streams of thought...july, 27th, 2014

The summertime.  A hot muggy season that seems to entice so many of us with offerings that only this time of the year can afford.

A movement from indoors to the outdoors.

We do know that It is just a season right?

We will not have any control over this movement of time but we do have control over how we spend it. 

I have a few friends that love the summer season. They love sitting out at the beach or at the park or on their patios soaking in all the vitamin D that their body eagerly consumes.  Others can found at the local park playing volleyball or taking their children to the playground.   During this season, there will be swimsuit clad males and females at the waterpark or at the pools splashing around while swimming or simply having a great time. There will also be some that will spend the day in front of an air conditioner trying to keep cool and avoiding the heat all together.

We all make choices and have preferences. We all make decisions on what will make our present day the best that it can be… or maybe we won’t.

For me one of the best parts of the summer is seeing the dark clouds rolling in over the Rocky Mountains.

Today, while driving over the crest of a hill looking down into the Boulder Valley, I saw the Flatirons being engulfed with clouds and to me that is one of the most awe inspiring views that I can imagine.  

What inspires our imagination or willingness to act is many times forgotten until… well, until we encounter it again. It seems that we move through life so focused on the event right in front of us that we miss a small whisper of a notion that resides within almost every encounter. The simple fact that we have the ability to take another breath should be a moment of inspiration. Many times we look for a grand event, sign, or thought to light an emotional kindling that will launch us into an act that will give us an internal fire that generates enough energy to move us beyond our imaginations.  However, it is not always the grandiose signs but often times it is the simplest and the most silent of all that moves us to travel on a path that we would have never gone down before. It could be…

the laughter of a child…

the sound of silence moving through the aspen leaves…

a photo or a painting…

a word spoken in a conversation…

If we are open to the possibilities and recognize our own capabilities, we can be inspired by almost anything.

Can I share a secret with you?  I am blended introvert. Some of you who know me well are just smiling at something that you already have known for quite awhile.  

Rarely, will I ever get inspired by some huge rally where some dynamic speaker will get up before thousands of people to espouse their insight in how to live… to sell… to promote yourself better than anyone else.  In fact, I will definitely react the opposite way that they will want me to act.  My sense of identity is totally contrary to the bombastic experience that this type of episode offers to me.

In other words, I find my inspiration in the smallest of things… a line in a book… a drop of a beat in a song… a quiet walk at Chataugua… or perhaps that presence of another person who seeks to do more than just live. They really don’t have to say anything.  No, it is something about their presence that tells me to act on all the gifts that I have been given.

Jung once used the phrase “the birthing of death”.  He was referring to his perception that we will hit an apex of life when we will be birthing on how we will be known after we die.  Simply stated, we begin creating our own legacy. I agree with him to a point but I disagree with his conclusion that all people will die.  Oh, I know that none of will escape the inevitable but yet how we interact with others will determine how will be remembered.  Yes, we will all eventually leave this earthly vessel called our body but we will never leave the memory of another person. It is our life reconstituted in the spiritual.  It is a non-physical yet always constant presence of how we are remembered. So, how we choose to live this life… to inspire others… to interact and act upon the behalf of others are decisions that we encounter with each breath of physical life.

We know our weaknesses all too well.  We live in the winter of our souls when we seclude ourselves from others. A spiritual and emotional hibernation… even in the heat of the summer we can isolate ourselves.  Our spirit needs the warmth of inspiration.  It requires the water of walking fluidly.  We allow the fear of drowning emotionally to take away the joy of living. So, find someone that will support you as you venture out into the “swimming pool” of life.  Let them be your “floaties”. 

Enjoy life.  Enjoy the heat of the season that we move through it.  Explore your own desire. Challenge yourself and in turn you will empower others to be challenged.   

streams of thought...may 14th, 2014

”In those moments I sometimes catch a glimpse of my true life, a life hidden like the river beneath the ice.” – Parker Palmer from Let Your Life Speak

Have you ever found a writer, a performer, a thinker of all times, or perhaps just another person that makes both your face and soul smile at the same time? 

It may be in the way they live their lives.  It may be in some act of kindness that they have done.  It may be in what they have written.  Or it may be just because they sang something that just reached inside you.

Parker Palmer is one of those individuals for me.  He speaks with such depth and clarity, yet with the simplest of ways.

In moments that I need to re-find my way, I go to some of the writing sources that always seem to inspire me.  Yes, I find refuge in the Jewish Proverbs.  I find meaning in the writings of Thich Nhat Hanh. I revisit my calling in the writings of Parker Palmer and Henri Nouwen.

We just left a winter season of introspection.  That period of time when we can pause to discover how we can live life. 

I think that we take the seasons for granted.  In winter, we move through them mindlessly and always looking for the warmer seasons to come. In the spring, we seem to be thinking about the family “vacations” that need to be planned out.  In the summer, we are outdoors and moving about going from one event to another, all the while making plans for the fall events and holiday seasons. We just do not seem to give the seasons a place where they can guide us in looking at ourselves.   

Hopefully, during this winter season of reflection, we had the opportunity to glimpse through the icy cold exterior of the day to day into a warmed life that flows inside of us.  Just as the trees had shed their leaves… a symbol of their external beauty… its life moved inside of itself to develop a greater strength in the roots, which anchor the tree into the soil of the earth.  We, too, have gone through a season of moving inside of our own souls to take a moment from the busyness of life to develop the roots inside of ourselves to anchor us for the impending seasons. 

Now in the spring season, we move into a period of renewal and rebirth.  Just as we see the flowers and the buds on the trees start to peek their colorful heads from the dark depth of their birthing place of protection, we, too, are moving into a new season of life.

If we have caught a “glimpse of (our) true life” during the season of introspection, we have discovered what path we are designed to travel on. Hopefully, we have looked at our sense of being a little differently than before.  Many times we get caught up into a cultural movement which pushes us into competing more… into earning more… into consuming more… and yet our life, that is uniquely individual, yearns for more than just moving in the same direction as everyone else.  We are reluctant… dare we say… afraid… to step outside of our environment that we live in to be different.  We have learned to live from the outside in and then wonder why we are never satisfied.  Instead, we need to pause long enough not to say how we want to live life but to listen long enough for our life to tell us how we should live it.  We are becoming deaf to the beating of our soul because the noise of the world has been turned up too loudly.

Nature has a way of teaching us so much more on how we should walk in our own present life.  We have become the consumers of the earth more than the caretakers.  A caretaker will do just that…. “take care”.  They will know the dangers and the possibilities in the land and the creatures that reside in the habitat.  It may be possible that we no longer listen to our own inner self because we are just thinking about how we can consume life not care for it.

Parker Palmer writes, “Before you tell your life what you intend to do with it, listen for what it intends to do with you. Before you tell your life what truths and values you decided to live up to, let your life tell you what truths you embody, what values you represent.”

We all go through a season of what is seemingly lost.  Is it possible that the loss is not really a loss but a lesson?  Is it possible that the lesson is meant to be a positive teaching of how to live and love?  Perhaps the loss is showing us what we truly value and therefore giving us a chance to live those values out in a richer sense.

We see the streams of water… the current is flowing and carrying with it what needs to be taken away… perhaps the only thing the separates us from that Living Water is the icy barrier of being something that we are truly not meant to be.

Breaking script… Namaste

streams of thought...january 27th, 2014

“Frustration is the first step towards improvement. I have no incentive to improve if I’m content with what I can do and if I’m completely satisfied with my pace, distance and form as a runner. It’s only when I face frustration and use it to fuel my dedication that I feel myself moving forwards.” – John Bingham
In Denver, a person will see a plethora of stickers on the back of vehicles that show “26.2″, “13.1″, and “70.3″. All are proud badges of honor of accomplishments that have been done. Like many that I know, when I start off on a run the very first steps seem to be the most difficult. Our bodies are still tight, even though we have done the proper amount of stretching. We begin to feel our lungs getting used to the expansion that is going to be required as we get further into the run. Some of us have our ear buds in the auditory canal… either there are musical notes beginning the beat that many times matches our will and our footsteps… or there is a subtle soothing voice that says “You are now beginning your run.”  All the while, we know the path and how far we want to go.
Often, we start our run and we come across something that causes us to detour our path or possibly we have a canter that doesn’t feel quite right. For those that have a goal in mind, we mentally fight to make adjustments.  For those of us that don’t have a goal in mind, we simply turn around to go back home.  All along the way we get frustrated and inwardly say how stupid it was to even attempt this exercise. We think about all the other things we could do to get “exercise” or how nice it would be in our warm homes on such a cold day.  Then we do the ultimate act of violence against ourselves… we think “I can’t do this, anyways.”  We declare ourselves to be less than we really are meant to be.
It wasn't just for external reasons that we initially thought of changing our life course. No, we saw a need and we wanted to change.  We wanted to “break script” from a life that was not going in the direction that we wanted to go in. We got tired of being out of breath when we walked up a flight of stairs… or we couldn’t move from an “up dog” position to a “chaturanga” in a fluid jumping motion… or we simply wanted to be healthier.  We wanted something back that we felt like we had lost. We wanted our youth back. We got so tired of being tired. We saw the vitality of the young and wanted it. We saw a life that we might have had and simply misplaced. We allowed the rhythm of an external life to carry us away to a place of mindless movement.  We may have rebelled at first and fought against it.  We promised that we would do extra workout outs after we binged on an extra-large, extra meat pizza. But those promises gave way to other things… and then eventually we just adopted a lifestyle that did not fit.
Now, we find a longing deeper within to get back what we had given away. Now, we want to live a lifestyle that is more representative of what we value. We get the inner motivation to become more active.
This inner motivation is what fuels our drive to the gym, the recreation center, the nearest Cross Fit location, the athletic store, the dance class… or whatever we want to do that will “make” us what we now want to be. We pay for the classes, the memberships, and the gear. Then we go to the local health food store to get the latest in whatever it is that we are looking to accomplish.
Then it happens.  We start to “run”. We are feeling sore from the previous workout and can barely move… we look in the mirror the next day and we wonder why we don’t see the changes that we are working towards wanting.  Or we get detoured in life due to a major illness… or life got derailed by a death or a loss of a significant other… or we get our inner value diminished by the loss of a job.
We sit back in our life chair and wonder “What is the next thing to happen?”  The quick burn of motivation is extinguished. We want to simply quit. We retreat inside and depression fills the void left by motivation. We find ways to escape the depression through activities such as games, television, or more life threatening lifestyle choices.
Life’s cadence is altered many times. It falls out of rhythm. It can be very frustrating.  John Bingham used the word “dedication” in the quote mentioned above. We misplace the idea of motivation when we are really looking for inspiration. Inspiration is the deeper sense of embracing an idea… an idea that leads to an act that is clothed in dedication.  When we are inspired, we move with a greater sense of dedication.  We give space to the fluidity of emotions that we will have as we “run our life race”.  Instead of seeing the emotions as being anchors and weights, we will find them as a wind that leads us to a greater understanding of we are and what struggles we have in discovering our true self. Allow the emotions that we encounter the freedom to move through not reside in our lives.
breaking script…Namaste

streams of thought...january 24th, 2014

“Life is not merely being alive, but being well.” – Martial (Latin poet in the 1st Century)
I think I know why I like coffee shops so well. For me they are places that soothe my soul. They are my church.  I have a few here in Denver that I like to go to from time to time. Stella’s. Pajama Baking Company. St. Mark’s. Pablo’s. Each have a sense of being. The people who walk in come here for as many reasons are there individuals. For myself, I come to a place like Stella’s in search of inspiration. It is near a major university and so there are all types that come in. Some are students’. Some are professors. There are a few business people that come in because you can tell that they like the relaxed environment that is filled with an energy of thought.
As I think more about the quote that Martial gave to us over two thousand years ago, I begin to think deeper into what he was saying. “Being alive” is not just a physical aspect but a spiritual and mental one as well. We strive for the physical part so much that we forget to take time to make sure that we are healthy in a moral and a mental sense.
We remember all of the postings and announcements responding to a simple internal question, “What do I want to accomplish this year?”
We have friends who have stacks of books that they will read this year. We also have friends that want to lose weight… or get physically fit… or to run in their first or many marathons this year.  We may have friends that have wanted to go back to college or to graduate school. We encourage them for a while… then as we and they start to get back into the normal everyday routine those goals tend to get dismissed. Not forgotten just merely excused.
So, we are almost at the end of the first month of the new year. How are we doing? Are we alive? Are we keeping on track with our expectations of what we wanted to accomplish just a few weeks ago?
Take a moment.  Just a moment of sitting in our thoughts and emotions. How do we feel?  Are we back to being anxious? When we think about the plans that seemed so doable at the beginning of the year, do our “shoulders drop”? When we think about where we are heading in our lives are we still wishing that we were on another path?
Take a moment. Breathe in deep. So deep that we allow the emotions to stay but to float in the air that we have just taken in. It is going to be ok. No past event can truly stop our future. It may bring us detours and those detours should lead to a creative state of how to make our dreams become a possibility… our possibility become an action… and action hopefully becomes passion.
Take a moment. We all have a pulse. The beating of a heart that says that we are alive. The pulse of the mind are ideas that are only held back by an emotion. We have a spirit within us that is alive… it may be hurting at times due to the events in our life but the ability to either be hurting or in joy means that our spirit is alive within us.
What does it mean for us to be “well”?  I am not sure.  That is a definition held by each of us.
I know what it means to be “well” with myself. I am physically alive after fighting against a major illness and its complications. However, I am not just content with being alive physically.  I want to go into the balance of my life being in a place that I strive for activity. To be physically “well” for me is to do more half marathons… hike a mountain peak that is above thirteen thousand feet… to be functionally fit…to actively create a joint venture helping others.
I am spiritually alive. However, I want to be spiritually well. I will be honest in that I think that this is one of my greatest struggles as I grow into my own faith system that brings me into reality with God, the One that many might call the Divine… and a part of this struggle is in discovery not just how to live in it but to breath in it. I will not deny my Christian faith but I am also not going to deny my acceptance and adherence to a Buddhist philosophy. For me one makes me who I am and the other helps me in being that person. I adhere to a faith not a following.
I am mentally alive. It seems that the more I study the more active my mind and spirit becomes. In my experience, my mind and my spirit are very connected.  I am not sure where some of my dreams come from so I just accept that is a result of the conversation between mind and spirit. I think that being alive mentally is another extension to the principle of inspiration not motivation. I want my mental exploration to lead me into a life that is inspired deeply not a life of superficial motivation.
We need to be present in our own lives… be alive AND well. We shouldn’t allow self-judgment to deny us the possibility of breaking script from our past.
Take a moment.  Be alive in this moment that we have and live it with a full heart of energy of acceptance not rejection.
breaking script…..Namaste

streams of thought...january 17th, 2014

It is a truly an amazing thing… here I am sitting in my home… Tigre curled up in a ball next to my desk… having my morning coffee and what do I hear?  A train.
Now, I live in the beautiful Washington Park area, which is a nice quiet kind of neighborhood.  We have more joggers and dog walkers than we do cars… ok maybe I exaggerate just a little but seriously our little neighborhood is nicely tucked away in Denver. So, I smile when I hear that sound moving into my home… into my room… into my previously and soon to be once again a quiet place.
I smile not just because it is so quiet that I can hear the distant moan of a train’s horn but I smile because I simply enjoy trains. A tad old fashioned, I know. It is actually quite…dare I say romantic?
Another thought that comes to mind, when I think of trains, is the idea of transition. After all, one of the greatest unification tools used to bring this amazing country into being was the advent of the coast to coast rail system.  I know that currently we see trains with a mixed sense of emotions. Some would say that they are too slow. Some would say that they do not serve our population very well.
Others might point to the fact that they are truly an escape mechanism… and in that regards they will cause us to slow down.
For me to travel to my other favorite city of Seattle, it would take me two days on a train; while, if I traveled by plane I could arrive there in a matter of hours. Here is the difference…I would miss the most beautiful part of getting there.  I would miss the transition of coming from the arid eastern slope of Colorado, a mixture of plains and mountains, to the more lush green scenery of the beautiful Northwest.
Transitions. An interesting word because to me it is a mixture of two words… transfer + positions. We simply are moving from one place to another. Some desire and dare I even say yearn for transitions to take place.
Politically, many individuals want it all the time.
Emotionally, it does happens to us all the time. We can be euphoric over a relationship, career, house, possessions, and many other aspects.  However, in a moment’s time we can feel a sense of disappointment that a relationship was not what we thought… a career ended up being a dead end…possessions become used and antiquated.
Physically, we will typically look for it at least twice a year. At the beginning of the year and when it is time to get out the bathing suits.
Spiritually, we want it or experience it when something deeply impactful happens. An illness. A life threatening event. A journey on to our “mat”. A natural disaster. A major national event that moves us so deeply that we act to show concern. The birth of a child.
We all live in and want transition until…it requires a deeper movement. We lose a job and the only one that seems to be available is hundreds or thousands of miles away. We lived a life that was not truly authentic with who we are and then we are met with the stark reality that we need to make a change before we have lived a life that was not only dishonest but one that robbed us of our true self.
We look at transition as some mysterious act of life when in reality we do it all the time. Fluidly, we move through the day making adjustments to our schedules and to our day without hardly a second thought. Those are the simple transitions that we see at that moment as being necessary. Yet, we are reluctant to make the bigger transitions.  Some of us have worked almost all our lives at jobs that were not careers. We have chased job after job, all in search of a better one, when all it really came down to is that really we were searching for ourselves. We have looked for companionship and instead of waiting we launch into relationships after relationships…then it happens…we realize that the companionship that we needed first was actually within ourselves.
Trains and transitions. They both take time. The life of expediency many times is unsatisfying. Once something happens quickly, we start looking for something else to happen. We get uncomfortable with moments of development.
I remember the day that I was told by my doctors that I was healthy… a time period that saw five surgical procedures performed…and I remember sitting in my car by Cheesman Park…it came like a whisper…I am going to be ok.  There have been other struggles since then but to inwardly accept the transition that was confirmed by the doctors took time.
No longer do I hear the train. It is probably down the tracks a few miles by now. My coffee cup is now empty and “T” has moved to another location in the room.
We have no way of knowing what is on the other side of the “mountain crest” that we are travelling; however, to stop now means that we will never know.
I want so much to say something that will not just motivate you but will inspire you to simply take one step… that is what transition is…taking one step at a time. However, many times transitions unlike the train moves in silence.
Breaking script…Namaste