Being receptive ......

I think I have mentioned before that ever since we returned from our cruise in July, I have had wanderlust.  I have tried to fulfill that yearning for travel by reading Travel Biographies and watching movies where the characters travel to other countries.  Reading "Man Seeks God;" Watching "Under the Tuscan Sun" and "Eat, Pray, Love."  I have read or heard somewhere that imagining living a certain experience is almost as or maybe more fulfilling than actually living the experience.  I agree with that.  Sitting still and imagining it allows you to really hear, see, smell, and taste all of the things that you might miss while being concerned with your bad hair day, the blisters on your feet, or your increasingly burning skin from the brightness of the sun.  Maybe this is what meditation is all about.  Experiencing without experiencing so that you may experience more fully. 

Speaking of meditation and "Eat, Pray, Love."  This morning during my weekly, Sunday morning movie time with Bella and coffee, we watched that movie.  I know that in the movie and book and real life ... Liz Gilbert was going through a divorce and made the decision to do so herself.  Some may say that she didn't deserve to be miserable or to be able to leave her life and explore the world the way she did.  Some may call her selfish.  Who says it is selfish to acknowledge some of the most difficult, unpleasant things about yourself and take the time to reconcile those things.  To better them.  Now don't start thinking, "Oh Ashley's gone off the deep end! She wants to leave her life and run away."  No.   Actually, while watching Julia Roberts as Liz Gilbert, find herself, I started thinking about how much I have to be grateful for.  Of course, I've always known this, but sometimes things just become very clear in your mind and you are able to just sit quietly and really feel the gratitude and happiness at what you are blessed with in your life.  I started thinking ...."I have Love.  I have Casey.  It almost hurts too much to think about what having Casey in my life means." 

My sister recently posed the question to me, "Ash, sometimes do you feel like you're afraid to be too happy?  Like you're afraid you don't deserve it, so when you start to feel it, you do something to mess it up?  You start a fight or think about something that makes you unhappy so that you don't have to actually open up and feel that happy?"  Wow.  It is true.  Lately, if I allow myself, I have these moments of brief clariy during which I feel overcome through my whole body with peace and contentedness.  Immediately, though, my mind .... my mind ... diverts itself to thinking about the baby situation, and I surprise myself by almost feeling relieved at the small presence of discontent that brings me back down to reality.  And then follows disappointment at the fleeting nature of happiness. 

Recently, I have read so many things that I am not sure where I read this but somewhere I read or heard that for things to come to you, you must be receptive.  During those fleeting moments of clarity and contentedness, I feel receptive.  My body relaxes, and I feel myself open up.  I felt this way during the 2 hours it took me to watch Eat Pray Love this morning.  Perhaps because at that moment I was not living Ashley's life.  I was living Liz Gilbert's, and I felt permission from myself to be receptive   for her sake.  Are we taught this?  That to think about ourselves and to be receptive to what we really want is selfish, so we learn to block those things.  We are miserable because we cannot have what we want, but we feel that we are good people because we are sacrificing our own happiness for others. 

Maybe this is the problem.  Maybe I am so afraid to have children because I am afraid of the amount of Love I will feel.  A friend recently said to me, "From the outside your life looks perfect."  That statement made me uneasy because when she said it, my immediate feeling was defensiveness and I wanted to say, "It is."  But then I thought, "Wait! You can't say that because you are the one who thinks it isn't!"  Talk about feeling confused.  Not to mention that I would never say to someone, "My life is perfect" because I have been taught to believe that sounds haughty and self-centered.  But really, what is wrong with saying, "My life is good.  There are things I have and things I don't have.  But it is perfect in it's imperfection."  There is always someone who is in a less perfect situation, so doesn't it make us a little ungrateful to dwell in what we feel is missing from our lives while others suffer greater deficiencies and still find it in themselves to feel happy? 

If all I am missing in my life is children ... and even that is only missing at this moment.  Up until about 3 years ago, I never felt like children were missing.  I only started feeling like they were missing when people started asking me when we'd have babies.  So then we started trying.  Then I lost the first one ... this is where the real feeling of something missing began.  Ever since then, I have been unable to focus on anything except what I feel is missing.  In Eat Pray Love, Ketut, a medicine man from Bali, scolds Liz for breaking things off with a wonderful Brazilian man she meets while in Bali.  She explains that she did it because while in Love she can't maintain her balance.  I think I can relate to that.  Feeling too much Love and Gratitude makes me feel unbalanced or afraid.  Ketut says to her, "Sometimes losing balance in Love is part of living a balanced Life."  Maybe being receptive is just a state of feeling unbalanced for a time so that the real balance can make it's way into your life. 

In Life, I see everything as a sign.  If you can't tell by reading this blog, I see something in everything.  I can analyze a piece of lettuce as holding the meaning to life if you give me the time to think and write about it.  (Probably I need to find some balance in that aspect of my life.  I have a feeling Ketut would laugh and say, Ashley, part of living a balanced life is just shutting up and eating your food.)  Anyway, after sitting quietly through the credits of Eat Pray Love, I turn the DVD off only to see the image of Joel Osteen preaching his Sunday morning Sermon on television.  I won't lie.  I'm a fan of Mr. Osteen.  I believe he believes.  I believe he cares about people and sees himself as a human being that may be able to help others.  As I turned the DVD off still a little lost in thought about what I had gathered from the movie, specifically, I need to be receptive... I hear Mr. Osteen's voice telling me to, "trust in God as Mary trusted in Him when he told her she would have a child without knowing a man."  I immediately stopped in my tracks and sat down on the edge of the coffee table about 1 foot from the television screen to hear what Joel had to say. 

He went on to say that we shouldn't look at our situation as something we have to control and analyze.  We should simply do as Mary did, and say, "I don't see any way this is possible any more, but I'm gonna trust You."  I liked this.  He didn't tell me, "Don't lose Hope.  Have Faith."  He acknowledged that sometimes your situation is just greater than all that.  That Hope and Faith are sometimes even too far out of reach.  To be receptive at that point, you have to just be honest with yourself and with God and say, "I don't see any way this is possible anymore in this physical world, so all I have left is You."  This, after hearing the Hindi belief that "God exists in You as You."  So when you tell God that all you have left is Him and he is You, then you are only left to trust your "self" to do what it already knows how to do.  This is so empowering.  Whew.  Now I must go find my balance.  Grocery shopping and house cleaning it is. 

Seylah!   

Adventures of Balloon Boy: A Buddhist Tale

Okay, so remember a couple of years ago when it was reported on the news that that kid was floating high in the sky in that balloon or blimp or whatever?  And then it turned out that it was all an elaborate hoax forged by his parents in hopes of attaining a spot on a reality show?  Read the full story here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balloon_boy_hoax.  Well, this story has somehow made it's way into Man Seeks God as a spiritual lesson.  Oh Eric Weiner, you are brilliant!

Buddhism, being a religion founded on experience rather than faith or belief, is a religion of "letting go," according to Weiner, and is based on the idea that all is suffering.  At first glance, this sounds incredibly negative and depressing; however, using the balloon boy story, Weiner illustrates how although all is suffering, this same suffering is an illusion.  Everything in our life is a dream, thus, we have no reason to be sad, angry, happy, or excited.  We should just be.  Don't be happy or excited, you might say?  But what's the point?  Well, the point is to maintain the self, as it is, in a peaceful state on a calm trajectory toward enlightenment. 

Of the balloon boy, Weiner says,

"People worried about the sweet little boy, they cried tears, they suffered, The emotions were genuine but the situation was not; it was an illusion.  Balloon Boy was never in danger.  Is life like that, I wonder - an elaborate hoax?  Are we all Balloon Boy?"

As strange as it might seem, this is actually very comforting to me.  To believe that the sadness, grief, anger, hope, happiness, and return to sadness I have felt over this whole ordeal is just an illusion.  This infertility only exists as some sort of dream state, and my emotions are genuine but not necessary because the situation does not exist.  This sounds vaguely like denial; however, with all due respect, I think I have reached a point way beyond denial.  So thinking about my situation this way, may just give me the room I need to detach from it to move on with my life.  I wonder if Eric Weiner knows he wrote a book about fertility?  :)

I am a Stick Figure

As you all know, I am reading Eric Weiner's, Man Seeks God.  Right now, in the book, Weiner has moved on in his travels to Kathmandu, Nepal to study Buddhism.  He has joined forces with a guru, Wayne (sounds totally Tibetan and Monkish, don't you think?).  In his teachings, Wayne is attempts to explain to Weiner the concept of separating the mind and body for meditation.  He says:

"You are working on the distinction between thought and mind.  You are weaning yourself off your thoughts....Just be with the body.  Check in with the body.  Rely on the body.  The body knows.....  The body is not stupid.  Everybody says the body is stupid and the mind is smart, but it's not that way.  The body is simple and wise already.  It's taking care of itself.  It's your final teacher.... Think of your body as a stick figure.  Legs, arms, torso.  That's what we're going to work with.  Keep coming back to that.  You're a bag of bones.  And the great thing about your body is that you carry it with you wherever you go."

Instantly, I applied this to my situation.  Lately, with the not-so-official-sounding-official diagnosis of "Unexplained Infertility,"  I have decided to explore mental or emotional blocks to fertility.  I think I have moved beyond exploring possible reasons why I might not be getting pregnant, and have just taken a general interest in the impact of infertility on women's minds and emotions as well as psychological and emotional issues that may be the root of infertility.  I have always believed that the mind has much more power and control over our physical well-being than most of us are aware of.  This statement by Guru-Wayne speaks directly to the heart of that.  It tells us to teach our mind: unruly, rebellious child that it is, to shut up because Body Knows Best.  Chris, the acupuncturist, mentioned this to me once.  He said, "We are going to help you relax and quiet your mind so that your body can do what it already knows how to do."  It is obvious that my body knows what to do.  I apparently am the proud-owner of impeccable health and have conceived 3 times (that I know of).  Doesn't it make sense that my always wondering and chattering mind could be to blame. 

I love the idea presented in Wayne's lesson that your body is wise and has the ability to lead you to calm and peace; it's omnipresence is to be considered comforting.  The body is like a mother.  Older, Wise, Stable, and Warm.  Whether we are ill, scared, cold, tired, or ignorant, our body is always there to protect us and lead us back to health, warmth, and safety - We just have to step aside and let it.  Starting today, I am a stick figure. :)  Preferably like the one below! Enjoy!

Family & Friends ..... PLEASE READ THIS!

http://heartsandhandss.com/2009/07/20/infertility-etiquette/

This blog pretty much hits the nail on the head.  I have always said that people who know people suffering through fertility challenges should be informed of some type of etiquette.  Here's is substantial proof that 1) I am not crazy 2) I am not alone in feeling the ways I have felt throughout the last few years and 3) There are ways to learn what to and what not to say. 

I want to thank this woman for writing this!  Very well done. :)

August 15th ....

Today would have been the first birthday of our little one who died Christmas of 2010.  I have been such a roller coaster of a person the last few weeks.  The last few days, however, I have felt good.  Peaceful, calm.  I expected the same today.  Last night, I laid in bed and couldn't sleep.  I wasn't thinking about anything in particular... I just felt fitful.  I felt anxious and upset for a reason I couldn't explain.  When I woke up this morning, I calmed myself and told myself I would be calm and peaceful today too.  Casey and I have dinner plans to go to Galveston after work.  I was happy about that and vaguely aware that we would be at the ocean which is where we said goodbye to our little one last year on this day....

Call it a self-fulfilling prophecy but while getting ready for work, it just felt like nothing went right ... I spilled my coffee, I dropped everything I picked up, I feel like I look an utter mess.  I jumped down Casey's throat for no reason whatsoever .... I screamed at people on the way to work.  Just not a pleasant morning whatsoever.  Now that I am at work, the tears just started pouring out.  I'm sitting here in disbelief b/c I can't believe I am this upset today.  Not after feeling happy and calm like I did yesterday. 

When I was going to acupuncture, Chris talked to me about 'echoes.'  Specifically, last year during November and December, I was feeling so incredibly down and sad and couldn't really explain it.  It felt like something beyond my control.  He told me that the smells in the air, the sounds, the sights, everything about that time of year was causing me to feel an echo of what I felt the year before when we lost the baby.  I thought, well duh.  BUT ... today feels like an echo.  It would be easy to say that the smells, sights, and sounds of Christmas would bring up old feelings, but there is nothing special about August 15th ... nothing besides what day it is.... and today, I feel like my emotions are out of my control.  Like I will feel this way whether I want to or not. 

I feel so bitter as I sit here at work and people come in to say Good Morning.  I want to ask them, "Is it?"  I don't feel like talking and barely respond when they talk to me.  I'm sure they think, "Oh she's in one of her moods again."  I'm sure they just see me as moody.  No one has any idea what today is or what it means to me.  I wish this day was just another day for me too.  How is it that women all over the world do this?  Probably everyday some woman wakes up and feels overcome by sadness because her child was supposed to be born that day.  Casey tells me I'm strong, but I don't feel strong.  I just need this day to be over.  I miss my little baby and I still see it's heartbeat when I close my eyes.  I wish today was a happy one instead of a sad one.  I wish I was planning a birthday party instead of mouring a death.  All I can do is hope and pray that I get through this day and that tomorrow I can have hope of planning a birthday party in the future.  Please, please God .... I just want to plan a birthday party. 

The Whirling Dervishes

Wow! Have you ever seen anything so pure and beautiful?  I guess I have heard of the term "Whirling Dervishes" before but I guess I thought it was some sort of weather condition like a really strong tornado with a tumbleweed in the middle.  That's sort of what it sounds like to me.  But my goodness! I never imagined it was anything this beautiful. 

I've recently begun reading Man Seeks God by Eric Weiner.  I love him.  I love his writing.  I think it reminds me of my own .... a lot of spiritual seeking, introspective, self-exploration with a bunch of sarcastic, dry humor mixed in.  His first chapter explores Sufism beginning with a hilarious stay at a Sufi Camp in California.  The only good coming of his "campout" being his encounter with a Whirling Dervish who inspires him to go to Turkey to see the origin of that practice.  Naturally, I had to google "Whirling Dervish" and found a bunch of videos.  The one above is one of my favorites, I think because of the artistic approach (probably Westernized, I'm sure). 

Anyway, in learning about the practice of the sama, a form of meditation through body movement (i.e. whirling) during which the meditator is able to reunite with God and achieve, hopefully, wajd,  a state of pure ecstasy in which one feels a rush of sorrow, joy, etc.  One might be more familiar with this state when it is referred to as Nirvana.  Thank you Kurt Cobain.  I digress.  In learning about this practice, I of course considered what I have always believed which is that dancing or body movement is a natural and almost necessary way to disconnect from one's life and perhaps transcend spiritually.  When watching children one will almost always notice that they "dance" when they hear music and sometimes even to their own voices or the voices of others.  No one teaches them to dance.  They just do.  So many cultures incorporate dancing into their practices and more than a few are even defined by their dancing.  I have always been partial to this idea having been a dancer myself.

But sama  is different even than dancing.  Again, my thoughts turned to children.  How many of us have played the game where we whirl and twirl in the front yard making ourselves so dizzy.... dizzy.... dizzy.... dizzy until we fall down in hysterics.  Is this a form of sama?  A natural form of meditation that children know inherently but forget as adults because it is silly and childish?  I can easily see how this whirling allows the Dervishes to completely transcend their lives here on earth to reach a state of wajd. 

I love this practice.  I may never be a full fledged participant, but I appreciate it's beauty ... especially in remembering having done something similar as a child.  Maybe one day I'll have my very own little Whirling Dervishes.  I'll hear their laughter floating in from the front yard and run to the window to catch them just as they fall down in hysterics .... in their own tiny state of wajd....   And I will be in mine. :)

Mal de Ojo

In feeling like a black cloud has settled over me, I have explored many avenues of removing or escaping this cloud. I started with the oh-so-popular Secret or Law of Attraction.  I found that it does have some validity if one is disciplined enough to continuously employ it.  The Law of Attraction does not support the idea of luck but places accountability on the Self by teaching one to attract what one wants by putting that very thing into the Universe.  Utter positivity can gain one success and fortune, if in fact, you have the discipline to be so. 

I am a firm believer in the Law of Attraction and like the idea of having control over my own destiny; however, and this is a big however, I do feel that there are others in your environment who have some control over your energy, feelings, outlook, and general well-being.  Having grown up in SouthEast Texas so close to the Mexican border and having had many friends and acquaintances of hispanic origin, I have alway heard and been familiar with the Mal de Ojo or Evil Eye.  I have joked in recent months about feeling like I have the Ojo, but recently I feel that this might actually be true.  I do not think I am cursed, but I feel like maybe there are people in my immediate environment who either intentionally or unintentionally are generating toxic feelings and negativity into my energetic field.  I know this sounds all kooky, but I think there may be some validity to it.  The belief in the Evil Eye exists across many cultures all over the world.  Each culture has it's own identifier for it and each group of people use different methods of warding it off.  In my initial musings on the topic, I thought to myself, "But can this be right?  It is basically blaming another person for everything that is wrong in your life?  What about the law of attraction?  What about personal accountability?"  I continued reading and researching the topic and realized that in every culture that cultivates methods of curing or preventing the Evil Eye, the responsibility of healing and protection is on the sufferer not the attacker.  It is up to the sufferer to don his talisman of protection and it is up to the sufferer to perform the appropriate ritual to heal himself from the Evil Eye. 

I think today, I may try to find myself a talisman.  Maybe even perform some cleansing ritual ... and most importantly continue to recognize the negative energies coming from people in my environment. 

Glass

Our pieces are all pointy and jagged but those are just fragments of something that was beautiful.  We can put them back together into a mosaic of our own making.  They'll never fit perfectly like they did before they were broken, but mosaics are beautiful too, aren't they?   

A prettier word for "Snorkeling?"

Last night, when I laid down to go to sleep ..... I found myself going back to the time I was snorkeling in Cozumel on the vacation.  I think that was the first time in my life I have ever been able to genuinely focus ONLY on what I was doing and be ONE with the nature around me.  I know that sounds so cliche, but I've never before just let myself go and focus only on breathing in and out while taking in the beautiful, natural sights around me. 

It seems like even out in the woods or on a beach there is always some distraction.  A car in the distance, an airplace overhead, a child crying nearby.  Under water, though, your ears fill with the sound of your own breath.  Then you are only hearing the essence of your life.  YOUR life.  To be able to hear nothing but my own breath and to be suspended by that breath over the beautiful depths of a mysterious ocean is perhaps the definition of Peace. 

This takes me back to the blog I wrote before we left.... the one that quotes the ending paragraphs of Kate Chopin's The Awakening.  I posted that blog because I was feeling oppressed, suffocated, despondent and hopeless.  The idea of disappearing into an endless ocean sounded appealing but only in the way of not coming out of it.  I realized later, that this is exactly what I did.  What Edna did .... maybe she did not commit suicide after all?  Maybe she just allowed herself to disappear if only for a little while so she could simply hear nothing but the sound of her own breath and allow it to carry her.  Sometimes the weight of the world takes our breath away and makes us hurt from its burden.  Diving off into an ocean that will carry those burdens for you, where everything becomes lighter, and you can hear physical proof that you are alive can be healing.  Even when you have to come out and return to land, the image and sound stays with you and you are cleansed. 

I hate to call this experience "Snorkeling".... who thought of that ugly word?  There should be a more beautiful and musical word for an experience during which one can gain so much peace and enlightenment.  Let's think of a new word for it, shall we?

Musing after cruising ......

Well, we just made it back from our very first cruise, EVER.  What an experience!

The boat itself was awe inspiring ... so big and so many things to do.  Of course, there were the drinks, the food, the shows .... everything everyone raves about.  But once we arrived back on land and got our 'land legs' back, I had to ask myself what my favorite part of our vacation was.....  the only thing that stayed in my mind.  That floated before my closed eyes when I laid down at night were all the wonderful people we met throughout those 4 days. 

The ship's crew is made up of a conglomeration of men and women from all over the world.  The beautiful Ukrainian woman at the coffee bar;the Transylvanian maitre d; the Philipino waiter; the Japanese country singer; the British cruise director; and the Italian ship captain.  Each of their beautifully accented voices rang in your ears decorating your day at different times and for different reasons.  Now I crave their sing-songy voices welcoming me aboard and wishing me Good Morning. 

Then there were the lovely people we met in Mexico.  Attempting our best Spanish and sharing loads of laughs at our mistakes was just plain fun.  It sounds so obvious but realizing that there are other people that you do not know in the far reaches of the world is Amazing!  Knowing there are people waking up on an island somewhere going about their everyday business is somehow reassuring that life is not so bad.  I'm not sure how, but perhaps it is knowing that you are not alone in the world.  That there are others who may not share your language but who would understand your laughter or your pain.  Knowing that at any time you could up and leave and go somewhere else in the world and find good company. 

Our 'Cruise Family' that we shared dinner with every night are the ones I miss the most.  How strange it is to sit down in such an intimate setting as the dinner table and share your day with complete strangers.  And how quickly they cease to be strangers.  Sharing a meal with someone is perhaps the quickest way to get to know them.  You can learn so much about a person just by the things they eat, the way they eat, the way they interact with waitstaff.  A cruise is a people-watcher's Heaven to be sure! 

I have to say that this was more than just a vacation for me.  It was a life-altering experience.  I find that in my old age (haha!) each experience I have becomes more and more life-altering no matter how trivial.  What a blessing it is to be able to see the beauty of those places you visit.  And not just the aesthetic beauty, which in itself is breathtaking, but the beautiful even in the non-beautiful things! 

I now have the travel bug.  I don't just want to travel; I want to wander.  I don't just want to vacate my life; I want to occupy others' lives.  I want to know people and their cultures inside and out.  My new favorite word: wanderlust. :)