I have always wanted more out of my life and I have always felt, sensed and knew that there was more. At times it seemed just below the surface, waiting to bubble up and at other times it seemed far beyond my reach. If I could only reach further, stretch myself more, push myself up, then I could reach it. The longing has been very real and powerful. It has led me to explore many places in the outer world and in my inner world.

I feel I am doing my small part as our world shifts consciousness and evolves into a new way of living and being beyond duality. Some days are, of course, more successful than other days. I have read that it not the number of times we fail but the number of times we get up, dust ourselves off and go forth again, this is what really matters. I am banking on this being true because that would mean I am doing all right.

This Blog site and this writing is a review of my journey so far. For me to take a moment to distill some of the thoughts and insights that have come to me along the way, with the intention they may be interesting, helpful and amusing to others.

Recently I had an interesting memory of a trip I took to Amsterdam, with its chocolate and canals and… toilets. The first experience I had of the Amsterdam toilet was in our B and B. The world of toilets is in itself a fascinating study in innovation and diversity. Each city, each culture, each people achieve a remarkable variety with their places of release, as it were. So it is always very interesting to encounter the first one in a country. This subject could be a whole separate psychological and cultural comparison study all on it’s own, but back to Amsterdam because it was where I learned the most.

I awoke, groggy, after a night spent on a bed that was too soft and a head still struggling with jet lag. I stumbled to the washroom and sat down on the toilet for my morning constitutional as visions of exploring this new city wondered through my mind. Then I arose complete and turned to flush and release the deposit, only to discover it proudly sitting on a little platform above the water in the bowl staring back at me. In my confused jet lagged state I paused mid way as I leaned in to pull the handle. My first thought was that I had somehow miss-aimed.

Slowly the realization came to me that it was the design of this toilet to catch and display the product. After my initial shock I quickly flushed and continued on with my washing up. Over the days I began to take an interest in seeing what ended up on that little platform. Thoughts about shape, colour, and texture became more interesting then I ever thought possible.

I also began to see the benefits. This ingenious design gave me a chance to observe and admire before sending everything down the drain. I had a lot more information then before. Corn, for example, did not seem to digest very well for me. I began to think that maybe that is why my stomach was sometimes upset after a meal containing corn. I decided that in the future I may or may not eat corn anymore. And beets… well anyway you get the picture, more that you wanted perhaps!

Before this I rarely had the opportunity or the inclination to look at what ended up in the toilet, preferring to simply flush. The construction of the toilet that I grew up with had a drain obscuring the view. So whatever went in seemed to disappear and there was never much to look at or contemplate. I could pretty much ignore it. Whether this was good or bad I don’t know. It was what it was. Or was it?

This memory of Amsterdam and the design of that toilet in particular got me thinking about many things. But especially about the way we observe our sh** and by extension what we do with it, both literally and metaphorically speaking. Many people, myself included, hold it up in the air, immortalizing it. “Look at my sh**.” “This is the sh** I have been through.” “See all the sh** that has been done to me. ”

We begin to think it defines us, that that is what we are. We carry it around with us as if it were a badge of honour. We drag it out at every party and at every family function often repeating it to people who have already heard it many times. We continue to take what has been behind us (literally) and smear it all over our present and often even fling some into the future just in case we might forget it. It begins to colour and smell up our whole world, we start to feel we cannot escape it.

Spiritual teachings say where ever we go, there we are. There is no escape. I am just not sure if we always have to take all our sh** with us. I know to be an eco camper you have to take out of the forest everything you took in and leave nothing behind. But we could compost. Take all the lessons, the messages, the deeper meaning and then just let the rest become fertilizer, our fertilizer.

The lotus flower grows best in effluent. But you never see them covered in it. No they are pure, clean and beautiful, serenely blooming far above it all. Could this be an option for us? Even though deeply rooted in it, we at the same time flower above it, wonderfully detached. We are growing from it, thriving in it, even thriving because of it.

Yes sh** happens, so now what? Do we hang on to it for dear life or ignore it completely or do we, as I learned in Amsterdam, stop, observe and flush?

Can you imagine what it would be like to quickly and effectively process our own sh** and even sh** that may get thrown at us by others? Now that would be great wouldn’t it?

But how? Well I had some thoughts about that too. Interested? Stay tuned.

To be continued…

INNERPEACE

Inner Peace is a condition that could possibly be affecting your home and workplace. You may be showing signs of it and quite possibly be passing it on to others.

You may have already have caught this condition. Ask yourself do you have…

1. A tendency to think spontaneously rather than from fears based on past experiences.
2. An unmistakable ability to enjoy every moment.
3. A loss of interest in judging self.
4. A loss of interest in judging others.
5. A loss of interest in conflict and control.
6. A loss of interest in interpreting the actions of others.
7. A loss of ability to worry. (This is a serious symptom!)
8. Frequent, overwhelming episodes of appreciation and gratitude.
9. Contented feeling of connectedness with others and nature.
10. Frequent attacks of smiling through the eyes of the heart.
11. Increasing susceptibility to feel love from others, as well as the uncontrollable urge to extend it.
12. An increasing tendency to let things happen.

Warning: If you have all or most of the above symptoms, please by advised that your condition of inner peace may be so far advanced as to not be treatable. Congratulations!




Patricia Coleman

My feel is that Gratitude is the highest vibration in this world of energy -
Find a way to be grateful every day, every hour, and every moment -
Then see for yourself how it can increase your Joy!

• Gàn ēn dé: Thanks in everyday life every moment
• Gàn: Touch
• Gàn yìn ēn dé: Response to the virtuous heart
• Gàn jué ēn dé: Feelings of or to gratitude
• Gàn wu: ̀ Comprehension from the heart, a certain kind of opening or understanding from the heart and mind
• Gàn huái ēn dé: Feeling the carrying or holding, touched or moved by the holding of the virtue
• Gàn jī ēn dé: Emotion, touched, thanking from the bottom of your heart, emotionally touched, involved.
• Gàn xiè ēn dé: Feeling thanks for the virtuous gift
• Gàn bào ēn dé: Return and repay with action.

(short excerpt from weekend workshop ‘Pure Awareness & the Power of Knowing’ –enjoy!)

Over the next months the complete article will be available here

Part 1 – May

The fourth dynamic is avoiding being present. There are several ways in which we do this. This is a nice catch all-dynamic. It includes every possible way that we can think of, of avoiding being present. What do we get to do when we’re present? Feel. That’s right. That’s what’s there to do. What we experience when we are present is our senses are in contact with the object of experience even if that’s an emotional energy in us. That emotional energy in us is the object of experience sometimes. So, when this dynamic is present we tend to get lost to stories that we make up about our experiences. When we’re wrapped up in the story, then we’re to busy being up here to experience what’s there to be experienced in the moment. Make sense?

The experiences themselves, the avoiding the present, is the primary technique that we use to not feel. The ignoring our intuition and the being judgmental are versions of not being friendly. We can definitely look at that, that way. Present complete present. If your totally present to something how can you, judge it? You’re not separate from it. What happens when you’re present is you are one with whatever is there. There’s no judgment. There’s no lack of trusting your intuition. There’s no not feeling. That’s all there is to do in the present is feel. So often, we become so absorbed in it and then find that the stories that we begin to feel that they are real. We life inside of them. I’m sure you know people who are depressed. Depression is basically living inside of an emotionally charged story. That’s all it is. Same for anxious people. Depressed is when you’re wrapped up in stories about the past. Anxious is when your wrapped up in stories about the future. Very simple.

We make ourselves victims not of what happened to us but to the stories that we have become dedicated to about the events. See what I was starting to talk about earlier, there is a distinction between events and the stories we make up about them. What’s the distinction? The events are long gone. It’s the stories that persist. Where do those stories exist? No place else, except for maybe the charge in the body that holds them in place. The issues are in the tissues. I like that. So, this dynamic is based on the habit of avoiding being present. The illusion or fear that being present will be difficult or impossible. I can’t deal with it. Okay. Expressions of this dynamic.

Part 2 – June

Getting lost in the grip of emotions. Sometimes being so wrapped up in an emotional state like depression or anxiety or just being always angry or whatever, sometimes that’s an escape in itself from dealing with the real feelings that need to be felt. You know what I’m talking about? You’ve all observed people like that? Where they are just kind in it like somebody that’s constantly complaining, irritated, what are they doing? They are avoiding feeling something. It’s just sometimes we use being in the grip of emotions as a way of not being present to what really needs to be felt. It’s like there is a much more important or deeper issue that needs to be felt.

Getting absorbed in stories about the past and/or future. One of the forms this takes is projecting possible negative outcomes onto the future. We call that worrying. Right? Predicting possible negative outcomes on the future. Why would we do that? What’s the point? We’re trying to make some rudimental kind of way of controlling the future or being right.

It’s an avoidance of being present to the feelings that are present now. At the same time, it’s an attempt to also avoid the near future.

Getting lost to addictive behavior. We’ve already talked about. Having databases unresolved emotions. One of the thing that’s a basis of addictive behavior and one of the principle things that you’ll find when your working with this issue of avoiding the present, is that the reason the person is avoiding the present is because what’s about to be experienced for them in the present is the unresolved issues of the past. What’s being held inside is as you’ve seen all these things for unresolved energy. We’re holding onto them. Now if we settle down enough to be present to it, what would happen? Oh, my god. Either we don’t want to go there or I’ll just be involved in this story or involved in this emotion. I’ll just overeat over here so I don’t have to feel it or whatever the drug of choice happened to be, the behavior of choice happened to be that keeps us from being present.

If you’re just quiet, enough for long enough that thing is going to force itself to the surface to be healed. The body wants to purge it out of you. It’s unnatural to be holding onto that inner conflict. The body wants to be free of that. Given any opportunity the slightest moment to file some quietness and whoosh its going to come up. Just a little bit of being relaxed and whoosh its right there. If you have a huge database of painful unresolved experiences you can’t even afford to be quiet for a minute. They are going to be right there in your awareness and if you are operating out of the old operating system of, I can’t go there. I can’t feel that. I’m going to get overwhelmed. Then your going to do everything possible to avoid being present in this moment. This is very huge. This dynamic is huge. It is pervasive. It’s huge.

So, when you start allowing yourself to be present, we already talked about it what do you have to do? You get to feel what’s there but the most common thing that’s going to be there, its not some new event that’s causing some triggering of a new emotional overwhelm. It’s going to be mainly the baggage of the past that’s unresolved. The body wanting to be free of that. Wanting to have it be purged from you. What’s needed in order to purge it? Is awareness. That’s exactly right. It’s allowing yourself to gently and maybe gradually start deleting those database files. There are two ways do it. There’s the slow methodical way which is the feeling every one of them.

Then there’s the way you’re going to see in about half an hour, which is where we just put the whole thing in the recycle bin and hit delete. Very elegant, powerful way of speeding this process up expediently. Sounds nice. So in this particular case what we want to do is we want to recognize when this dynamic is absent. We feel I can experience emotions fully but without getting lost to them. Fully present to it but not lost to it such that we don’t feel whatever else is there to be felt. I live in the wonder and delight of uncertainty.

When you’re in the presence, you don’t know what’s going to happen. There’s no illusion of being in control. We are not in control folks. When you make the shift from the terror of uncertainty to the wonder and delight of uncertainty, your whole life gets transformed.

There is only one way to be able to do that and that is to be willing to be fully present to feel whatever comes up. Otherwise, you’re terrified of whatever might come up. I can stand in the wonder and delight of uncertainty is a major upgrade over standing in the terror of uncertainty. Standing in the terror of uncertainty is I don’t want to feel all those possible things that are going to come up. Were as standing in the wonder and delight of uncertainty is like wow, what’s next. Totally different.

All it takes is a full activation of the willingness to utilize your innate capacity to feel that you all ready have. Its just completely un-utilized. Deep habits of not utilizing it that’s all that is. That’s why we’re spending the whole day. The whole day on learning how to feel. That’s all this is about today. Just learning how to feel. Just learning how to access your capacity to feel. God what a gift we have this huge incredible computer. It can process anything. We actually have unbounded capacity to feel because we are the universe. The only limit is physical limitations of the hardware and those are pretty amazing. It’s mostly software problems that keep us from being able to feel.

Therefore, when this is absent I easily face and feel fully anything from the past that may come up in the present. This is the biggie. This is the one that mainly keeps people out of presents. Is the fear of having to feel those unresolved feelings from the past. Here’s what it looks like when you’re avoiding the present. Isn’t that a great graphic? It says going off into nowhere land. When this dynamic is absent, we feel I live completely in the present moment. So how do you avoid the present? Anybody.

So these are the kinds of questions that help in accessing the feeling. Do you feel like you are typically fully present living in the moment? Does it feel uncomfortable to stay present to the feelings that show up if you are really present and in the now? What do you do instead of staying present? Do you fantasize about the future? Do you think about the past often? Do you use some behavior to avoid feeling things when the feelings become uncomfortable? That’s exactly what we were just doing.

Part 3, December

Would you like to have a more effective way of dealing with discomfort so that you could more easily stay present? These are some of the kinds of questions that obviously we went much deeper then that in the questions we did with Amy. This is a good example of how occasionally you have to be a little persistent in digging around down there in the file directory pathways to find the bugs. The bug files. However, it is always going to be some form of not wanting to feel something. This is an unresolved feeling from the past. Very much in the past like from infancy. We’ll go more in detail how/where this one comes from. This fear of abandonment or being alone, it’s very, very pervasive almost universal fear that pretty much all of us have. It’s incredible when you start to come out of it. Absolutely incredible.

What it does to your sense of self-sufficiency and independence. Autonomy. Incredible. This becomes the foundation of truly successful and extraordinary relationships. When you don’t need them anymore, that’s when you really get to enjoy them. One of those wonderful dichotomies. Doesn’t mean you don’t enjoy them. You do far more then you ever did before. Before you were just ooh, I need it. The other person is over there going yuck. You know what it’s like when someone’s needy. It’s a taking, the energy is taking. Yuck. Nobody likes it. Kind of like you have a needy partner so you don’t want to be one either. Therefore, we are going to do the practice in pairs. Get our little ten-minute things in so we finish this up. We want to have the person who’s going to be the client is someone who indicates through their description of what is happening in their lives that they are avoiding the present.

Start the discussing by exploring the ways in which they are avoiding the present.

What are they doing to avoid the present? Which type of present avoidance techniques are they using? Use the questions back here to help bring the person in touch with the charge of feelings that they are avoiding by not being present. Guide them through feeling until they have felt it so thoroughly there is nothing left to feel. We’ll often be after resolving the energy of the feeling that they will more easily be able to easily see how they have been leaving the present to avoid the discomfort of those unresolved feelings. Is that clear to you now? Absolutely. Very good.

Point out to them that they can use this technique anytime to feel something fully and stay present. So anytime, you feel like you’re procrastinating or reaching for the food. All these different kind of things we’ve been talking about. In the moment when you begin to do that, that’s the moment to stop and check it out. What is this that I’m trying to avoid here? Very, very powerful thing to do. Now you have the technique for resolving and actually fully feeling that thing that you have been avoiding. Then no problem. Resolve it and then bring yourself back to the state of peace.

That’s totally fine. But this is your background of experience is such that you feel because there has been lots and lots of things you’ve had to feel that oh, I’ll just have to do this forever. However, you see that if you’re standing on the side of this of being afraid of feeling things then this is a problem. However, if your standing on the side of this which is bring it on, I’ll just feel whatever is there. Then its not that you have to be feeling to the core of the feeling of everything all the time it’s just that life is rich and full of flavor and experience and richness of feeling everything. What’s wrong with that? That’s called being alive. You see.

If you have to do for a while, feeling into the core of stuff, just to get the hang of hanging out in this place called feeling things, okay big deal. Why not invest that for a few hours, or days, or weeks, or even months, or even years if it liberates you from the total avoidance of life. Wouldn’t be worth it? Yeah. It’s kind of a no-brainer.

You have a Meta fear. The fear is oh my god I’m going to have to do this forever. Feel into that one, resolve that one. You’ll have no that’s not true it’s just a story you’re making up. It’s just a story. Doesn’t matter if it’s had some basis in it, you’ve been doing this all day. That’s why you’re here to learn how to do it. That’s why we are doing it all day. We are doing it all day so you can get good at it. Once you get good at it, it’s like shoo. When you get that good at it shoo, bring it on. No problem. You okay. Okay good.

So what we are going to do is we are going to break into the last group of pair practice and you want to follow basically this procedure. It’s exactly the same thing. This one is sometimes not necessarily as tricky as the one we did with Amy where we really had to dig it out. Whatever is appropriate. Each one of these is giving you another opportunity to see how you connect with these things that we’ve been avoiding.

The whole day is educating you, experientially in how to feel. I don’t know a greater gift I could give you then this today. Going to feel that fully. Wow. This is giving you yourself back. And living fully present to this now moment of our life.

A young man had spent five arduous years searching for truth.  One day, as he walked up into the foothills of a great mountain range, he saw an old man approach from above, walking down the path, carrying a heavy sack on his back.  He sensed that this old man had been to the mountaintop; he had finally found one of the wise – one who could answer his hearts deepest questions. "Please sir," he asked.  "Tell me the true meaning of enlightenment." The old man smiled, and stopped.  Then, fixing his gaze on the youth, he slowly swung the heavy burden off his back, laid the sack down, and stood up straight. "Ah, I understand," the young man replied.  "But sir, what comes after enlightenment?" The old man took a deep breath, then swung the heavy sack over his shoulders and continued on his way. CONCLUSION:  A flash of enlightenment offers a preview of coming attractions, but when it fades, you will see more clearly what separates you from that state – your compulsive habits, outmoded beliefs, false associations, and other mental structures.  Just when our lives are starting to get better, we may feel like things are getting worse – because for the first time we see clearly what needs to be done.  After illumination difficulties continue to arise; what changes is your relationship to them.  You see more and resist less. You gain the capacity to turn your problems into lessons and your lessons into wisdom. 

They sat together for a few more minutes, finishing their drinks. Then Miss Makutsi rose to her feet and announced that she was going to the ladies room and would meet him back in the dance hall for the rest of the class.

She found a door labeled power room which bore an outline picture of a woman in a long flowing skirt. She went in and immediately regretted it.

“So! There you are, Grace Makutsi!” said the woman standing at the basin.

Miss Makutsi stopped, but the door had closed behind her and she could hardly pretend that she has come into the wrong room.

She looked at the woman at the basin, and the name came back to her. This was the woman she had seen in the dance class and her name was Violet Sephotho. She was one of the worst of the glamorous, empty headed set at the Botswana Secretarial College and here she was applying powder to her face in the aptly named Powder Room of the Presidents Hotel.

 ‘Violet,” said Miss Makutsi.  ”It is good to see you again.”

 Violet smiled, closed her powder compact and leant back against the edge of the basin. She had the air of one who was settling in for a long chat.

‘Yes, sure,’ she said. “I haven’t seen you for ages. Ages. Not since we finished the course.” She paused, looking Miss Makutsi up and down, as if appraising her dress. “You did well, didn’t you? At that college, I mean.”

The thrust of the comment was unambiguous. One might do well at college, but this was very different from the real world. And then there was the disdainful reference to that college, as if there were better secretarial colleges to be attended.

Miss Makutsi ignored the barb, “And you, Violet? What have been doing? Did you manage to find a job?”

The implication in this remark was that those who got barely fifty per cent in the final examinations might be expected to experience some difficultly in finding a job. This was not lost on Violet, whose eyes narrowed.

“Find a job?” she retorted. ”Miss, I had them lined up to give me a job!  I had so many offers that I could think of no way of choosing between them.  So you know what I did?  You want to know?”

Miss Makutsi nodded.  She wanted to be out of this room, and away from this person, but she realized that she had to remain.  She would have to stand up for herself is she were not to feel completely belittled by the encounter.

“I looked at the men who were offering jobs and the chose the best looking one,” she announced.  “I knew that was how they would choose their secretary, so I applied the same rule to them! Hah! 

Miss Makutsi said nothing.  She could comment on the stupidity of this, but then that would enable Violet to say something like, “Well that may be stupid in your eyes, but look at the jobs I got.”  So she said nothing, and held the other woman’s challenging glance. 

Violet lowered her eyes and inspected her brightly polished nails.  “Nice shoes,: she said.  “Those green shoes of your, I‘ve never seen anybody wear green shoes before.  It’s brave of you.  I would be frightened that people would laugh at me if I wore shoes like that.”

Miss Makutsi bit her lip.  What was wrong with green shoes?  And how dare this woman, this empty headed woman, pass comment on her taste in shoes?  She looked at Violet’s shoes, sleek black shoes with pointed toes and quite unsuitable for dancing.  The looked expensive – much more expensive than these shoes which Miss Makutsi had treated herself to and of which she felt so proud.

“But lets not talk about funny shoes,” Violet went on breezily.  “Lets talk about men.  Don’t you love talking about men?   That man through there.  Is that your uncle or something?”

Miss Makutsi closed her eyes and imagined for a moment that Mma Ramotswe (her teacher) was by her side.  What would Mma Ramotswe advise I such circumstances?  Could Mma Ramotswe provide the words to deal with this woman, or would she say, “No, do not allow yourself to be belittled by her.  Do not stoop to her level.  You are worth more than that silly girl.”  And Miss Makutsi saw Mma Ramotswe in her mind’s eye, and heard her too, and that is exactly what she said.

“The man you are dancing with is very handsome,” said Miss Makutsi, “You are lucky to have such a handsome man to dance with.  But then you are a very pretty lady, Mma and you deserve these handsome men.  It is quite right that way.”

Violet stared at her for a moment and the looked away.  Nothing more was said, and Miss Makutsi went about her business.

“Well done,” said Mma Ramotswe’ voice, “You did just the right thing there.  Just the right thing!”

“It is very hard,” replied Miss Makutsi. 

“It often is,” said Mma Ramotswe.

A professor stood before his philosophy class and had some items in front
of him. When the class began, he wordlessly picked up a very large and
empty mayonnaise jar and proceeded to fill it with golf balls. He then
asked the students if the jar was full. They agreed that it was. The
professor then picked up a box of pebbles and poured them into the jar.
He shook the jar lightly. The pebbles rolled into the open areas between
the golf balls. He then asked the students again if the jar was full.
They agreed that it was.

The professor next picked up a box of sand and poured it into the jar. Of
course, the sand filled up everything else. He asked once more if the
jar was full. The students responded with an unanimous “yes.” The
professor then produced two cups of coffee from under the table and poured
the entire contents into the jar effectively filling the empty space
between the sand. The students laughed.

“Now,” said the professor as the laughter subsided, “I want you to
recognize that this jar represents your life. The golf balls are the
important things–God, your family, your children, your health, your
friends and your favorite passions–and if everything else was lost and
only they remained, your life would still be full. The pebbles are the
other things that matter like your job, your house and your car. The sand
is everything else–the small stuff.”

“If you put the sand into the jar first,” he continued, “there is no room
for the pebbles or the golf balls. The same goes for life. If you spend
all your time and energy on the small stuff you will never have room for
the things that are important to you.

“Pay attention to the things that are critical to your happiness. Play
with your children! Take time to get medical checkups. Take your spouse
out to dinner. Play another 18. There will always be time to clean the
house and fix the disposal. Take care of the golf balls first–the things
that really matter. Set your priorities. The rest is just sand.”

One of the students raised her hand and inquired what the coffee
represented. The professor smiled. “I’m glad you asked. It just goes to
show you that no matter how full your life may seem, there’s always room
for a couple of cups of coffee with a friend.”

Feel free to share this with those you care about. I JUST DID… Have a
wonderful life!

People Are Often Unreasonable

• People are often unreasonable, illogical, and self-centered. Forgive them anyway.
• If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives. Be kind anyway.
• If you are successful, you will win some false friends and some true enemies. Succeed anyway.
• If you are honest and frank, people may cheat you. Be honest and frank anyway.
• What you spend years building, someone could destroy overnight. Build anyway.
• If you find serenity and happiness, they may be jealous. Be happy anyway.
• The good you do today, people will often forget tomorrow. Do good anyway.
• Give the world the best you have, and it may never be enough. Give the world the best you’ve got anyway.
• You see, in the final analysis, it is between you and God. It was never between you and them anyway.

Mother Teresa of Calcutta (1910-1997)
Roman Catholic nun, founder of the Missionaries of Charity
Winner of the Nobel Peace Prize (1979)

In this life we cannot do great things.
We can only do small things with great love.

mother teresa