Cultivate Harmony

In search of clarity? Me, too. Here's a Lau Tzu quote and a new meditation/poem to help us on our quest.

In Japan, 2009. photo by Emily Erwin.

Cultivate harmony within yourself, and harmony becomes real;
Cultivate harmony within your family, and harmony becomes fertile;
Cultivate harmony within your community, and harmony becomes abundant;
Cultivate harmony within your culture, and harmony becomes enduring;
Cultivate harmony within the world, and harmony becomes ubiquitous.

Live with a person to understand that person;
Live with a family to understand that family;
Live with a community to understand that community;
Live with a culture to understand that culture;
Live with the world to understand the world.

How can I live with the world?
By accepting.

-Lau Tzu, in the Tao Te Ching



In waiting for opportunity, I've denied it.
Fearing failure, I've dismissed success.
In struggling for ease, I've crafted difficulty.
Acquiescing, I've withheld my truth.
Asserting ability, I've forgone capacity.
Attempting to contain, I've lost control.

Welcoming humility, I dismiss failure.
Acknowledging fear, I banish shame.
Resisting action, I bypass reaction.
Accepting weakness, I allow release.
Declining responsibility, I dispel obligation.
Avoiding attention, I circumvent tension.

Imbalanced, I allow myself to fall.
Forgoing power, I regain self.

-a meditation on clarity, March 28, 2011
  

Winter Changes

Welcome back, everyone!

Modeling Scott's (literal) birthday suit

...And welcome home to me! After three months of travel, Mr. Yates and I are finally back from our first major jaunt together across the country - no small feat! After flying from California (where it finally stopped raining) back to the Frozen Northlands (where it hasn't stopped snowing), we're enjoying some quiet catch-up time with the godkids & company, as I've christened our adopted clan.
Today was a good day for it, too. It was so cold - 24 degrees below zero - that the girls had the day off from school because the school buses couldn't start. Seriously. Needless to say, they were completely heart-broken. :) As for me, I experienced not a one of the usual Vermont urges to put off my writing and go outside to play, and so was remarkably productive. In fact, the only procrastinating I did was to avoid going outside, where we have yet to finish pushing my car out of the snow-bank it was buried in. I didn't mind the wait. It's already taken us two days just to dig a path for it, and I'd rather be covered in kids than ice.

Speaking of the not-so-wee ones, today's gem of a kid comment came from Ms. S, who was listening to one of her sisters and their other nanny talking about foreign phrases they enjoy.
"Ooh, schadenfreude," suggested the nanny. "One of my favorite German words!"
"That's German?" Ms. S wrinkled her nose.
"Sure it is!" Her sister was all too pleased to explain. "It means taking pleasure from someone else's pain."
"I'll have to remember that," murmered Ms. S thoughtfully, and turned away. As she walked by, I heard her repeating her new phrase softly to herself:
"Shot in Florida, Shot in Florida, Shot in Florida..."

This one almost tops one of her younger sister's comments the other day while actually in Florida, where she was vacationing with her moms.
"Why is the water so much warmer here than it is up North?" quizzed her mom, who never misses an opportunity for homeschooling. "They're both part of the Atlantic."
"Mo-om," replied Madame H incredulously, in that particular way she has. "We learned this already. It's because it's closer to Ecuador. Duhh!"
While technically right...

In other (less hilarious) news, I've finally come up with my New Year's resolutions: enroll in aromatherapy school (and thus, stay in one place long enough to help the kids and plants grow), pay off some debts, and actually use some of those products I'm always giving away and selling - now that's a novel idea, huh? Physician, heal thyself (or at least pamper the bejeezus out of thy skin)!

Speaking of herbs, the blog is finally back in action with a few new pages (hooray!), and I'd love any feedback on the new layout. Okee-dokie, pokies - time for this blackbird's daughter to hit the nest. 

Sweet dreams,

Jessica

'Resolutions' Part II

Hey, umm, guys?

These resolution things are kind of trickier than I thought.

Just sayin'.

On a slightly-related note, one of my loverly grandmothers is teaching me to knit. (The other one is attempting to teach me common sense. Please wish them both patience.) I only mention this because it explains why when I think about self-improvement strategies my brain fills with phrases like "wrap up your loose ends" and "even out your stitches."
It's not a handicrafting metaphor, but my mother also suggests that I should add "overbooking" to my list of jetison-worthy activities.

Consider it done, oh Maternal Font of Wisdom.

Or at least added. Easier attempted than accomplished, but like they say, a long-ass row begins with a single knit. Or perl.
Or something.

Resolutions and Absolution.

(image courtesy of northernsun.com)

No, not the Catholic kind - but close.

I've never been big on New Year's Resolutions. Designating an arbitrary day in the gray of winter to both jettison old coping mechanisms and celebrate mass drunkenness and socially-mandated coupling seems like a loaded sort of situation at best. It's the kind of vibe I try to stay away from, not out of prudence so much as basic emotional self-preservation. The way I see it, life and temperament afford me copious opportunities to feel like I'm not doing or becoming enough; why set myself up with one more?

That being the case, this year I celebrated the best way I knew how: a brief appearance at a kid-friendly party, a drive through the snowy Vermont landscape, and an early-to-bed evening in the company of one of the dearest people I know. I'm pretty sure I was asleep by 10, and bright-eyed and bushy-tailed by 9, which officially makes this the Best New Years Ever.

Of course, celebrating the new year is an ancient tradition - one of the oldest holidays ever recorded. The first written mentions come from the Babylonians, who celebrated on the vernal equinox (aka Spring); when better to celebrate the birth of a new year than the season when everything is born anew? Apparently, they celebrated with resolutions, too - mostly ones about returning borrowed farm equipment.

Thinking about the Babylonians' ancient resolve has me considering mine, not because this particular day feels like a new beginning, so much as the fact that it does line up with a certain break in this here Journey of mine. For a brief period, I'm back where I started, at least physically, and since the end of one cycle (however small) does mark the beginning of another, why not chose it to reflect on the changes I'd like to manifest?

Those who know me know I've got a tendency to push push push myself down life's path, in an effort to do/see/live asmuchaspossible. Why? Your psychoanalysis is as good as mine. I think it has to do with some internal fear that if I make the wrong choices I'll step off the my Path - a path that I often navigate based "soully on faith," as Hunter says - and end up in the wrong place. Surrounded by so much bounty and confusion, it's often impossible to know which is the right step to take - all that's left is the faith that I'm doing what I should be.

That said, here are this year's resolutions*:

(*I should note here that they're not so much resolutions as gentle suggestions to myself. I have a feeling that's going to be a lot more successful than anything else.)

1. Stop actively looking for people's negative characteristics to emerge. It's an unnecessary safety measure, and one that depletes new relationships and interactions of the uninhibited joy that I want to share with the world.

2. Relax. You've all been telling me to do that for a while, so why not give it a shot? The path will unfold, whatever I do will bring me joy, and ultimately, I'm not all that important in the grand scheme of things, anyway - if worst comes to worst and I don't make the right choices, I'm going to trust you all to take care of all the stuff I didn't get to.

3. Reduce the multitasking and limit the stress. One thing at a time really is ok. So is saying "No." Here, let's practice:
"Self, do you have enough time to do everything you want to today?"
"No."
"Should you maybe try and get it all done anyway?"
"Uhhh...no."
"Are people (including you) going to be dissappointed in you if you don't get it all done?"
"Potentially."
"So which is worse: admit you can't do everything and give up trying, or set up unreasonable expectations for yourself, crash and burn, and singe everybody around you in the process?"
"Ummm, that would be the second?"
"Very good. Here, have a cookie - now you've got time to eat it."
Wow, that was... surprisingly easy.

4. (And most embarrassingly necessary of all...) Ok, officially? I want to stop standing you all up and being late all the time. That shit is old and unbecoming. I'm pretty sure I've got what it takes to beat a little ADD, know what I'm saying?

5. Be gentle with myself. Ever since I can remember, I've had a difficult time forgiving myself for my imperfections and general screwed-up-edness - you know, those really human, really embarrassing or stupid or just generally clumsy sorts of interactions with the world that mark everybody's lives in some small way, but have the tendency to grow and morph into something so much greater inside your head. And I was very good at letting them take over a lot of my self-analysis; more, I think, than perhaps they deserved.
Eventually, though, I figured out that if I forced myself to stop staying awake at night reliving my foolish mistakes, I'd have enough energy to laugh at them when they happened. Or at least soon after, which is sometimes as much as you can ask of yourself, even if you do tend to fill your life with as much ridiculousness as I do. And let's face it, I'm never really going to be graceful or completely organized or tactful. But I can be funny, and I can be self deprecating, and I can be kind. And that has to count for something in these Kali Yuga times. After all, not everybody can be a slapstick routine unto themselves.
So now I try and go easy on the whole beating-myself-up shtick. It gets easier each year; maybe that's part of the whole "maturity" thing. Or maybe it just got boring, who knows? What I do know is that for the past year or so, I've stopped feeling the need to forgive myself for being human.

And to that effect, I now turn you over to Alanis Morissette, who continually sings things better than I know how to say them:

"Thank You" music video

How bout getting off of these antibiotics
How bout stopping eating when I'm full up
How bout them transparent dangling carrots
How bout that ever elusive kudo

Thank you India
Thank you terror
Thank you disillusionment
Thank you frailty
Thank you consequence
Thank you thank you silence

How bout me not blaming you for everything
How bout me enjoying the moment for once
How bout how good it feels to finally forgive you
How bout grieving it all one at a time

Thank you India
Thank you terror
Thank you disillusionment
Thank you frailty
Thank you consequence
Thank you thank you silence

The moment I let go of it was
The moment I got more than I could handle
The moment I jumped off of it was
The moment I touched down

How bout no longer being masochistic
How bout remembering your divinity
How bout unabashedly bawling your eyes out
How bout not equating death with stopping

Thank you India
Thank you providence
Thank you disillusionment
Thank you nothingness
Thank you clarity
Thank you thank you silence

and while we're at it....
Here's another great Alanis video. It's a promo for a song about letting go of those old coping mechanisms we all know and love. I first heard this about a year ago, and it really resonated, but I think the video needs a sequel...

"Precious Illusions"

You'll rescue me right?
In the exact same way they never did.
I'll be happy right?
When your healing powers kick in.

You'll complete me right?
Then my life can finally begin.
I'll be worthy right?
Only when you realize the gem I am.

But this won't work now the way it once did
And I won't keep it up even though I would love to.
Once I know who I'm not then I'll know who I am
But I know I won't keep on playing the victim.

These precious illusions in my head did not let me down
When I was defenseless
And parting with them is like parting with invisible best friends.

This ring will help me yet as will you knight in shining armor.
This pill will help me yet as will these boys gone through like water.

But this won't work as well as the way it once did
Because I want to decide between survival and bliss.
And though I know who I'm not I still don't know who I am
But I know I won't keep on playing the victim.

These precious illusions in my head did not let me down when I was a kid
And parting with them is like parting with a childhood best friend.

I've spent so long firmly looking outside me
I've spent so much time living in survival mode

This won't work now the way it once did
Cuz I want to deside between servival and bliss
Now I know who I'm not
I don't I still don't know who I am
But I know I won't keep on playing the victom

These precious illusions in my head did not let me down
When I was defenseless
And parting with them is like parting with invisible best friends


These precious illusions in my head did not let me down
When I was a kid
And parting with them is like parting with childhood best friends.

I love Alanis, the same way I love dandelions and myself. She's gone from wounded and pissed to strong and centered, and has been remarkably witty and self-reflective through the entire process. The world's a better place because of it. Hare Krishna, Alanis - go you.