I've Moved!!

Happy Easter!

I've moved my blog to hildaporro.wordpress.com.

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"Whose Camp?" Revisited

This is a re-post of something I wrote about a year ago. It's a topic that's been coming up in conversation recently so . . .

We are given this one “wild and precious” life. (Regardless of whether you believe in past or future lives, I’d say that this one is wild and precious).  It surprises me, then, how easy it is to focus on other people’s lives and what they are doing or not doing, what they could or should be doing or how things could be if only they would have been doing, or seeing, or understanding, or listening, or . . . It is surprisingly easy and even entertaining to see other people’s issues and come up with the appropriate – and obvious – resolutions.

 

And all the while, our own lives and issues and choices remain unattended to.  It is impossible to ponder and contemplate other people’s lives while paying close enough attention to our own.  There is no one left manning our own camp which sits lonely, abandoned and neglected.

 

So I ask, whose camp are you in? Where do you spend most of your time, in your own camp or in someone else’s? And if you’re in someone else’s, has another person stepped in to manage yours?  If so, how is that working out?

 

“Camp” is defined as a “temporary structure used on an outing or vacation”, which could be a quite adequate description of life. Our light bodies are given a physical body for this temporary human existence.  Interesting that another definition of the word “camp” references battle and battlefields and a group of troops.  I suppose that we have the option – the daily option, or even the moment-to-moment option – of making life a pleasant vacation-like experience or a constant struggle, battling everything around us and, oftentimes, ourselves.

A well cared-for camp would provide the sense and feeling that everything needed is available. Right here. I feel secure because I know that I have everything that I need.  If things feel a little vacant or lacking, it’s up to me to make the repairs and make my camp as welcoming and comforting as I can.  It is amazing what pure, positive attention can do to bring warmth and transformation.

 

After all, this is my one wild and precious life.

Remember

S C R E A M I N G. . . . .. LOUD. PRIMAL. RAW. ETERNAL. IT’S VASTNESS AND PAIN OVERWHELMS. It takes everything, every bit of available energy not to bolt, run, as fast and as furious as possible. And I do bolt. I hide in projects, in obsessions, in organizing, in food, in friendships. I run. The problem is that it doesn’t make the

S C R E A M I N G .   .  .  .

stop. It’s endless. Relentless. I finally stop and realize that I’m exhausted from the energy of avoidance. I decide to quit. I sit. I try to remember to breathe but my annoyance makes my breaths short and shallow. My own scream rises from the depths of me.

“WILL YOU PLEASE, PLEASE STOP!”

Which only makes that sound of raw, desperate pain louder.

“Geez, have you always been wailing so? I can’t imagine that you’ve always been this, uh, blaringly loud.”

She stops, shocked to hear any un-screamed words directed her way. She sits, alert, a skeptical look in her eyes.

She begins timidly, “Yeah, I mostly wail. I’m not sure why that would surprise you, though.”

I have a vague sense that I know her, that we’ve met before. I try to find the memory. She watches me in utter amazement.

“Wow,” her head shaking slowly. “You seriously don’t remember.”

I start to say that there’s something familiar or that my memory is just not great, or something but then find myself completely disoriented. I know that I’m still sitting on my couch, in my living room. I can still hear the wind rustling the blinds and can feel the cool fall breeze on my arms. But I’m here and not here. What had started to feel like panic has opened into something impossible to describe. It’s familiar, so familiar that I find I have tears running down my cheeks. It’s home. That’s what it feels like. Home. Oh my God, I’ve missed this. I take a few breaths, taking it in. I realize that my heart feels wide open and, as I notice how my heart feels, I feel it opening even wider, like a fully blossomed rose. I don’t know how long I rest in this before remembering that I had been communicating with the Screamer when time seemed to have stopped.

I look for her for a slight instance and then I feel my body smiling.

“You’re me!” And I laugh out loud and can sense her (me) laughing too.

“You’re my darkness, my fears. You’re all the things that I push away. You carry all the scary memories from my whole life. You’ve always felt so separate from me. I’m having trouble grasping what’s going on.”

And then my own voice but not my own voice said, or perhaps it was just a knowing that wafted in from nowhere or from everywhere, I am home and can never really leave. From this perspective, even the darkest and scariest thoughts and memories fill me with wonder and amazement. Humanity is wondrous. I remember my most painful experiences as though they were other flavors to taste in a wide spectrum of flavors. I know, too, that I have yet to experience some truly blissful “flavors”. I am wonderfully overwhelmed with gratitude.

My cat jumps up on the couch and rubs up against my arm. I am in my living room. My body feels profoundly relaxed. I look for the Screamer, smiling. I know that little time has passed yet something is fundamentally different.

“So flavors, huh?” She finds me.

“Yeah, that’s what it felt like, even the really scary stuff. In that place, it all seemed – I don’t know – valuable and important. Like I wouldn’t be me if all of it hadn’t happened.”

“That’s true. You know that eventually I might start screaming again, right?”

I nod, staying with her this time. “I’m sure I’ll forget but maybe we can help each other remember.”

How We See

We don't see things as they are, we see them as we are.

Anais Nin

I took my car in for service a few months ago – just the regularly scheduled maintenance. What’s nice about it is that they wash the car as part of the service, and I’m not one to wash my car very often. I enjoyed the time in the waiting room, reading a good book and sipping a cup of hot coffee. Before I knew it, my car was ready. Nice and clean. I was pleased - at least until later that day when I was driving towards the sun. With the light coming from a certain angle, I realized that the windshield was really dirty. I tried to clean it with the windshield wipers but that didn’t accomplish anything. I was really angry! What the heck did these people do to my car? I was home by this point and figured I’d clean it some other time.

For several weeks, at certain times of day when the sun was at a certain angle, I would again notice the dirt (or whatever it was) clouding my vision. Sometimes I’d get mad. Sometimes I’d try to figure out what I could do to clean it (since the regular wiper fluid wasn’t helping at all). Maybe windex or vinegar or .  .  . I mostly just let it annoy me. And I didn’t actually do anything about it.

Then one day there was a bug on the inside of the windshield and, as I brushed it off with my finger, I couldn’t help but realize that the yuck on my windshield was on the inside. I had to laugh. I picked up a napkin and simply and easily wiped it clean.

I learned so much from this inconsequential experience in my life. The way we choose to see what happens in our day-to-day experience is the most powerful choice that we make. Even the tiniest detail of our lives – especially something that stirs an emotional response – can reveal a profound truth. It is an awareness practice and we have the power to choose.

How often do we blame all the things on the outside – other people or circumstances – for our own lack, especially our lack of peace of mind? For some reason it seems easier to think that something “out there” can create peace “in here”.  How much energy do we waste in annoyance over things that are far beyond our control? Blame can feel good and somehow empowering and it’s true that, at times, we have to move through blame to a deeper truth. But living in constant blame will never create an atmosphere of inner peace.

We live in a society that generally supports our willingness to blame. We love drama. Stepping out of the role of victim takes discipline. Refusing to collude with another person’s grip on being the victim also requires discipline. Instead, we must consciously choose to see ourselves and others as whole human beings and open our hearts in compassion.

Reminders

I was recently in a dear friend’s car and, a moment after she started the car, a kind voice announced, “You are now connected.”

What a wonderful reminder. I have spent much of my life feeling alone and believing that I was carrying worlds of responsibility. It’s not uncommon: we carry the weight of our children’s well-being, our bills and debts, our relationships – and on and on. There is much to worry about if we so choose.

The weight of our day-to-day responsibilities can be lightened when we are conscious of our connection.  We are, now and always, connected to the light, to the Divine. Coincidence that it’s the same word? (Being connected to the light light-ens our load).

I like to imagine that my feet our rooted deep into the core of the Earth, receiving nurture and stability from Mother Earth and that my arms are reaching up to the heavens, receiving light and love from the heavens, from Father Sun, Grandmother Moon and all the Stars. The experience is one of profound connection.

Lovely that a car can provide a wonderful reminder of the connection that we’re invited to live. In our curious human experiences, reminders can come from anywhere.

What are your favorite reminders?

Seeing

"You know what I've always thought?" She asks in a tone of discovery, and not smiling at me but a point beyond. "I've always thought a body would have to be sick and dying before they saw the Lord. And I imagined that when He came it would be like looking at the Baptist window: pretty as colored glass with the sun pouring through, such a shine you don't know it's getting dark. And it's been a comfort: to think of that shine taking away all the spooky feeling. But I'll wager it never happens. I'll wager at the very end a body realizes the Lord has already shown Himself. That things as they are" - her hand circles in a gesture that gathers clouds and kites and grass and Queenie pawing the earth over her bone - "just what they've always seen, was seeing Him. As for me, I could leave the world with today in my eyes."

From A Christmas Memory, by Truman Capote

Honesty is the Best Policy

I don’t know of anyone who would disagree that honesty is the best policy. If for no other reason than that it’s simply easier to be truthful. I recently heard a woman say that she always tells the truth – because she can’t keep track of what she’s said otherwise. We generally expect truthfulness from others. Trust is an important foundation in on-going relationships.

A complicating factor, though, is the inherent assumption that we’re being honest with ourselves. But are we? We are social animals and, as a result, our preferences are powerfully influenced by the people around us. Some people create personas that are easy-going and cooperative which are wonderful qualities. But is it possible that we lose something along the way?

At different stages in our lives, we make decisions. We decide where we want to live, what we want to study, what job we want to take, etc.  I wonder if we lose sight of some of our passions and dreams in the process. I am not advocating not making life decisions – they are obviously necessary and with each experience, no matter how pleasant or unpleasant, we learn and, ideally, grow.

Is there a way to keep our unlived passions alive? A way to re-visit those ideas that make our hearts sing and bring smiles to our faces?

In the Gospel of Thomas, one of the Gnostic texts, Jesus said, “If you bring forth what is within you, what you bring forth will save you. If you do not bring forth what is within you, what you do not bring forth will destroy you.” I believe that we’re meant to live lives filled with joy and passion. It seems that many people get caught in the day-to-day without much consideration for anything else. It takes a certain amount of relaxed discipline or effortless effort to allow our truest selves to surface. If there is no still silence, we will never be able to sense our deepest longings.

What is your passion? What is your heart’s desire?

Be honest now.