Author Archives: Susan McNamara

Parallels

Posted on by

 

I am sometimes asked how it is that I see what I see in terms of the impact that technology is having on us and our children. For the longest time, I did not know. Then, I began writing a book on the downside of technology and kids and found my answer. Here it is from me to you.

The reason I see what I do in terms of the pervasive and all encompassing damage technology’s presence is having on our families, most especially on our children, is because I grew up in addiction. It was what I smelled, tasted, touched and walked through each and every day that I lived with my family of origin. It was the sea that I swam in. I did not question it or think it out of the ordinary. Disconnection and dissatisfaction felt normal to me. It felt like home. 

As a child, I lived with the constant and unspoken reality that something was always in between me and my parents. Something was always in between me and my siblings. And something was always in between me and myself. The long arm of addiction insinuated itself into every single aspect of our lives from what time dinner was, to how we socialized, to what we believed as children, to how we were with one another, and to how we felt about ourselves. Alcohol was more important than people’s feelings. It was more important than love and connection. It was more important than health and well-being. It was more important than honesty and trust. And it was more important than me. Something non-human told us who we were and how to act. It told us how to be with one another and what to value. Sound familiar?

Like any child, I needed my parents to be available to me. And because they were not, I worked very hard to get them to pay attention, especially my father. I tried to catch his eye. And because what I did never worked, I kept trying harder and harder believing that it was my fault. Believing that if I could just do or say the right thing, at the right time, and in the right way then he would want me. Deep down it felt like there just had to be some dark and awful thing about me that was keeping him from wanting a better connection with me. Because he was my father, I believed him when  he told me I was needing and wanting the wrong things. He just had to be right. He was the parent, the one in charge. The one who knew how things worked in the world. The one who was supposed to know how to pay attention to their own kid as well as the one who was never supposed to be the source of their sadness and disconnect. Throughout it all, I learned how to do for myself, how to accept harmful and sub par substitutes and how to go without what I needed most because what I really needed was not available.

Back then, when I was sensing and saying that something was off, nobody wanted to hear it. For them to hear would be to admit that there was a problem, and to admit that there was a problem would be to recognize that something must change, and then actually change. Back then, I was the one saying something is wrong, terribly, terribly wrong. And I am saying it again here. Now. Please God that we do not have to hit a collective bottom before we choose to recognize what is happening to us. Please God that we have a low tolerance for allowing machines to get in between us and our loved ones. Please God that we do not leave our children believing that an inanimate object is more important than them. Back then I was an irritant, a “trouble-maker.” Today, I say, “yes,” it is irritating and inconvenient to hear that the thing that you have made your god is squeezing the life out of you and your family.  As bothersome and upsetting as this may be to hear and to recognize, it is still true nonetheless.

Looking back, I see that worse than any emotional neglect I experienced, were the daily choices I had to make; go with the program and have a father who tolerated me being around, or break from what I was being sold and be true to myself, and therefore left without. This left a deep and dangerous imprint on me, so soul-crushing that I still wonder how it was that I did not wind up going over some edge from which there was no coming back. I hated myself when I looked through the eyes of addiction. And for the longest of times, I did not trust myself. In the end, though, I have come to make my peace with it all. Even though it is deeply unsettling for me to be at odds with others, to go against the flow, there is now something in me that is willing to disturb dysfunction and disconnection despite my discomfort. And it all started with having my children and wanting something more for them. Could we not all find this within ourselves? Could we not all refuse to engage with what is inhumane, addictive and life-depleting? Could we not do this for our children?

Children are so astute and so very, very intuitive. In the beginning, they are more like animals; sensing and feeling their way into the world. They read what is beneath the surface. They respond to what is beyond words. When they are young, you cannot con them. It is only as they get older and figure out that if they want your love, they must tow the party line or risk falling out of favor with you, that they begin to lose their knowledge of what they need from you. Abandonment is a loss they cannot bear. Because of this, they will learn to be OK with very little if very little is what we offer them. It does not mean that this is what they want or need. It means that they are willing to make a deal. A compromise. And the compromise will be them; their hearts, their spirits, their lives. It is by our hand that we force this compromise on them when we live as if the screens are the most important thing in life. We do not do this with our words, but through our daily choices and where we place our attentions.

Share this article

The Medicine Of Belonging To Yourself

Posted on by

 

Isn’t there a way that we can find our place in the world while still being true to ourselves? A place where we do not need to make apologies, give excuses, dumb down, tone down or hide? This is always on my mind these days, and as fate would have it I ran across something I wrote a while back  that I would like to share with you. The piece reflects my experience as a mother who chose to strongly limit the influence of the screen technologies in my children’s lives. I believe that it speaks directly to how the process of living the truth of our lives opens the door for belonging.

Making choices that were different from how I was raised, and different from those around me, challenged me down to my very core. I grew up believing that if I did not do it “right” according to others, I would be banished. Kicked out. When I began making different choices than those around me it pulled up all of my fears around belonging and affiliation. I thought I would be driven out of the group for doing things differently. I struggled terribly, and at times still do, with the sense that others might be offended, upset or threatened by my choices.  For a long time I was very defensive and protective about our life, believing that others held the power to destroy what was so important to me. I tried so hard for so long to stay above reproach, in the minds of others, so that I would not be rejected or criticized.

When I became willing to see this about myself, I was able to shift my perspective recognizing how brave it was of me to be doing what I was doing and risking what I was risking. It taught me the power of affiliation and how often, and under what circumstances,  we will betray ourselves and our values to stay in connection with others. It showed me the painful dilemma this puts all of us in regarding the choice between being who we are and belonging. And it showed me that at its best, there is no choice to be made; that when we are fully ourselves, we can be anywhere and with anyone. In the end, it continues to motivate me to stay true to myself, trusting that there is always a place for me when I am at my authentic best. 

It is so easy to believe that belonging lies outside of ourselves. That if and when the outside offers permission and acceptance of who we are and who we most want to be, then we will be given our place at the table. Belonging begins from within and is without condition. Belonging is a state of mind. Belonging arises from the knowledge of who you are and who you are wanting to be. It originates from within and radiates out to include all who we encounter. It is never about whether or not others will include us, but whether or not we will include ourselves.

Share this article

What Kind Of A World?

Posted on by

 

It is so very, very easy to look out at the world and to believe that all of the difficult and horrible things that are happening are due to someone else. Some other group of people. Some set of circumstances beyond our lives. So, not only do we find ourselves in the position of feeling afraid and overwhelmed, simultaneously we can feel that it is beyond our control to do anything about what is happening.

Every semester, with the college students I teach, we do a group think exercise at the board. I divide the white board up into the following categories; physical, social, emotional, mental and spiritual. Then, we collectively brainstorm on all of the costs associated with living stressed out. As you might imagine, the list includes things like headaches, insomnia, illness, irritability, anger, isolation, poor judgment, anxiety, depression and lack of faith. Just to name a few. This is nothing new. We know this. What we don’t know or think about is how this personal experience of being so out of balance is impacting the world we live in.

What we do next is to imagine what kind of a world we are creating by living in a state of chronic and habitual stress. Words like “unsafe, unhealthy, unnatural, scary, pessimistic, dark, bad and toxic regularly make the list. It is always a sobering moment to be in a group of people realizing not only what their behavior is costing them, but how it is creating the very things that they loathe and fear in the world. Before our next class, their homework assignment is to catch themselves in a stress response noticing what kind of a world they are creating when they live from a place of tension and overwhelm.

If we have any hope of things changing for us collectively, we must begin to connect the dots between our personal choices and the state of the world. And we must do this not in theory, but in practice. Daily practice. So, what do your stressed out behaviors and choices cost you? What do they cost the world?

Share this article

Self-Trust

Posted on by

 

“Do things not smell or sound right-even if you can’t define why? Trust those feelings for they will define themselves shortly.”  I have these words tacked up on my bedroom wall. I need to be reminded daily that I can trust myself despite what the demands or expectations of others, or the culture at large, may be. My experience has been that within each of us, there is an urge, an undefined and maybe not yet articulated knowing that rests just beneath the surface. All that it takes is a little coaxing to come forward.

One of the best ways to tune into this internal knowing is to go through the body. It is the home of our most basic instincts, intuitions and urges. Unfortunately, we live in a culture that both degrades and ignores the body. And it shows. Look around at how many of us have illnesses and diseases that are purely choice-related. Look around at the cultural sanctioning of health-degrading habits in the forms of fast foods, the use of stimulants, the disregard for the body’s need to rest along with the expectations of busyness that serve as the agreed upon standard for how we are doing. Having no idea how to take care of our own bodies leaves us bereft of the health, joy and well-being that come from living as a being who understands how to take care of a body. On a deeper level, we miss out on the wisdom and guidance that is available to us from within; a kind of built-in navigational system that is sorely missing and desperately needed if we are to live lives that matter and make sense to us.

We are what Clarissa Pinkola-Estes calls “instinct-injured.” We have forgotten how to trust our inner wisdom; that which is natural and innate.  Screen messages, “expert” advice, stress, busyness and the sense that we are not doing enough have created and continue to compound this injury, leaving us vulnerable to the belief that we need a steady stream of outside sources to tell us how to live.Trusting your instincts and intuition runs contrary to the belief that only the rational mind knows the way, and that we must constantly be looking outside of ourselves to keep up in order to know what to do. In this time of information overload, hidden agendas and multiple ways of distorting the truth, we need a way of being in the world that goes beyond the ways that our rational mind can deceived. It is a most empowering experience to know that there are instincts and intuitions within all of us that will take us to exactly where we need to go. It is from this place that we begin to develop the impeccable radar that will serve our lives as well as the best instincts of any wild animal.

When I think of body wisdom, I think of my dog Grace. She lays on the porch until some inner urge says, “get up, get a drink, bark at that person, scratch, roll around, chase that animal.” This is not an exercise of the rational mind. Instead, it is about going below your every day, habituated behavioral patterns. It is akin to following bread crumbs through the forest where you allow yourself to be led from within. Do not let yourself be fooled by the simplicity of this. When we can learn to listen to the needs and the demands of the body, we begin a conversation; one that for many of us is long past overdue. As we begin to tune into and respond to body basics like hunger, thirst, rest, the urge to move, the urge to get away from something, we begin a dialogue with a part of us that cannot be fooled. Cannot be misled. No matter how good something looks. No matter what “they” say. The willingness to really learn what your body needs is what gives this approach its power. For when we learn how to pay attention to what the body needs, we learn to see beyond all the thoughts, demands, expectations, beliefs and busyness that swirl around us and obscure the truth.

When I can tune into what my body needs or is experiencing, two things happen. I take care of myself in the most natural of ways, and everything that actually needs doing, gets done. I have come to discover, over and over again, that there is something within that I can rely on that transcends external pressures, agendas and demands. This orientation to life creates a way of being that allows you to be with the challenges of living while simultaneously experiencing your own  inner guidance, leaving you with the greatest inner capacity of all: self-trust. In my own journey, the supports I ran across gave me the hope and the inspiration I needed to learn another way of being. But more than anything else, they gave me the permission to trust myself. Who or what helps you to trust yourself?  Do you have that in your life?  Carve out more time in the presence of those people, circumstances and places.

Share this article

The Medicine Of Self-Care

Posted on by

 

Yesterday was my first day back teaching at a local college after four months of being “off” for summer break. Being back in a fast moving, regulated system with lots of people, and lots of expectations and beats to hit, is always a reminder to me of how difficult it is to take care of yourself. The external pull for how to show up is so great that it often seems like you need an act of God or Nature to break free from the gravitational force of “do more, faster, and more perfectly.” It was only Day One of classes, and yet, many (most?) had already hit the ground running.

There is no lack of information out there on what we are supposed to be doing to take care of ourselves. We are supposed to manage our stress, eat a healthy diet and exercise more. I do not think there is a single person within earshot of the Western world that has not heard that advice. We read about it. There are programs for it. We can download apps to help us be better. Only…we are not better. We are sicker, more stressed, more overweight, more sedentary and more unhappy then we have ever been. We can look to multiple causes for the situation we find ourselves in ranging from the environments we live and work in, to how we feel about ourselves, to lack of direct experience around how to actually take care of ourselves.

Self-care is always a choice. Based on what is all around us though, along with what we have been taught, it is certainly no easy choice. It requires that we go against the grain; the grain of our own habits and beliefs, and the grain of a culture that makes doing the unhealthy thing the automatic, easy, and “right” choice. So what are we to do? Maybe we can get clues by looking more closely at the word “self-care.” The dictionary has many, many meanings for the word “care;” protection, charge, temporary keeping, an object of concern or attention. One definition of “self’ is a person’s nature. I would like to propose that we think of self-care as a way of serving, honoring and safeguarding our truest nature. And while that may seem like a tall order at first glance, it actually is not because what we are really talking about is a return to something that already exists within each and every one of us; the capacity to choose on behalf of ourselves. And how we get there may be simpler than you think.

While I was “off” from teaching this summer, it became very, very clear to me that in any given moment I had a choice to make. On the one hand, I could notice and respond to how I was feeling. On the other hand, I could act on what I was “supposed” to be feeling based on longstanding beliefs or what others expected I feel and do.This is the crossroads we all reach each and every day; will you honor what your truest nature is feeling and needing or will you do what looks good on paper? It is the difference between listening and ignoring. It is the difference between being authentic and automatic. So, what would it be like if you learned to listen way down deep and then chose to act on that? What would it be like to notice when you are hungry, tired, and thirsty regardless of what the environment pulled for? How might you serve yourself by noticing that the way you have your life set up is too fast, too demanding, too inhumane? How might your life improve if you just chose to trust that even though it might not look like anything you have ever seen, or for that matter anything anyone else has ever seen, it is your way nontheless?

I often tell my students that taking care of yourself is not a chore. Nor is it a burden. It is not some dry and obligatory way of “have-to” living. It is not built on guilt or shame. It is not about “being good” or “being bad.” Instead, it is a celebration. Of Life. Of your Truest Nature. It is a way of choosing on behalf of yourself.  It is something you get to do.

Share this article

Direct Experience

Posted on by

 

Every time I go away on retreat I have only one intention, prayer, hope and focus: “May I be faithful to my experience.” What this means to me is, may I be able to recognize what is actually happening for me in any given moment, as opposed to seeing my experience through the stories I have amassed over a lifetime. Stories that run beneath the surface of my awareness. Stories that tell me what I need to do and say and feel in order to belong, be safe, be me. These are stories that I have told myself for a long, long time.

This intention translates into a running dialogue with myself where moment by moment I am checking in to notice how things are actually going for me. I focus on what is happening at that very moment. I notice which  direction I am most inclined to move in. I notice when I am eating, not what my mind is pushing for, but the actual feel of the food in my mouth and in my stomach. When I leave a program session, I try not have to an agenda about what I do next, following instead wherever it is that my feet take me. Quite literally that may mean I get about 20 feet before I sit down, waiting where I am, until I feel directed to the next place. As for my mind and my emotions, well, I let them be too. I notice what is rising and falling like I am watching images on a screen. Instead of trying to fix or push away, instead of getting lost in a story, I try and just be with what is there, noticing as impartially as I can where it comes from and what it is linked to. For me it is like a game of connect the dots for my mind. I look at how my responses now come from then.

And while this is a tremendous amount of effort, exhausting even, at some point, I hit a critical mass, and it clicks over into a place where I just am as I am.  All my edges are worn off. The need to run incessant story lines is gone. And I am left with a softness and a spaciousness that far exceeds any story I could come up with. I tell you all of this because we are living in times where the pull from the external world is great, so great in fact, that it is pulling us out of the truth of what we are personally experiencing. We look  outside of ourselves to tell us what to think, how to feel and what to want. And we run our lives on memories from the past. This leaves us without the presence to know reality for what it is. And without that knowledge we will always, always suffer.

The body is such a great antidote to any story line. Over and over throughout your day, come back to any experience that the body is having, and watch what your mind has to say about it. You do not have to like it or want it. When you feel a sensation or a need, notice the stories the mind is telling you about it. For instance, if you are tired, see if you can let yourself just be tired without trying to make it go away. Watch what happens with the mind. Watch all the reasons you have for not being able to be tired. Watch all the actions you will take to deny that reality. Watch the feelings that arise when you are denying exhaustion, and then when you allow it. Daily we lose track of ourselves because we do not want what is happening with us to be happening; believing that it just has to be something else that is right, or better. When we do this, we deny our very existence. And to deny our existence is to say that what we feel and experience does not matter, or is wrong. Denying ourselves in this way is to create a kind of sickness inside for which there is no outside cure. Denying ourselves in this way is to collectively create all of the horror we see in a world bent on denying the existence of Life itself.

Share this article

Do Something Else

Posted on by

 

In practice, I am contemplating old relational patterns that are not working for me. I write. I analyze. I breathe. I meditate. I engage all the practices that support me so well, and yet, my end of the pattern is still there. And then, a funny thing happens. As I go to put my pen away, clipping it to the side of my journal, the pen makes marks on the back cover. I think to myself that if I put it away like this I am going to have ink all over my bag. So, I start pushing the button down on top of the pen to make it retract. Only, it doesn’t work. I keep doing this over and over again to no avail. I am thinking; “What’s going on? This thing must be broken.” Frustrated, I finally pause long enough to notice that the button to retract the ball point is on the side of the pen. Oh. Suddenly the whole thing becomes very, very obvious and very, very easy. I was just going at it in the wrong way. I just needed to do something else. And it hits me– Yes, understanding what is behind our patterns is so helpful, necessary even. But in the end, it will always, always boil down to needing to do something else, if you want something else.

Share this article

Not Knowing

Posted on by

 

We live in a time where the zeitgeist demands: You must know. Not only that, you must know a lot, instantaneously, and always. No matter what, you must never stop knowing. We are inundated with more information than we could make use of in multiple life times. Awash in a tsunami of information, images and new sources of output, we try and keep up. There is always something else to check out. There is always something more that we just have to see.  Along the way, our sense of ease and well-being erodes. This is not just because of the content. And this is not just because of how much effort and time that this takes from us. The biggest impact lies in our knowing, way down deep, what a false and futile chase this is leading us on.

Despite our distorted need to daily run this never-ending treadmill, we know somewhere inside that we will never be able to do it. Rightly so. And yet, we soldier on. We tell ourselves how great it is. How advanced we are. How much better our lives are.  And we are training entire generations to build lives on this lie. While the ego eats it all up, the health of our bodies, minds and spirits tells a different story. These parts speak the real tale of living with the pervasive, constant and ultimate impossibility of keeping up with all that is being generated by the machines. We are sicker than we have ever been, despite all of our “advances.” There is even a new mental health category: FOMO. Fear of missing out.

What would it be like to not know? What would it be like to not have every answer instantaneously? What would it be like to spend time with children puzzling something out as opposed to letting Google give them the answer right away? Without a sense of the unknown, we run the risk of believing the wrong things about ourselves. Without a sense of the unknown, we run the risk of believing the wrong things about how life and the Universe actually works. Without a sense of the unknown, we run the risk of believing that machines are more powerful than anything else. And without a sense of the unknown,  we run the risk of believing that our lives are most fully lived in the pursuit of more and more information; reducing ourselves down to little more than zip drives.

Try this: Upon awakening in the morning, let yourself speak out loud some version of, “I do not know what this day will bring.” Say this despite knowing your schedule and how you need your day to go. “I do not know what the weather will bring.” Say this despite being able to pull up the 10 day forecast in a heartbeat. “I do not know what the world at large will do.” Say this despite the availability of live streaming into every nook and cranny of the world. With all of our  ability to know everything, right now, we are masking something vital that we require as human beings; a relationship to the unknown. A way of being mortal that keeps truth, wonder, curiosity, connection to something Greater, along with the knowledge of our own fragility and vulnerability, alive and well. Do not be quick to annihilate this in your life. Do not be quick to obliterate this from your children’s lives. To do so, puts us in the position of believing the wrong things, leaving us at risk to perils that are heart-breaking, soul-sucking and health-depleting.

And while dread, uncertainty, fear and anxiety may arise in admitting just how much we do not know, these words are closer to the truth than any idea you might have about what is going to happen this day. Notice the possibilities that arise when you align with the unknown. Notice the burden that gets put down. Notice the ease that is allowed to come in because you have turned towards the Truth. When we can allow ourselves to turn to Truth, there is a peace that follows. As Swami Kripalu once said, “We are on a journey from the known to the unknown.”

Share this article

Demons and Goddesses

Posted on by

 

In Tantric Hatha Yoga, there is a model that breaks down our experience of life into two energies: demons and goddesses. Demons are those things which feel harmful to us, and goddesses are those things which feel like blessings to us. It is easy to see this split in our own lives. We all have experiences, energies, emotions, thoughts, circumstances and people which feel upsetting and threatening to us. And we all have those aspects of being alive which bestow upon us great calm, support, generosity and abundance. Mostly we believe that these two energies live separately from one another. Mostly we believe that it is best to avoid the demon and to curry the favor of the goddess.

From the Tantric perspective however, it is said that if we can learn the name of our demon, i.e. what that experience, feeling, thought or habit actually means to us, then we can transmute that demon into a goddess who  blesses us. To learn who the demon is is to learn its power and precisely how it is that it hurts us. This is the alchemical process of changing darkness into light.This approach offers a rationale for turning towards the dark, as opposed to hiding from it. This view offers a way to embrace the totality of what life brings to us while allowing us to be strengthened in the process And it gives the permission and the protection that we need to actually look forward to getting to know what we most seek to avoid.

I was away last week for my father’s memorial service. Anticipating seeing family of origin, while preparing for the day itself, brought up more emotions, and more combinations of emotions, than I could possibly list out. It was the equivalent of repeatedly being caught in a daily avalanche which ripped and pulled at me as I spiraled down and out of control. Every day I walked, ran, danced, did yoga, and meditated; multiple times on certain days because the demons had me on the run. It was exhausting. And when it was over, it was liberating. Why? Because I had learned the name of my demons. And they did not exist in others. They were, in fact, alive and well within me. While overwhelming at times, ultimately it left me with one unavoidable question; “Do you want to be free and happy, or do you want to continue to pull forward pain and suffering in the form of what other people do, or do not do?”

Every day we are all faced with some version of this question. And while we would all likely say we would rather be free, we often do not think or behave that way. There is a world of difference between wanting something and choosing something. To choose is to get to know your demon’s name, his real name. This is a very, very difficult thing to do. It requires that you be willing to see things differently. It requires that you be willing to put your attention to this. It requires that you slow down enough to feel some things you have been desperately trying to avoid.

Try sitting quietly with yourself taking long, slow, deep breaths. Allow an image of your demon to surface. What does it look like, smell like, feel like to you? What memories and thoughts arise in association with it? When you feel ready, ask it its name, and nothing more. Do not try and do anything to it. Do not try and make it go away. Instead, try listening. Just as you would introduce yourself to a new person and spend time getting to know them, do this with your demon. Be open to allowing the demon’s name to shift and change over time. Doing this will bring you closer and closer to the power it holds over you. From this place, it will become clear how what has harmed you can instead be what blesses you.

As I did multiple versions of this work across the week, my demon changed form many, many times. Initially it began as a person from my past, only to shift into “the governor;” that internal part of me that keeps tabs on me, making sure I do not step out of line. That part of me that references others to make sure I am doing it “right.” Not exactly the path to freedom I am yearning for. Ultimately, it presented as an essential protection that I required growing up, but that I no longer need. I had finally caught up with the change in my reality. Difficult as it is to do this work, once you know your demon’s name, you have something to sink your teeth into, as opposed to something sinking its teeth into you.

Share this article

Darkness as Medicine

Posted on by

 

Years ago I was doing a shamanic training. It was an intensely deep, personal and arduous experience. Suffice it to say that when I began this inner exploration there was a lot I ran into about myself that I had been keeping from myself; both the light and the dark. A shaman is said to be one who sees in the dark; one who goes into those places most of us do not want to go because we are afraid of what we might find. Rightly so. At one point, utterly and completely overwhelmed by it all, I was wisely told, “This is your power coming towards you.” Nothing about my experience felt empowering. It felt dark, scary and beyond me.

When looked at from a certain angle, we are living in very, very dark times. And we are most definitely at the end of something. The evidence is everywhere. Every form of life is crying out in one way or another. We are drowning in violence. We are saturated in suspicion and hate for those we do not understand. Our bodies are screaming in pain and with great alarm. Nature rebels.

We have a choice to make, each and every one of us. How will we choose to be in this time of great upheaval? Will we put our heads in the sand, refusing to see? Or will we turn towards the pain and violence we see all around us and do the bravest thing of all; find it within ourselves. I have built a life on choosing to see. Deciding to know, no matter what. I will tell you that this one decision alone has brought me the greatest comfort, joy and inner confidence that I have ever known. Equally it has brought me the greatest fear I have ever known. It is terrifying to look at those things we have shoved beneath the surface. But like anything pushed down long enough, it will makes its way back to the surface at some point, with or without our consent.

Whatever is breaking down in you, let it. Whatever is dying, say good-bye and thank you. Whatever is struggling, hold it tenderly and then allow it to release. Do not try and get past this. As I was once told, “When all that can falls away, what remains is true.”  We need to let what needs to, fall away. We need to become the ones who can see in the dark. The ones willing to become familiar with those banished places within ourselves. For only in knowing the dark places within will we be in a place to understand the totality of who we are. And in knowing this, we will understand and shift what is happening all around us.  As the saying goes, “As within, so without.”

Share this article