White flowers
Dark textures
Straight lines
Soft edges
Living wholeness
Dried pieces
Flowing lines
Still emptiness
Warm touches
Cool feeling
Hope and breath
In the spaces
Photo courtesy of Susan Kerr.
Living in the space of AND
Category Archives: coaching
Wide Open
Hope you stay open today to all the world out there has to offer you.
There are no wrong choices…even if you choose to be the object of pain or discomfort for yourself or someone else. There is a lesson in it all… a forward momentum.
Sense when to watch and when to leap. Don’t be afraid to feel – all of it. Know that it is all there for you to experiment with and none of it bigger than you…because it is there as a part of you.
Seek adventure curiously and joyfully…in your heart, in your mind, and in every action or inaction. Take on all that is out there in whatever way will grow and inspire you best.
Lift the blinds. Open the window.
Breathe it all in.
Now go live in it.
Bad and Beautiful
The Ackland Museum at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill just hosted an exhibit entitled “Good Object/Bad Object,” inviting visitors to examine works of art that defy customary decorum and could be called “bad” because they are unpredictably designed yet they achieve an emotional depth and resonant beauty equal to “good” art.
Bad objects are opportunities to explore the edge of our comfort zone and try on new ways of seeing the world.
When the role is taken on responsibly, a bad object can be the catalyst of change and inspire different thinking.
Isn’t it interesting how quickly we humans need to label things as good or bad when often those characteristics are circumstantial. Nature doesn’t operate that way.
In humans, often when a bad object occurs without sufficient planning and understanding, the artist might become defensive or even resentful, denying accountability for their creation. If they have not been provided the encouragement and freedom to create outside of traditional constructs, the artist might try to hide the bad object, its potential emotional depth and beauty lost.
More often than not these days I find myself stronger, more confident, and more accomplished when I step into the role of “bad object.” It is not that I am not good at these times. It is that I willingly take responsibility for non-conforming, breaking a patterned interaction, and inciting a shift in perspective to achieve a familiar level of resonance in an unfamiliar way.
There is a role for each of us as good objects and bad objects. The contrast reminds us of our undeniable ability to contain emotional depth and resonant beauty in the most surprising ways.
Resonance
There is something timeless in the rolling sea.
Individuality is lost as droplets leap into the air then instantly become consumed by the primal tugging, pulling, pushing, of the random rhythms.
There is something familiar in the curling, crashing surf. A sound and feeling calling me into its whisper, a deafening roar somehow barely audible.
It speaks of protecting me,
clearing my hurts and the world’s imperfections even before I know of them.
The spray catches my cheek.
Resonance of life force and love pulsing on the tide, pulsing through me.
I am consumed, transported back to the space and time when all I knew was the wooshing, whirling roar of silence in the womb.
My individuality is imperceivable.
I know precisely who I am…I am all.
It is with this magnificence that I crest the next wave dancing momentarily, singularly in the air and time and time again am happily reabsorbed into the flow,
into the moment of truth where I know I am the love and the life force that pulses with and through it all.
I am the resonance.
Exposed
Sanding and scraping at the scars, dents and built up layers of protection releases not only the renewed beauty of the untouched core but reawakens all the senses as the scent, taste, and feel of the raw nature is revealed.
It is hard work to peel away the layers and return to that soft exposed space of vulnerability. It also comes with a lightness and freshness that invites expanded breath and awe at the ability to renew and return to untouched purity.
It is the purity and vulnerability that allow the true Self to be revealed, rekindled, and invited to be seen, smelled, tasted, and heard.
I sand, scrape, and rub at the layers of my existence to expose the grain of my soul, renewed with freshness, clarity, and beauty in my raw, natural state.
While I may still need a soft coat of protection for survival, this time it will be applied lovingly and gently by me, and leave room for my natural imperfections to shine through.
Bedazzled
My body is a temple, golden and glowing.
My heart is a treasure chest bedazzled and sacred.
My mind is a granite stone vault protecting all that is known.
Ease, kindness, and clarity are the keys that unlock each one,
The breath the foundation on which all are secure.
It is my job to keep them all sacred and shimmering, accessible and strong.
Awake and aware, I guide myself with each breath through the healing and care needed to nurture and polish every surface, every corner,
So that every bit of me shines
Confidently,
Joyfully,
Magnificently,
And every bit of me knows it.
The Way
Standing on the precipice, mountains before me and behind me, I contemplate briefly the ascent or decent into the unknown.
No worries that the fog hinders my view because I feel my feet. I know that each moment, step by attuned step, I will find the earth and the sure footing that only comes with internal clarity.
Like the goat that climbs the rocks and edges of the cliffs with certainty, I approach the present, with the same attention to which I have all too often focused on my future and my past.
Looking back and looking forward the fog distorts the view. The lack of clarity forces me to see here, only that which is right in front of me.
In this moment, I put my hooves to the ground. I see the steps I need to take right here and now. I do not need to see the mountains in the foreground to know my way.
And…
The wind says run.
The sun says stay.
The cool at the edges of my body says retreat…or is it calling me towards it?
The warm in the center of my being spreads outward craving more – warm seeking warm.
The body clenches and contracts in the coolness,
Portions of me are soft from the inner warmth.
I crave the warm.
I find the cool invigorating and awakening.
This tug of warm and cool, of retreat and advance, of contract and expand, plays within and all around me.
Ping-ponging from one as if better than the other or as one instead of the other, appearing as lack or wanting.
Then there is that moment…I recognize I can be warm and cool at the same time.
Where the opposites exist simultaneously within and for me.
Feeling nurtured and grounded, safe and secure in the warmth, and at the same time empowered to expand outward into the bright, crisp air and what lies before me.
How magical it is to be in two experiences simultaneously – like night and day, not opposites or tag-teaming but always there, highlighting one another.
A reminder that my world is not linear or singular.
There is never just one view, one perspective, or one answer.
I can have both but I am not without either. It is just where I happen to focus my attention, where I choose to create the story, and what I chose to feel.
It is the play of duality.
It is the “and” of being human.
Seeking My Place in the Sun
I am never quite sure what challenges lie ahead.
I reach out, spreading my branches despite the fog.
I do not know what I will touch or be touched by.
I cannot help but feel a darkness lurking there, fear ever present in knowing there may be hurt or pain in the unknowns and unkinds that secretly swirl around me.
The fog fuels my insecurity as the branches of other trees press against me further threatening my place in the sun.
It is then that I remember that I am made to bend and sway.
I reach not with my branches but deep down through my roots.
I extend my roots for both of us, steadying me and gently holding you so that together we can face the fog and darkness with greater certainty.
I am grateful to feel your roots hold me in return.
Under the pressure to withstand, when I feel and share my roots I need not push away those that cast shadows.
We need not struggle to find our way alone.
As I lend strength, I find security.
As I steady others, we stand together,
equally thriving,
despite the fog.
It’s not bad, it’s just now
Someone reminded me this week that I am a grown up. As such, I have the capacity to care for myself, even survive on my own, and I have the luxury of absolute choice.
Sure, I know I am a grown up and can make choices but I still have the fear of a child. I fear making choices that will be wrong, cause suffering, or result in bad consequences.
As I further consider my power of choice, I am just now realizing that perhaps there are no right or wrong consequences. There really is no good versus bad. I do not need to avoid a choice because the outcome is not crystal clear or safe enough to follow through on.
I can chose to do or not do anything. Yes it comes with consequences but it also cultivates freedom.
Each consequence is simply another opportunity for choice, an opportunity to play more confidently and creatively with my power to choose.
Karma, choice in action, is not the punishment that results from my choices but the next actions available to me as a result of my choosing.
I do not need to avoid choices or fear consequences any more. I am a grown up. I just need to be ready to make the next choice.
Monday Mindfulness 