Freeway Forgiveness

Don’t we all just love traffic? Not! I was on my way from Cedarburg to Pewaukee on Thursday evening at the peak of rush hour traffic. Hwy 45S seems to always become congested just after Capital Drive. This Thursday evening was no different. In order to access the 94W exit, I decided to get over into the far right lane when the slowdown began so that I wouldn’t have to fight my way over there once the traffic truly was bumper-to-bumper. I’ve gotten to a place in life where traffic jams don’t upset me like they used to. What would be the point in that? Rather, I find a way to enjoy the idle time as much as possible. This usually means I’m dancing in my seat to the music on the radio. I was enjoying a good groove to Rhianna when all of a sudden this silver Jeep Grand Cherokee with Texas license plates comes barreling up the right emergency lane….yes I said emergency lane…and cuts right in front of me. Can you believe the nerve? Oh my ego sure wanted to get into his ear. Do you think he could read my lips that formed the word “JACKASS!?” I decided my only revenge was to turn my bright lights on and leave them on until Mr. Silver Jeep Grand Cherokee from Texas rudely cut himself into the lane to the left. Well good riddance to him.

Doesn’t sound like I was very forgiving in that moment does it? I wasn’t. And I still wasn’t when I told the story to a friend the next day. But come Saturday morning, thankfully forgiveness set in. For me, forgiveness is not a way of saying I was right, you were wrong, but I’ll let it go. It’s also not a way of saying I condone what you did. For me, forgiveness is about not judging the behavior or actions of another human being. The ego likes to keep us separate by judging others as wrong or right and therefore less than or better than itself...it’s all about the separateness. The Higher Self is always aware of our Oneness. Human beings always have both and operate from one or the other at all times. By the way, I forgot to mention my drive to Pewaukee was taking me to a discussion about how do we know when we are operating from the ego or the Higher Self….oh the synchronicity, gotta love that  So, how did I get to forgiveness you may be asking? Somewhere in my unconscious mind I must have been still grumbling about this person, because on Saturday morning out of the blue I had the thoughts….you don’t know why this person was driving like a lunatic. What if someone he loved was on their death bed? What if his child was in a serious accident and he was on the way to the hospital? And really Tara, you’ve never made a bonehead move in traffic? Ha! Hmmm, why am I all of a sudden feeling compassion for this guy? It didn’t really matter the why, the point was I had no idea the why of it. I just knew in that moment, the situation was an opportunity for me to practice forgiveness. I may not have practiced it right while it was happening, but getting to it even 2 days later I felt the tension flow from my body. What a beautiful feeling that was. What a gift the situation was to remind me I never know what is going on with another person so how can I possibly make a judgment about their behavior in any given moment. Thank you Mr. Silver Jeep Grand Cherokee from Texas for being my teacher.

The holidays are an especially emotionally-charged time of year. The hustle and bustle of everyone trying to find just the right gift; get to this store for that gift and that store for this gift; many are in their own little world and not aware of how they are interacting with others. Now might be a particularly good time to practice forgiveness.

Note: I have no idea if it was a man or woman driving that vehicle. I used one gender to make the story telling easier. I’m fully aware women can drive just as crazy as men.

Opening Hearts

I just finished reading an article (published in O The Oprah Magazine, August, 2010) adapted from the book “Let’s Take the Long Way Home: A Memoir of Friendship” by Gail Caldwell. It describes a friendship between the author and Caroline Knapp, another writer. The article gives a glimpse into their friendship, and a snapshot into Gail’s grief after Caroline dies at the age of 42. What the article brought to me was the realization of how most of us live our lives with a guarded or even closed heart, and the friendship between these two women was a beautiful example of living with an open heart.

Gail describes their friendship as “something intangible and even spooky…that could make strangers mistake us for sisters or lovers.” Why do we often reserve such love and open-heartedness for one significant other (lover) or a family member (sister)? Seems like a silly question, when I already know the answer if fear. We fear being hurt. We fear judgment. We fear letting others in that deeply because they may not like who we really are. We fear others thinking we are gay (not that there is anything wrong with that!) if we share emotional intimacy with a same-gender friend. We fear other’s judging an emotionally intimate friendship with someone of the opposite gender as “inappropriate.” We live in a society that likes to reserve emotional intimacy for a select few, usually in a family dynamic, and even then that can be a stretch. How often do we truly reveal our hearts, hopes, desires, fears and dreams with those we say we are close to? Heck, how often do we take the time to share these things with ourselves? We seem to be a society that fears vulnerability. It seems to me we like to associate the fact that we can hug, kiss and tell someone we love them as being emotionally intimate. I believe true intimacy is revealing oneself on a deeper level, moving past the fear of judgment, and accepting others as they are...however that is revealed in any given moment…it’s giving each other a safe place to just be. This isn’t to say we reveal our deepest selves to everyone we meet…discernment is good self-care and there is often some sort of commonality that brings people together. But it is to say when we feel a special connection to another human being, let’s allow ourselves to take it a little deeper…over time so we feel safe. It is also to say in every day life, allow your heart to shine through a smile or hello to a stranger on the street, the person who held the door open for you, or the server who just brought you a meal. You never know how your openness will help another.

I have no idea if these two women lived their entire lives with an open heart, or if it was something just between them, but what a beautiful example this friendship is.

Expectations

Our lives are full of expectations from other people. Our bosses expect us to perform at work. When we are young our parents expect us to behave. Our teachers and parents expect us to get good grades, or at least passing grades. Our friends and family expect us to be loving and supportive. The government expects us to pay our taxes. The police expect us to obey the laws. I’m not judging these expectations as good or bad, some are necessary in order to coexist in this society. However, I’m beginning to see how many of our expectations of others are born out of fear and are really another way of trying to control another person.

In a love relationship we put the expectation on our partner to be faithful and never leave us. Do we really want someone to stay with us just because we expect them to? Isn’t it better to allow them the freedom to choose to be with us?

What about expectations of friends….when we expect our friends to support us or “be there” for us in the way we think they should be we are telling them how to be a friend, rather than letting them be the kind of friend they truly are. Isn’t this trying to control who they are?

Parenting…this one is near and dear to my heart. For years I had an expectation of how my mother should be…she has yet to live up to that expectation. Who am I to say what kind of mother she should be? Where did I get my idea of how a mother should be? Likely society or watching some idealized TV show. Obviously as a child, one doesn’t have the emotional maturity to understand this, but as an adult I sure to. I wasted a lot of years angry my mother wasn’t the way I expected her to be, rather than appreciate the ways she did express her love.

Children…we put expectations on them for good behavior and so many other things. Whose definition of “good behavior” do we use? How often do we tell children not to say this or that, or do this or that because we think “society” won’t accept it? We expect them to live as our society dictates…but who says our society is right? I think so often we trample a little bit of a child’s spirits when we tell them what they think, say or do is wrong.

I’m in no way saying we can or should have a society of no expectations. I’m simply asking next time you have any kind of expectation of another, ask yourself why. If you find it’s because you want to control that person in some way, I ask that you consider allowing them to be just as they are. This can be difficult because we have a lot of fears about letting others are who they are and express themselves as they wish. It’s a good opportunity to look at your own fears about life.

When is it their stuff?

I am a person of self-reflection. I am aware enough to know when something about someone else triggers me or I dislike a quality of theirs, I go within and I ask the question....is this a shadow part of me? I have learned a great deal about myself by doing this practice for the better part of 10 years. I'm not afraid to look at my shadow parts. I'm not afraid to learn and grow from them. I also learn from listening to how others perceive me. Where I struggle is knowing when what they are saying about me is truth and when it is simply them projecting their shadow self onto me. When to know this is their deal, not mine. And actually, to be real with myself it's not a matter of knowing when this occurs because your spirit/soul/inner being always knows the truth; it's being strong enough to hand it back to them and say "here, this is yours, I will not take it on." You take a risk when you do this. You may lose people you love. But I know deep from my spirit to live authentically, this is a very necessary step...and I am at peace.

Maintaining friendships

I was listening to Marianne Williamson's radio program yesterday and her topic was friendship. Her guest was Farrah Fawcett's best friend who helped Farrah document her journey through cancer and also wrote a book about it. Something Marianne said struck me. She had received an email from a friend but hadn't responded for a few days...life happens. When she did respond the friend was grateful as she had become worried that something had happened to Marrianne or that perhaps Marianne was angry with her. Now I realize it's typically only women who let their minds go to those thoughts...men typically think nothing of it. Marianne's point was she hadn't been a very good friend by not taking the time to respond to her friend...that we often don't take the time to communicate or spend time with friends because we get caught up in everything else going on in our world. I personally have found it hard to keep connected to friends either because my life is busy, their life is busy, or both. I don't foresee a lot of people's lives slowing down any time soon. We live in a society that says you're not living a productive life if you aren't always on the go, doing something, accomplishing this goal, finishing up that project. So perhaps the best way to stay connected is through simple email communication saying "hey, I was thinking about you." Facebook has helped people reconnect and stay connected...is this enough to sustain friendships? To a degree yes...but I still think it's wonderful when friends make the time to spend time in each other's presence.

Emotional addiction

We have all heard of addiction to drugs, addiction to gambling, addictions to food, but emotional addiction? I recently watched a movie called “What the Bleep!? Down the Rabbit Hole.” The movie is a narrative story along with interviews with scientists (mostly physicists) and spiritual scholars and the premise is how physicists are beginning to bridge the gap between science and spirituality. So what does this have to do with emotional addiction? Because it all has to do with our thoughts, and just how powerful our thoughts are.

It has been known for some time that our thoughts create our emotions, and if you give that some thought you will likely agree. Think a sad thought and you feel sad. Think a happy thought and you feel happy. The thoughts create a chemical reaction in our brain. Our brain produces a peptide based on the thought we have, this peptide is released into the body and our cells have receptors that these peptides lock in to. The more often our cells receive a certain peptide, the more it wants to receive that peptide. So when we continue to think the same negative thoughts about ourselves, we are conditioning our body to want more of that chemical peptide. Our thoughts also create or destroy neurological pathways in the brain. The more a person thinks about and experiences the emotion of love, the stronger those pathways become...so those people that always seem happy and you can’t believe someone could always be that happy...well maybe they have created an environment in their body that allows for that! The danger is we can also destroy good pathways in the brain through out negative thinking and create new pathways that perpetuate the negative thinking.

So the answer is to just change your thoughts, right? Yes and no. Yes, ultimately that is what is needed; however, as it took time for you to become addicted to the chemical releases and creating the negative thinking pathways, it will take time to reverse the process. The good news is it is totally reversible. You start where you are, and begin to reach for better feeling thoughts. It could be difficult at first because your body is craving the chemicals it is used to getting from your negative thinking. But as with a drug addict, you wean yourself off the negative thinking.

I had mentioned to a person I know I thought he might be addicted to drama. It had been my experience he was quick to respond to an email or phone call that had a lot of drama involved, he liked to get in the middle of family drama that had nothing to do with him, he liked to rehash old family drama. I sent this email message on a Saturday morning. This person rarely, if ever, checks his email on a Saturday morning/afternoon, and even more rare would it be for him to respond right away. Imagine my surprise, or not, when he did respond as soon as he read it that Saturday afternoon. For someone who had to defend he was not addicted to drama, he sure was quick to create a little by reading and responding right away. Of course he probably wouldn’t see it that way nor did I try to point that out to him...that would be me creating more drama :-) And I don’t live in his body, so do I even really know for sure? Take a look in your own life and see what your emotional addictions might be. Do you like to push other people’s buttons? Why, what do you get out of it? Do you beat yourself up about something you did or said? Do you have to get that last word in or can you walk away and let it go? When you feel a negative emotion strongly, what thought created that emotion? If it was a negative emotion, can you change that thought, even slightly, so you feel a little better? These negative emotional addictions is what Eckhart Tolle would call your ego painbody...that part of you that feeds on past hurts by bringing them to the surface again and again. Consciousness...raising your awareness to the present moment and the feelings inside is what begins to release this negative energy from within. So it’s not a bad thing to feel negative emotion, it’s actually a very good teacher for you...if you are aware. As always, I want to say I know I have my own emotional addictions and am a work-in-progress. I’m happy I am more aware now than ever so that I can begin to turn the tides, create new neurological pathways and begin to live more of my life in joy and harmony.

What is Love?

Love...we all want it in our lives, right? What is the definition of Love? Is it a feeling? An action? A way of being? Does anyone really know? Is it different for each person? In the last year and a half, I’ve found myself questioning what exactly love is. Religion would tell us we are to love all people...how’s that workin’ for ya? Did you love that guy on the freeway this morning who cut in front of you? What the heck does that mean anyway...love all people? Well, from a spiritual perspective we are all created from the same Divine Source, or God....call it whatever you like. We are all connected...even science is beginning to prove that through quantum physics. And that Divine Source is pure love, so we must be pure love right? Do you feel like pure love? Or are you like a lot of people constantly criticizing yourself and judging yourself and others? Do you look in the mirror and only see what you don’t like? Or can you get to a place where you begin to see what you do like both inside and out? That is self-love. I’ve begun to think that while love can be a feeling, an emotion that stirs from deep within, to truly love means to unconditionally accept another Being just as they are and it begins with the self. When we begin to love our self, we begin to see our self and others in a new way. We begin to live empathetically. We begin to put ourselves in another’s shoes as best we can. We see a mother have an angry outburst towards her child and rather than judge her as a bad mother, we acknowledge we’ve been where she is and our hearts open with compassion rather than close with judgment. Rather than curse the guy who cut us off in traffic, we know we’ve been in a hurry like that before and cut someone off in order to reach our destination faster and we hope he makes it where he needs to be...perhaps he just learned his loved one was taken to the emergency room. We have no idea what another person is experiencing, so truly, who are we to judge? So now I’ve moved from love, to unconditional acceptance, to empathy, to compassion...seems I’m all over the board...but maybe not. Maybe they are all tied together.

Here’s a challenge. Begin to work on self-unconditional acceptance. I think this will naturally flow into you beginning to unconditionally accept your family, your husband or partner, your children, your co-worker, the stranger at the grocery store. It’s a process, just start with a little awareness. I promise if you continue, the awareness continues to grow.

So I think love is a feeling, a deep emotional stirring, and an action. Questioning this all started about a year and half ago while I was on a quest for love from a man and I read a book called A New Earth. The book really made me question what love is, it actually turned me off of love for a short while because I thought if everything in creation is love, what’s the point of “special” relationships? Thankfully I did not completely give up on love, really that is impossible for me. But I did have to get love from myself first. I still want to share love with one man, but I now know he must love himself first, then he can let it flow to me and others. No amount of love from me can change that fact. When you get to a place where you love yourself, everything else in your life balances out and you can then fully receive love from others. And as always, I remain a work in progress...