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RE: renewable caring

For those who show up...however they can for love

…caregiving of yourself and your others …and the world

to be better gardeners of our ONE WILD AND PRECIOUS LIFE….

Listening to the Inner Voice

2/13/2021

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3rd Video in a series on LISTENING

When I am deaf, dumb and blind to my own inner voice, it’s easy to get lost in the wilderness…

(Wilderness being defined as the place where I  have forgotten who I am… )

Or maybe destination is my problem…

Giving the Car Keys to a Knucklehead...

I  have forgotten where I want to go…because long ago I gave my keys to a knucklehead …or a series of knuckleheads…
 
Or perhaps…just moving fast is what I need… (It can be a useful distraction… ) Just moving felt like progress… for years it distracted me from noticing that I had a happy face sticker covering over an empty gas tank…
 
I was depleted … but these are the fruits of the tree of NOT LISTENING…
 
       • The first focuses on connections to community as a source of strength
       • last week’s is about the privilege of witnessing  the whole of a friend’s lifetime
       • Todays one lifts up the value of listening to the inner…voice…

How do we return to our original source spiritual DNA?

To health? to what we came here to do?
 
We get quiet enough for the sound of silence to be useful, which according to Deepak Chopra in his newest book Total Meditation is the key.  To get quiet so the silence can be useful.
 
Part is about feeling safe enough. Grounded enough to listen.

The spiritual journey (and a good life) begins, developmentally, by being gifted with a safe place to feel that we belong, are wanted, and are safe.  Then we can launch into the world as we understand that to be. 
 
Some of us must take over the gardening of our lives, earlier than others by circling back to find an inner place safe enough to be our best self and do in the world. We can then till the soil of ‘what is’ and bloom as we are able to sow and nurture. But we all must take over …,sometime…as gardeners of our lives.

How do we find a SAFE ENOUGH place to sit and listen?

How do we find a SAFE ENOUGH place to sit and listen?
My answer to both is the sustaining circle of mindfulness…
 
But mindful as defined from a scientist & psychologist, Daniel J. Siegel, from his book 'The Neurobiology of We’ is his definition of mindfulness this:
 
COAL – Curiosity Openness Acceptance and Love.

COAL – Curiosity Openness Acceptance and Love.

               • Curiosity
               • Openness
               • Acceptance and
               • Love.

This is a self-regenerating place…a circle of love
Mary Baker Eddy helps me retuirn to where I started with the driving metaphors:
 
“We have nothing to fear when Love is at the helm of thought.”

Me…I’m sitting back, getting comfortable and giving my car keys to LOVE…God is at the helm of thought.

MEDITATION CHORUS REFRAIN
Sit back.  Relax. 

Breathe into the favorite holding places of your stress
Sit,, breathe  and listen
 
Listening from the place of curiosity & openness creates space for new – new solutions, new ideas.

3rd Video in the LISTENING series
Listening from a place of Acceptance and Love allows us to let go of what no longer serves us.

Get quiet
Get quiet enough to be useful…
 
Drop down to the kingdom within…
Under the turbulence and uncertainty of the surface world
Get quiet …
Get quiet enough to be useful…
Listen to the inner voice…
listen to the kind voice in the silence and in the sound.
 
Safe…nothing to fear … give the car keys to LOVE… sit back; slide over into the passenger’s seat for the next 20 minutes…get comfortable.
God is “at the helm of thought.”

ATTRIBUTIONS:
  1. CSM January 4 & 11 , 2021; p 29 Headed in the Right Direction? Let God steer.
  2. Deepak Chopra in his newest book Total Meditation
  3. Daniel J. Siegel, from his book “ The Neurobiology of We’
  4. Mary Baker Eddy writings
  5. Love fr Richard Rohr Newsletter - Inner and Outer Freedom:
    Freedom to Love.
    6.16.2020
  6. Background video LOTUS from Pexels
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LISTENING: the privilege of witnessing

1/24/2021

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The United States has a new president…and a country to heal.

How do we do that?

As a hospice chaplain, I have a few superpowers…the first and foremost one is listening. This post and its sound meditation is the second of three…in a series on listening.

David Whyte lent us a quote or two (again) about friendship’s “privilege of witnessing another’s whole self over time” NOT JUST THE NICE PARTS…but also (and especially) in crisis…” when our armored personalities run into the inevitable natural disasters and vulnerabilities found in even the most average existence….”

I call these the our tender human trenches…which this country is in. I’d say we need to be friends now more than ever…

• to our principles &
• to our constitution &
• to each other.

How do we listen with our hearts open?

So How do we do this? How do we listen with our hearts open?

I am heart centered. It is my practice to listen to the ‘the still small voice’ of Divine Guidance in my own heart…but I read too.
"Finding the information given to me from the cranky, and well-intentioned is not easy. The linkage that makes me renewable is being able to course correct. This is fertile soil…”  - EM Hager Feed Me Feedback No. 30
I believe in the “Feed Me Feedback” of the world …that is, in the muck and from which the lotus blossoms. I believe in feedback of others…but it is my own mind and heart that decides what to use and what to give back to the muck...

MEDITATION CHORUS REFRAIN

Friendship is the great hidden transmuter of all relationship.

Not seeking to change anyone…but listening we listen to the tree through its fruits. …we don’t have to eat those fruits.

Second in series on Listening
We REMAIN IN SIGHT of our friends (…and family) the ultimate touch stone of friendship (and listening) is not improvement, but the privilege of witness.

Keep your heart Open; stay connected.

Personal Experience of God & the Muck

I trust Spirit to speak.  I know it by its voice of wisdom and love…and it is above all kind…not coddling…not easy… but good.I speak a lot about this direct experience WITH OUR OWN Higher Power here. It is oddly, something the spiritually progressive mystics have in common with the thoughtful but more traditionally religious evangelicals.

Prayer and Meditation is a conversation with the Divine.  Meditation is about getting still and LISTENING to Spirit...so we can witness our friends and even those who we do not yet (or perhaps might not ever) call a friend.

So it was particularly troubling when I read a CSM article last week about the militant evangelical conservatives who guided the “Stop the steal” JERICHO  Washington March in mid December and rioted at the capital on Jan 6th. The article says it is a new 'Christian Nationalism' which is reminiscent of the South after the Civil war.

Apparently, they think they are listening to God too...

Here’s the quote from one of its leaders that is most troubling to me:
 
“When God gives you a vision, you don’t need to know anything else.” 
             - Eric Metaxas, A prominent conservative writer and Jericho March’s Emcee.
 
It’s an interesting and well-balanced article…as is usual from Christian Science Monitor. December 11, 2020

How can I know that the voice to which I am listening is Divine guidance or one of fear?  i.e. the inner 'devil'

That is the question for this meditation...
How can I know for certain that the voice inside which I am listening to is Divine Guidance or one of fear … (the small personality, my ego or the inner devil whispering)

Gratefully, Jesus has some clarifying thoughts here:
 
You shall know the tree by its fruits… LUKE 6:44-45

LUKE 6:43 … figs are not gathered from thornbushes, nor grapes from brambles. 45 The good man brings good things out of the good treasure of his heart, and the evil man brings evil things out of the evil treasure of his heart.
So that’s clear. If you want grapes, plant a vineyard.  If you want love, sow it.  Common Grace? Goodness? You have the seeds readily available…

I listen to the tree through its fruits…
I don’t have to eat those fruits…

But how do stay in witness to that which we disagree? to that which disturbs us ? ….How do we listen and get past the us vs. them mentality?
Not seeking to change anyone…but listening

David Whyte says to simply be a friend…

‘Friendship is the great hidden transmuter
of all relationships.

...Remain in sight of my friends

...The ultimate touchstone of friendship (and listening) is not improvement but the privilege of witness”


How to stay open & witness that to which I disagree?

Keep your heart Open; stay connected.
No matter how great the distance that exists between me and the people I care about,
if I LISTEN to the connections of love and friendship, I can stay in sight of them.

I do that by staying close to the voice of kindness…and let it guide me.


KINDNESS: the fruit that we all want to eat.


ATTRIBUTIONS:
1. CSM Dec 16, 2020; Humanity behind the Headlines: New York; Will election be a new ‘lost cause for evangelical conservatives?
2. David Whyte, Consolations- Friendship
3. Feed Me Feedback – CH 30- Hager, EM. A Hospice Chaplain's Fieldguide to Caregiving: Finding Resilience on the Frontlines of Love (p. 151).
4. Love fr Richard Rohr Newsletter - Inner and Outer Freedom: Freedom to Love. 6.16.2020
5. Background video LOTUS from Pexels

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Listening: Curating with our Focus

1/17/2021

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The only choice we have in how we mature is how we inhabit our vulnerability.

How do we become larger and more courageous
and more compassionate in our
intimacy with disappearance?
                  – David Whyte


How we become larger and more courageous
and more compassionate in our
intimacy with disappearance?

Friendship transcends disappearance
REMAIN IN SIGHT of our friends.

The ultimate touch stone of friendship (and connection) is not improvement, but the privilege of witness.

Keep your heart Open;
Stay connected
Begin again. 

The Three Superpowers:

I talk a lot about the power of gratitude in these sound meditations- it is one of the three major superpowers we use;
• Breath

• Sound

•Gratitude

FIrst in the sound meditation on LISTENING
In the Gratitude project, its director, Dr Robert Emmons at the University of California at Davis,  says:
“It is precisely under crisis conditions when we have the most to gain by a grateful perspective on life. IN the face of demoralization, gratitude has the power to energize . IN the face of brokenness, gratitude has the power to heal.  In the face of despair, gratitude has the power to bring hope. …He goes on to say “ But the sense that there’s real skin in the game – real potential for loss – is important. Sometimes, maybe, actually experiencing loss is what has to happen to wake us up.”

Loss & change is chaotic and noisy…

As a hospice chaplain, I have the honor and privilege of witnessing the edge of loss for many… sometimes the ultimate loss.  It is. chaotic and noisy…

How do we listen to the guidance of our hearts amid the noise of the world…and most particularly…loss?We curate…we chose what to focus upon…Meditation and prayer, of course are the path to  that practice…a good life…as well as wise, curious and brave questions.

Questions in the Muck...&
under the lotus?

There are interesting question in the muck of loss and stress…. for a good life.and  for innovation…on any leading edge, cutting edge…or even bleeding edge of business or technology or life...what are the opportunities that present themselves here …in the muck? under the Lotus…

More importantly how do we hear them?How do we hear the lotus…in the muckI think …it is not an either or proposition…but yes and…we have a choice in how we observe this life and its challenges and opportunities…BUT we must first feel safe.  We need to feel our connection to Presence…and to our community and friends.  Then we have access to our inner worlds.

In my intimacy with disappearance,
I try and ask good questions.


How can we access what is under the words? or rather how can I access what is in my own heart? Here's the poet on friendship:
The dynamic of friendship is almost always underestimated as a constant force in human life: a diminishing circle of friends is the first terrible diagnostic of a life in deep trouble: of overwork, of too much emphasis on a professional identity, of forgetting who will be there when our armored personalities run into the inevitable natural disasters and vulnerabilities found in even the most average existence…

A friend knows our difficulties and shadows and remains in sight, a companion to our vulnerabilities more than our triumphs- even when we are under the strange illusion we do not need them….Friendship transcends disappearance: an enduring friendship goes on after death, the exchange only transmuted by absence the relationship advancing and maturing in a silent internal conversational way even after on half of the bond has passed on….

But no matter the medicinal virtues of being a true a true friend or sustaining a long close relationship with another, the ultimate touch stone of friendship is not improvement, neither of the other nor of the self, the ultimate touchstone is witness, the privilege of having been seen by someone and the equal privilege of being granted the sight of the essence of another to have walked with them and to have believed in them, and sometimes just to have accompanied them for however brief a span, on a journey impossible to accomplish alone.

–David Whyte Excerpts from his book Consolations- Friendship


Lets take that into our meditation today
Let’s take those connections into meditation today…
to ground into Spirit, and the muck
and ask interesting  questions of the Lotus

…together and in friendship.

There is a love which itself has the power to free the human heart.
Whoever arrives at this place looks at the world differently. The distinctions on the surface no longer exist.
Love does not come as theory. It moves in bodies, in nature, in the ground beneath us and the space between.
True Love is not emotional. It is a different nature, waiting in us like a secret seed
…this is the truth we all must find. The profound problems of …the inner and outer world… will be solved by love, and love alone
-Richard Rohr - Inner and Outer Freedom:
Freedom to Love.
6.16.2020

 
ATTRIBUTIONS:
  1. CSM November 23, 2020 ; p 26. Finding Uplift in a Dark Year  
  2. David Whyte, Consolations-  Friendship
  3. Gratitude project, its director, Dr Robert Emmons@ Univ. of Calif at Davis, 
  4. Fr Richard Rohr Newsletter - Inner and Outer Freedom: Freedom to Love. 6.16.2020
  5. Background video LOTUS from Pexels
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Sound to Stay awake...and to sleep with...

12/6/2020

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Max Richters piece Dream 3 (in the midst of my life)
Like many others, I stumbled into Zoom to support people. Almost 200 YouTube sound meditations later, I am on sabbatical  for the holidays and thinking about what i might offer in January 2021 when I begin again. What do I need? What does the world need.  My answer to both is rest. This post is about a composer who makes music to help us sleep: Max Richter may be in your COVID-19 necessary coping toolkit...

The Work of Max Richter is a COVID-19 toolkit must.

The intention for my sound meditations are to help us STAY AWAKE yet still open hearted in order to continue to show up in the world, which needs us to do so... but sound can also help us sleep.
As I started researching how sound might help us do this, I came across an artist whose work has gracefully delved into "What kind of music would I want if I am sleeping?"  (LINK to it here)  Max Richter sees music as an extension of natures balance and symmetry...for growth.

Max Richter' sleep music for your Covid-19 coping kit.

PictureMax Richter does music compositions for sleep - One lasts 8 hours - this link is called SLEEP 2 & lasts 2 minutes...
As a hospice chaplain, I support many in the scariest places they have ever journeyed: to the edge of life. It is the edge of our known world. My intention in my own work is to walk with people to enough ease...to support people in staying awake...while actively giving care in the world. 

Because insomnia is rampant here...on the edge of the known world...and we need "a place to rest".

PictureMax Richter walking in a Los Angeles outdoor venue with an interviewer...before the concert there in 2018
And he made music (and a film) for SLEEPING PEOPLE..."to help us navigate our way through the chaos that we live in..."

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Max Richer at the Sydney Opera House...performing sleep

Max Richter Composes with the symmetry of nature...

Max Richter composed a piece of music that lasts 8 hours and is derived from the symmetry of nature.  He has, before COVID-19 restrictions, performed it to sleeping audiences...on cots in symphony halls and outside in amphitheatres for eight hours.  It is lovely.  I would like to recommend it and many other sleep pieces for your COVID-19 coping tool kit

We need to find harmony and growth.  Max Richter sees it in fibonacci
numbers and the symmetry of nature...

May it help you too this holiday season.

SHELTER IN GRACE Sound Meditations may help you stay awake...May it be so.  Thank you for your support too.
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CONNECTED & a Perfecting Moment

8/1/2020

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I  begin by reminding myself, (and you) about the FIRE HOSE of power in the moment. 

EVERYTHING can change in a moment but when we make the moment a practice...it perfects us.

(Ahem, that would be THIS one.) No... wait we missed it.  Don't worry here it is again... because the quantum scientists and the ancient mystics say that we only have ONE: i.e. This one moment. 

Practicing the PERFECTing Moment

We began this sound meditation with a ONE MINUTE meditation.  I call it PRACTICING the PERFECTING MOMENT: It is a Pause button which may be pushed any time.  We always have a minute.  This one was to the Indian singing bell with an "In & Out' mantra.

Daily Word today that day spoke about getting to a "calm certainty…in connection…" (that would be a great 1 minute mantra...) or simply Let your breath be your in and out mantra….

Here: it's simple:

1. Align – your spine …you should get a little spark of energy when you sit up straight or stand in a mindfully balanced way….( a frisson of flow)

2. Allow the breath to breathe you – to the sound of the singing bell.

3. Repeat for ONE minute.


    I am called to a sacred connection to all life.

    Our interconnectedness of everything with me …is my conscious powerhouse of energy.
    
    I am called to connect with my full, and confident expression of myself and engage the circumstances of life with poise and tenacity.  
    
    I see A calm certainty  of CONNECTION  When I look at nature.

    I notice how the trees provide a nesting place for birds and how rainfall nourishes all living creatures. My observations remind me that I am connected to all things through Spirit.
    
    I remember and honor my connection to all living beings as sacred by

•    expressing respect to animals, the environment, and all people.
•    Giving thanks for how nature provides & sustain my life.
•    improving my interpersonal skills so that I may connect with authenticity and compassion.
•    growing from life’s wisdom  
This wisdom informs my mind and directs my steps. I am a conscious agent for beneficial change.
I connect to my full, and confident expression of myself and engage the circumstances of life with poise and tenacity.

    - Daily word  – Believe

An Embodied PAUSE BUTTON...

This is a PAUSE BUTTON in your day…making a better day by making the next moment better. IT REMINDs us in a deep embodied way…that we have all the time we need right now for a good life…well lived.

I teach this to my teams in hospice, (if they are willing).  There are many ways to pause but using meditation techniques allow quick access the deep medicine of CONNECTION, (to  the Holy SPIRIT or our Higher Power ) in THE NEXT moment.

BECAUSE…pausing can mean that we respond instead of react …and that matters in my world, in your world, and in everyone else’s. Is the world today not reactive ENOUGH?

CONNECTED: 
Listen to the meditation here.

No time...not to.

Now is the time
for the world to know
That every thought and action
is sacred

This is the time
For you to deeply compute
the impossibility

That there is anything
But Grace…. 

      –Hafiz, The Gift
        Translation Daniel Ladinsky

Because playfully …and in truth…there is no time.  This is both quantum and eternal truth that time does not exist. 

We are spiritual beings having a human experience…and we are… only now. (i.e. that would be that same moment I mentioned earlier...)

FOR a single minute, you can
• Drop into ‘NO TIME’…(and in no time you can find a moment of ‘no-time’.)

• Take a moment (Say...this ONE) to know time because "NOW is the time" to Know Time… because we don’t need 20 minutes to be calm. We can, with practice, put it all aside..for 60 seconds, drop down, touch down, and BEGIN AGAIN.

No. 1  The In & Out Mantra...

In this first exercise, the "In & Out" Mantra, let's make the mantra short but EXPANSIVE. It can be a word, a principle, an image, a color, an idea, or it could be an experience.

The feeling of opening would be a great mantra for this one minute practice. Whatever you choose take it from your 'happy list'.  You don't have a HAPPY LIST...Make one. It's important to your happiness to know the things that make your heart sing.

BEST PRACTICE: the list of happy.
What are your happy symbols, words, images to carry with you?. 
ere's my list:

•  puppy energy,
• color orange,
•  a crackling fire,
•  a walk in nature,
• Deco architecture
• laugh lines
•screened porches
• Hafiz etc.

What MAKES YOU HAPPY?)

Choose Happy...(Why not?)


Whatever mantra you choose for the in breath, use it for the out-breath, too. REPEAT &  Start again. Do this for one minute.  It can be intense but it is easy... Let's take 'EASE" as an example:

Breathe in - THINK: ease
Hold it for a count of 4 - think of that image, sound, meaning as filling you up

Breathe out fully & slowly: THINK: ease (flowing out into the world)
BECAUSE, if you are connected to LOVE (insert you word for God/SOURCE here) you are connected to a fire hose of refreshment and YOU (little old you) have more than enough to spread around. What you are and do matters.

RIGHT?  If you are not fully convinced that you have to put in hours on the cushion (to earn) your peace, prove it to yourself.  TRY this one a day.  Like our AA friends say, it works if you work it.

HOW to DO a Perfecting Moment?

1) Go APART – (find a quiet place...where no one can find you...it's only a minute...)
       a. Put it all aside for just 60 seconds.
       b. Decide on what you want your mantra to be for the next 60 seconds
       c. Set timer & go.

2) Align spine …You should get a little spark of energy when you sit
up straight or stand in a mindfully balanced way….

3) Allow the breath to breathe you – BEGIN the minute: breathe in, pause, and out repeating your mantra of the moment.

DO this once a day – or once an hour and you will grow a better life.

ATTRIBUTIONS TODAY:

Daily Word July 29 & 30, 2020:  Connection & Believe

THANK YOUs

THANK YOU to all you who have signed up for my monthly writings in Taking Care Resilience News And, of course,  to those who have purchased my book.   

It is lovely to be seen….and heard

A new & free audio book will be coming out soon… you will get it automatically for those who belong to my mailing list… sign up HERE

1) My thanks to Mary Oliver for her  line from THE SUMMER DAY. – my one wild and precious life…

2) MY thanks to  SF unity for the invitation to practice as my highest self.   I invite you to do that today.  We need your voice.   


Blessings….on your day.

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Wonderfully Made.

7/22/2020

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I am having a conflict with a business associate…It troubles my world.
My responses to date have not healed it.  Compromise does not work.  I experience this someone as a bully, which makes me want to fight him…not literally… but to prove I am right so I can be safe.

BUT I DON”T have to fight to be safe. Safety is in my control by declaring Divine order...(This is not a beginner spiritual lesson... it's for the seasoned.)
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You don’t have to fight to be safe...

“THE absolutely trustworthy is seated at our hearts, working through our hands, predominating in all our being.”

“Reside at the center of this circle “


Drop down to your heart center
Trust yourself and the unfolding.
Be steady in the ‘not knowing’ I am right where (and when) I am meant to be

Divine Order is for the seasoned...

Life has to kick you around a little and soften you before you do something that crazy.  Trusting the unseen?  Or that the knucklehead in our way... might be there to help us learn a lesson...or remember the lesson. 

Life is this practice.


Daily word last week said this about Divine order:

I declare divine order and know all is well. It is the first and last affirmation for a prayer…My job is to pray and trust that the highest and best good of all concerned is manifesting in an orderly fashion…the answers will come in perfect timing…

Spirit is within me and within everyone…Divine order is present in every person and in all situations.

I am at peace with what is…and what will be; Divine order is unfolding.
I affirm the unfolding…even when the world looks like it is not…

…like this situation before me.

A Higher Perspective

Affirming Divine order lays the critical ground of PERSPECTIVE AND perspective allows me to stand in my authenticity (or truth)  BUT at…a higher perspective… I can 'reside at the center of the circle" at my center…and listen.



The Master sees things as they are,
Without trying to control them.
She lets them go their own way,
And resides at the center
of the circle.

   –The Tao te Ching No. 29


Feed Me Feedback...is a good thing.

I know this:
The world is designed to trigger what is not yet healed in me.

...So… it COULD BE that feedback is happening here.  We are all learning and until we do we are all (sometimes) knuckleheads.

That’s pretty humbling...its a human place and a forgiving place.

This is from my book. No 30 – Feed me Feedback and like Divine order...it is NOT A BEGINNER RULE…


Sound meditation...which inspired this.

No. 30  Feed Me Feedback

We are not made to do this alone.

We need our fellow passengers, our time-traveling shipmates, to help us refine the implementations of our dreams...

It is the basis of all innovation—and what makes the Golden State gold (and the Pacific Northwest green) because we don’t do great things alone. We need each other.

It’s about being willing to try again, to grow and be better—from information received.

Just because I listen to advice doesn’t mean I take it, (or that they are right…)
but it could be the key to discovering something wonderful. Feedback is easier to accept if it is tactful—but even if unskillful, if it lands on the fertile, adult soil of willingness … it can be course correcting.

You can pivot. Changing how a dream looks (or starting again from scratch) may be the quickest and best way to get to where you want to be. It is the difference between persistence and stubbornness (which can be look-a-likes).
I lost a lot… not receiving feedback well.

 – A Hospice Chaplain's Field Guide to Caregiving–Finding Resilience on the Frontlines of Love


To stay in relationship with what and who disturbs you...or not

it could be that the best response to this to let this situation or person go.  
AND…THEN You become feed me feedback to them…if they are listening…which is not really your business.


THANK YOUS
1) My thanks to Mary Oliver for her  line from THE SUMMER DAY. – my one wild and precious life…
2) MY thanks to  SF unity for the invitation to practice as my highest self.   I invite you to do that today.  We need your voice.    Blessings….on your day.

ATTRIBUTIONS:
1)    Daily Word – 7.16 & 7.16. 2020 World Peace & Reflect
2)    Ralph Waldo Emerson – Self Reliance
3)    My book Ch. 30 Feed Me Feedback – a Hospice Chaplain’s Field Guide to Caregiving- Finding Resilience on the Frontlines of Love.
4)    Tao de Ching – No. 29 translation Stephen Mitchell

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The Value of Kindness

7/21/2020

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What is the value of human kindness?
Do a ‘random act of kindness’ in this moment, on yourself. Choose now… to see it all with kindness…

Maybe…just maybe you and others are doing the best they can.

Be kind. Let kindness rain down.

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“..Be the ground that drinks up
the rain…”. – Hebrews 6:7

Kindness isn't simple. It changes worlds.

My prayers today are for health and I find myself needing to be kinder to myself.  I am not feeling as well and energetic as I would like. A couple of deaths in my life in the last week have complicated a health issue I am having… and has left me feeling permeable…and depleted.

So I find myself seeking new answers, and to start again…looking at  resources….

Kindness came up for me. Kindness is a resource.  I am remembering how energizing it is…how healing it is ….to give it, for sure, but to…(and this is more challenging) to receive it.

The sweet small steps that heal...

“Bring forth your own joyous world of love, friendship, beauty and plenty… There is within you the God-given intelligence to. Build such a (joyous) world.”.
                    
– Myrtle Fillmore
These kindnesses are sweet small steps that heal me…and I can supercharge the healing by focusing on them…
and dwelling there.

I spoke  a few days ago, about the clarity we get with spiritual vision, i.e. listening for a higher power to gently nudge you (or kick you...) in the right direction.  To see beyond appearances…to the ‘assurance of things unseen’ and I asked a question:

Can I just choose a better, happier moment on which to focus?
So to shift  to some more interesting story—or something more worth doing?

Each moment, we are offered a choice.

In each moment, I see us being offered a choice. How do we see the knuckle heads – out there? Or the inner knuckle heads?  How do we see our own foibles?

We can choose to see it all with kindness….

..Be ground that drinks up the rain… Hebrews 6:7
Let kindness rain. Choose

Resonate at the frequency of Kindness today.
Be your own ‘random act of kindness’


Try the Sound Meditation HERE  that inspired this write up.

If you enjoyed it,  subscribe Here on Youtube.
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BEST PRACTICE: the ONE thing

What is the ONE THING that you can do in kindness for yourself today?

     • Make it doable...a sweet small thing 
     • Make it an adjacent possible.
     • Make it yours.

Or use A KNUCKLE HEAD SUPERPOWER.
Maybe it is that ONE THING that you need to forgive yourself about...and let it go.  (Really...quit picking at the wound and let it heal.)


It's not so shameful or scary to forgive yourself when using the word "knucklehead". 

Try it on.

It is a little funny, and lighthearted.  But most importantly it has a collective quality. Hey, we are all knuckleheads at one time or another.  like, join the human club and get over yourself.  We ALL make mistakes. Admit them and stop suffering.

It's not only efficient. It's compassionate.


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THANK YOUS:

1) My thanks to Mary Oliver for her line from THE SUMMER DAY– "my one wild and precious life"
2) MY thanks to  SF unity for the invitation to practice as my highest self.   I invite you to do that today.  We need your voice.   

Blessings….on your day.

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Confused? Worried? Use spiritual vision.

7/17/2020

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Every day we start again.  But what to weed and what to feed?  This COVID-19 world is the pressure cooker du jour but when were we not immersed in it and confused by it? 

(It being life's changes...)

Hey, it's the human journey. But, using our Higher vision (that of the Higher self, our spiritual Self) we can see beyond the appearance of things...It orients us to what DOES NOT CHANGE (the Eternal & evergreen) and gives us clarity.

"The only true voyage of discovery, the only fountain of Eternal Youth, would be not to visit strange lands but to possess other eyes, to behold the universe through the eyes of another, of a hundred others, to behold the hundred universes that each of them beholds, that each of them is.
           – Marcel Proust,
         The Captive 1871-1922

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Shift the story...

How about shifting to some more interesting story?
See with spiritual vision and celebrate the simple blessings right in front of you. If we are aware of what stories we are living, we can use them to grow a better now. But if we are not, they may use us and grow a life that is not ours.

Marcel Proust says that the ONLY fountain of youth is to see with new (other) eyes...to see through the eyes of another.  How much in our world would be harmonized if we did that story? 

The ONLY Fountain of Youth: other eyes

I thought for years that I needed a massive win to feel safe; millions in the bank and I would be okay.  I have tried on a better story, the story of the sweet small steps to progress... I ask what is the next adjacent possible?  (Letting go of the grandiosity that, hey was my mother's story of safety. which I inherited.)

I am happier now seeing with my 'spiritual vision' of faith that it will all work out.  There will be enough.

Use spiritual vision & celebrate blessings.

BEST PRACTICE:
Stop. Take a breath. Set a timer for 2 minutes.  (You can spare that, right?)

Start. Imagine a calm place mentally in your head. Breathe it in. With every breath, start over.  Breathing in the calm of that place ...slowly and supercharging it with gratitude.  Think of what you are grateful for and breathe that in with the calm.  Repeat with each breath. Repeat until the time dings.  Feel better?

Easy.

You have the power.  but what good is it if you don't use it?

Each moment  is a choice…an unfolding…to see deeper and more kindly. Start again.
We are travelers on this journey.

Each moment we are being offered a choice. How do we see the knuckle heads – out there? How do we see our own foibles and knuckeheaded moments? With spiritual vision… we see deeper.

Daily word –
How I choose to see the world determines my experience of it.  ...

When facing challenges, It may be easier to see myself and others through the lens of my inner critic – judgment…But I pause…and breathe deeply and remind myself that I am a traveler on this journey of life and still have much to learn about myself. I refrain from making harsh judgments against my fellow human beings. 

In material ways, attitude is altitude

Not spiritual bypass… I am not suggesting we ignore the feedback from our body and our world.  But that knowing the world is not perfect, it seems to be perfectly made to trigger in us what is yet to be healed or what is the next step on my journey.

"Do we dare to re-remember? To retell and rewrite?

What if we just woke up and translated the old stories into a different language in which we understand that all people act to their level of skill. They do the best they can in the moment—with what they have. Why not reinterpret my stories in the light of my current more-adult understandings? Then my history changes. It sets me up to cascade forward. Who I am changes. There is nothing to forgive. I am free.

…Then I can shift to some more interesting story—or something more worth doing?"

-
No. 20 Live Backwards, Remember Better – A Hospice Chaplain's Field Guide Book to Caregiving- Finding Resilience on the Frontlines of live

Sound meditation helps us get & hold that Higher vision. Get yours here: 30 minutes

•••••••••

ATTRIBUTIONS:
1)    Daily Word – Clarity – Mon 6th July
2)    My book the ending Rule no. 20 …and the most important one…it is the rule my next book will start with.– No. 20- Live Backwards, Remember Better
3)    Quote from Marcel Proust – The Captive.


If you enjoyed this sound meditation – please Subscribe on Youtube.
If you are caregiving, try my monthly email –Taking Care Resilience News signup
If you want to attend the live recording session:   they are WED thru SUNDAY  - link on Unity SF.com Website -

THANK YOUS:
1) My thanks to Mary Oliver for her line from THE SUMMER DAY– "my one wild and precious life"
2) MY thanks to  SF unity for the invitation to practice as my highest self.   I invite you to do that today.  We need your voice.   

Blessings….on your day.


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    EM Hager
    Author,
    Hospice chaplain,
    Bereavement counselor & Sound meditation guide.


    "Look deeply into nature and you will understand everything human" – Albert Einstein

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