When it comes to enlightenment, you have to have a sense of humor...
I was returning home from a walk a few weeks ago, remembering moments when I was single and used to go to the local bars to socialize and dance. I experienced the fairly common occurrence of a random guy approaching me who was "several sheets to the wind," "deep in his cups," or--to use proper English--"pissed."
I liked to tell myself it was because they thought I was so smokin' hot that they thought they needed the "liquid courage."
My Ah-Ha! on the subject on this particular walk was:
What if it was just because I was one of those women who got better looking after he'd had a few, or--in my case--several, eyesight-blurring beers?
Monday, May 20, 2013
Saturday, May 18, 2013
Life is a Gift, NOT a Test
Contrary to popular belief, I've realized for myself that life is not a test, a place where you have to prove yourself worthy of being--LIFE is a GIFT.
One simple statement with a huge life-transforming potency: "You are, your life is, a gift."
If you take a moment to close your eyes and feel into it, you'll become aware that most of humanity has been living his/her own life from the viewpoint of having to prove oneself through how well she performs through a series of life lessons--tests...and then we die...
What if the purpose for our life on Earth in human form was meant only as a method of self-discovery--to be a place to express and experience oneself? Doesn't every loving parent desire to give his/her child a SAFE and SACRED SPACE in which to freely choose to explore all there is to experience?
What if we don't have to prove our worthiness to anyone or anything? Proving one's worth is deeply ingrained in our consciousness beliefs--so much so, that most people are completely unaware of other easier paths. Paths like the one where life is viewed as a simple gift from an unconditionally loving Source of All that Is.
What if you don't have to fight and struggle against evil, but instead just need to compassionately and gently shake yourself awake from the nightmare or dreamworld you "believe" is reality?
One simple statement with a huge life-transforming potency: "You are, your life is, a gift."
If you take a moment to close your eyes and feel into it, you'll become aware that most of humanity has been living his/her own life from the viewpoint of having to prove oneself through how well she performs through a series of life lessons--tests...and then we die...
What if the purpose for our life on Earth in human form was meant only as a method of self-discovery--to be a place to express and experience oneself? Doesn't every loving parent desire to give his/her child a SAFE and SACRED SPACE in which to freely choose to explore all there is to experience?
What if we don't have to prove our worthiness to anyone or anything? Proving one's worth is deeply ingrained in our consciousness beliefs--so much so, that most people are completely unaware of other easier paths. Paths like the one where life is viewed as a simple gift from an unconditionally loving Source of All that Is.
What if you don't have to fight and struggle against evil, but instead just need to compassionately and gently shake yourself awake from the nightmare or dreamworld you "believe" is reality?
Wednesday, May 15, 2013
Blueberry Muffins
Blueberry Muffins
Preheat oven to 425 degrees.
Grease/butter cups of a dark (browns bottoms better than aluminum) 12-muffin/cupcake pan.
Mix topping in small bowl and set aside for last step before baking:
1 tsp. finely grated lemon rind (zest)--should look like coarse mush
2 Tbsp. sugar
Using a wire whisk, sift together in a large bowl:
2 c. flour
1/3 c. sugar
3 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. salt
Gently toss in the flour mixture until coated:
2 c. blueberries, fresh or frozen
Lightly whisk together in a small bowl:
1/4 c. butter, melted
1 egg, well-beaten
1 c. milk
1 tsp. pure vanilla
Pour the entire bowl of liquid ingredients over the dry ingredients and blueberries. Stir lightly with a fork just until all liquid is absorbed (batter will be lumpy). Spoon into the 12 greased cups of the muffin tin, filling each about 3/4 full.
*Before baking, sprinkle each muffin with the lemon zest and sugar topping mixture.
Bake until golden brown--425 degrees for 20 minutes. Best served hot out of the oven, with a smear of butter, of course. Makes 1 dozen muffins.
Preheat oven to 425 degrees.
Grease/butter cups of a dark (browns bottoms better than aluminum) 12-muffin/cupcake pan.
Mix topping in small bowl and set aside for last step before baking:
1 tsp. finely grated lemon rind (zest)--should look like coarse mush
2 Tbsp. sugar
Using a wire whisk, sift together in a large bowl:
2 c. flour
1/3 c. sugar
3 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. salt
Gently toss in the flour mixture until coated:
2 c. blueberries, fresh or frozen
Lightly whisk together in a small bowl:
1/4 c. butter, melted
1 egg, well-beaten
1 c. milk
1 tsp. pure vanilla
Pour the entire bowl of liquid ingredients over the dry ingredients and blueberries. Stir lightly with a fork just until all liquid is absorbed (batter will be lumpy). Spoon into the 12 greased cups of the muffin tin, filling each about 3/4 full.
*Before baking, sprinkle each muffin with the lemon zest and sugar topping mixture.
Bake until golden brown--425 degrees for 20 minutes. Best served hot out of the oven, with a smear of butter, of course. Makes 1 dozen muffins.
Thursday, May 2, 2013
Use "I CHOOSE," instead of "I Want" or "I Need"
I make it a conscious habit to use the phrase "I CHOOSE" instead of "I want" or "I need."
First of all, the universe is very literal--so if I state, "I want to travel," I end up experiencing staying home, wanting to travel. If I say "I need money," the universe creatively manifests an experience that I need money for.
I am the source and center of my own unique world--and the universe supports me unconditionally by LITERALLY helping me co-create everything I CHOOSE.
I've learned it's important to not get too mentally specific about my choices, because that limits them manifesting in my life--often to the point that it actually stops them from materializing. Keep your choices FEELINGLY simple.
So in order to cover everything, I just say:
"I choose to ALLOW myself, with EASE and GRACE, to live my life with joyful, OUTRAGEOUS abundance."
And I leave it at that, and let go...
With that, there is no having to mentally figure out how to make it so, there is no action I have to take--I just ALLOW and breathe with ease...and later I find myself ooh!-ing and ahh!-ing at the magic of it all.
If I had kids, I'd definitely practice "I choose" statements with them. It empowers the individual, and that way parents no longer have to try to figure out how to give their kids all their wants and needs and desires. You'd have given them the greatest gift of all--the reminder of how to create their own.
P.S.
I wanted to keep this post short and to the point, but my husband and I were playing around with "I choose" versus "I want, need" statements, and I realized two more things:
First: CLOSE YOUR EYES and say each phrase out loud.
Notice that "I choose" FEELS and sounds MASTERLY and in control of your life.
And that "I want" and "I need" feel and sound WHINY--kind of like a poor, pitiful peon begging?
Secondly: My husband stated as he was leaving this morning, "I HAVE to go to work." Notice again, how it feels and sounds like "I'm a poor, pitiful, puppet-on-a-string"?
I told him, "Put 'I CHOOSE TO' in front of that 'HAVE TO'--and then notice the difference." (CLOSE YOUR EYES again).
"I choose to have to go to work."
Suddenly you're aware that you're "having to go" to work because it's your choice as a self-master...and with that awareness, you can now make a new choice, if you choose...
Perhaps you'll choose to say instead:
"I choose to release myself from having to work."
*Rule of Thumb: Keep the word, "not," out of your choosing statements.
The co-creative Universe doesn't recognize the word, "not"--so I would recommend refraining from using it, or you'll end up choosing something you do not desire. For instance, according to the Universe,"I choose to NOT work" is pretty much the same as "I choose to work."*
First of all, the universe is very literal--so if I state, "I want to travel," I end up experiencing staying home, wanting to travel. If I say "I need money," the universe creatively manifests an experience that I need money for.
I am the source and center of my own unique world--and the universe supports me unconditionally by LITERALLY helping me co-create everything I CHOOSE.
I've learned it's important to not get too mentally specific about my choices, because that limits them manifesting in my life--often to the point that it actually stops them from materializing. Keep your choices FEELINGLY simple.
So in order to cover everything, I just say:
"I choose to ALLOW myself, with EASE and GRACE, to live my life with joyful, OUTRAGEOUS abundance."
And I leave it at that, and let go...
With that, there is no having to mentally figure out how to make it so, there is no action I have to take--I just ALLOW and breathe with ease...and later I find myself ooh!-ing and ahh!-ing at the magic of it all.
If I had kids, I'd definitely practice "I choose" statements with them. It empowers the individual, and that way parents no longer have to try to figure out how to give their kids all their wants and needs and desires. You'd have given them the greatest gift of all--the reminder of how to create their own.
P.S.
I wanted to keep this post short and to the point, but my husband and I were playing around with "I choose" versus "I want, need" statements, and I realized two more things:
First: CLOSE YOUR EYES and say each phrase out loud.
Notice that "I choose" FEELS and sounds MASTERLY and in control of your life.
And that "I want" and "I need" feel and sound WHINY--kind of like a poor, pitiful peon begging?
Secondly: My husband stated as he was leaving this morning, "I HAVE to go to work." Notice again, how it feels and sounds like "I'm a poor, pitiful, puppet-on-a-string"?
I told him, "Put 'I CHOOSE TO' in front of that 'HAVE TO'--and then notice the difference." (CLOSE YOUR EYES again).
"I choose to have to go to work."
Suddenly you're aware that you're "having to go" to work because it's your choice as a self-master...and with that awareness, you can now make a new choice, if you choose...
Perhaps you'll choose to say instead:
"I choose to release myself from having to work."
*Rule of Thumb: Keep the word, "not," out of your choosing statements.
The co-creative Universe doesn't recognize the word, "not"--so I would recommend refraining from using it, or you'll end up choosing something you do not desire. For instance, according to the Universe,"I choose to NOT work" is pretty much the same as "I choose to work."*
Friday, April 26, 2013
Fly! Fly, Birdie!
Fly away and don't come back until you're a sovereign Big Bird...
I realized today that it's appropriate for me to let go of my old role of trying to uplift and be the wind beneath everyone else's wings.
I let go of the role--not out of resentment or blame--but out of gratitude and celebration for myself, and for all those outside of me whose projects, creations, causes, and stories I supported. You all served me so well--Well Done! And much of it has been a pleasure. Many of you helped me remember to simply LAUGH at myself--and to spread my own wings and just leap--and now it's time for me to part ways.
I'm off to live my own sovereignty my own way--no more trying to mold myself to fit in with others' ideas and passions--or trying to protect them from unfriendly energies. I do need this time to disconnect, to be alone with me for a little while, in order to refocus all that love and energy and attention I gave to others, on uplifting and flowing my own self-expressions. I've realized that any time you have two or more people gathering together in order to feel better about oneself--well, the SEXUAL ENERGY VIRUS has slipped in.
I choose to completely independently love and encourage and honor me. When I've got that part down, then I can return to laugh with others from the gatherings that I so love, who have also, hopefully, each claimed their own embodied self-mastery and sovereignty. I'll return in the form of a new kind of free-living and free-loving friend, sans (without) the energy feeding.
In the old energy consciousness, we've long been accustomed to creating our ideas and passions by first garnering the outside approval of like-hearted or like-minded people, who would then supply the "belief-in-its-value energy", the "labor energy" and the "money energy" to back those causes and get our creations (self-expressions) up and flowing.
The fear is that if the old funding and old energetic support is pulled, the creation will collapse--but I KNOW, without a doubt, that it won't...
Energy never ends--it transmutes, it changes, and it flows and flexes. And if the need, or passionate desire, is there for a system or creation to continue, the energies will rearrange themselves in order to keep it flowing--even if someone like me should opt out of it. And it can happen with ease and grace for all parties--no trauma or drama necessary in the shift.
I've been holding energies for the causes that I've supported because of that old fear that I will have let my friends down. That the good things we created together in the past will come to an end if I disconnect and withdraw my financial and old manner of energetic support--and that is what was stopping me from taking that final step over the threshold into my own sovereignty.
No one needs my wind "uplifting them" to help them fly--and I don't need outside support in order to soar either...
No one really flies until they've allowed themselves to be uplifted BY THEMSELVES. You can love the living daylights out of another being, but if they don't allow themselves TO BE loved--your love doesn't matter, and their life won't change.
Remove, quit being, the crutch. Give everyone the opportunity to discover their own god within, that they can walk (whatever mode one chooses) on their own...because we each can.
I am all that I need, to fly on my own...the Source of all of us created us to do exactly that.
Fly! Soar! Be FREE!
I realized today that it's appropriate for me to let go of my old role of trying to uplift and be the wind beneath everyone else's wings.
I let go of the role--not out of resentment or blame--but out of gratitude and celebration for myself, and for all those outside of me whose projects, creations, causes, and stories I supported. You all served me so well--Well Done! And much of it has been a pleasure. Many of you helped me remember to simply LAUGH at myself--and to spread my own wings and just leap--and now it's time for me to part ways.
I'm off to live my own sovereignty my own way--no more trying to mold myself to fit in with others' ideas and passions--or trying to protect them from unfriendly energies. I do need this time to disconnect, to be alone with me for a little while, in order to refocus all that love and energy and attention I gave to others, on uplifting and flowing my own self-expressions. I've realized that any time you have two or more people gathering together in order to feel better about oneself--well, the SEXUAL ENERGY VIRUS has slipped in.
I choose to completely independently love and encourage and honor me. When I've got that part down, then I can return to laugh with others from the gatherings that I so love, who have also, hopefully, each claimed their own embodied self-mastery and sovereignty. I'll return in the form of a new kind of free-living and free-loving friend, sans (without) the energy feeding.
In the old energy consciousness, we've long been accustomed to creating our ideas and passions by first garnering the outside approval of like-hearted or like-minded people, who would then supply the "belief-in-its-value energy", the "labor energy" and the "money energy" to back those causes and get our creations (self-expressions) up and flowing.
The fear is that if the old funding and old energetic support is pulled, the creation will collapse--but I KNOW, without a doubt, that it won't...
Energy never ends--it transmutes, it changes, and it flows and flexes. And if the need, or passionate desire, is there for a system or creation to continue, the energies will rearrange themselves in order to keep it flowing--even if someone like me should opt out of it. And it can happen with ease and grace for all parties--no trauma or drama necessary in the shift.
I've been holding energies for the causes that I've supported because of that old fear that I will have let my friends down. That the good things we created together in the past will come to an end if I disconnect and withdraw my financial and old manner of energetic support--and that is what was stopping me from taking that final step over the threshold into my own sovereignty.
No one needs my wind "uplifting them" to help them fly--and I don't need outside support in order to soar either...
No one really flies until they've allowed themselves to be uplifted BY THEMSELVES. You can love the living daylights out of another being, but if they don't allow themselves TO BE loved--your love doesn't matter, and their life won't change.
Remove, quit being, the crutch. Give everyone the opportunity to discover their own god within, that they can walk (whatever mode one chooses) on their own...because we each can.
I am all that I need, to fly on my own...the Source of all of us created us to do exactly that.
Fly! Soar! Be FREE!
Wednesday, April 24, 2013
Discerning the Pity Trap
"Awakening is not POLITE...Awakening is BRUTAL..."
Good old Adamus Saint-Germain nailed it. For me, awakening was painfully brutal:
I put myself through hell in order to motivate myself to wake up. I creatively lost a boyfriend in a motorcycle "accident." I lost my beloved home on the farm, my pets, more friends, parents--myself. Shattering old belief systems in order to shake myself awake from the layers of hypnosis of the mass consciousness of humanity involved all kinds of physical, emotional, mental and spiritual pain.
See related post by clicking here: Physical Symptoms of My Awakening Self-Awareness. The rest of my blog is about all the other types of aforementioned pain that I used to help me step back out of the reality illusion I'd unknowingly created when believing I was an all-alone Little Insignificant Human Being, being tested by, and trying to please, some god "out there."
It was the only way at the time to get myself to look more closely at, FEEL more SENSUALLY--this life I was complacently and unquestioningly inhabiting.
You know, when you're deep asleep in a hypnosis and if life is always pleasant, there is no passion-fired desire to change it, much less explore the possibility of there being more to it. But pain (imbalance)--that motivates one to more quickly shift perspective and try new ways. One even begins to imagine, and to go beyond into, things once believed impossible!
I was taught to be considerate of others, to be sensitive to their needs--over and above my own.
Being polite kept me outwardly focused. We are constantly inundated with stories of the wrong and bad things in the world--and we're constantly bombarded with guilt-laced admonitions to get out there and fix it! That's our responsibility, damn it!
That POLITELY-CARING outside-of-me focus was the hook that repeatedly snagged me into playing in the perpetual game of pity for others in their stories. I hadn't realized how much it was still a culprit in my own life until Adamus pointed it out. Especially in times of chaotic distress and tragedies in the world around me, I have to constantly remind myself that it's all just illusion, that those experiencing it are doing so by deep inner choice, and that everything is okay. But I KNOW THIS, without a doubt, WITHIN MYSELF--it's not something I was taught.
In order to become self-aware--you have to literally close your eyes to the outside world, breathe, and feel into your beingness within. You become aware of your PRESENCE.
Pity and Compassion are two very different feeling energies.
After reading each of the two energies' statements below, CLOSE YOUR EYES (it's the quickest and easiest method of self-awareness) and feel into them. How do you feel inside? Does one make you want to jump up and try everything you can imagine? Does the other just make you want stay in bed hoping to not have to wake up to another dismal day?
Pity says,
"I'll pray to some god out there for you, you poor thing. You're in the clutches of the whim of some being that you can't possibly know or understand the reasoning of."
"Let me hold your painful baggage for you. I'll sacrifice myself and haul it around like it's my own cross to bear, and hopefully I'll figure out how to fix it for you..." (I was an expert at ENERGY HOLDING--and it sucked the big one. If I did find a solution for someone, they didn't want it--they wanted their experience--and to commiserate with me about it).
"You poor, meek VICTIM of life. This experience you're having is NO GIFT. It's your sad cross to suffer and bear...until you die."
"Hopefully--who knows?--your reward in Heaven will be great for enduring the pain and misery that you're living right now."
"Sorry you're stuck with it. I feel powerless to fix it for you. You don't deserve this. One, or both, of us must have done something really wrong to have brought ourselves this punishment."
"You poor, poor thing...I'm so sorry for you..."
Compassion says,
"YOU are the CREATOR of your own REALITY."
"You're choosing to immerse yourself in an experience! Dive in, have fun! Explore! If things get tough, all you have to do is choose to release yourself from the illusion you've created. You can't get stuck--not really--but you can pretend that you are stuck."
"If it's in your life, YOU put it there--and, appropriately so--ONLY YOU can choose to let it go."
"Isn't this grand illusion of the human virtual reality game an amazingly ABUNDANT gift? YOU ARE a GIFT!"
"Enjoy your life, and remember you really don't ever do anything wrong. It's just illusion--A SAFE and SACRED SPACE to experience and discover all that you are."
"And I honor and allow myself and you in however each of us chooses to play the game, the current scene--whether we choose to play it the same way or not."
When I was in fifth grade I had the hard measles. My perfect attendance record was blown all to heck by being kept home for a week or two. I was afraid of missing too much school and being held back. I remember Mom finally giving in to letting me return to school, only to have the school nurse do a scoliosis check on everyone that day, and discover I still had signs of the rash. She told me I shouldn't have come back to school so soon.
It was the first time I remember being so ill that I fainted when getting up in the night to use the bathroom--an ancestral biology trait (another type of story you can release yourself from by simply choosing to do so). My point in telling this story though, is that I overheard my mom talking on the phone to a neighbor lady, telling her how sick I was--and I didn't like being discussed that way. I didn't like being thought of, or perceived as "poor Penny"--ever.
Feel into that act for a moment: Close your eyes and Feel as your own energies deflate and your radiation dims when you immerse yourself in the role of "poor, pitiful me."
Shortly after Mom died, Dad had a physical done in order to get qualified to drive bus, and ended up being diagnosed with an erratic heart rhythm. It not only prevented him from driving a bus, but with the diagnosis, he believed himself to be a sickly man. Suddenly he was caught up in the mental belief system trap of trying to keep track of the symptoms of bruising too easily and bleeding out, versus, a too slow and sluggish movement of blood out of his heart.
He was prescribed medication where he had to try to figure out, by trial and error, how much to take to regulate his body. I watched him quit eating anything green (this is the guy who believed in organically-grown food and vegetables) because of the fear of the vitamin K in such vegetables causing his blood to thicken, thus counter-acting the thinning properties of the Cumadin medicine. Does anyone else see the irony in that whole scenario? He gave up eating foods that he believed healthy for him in order to take a medication.
When the arsenic drug (a.k.a, "rat poison," according to Dad) failed to help regulate things, he opted to have the out-patient procedure done where medical professionals stopped, and then restarted his heart, hoping to get it back in rhythm.
I observed him enter the hospital that day, acting kind of poorly and pitiful and scared--and then saw him shift out of the role shortly afterwards. While walking the hallway in his hospital gown after the procedure, he stopped, suddenly shook his head, and acted like he felt foolish, silly and disgusted with himself for playing out the act of "I'm the poor, sick, helpless patient." He didn't like playing the role of being ill and pitied by others anymore than I did.
I had an epiphany similar to Dad's the day I CLEARLY CHOSE to take responsibility for my own health and well-being while meditatively walking things out. I was in the midst of chiropractic therapy for scoliosis-related symptoms--and it wasn't working. The discs were still shifting out of alignment almost daily, weeks into the process, and I'd feel myself tense up (not a good thing) when he would adjust my neck. I didn't want to do medications, nor did I want surgery, or trip after trip to doctors and appointments.
It was truly an inner knowingness moment--I have never felt more certain about a choice than I did about that. Even afterwards, when I was literally told by the chiropractor that I would "crash and burn" if I didn't stay with the program, I walked out of that office and never looked back or second-guessed my decision. This was my life--and I was taking charge of it my way.
And it helped that the chiropractor pissed me off by acting so egotistically that day. He truly served me well, both by compassionately helping me through a painful and terrifying experience at the beginning of our relationship, and by playing the role of antagonist for me at the last. It helped me see clearly, and finally experience feeling with certainty, my own determination and conviction.
Anger--I know it's not comfortable feeling it because we're so deeply ingrained with believing it to be wrong to feel--does help to shake a person awake and into self-awareness. I've gotten much better at acknowledging it and allowing it. I now know that it doesn't mean I'll be stuck permanently feeling angry if I do experience it. Anger is just an energy--and all energy will naturally flex and flow easily when we allow it.
Thank you to the doctors
Who could not cure my ills.
All you seemed to see was the "sin" in me,
Which we tried to fix with pills.
It made me look past my pained condition
To the perfection that's my Soul.
I never would have seen it,
Much less, believed it--
Had you done anymore than my will!
I was born in 1964, so the consciousness that I grew up in was focused on pitying the poor, the sick, the helpless and the meek. We saved old clothes to give to the "poor" people in some other place in the world. When I turned up my nose at something at the dinner table, I was told like every other kid my age in the western world, "There are starving kids in Africa who would love to eat that!" I admired the kid who had the audacity and wit to respond to that manipulative guilt trip with, "Then why don't you feed it to them instead of me?"
From my beloved mom's example (much more powerful than lecture), I learned the art of pitying. She listened patiently and endlessly to the relationshit dramas and aches and pains of others (who chronically happened to be the same people all the time).
I searched for methods and practices to help heal those less healthy than me. Sometimes it felt like I was more invested in healing the perceived sick person than he or she was. I actually got to the point of feeling apologetic for being healthy! Imagine that--a low sense of self-worth for not being a drain on the health-care system or friendships!
I respectfully drove elderly people to doctors appointments. I visited and assisted them (not looking for compensation), and I politely listened to them and felt sorry for their circumstances.
I had people befriend me only to find myself guiltily feeling resentful in a supposed friendship that seemed one-sided. The other person was always sick or in the midst of some trauma or drama (which they seemed to always attract). She or he always seemed to be commanding and demanding to be the center of attention in any room. Those were really sucky experiences.
I have watched people line up and discuss all the medications they're taking--with pride. It's a subject matter that I find boring.
Sometimes people like to see if they can trump all the others sitting at a table of commiseration of physical ailments in a weird type of contest where the most miserable person deems himself superior to all the others. "Nobody has been through pain like I have...blah, blah, blah..." I may be bursting bubbles here, but, frankly, everyone's pain is unique. You really can't compare pain.
I observed a mother-daughter moment while they tested their blood sugar, took their shots and meds, and discussed all their latest ailments--they actually cliquishly flaunted their illnesses in my healthy face. It was so obvious that they were enjoying themselves in the story they had going. Who wants a cure when you can have that?
Too often, I heard the biggest (funniest, in retrospect) manipulative friend statement ever, "You're the only one who understands me...You'd never do or say anything to hurt me or betray me...YOU'RE ALWAYS THERE WHEN I WANT and HOW I NEED YOU TO BE THERE!"
I see those "poor, pitiful misunderstood me or some other people," and whining "how only true friends should be," B.S. statements on Facebook and catch myself gagging.
In my book, a true friend will remind you that you are the creator and master of your own gift of life. If you have a trauma-drama going and I'm not rushing to your side to carry your bum over your mud puddles, it's because I love you unconditionally and I'm going to compassionately allow you to immerse yourself fully into the experience you've created--oh, fellow sovereign.
And when we're done with that scene, the two of us can sit together and laughingly swap stories of our experiences and share how it felt to play such-and-such a character role.
PITY and EMPATHY are two highly seductive energies that have had me playing in old icky, so-not-fun-anymore stories with others way longer than I've wanted. I don't like seeing anyone in pain, because I--out of old defaulting habit--energetically feel myself rushing into their story, clothing myself in all their stuff, literally weighing myself down with the weight of their world.
And that doesn't compassionately honor either one of us in the experiences each individual wants to have. It also distracts me from my personal pursuit of changing MY WORLD. In my world, I choose to make some changes--drastic ones. I choose to see if I can create a personal world free of disease and the fear of death.
So when someone is sick or has an "accident" (I don't believe in accidents anymore), I don't go rushing to the people involved--AND THAT CHOICE IS NOT MADE LIGHTLY, because I DO CARE in the sense that I'd enjoy living in a world of stories beyond the old dramas and traumas. I actually stay put, and give myself the opportunity to step back and out of the illusion, in order to more clearly see the dynamics of whatever is happening--and to better understand the gift that particular experience has for me!
I remember that when Lazarus was sick, Jesus didn't rush back to take care of him. One of the women actually was a bit angry with him, and admonished him for dilly-dallying, when she had to tell him he was too late, that Lazarus had died and already been entombed a few days. Did Jesus apologize for betraying a friend in need? No, he had the audacity (love that word today) to reprimand her for having a lack of faith--for just giving up and believing that Lazarus's death was the end of the story.
And it wasn't the end of the story. Lazarus did come back to life in the body he had left for a little while...
Could I be wrong in believing such a miraculous and magical story to be a true possibility? Of course! I could be totally wrong, but I won't know unless I give it a try in my own life, and I can only do that by changing the commonly practiced rules I once accepted as a way to be in a POLITE SOCIETY--one where I used to just shake my head at the injustices in the world...here goes another funeral, here goes another loss that I'm powerless to change...alas!...woe is me...woe is you...
If I don't allow myself to even consider it as a possibility, it'll remain an unattainable dream, a wish...and that's no fun for me.
Good old Adamus Saint-Germain nailed it. For me, awakening was painfully brutal:
I put myself through hell in order to motivate myself to wake up. I creatively lost a boyfriend in a motorcycle "accident." I lost my beloved home on the farm, my pets, more friends, parents--myself. Shattering old belief systems in order to shake myself awake from the layers of hypnosis of the mass consciousness of humanity involved all kinds of physical, emotional, mental and spiritual pain.
See related post by clicking here: Physical Symptoms of My Awakening Self-Awareness. The rest of my blog is about all the other types of aforementioned pain that I used to help me step back out of the reality illusion I'd unknowingly created when believing I was an all-alone Little Insignificant Human Being, being tested by, and trying to please, some god "out there."
It was the only way at the time to get myself to look more closely at, FEEL more SENSUALLY--this life I was complacently and unquestioningly inhabiting.
You know, when you're deep asleep in a hypnosis and if life is always pleasant, there is no passion-fired desire to change it, much less explore the possibility of there being more to it. But pain (imbalance)--that motivates one to more quickly shift perspective and try new ways. One even begins to imagine, and to go beyond into, things once believed impossible!
I was taught to be considerate of others, to be sensitive to their needs--over and above my own.
Being polite kept me outwardly focused. We are constantly inundated with stories of the wrong and bad things in the world--and we're constantly bombarded with guilt-laced admonitions to get out there and fix it! That's our responsibility, damn it!
That POLITELY-CARING outside-of-me focus was the hook that repeatedly snagged me into playing in the perpetual game of pity for others in their stories. I hadn't realized how much it was still a culprit in my own life until Adamus pointed it out. Especially in times of chaotic distress and tragedies in the world around me, I have to constantly remind myself that it's all just illusion, that those experiencing it are doing so by deep inner choice, and that everything is okay. But I KNOW THIS, without a doubt, WITHIN MYSELF--it's not something I was taught.
In order to become self-aware--you have to literally close your eyes to the outside world, breathe, and feel into your beingness within. You become aware of your PRESENCE.
Pity and Compassion are two very different feeling energies.
After reading each of the two energies' statements below, CLOSE YOUR EYES (it's the quickest and easiest method of self-awareness) and feel into them. How do you feel inside? Does one make you want to jump up and try everything you can imagine? Does the other just make you want stay in bed hoping to not have to wake up to another dismal day?
Pity says,
"I'll pray to some god out there for you, you poor thing. You're in the clutches of the whim of some being that you can't possibly know or understand the reasoning of."
"Let me hold your painful baggage for you. I'll sacrifice myself and haul it around like it's my own cross to bear, and hopefully I'll figure out how to fix it for you..." (I was an expert at ENERGY HOLDING--and it sucked the big one. If I did find a solution for someone, they didn't want it--they wanted their experience--and to commiserate with me about it).
"You poor, meek VICTIM of life. This experience you're having is NO GIFT. It's your sad cross to suffer and bear...until you die."
"Hopefully--who knows?--your reward in Heaven will be great for enduring the pain and misery that you're living right now."
"Sorry you're stuck with it. I feel powerless to fix it for you. You don't deserve this. One, or both, of us must have done something really wrong to have brought ourselves this punishment."
"You poor, poor thing...I'm so sorry for you..."
Compassion says,
"YOU are the CREATOR of your own REALITY."
"You're choosing to immerse yourself in an experience! Dive in, have fun! Explore! If things get tough, all you have to do is choose to release yourself from the illusion you've created. You can't get stuck--not really--but you can pretend that you are stuck."
"If it's in your life, YOU put it there--and, appropriately so--ONLY YOU can choose to let it go."
"Isn't this grand illusion of the human virtual reality game an amazingly ABUNDANT gift? YOU ARE a GIFT!"
"Enjoy your life, and remember you really don't ever do anything wrong. It's just illusion--A SAFE and SACRED SPACE to experience and discover all that you are."
"And I honor and allow myself and you in however each of us chooses to play the game, the current scene--whether we choose to play it the same way or not."
When I was in fifth grade I had the hard measles. My perfect attendance record was blown all to heck by being kept home for a week or two. I was afraid of missing too much school and being held back. I remember Mom finally giving in to letting me return to school, only to have the school nurse do a scoliosis check on everyone that day, and discover I still had signs of the rash. She told me I shouldn't have come back to school so soon.
It was the first time I remember being so ill that I fainted when getting up in the night to use the bathroom--an ancestral biology trait (another type of story you can release yourself from by simply choosing to do so). My point in telling this story though, is that I overheard my mom talking on the phone to a neighbor lady, telling her how sick I was--and I didn't like being discussed that way. I didn't like being thought of, or perceived as "poor Penny"--ever.
Feel into that act for a moment: Close your eyes and Feel as your own energies deflate and your radiation dims when you immerse yourself in the role of "poor, pitiful me."
Shortly after Mom died, Dad had a physical done in order to get qualified to drive bus, and ended up being diagnosed with an erratic heart rhythm. It not only prevented him from driving a bus, but with the diagnosis, he believed himself to be a sickly man. Suddenly he was caught up in the mental belief system trap of trying to keep track of the symptoms of bruising too easily and bleeding out, versus, a too slow and sluggish movement of blood out of his heart.
He was prescribed medication where he had to try to figure out, by trial and error, how much to take to regulate his body. I watched him quit eating anything green (this is the guy who believed in organically-grown food and vegetables) because of the fear of the vitamin K in such vegetables causing his blood to thicken, thus counter-acting the thinning properties of the Cumadin medicine. Does anyone else see the irony in that whole scenario? He gave up eating foods that he believed healthy for him in order to take a medication.
When the arsenic drug (a.k.a, "rat poison," according to Dad) failed to help regulate things, he opted to have the out-patient procedure done where medical professionals stopped, and then restarted his heart, hoping to get it back in rhythm.
I observed him enter the hospital that day, acting kind of poorly and pitiful and scared--and then saw him shift out of the role shortly afterwards. While walking the hallway in his hospital gown after the procedure, he stopped, suddenly shook his head, and acted like he felt foolish, silly and disgusted with himself for playing out the act of "I'm the poor, sick, helpless patient." He didn't like playing the role of being ill and pitied by others anymore than I did.
I had an epiphany similar to Dad's the day I CLEARLY CHOSE to take responsibility for my own health and well-being while meditatively walking things out. I was in the midst of chiropractic therapy for scoliosis-related symptoms--and it wasn't working. The discs were still shifting out of alignment almost daily, weeks into the process, and I'd feel myself tense up (not a good thing) when he would adjust my neck. I didn't want to do medications, nor did I want surgery, or trip after trip to doctors and appointments.
It was truly an inner knowingness moment--I have never felt more certain about a choice than I did about that. Even afterwards, when I was literally told by the chiropractor that I would "crash and burn" if I didn't stay with the program, I walked out of that office and never looked back or second-guessed my decision. This was my life--and I was taking charge of it my way.
And it helped that the chiropractor pissed me off by acting so egotistically that day. He truly served me well, both by compassionately helping me through a painful and terrifying experience at the beginning of our relationship, and by playing the role of antagonist for me at the last. It helped me see clearly, and finally experience feeling with certainty, my own determination and conviction.
Anger--I know it's not comfortable feeling it because we're so deeply ingrained with believing it to be wrong to feel--does help to shake a person awake and into self-awareness. I've gotten much better at acknowledging it and allowing it. I now know that it doesn't mean I'll be stuck permanently feeling angry if I do experience it. Anger is just an energy--and all energy will naturally flex and flow easily when we allow it.
Thank you to the doctors
Who could not cure my ills.
All you seemed to see was the "sin" in me,
Which we tried to fix with pills.
It made me look past my pained condition
To the perfection that's my Soul.
I never would have seen it,
Much less, believed it--
Had you done anymore than my will!
I was born in 1964, so the consciousness that I grew up in was focused on pitying the poor, the sick, the helpless and the meek. We saved old clothes to give to the "poor" people in some other place in the world. When I turned up my nose at something at the dinner table, I was told like every other kid my age in the western world, "There are starving kids in Africa who would love to eat that!" I admired the kid who had the audacity and wit to respond to that manipulative guilt trip with, "Then why don't you feed it to them instead of me?"
From my beloved mom's example (much more powerful than lecture), I learned the art of pitying. She listened patiently and endlessly to the relationshit dramas and aches and pains of others (who chronically happened to be the same people all the time).
I searched for methods and practices to help heal those less healthy than me. Sometimes it felt like I was more invested in healing the perceived sick person than he or she was. I actually got to the point of feeling apologetic for being healthy! Imagine that--a low sense of self-worth for not being a drain on the health-care system or friendships!
I respectfully drove elderly people to doctors appointments. I visited and assisted them (not looking for compensation), and I politely listened to them and felt sorry for their circumstances.
I had people befriend me only to find myself guiltily feeling resentful in a supposed friendship that seemed one-sided. The other person was always sick or in the midst of some trauma or drama (which they seemed to always attract). She or he always seemed to be commanding and demanding to be the center of attention in any room. Those were really sucky experiences.
I have watched people line up and discuss all the medications they're taking--with pride. It's a subject matter that I find boring.
Sometimes people like to see if they can trump all the others sitting at a table of commiseration of physical ailments in a weird type of contest where the most miserable person deems himself superior to all the others. "Nobody has been through pain like I have...blah, blah, blah..." I may be bursting bubbles here, but, frankly, everyone's pain is unique. You really can't compare pain.
I observed a mother-daughter moment while they tested their blood sugar, took their shots and meds, and discussed all their latest ailments--they actually cliquishly flaunted their illnesses in my healthy face. It was so obvious that they were enjoying themselves in the story they had going. Who wants a cure when you can have that?
Too often, I heard the biggest (funniest, in retrospect) manipulative friend statement ever, "You're the only one who understands me...You'd never do or say anything to hurt me or betray me...YOU'RE ALWAYS THERE WHEN I WANT and HOW I NEED YOU TO BE THERE!"
I see those "poor, pitiful misunderstood me or some other people," and whining "how only true friends should be," B.S. statements on Facebook and catch myself gagging.
In my book, a true friend will remind you that you are the creator and master of your own gift of life. If you have a trauma-drama going and I'm not rushing to your side to carry your bum over your mud puddles, it's because I love you unconditionally and I'm going to compassionately allow you to immerse yourself fully into the experience you've created--oh, fellow sovereign.
And when we're done with that scene, the two of us can sit together and laughingly swap stories of our experiences and share how it felt to play such-and-such a character role.
PITY and EMPATHY are two highly seductive energies that have had me playing in old icky, so-not-fun-anymore stories with others way longer than I've wanted. I don't like seeing anyone in pain, because I--out of old defaulting habit--energetically feel myself rushing into their story, clothing myself in all their stuff, literally weighing myself down with the weight of their world.
And that doesn't compassionately honor either one of us in the experiences each individual wants to have. It also distracts me from my personal pursuit of changing MY WORLD. In my world, I choose to make some changes--drastic ones. I choose to see if I can create a personal world free of disease and the fear of death.
So when someone is sick or has an "accident" (I don't believe in accidents anymore), I don't go rushing to the people involved--AND THAT CHOICE IS NOT MADE LIGHTLY, because I DO CARE in the sense that I'd enjoy living in a world of stories beyond the old dramas and traumas. I actually stay put, and give myself the opportunity to step back and out of the illusion, in order to more clearly see the dynamics of whatever is happening--and to better understand the gift that particular experience has for me!
I remember that when Lazarus was sick, Jesus didn't rush back to take care of him. One of the women actually was a bit angry with him, and admonished him for dilly-dallying, when she had to tell him he was too late, that Lazarus had died and already been entombed a few days. Did Jesus apologize for betraying a friend in need? No, he had the audacity (love that word today) to reprimand her for having a lack of faith--for just giving up and believing that Lazarus's death was the end of the story.
And it wasn't the end of the story. Lazarus did come back to life in the body he had left for a little while...
Could I be wrong in believing such a miraculous and magical story to be a true possibility? Of course! I could be totally wrong, but I won't know unless I give it a try in my own life, and I can only do that by changing the commonly practiced rules I once accepted as a way to be in a POLITE SOCIETY--one where I used to just shake my head at the injustices in the world...here goes another funeral, here goes another loss that I'm powerless to change...alas!...woe is me...woe is you...
If I don't allow myself to even consider it as a possibility, it'll remain an unattainable dream, a wish...and that's no fun for me.
Wednesday, April 10, 2013
Thank Your Moms and Dads
Words and music by Penny Lewton Binek
Mom and Dad, you know that I have adored you
From the moment I was born.
Imagine my dismay, when I found one day
That to your views I'd not conform!
It made me look deep inside,
And question my pride,
For with this I must not be wrong!
But what better way to see the strength of my faith--
Than have to"go against" the two of you...
These are my footsteps, my battles--
A contrast, every one,
To the Light which I see within me
Dawning as the Sun/Son.
The love that I sought was in me,
Buried beneath a film.
From the sorrows of a blinded heart
To the joys of opened eyes!
Take a bit of time alone with you to thank your Mom and your Dad--for everything, no matter where they are. I had parents and grandparents who were easy to love, but even they did things at times that had me thinking, "That's NO WAY TO BE! I'm not going to do that...I'm choosing a different way."
That, my beloved friends, is wisdom gained...
And I don't care how raunchy and horrid the part played, someone had the love and the courage and the trust to play it convincingly to the hilt for you. It's easy to play the hero--because they get all the love. Look deeper.
The stories we humans have acted out together are filled with ancestral and personal karma (an energy balancing mechanism that we all put in place to keep ourselves from getting completely lost, and to give ourselves the true and sensual fullness of experience).
That person who plays the role of abuser of you now, was probably someone that you (a different life expression of your soul) abused in another lifetime. Be quicker to forgive both of you, than to hang onto blame, guilt, victimhood, revenge. Choosing to forgive, and to be grateful for the wisdom gained from the experience, dissolves and clears all karma away. The slate is made clean, fresh--ready for new...
It's good for the human and the soul to reminisce together, as one--because it transforms even the murkiest moments of the past into a priceless gem of the present. Thank all who have been and gone before, for all the parts played--heroic and dark, vibrant and dull--because they helped to build the bridge we're crossing today...
I love a good egg salad sandwich. I helped Mom assemble them, and to bake the fork-criss-crossed peanut butter cookies that were Dad's favorite. We'd pack up the lunch to take to Dad and the boys. Bump across the fields in the pick-up. The dogs--Cricket, Pudge, Charlie, Urch--run alongside, loping off every now and then to chase a deer, rabbit, bird, gopher. I can see Dad's hands, all dusty and grimy, one holding his sandwich and the other the screw-cap cup from the thermos of coffee. There was no place to wash the hands that had greased the equipment. All that earth freshly seeded, or swathes of mustily sweet golden grain, mowed and drying in the sun, fresh air tinged with the aroma of black coffee, underneath that expansive sky-blue ceiling--the picnic--seemed to make everything taste gourmet.
I'm not a huge lover of ice cream, but I love chocolate or strawberry malts from the Tastee Freez--maybe more so the idea and memory of them than the actual imbibing in them today. Just because when we were in town for groceries and errands, Mom would stop to pick one up to drop off with Dad when he was farming land close to town. One summer day, the year before he died, Dad bought a couple chocolate malts for Laurie and me, and stopped by to visit with us while we were painting her new house. He would probably have actually helped paint, but as it was, he couldn't stay very long because the paint fumes were too hard for him to be in.
Mom made it a point to know everyone's favorites--it was usually home-made from scratch. We didn't do cake mixes or pre-made pie crusts or fillings. I inherited the knowing of favorites from her. For years, I've easily remembered things certain people like or hate--I do it without thinking about it. I do it as a way of letting them know they're important to me, that I'm listening to them, that I love them.
I did a whoopsie a few weeks ago. In a flurry of computer housecleaning, I deleted a writing about some treasured memories of my dad--totally erased them from my hard-drive.
But, he's here yet--though he's been physically gone from my perception for almost 10 years.
When I was driving our pick-up around town the other day, I suddenly felt Dad in the way I was lounging against my seat, left elbow on the support on the door while my right hand manned the steering wheel, lazily easing around potholes like I watched him navigate the creek crossings and the grassy, rutted trails out to the fields on those Sunday afternoons--when we walked into the sun, across the dormant furrows searching for treasure from ancient civilizations, in the light-glinting form of arrowheads, scrapers, hammers, and such. I realized this feeling of his presence in me happens often. When I go for walks, I find that I still search the ground beneath my feet for a special-looking rock.
I spent a lot of time in vehicles with my dad. He was a speed demon well into his middle-age years. He was known as the "Silver Streak" by highway patrols, in his Hudson convertible with the red leather seats. One of my favorite photos is of Mom posing in it--she photographed like a movie star. He went through a lot of tires in those early days of mostly gravel roads, courting Mom after meeting her while attending his one quarter of college in Spearfish.
Dad told me that, as a kid, sometime around the conclusion of World War II, when on a trip to South Dakota with Grandpa to pick up a piece of farming machinery, he'd JUST KNOWN he was going to marry a girl from South Dakota--and he did. She was an angel that even his own mother loved.
I guess they met in the laundry room. He tried to show his appreciation for her ironing his pants and shirt by literally paying her with money. Any of you who knew Dad, will recognize that part of him.
Mom laughingly told me that when she informed her roommate that she was going on a date with him, her friend's reply was, "You're going out with him? He's been out with a different girl every night of the week since he got here!"
On their first date, she had to sit on his lap, in the rumble seat of the car of the couple with whom they were double-dating, on the ride to Rapid City to see Lawrence Welk.
Mom finished school and became a teacher, but Dad chose to end his formal education and, instead, learned about life in a different way, by touring around the United States in the specially-made convertible that was a gift from his parents. In the months after Mom passed away, my dad used to lament to me (when talking about the car and Mom), "I had too much."...
He thought he'd been spoiled with the car (just a material thing), and that he'd foolishly taken for granted the ones with true value, importance and worth--loved ones like Mom. Dad--you were just so hard on yourself, and I didn't know how to fix that for you...
Mom's former students would not only talk of her--this amazingly gentle, kind and beautiful lady-teacher--with fondness, but they'd also tell us kids about the guy, her husband, who brought them candy on Fridays.
My brothers and I went from fighting over who got to crawl into his lap and blow out his cigarette match (the smell of sulfur and a freshly lit cigarette still makes me swoon a little, though I've never smoked), to who pulled the packet of gum out of his front shirt pocket. My friends always knew Dad had some Juicy Fruit gum to share with them.
Later on, I think his grand kids and their friends expected it to be either Big Red gum or quarters for the prize machine, in the glassed entrance to the Gateway Inn, that tantalized little ones.
Take a bit of time alone with you to thank your Mom and your Dad--for everything, no matter where they are. I had parents and grandparents who were easy to love, but even they did things at times that had me thinking, "That's NO WAY TO BE! I'm not going to do that...I'm choosing a different way."
That, my beloved friends, is wisdom gained...
And I don't care how raunchy and horrid the part played, someone had the love and the courage and the trust to play it convincingly to the hilt for you. It's easy to play the hero--because they get all the love. Look deeper.
The stories we humans have acted out together are filled with ancestral and personal karma (an energy balancing mechanism that we all put in place to keep ourselves from getting completely lost, and to give ourselves the true and sensual fullness of experience).
That person who plays the role of abuser of you now, was probably someone that you (a different life expression of your soul) abused in another lifetime. Be quicker to forgive both of you, than to hang onto blame, guilt, victimhood, revenge. Choosing to forgive, and to be grateful for the wisdom gained from the experience, dissolves and clears all karma away. The slate is made clean, fresh--ready for new...
It's good for the human and the soul to reminisce together, as one--because it transforms even the murkiest moments of the past into a priceless gem of the present. Thank all who have been and gone before, for all the parts played--heroic and dark, vibrant and dull--because they helped to build the bridge we're crossing today...
I love a good egg salad sandwich. I helped Mom assemble them, and to bake the fork-criss-crossed peanut butter cookies that were Dad's favorite. We'd pack up the lunch to take to Dad and the boys. Bump across the fields in the pick-up. The dogs--Cricket, Pudge, Charlie, Urch--run alongside, loping off every now and then to chase a deer, rabbit, bird, gopher. I can see Dad's hands, all dusty and grimy, one holding his sandwich and the other the screw-cap cup from the thermos of coffee. There was no place to wash the hands that had greased the equipment. All that earth freshly seeded, or swathes of mustily sweet golden grain, mowed and drying in the sun, fresh air tinged with the aroma of black coffee, underneath that expansive sky-blue ceiling--the picnic--seemed to make everything taste gourmet.
I'm not a huge lover of ice cream, but I love chocolate or strawberry malts from the Tastee Freez--maybe more so the idea and memory of them than the actual imbibing in them today. Just because when we were in town for groceries and errands, Mom would stop to pick one up to drop off with Dad when he was farming land close to town. One summer day, the year before he died, Dad bought a couple chocolate malts for Laurie and me, and stopped by to visit with us while we were painting her new house. He would probably have actually helped paint, but as it was, he couldn't stay very long because the paint fumes were too hard for him to be in.
Mom made it a point to know everyone's favorites--it was usually home-made from scratch. We didn't do cake mixes or pre-made pie crusts or fillings. I inherited the knowing of favorites from her. For years, I've easily remembered things certain people like or hate--I do it without thinking about it. I do it as a way of letting them know they're important to me, that I'm listening to them, that I love them.
I did a whoopsie a few weeks ago. In a flurry of computer housecleaning, I deleted a writing about some treasured memories of my dad--totally erased them from my hard-drive.
But, he's here yet--though he's been physically gone from my perception for almost 10 years.
When I was driving our pick-up around town the other day, I suddenly felt Dad in the way I was lounging against my seat, left elbow on the support on the door while my right hand manned the steering wheel, lazily easing around potholes like I watched him navigate the creek crossings and the grassy, rutted trails out to the fields on those Sunday afternoons--when we walked into the sun, across the dormant furrows searching for treasure from ancient civilizations, in the light-glinting form of arrowheads, scrapers, hammers, and such. I realized this feeling of his presence in me happens often. When I go for walks, I find that I still search the ground beneath my feet for a special-looking rock.
I spent a lot of time in vehicles with my dad. He was a speed demon well into his middle-age years. He was known as the "Silver Streak" by highway patrols, in his Hudson convertible with the red leather seats. One of my favorite photos is of Mom posing in it--she photographed like a movie star. He went through a lot of tires in those early days of mostly gravel roads, courting Mom after meeting her while attending his one quarter of college in Spearfish.
Dad told me that, as a kid, sometime around the conclusion of World War II, when on a trip to South Dakota with Grandpa to pick up a piece of farming machinery, he'd JUST KNOWN he was going to marry a girl from South Dakota--and he did. She was an angel that even his own mother loved.
I guess they met in the laundry room. He tried to show his appreciation for her ironing his pants and shirt by literally paying her with money. Any of you who knew Dad, will recognize that part of him.
Mom laughingly told me that when she informed her roommate that she was going on a date with him, her friend's reply was, "You're going out with him? He's been out with a different girl every night of the week since he got here!"
On their first date, she had to sit on his lap, in the rumble seat of the car of the couple with whom they were double-dating, on the ride to Rapid City to see Lawrence Welk.
Mom finished school and became a teacher, but Dad chose to end his formal education and, instead, learned about life in a different way, by touring around the United States in the specially-made convertible that was a gift from his parents. In the months after Mom passed away, my dad used to lament to me (when talking about the car and Mom), "I had too much."...
He thought he'd been spoiled with the car (just a material thing), and that he'd foolishly taken for granted the ones with true value, importance and worth--loved ones like Mom. Dad--you were just so hard on yourself, and I didn't know how to fix that for you...
Mom's former students would not only talk of her--this amazingly gentle, kind and beautiful lady-teacher--with fondness, but they'd also tell us kids about the guy, her husband, who brought them candy on Fridays.
My brothers and I went from fighting over who got to crawl into his lap and blow out his cigarette match (the smell of sulfur and a freshly lit cigarette still makes me swoon a little, though I've never smoked), to who pulled the packet of gum out of his front shirt pocket. My friends always knew Dad had some Juicy Fruit gum to share with them.
Later on, I think his grand kids and their friends expected it to be either Big Red gum or quarters for the prize machine, in the glassed entrance to the Gateway Inn, that tantalized little ones.
If Dad set foot in the grocery store, there would be candy. I'm certain he inherited that from his mom--she had a bureau drawer in the dining room full of an assortment. She also had a basement with bottled pop and a freezer full of Popsicles, push-ups and ice cream bars. In preparation for weekends fishing out at the dam or for a grandchild's birthday party, Mom and Dad made sure to pick out an assortment of Brach's candy for Dad to place in a bowl on the table.
Grandpa Frank kept candy in the drawer after Grandma passed away, but it seemed to get old and hard--probably because he didn't personally eat much candy. He did, however, make us popcorn using an electric skillet. That was his specialty--and whenever a grandchild got married, his gift was an electric skillet.
Dad's few short months at college wasn't a waste--it was there, in a ballroom dance class, that he discovered his natural ability to dance. Mom and Dad danced together--a lot! My next best thing to getting the pleasure of personally dancing with either of them, was to watch the two of them work their magic together:
Passion and his beloved Compassion
glide a path together--
sometimes breaking apart,
sometimes framing the other, heart-to-heart--
waxing and waning
'round the floor of the Flagstone Terrace.
They dance through the annals of the ages,
the picture book that is my mind,
to the wildly whirling-twirling,
strangely peaceful,
dervish that is my heart,
in rhythm to
the song that is my soul...
Mom and Dad would both be the first to admonish me, "Pen, we weren't that good." And, no, they wouldn't have won a little metal statue on the latest TV show with a ballroom dance competition--they won something more...
When Dad was driving, the roads and curves used to feel like a roller coaster ride to my stomach. Mom joked that she always knew she was pregnant "again" when she got carsick with him on the way to Newell to visit her parents and brothers. I spent the first hours, upon our arrival at Great-Uncle Woody's (near Lodgepole, SD, usually to go catfish fishing on the Grand River), waiting for my land-legs to return, my bloodless lips to get their color back, and the green around my gills to go away.
I catch myself leaning against the back of my chair, leg crossed at the knee, my right forearm on the table, running my fingers and thumb over the handle of my coffee cup, nursing it so long it turns cold--unconsciously imitating all those idiosyncrasies that were his.
I feel him standing inside me with his one-legged lean and my right hand in the front pocket of my jeans.
Even when I walk across the yard, I feel his loose, flowing gait as we walked side-by-side to check out his garden that's the size of a field--he liked to see people feed themselves with good, fresh food. Dad gardened, and Mom prepared meals from it, froze corn, canned beans and tomatoes. And all of us kids and grand kids, at some point, picked potatoes--it was back-breaking labor--laughing together, while crawling around to fill buckets to dump in the gunny sacks.
...and then in the days following Mom's death, I helplessly watched Dad gasping for air as he lugged those awkward-to-hold, 100-lb. bags from his van as he delivered his love-enhanced produce to friends and customers.
And I feel him smiling into my eyes, spinning around the floor in circles with me, guiding me, every time I dance the waltz.
Kel and I have cappuccinos now every afternoon, and that reminds me of talking with Mom in the living room. She has her legs nonchalantly draped over the arm of the Lay-Z Boy, and instead of the 70-year-old great grandmother that she now is, I see the teenage girl, jeans rolled up at the ankles. She just sparkles with grand plans for her whole life ahead of her.
In her high school scrapbook, I discovered that she'd planned to have a career and travel--but she lived on a farm, instead, gave birth to and raised eight kids, often alone at night, while her husband traveled. I remember her often walking, in the evenings, the quarter mile to climb the Big Hill to see if she could see Dad's headlights coming home.
I remember him calling once while he was away--just because it was Thanksgiving and he didn't think he'd make it back in time. I felt sad because my dad might not be home with us and he'd be stuck eating pizza all alone. But, if I recall correctly, he did actually make it home. Mom's motto with him was "No news is good news."
She became a standard of living life (not an easy one either) gracefully. She loved us, unconditionally, and the slew of grandchildren and pets we brought home to her. Wherever Mom was, that was Home, our bit of Heaven on Earth.
She was the one who inspired me to decorate my home with the things I loved and cherished created by someone I connected with--dandelions picked by a yellow-nosed nephew sniffing 'em before he gives them to you, cherished rocks from another, artwork where you're the subject matter painstakingly rendered in crayon, pencil or whatever medium is available.
Whenever I was back for a visit, upon first stepping inside the door, I walked directly into her soft and so-enfolding, bosomy, heartfelt hug. And she's just...SO beautiful!...all of her!
I think I have some of Mom's sense of humor--we have something of a wind-blown look over the top of our heads upon initially hearing a joke with some naughty innuendo. Several minutes, or hours later, you'll catch us laughing out loud because we finally actually "got it," understood it.
Our beloved Max and Molly cats were the offspring of Mom and Dad's long-haired calico, Cally. It's why it was so hard for me to let them go, because they were the closest we got to having kids of our own--and they were connected to Mom and Dad. During her first year with Mom and Dad and Dave, on our Sunday morning chats, Dad used to hold the phone up to Cally, and have me talk to her to see if she would listen. Yeah, I know...but we had fun!
I named her Cally, but Dad called her Hummer. To this day, we all still think of her as Hummer--I don't think anyone else would know who I was referring to if I used my name for her. I've always thought Dad's little nickname was cute for a kitty because of its reference to purring--you know, humming a sweet tune.
It was just a couple years ago at my ripe, old-enough-to-finally-catch-onto-stuff age of 47, that my brother and husband informed me that my dad kind of secretly chuckled with mischievousness over his name for her. The only "Hummers" I knew of were an extra-wide vehicle initially used in the military, and people who hummed tunes. I did not know that Dad's name for their precious kitty was a naughty innuendo. And I'm really wondering now if Mom even knew that? I'm almost sure she didn't, because she called her Hummer all the time, too--without giggling. And I don't think she could have pulled that off with me.
As Mom and I chat away in the living room, we watch Dad comically emerging, blurry-eyed and blinking in the light, not-fully-embodied-yet, from his after-dinner (that's the term we mid-westerners use for "lunch") nap. He's pulling on each cowboy boot, smoothing his jeans over the tops of them, as he moves towards us through the hallway, combing his hair back off his forehead with one hand, while hovering his cap overhead with his other, tilting it to my left, rolling the rim around the back of his skull to the right gathering his hair neatly beneath its crown, with the other--all in a choreographically-smooth motion. And with that oh-so-familiar sheepish grin, he asks, "Ready for coffee?"
He knows it takes Mom and I a few extra moments to get ourselves ready so he heads out to his van, crawls into the driver's seat and patiently waits for us. We load up and head into the Gateway Inn.
We sit in Dad's favorite booth--the one with an indentation deeply worn into the seat cushion from his bony butt, after spending many hours drinking coffee, playing Johnson's Bar or wrap Poker, visiting and laughing with friends of all ages, and sometimes with strangers passing through. It's the side of the seat next to the window facing the door, so he can hear better by keeping his right ear (that's hard-of-hearing) next to the silence of the glass. Behind him is the coffee and water service station--the waitresses and owners may occasionally stop by and chat for a bit, when things are slow. There's a running joke, based in truth, that he's there to help open up the restaurant for the day...and probably to close it down, too, at night. He doesn't spend the whole day there, though. He comes, and he goes.
Two nights ago, his best friend treated me and my husband to supper. And as always, whenever I'm visiting with this man, whether by phone or in person, I feel my dad breaking out in a grin and laughing--simply twinkling all over the place, excited about how far we've all come in our individual lives and as a part of this earthly humanity. I feel his passion and his excitement about our world, the new one emerging out of all the pain of the old.
And all of these self-awareness moments give me the warm tingles, and a goofy grin across my face.
Yes, I know it's REALLY CHAOTIC right now, that the old consciousness energies are having a last extremely-blustery hurrah--just because that old obsolete stuff realizes it's on its way out. WE DID IT! All of us together, through the ages...
Dad's best friend (other than my mom, of course)--a man who shared his vision and passion for this world--became my best friend when I was around nineteen years old. His daughter and I were good friends all through our younger years, so I was a bridesmaid in her wedding. For some reason, her dad was giving me a ride somewhere that weekend, and he told me there was no one else like my dad--that he thought of Dad as his best friend, as a real brother.
This was from a man who has known people and heads-of-state from all over the world, people for whom wealth and power were just everyday things--some are even close friends of his, as well. But to this day, he maintains that none of them were like my dad--that his best times were sitting fishing with Dad, chewing the fat, laughing together--reminiscing of stirring up politicians, fighting greed and hunger in their own special way. These men were the ones inspiring me to live my own best life--to be a benevolent rebel.
Thankfully, my dad wasn't a veteran of a war. I honestly don't think he could have handled being a soldier in that way in this life expression. I remember him telling about his beloved uncle who'd served in World War II--how my teenage Dad remembered him staying in their home upon his return from overseas, screaming himself and everyone else in the house, awake from night terrors, as he re-lived the battle fields. Dad never wanted that experience for his own children--or for anyone else's. He valued and honored all the soldiers and the veterans, but he was not into wars as the solution for anything.
When I was deep into Freeman Education seminars and conspiracy things, I returned home to hear Mom and Dad telling me about some people in the area meeting with the intent to start a local militia. Dad told them that wasn't the thing to do.
He attended gun shows and, just like his own father did before, bought his kids and grand kids all kinds of fishing equipment and guns. He supported those who had a passion for the sport of hunting and target shooting. But, in the latter years, when he didn't have to resort to hunting to feed his family, I seldom ever remember him shooting a gun himself. He fished a lot.
Dad was looking for a way to change the world--for the better--without having to go play war. This is the legacy he and Mom left me.
Dad and Grandpa had a love-hate relationship that was difficult for me to find a place of balance within. When I was little, I overheard my beloved grandpa say to Dad, "Dean, I don't care about you..."
NOBODY, but nobody!--was going to get away with saying such a mean and hurtful thing to my dad!
And, unfortunately, that colored my own relationship with Grandpa--a man who treated me with such kindness, love and compassion. The grandpa, whose lap I found myself sitting on at the dining room table when I was a fully grown girl of 20, who'd just lost her boyfriend in a motorcycle accident. My grandmother, his beloved wife of 50-plus years of shared experiences, had just died 10 months before.
I was working at the local drugstore at the time, and he told me his own stories of working in a drugstore when he was young in the nearby town of Hettinger. He made an extra-special effort to connect with me that day, to comfort me.
As a result, I did soften some then, my heart lowered its protective gear a bit, and I realized that sometimes loved ones said, and did (myself included), mean and cruel things--but we amazingly still love each other even so.
Dad and Mom and my brothers struggled to keep the farm afloat while Dad simultaneously tried to change the world. He traveled so much that Mom was left to care for and raise the family of eight kids, while my older brothers dealt with the farm and livestock.
When he was home, he and Grandpa just seemingly clashed over everything. As an adult, I can see how they each admired, and longed for the approval of the other--they couldn't stay apart. And I think they must have liked the drama of the relationship they had going because neither of them really seemed to make the effort to change it.
Grandpa was all about survival and family, often tough on his sons and his grandsons (though, he was softer with us girls)--I think of it as a "cruel to be kind" mentality. It was a tough world out there, and you had to be aggressive and always working. Taking time out to just be with your family was precious time wasted when you had to make a living to provide for them. Maybe you even believed you had to do things that didn't feel so good inside to do, but you just sucked it up and lived with it.
He and Grandma raised a family during the Great Depression, and it was a matter of great pride to not accept charity--Dad talked of how he used to envy the kids at school who were eating oranges. Grandpa and Dad had different approaches to the federal government farm programs and hand-out systems, though, truthfully, they both viewed them as basically flawed. I appreciate that about them. It's had a tremendous influence on the way I view world issues. Empower people in themselves and we won't have to worry about us or them.
According to Dad, towards the end of his life, Grandpa walked into their carburetor shop one day, sat down, and said, "Dean--I did it all wrong." He didn't elaborate any further. He and Dad did go fishing together down at Haley Dam, just the two of them, one last time. I know Dad enjoyed it, and when it all was said and done, I think they were okay with their tumultuous life together.
And Grandpa--you never did anything wrong, not really--ever! Thank you for everything and for all the roles you played for me. I'll always hold you close and in my heart and memories, with fondness and gratitude.
My brother was telling me he remembered Dad being all about work all the time with them, too. And then one day, he just changed. He told them that was enough, that there was more to life than hard work all the time. "Let's go have coffee."
Dean having coffee with his sons was a pretty common occurrence from then on. Another of my brothers used to sign his own "get out of class free" passes from high school in order to go have coffee with Dad. Dad was a pretty talented welder, and he'd taught his sons that craft, too--so they were ahead of the game sometimes in the vocational agriculture class curriculum. I truly believe my brother got more out of those moments socializing with his dad, learning about other aspects of life, than he did in a class that probably would have just been redundant for him.
There was a sense of an inner restlessness about Dad--he came here to do great things with his life. He just couldn't seem to sit still. He loved his family--he loved people! He was so easy-going with waitresses. Shy and quiet, more of a listener like my mom when it came to social settings, I used to envy his ability to comfortably talk to and joke with anyone. Those brilliant blue "black-Irish" eyes of his just twinkled, and you knew you were safe with him.
I loved watching Saturday morning Bugs Bunny and The Roadrunner cartoons with him. My nephew chuckles, telling the story of how his grandpa used to laugh, raising his leg, and slapping his knee at at the parts he found particularly hilarious.
I remember cuddling against him, inhaling Old Spice as I snuggled under his arm, Dad holding my hand, gently squeezing my fingers while watching The Love Boat on TV. And going to the theater, crunching popcorn from the little white and red box, watching a John Wayne western.
I used to peruse the shelves of the city library in search of a Louis L'Amour western that I didn't think he'd read yet. I always looked for the shorter novels, because once he started a book he never put it down until he was finished, usually in the wee hours of the morning.
People who are able to laugh at, and share humiliating anecdotes about, themselves are the most likely to get my admiration and friendship. "Don't be an insincere fake" is a value I learned from Mom and Dad. We all had an appreciation of people who maybe seemed gruff on the outside, but on the inside--and through their actions (in place of politically correct phrases and chatter)--had hearts of melted, buttery gold.
Dad and Mom both would be the first to remind me not to put either of them on any perfect-human pedestals. I feel their delight in my reminiscences, but I also knowingly hear them reminding me:
"Pen--please make sure to tell your stories with us with integrity--be honest about all of it. We trust you, because we know you trust yourself in your celebration and gratitude and love for yourself first, and, thus, for all of us...
And we hope that when you're all done writing, you've managed to encourage whomever reads this to laugh with us--especially at the seriousness with which we acted out our temporary roles together."
"We did all right, didn't we, Pen?"
"Yes! We ALL did..."
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