The desire to know and recognize God, Truth, to experience that sweet space of Oneness is thought by some philosophers to be the root of all desire, the one desire.  It may be that the desire disguises itself, showing up as a wish for a new car, or a particular job.  Perhaps it shows up as some wanting for a girlfriend, a boyfriend, a relationship.  However it comes to us, there is desire. 

We, in our ignorance, sometimes think that desire itself will cease when we obtain the object of our wanting.  Yet, the moment we fulfill one desire, the moment we obtain the object of our wanting, there is another desire.  Often, even before we obtain the object of our wanting, there is still another desire.  Desire itself never goes away.  Whatever mundane satisfaction we experience in the fulfillment of one desire fades in a short while only to be replaced with a new desire.

In fact, Patanjali, in his yoga sutras, offers guidance as to how one transcends the desires of the ego and return to the purist desire of the soul, to know God.  He suggests that we be relentless in our determination to know and recognize God.  He advises spiritual aspirants to gain gradual control over the negative tendencies of the mind through vigilant self-inquiry.  He wrote that we should ask ourselves, “Why do I really desire that object?  What permanent advantage should I gain by possessing it?  In what way would its possession help greater freedom and knowledge?”  Even without going full boar into contemplating these questions, it’s easy to see how ephemeral our mundane desires are.

In all our restless wanting, we get lost and end up collecting all kinds of stuff that can clutter our lives even more .  Or, we feel that the goal of our wanting is beyond our reach.  This is especially evident in those who reach for the high goal of knowing Truth.  Clearly, as we work towards the achievement of a particular goal, we have all experienced the alluring pull to simply give up and quit.  How many students quit before they obtain their goal and graduate?  Either they fall prey to the mistaken belief that they will never reach their goal due to their own ignorance, the demands of family, or the whining and screaming of their own ego leads them down a different road.  How many times have you found yourself confronted by a particular job or goal that stretched beyond what you thought you were capable of, only to find that in your tenacious perseverance, you succeeded?

I was on the phone with a client.  I heard her gasp and say, “they’re telling me a plane just hit one of the towers of the World Trade Center.”  I remember we both carried on for another minute or so, a little in shock.  How do you actually take in information like that?  After a minute or so, she said they were evacuating her building and she had to go.  At the time she worked in a multistory government building in Detroit and I was in my cozy east Tennessee home.  Ever so gradually, it dawned on me that our country might be under a major attack.

After we got off the phone, I went to the TV.  In a dazed horror, I watched.  The rest of the day is a bit of a blur.  I know I moved between my office and the TV.   I remember the feeling of sadness and loss.  At the time, I didn’t even know what we’d lost.

I was also afraid.  The week before we had taken our oldest daughter to school in the northeast.  When we finally got through to her, I could hear how shaken she was.  I called my aunt who also lives in the northeast and she was able to get to Kait.  I remember how comforting it was to me that someone  who loved my daughter to could be there for her.  Two weeks later, when the planes were back in the air, I was on one of them heading to Boston.  I needed to see my daughter as much as she needed to see me. 

Now ten years later, I’m feeling the grief of remembrance.  Softening into this grief, my quiet tears feel like a balm to my heart and soul.  Softening into what is is so much easier on the heart and spirit than resisting it.  Softening into our pain can bring solace.  Yet, our very natural human tendency is to resist pain.  In fact, I’ve had several clients this week tell me how they don’t want to revisit 9/11 and yet they know they’ll not be able to escape it for the news is infused with remembrance.  And in this remembrance, there’s sorrow.  Sorrow won’t destroy us.  Seriously, sorrow won’t destroy us.  I suggest turning towards the pain of remembrance rather than away from it.  In this turning towards the pain, there’s the potential for release and healing.

Sometimes, telling your story can help you lean into the pain of remembrance.  Again, as we lean into that pain, we have the potential to heal that pain, collectively.  Since that brilliant horrible morning, I think that we’ve succumbed to fear and much of our current politic is driven by fear.  Perhaps holding the collective intention to heal, we can shift away from the polarized point of fear and find our way back to peace.  Or at least bring peace and fear into better balance.

Beyond our fear, we have a shared sorrow and a shared love.  Despite our differences, we share the sorrow of loss and the love of country.  In the same way, many our brothers and sisters on the other side of the world are still feeling the terrors of war.  They too, are feeling sorrow of loss and love of country.  In this time of remembrance and sorrow, may we also feel love.  May we wish each other well.  May we look past and through the illusion of our differences to the shared experience that pulses through our hearts.  There, we are One. 

I salute the bravery of our armed services.  I salute the courage and selflessness of firefighters.  I humbly salute every man and woman who offered themselves with such generosity of spirit on that horribly beautiful morning and on the days that followed.

Would you like to share what you remember?  What’s your story?

I am a big believer in mentors.  Mentors have enriched my life throughout my life.  My first mentor was Dick Olney, the father of Self Acceptance Training.  More recently, I’ve been studying with Zivorad Slavinski, the founder of Spiritual Technology.  Both Dick and Zivorad have deeply influenced me both personally and professionally.  More recently, I’ve found business mentors – two incredible women who are teaching me how to share what I have to share.  As a social worker, I’ve been challenged to find teachers who come at business from a heart-centered/service oriented place – enter Tory Johnson and Michelle Pippin.

When I’ve asked Tory about some project I’m working on, her first question is something along the lines of “what outcome are you going for?”  I love that question.  It refocuses me back to my intention.  It brings me back to beginning with the end in mind.

Well here’s where it gets interesting for me.  A few months back I did a piece of Spiritual Technology work with a friend of mine, Judith Daniel, that Zivorad calls the “Unification of Time.”  One of the many benefits of this piece of work has been that I’ve come more fully into the present with more clarity about the past and future.   At least that’s how I’ve experienced it and what my clients describe. 

This means that though I’ve had a daily meditation practice for the last almost 30 years and have long experienced the benefits of mindfulness meditation, after this work I’ve found myself effortlessly experiencing myself in the present.  For those of you who have read Eckhart Tolle or practice mindfulness meditation, I trust that you can understand what I’m talking about here.  Another of the benefits of this piece of work has been that I’ve found myself being much clearer about my goals in just about every area of life.  Further, this clarity has not come from sitting down and fretting over goals, it’s been more like I’ve become aware of goals from a purer place within, goals that are aligned with me at the deepest level.  Very cool.

Anyway, back to the beginning with the end in mind.  After this work with Judith, I found myself thinking more and more about my death.  If you’ve never contemplated your death, it’s a worthwhile contemplation.  In thinking about my death, I found myself remembering Tory’s question and asked myself, “What kind of death do I want?  And if I want that kind of death, what do I need to do NOW to set the stage for that?”  I’m beginning with the end in mind — with the awareness of my eventual death.   I’m quite certain that when Tory asks me this question, she is not intending that I think about my death, but about what I’m offering in my business.  What’s a contemplative girl to do?

This contemplation has inspired me in numerous ways.  I’m walking more, I’m coming out of the closet with offering more workshops in spiritual technology, even the way I interact seems to be changing — effortlessly.  This contemplation is putting my life in perspective in a different way.  Of course, I’ve always known that I will one day die.  But somehow holding that contemplation has opened up life for me in a new way.  It feels like I’m living more fully, more freely.

It’s like Steve Jobs said, “Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.”

How do you stay on track with living more fully and following your heart?

At dinner the other night with a group of friends, my friend Ginny shared pictures and stories from a trip she took to Bali.  For me, what was striking about the conversation was how she kept coming back to the word “freedom.”  Ginny also touched on something that I’ve been thinking about for a very long time now, that our freedom is also our responsibility.  She illustrated this with a great story about an elephant driver, Mu.

Mu

It seems that Mu was pegged to enter banking as a career.  Then to the dismay and hopefully eventual acceptance of his family, he chose to become an elephant driver.  He was insistent that he couldn’t be happy as a banker.  He needed to be an elephant driver.  Mu took up the reins of his life and chose his path.  Freedom.  Mu embraced the responsibility for his happiness in life and chose the thing that would grant him the most happiness – elephants.

Our freedom is our responsibility.  For Mu, freedom was found in taking responsibility for his happiness and choosing that which filled his heart with joy.

Freedom.  It’s a word we toss about in political conversation.  It’s used as a way to explain our wars.  It’s also something that people use as a reason not to be in relationship.  For me, it’s a deeply held core value.   It has played out in my chosen career, in my choice of partner, and in my relentless search for a lasting experience of God, of true Freedom, not just the single experience, but the steadfast awareness that transcends the daily dramas of life.

In many spiritual traditions, true Freedom, freedom with a capital “F,” is considered to be freedom from suffering.  Moreover, suffering is thought to ultimately be caused by our being wrapped up in our attraction to this and our aversion to that – a play created by the tension between pairs of opposites.  On the other hand, Freedom lies in our ability to transcend, to end the trance of being caught up in this play.

I see this playing out in my own life and in the lives of my clients.  When you or I feel some sense of things not being okay, to me, that’s an indication that there is a tension of some pair of opposites in play and out of balance.  Bringing those opposites back into balance has the remarkable effect of restoring a sense of well-being.  This has become even more evident after having completed the training to become a trainer of spiritual technologies.

Some of you know that I’ve been studying this work of Zivorad Slavinski for quite some time.  What’s remarkable to me about this work is that it gives us processes by which we can transcend the play of polarities in life.  I was initially skeptical at the veracity of such a bold statement.  But now, four years later, I’ve seen the difference with my clients and I feel the difference in myself.  I fully believe that aphorism, “s^*t happens, suffering is optional.”  Therein lies our freedom.

Funny, I have freely moved through a variety of spiritual paths in search of Freedom.  Perhaps by the time it’s all said and done, I’ll be a little like Einstein and know a thousand ways you cannot attain self realization, freedom.  It only takes one.  In the meantime, I am delighting in the journey more than I have in years as I’m feeling more free day by day.

What about you?  What is freedom to you?  What do you think is the relationship between freedom and responsibility?

I’m a big believer in life long learning.  My mom was too.  One principle she had about learning was to occasionally be a beginner.  The way this took shape for me as a child was to take beginning dance classes.

I danced from age 5 to about 26.  Throughout those years, I occasionally took beginner dance classes.  In the early years, my sense of pride was wounded when she would insist that I take a beginner class.  I’d hang up my point shoes and wear out yet another pair of ballet flats.

However, when I hit college, I started to see the value of being a beginner.  There is something liberating about not knowing, not feeling like I have to know, about beginning.  Not knowing and not feeling the pressure of having to know something opens us up to a fresh new perspective on those things we think we know or think we should know.

It’s also humbling.  Being willing to not know, to be a beginner, is great for releasing our grip on the ego, if but for a moment.  And that, my friends, is a glorious feeling — loosening your grip on the ego.  For when that grip loosens even a little bit for a slight moment, the breath comes a little easier and the mind relaxes.  In this relaxation, it feels like my spirit can breathe a sigh of relief and shine a little more brightly.

I’m heading out tomorrow for some more training in Spiritual Technologies.  What are you learning?  When’s the last time you let yourself be a beginner at something?  What did you learn from beginning again?

Twenty years ago this year, I moved from Salt Lake City, Utah to east Tennessee.  For me, it was a bit of a challenging move.  For all its conservativeness, the culture of Salt Lake was balanced by an open-minded contingency of people.  There were lots of yoga studios, drumming circles, alternative approaches to mental and spiritual well-being.  I fit in.

I had a thriving practice and active social life.  When I moved to east Tennessee (remember this was in the days before the internet) there was one yoga studio and I could not easily find like-minded people.  I was afraid of being professionally rejected.  Being rejected as a psychotherapist meant that I would not be able to practice.  Not being able to help people release emotional pain and fall in love with themselves and life would have broken my heart.

A part of me went into the closet a little bit.  I was not fully conscious of this then.  I just knew that my clinical training was not at all like most other practitioners and my way of viewing the world was quite different.  It was clear that I was “not from around here.”  That’s really not such a problem, not being from somewhere. My early and teen years were spent as an army brat.  So I was always “not from around” where ever I was.  What was a problem was my not knowing how fully stand in my skills and understanding about personal growth and spiritual evolution while simultaneously building a psychotherapy and later coaching practice in a community where meditation was perceived as evil.

So, I shut a part of me away in the closet.  I wasn’t even conscious of doing this.  Part of me was afraid, so I hid a bit.  Even now, writing this, it’s a little unnerving.  For, I am aware of feeling small hints of the lingering fear of rejection.  But the truth is I allow for a fuller expression of who I AM when I liberate myself from fear in all of its manifestations.  That’s true of all of us.  I’m no different.

Coming out of the closet professionally is one more step in dismantling fear.  Twenty years ago, rejection meant that I would not be able to build a psychotherapy practice.  So, I unconsciously chose to restrict myself out of fear. That’s ok. Now, I think that’s just how it unfolded and it was perfect.

The short story of all of this is that I am coming out of the closet, so watch for some changes on this site. A client recently pointed out to me that she couldn’t really see the fullness of what I do expressed on my website.  Though clients for whom I am a perfect fit have found their way to me and have trusted me with their hearts.  Yet, you wouldn’t fully be able to grasp the depth of what I offer if you just poked around on this site.  Time to change that.

For instance, though I mention retreats, I don’t think that there’s any way anyone could know the richness of spiritual transformation that happens on these retreats. So, I’m coming out of the closet and will be attempting to more clearly articulate what I offer.  Stay tuned.

In the meantime, are there ways that you are hiding?  What parts of you are you keeping in the closet out of fear?  I think about the small ways that some of us hide and am reminded of the tremendous hiding that some of our gay and lesbian brothers and sisters endure.  Their courage inspires me.  If you want to get inspired to come out of the closet a little, join me and let’s take a lesson from our courageous brothers and sisters.   Check out It Gets Better.

Do you know?  Do you know how truly remarkable you are?  Or have the challenges of life distorted your view?

I think that in the ups and downs of daily life, many of us just forget how very precious we are and how truly remarkable life is.  We human beings tend to get caught up in the ups and downs and dramas of life.  In this way, it’s easy to get pulled off center and shift out of balance.  That’s where centering practice and self reflection can really serve you.  With centering practice, you really learn what if feels like to be centered and balanced in life.  With self reflection, you learn what has pulled you off center and how to get back, back to center, back to you, remarkable YOU!

A few nights ago, a ferocious storm blew through my neck of the woods.  Funnel clouds were spotted, trees down and rain blowing sideways.  That night, I was to facilitate a women’s group.  This group has met weekly for about ten years.  The intention is to explore how to fully live life from a place of True Being-ness, using peace, love and joy as the markers.  On this stormy night, it was a little touch and go whether or not to meet.  As I looked at the radar and remembered where people were driving, it was clear that our group time fell smack in the middle of  a little window between storms.  We decided to meet.

Sometimes that’s the way life is, we are between storms.  Yes?  Yet, how frequently are you living as if the storms of the past are still raging when the sun is shining, or just a few raindrops remain?  It’s a gift to learn to release the worries of the past and simply greet life in the present.  Even if that present means dealing with the debris from the past.

These days, there are ample resources to support you in learning to live in greater peace, love and joy.  There is support available to help you deal with debris?  Are you accessing your resources?  What are they?  Often, it is valuable to take a few moments to assess where the challenges are that are taking you off center.  I’ve crafted a little survey to help you look at this, it will take less than five minutes to complete.  However, the aim is that in those five minutes you’ll have a clearer picture of what challenges are taking you off center.  Wanna play?  Click here.

I’ve been re-reading a translation of the Shiva Sutras, an text from the tradition of Kashmir Shaivism.  One of the sutras reads, “Nothing exists that is not Shiva.”  Shiva, of course, is another name for all-pervasive consciousness, God, the Great Mystery, Allah, Shiva, The God of 10,000 Names.  This teaching is echoed in Psalm 139 in the Holy Bible, “Whither shall I go from thy spirit? Or whither shall I flee from thy presence?  If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: If I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there.”

This God of 10,000 Names seems to have left clues about how to live a life filled with wonder, experiencing the Great Mystery in all that is.  So instead of wasting time dismissing the beliefs and ideas that don’t match our own, what if we all found some common threads and wove those threads into a coat of many colors, a coat that warms our heart and opens us to a greater sense of the wonder of the Divine, right now?  For, isn’t right now all we really have?

One of the easiest ways I’ve found to bring myself back to now is to use my senses.  I’ve found that you can use the details provided your senses to enhance your awareness of God in the present moment.  Simply remind yourself, this thing I see, this scent, this sensation,  this sound, this taste, this, too, is God.  This, too, is God.  This, too, is God.  Our senses can take us to the experience of God or away from the experience of God.  Honoring each thing we touch, each thing we taste, each thing we hear, each thing we smell can bring us ever closer to experiencing the all pervasive consciousness of the Divine.

With this kind of honoring and respect, imagine what kind of colorful coat might we weave together!

Things don’t always unfold as I think they should.  Does that ever happen to you?  Come on, you can tell me.

Long ago, for Lent, I gave up having expectations, not that I’m Catholic or Episcopalian.  I just like the idea of Lent.  (Note to Self, write about Lent, during Lent!)  I found that I was not so successful at completely letting go of expectations, but it sure did make me more aware of the role expectations play in Life.

What brings this to mind is my recent trip to the mountains of North Carolina.  Let’s give a shout out to 75 degree weather!  Anyway, we were staying on the border of the Pisgah National Forest, where I fell in love, again, with trees.

What do trees have to do with expectations?

Expectations, if we hold them too tightly rob us of delight and peace in the unfolding moment.  Whereas, trees, ahhhhh, trees ~ their very existence demands that they be flexible.  The wind blows, they bend,  The snow falls, they bend.  They don’t seem to mind the wind and the snow.

In fact, the wind seems to empty them of their dead branches, revealing even more beauty.  So, they flow with the wind and let go of what is no longer alive.

I think we can learn from trees.

Where might you need to bend a little?

Where might flexibility open the door to delight or peace in the unfolding moment?

What expectation might you be holding on a little too tightly?

How might being a bit more flexible enrich the forest of your life?

Finally, what ideas or beliefs might you release like so many dead branches if you bent with what is, rather than with what you think should be?

I love love love ‘follow my nose days.’  I aim to have a ‘follow my nose days’ at least once a week.  These days were inspired by one of my long time favorite books, “The Secret River” by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings.

These are the days I wander through my life, following my nose.  It feels like finding and re-aligning with the Current of Life moving through me in the present moment—rather than setting out to accomplish a set of prescribed tasks.

Following your nose if the mindful practice of sensing the impulse of Life within, mindfully attending to whatever I’m doing until that impulse leads me elsewhere.  Being while doing.

Humans are a hidden stream whose source is hidden. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

On one recent ‘follow my nose days,’ I felt drawn to unload the dishes, mindfully.  This lead me to cleaning out underneath the sink, mindfully.  This lead me to deep cleaning my laundry room, mindfully.  On any other day, I might have called these activities ‘chores.’  On this day, these activities led me to a state of bliss.  I kid you not.

On other ‘follow my nose days,’ I’ve read, walked, played with the dogs, rolled around on the floor and stretched.  The trick is to do whatever you are doing with complete attention and when you feel drawn to do something else, do that, EVEN if the thing you started is not finished.  There are no rules, no shoulds.

In fact, following your nose frees you ‘should’ and teaches you to release the tension of ‘should’ in each moment.  These are the days I practice living as Brother Lawrence, as if there were no one but Thee and Me in the world.

The perfectly precious gift of following my nose is realigning myself with the Current of Life in me.  The bonus prize is the pure peace that comes from aligning with that Current.

If you can’t take a full day, take a morning or an afternoon.

If you can’t take a morning or an afternoon, take an hour.

If you can’t take an hour, take a half hour.

Follow your nose.  What happens?  What Wisdom flows to you when you are aligned with the Current of Life in you?  Can you sense the Source of your stream?  I’d love to hear your stories.