Grace Notes

Right now in Year of Inquiry, we’re looking at what we believe is the worst that can happen.

When I first read Loving What Is by Byron Katie, my brain went on alert when I read the part about considering your worst nightmares, and inquiring into the truth.

No.

I don’t want to look at that.

Death, physical impairment, crushing abandonment, whole countries being devastated by earthquakes or volcanoes, suicide, losing everything, the horror of war and cruelty, bizarre and sick abuse, death by fire, death by drowning, death by falling, death by car accident, death by cancer.

Do I have to look at all this?

Ugh.

But I must confess….even though I didn’t want to really think about this, I saw a theme there.

Pain and death.

It was obvious I had a few beliefs about these two things.

As in…..run for your life!!!!!

Do. Not. Go. There.

But then, I had to admit.

Avoiding any thought of death, ever, had not particularly taken any of my sheer terror away.

Being completely against pain (including emotional pain) had not exactly made it easy to face pain.

What if looking more closely at situations that created and generated terrible pain…..assisted the healing process?

I had learned long ago in therapy that the only way to really sort out my feelings about events I didn’t like, or situations I found troubling, was to talk about them honestly.

This step was a huge one.

I began to have conversations about things I found really hard and difficult, in therapy, long before I encountered this self-inquiry process called The Work.

Talking about hard times was a huge relief. Wise mentors and therapists, by listening alone, brought a new acceptance to what I had gone through that felt like crap.

By reviewing a terrible story, with good questions, the story felt more bearable.

Relaxing happened. Acceptance happened. Connection happened.

But I still had strong beliefs that I’d be better off without those things every having happened at all.

THAT would have been the best thing. Any ordeal actually NOT happening.

Good thing I bumped into self-inquiry and The Work later on, because it has been amazing to continuously investigate suffering, pain, death and loss.

It doesn’t mean you have to like these things.

I don’t.

I prefer happiness, no pain, life and abundance (or, my mind does).

I like the idea of my dad living a much longer life, rather than dying of leukemia close the age I am right now and never meeting a single future grandchild.

However, all the stories I see about death in my life, in others’ lives, are more blended, unknown, strange and mysterious. And I can see incredible benefits sometimes. Shocking.

So once again, I get to visit the planet called The Worst That Could Ever Happen with the brave inquirers who do their work in Year of Inquiry.

Here’s a powerful underlying belief I notice still re-emerging the other day.

There is such a thing as unbearable pain.

Any of those tormenting images of death, loss, horror…they are unbearable.

Is it true?

Deep breath. I can hardly believe it, but my answer is “no”.

Because I notice, even if I am raging and screaming on the inside (or outside) with fear, even if I see terrible visions and pictures, even when I haven’t been able to sleep at night because I am afraid of the nightmares, even in the depression….

….none of it has killed me. Ever.

It has all been bearable.

When I believe this thought anyway (despite the facts) I am careful. I try to be super healthy, I keep a little safety zone around me, I try not to think of “bad” and scary stuff, I feel inadequate helping others who are suffering.

But who am I without the belief that nothing is unbearable?

Holy smokes.

Something deep within down to my bones just lets up a little.

Maybe it lets up a lot. It loosens. It doesn’t have to try to control anything else or feel worried about all the tough things that happen in life for no apparent reason.

Something begins to sink into the idea that I’m willing to have anything happen.

Or the ultimate turnaround idea that seems so crazy when you first encounter it in The Work…..I look forward to this scary thing happening.

I can handle it. I will survive.

I might rage and scream, but I’ll still be here in this life on this planet earth, even if I’ve visited planet The Worst That Could Ever Happen.

If I lived the turnaround…..all pain is bearable….

….what would that look like?

Even in thinking it as I write, in this moment, something opens up even further than it’s ever opened before. Everything is welcome here, in this moment.

Even a meteor hitting my cottage from outer space. Or frightening news from a phone call.

My thoughts are welcome here. They are all bearable.

I know what to do with them. Listen. Do The Work. Meditate with them. Watch. Feel.

And in being with other people, I notice a deep gratitude and love…..when I don’t believe the thought that there is such a thing as unbearable pain.

I used to feel so cautious with people. I still have an impulse sometimes to be careful, or be quiet, or to feel a little nervous…but soooooo much less than ever I once did.

Without the belief that anything is unbearable, I say yes.

Yes, I can do The Work with you. Yes, it is possible to stop suffering even about that terrible experience you had. No, you can’t move in with me. Yes, I will travel to be with you and your group. No, I don’t know what any outcome will be.

Guess I’ll just be here, living this life, sticking around and being here and noticing how so far….everything that’s ever happened has been bearable.

Including other peoples’ death. Including my own brushes with death. Including my thoughts about death. Including the inevitability of death.

Could this be true for you, too?

“Health is not the absence of disease or hardship or brokenness. Health includes all of that. It includes dying….Grief and the praise of life, side by side.” ~ Steven Jenkinson of the movie Griefwalker and founder of Orphan Wisdom. 

“If you don’t know how to die, don’t worry. Nature will tell you what to do on the spot, fully and adequately. She will do this job perfectly for you: don’t bother your head about it.” ~ Michel de Montaigne

Much love,

Grace

“I wonder what they’re doing?” 

I thought this as a big-muscled construction worker with a hard hat, heavy boots, and an orange vest dragged a “Road Closed” sign into place at the end of my street.

This is a big intersection only a block from my cottage. A heavily driven route right along Lake Washington, a long deep lake only a stone’s throw from this intersection.

(No, I don’t have a dock and I’m not on the water. Did you have to bring that up right now? I’m busy trying to investigate another thought about the neighborhood!)

So where was I.

Right.

Construction worker closing the big intersection one block away, at the end of the street where I live.

I forget about it until a few hours later, when I walk with my empty grocery bags to the corner Haggen store for supplies.

As I cross the same big intersection, this time on foot, I peer down the strangely-empty arterial, usually two lanes of traffic going north, and two going south.

Now there were about ten construction worker guys, about three bulldozers, a few cop cars with lights blinking.

After unpacking groceries, I look up on the city website to jog my memory about what’s happening.

It’s called the Flood Mitigation Project.

Mitigating a flood. And helping the salmon during spawning season find their way upstream.

OK. Sounds like a reasonable plan.

You go, little town of Lake Forest Park!

Stop the floods in the winter! (When sometimes the water in the creeks rise up so high this same road is underwater and peoples’ basements are flooded)! Help the fish!

Why not. If my taxes went to this, good.

My husband comes home in the evening and comments as he enters the house “Wow, serious traffic from the construction project.”

We forget all about it and go to bed later.

And then.

KABBBBOOOOOOMMMMM!!!!

The cottage actually shakes and we hear cracking, pounding, smashing and thumping noises.

At 1:30 am.

We smell big-truck diesel fumes and hear huge motors and roaring.

We have to close the window, even though its a gorgeous summer night and a little warmish.

Seriously??

They continue.

That was 3.5 days ago. The pounding is still underway.

24/7.

As in, all the time.

Inquiry on noise. My favorite.

Did you know they actually have a name for people who are bugged by noises?

Misophonia.

Who would I be without the belief this is too annoying, it shouldn’t wake me up, when will this be over with, how much did this cost again, I think other neighbors have left town, I should have cancelled my meet-up, if the city had told me earlier it was going to be this intrusive….

Without any of those thoughts? About noise?

Wow. Funny.

I hear big-truck back-up beeps right now in this moment, and the house just literally shook again. From the Flood Mitigation Project. That’s helping salmon.

I watch the imagination kick in with the question “who would I be without this thought about noise?”

Recalling many meditation retreats when things made sounds.

Cell phones, trains in the distance, wind rustling leaves, horns, engines, birds, hums of refrigerators, someone opening and shutting the microwave, distant airplanes, wind chimes, human voices, bangs, bells, gongs, whistles, toilets flushing.

Beep-beep-beep-beep.

Noticing almost never is there complete and total silence.

Maybe never. Ever. Sound appears.

Who would I be without the belief any of this is bad?

Wow.

It doesn’t mean I have to love it.

I COULD go stay with friends, or my mom.

But I notice, I don’t.

In some ways, I’m kind of amazed by the abundance of it all.

Somewhat entertained by all the noise and this hilarious story.

Laughing with neighbors about sleep.

Walking over to watch the construction ant-hill at night with huge spotlights and a gigantic tall crane that moves huge slabs of concrete and metal into a tunnel shape in the hole in the ground.

Marveling at human capacity to build, create, change, diverge and solve physical problems.

Just like my big operation 18 months ago now pinning hamstring back to pelvic bone….

….I didn’t have to do it. The surgeon did it.

And I definitely did not like it, but I actually paid him to do it.

I was asleep.

Which is what I was most of the nights these past three nights, even if there were a few bangs and thuds where I was awakened off and on.

Noticing at the Sunday afternoon meet-up, only one person made it out of ten who had RSVP’d, and the traffic congestion made her 30 minutes late, so I got to sit and write.

And then it was the sweetest personal inquiry with such brilliant awareness, about “mother”.

The concept of “Mother”…

…sometimes the very same as “noise”.

Giving “noise” and “mother” attention, allowing it to be there and do what it does whether interrupting, asserting itself, expressing itself.

Allowing space to investigate, waking me up.

Literally.

How is it a good thing this noise is occurring every day, every night?

I’m sleeping a little less, producing a little more. I am aware of people who are specialists helping to address a repetitive problem called a “flood”. I get to have a great laugh with neighbors in the driveway.

I like eating salmon.

I get to see how it doesn’t matter one way or another.

As a friend of mine said recently “it ain’t nothing but a jellybean.”

“You cannot find peace by avoiding life.” ~ Virginia Wolff

You cannot find peace by avoiding all noise.

You cannot find peace by avoiding your thoughts, about noise.

You cannot find peace by avoiding.

Do The Work.

Much love,

Grace