I may not have a job, but I am WORKING.--EMR, p.1. "Leave that Alone. Come Sit With Me. Just Sit. It'll Do Us Good."

I have found a new rhythm. It's temporary, but it is allowing Work to be chosen. To be completed. To be Seen. This is scary stuff. This is what I wanted. And the teachers/means are showing up at exactly the right time. So is the San Giovese for that matter.:)

We are reading "The Invitation" by Oriah Mountain Dreamer for Book group. I have "read" this before and scoffed at it. When I was in the throes of denial. Not anymore. I have just finished reading and writing some notes about Chapters 3 and 4: Fear and Sorrow. Here is some of what she writes that resonates. Chewable. really...for me anyway.

"I have learned that doing things the hardest way provides NO CURRENCY to be traded for greater future rewards."-p. 29

"I am afraid that if I stop, if I slow down and rest, I'll never amount to anything."-p.31..."What if I told you that everything you are ever going to amount to, you are right now?"--p. 31


"We are not offered guarantees. What we are offered is knowledge of life and ourselves, and if we are awake, glimpses of the wisdom held in the story our life is telling the world."--p.32

Then she challenges some of the participants in a workshop she is facilitating to surrender 7 things they hold precious....I immediately began to write without thinking ...and when I came to the end of the list, came to realize that I already have laid them down. And am looking at them with Love and Grief and some Fear. It has already happened...and someone asked her "For WHY" WHY would we do this? She answers-For freedom. Not Love and Freedom. Just Freedom.

Then she writes in a later chapter, that she has not learned to be with another's pain without feeling an impulse and a responsibility to "fix" it or do something just as she has not learned to be with her own...,a deep responsibility to ease others' pain...-p. 35. So, she teaches what she needs to learn.
And she writes that she is a good student and a very tired woman. And then she goes on to describe the exact kind of debilitating migraine experiences that I had. And what happened when she quit trying to avoid the pain, change it, or medicate it. She found Her Breath. That's what happened to me. And the green of leaves. I found elderberry. And little pears. And the quiet of hummingbird wings. The wisp of clouds. The brown and warmth of a puppy's body as I sat---Breathing.

Now I am Breathing and Grieving the surrendering. I have laid down seven of my most preciousnesses. Getting used to what that feels like. These are how I have defined myself and my Life all these years. I mean ALL THESE YEARS. They don't apply anymore.The"pile" is "WHO" I have been all this time. The labels. The action. The Job. How I have perceived others have perceived. What I have always accepted as what the "good, responsible, rule-abiding" girls do. And the bills still have to paid. The food found, etc. And there are no rules. There are no guarantees. There is no trail breaker. I do have something and Someone who is always there. Always here. His scarred hands and Heart the size of All Creation Hold all the Wisdom there is. I picture Him looking at this pile of precious "stuff" lying there in the sand and dust. It doesn't look like much when I look at it. He bends down. With a smile, He carefully places the pile in a basket His Mother made and puts it at the bases of the Cross. And He laughs and asks how I feel now? Then we walk together and go get a milkshake because it's really a little too early for SanGiovese. To sit under an elderberry and look for hummingbirds.

... and when I am not working that way, I am learning to make zucchini bread, working on subbing and other teacher applications, looking at grad programs for what I want to do next, getting rid of more stuff around here, practicing the harp more, helping a friend move her stuff, and reveling in the fact that the ants seemed to have moved on. And wondering what it will be like next week...