Since I’m not going to Los Angeles for the Cleanse with Byron Katie next week, I’m going to offer my own mental cleanse!
Part of my own mental cleansing will happen by me being on the Help Line and offering free facilitation all morning (Pacific time) on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday next week, to anyone who calls.
You can check the Help Line schedule and how it works here. My favorite is working on skype, since my headphones are so deluxe, so check for me there first (before phone).
It’s a fabulous resource for anyone and everyone if you want to sample receiving facilitation through the four questions and finding the turnarounds to a stressful concept you’ve got running in your life.
Everyone on the Help Line is there to serve! That goes for facilitators and facilitated, both.
You’ll be in safe hands either way.
Don’t be shy!
If I’m not available it’s probably because I’m already with someone else….just check the Help Line schedule and call another facilitator.
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Last night our Year of Inquiry (YOI) group met for a little extra Tuesday evening session, since we won’t meet Thursday as it’s Christmas.
We’ve been looking at our common complaints in great depth.
Out of these often-repetitive thoughts and ideas about who and what we complain about are very profound underlying thoughts.
One YOI participant found that she had a belief about an upsetting situation that sounded like this:
I should have prevented it!
Holy Moly that is a very painful belief.
When I have had this belief come through my mind, it’s been crazy discouraging.
An abortion, hurting someone I care about, being distant with a friend who wound up betraying me, not bringing something up that Iknew to address, lying about where I was or what I was doing to not hurt someone’s feelings, getting involved with a man I felt nervous about, being incredibly anxious and getting cancer, not working full time or planning for a better career….
There are many situations where we’ll think, when something difficult happens, about OUR part with great disappointment.
The part we should have known, or prevented, or been more aware of, or not been so dang unconscious about.
Ouch.
That attack towards yourself stings. Sometimes really badly.
Who would you be without the belief that you could have prevented the difficult, or absolutely horrible, thing from happening?
Some people will say “that would be letting me off the hook!”
But what if it was OK it went as it did?
What if you were actually doing the very best you could, with what you knew and believed and had learned?
What if you always have been doing the best you could?
“What’s worse, the falling rain, or your resistance to getting wet? The changing winds, or your battle against them? The grass as it grows, or your demand for it to grow faster? This moment, or your rejections of it? Consider the possibility that Life is never *against* you. You are Life.” ~ Jeff Foster
Much love, Grace
Click here to register for teleclass about learning to love yourself when it comes to money. Tuesdays 5:15 pm Pacific time 8 weeks.
I’m not heading to Los Angeles to the Cleanse after all.
It’s weird the way things unfold. Almost never as expected, never as truly anticipated.
In fact, right now I really have no idea what’s happening next week!
Except it’s not likely I’ll be driving to the airport and getting on an airplane, given I just cancelled my flights. Nope, I’ll be right here in Seattle doing many family things with my kid who is home from college, and my husband who’s having a birthday.
Staying home seems the way of it.
It doesn’t even seem like Staying Home Vs. Going To An Event is a pro-con situation. Both are fantastic.
I can even picture the joy of either one of them, the fun of each day, the activities that could be possible, the insights, the awareness, the learning, the laughing.
Sometimes….people have a bit of trouble when two choices both seem wonderful.
When there are so many possibilities!
Here’s a sneaky little thought that I discovered would sometimes cloud my clarity and make me very torn between two decisions, if I started to believe it:
Later, in the future, it would be *terrible* to feel regret about this decision.
Therefore, I must prevent that bad, shameful, guilty, disappointed feeling from ever happening.
The way to prevent that terrible, shameful, my-fault feeling from happening, is to make DANG SURE you make the right decision NOW so you feel all good later on….
….like you can say “I made the right decision, I rocked it, I made this happen, yeah baby!”
And strut across the room with confidence and pride.
Not the opposite outcome. The opposite would suck.
The opposite is very possible….so WATCH OUT.
Pause.
Pretty stressful, right?
If so much is weighing on a future moment when it could be your entire fault that you feel disappointed, or happy, then you may carry the weight of responsibility that’s very crushing.
Who would you be without the belief that this decision in the present moment is creating a future experience of happiness OR unhappiness?
Who would you be without the belief that a decision between two, or several, options is CRITICAL for your happiness? Or even other peoples’ happiness?
Wow. Seriously?
But all the books and teachings and philosophies scream that whatever I decide today invents my future, creates my reality later on….right?
It’s up to me! I needa make a good decision, really….I have to pick the “right” sandwich on the menu or I’ll have a sucky or fabulous time eating lunch.
There is a Wrong Decision and a Right Decision.
Isn’t there?
Stop!
You’re supposed to know the future?
Who would you be without that thought?
Back to what’s going on HERE.
Noticing that right now today, stuff is happening, options are being presented. I am dreaming of events, moments, time passing, jet planes, airports, hugging people, staying right here in this city, connection, conversations, being with people I absolutely love….strangers or family….all of it different incredible flavors.
Noticing that no matter where I am, it’s possible to enjoy what is.
Turning the thoughts around….
….there is absolutely no way to know how the future will go. It doesn’t matter what I choose. I look at the options with joy, I pick, it’s over.
Balance.
What if I couldn’t miss anything? What if there is no rhyme or reason or need to do anything for this outcome I think I seek? What if nothing is required?
What if there is no preventing disappointment, or generating pride, no way to determine success or failure, based on the decision?
What if none of this is *entirely* up to me?
I notice a great peace with people who stop trying to make the right decision with such vengeance.
“The Master stays behind; that is why she is ahead. She is detached from all things; that is why she is one with them. Because she has let go of herself, she is perfectly fulfilled.” ~ Tao Te Ching #7
Stay, go.
Right now, good.
Put down your burden. Fulfilled right now.
Much love, Grace
Click here to register for MONEY teleclass Tuesdays 5:15 pm Pacific time 8 weeks, teleclass, awesome insights into learning to love your Money Story.
“He/she shouldn’t act that way in front of me. He/she shouldn’t like anyone else. She/he shouldn’t have a history with another woman. She/he should leave him alone. She/he shouldn’t exist. This shouldn’t be happening.”
When I read or hear these kinds of thoughts, I notice many people might think almost immediately afterwards, before these thoughts are even completed practically….
….that they shouldn’t be thinking them.
I’m beyond on all that, right?
I don’t have these kinds of thoughts! I don’t care which boyfriend is now with someone else, or what my partner once had with another!
That kind of thinking is for people who are attaching too much to the story of their partner, or stories about love and commitment and intimacy!
And yet….
….even the most brilliant, thoughtful, loving, kind people will have concerns that they want to be the only one in their partner’s life, or wish deeply that it went another way than it went.
I remember learning about a man I admire who finally found the woman of his dreams, after more than a decade of hunting and making it known to people in his world that he was searching for this woman.
He described their finally meeting, the fire that burned, the knowing. He described the fun, the wildness, the marriage proposal, the fights and make-up conversations, the passion, the dream-come-true.
Fights? They have fights? Like yelling and intense words?
Yes.
Oh, I thought.
I do not have that in my marriage. That sounds different. The freedom, the energy, the action, the zest, the fervor.
But I immediately laughed…it’s funny how the mind will compare, and decide you lose, or something a wee bit on the edge should be different.
Many people contact me because of terrible jealousy.
People are brilliant and wise. They know it is something going on inside their own minds, which is why they contact me in the first place, since they know self-inquiry will help them see the picture and question it honestly.
It’s like closing the gap between this knowing that they are attaching to something, but not sure how to stop.
The first thing to do, if you notice you feel jealous or envious of someone else, especially when it comes to love, is to allow your raging teenage or childish voice to write down what you’re most afraid of on paper.
(It can be absolutely anything you’re jealous of–I had big envy of other peoples’ money 8 years ago that doesn’t appear to exist now–after doing self-inquiry many times on wealth and money).
Let those thoughts about what you’re so afraid of be there, instead of thinking immediately “I should be beyond this…I AM beyond this.”
Once you’re there, in that space of seeing this other man or woman in your mind and feeling pain because they are with someone else, you can write what you really think should be happening instead.
You let that little child in you speak. You’re honoring that scared part.
And then….inquire.
I found every time, the only reason I would ever experience jealousy is because of what I believed it meant: That I was worthy of being left for someone else, that I was un-wantable, that I was losing out or missing out, that I needed to be something MORE than what I was, or LESS.
Who would you be without the belief that it’s terrible if someone you care about wants to go be with someone else? Who would you bewithout the belief that it means you’re missin’ out, or you’re abandoned, or you’re not as good as that other person?
Who would you be in your present moment, if NONE OF THESE MEANINGS are true?
I notice without using my busy mind which loves to make comparisons….
….they are just pictures floating through like a breeze. These images are very small. They are unimportant.
They are almost funny.
Actually they may make you laugh.
If you turned around the beliefs that it’s bad when someone goes off to be with someone else…..
…..WOW.
What would you notice? What is that like?
How could it be an advantage for you, a wonderful and marvelous and incredible experience that this person is doing what they’re doing, has done what they’ve done?
What does that make available or possible for you?
Could you open up to the idea that it should happen exactly the way it is, so far?
What if it has nothing to do with your worth….or even beyond that….what if it means you are deeply worthy and your are very want-able somewhere else?
What does it take for you to wake up and see how amazing you are?
How has it been that the person in question does you a favor, by having this history, or moving or acting the way they do?
“You see persons and things not as they are but as you are….How can you love people when you need people? You can only use them. If I need you to make me happy, I’ve got to use you, I’ve got to manipulate you. I’ve got to find ways and means of winning you. I cannot let you be free. I can only love people when I have emptied my life of people, then I’m right in the desert. In the beginning it feels awful, it feels lonely, but if you can take it for awhile, you’ll suddenly discover that it isn’t lonely at all. It is solitude, it is aloneness, and the desert begins to flower. Then at last you’ll know what love is, what God is, what reality is.” ~ Anthony DeMello
Thank you to the people who helped me stay in the desert because they were unavailable.
I would have never seen, with honesty, what I was so attached to, what imprisoned me in fear and grief and anticipation.
Thank goodness, thank God, thank mystery for their courage to move away from me.
Who would you be if all was perfect, as it is, when it comes to those other people?
They helped me find myself again.
Much love, Grace
P.S. If you notice jealous thoughts about MONEY then join us on January 6th to start a new year with living turnarounds about money, your wealth, your power, your freedom, your security. It’s so fun!Click here to register.
Where I live, it’s the shortest day of the year and the longest night.
Something cranks to a slower, slower, slower pace….
….and like a huge gigantic ball rolling, it comes to a pause.
Then, time to turn back again the other way.
The atmosphere is dark in the morning, dark at night. Lights are hung all about in the city, some people going a little more crazy than others.
OK, a lot more crazy. (Have you seen the house on such-and-such street with a scene so bright you’ll need sunglasses?)
I was going to write about jealousy today, because when I get at least three people writing me letters about a topic, and what to do about it, I know it’s time to visit that story.
But for the weekend, I give you this poem for now. Because it fits so well with the celebration of light, dark, returning, going away, moving in, moving out.
Maybe jealousy fits into all this as well.
Jealousy on Monday. OK?
Meanwhile…..in celebration of what is dark, remember this.
If you have the thought “it’s too dark” or “I want more light”….
….notice the turnarounds. Notice who you would be without the belief it should be brighter than it actually is in this moment.
Can you find an important reason it shouldn’t?
I can.
Out of the darkest seasons in my heart, like the death of a friend, addiction, cancer, father dying, a broken heart, change, house lost, money lost, neglect, sadness, grief, unhappiness….
….came the most exquisite light.
Totally unexpected. A surprise. Little things, little examples. Big examples. Freedom from control. Freedom from sleep. Awareness of this precious moment, right now.
See if you can also find benefits or advantages for why that darkness occurred in your life in the past.
It doesn’t mean you have to like it, not at all.
It’s only noticing the freedom when you question that it was a complete tragedy, something to fear, something to resist.
“When your eyes are tired the world is tired also. When your vision has gone no part of the world can find you. Time to go into the dark where the night has eyes to recognize its own. There you can be sure you are not beyond love. The dark will be your womb tonight. The night will give you a horizon further than you can see. You must learn one thing. The world was made to be free in. Give up on all other worlds except the one to which you belong. Sometimes it takes darkness and the sweet confinement of your aloneness to learn anything or anyone that does not bring you alive is too small for you. ” ~ David Whyte
Recently I received an email letter from someone that is not uncommon.
She wrote about how she tried to do The Work on her own, but somehow, she wound up going in circles or not staying right on track, getting lost in some of the stories and pictures formed in her mind around these constricting, stressful experiences.
It does appear difficult to do The Work with yourself at times. It’s like doing it in a vacuum, me-myself-and-I all here together making comments, and no WISE person in sight.
I remembered how when I first tried to do The Work. Even though I had read the book Loving What Is, which explains the entire process and even has examples of Byron Katie doing it with people on all kinds of topics…..
…..when I got to the very first question, I was slightly stumped.
Is it true?
Wait. What does that actually even mean?
It seems true.
What a crazy, unusual, bizarre, challenging question.
The other questions seemed even stranger.
Especially the fourth question….who would I be without my thought?
I could hardly imagine it!
At least that’s what I told myself.
What I didn’t realize, was that it would be much easier than I knew.
It is for you too!!
I thought I’d share an exercise you can try, if you find questioning your beliefs tricky, confusing, or you don’t experience much in the way of insight or a more open mind (not that we’re *trying* to get anywhere specific with this work).
It begins with dropping the belief that there is no wise person in sight, when it comes to your own investigation.
What if there was?
What if there is some incredibly wise, open, unattached voice inside of you, who can answer these questions?
Here’s how you can access that voice:
When a question is offered, get up a change the seat your sitting in, or move over from where you are standing, just make a shift.
Take on the voice of the one who can answer with a bigger view, an aware view.
Now answer from that perspective, like you are channeling that expanded voice.
Neal Donald Walsh did this when he had his conversations with God. I have participants do this exercise in retreats sometimes.
People become shocked, over and over again, that they can even do this exercise. They are surprised with their answers and how revealing, how loving, and how caring they are. These answers come out of them! They are accessing some different place, that moments ago they didn’t see!
Someplace different than their world of “little me” who is a victim, frightened, desperate, or angry.
You can do this.
It’s not as difficult as you think.
“It’s so easy not to pay attention to it, because it’s not noisy and it’s not clamoring for attention like all the other aspects of the human mind. Egoic consciousness is always pretending to be the most important thing that is happening…..And right in the midst of all that, there is a presence, there is an awareness, an unconditioned awareness, an unconditioned consciousness. Right in the middle of this conditioned mind, conditioned consciousness, is this shining, unconditioned essence. Essence doesn’t mean a little part hidden somewhere in us, the little teeny kernel of essence. Essence means the totality, the whole thing. Essence means the truth of you as opposed to the untruth of you.” ~ Adyashanti
You are all of this, incredible.
Even if you think it’s difficult to find answers in self-inquiry, even if you think you don’t have them.
Yesterday I clicked the BUY button to purchase tickets to an event I knew was happening all year. An annual event I have loved attending in the past.
It’s a Solstice Feast! People dress in the most fabulous costumes. Fawns and Centaurs, Garlands and six-foot long loaves of braided bread, music and dancing. The great hall is lit with candles and twinkling lights. People bring magnificent food, and their own plates and forks.
I love the dreamy, dark, magical experience….like being in a theater show as a part of the “crowd” and loving the creativity all about, and the joy of celebrating light and dark.
Last year, I couldn’t go to anything normally happening this time of year.
I had major surgery on my leg, I was lying very flat in bed on this day last year, hardly able to turn over, barely able to get up out of bed to go to the bathroom.
Ahhh the memories!
So this year, I’ve been looking forward to being at events like the solstice feast, that I haven’t attended in what feels like a very long time.
But after I clicked the BUY button, a message appeared.
SOLD OUT.
This event is no longer available.
What? Seriously?
But. That was going to be fun.
I’m missing out.
Pause.
Who would you be without the belief that when you get a “no” or it turns out something isn’t available, it’s BAD.
What if it was a good thing?
It saves so much time to have this new turnaround idea appear, excited about what new, different, unknown experience will happen instead.
Sometimes people have excited feelings about how they can approach a barrier from another angle.
Perhaps they’re figuring out a great challenge, discovering the cure for polio, or inventing the lightbulb.
So it doesn’t mean giving up…just a joy at a very deep inner place that says all is well, whatever occurs.
Even if it’s nothing….silence….staying home for the evening.
That’s wonderful, too.
“When you no longer have a will of your own, there is no time and space. It all becomes a flow. You don’t decide, you flow from one happening to the next, and everything is decided for you….
It is always more beautiful here, wherever I am, than any story of a future or a past. The here and now is where I can make a difference. It’s what I live out of. Nothing more is required.” ~ Byron Katie in 1000 Names For Joy
Much love, Grace
P.S. See all the new classes and events right below here, in bright colors? You can find them on my website, and by clicking the event you’ll be taken to the right page for more information. I’d love to have you. Write if you have questions or need more information.
It’s 2 months until I offer the three-day Eating Peace workshop in Seattle February 6-8, 2015. It’s really happening. People are buying their plane tickets to come stay. People are already enrolled.
Love yourself, love your eating, love your body–the truth of who you really are
And I have a confession to make.
Last year’s Eating Peace weekend (I called it Horrible Food Wonderful Food) had three people.
My confession?
I had a push-pull love-hate not-sure feeling about marketing, promoting, even offering the event.
Who am I to help people address such a deep, anxiety-ridden, frustrating issue? An issue that lasts and lasts for people, year after year, maybe ever since they were a child?
How can I say “come for a weekend, and question your relationship with food and eating, for the better”?
And I realized in this one particular area, food and eating, so close to my heart since I had an eating disorder that almost cost me my life….
….that I still felt the power of the deep discouragement, the pain and suffering, the hopelessness other people experience around this topic.
I may have found personal freedom, but I wasn’t sure how to put it into words, or if I could really help anyone else.
At least that’s what I was thinking, and partly believing.
Last year, I took a very close look again after I successfully taught the workshop to the three wonderful people who attended, one of them via skype.
Why had I hardly said a word about offering the weekend? Why had I not posted it in the usual online places? Or mentioned it to my peeps locally? Or made flyers, or announcements, or even spent time creating it as an official “event” on facebook?
I kind of half-whispered that it was happening and secretly thought….no problem if it’s canceled if no one shows up.
Several brave souls DID sign up.
They called me on it, without knowing they were doing it. One person drove from another city to be here.
I had to step up to the plate.
I could have said no. I could have backed out. I could have continued to avoid being in this role, and stop trying.
I took it to the mat. I did The Work.
My mind had been keeping me in flip-flop mode.
This happens in tons of areas for humans. Not just offering workshops, teaching material, sharing yourself, being vulnerable, wanting to be of service, creating something new.
People flip-flop about relationships, where they’re living, jobs, schools, all kinds of “decisions”.
Here were my concerns:
This is a huge big issue, with medical and physical impact. People get upset about their food…they are challenged, despondent, outraged, furious. Even brilliant people who are very well-read, have researched this topic endlessly, and tried many solutions.
This concern is dark, frightening, powerful, addictive.
Some people might die of it, there are no guarantees for healing.
Many people won’t relax and question their stories. Period.
I don’t have all the answers……
….Eeeeeeek! I’m scared!
Maybe you’ve had this kind of experience around doing something new.
You are drawn towards something, you’ve learned something magnificent, you want to learn more, you’re challenged.
Who would you be without the belief you can’t be of service? Who would you be without the belief you need to have all the answers? Who would you be without the belief that your life experience won’t benefit others if they hear your story?
Who would you be without the belief you could make a mistake?
What I know is, I feel a persistent call to serve. I used to be so different in this department called eating. I feel so simply free now.
How could I sit back and stop sharing when people ask me questions? Everyone can have this freedom, I know it.
Yes, thinking about food is a deep, dark, powerful, unsettling process.
Yes, eating out of balance appears to depress people, kill people, make their lives miserable, and they do it anyway.
What if all those people who helped me when I was suicidal and struggling and seeing no future or believing I could never change said to me…..
…..”Yeah, I think you’re right. Why bother trying to heal from eating issues? You should just give up.”
They didn’t.
I didn’t either.
I turned my thoughts around about working with people who want to explore their troubled relationship with food and eating.
They are coming along to be of service to me.
Everyone who shows up, writes to me, or has questions is all a part of a great and wonderful path.
I may not be the one to give everyone what they need, that’s very normal. Each of us needs to discover the right ingredients, in the right timing, at the right temperature….and exchange insights with others in the way they’re moved.
But I AM going to offer an absolutely awesome workshop, for three full days with an incredible group. We’re going to have an amazing time.
To read about the details of the Eating Peace workshop cost, food, logistics and accommodations, click here (you can also register).
We’ll be meeting February 6-8, 2015 in north Seattle near my home.
And even if this is not your topic, and you’ll never take a workshop on eating issues of any kind, but you’re agonizing over something really troubling….
….everything is working itself out just right.
You have what it takes to end your struggle. You don’t have to suffer. You can put yourself out there, with pure honesty.
“As long as you think that the cause of your problem is “out there”–as long as you think that anyone or anything is responsible for your suffering–the situation is hopeless. It means that you are forever in the role of victim, that you’re suffering in paradise.” ~ Byron Katie
Question your thinking, be your honest self from the inside out, right now.
Maybe you can learn something about yourself by working with only one person, maybe you need a small crowd, maybe you need an audience of 500, or no one at all but you.
It all comes down to the same thing in the end.
Ha ha!
“To be here, all you have to do is let go of who you think you are. That’s all! And then you realize, “I’m here.” Here is where thoughts aren’t believed. Every time you come here, you are nothing. Radiantly nothing. Absolutely and eternally zero.” ~ Adyashanti
To feel the beauty, the ecstasy and joy, in what is here.
Today, and this weekend….pause.
Go much slower.
Let silence show you the way….nothing else is required.
Notice the sky, the light.
“Sunlight made visible the whole length of sky, movement of wind, leaf, flower, all six colours on tree, bush and creeper: all this is the day’s worship.
The light of moon, star and fire, lightnings and all things that go by the name of light are the night’s worship.
I am definitely going to be at the New Year’s Cleanse with Byron Katie Dec. 29-January 1st. If you are there, I would LOVE to hug you and say hello. If you recognize me, come say hi.
This month in the Year of Inquiry (YOI) groups we’re looking at our
complaints.
As we began to dive into them this week, it was really interesting how first our Tuesday call, then our Thursday call just last night both had to do with measuring something and having it come out too much, or too little.
Not so surprising, when it comes to complaints.
You can try this exercise yourself.
Sit down with a pen and paper, and write for 5 minutes the following prompt:
I complain about ____ because _____.
Just write it over and over again, making a list, adding all the things you complain about regularly, but only for five minutes.
People in YOI felt like they barely got started, there were so many.
I think of it as a certain kind of voice or energy, the complainer. Once you tap into it, it begins to almost ramp up and collect like a crowd gathering in a stadium.
Louder, louder and louder.
Finding fault or imperfection in practically anything and everything.
Nothing’s just right the way it is.
In the Tuesday group, we took this belief to inquiry: “it is inequitable”. People could find this around work, tasks, money, lifestyle, love.
In the Thursday group, we found “it is too expensive.”
Woah.
Isn’t it funny how the mind sees what is not fair, not equal, too much for me, too little for me, too much for you, too little for you….just weighing and measuring incessantly?
You may notice these thoughts appear on a regular basis in your mind.
But who would you be without them?
Without the belief that something is too expensive, or is inequitable…unbalanced, unfair, unevenly distributed, not enough, too much?
It doesn’t suddenly mean it doesn’t have a big ticket price…but without the repetitive belief that it’s true true true and that’s bad bad bad, you’re back to an inner calm.
You get to choose.
You get to free yourself from being sure things are going wrong, or dangerous, or threatening. That numbers mean you have less, or more. That there is limited supply and you need to be careful.
Try it today and see what happens.
“You find peace not by rearranging the circumstances of your life, but by realizing who you are at the deepest level.” ~ Eckhart Tolle
Recently when in silence meditating, an old face popped in my mind.
There she was, again.
I could see her smiling, the laughter we shared which was so much fun, the intelligent conversations over dinners.
My mind went into storyland and revisited several scenes. That was someone I really loved and enjoyed very dearly.
Then something happened. Suddenly she had shifted her approach towards me, accused me from a distance of outrageous things, and left me feeling shocked, puzzled, searching for how she could have been so mistaken.
The memories were strong enough to open a conversation with my husband later in the day, about whether or not there was anything I might do, any action I could take, anything I haven’t done yet to resolve or make contact or repair my part, even though years have gone by with no contact.
What I found after contemplating, looking, being open…
…is that there was nothing more to do, not right now.
I seemed to have incited her to rage, or jealousy, or attack, and now it had died down and really, the ball was very much in her court. I had already called her (several years ago) and left phone messages, written her emails and told her voicemail that I loved her and missed her.
What I got back was…..silence.
Who would I be without the thought that I need to do MORE, make it feel right, push for the dream connection and resolution like in the movies, drive a happy ending?
Who would I be without the belief that the way it was going was wrong?
Byron Katie has a great line she utters sometimes with people doing The Work….that when someone leaves you or says no to you….you’ve been spared!
Today, what I can continue to do is The Work around that confusing situation, when it pops back in.
Without the belief that something went terribly wrong…her face would pop in and I’d be delighted. I’d smile. I’d remember how fun that energy, that friendship, that connection was.
Even if someone you know dies, you can do this.
You can notice as you remember them a feeling inside of friendliness, of joy, of love….even in the middle of great sadness that you don’t talk anymore.
You can say “Oh, hi dad! How are the cosmos today?” or “remember that time when we….” or “hey, did you hear the one about ….?” when their image comes to mind.
It’s a little visitation from them.
“Grief, unresisted, is grace. It doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt anymore, it doesn’t mean it doesn’t rip your heart out….In great grief, there’s an incredible love in it. In love there’s a tinge of bitter. In true love. My teacher used to say ‘all love is bittersweet’. All things experienced fully, reveal their opposite.” ~ Adyashanti
Today from here, I feel deep appreciation even though in that friendship I experienced some of the greatest grief and confusion I’ve ever felt about a friend and what they did.
