Warehouse

I was trying to wash a mountain of dishes that had been accumulating for God knows how long. It became obvious that I’d have to unclog the drain first.

I started pulling out massive amounts of garbage. Rotted food, towels, grocery bags, old Levi’s. I realized I’d have to go deep to get it all cleaned out before I could fill a sink with clean, soapy water so I kept digging. I soon realized I’d have to go into the drain to get to the end of the garbage, so in I went.

Once inside, I saw that it led to a huge warehouse with high ceilings and heavy equipment. There were workers there too.

There were valuable items mixed in with the garbage and I made a note to self to retrieve them on my way out. Most impressive was the pale green depression glass bowls and plates.

I thought I could take what I wanted but soon realized the stuff belonged to the workers who were collecting items to sell so I left everything there.

When I tried to back out of the drain back into the kitchen it was too slippery and dangerous. I realized I’d have to find a way out through the warehouse.

I wandered through giant rooms searching for a way out. I found an opening but it was flooded with sea water and too deep to cross. Also, it was miles and miles from the house.

One of the workers was irrate because his paycheck was only half of what was owed to him. I told his wife I’d go get a twenty to make up the difference. Apparently he was owed 41 dollars and was short by twenty.

I couldn’t find my way out of the warehouse.

In one room there were two men making giant wooden chairs. I wanted one of the rocking chairs and made a mental note to come back and order one for myself.

There were many other aspects of the dream but to tell them would require too much of a back story so I’ll keep it simple for the sake of clarity.

The drain seems to be a pun about what is draining me of energy. It was stuffed full of old food and the rest of the stuff mentioned above.

The warehouse was, I believe a play on the word aware-house.

In other words I had to go into a state of deep awareness to clean out the garbage preventing me from having a clear, clean place to wash all the dishes that were piled up all over the house.

It was clear, in the dream, that the dishes were mom’s responsibility but since she wasn’t going to do them I had decided to take on the task.

At one point I realized I was never going to find a safe way out except to go back through the drain. I also realized it was a dream and kept ordering myself to wake up. But I didn’t wake up. Instead I would just end up in another warehouse room.

Obviously I did finally wake up. Now I have this dream puzzle of how to get back through the source of drain on my energy system so I can get back to my room to get the 20 dollars I promised the wife of the short changed worker.

I think the fact that he was owed 41 dollars is significant. 40 is the number of maturity and 1 above and beyond seems to indicate the required work in one area of my life was completed.

I am currently working to clear the channels in my body and mind of old fears and I’m convinced that is represented by the dream drain. It is also clear that the garbage in the drain was put there by the woman in charge of the family kitchen.

I’m awake now. I’m ready to clear out the garbage with Reiki and prayer.

Forgiveness, more than forcing the woman to clean up her mess, is called for. It’s the only way to accomplish such a huge task.

This Longing

This deep longing for God, for miracles, is as natural as longing for spring after a cold winter.

It is as natural as longing for a bountiful harvest after a summer of growing, and as welcomed as winter after the work of harvest.

So now, when I hunger and thirst for spiritual sustenance I don’t worry that my appetite for heavenly things is unnatural.

But I am happy, knowing I will have everything I’m hungry for.

I can be, as David sang, as content as a hushed child in its mother’s lap. “Like a weaned child in its mother’s lap, so is my soul within me.”

Vespers

Under the hush of evening,

There is a garden,

lush and dark with sleepy trees.

Birds chant vespers, their call and response

The peaceful denouement.

A Master

When a student begins to master Reiki she or he crosses a threshold whereby the process of sharing reiki becomes authentic and specific to the student.

She begins to have courage to translate the ancient practices into a process as original as her fingerprint. He begins to trust the flow of divine love because he no longer seeks to posses the good stuff except to share it.

The more true he or she is to their unique design, the more open they become.

They exude a childlike sense of awe because every moment is the very beginning of something miraculous; NOW is a living thing and now is the best time for original quirks that heal like only he or she can heal.

A Reiki master may come from a lineage of master teachers but it is a line of absolute original first editions, not reproductions of one masterpiece.

Holding a Space

I just completed a Reiki session for you and I followed it by holding a space for you in my heart.

It wasn’t a cosmic space with spirit lights and whirling vortices as often happens.

It was, instead, an afternoon sometime in your past or future–doesn’t matter when because in this space it is always now.

You are calm, filled with joy for the simple pleasures of golden sunlight, the sound of the fountain gurgling and birds singing, the prayer flags and ribbons dancing in step with flowing, unseen yet undeniable grace.

You sip water infused with cucumber and mint.

You are content.

Divine Intervention

I was at a breaking point. I was suicidal. But something gracious intervened.

I want to protect the identity of the other parties so I will be careful to say only the truths as they pertain to the miraculous events of the past week.

I was, to say the least, under a mountain of stress. I was in an abusive relationship.

I had decided to be like a ninja and block the blows of the other party. I paraphrased St Patrick’s prayer by asking the holy spirit to go before be to be at my back, beside me, all around, above and below me—to be my thoughts, words and actions–in fact I named all the steps of the Noble Eight-fold Path and gave full charge of myself to the holy spirit.

Then one day when I was dodging the arrows of the enemy I realized that it was ABUSIVE to attack someone the way I was being attacked. It was not that it was just mean and rude, it was literally verbal and emotional abuse with threats of physical violence thrown in for added torture.

Somehow, finally, I was able to step beside myself and feel a little empathy for the part of myself that was taking the abuse. I decided that it was not okay.

I kept turning it over by chanting my prayer and as “luck” would have it a fully furnished apartment fell into my lap. I must add here that I am also doing a world wide sadhana practice with Spirit Voyage, so the prayers and chants of all those others were working in my favor as I hope my prayers are working in their lives as well.

All I had to do was say yes. (Well, there was more work than that but it all flowed with such ease it may as well have been handed to me by angels.) I have never felt more secure. All my life I searched for security and never found it until I completely gave myself over to the care of my higher power. That is not to say I stopped using my brain and creativity and all my resources to accomplish the tasks I was faced with, but the way it all played out was so much above and beyond what I could have orchestrated on my own that I am delighted to think it was divine intervention.

Which brings me to a statement I found in A Course in Miracles.

“Anxiety has been replaced with celebration. Now [I am] carefree knowing I am cared for.”

Tell Me A Story

Please! Please tell me a story,

One I can believe, one I can believe in.

There is truth inside of me waiting to be told

And the only way to tell it is to say it bold.

I’ll tell you a dream instead because dreams don’t pull any punches.

Dreamed I was Jesus for a day;

There was a play and we were asked if we wanted to be the enemy or the saviour.

I picked the saviour, of course.

But it was cold on the battle field and I wanted to crawl under the covers.

There was a sick boy there, though, and he needed to be comforted

And since I was role-playing Jesus I sat beside him and pulled the covers up to his chin.

I smoothed them over his shivering body

it was easy

To put the child’s needs before my own.

Not easy to bear the sound of a broken rooster.

My heart broke because outside the boy’s window, a rooster was tied with a rope around one leg so he couldn’t wander.

He had lost the will to crow and made sounds like a whimpering puppy.

It was heart wrenching when I, who was role-playing Jesus, realized all I could do was pray.

Fear of Getting Fat

For years I’ve lived in terror of being fat.

For the past 40 years I was tied up in knots of fear, resolutions to not eat, resolutions to exercise more, I wanted to be thin more than anything in the world.

For 35 of those years I starved by any means necessary. I smoked, I took diet pills and laxatives and diuretics and used speed in high school. I didn’t use drugs to get high, I used them to stop my appetite.

The only time I gave myself permission to eat was when I was pregnant. Somehow food was a non issue when I was really feeding another human being.

Being skinny was the code for happiness. I believed all my problems would vanish if I were skinny. I still feel that way, but there is beginning to be a shift towards something other than fear.

At first, when the shift started, I was angry. When I was 35 I got really angry at myself for all those years of starving. I was angry at my body for needing food. I was upset about being weak.

I started to eat compulsively. I was ok during meals, but after meals I started sneaking food, hiding what I ate from other people. And I felt compelled to eat fast, to cram large amounts of food in my mouth quickly so that no one would see me eating.

As I started to gain weight I became despondent. I felt defeated. Food won. It was more powerful than me.

I’ve had different kinds of therapy and I told each therapist that my main problem was with food. (Remember, I still believed that being skinny would solve every problem.)

All the different therapies helped in their own way. But I didn’t really find relief until tonight.

I’ve been “tapping” to deal with all sorts of complaints and tonight I noticed I was feeling anxious like I usually do when evening comes. So I went inside, as they say, to find out why I felt so much tension. I discovered right away that it was FEAR that was causing the problem, specifically the fear of being fat.

I rated it a 7 on a scale from 0 to 10, 10 being the most fear I’ve ever experienced. I started tapping as I talked about the fear of being fat. When the roots of the fear or the very beginnings of the problem came, they came in flashes or mental images of events that left their marks throughout my life.

I tapped until I felt a shift. Something inside shifted and I suddenly realized I don’t have to be afraid anymore.

Even if people judge me because I’m fat or thin, and people DO judge, I don’t have to live by anyone else’s guidelines. Not the guidelines of my ancestors, or the media, advertisements, music and films, even if all those people judge me, this is my body and I decide what to eat or not eat. It’s up to me.

When that realization happened I felt the imaginary belt around my middle get looser. I breathed deeply, a long yoga breath.

When I rated my level of fear after the exhale I was at a 4.

I can live with 4 for now. In the near future I would hope to ease the fears even more and I will do more tapping to facilitate that.

I know a lot of people suffer from eating disorders. I’m sharing my story as away to extend my compassion for the others who suffer from the Fear of Being Fat. I offer you compassion and comaraderie.

I’m finding relief through mind/body integration and cooperation. I find tapping and mindfulness meditation, kundalini yoga and music as a visceral experience to be useful tools; we all have our own set of tools.

(Look for information on EFT or therapeutic tapping of the end points of the energy channels in our bodies. Also search for the Tapping Solution, #Nick Ortner, Heart Centered Therapy. #John Diepold, # Why Do I Eat When I’m Not Hungry, #Roger Callahan and many other sources.)

I still have work to do, but with tapping and other mind/body practices, I know I can do it.

I am free. You can be too.

The House is Tilted

I don’t know if it started out this way or not, but this house is crooked.

The chest of drawers and revolving book shelf slant toward the east.

The tall bookcase in the middle room leans to the north

and the floors in the front room are warped at unpredictable angles.

It’s like the house has arthritis.

I’ve always loved it’s quirkiness

Coming undone seems to be part of the nature of living. Structures, some of them miraculous, come together and then loosen up more and more with time.

Now, at 60, when I see my reflection I don’t recognize the woman who looks back.

I catch her looking at me,

One fractal to another.

To Disappear

I am not the person I dreamed I could be because she was a mirage. 

I’m becoming nobody, the real me. 

It’s a relief to be free of the constant striving to be 

More proficient, more productive, 

 pure and more pristine in matters of the heart. 

It is good to let go and know that the world will continue to turn 

If I stop. 

Now that I know who I am not I am curious about who’s left.

Choices, 

One after another. 

Gratitude

For the ordinary.

I take ownership of my thoughts.

Those that are soft

Like leaves on the stream.

And those fierce shifts in perspective

That leave me far from complacent.

I am engaged and unattached,

wondering what might happen next.  

Curiosity is my soul’s sole guest. 

House

I have recurring dreams about being in a house that I’ve just moved into. For years it was always a big house with rooms that were haunted. But it has been changing over the past year or so. I still dream I’m moving into a new house but now it is a house with light and air, big and roomy but not haunted.

Last night I dreamed there was a room with a hot tub. I was unpacking some boxes of stuff that had been left there by a previous owner. There were lots of white clothes that would work for my Kundalini practice. (I know I don’t have to wear all white like many Kundalini practitioners wear, but I have always wanted to.)

I had just unpacked a giant swan vase that would go perfect in the training room, which is what I was calling the room that housed the hot tub. The role that water usually plays in my dreams is that of the Truth. The water always represents truth. If the water is murky or dirty then the truth in my life is not clear. The fact that the hot tub was fully functional in a clean, white, marble basin full of clean hot water is a good sign. To me it says that I am getting to the truth of the matter, a matter that once caused me pain. And the truth will be giving me relief from pain.

There was also a Japanese woman there who was going to teach me the tea ceremony. The ceremony was also going to help me with my relationship with my children. In fact, the Japanese woman and her husband were both there to help me heal the damage caused by years of the trauma they endured because of my long history of severe depression.

I woke up thinking about the value of ritual and ceremony.

I woke up thinking that some of my most heartfelt wishes were going to come true.

To practice Kundalini yoga in a more consistent manner and to show my devotion to the practice by wearing the white clothes would be a big commitment, and to go by my spiritual name 24/7 would take some getting used to, but it is something I see happening in my future, when I’m brave.

Having a good relationship with my children would be the real dream come true and is my real-life goal.

I wonder what I could do today that would be brave and move me closer to my goal.