Metaphysical

Can We Ever Have Too Many?

/ still a dreamer / 4 Comments

Probably the answer to that is `yes,’ but when I think about it being books, my head just seems to automatically move from side to side … no. We can’t.

Of course, I say this in my own defense, as well might you, in the face of Tuesday’s experience. I went to vote. Our town votes in the local library. There are no services for that day, but one can still roam about and  peruse the shelves. Well, the shelves I perused were the ones in front of the check-out desk which are always filled with used/unwanted/donated books for sale. $1.00 for hardcover, $.50 for paperback.

I asked one of the ladies helping out with voting if I could just leave the librarian some money for a few books. Of course I could, just no borrowing from the main shelves. (I bet they’re all in cahoots, I thought, conspiring to entice helpless readers.) I didn’t have change, so left a bigger bill which would cover the books and a small donation to the library along with a note.

I found another book by Amy Tan, The Kitchen God’s Wife, her next after her first big success. The Joy Luck Club. That seemed like a good bet. And then I found Toni Morrison’s latest novel, Paradise, a mystery about some evil goings-on in a convent outside a small Oklahoma town. Now that sounded interesting! And then in paperback, The Power of Silence, a later book by Carlos Castaneda, and also The Secret by Rhonda Byrne … the book. (I’ve only read the web site.) What a tasty little gathering of reads for such a pittance.

Now, that fortune cookie … technically, it belonged to my friend as I had already opened and eaten my cookie. Half of it was good advice … the generosity part. The perfection part? Well, sometimes that’s just a way to make ourselves crazy, but hey, it’s only a thought in a cellophane-wrapped, folder-over piece of fried dough, right? I have something more on my mind … I’m stalking through the freshly vacated rooms of the convent with men seeking justice in Paradise.

Perfection

/ still a dreamer / 4 Comments

Perfection sucks. Plain and simple.

This is not to say we shouldn’t strive for the highest standards or do the very best we can do, but striving to always be perfect is a useless and demoralizing task. Yet it’s how many of us live and  how many of us were raised. Things had to be perfect … we had to be perfect.

When you aim for perfection, you discover it’s a moving target.  ~George Fisher

Growing up, many of us had parents and teachers that believed in perfection, and who were no doubt raised the same way. Every little thing had to be just so. No messes, no mistakes. It’s hard for a parent to teach a child that not being perfect is really OK when the opposite message was enforced in them. And so the manacles of impossible perfection get passed on from parent to child.

Have no fear of perfection – you’ll never reach it.  ~Salvador Dali

Even knowing this, we get caught up on this search for perfection again and again. Like a piece of cloth catching on a rusty nail as we walk by, we lament the tiny new bubble of thread in the fabric instead of seeing how beautiful the whole still remains.

You see, when weaving a blanket, an Indian woman leaves a flaw in the weaving of that blanket to let the soul out.  ~Martha Graham

We feel compelled towards perfection in our need for immaculately clean homes, spotless clothing, the perfect score in golf, the car without the tiniest of marks in the finish. We must have perfect grades, the best performance in our jobs, in sports and other accomplishments, berating ourselves ruthlessly when we “fail.” We are so horribly unfair to ourselves, is it any wonder so many people have difficulty reaching goals and dreams, having allowed so many stumbling blocks to remain in our path?

Always live up to your standards – by lowering them, if necessary.  ~Mignon McLaughlin

I was once given an assignment. I was told to put a deliberate flaw in every drawing I did as a way of getting past my fear of the drawing being less than perfect. It still is a challenge that I cringe before, and if I do it, I can’t let it stay for long. Perfection takes away the enjoyment of the moment, of whatever we’ve worked on and completed, and … the enjoyment of others, too. For those of us who were raised this way, it’s a lifelong challenge, but let it go.

Let perfection go. Pick it up in your hand and blow it away like the tiny fluffs of a spent dandelion. Because here’s the truth. In the deepest sense of the word, we are already perfect. And we never need to try so hard.

Sometimes… when you hold out for everything, you walk away with nothing.  ~From the television show Ally McBeal

Moving through The Flame

/ still a dreamer / 4 Comments

I believe it was the Christmas before last that a dear friend gave me The Book of Awakening by Mark Nepo. Nepo is a poet who writes a daily (prose) offering of guidance for the reader, drawn from his own experiences, from others who struggle with their own humanness as well as the wisdom of the great traditions and teachers. Every day is a different subject and a beautifully written piece.

When I first got the book, I diligently followed along every day, enjoying the wisdom offered for the entire year. Now I dip in when I feel the call to do so which almost always assures me of a nugget of truth which is exactly what I need to hear at that time. I opened the book this morning to where my bookmark sat, May 25th, Through the Wall of Flame. The first paragraph reads:

Living long enough, we each find ourselves surrounded by an old way of being, thinking, or loving that is going up in flames. In that unexpected moment, we usually find ourselves full of fear, feeling trapped by an old way of life coming in on us. But this is the passage of rebirth that we must move through if our lives are to unfold. It is the momentary and painful crossing from what is old into what is new.

Nepo goes on to say how understandable it is to stall at this wall of flame, not wanting to go through, but that old ways can burn forever, and we can waste years in the waiting for the flames to go out. And they often never do.

I find there are times in life where things seem to be going smoothly, where we are moving easily forward in positive ways, where our goals and dreams are clearly in view. And then there are other times when they are obscured by Nepo’s described wall of flames … time to learn another lesson to help us grow. Oftentimes, the lessons are the same ones we have been learning and struggling with all along, but now at a new level, a new depth, with a greater challenge and … with a greater reward for pushing through. Even though we may occasionally lose sight of it in the trying.

Over the years, I have been told to be thankful for these challenges as they are opportunities to grow and to grow closer to my dreams. It’s not always easy to cross through the flames, and, while our hands are burning hot, to be grateful as well. The choice, however, is to stay safe at a far greater cost. What I have learned to do when it seems there are flames all about me is to just put one foot in front of the other and believe. Believe that I am always loved, believe that I will always survive the jump through, and believe that what is on the other side is richer than what I ever imagined.

In front of a wall of flames? Let’s all of us take a breath. Ready? Jump!

The Package Arrived — It’s Books!

/ still a dreamer

Surprise! It’s books! Hardcover, too!

With the annual Hunterdon County Library Book Sale just around the corner, (details here, if you want to go – you won’t be sorry), and with a decent size stash still waiting to be read, I almost … that’s almost, but not totally … don’t feel entitled to purchase brand new books. But alas, it is one of two indulgences I’ve allowed myself in this life, (the other being music), and so the books arrived. If you are reading this post currently, you will see them to the right. If you visit this blog regularly, you will note there are always two books there – one a novel, be it adult, YA or MG, and the other a book of an enlightening, metaphysical/spiritual nature. And so goes my reading. Picture books go too fast to even warrant a spot, but I may write about them here.

How to Save A Life kept popping up at me from different places and sounded terrific, so I got it. More on that when I read it. And then, while flipping channels last week, I came to a halt on Wayne Dyer and a PBS special, Wishes Fulfilled, also the title of the book. He is so on the money, and who doesn’t want their highest good manifested? So I’m starting on that, too.

But first, a word on Click. While waiting for said package to arrive, I felt drawn to read this again. It is a continuing story told chapter by chapter by different authors from the USA and the UK, each highly accomplished. It’s a great concept with each new chapter a revelation that could only result in the story being told this way. It starts off with Linda Sue Park, and then continues Chapter 2* with David Almond, one of my favorite authors. His chapter was so amazing and magical, I could have stopped right there. But I’m more than halfway through and want to enjoy the rest before I start my new choice.

In addition to these wonderful authors bringing the tale of Grandpa Gee, photographer and worldwide traveler, his family and those he encounters in his journeys to life, they have also contributed their book sale proceeds from Click to Amnesty International to save a few lives themselves.

*Here is a quote from Chapter 2 of Click by David Almond:

“I’m Annie Lumsden, and I live with my mum in a house above the jetsam line on Stupor Beach. I’m thirteen years old and growing fast. I have hair that drifts like seaweed when I swim. I have eyes that shine like rock pools. My ears are like scallop shells. The ripples on my skin are like the ripples on the sand when the tide has turned back again. At night I gleam and glow like sea beneath the stars and moon. Thoughts dart and dance inside like little minnows in the shallows. They race and flash like mackerel farther out. My wonderings roll in the deep like sails. Dreams dive each night into the dark like dolphins do and break out happy and free into the morning light. These are the things I know about myself and that I see when I look in the rock pools at myself.”    — David Almond

Accepting Now

/ still a dreamer

I’m always a big fan of good quotes, and this one came up on my metaphysical flip calendar on Friday.

“You cannot live on earth and avoid lessons;  but you can learn them easily and with joy rather than struggle.”  – Sanaya Roman and Duane Packer.

I’m thinking that learning them easily and with joy IS a big lesson no? I’ve been observing and talking to others and thinking about my own experiences, and realizing how much of our stress and anxiety is attached to outcomes, i.e. our having a lot invested in our own expectations coming to pass. Sometimes our expectations are based on “reality” and are reasonable. But sometimes they’re really what we want to happen. Or not to happen. In the latter two cases, the result is the same; we are not living in the present world of possibilities or accepting what is and we become messy balls of anxiety.

So in accepting the not-knowing, it might seem like we’re spending our lives walking on a tightrope of uncertainty, and in a way, I suppose we are.  But if we believe that there is a reason why things happen, whether we can see it or not, that there may be a bigger picture that we don’t know about, or a lesson we have yet to discern, then the tightrope has an infinite safety net. We’re really always OK. It’s our own attachment to outcomes that prevents us from walking that sparkling tightrope called life with confidence and perfect balance. And leaping with joy. Yes!

Accepting Now and being grateful for all we have in this moment, can bring us joy and help us learn our lessons without struggle. It can be a challenge. I’m right on the journey’s path with the rest of you, trying to grasp the lesson a little better,  on a deeper level each time, and coming back to joy. Happy travels.