleep.  Is there any better way to end a rambling Valentine's Day post than with their duet celebrating the ineffable nature of Love? 

I didn't think so, either.  

The Road is Made by Walking

I am comforted when I remember that it is not my job or within my capacity to know everything.  The road is made by walking.  

Relationships, work, peace of mind, creative expression, are all made by walking.

But my flimsy self-image is threatened by the mystery of lived experience.  I have an identity to protect, I am a this and a that, says my self-image.  I've got to do this and have that to be me.  

In times of major change, my ego/self-image looks for a rational explanation of circumstance. Rationalizing is the work of the ego.   

What a distraction! 

Figuring things out is a distraction from lived experience. 

Get out of your head, 

and into your heart. 

Think less. Feel more. 

- Osho

I am regardless of what else is occurring because I am the Loving Awareness of my experience.  And I am the Loving Awareness of any experience.  This is a link to the experience of Canadian ski coach Justin Wadsworth.  

**Invitation to Inquiry**

Make a list of areas in your life where you are trying to "figure things out.  (Figuring things out is not a moral issue, it's not a good or a bad thing.)  
Go through each item on your list and ask yourself,  "if I never figure this out am I okay?"

A gold medal is a wonderful thing 

but if you're not enough with out it, you'll never be enough with it.

- Cool Runnings 

Sad and Grateful Love

Today, after Alice and I agreed that I cannot give to PPY what I want to give as a yoga teacher right now, I cried. 

I got home and called Michelle

Me:  I am just so sad.  I won't be on the teaching schedule.  I won't
        be a yoga teacher at PPY.  I'm sad like heart-broken sad.  But
        there is no regret, no resentment, no problem  It's just like 
        this clean kind of raw sadness.  With gratitude.  I'm just so
        grateful I got to be there as long as I was.  But still I'm so sad.   

Michelle:  Yeah, honey.  You did a good job becoming a yoga 
                  teacher.  Alice challenged you to grow and you worked 
                  really hard.  You love that.  

Me:  Exactly.

Michelle:  And, you love teaching yoga.  You get a vehicle for 
                  putting your life into practice.  

I cried again. 

Me:  I know.  That's why I'm sad.  I am grieving loss. I 
         don't have any regrets.  There are no problems.  It's just that
         my heart hurts. 

         I'm going to write about how I am so grateful for Alice and 
         PPY tonight.  I wish for everyone to be loved like that; loved
         like PPY has loved me. 

It has been an honor and privilege to teach at PPY.  

Alice taught me how to access wisdom in my body.  
She trained me to serve others.  
And she got me intimately related with my Boddhichitta heart.  
How can I begin to describe her impact?  I don't know yet.  

With the managers, sevateers and assistants, the teachers at PPY created a net to hold my life with me.  The love and support I received in the teachers room, office and lobby is Infinite and humbling.  

May that net extend outward and hold everyone.  

ICD-9 333.4

As we were cutting vegetables for dinner tonight Emma said to me, "Mom, don't you think that at a certain point you're overdoing it with things that make you happy?"

Me: What do you mean?

Emma: Well, you went to that Buddhist thing yesterday, and you are doing Love Like That and making this video and it just seems like you are always doing these things that make you happy and maybe you just have to suck it up.

Me: Suck it up?  You mean not enjoy myself so I can do what, exactly?  Is there something you want me to do for you?

Emma: No.  I don't know.  It just seems weird that you do these things just because they are fun. 

Me: Emma, please please please don't let anyone convince you that being happy is  selfish.  Can you imagine me as a mom if I was miserable?  

Emma: That would suck. 

Me: Me being happy makes you happy. You being happy makes me happy. When we are happy, we are contagious, it's a gift to everyone.  If it takes away from someone, it's not really happiness.  

Emma: Yeah. Okay. 

Pausing.  Eating.  

Me:  What do you think of this video?

Emma watches the first iteration of ICD-9 333.4.

Emma:  You need to get poster board and do a presentation or something. 

Done

Love Is Not a Secret

What secrets are you hiding?  What do you want to make sure that nobody knows?

• bankruptcy
• the way you treated your first husband
• what you said to your daughter last night
• you're using again
• stealing from work
• haven't paid your taxes in fifteen years
• you haven't had sex in fifteen years
• nobody has ever told you they love you
• you are/were abused

If you think you suck, if you think what you are hiding is really bad, I recommend seeing a documentary that streams on netflix called The Dhamma Brothers. It's about men in a maximum security prison who begin to practice meditation.  Some of these men have murdered multiple people and they've re-discovered their true nature.  You can, too.  

There's nothing anyone can do, think or feel that dims who you are - Loving Awareness.  

Maybe you feel guilty because your secrets aren't 'that bad' (whatever that means):

• you haven't done the laundry for a month
• you were relieved when your dog ran away
• someone told you you look angry all the time

There's no amount of guilt that dims who you are - Loving Awareness. 

Maybe you feel disconnected to Loving Awareness practice:

• you don't experience being Loving Awareness of disconnection
• you believe some people don't deserve love
• sometimes you wonder if this whole Loving and Awareness business is a grown up fantasy

There's no amount of confusion or doubt that dims who you are - Loving Awareness.

The blog PostSecret is a community art project that posts secrets mailed in anonymously.  You could send a secret in to them for fun.  

Be Dazzled

**Practice This**

When is the last time, or a time, when you felt dazzled?  Give yourself a moment to remember.  Remember the details of that moment - what did you see, who was with you, what was the temperature, what were you wearing, where were you? Be there again and bring the feeling of being dazzled into your body. This feeling is you.  

So why don't you walk around feeling dazzled all the time? 

Because your (as in, our) family, schools and jobs taught you to:  

• Think things through  
• Identify your position, then convince others of it's validity
• Explain yourself
• Rationalize your behavior 

None of this is particularly dazzling.  Right?

These are all functions of the brain that make experience predictable and known. There is nothing wrong with this.  In fact, this mechanism is a blessing in times of danger or when executing technical actions.  

         For example, when you hear a sound and your brain says, 

"That is the same sound that the tiger that almost mauled you 

two weeks ago made. Giddy up!"

And, when you are cooking a roast and remember, 

"last time I did this, I left it in a half hour too long." 

Thanks brain; that was super helpful!  

More Than The Known  
We live in a society that elevates the value of what can be seen, measured, predicted and controlled.  So much so that we have accustomed ourselves to perceiving the world through the (unexamined) belief 'what is best is what is known.'  

When I don't know what the heck is going on I feel uncomfortable.  I am so trained - like Pavlovian dog trained - to equate knowing what is going on with feeling safe that when I do not understand what is occurring I feel uneasy. Even when there is no danger or technical action to perform.  How is it that my automatic reaction to not knowing what is going on is to think, think, think, so I can know? How is it that it is not "natural" for me to surrender to an experience that I don't understand and let it dazzle me? 

Again, this excerpt from The Voice of Knowledge by Don Miguel Ruiz helps explain this.  Please be kind with yourself; being socialized is not a personal failing.  

Thinking can get in the way of Love when you confuse what you think with who you are. You cannot think your way into being dazzled any more than you can think your way into Love.  Love is. Love is who you are.   

Question Your Thinking 
Teachers across traditions use self-inquiry as a method of dis-identifying with thinking. Simply put, question your thoughts to experience being the awareness of thought rather than the thoughts themselves: 

Who would you be without your story?

You never know until you inquire.

There is not a story that is you

or that leads to you. 

Every story leads away from you. 

Turn it around; undo it. 

You are what exists before all stories. 

- Byron Katie

Rest Your Brain
Honor the brain by letting it rest.  When you let your mind rest, you will find it is easier to move out of your head and into your heart. When you are quiet and still it is easier to experience who you are: 
~ loving awareness 
~ loving awareness of your brain 
~ loving awareness of the thoughts you think
~ loving awareness of the stories you tell 
~ loving awareness of the feelings in your body
~ loving awareness of everything
~ loving awareness 

Be dazzled.