Category Archives: Meditation

Spirit

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Back in 2004, when my father-in-law was gravely ill, I happened across a book that I was compelled to buy: The Grace in Dying: How We Are Transformed Spiritually as We Die, by Kathleen D. Singh. I began to read it, and in the introduction the author suggested that if the reader was in the process of dying or reading this because a loved one is dying, to do the following: know that you are safe, all is well, and put the book down.

I took her advice. Four months later my father-in-law died, and I was with him for his last week nearly 24/7. It was a daunting, draining experience. I watched him take his last breath. In the process of his dying, it occurred to me that it seemed much like a labor. And having had a child since, I know it is indeed labor. But what, I wonder, is in the process of happening? Is dying just dying? The lights simply go out? What happens to the entity called “me, myself, or I”; is it really annihilated?

Or is it a transition, a birthing into something else?

I was raised religiously and have traversed a varied spiritual path. In recent years I’ve applied the term “atheist” to myself, though “agnostic” is probably more accurate. I do not need “god” as humans are able to articulate the term; I believe the universe is marvelous, and science is a way to explore it all, and isn’t that miracle enough? I am drawn to Buddhism, particularly Zen Buddhism, although I have not become a practitioner yet.

However, I did have a remarkable experience back in 1996 that at the time, I believed (as much as I could believe, which was really a process of trying to convince myself to believe) was the Holy Spirit. When I left the Christian religion (for the second time in my life), I categorized the experience as an anomaly, as an experience of self-hypnosis or psychological wish fulfillment.

I was a member of a conservative, bible-based, fundamental Christian church. The story behind the path that led me to that after years of atheism can be read here. Anyhow, one Saturday evening I remained after service. It was common for members to remain and pray with each other. This was a church where people sometimes experienced the “baptism of the Holy Spirit,” evidenced sometimes by people speaking in tongues (seeming to babble) and being filled with the Spirit, evidenced by joyous, continuous laughter. Not hysterics, not banshee laughing, just a robust laugh as one would do watching a funny show.

One evening a woman sat on the floor experiencing this laughter. I observed awhile, curious. Another woman came over and asked, “Would you like to join and be filled with the Holy Spirit?” I answered yes, but expressed a worry that it wouldn’t “take.” She said, “Just trust. Let thoughts and worries go and just be with whatever is.”

I sat next to the spirit-filled woman, put my hand on her arm, closed my eyes, and waited. To my wonder, I felt a tingling warmth from her enter my hand and flow up my right arm into my body. Whatever words I summon to describe the experience won’t do it justice, but here goes: As I was filled with this feeling, I felt light, both weightless and incandescent. I began to feel a laugh bubbling up in me. I allowed it to come forth. I sat for however long, bathed in this energy, laughing gently, feeling joy. At the same time, I also felt a part of me was still there, observing. I was not generating or creating this. Nothing was forced by me. At the same time, I did not feel “possessed” or taken over; I still felt I had agency. It was an experience unlike anything I’ve known before or since.

At some point I felt satiated, full, and decided I was done. I removed my hand from the woman’s arm and opened my eyes. I felt new. I felt connected, united with myself and with everything. As I walked, my feet connected in a way that felt like I was the earth and the earth was me. I had a feeling of well-being, life, and love. This feeling remained with me for many hours. After the night’s sleep, it had dissipated. I did not seek this encounter again, and one year later I came to terms that I did not agree with aspects of this church’s dogma and no longer wanted to pretend I did. But I remembered this experience and cherished it awhile.

Then life happened, and the incident faded. Whenever I thought about it, I lumped it in the “I’m not certain what that was but it probably wasn’t real” category. Except… it felt real, and it still resonates like an authentic experience, an encounter with the energy that makes up the universe. While I don’t believe in an anthropomorphic god, I do believe there is something that makes the universe go, something science does not explain completely yet, that it is real, we are made of it, and that we can access a connection with it. (As Carl Sagan said, “We are star stuff.”)

And now I have reopened Kathleen Singh’s book to face the question of dying, of what it’s about and what might follow. The experience I had in 1996 was a glimpse. My hunch is that this connection is possible, is accessible via meditation practice over many years, and that it is our destination at the moment the body dies. As I read her book I will process some of my reactions here.

Labor Day Anthem

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This song gives me chills every time I hear it. Before I met my husband, I lived on the edge this song describes. (We are incredibly fortunate and grateful for that.) I also used to work with (i.e., provide social services to) people whose lives were rife with the challenges that he sings about. And there is a blogger I know and admire who works and serves people in the situations he sings about and somehow keeps her sanity. This is for all of them and for her. (If the video doesn’t show and play for you, click this link to see it.) Turn up the volume, close your eyes, and really listen. Then, if you can, do something to help somebody, somewhere. Here are a couple of places to start:

Modest Needs
Feeding America

Give Way

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This is perfect.

Being Human

I wonder if the sun debates dawn
some mornings
not wanting to rise
out of bed
from under the down-feather horizon

If the sky grows tired
of being everywhere at once
adapting to the mood swings of the weather

If the clouds drift off
trying to hold themselves together
make deals with gravity
to loiter a little longer

I wonder if rain is scared
of falling
if it has trouble letting go
If snowflakes get sick
of being perfect all the time
each one trying to be one-of-a-kind

I wonder if stars wish
upon themselves before they die
if they need to teach their young to shine

I wonder if shadows long
to once feel the sun
if they get lost in the shuffle
not knowing where they’re from

I wonder if sunrise and sunset
respect each other
even though they’ve never met

If volcanoes get stressed
If storms have regrets
If compost believes in life after death

I wonder if breath ever thinks
about suicide
I wonder if the wind just wants to sit
still sometimes
and watch the world pass by

If smoke was born knowing how to rise
If rainbows get shy backstage
not sure if their colors match right

I wonder if lightning sets an alarm clock
to know when to crack
If rivers ever stop
and think of turning back

If streams meet the wrong sea
and their whole lives run offtrack
I wonder if the snow wants to be black

If the soil thinks she’s too dark
If butterflies want to cover up their marks
If rocks are self-conscious of their weight
If mountains are insecure of their strength

I wonder if waves get discouraged
crawling up the sand
only to be pulled back again
to where they began

I wonder if land feels stepped upon
If sand feels insignificant
If trees need to question their lovers
to know where they stand

If branches waver in the crossroads
unsure of which way to grow
If the leaves understand they’re replaceable
and still dance when the wind blows

I wonder where the moon goes when she is hiding
I want to find her there
and watch the ocean
spin from a distance
Listen to her
stir in her sleep

effort give way to existence

—Naima Penniman

Ordinary Life = Joy

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Four days after our move, our washer went kaput (after 12 years of faithful service). This occurred on a day that Claire decided to try to, erm, clean up her poopy diaper while in her crib for a nap. So, Husband did fast research on Consumer Reports, and we went to Sears. We now have a high-efficiency washer and matching dryer! In the video below, Claire demonstrates the attitude that I try to live by as written about by my friend, Karen Maezen Miller of Cheerio Road.

Hidden Blessings

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It had been a rough winter for Claire. She got sick nearly every month since September (and coincidentally she started preschool one day a week that month), had two bouts of pneumonia, and required treatments to help her breathe. The latest illness began on Mother’s Day, and by Thursday she was in a spiral of non-stop coughing. I mean that literally. She couldn’t utter a sentence without coughing between words. She couldn’t eat; she coughed so much and so hard she vomited. She hardly slept. The doctor had me bring her in and gave her breathing treatment, then sent us home with a prescription for prednisone and albuterol treatments. We also discussed whether to forgo attending preschool in the fall.

At our follow-up appointment on Tuesday, we discussed the situation. It turns out that Claire has asthma. This may be something she outgrows, as her respiratory system gets bigger and her immunity builds. She’s very petite. We have an asthma plan. When she’s healthy, it’s the green zone, and we need not do anything. At the sign of any sickness (fever, runny nose, sneezing, congestion, coughing — any one of these) we enter the yellow zone. We are to give her albuterol every four hours round the clock and prednisone twice a day until the cold goes away.

However, if she’s in the yellow zone more than a week, or she falls into a coughing spiral as she has, we enter the red zone and need to seek emergency attention — Urgent Care if they’re open, the ER if not.

At first I felt a little sad about pulling her out of preschool. I really want her to have the social outlet, and I want it too. The doctor pointed out, though, that if she’s sick all the time, she can’t get the social contact anyway. And preschool is a lot more exposure to illness than small play-dates with friends. So, I set about creating an at-home curriculum for us next year: reading/phonics, science, art & craft, music, games, adventure days. I’ll invite a couple friends over to join us now and then. And after more pondering, I realize that I have a gift. Soon enough, Claire will go to school five days a week and enter into her own life away from me. I have the privilege of her company for another year, at least, and maybe two.

I just returned from a day-long retreat with my friend Karen, where I realized something else. We’ve resorted to doing “puffs” — breathing ten times from a little chamber where the medicine is squirted into — because she fought the breathing treatments that took ten minutes every time. And I realized, today, that by sitting with her and helping her count breaths to ten, I am setting the foundation for her to learn how to settle herself and become aware of breath. It also helps me to stop and breathe, and be quiet. Breathing is the foundation of meditation, which leads to attention, which leads to love, which leads to patience, which leads to forgiveness, which leads to peace.

So what first seems like a hindrance has turned out to have aspects to appreciate. I’m grateful for that.

——-

I have written this post quickly, because my life is in flux and I have to give my attention to other things: dinner, and packing. I feel eloquence is lacking in the above reflection, but it will have to do. We move on Tuesday! So much to do before that!

Radio Silence

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Throughout my life, writing has been a cherished expression for me. At one point I even felt that writing was as important as breathing. I so urgently wanted to tell my story about where I came from, what was done to me, what had happened in my life. I wanted to share tidbits, information, inspiration, resources. It was a form of therapy, a creative outlet, and a way to connect intimately with others (even when those others were anonymous).

I’ve noticed since becoming a mother I have written less. No, I take that back. For the first two years of Claire’s life, I wrote about her. Then I decided to reign that in, since she is developing greater agency over her life. Lately, blogging about my life strikes me as an incredibly narcissistic activity; it always has been, but at one point I actually thought it had value. Increasingly, though, I see that my vignettes, reflections, and insights are not original, and I’m not certain that writing them (here or in a paper journal) effects anything beneficial. I don’t seem to need to do it anymore. So this blog has become a place to link to resources related to my current activity (parenting) and the occasional photo or movie of Claire. This morning I realized there are usually three factors that cause my writing silence; any one of these can be cause for me to abandon writing for while:

  1. I am very busy with daily activities (such as when I worked and went to school, both full-time).
  2. I am content with my life.
  3. I feel that to write is to express nothing unique or new, and to blog is just adding another voice to the cacophony of Twitterers, bloggers, Facebookers (of which I’m an avid user) and other sundry voices.

As it happens, all of these factors are true at the moment. Hence, my sporadic posts.

I’ve been reading voraciously this year. Some years I barely touch fiction, other years I devour it. This is a fiction year. Yet I’ve also been immersed in a number of existential books by Eckhart Tolle, and most recently I’ve been soaking in Hand Wash Cold: Care Instructions for an Ordinary Life.

At this point, I’ll keep living as usual. There’s a season for all things, and the writing season will probably come ’round again.

Sometimes

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Some days I look at my child and am astounded that she has made another leap toward growing up. Today was such a day. She rarely permits me to “do” her hair, but today I insisted on trying pigtails, which she loved. But oh! She looked so much older with them, and her thoughts and speech are becoming increasingly sophisticated. Her imagination soars. I sit and watch her. I hang out with her and play. I soak in each moment that I’m capable of bringing my full attention to; it’s all going so fast, and once it’s gone, it’s just… gone. She was once a wee babe that I cherished, but that’s ancient history; yet I’m not sad because I paid attention to what she was then. I didn’t focus on a future time when she’d be walking, or telling stories, because I knew that would come and didn’t want to miss what was right in front of me. I’m so lucky to have this bit of wisdom by which to live (thanks to my mother and my friend, Karen), and I’m so lucky to be Claire’s mom.

having fun

What’s The Story?

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In reading Eckhart Tolle’s books, I am reminded that we shore up our egos with stories. Unfortunately, ego can be a monumental obstacle to real peace, real being. At one point in my life, it was very important to me to tell people my story: of where I came from, my family dynamics, the struggles I had, the battles I fought. I wanted to be understood. That is, I wanted to be praised, pitied, cosseted. The older I get, however, the less important all that seems. Perhaps it’s interesting as family history, but it really isn’t vital to how I’m to live now. Or at least, it need not be.

I was given a subscription to The Sun, and I always savor the last few pages, including the section called Sy Safransky’s Notebook (he’s the editor). From the March 2010 edition:

I left my story in a barn so someone else could keep milking it. I left my story in the fitting room; it didn’t fit me anymore. I left my story at the hospital because it wouldn’t stop bleeding. I left my story at the rest stop; it needed a rest. I left my story at the body shop because it always wanted a different one. I left my story with some cash so it could never say, “Poor me.” I left my story without saying where I was going because I didn’t want it to follow me; it never even noticed I was gone.

–Sy Safransky

On Keeping the Sabbath

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I just heard a fascinating interview on Fresh Air with Judith Shulevitz as the guest.

She has written a book about the history of the Jewish sabbath and also included a memoir about her own journey into keeping Sabbath customs. I found her lyrical and articulate, and her views impressed me. What I especially appreciate is the concept of resting as a community, and of stepping back from our attempt to manipulate and control the world for one day.

For one day each week, the Sabbath encourages us to enter into a moment outside of ordinary time and all the cares associated with it. I can’t do her ideas justice; it’s worth a listen.

Even for an agnostic such as me, it was worth a listen. And now I want to read the book. It resonates the way the Unplug campaign did. I found that the weekend I unplugged for one day, I felt more centered. Last weekend I did not unplug, and I felt I hadn’t even had a weekend!

Go here for more information and to listen to the interview.

Practicing Courage (i.e., Patience)

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If you practice the kind of patience that leads to the de-escalation of aggression and the cessation of suffering, you will be cultivating enormous courage. You will really get to know anger and how it breeds violent words and actions. You will see the whole thing without acting it out. When you practice patience, you’re not repressing anger, you’re just sitting there with it—going cold turkey with the aggression. As a result, you really get to know the energy of anger and you also get to know where it leads, even without going there. You’ve expressed your anger so many times, you know where it will lead. The desire to say something mean, to gossip or slander, to complain—to just somehow get rid of that aggression—is like a tidal wave. But you realize that such actions don’t get rid of the aggression; they escalate it. So instead you’re patient, patient with yourself.

–Pema Chodron

Something About the Wind

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Something about the wind makes me feel alive…the seagulls and the sky…whether its sunny and bright or cloudy and grey or nighttime and I’m surrounded by vast darkness…I just feel…FULL. Full of love and energy….almost as though I’m porous and the wind soars through tiny holes in my body and I’m part of it all…the earth and the people and the relation of everything with everything…as though I don’t matter…but its not scary…its wonderful….i feel so free.
It’s the only time I’m not afraid to die. Cuz I can feel the wind and I know that I’ll always be a part of life…and the love and energy that are contained in my skin will be let loose into the wind and the world will just know how much I care and love and I will live forever.

–Eva Dien Brine Markvoort, 2006-2010

Eva was a lovely woman, full of spirit and beauty and fire, who battled Cystic Fibrosis and MRSA. She underwent a double lung transplant in 2007, but eventually her body rejected it. She went on the waiting list for another transplant. She fought to stay with this world until she could not. In February, she recorded this loving message to the world. She lived another six weeks, and died at age 25 on March 27, 2010. I’ve spent this morning reading the archives of her blog, looking at her photos, and marveling at how much life and love this young woman packed into her stay on earth. I wish I could have met her. I hope I can heed her words.

Click this link to see the movie, or watch it below. It might make you cry, but it’s important to listen. (And turn up the volume; her condition made her speak softly and slowly.)

A Future We Can Change

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Life is competitive around here. It is everywhere, but I feel it especially here — in the play group, among other parents in general, especially when the topic of education comes up. Last year, four Gunn High School students in Palo Alto committed suicide by stepping in front of trains; already one child committed suicide the same way this year. Granted, Palo Alto manifests “the best of the best” — affluent, highly educated, highly successful Silicon Valley players who want their children to succeed and exceed the norm. Not all school districts are as packed with scrambling over-achievers.

We want a good school for Claire, but more than that, we want a good learning experience for her, and a good life. I want to see this movie when it comes out. And I want to be part of the solution.

If you can’t see the movie trailer, click this link.