Tendons, Bones, Alzheimer's, Muscles and Emotions

I have watched Alzheimer’s from a close distance, always pretty fearful of my own lot in life since most of the women in my immediate family have had that cross to bear. And over and over I’ve seen that the disease makes everything stifled rise to the surface; all the fears un-faced and unaddressed, all the traumas shoved under the rugs, all the heartbreak and disappointments that were never properly digested. Maybe that’s why I’m on the mental journey I’m on. Maybe that’s why I long for and search for and strive for that place of enlightenment I know others have found. Selfishly, I don’t want my mind and body to end this life still carrying the scar tissue lodged on a cellular level, waiting for a chance to disengage and bubble up.

There are healers I know of who don’t believe the old school of thought “no pain, no gain”. They have learned how to accept things as they are, gently coax, gently guide and redirect and open up and clear problems inside the physical body, such as adhesions in muscle tissue, stuck fascia tissue, edema, etc.  I admire and believe wholeheartedly in their “way”, their methods. And try to embrace that philosophy when I’m most frustrated with myself and most hard on “getting a grip” in my own life.

Muscles, tendons and bones all become reactionary when life hands out some nasty things, whether it’s due to overuse, under use, strains, sprains, pressure, patterns. When the human body cannot stay relaxed, it tightens itself up in self-defense.  It  guards and protects itself from injury. But too many times, it forgets to relax again because it has learned to expect danger,  The body prepares for what might hurt next; it loses the innocent  trust that outside forces aren’t going to cause damage. So “knots” form in the shoulders, between the shoulder blades, the lower back. Then the body learns how to compensate or use an uneven, unbalanced pattern to accommodate the inflamed, angry parts. And one small problem builds upon another and another until eventually permanent damage can be the result. The therapists I admire most have learned how to speak to and address the discomforts by using a more graceful approach.

Emotions. Muscles.  Muscles. Emotions.

I’ve compared the disease of the brain, the reaction of life against human form, and healing ones heart after loss upon loss. All seem to be a maze of twists and turns and actions and reactions. All show what happens when you keep staying in the same patterns of behavior, when you get used to being off balance but things have a way of rising and making themselves heard and known regardless of any “control” one thinks they might have. All have breaking points where nature simply takes its course. And any small thing can trigger a “flare up”; a familiar face that once caused joy but then caused pain, carrying a purse on the wrong side and causing muscles to scream in pain, a song on the radio that churns up love lost or love destroyed, tripping over a stone and causing one leg to remain guarded while protecting the one whose ankle was twisted five years prior, a date on the calendar that reminds us of tragedy… and unfortunately there are those of us who seem to carry the harsh more than the happy events. Perhaps tied in to what seems “normal”.

Life is for the imperfect. The flawed. And none of us make it out unscathed.  So life for me, has become about reaching. Reaching deep inside to find healing. Reaching beyond and out and through and learning all I can from all the things that speak most clearly to my soul.

Emotions. Muscles. Muscles. Emotions….

 

Swinging From Branches and Hanging Onto Me

Several times throughout life I’ve been filled with childlike wonder; an innocence and quiet knowing that what I’m experiencing is beyond beautiful and is as perfect as life can be on Planet Earth. Those times have spoken and shown me heaven while in human form. I’ve been blanketed by magic and pure joy when I saw the Pacific Ocean for the very first time with my grandmother, every time I saw my children get the giggles, when I felt mountains for the first time, when I rode a horse across the desert in Arizona while staying with a woman who couldn’t speak English but who showed me a kind of love that spoke loudly and clearly, when I held my granddaughter for the first time, when I landed in Maui the first time… the second time… the third, when I swam with my Lomi family in holy waters and spent time praying alone at Kukuipuka Heiau.

Unfortunately, and something I’m desperately wrestling with right now, this flawed world has a way of sometimes tarnishing the luster and taking away or chiseling away what once was so precious and sweet. Thieves have a way of stealing into those moments that I somehow wish I could figure out how to cling to forever. And a heavy cloud of doubt or fear or lack of faith tries diminishing and lessening the innocence.

I’m lost. I honestly can’t find my way back into those holy spaces. I guess I have to just trust and know that they are a part of who I am. They haven’t gone anywhere, even though time and circumstance has whittled away at their initial impact on my life. And I come full circle inside my own head, thinking all those things add up, layer upon layer and provide a quiet foundation of truth. And even though the world tries crowding them out or stealing them away, I’m elevated by them. They are my stepping stones; my building blocks.

So when it feels like an earthquake is trying to knock me off my feet or push me off my course or whip me off balance, the remembrances may be all that is needed to keep carrying me forward. I just need to think back on those times and stop and see and feel their light shining from “what was” into “what is”…..  And no matter what happens tomorrow, whether there is pain or whether there is laughter, I can stand in tact and in touch with a childlike heart.

“So was I once myself a swinger of birches.

And so I dream of going back to be.”

― Robert Frost

WhAt DoEs It TaKe To MaKe Me LoSe My InHiBiTiOnS aNd DANCE????

For as long as I can remember, my mom would remind me whenever I felt like I was walking through “the valley”, whenever I hit a low point in life, that a person “can’t just stay on the mountaintop forever. Think how boring life would be.” She would add a touch of light-heartedness and a big heaping of hope to encourage me to just keep walking. Move one foot in front of the other when life throws you a curve ball and you feel you’ve descended from the heights and the beautiful sights.

She would remind me that things simply don’t remain; the valley, the peek, sorrow, joy, boredom… Ever changing, ever flowing and sometimes quickly moving, sometimes slowly moving through life.

I was reminded awhile ago by a very great friend of mine that some of us have a hard time being patient. Waiting. If I find myself inside of a situation I don’t want to be in, I get restless. I push and shove and try to force myself onward and upward. And I forget to stop, take a deep breath, look around me. I’m finding out the lessons are sometimes screaming at me to be seen and heard, but I’m so busy trying to get back up the mountainside, I miss the most important and often the most beautiful parts of the experience.

I was thinking earlier how life has this way of whittling away at us. One thing happens that causes us to react a certain way or to go a certain direction. Then another thing. Another thing. Sometimes all those layers end up stripping us down or crushing us. Making us feel like there is nothing left to do but to completely surrender and simply “be”; maybe for a few minutes, or a day or months or years.

I have felt the pain of that chipping away. And I’ve felt as the last little pieces have unstuck themselves from my core being. And in the place of all the disappointments, all the struggles, the terrors and the pain, my inhibitions and the things that served as barriers against a world I don’t understand suddenly, momentarily disappear. And I know what it is to dance in a way that takes me back up the slope and into higher ground.

My Maui sisters recognize the process as “ebb and flow”. The coming in and going out of the tide. It can be breathtakingly beautiful, even though the movement might temporarily cause discomfort.

Losing inhibitions.

Dancing….

“Dance, when you're broken open. Dance, if you've torn the bandage off. Dance in the middle of the fighting. Dance in your blood. Dance when you're perfectly free.”

― Rumi

Of What We're Made

I’ve been “thinking” in circles and squares and all kinds of random shapes since I first remember being able to remember. And once again, the Queen of Abstracts and Absolutes finds out what she thought she knew, she doesn’t know at all.

I’ve been on a quest for the past several years of learning what it takes to “let go”. To subtract those things that don’t make me better or leave me in a higher place. I’ve learned to dismiss, diminish, take away, step back, stop trying so hard, simply allow, go with the flow, reduce, remove. And I stand by the realization that all of the changes and re-arranges have shifted me, made me better, brought me more spirituality, more grace, more understanding and more joy. But I just had a “eureka moment” that can’t be ignored.

Until my life is over, I don’t think there are certain situations and circumstances of which  I will ever be able to completely let go. There are losses we face and are forced into bearing. There are tragedies that rob us, morph us. There are heartbreaks that we never fully recover from. All things I’ve tried over and over to rise above. All things I’ve peeled apart, layer by painful layer in an attempt to reach total healing. And it just now occurs to me that maybe we’re not designed to let it all go. Rather maybe we’re designed to process, digest, take it IN – not push against it or attempt to eradicate. Maybe it simply becomes part of who we are, becomes our make-up and part of our grander design. And maybe finally, in the surrendering, truly surrendering, I’ll discover maybe, just maybe, I’ve let go more than I think I have… and if not, maybe I’ve let go “enough”.

The things that happen TO us all, aren’t who we have ever been, aren’t who we potentially can be. I hope I’m learning how to place those things gently somewhere within where they work best so that I can be connected to the me I know I can be. And I hope I allow myself more breathing room and more elbow room.

3D Glasses

Sometimes I forget that I’m a three dimensional shape and that I won’t always get to be…

A three dimensional shape.

We all call it dying, but really I think we’re just shifting and evolving and changing and by the time we breathe our last breath of earth air, we let go of this experience, this body on loan from elements and minerals and earthly and other-worldly materials and move into the fourth dimension, fifth, sixth, seventh, millionth or wherever our next adventure lies.

I hope I never take for granted the form I’m in, the forms around me, the parts that I will never even get the chance to encounter because I’m so limited in 3D.

Here for such a short time. Inside this shell we take for granted.

May I recognize the dance I’m supposed to dance.

May I recognize the song I’m supposed to sing.

May I recognize the dreams I’m supposed to dream.

May I recognize the life I’m supposed to live.

Three dimensional nose that smells the pleasant and unpleasant.

Three dimensional eyeballs that fit into sockets that allow me to see in my own unique individualized colors and shapes.

Three dimensional fingers that let me feel the things that we call “tangibles”.

Three dimensional heart that beats and pumps and rhythmically and unrhythmically keeps me without sharp edges and hard corners so that I can fluidly move through the pounding of this thing we call “life”.

Shape. Form. Substance. Always changing, moving towards being without

this

that happens in

3D.

On Becoming More Bitchy

My mom told me over and over when I was young, “Be nice. Nice girls always get the guy.” Or “nice girls always come out ahead.” Or “nice girls always win in the end.”

I love that my mom taught me about how to be nice. Her actions more than her words became my road map. And she has always been one of the sweetest women I know. But often times while watching her be “kind”, I pushed down an overwhelming feeling of MAD. Because I watched as she worried about others so much, she lost parts of herself that I’m not sure she ever regained. While making others (including me) happy, she sacrificed her own self and life and health. A horrific price to pay. Pushing herself beyond her own limits so that others’ lives could be more comfortable. I learned from the master teacher.

But lately, I’ve been questioning “nice”.  Or my own interpretation of what that is.

Questioning it alot.

Not saying I think we should all throw kindness out the door. Far from it. But how about if we’re nice to ourselves enough to keep ourselves intact? To make our lives a bit easier?

For the first time in my life I’m finding out the efficiency of placing boundaries quickly and quietly around my inner being. It's hard for me to do. I have to work hard at it.

At work, I've had to learn how to apply these new principles better. Be more precise. Be more decisive. Be more clear. It saves time. It manages other’s lives better. It makes the well-oiled machine run much more economically. It helps MY life feel easier. I’ve struggled with it, because in demonstrating THOSE qualities, I have felt I’m sacrificing “nice”. Today the light bulb went on as I was gently taught that my concept and interpretation is a bit askew.

I also figured out today that this world isn’t always nice. (duh) Very few individuals I know of are completely selfless. Most of us are incredibly selfish, putting our own wants before anyone else. Not that that is good or bad. I’m convinced it’s simply being human. We all expect life and the universe to swirl around our importance and when it doesn’t we get all bent out of shape and wonder why and feel we’ve failed or something. (a different topic altogether) So I’ve entered into the challenge to begin using my built in Bullshit Radar - on myself and on others. What can I do to not only protect my energy but also “your” energy? Keeping us out of circumstances or moments that are unnecessary or unimportant or just really not needed? Going back to that feeling of creating more empty space around me. I’m finding out there’s a way to make vastness around my reactions or lack of reactions and in my constant need to people please.  Whittle down. Take away. Remove. And in so doing, I become aware that there truly are those who take advantage. (insert huge audible, collective gasp) Some people try to get away with as much as possible simply because they can, probably without even understanding what they are doing.

Just say no. Be blunt and to the point. 

Especially if you’re in a place where you feel you need to start protecting your own value and worth. I’m giving myself permission to pull back on the nice-ness.

Look out world. And um, sorry mom.

lol

Dancing With Life

I had an amazing conversation last night with someone I’ve known “on the surface”, someone who has died twice, gone through incredible life journeys, has had to climb back and rise from the rubble more than once; someone who is worlds away from where they first started as a child. The stories inspired me and feel like they’ve changed me somehow for the better. I heard about tragedy that led to a place of learning how to embrace and live in each moment as it comes, trials and traumas that led to a place where dancing, absorbing music and just shining an inner light for others has ignited a willingness to open one’s life to complete service to others. Through “me”, use me to change a world one little piece at a time is the lesson I gained from simply listening.

It’s a call I feel my mom instilled in me forever ago. A call to take the ashes or the shitty parts and pieces and raise those things up with love and life as the driving forces, the forces that know innately that everything, every little thing can be used for the good, for betterment of self and others.

I don’t know, nor will I ever really figure it all out, I don’t know if we are all here on planet Earth for a reason. I have my gut feeling we are. But I also have my doubts that maybe life is nothing but randomness and chaos. But the stories that weave themselves in and out of my life ignite my bones. They wrap around and tie things together and make sense out of nonsense and guide me to a feeling of wanting to sing and share smiles and laughter and ease other people’s pain. Those wishes become the fabric of life and take me away from an even-keeled center where there is little to feel, shallow waters;  where there is no depth into this expansive full spectrum ocean of experience. It all keeps taking me further into the highest highs and lowest lows and I emerge feeling baptized over and over by some kind of grace that is stretching me beyond comfort and ease and into a new dimension of absorbing life in ways I never dreamed I could or would.

The more I love myself, the more I love this life, the more I love others around me who have similar paths and ideas and dreams to express, the more expansive everything becomes. I might not have a lot of money, I might not have a mansion on a hill complete with swimming pool and servants… but I have stories and the hearts of friends that make me feel incredibly rich. Thank you life. Every day.