One of the lessons from my childhood was to "tell the truth." Then I learned that some lies are okay, even liked and rewarded. When someone feigns confidence on-stage, for example, there is often applause, whereas showing one's own true lack of confidence there is likely to lead to humiliation. Or if I portray my business as very successful, it seems to spawn more business, but if I talk honestly about the weak economy's negative impact on my business, I seem to gain little from it.
I've learned that the importance of "telling the truth" is relative. . . except in the sphere of deep reality, where discerning and telling My Truth is what matters most. Deep reality bathes me in light and warmth. It lies beneath my compulsive behaviors, my automatic thoughts, my feelings of shame and distress, buried by them to the extent that I forget to make contact with my depths. It resides everywhere but is easily veiled by my busy mind, as it worries, ruminates, plans, goes over past events, creates ideas about other people's meanings, etc.
When I tell myself My Deep Truth or allow that truth to speak to me, I begin to feel its radiance. And the surprising thing is that others notice and actually comment on an apparent openness and radiance they sense in me. Another surprising thing is that I seem to have found My Deep Truth by allowing myself not to know what it is and letting it emerge.
Light emerging from nothingness. . . it's an image that reminds me of the first part of the creation story, where light comes from the void and God calls it good.
I believe that all of us can find deep truth within ourselves. It's often challenging and can take time, but never is it impossible. Sometimes we need help from a spiritual guide or therapist to be able to surrender to not knowing and to let Deep Truth emerge.
May you take the steps which are right for you to be able to locate your own Deep Truth.
Friday, May 18, 2012
Thursday, May 3, 2012
Spaciousness and How the Spirit Sings
Funny, I've been listening to teachings on spaciousness, realizing how breathing all the way down into my own deep spaciousness begins to open me up to the Real in me, discussing spaciousness as the starting place with a friend who is facing an enormous task. . . and then this afternoon when I decided to take a break and look around on YouTube for some of my favorite singers, there it was again: Spaciousness.
I listen mainly to classical music, and few things thrill me more than hearing a glorious voice with gorgeous execution, brilliant use of technique, causing music and singer to appear as one. Having studied singing myself, I marvel at the melding of a performer's voice, conditioned breathing apparatus, finely honed muscular support, interpretive skill, and deep artistic feeling with wonderful music and lyrics. I looked up Schubert's Ave Maria and listened to performances by Luciano Pavarotti, Barbara Bonney, and Susan Graham, each causing my eyes to well with tears, before going on to some favorite arias, just as powerful, and then clips of famous singers coaching young musicians.
In a masterclass at Boston University, mezzo-soprano Denyce Graves worked first with an Asian-American bass-baritone. She listened to his aria and decreed that he had a lovely voice, well placed, but was not giving it the space it needed to soar freely. Using images and exercises, she helped him to create spaciousness, relaxing the voice and opening it metaphorically to a tall, wide cylinder of breath, no longer squeezed or limited.
I imagined the cylinder for myself, with the spaciousness of the universe inside it, molecules roaming there or doing whatever molecules do without any sense of being compacted, riding on the breath of Being, able to be all that they are just as they are. I believe I heard Spirit singing.
I listen mainly to classical music, and few things thrill me more than hearing a glorious voice with gorgeous execution, brilliant use of technique, causing music and singer to appear as one. Having studied singing myself, I marvel at the melding of a performer's voice, conditioned breathing apparatus, finely honed muscular support, interpretive skill, and deep artistic feeling with wonderful music and lyrics. I looked up Schubert's Ave Maria and listened to performances by Luciano Pavarotti, Barbara Bonney, and Susan Graham, each causing my eyes to well with tears, before going on to some favorite arias, just as powerful, and then clips of famous singers coaching young musicians.
In a masterclass at Boston University, mezzo-soprano Denyce Graves worked first with an Asian-American bass-baritone. She listened to his aria and decreed that he had a lovely voice, well placed, but was not giving it the space it needed to soar freely. Using images and exercises, she helped him to create spaciousness, relaxing the voice and opening it metaphorically to a tall, wide cylinder of breath, no longer squeezed or limited.
I imagined the cylinder for myself, with the spaciousness of the universe inside it, molecules roaming there or doing whatever molecules do without any sense of being compacted, riding on the breath of Being, able to be all that they are just as they are. I believe I heard Spirit singing.
Wednesday, May 2, 2012
I'm Stressed Out! Make It Stop! Don't Get Spiritual on Me!
Sometimes the stress of living is overwhelming, like a hailstorm with no end in sight. It hurts, it's chaotic, it just won't let up. You want to make it stop, and you can't. At the same time, your spiritual teacher, your 12-Step group, or your therapist is telling you to let it be, to roll with it, not to take it personally, to appreciate the moment. What?!?!? They're kidding, right?
What's to appreciate about being pummelled? How do you roll with it when you have too many responsibilities and too few hands to tackle them? How is it not "personal" when your boyfriend says good-bye forever or you're fired from your job?
To reckon with this sort of spiritual guidance means to take a different perspective altogether, and this is always hardest to do when the vicissitudes of the outside world seem to have control of you. When you feel controlled by circumstances, your defenses go up, and when your defenses are up, you lose contact with your inner being.
Whatever the circumstances, your inner being is steady, calm, perceptive, and wise. It waits for you to find it, and when you do, it will guide you to the extent that you stay open to it. Your inner being knows that a more flexible you negotiates storms effectively, "rolls with" them. It knows that when you are centered in yourself (not "self-centered," but centered in the depths of your inner being), you can let the outer world "be" and draw strength and courage from within. It allows you to discern truth from falsehood, right action from re-action, and your responsibility from that of others. In being with your deepest self, you are living in the moment.
As I write this, the First of the Twelve Steps comes to mind. It is openness to my inner being which allows me to admit that my egoic self, made up of all the defenses I have learned over a lifetime, is powerless and that manageability can come about only when I let my defenses loosen their hold.
What's to appreciate about being pummelled? How do you roll with it when you have too many responsibilities and too few hands to tackle them? How is it not "personal" when your boyfriend says good-bye forever or you're fired from your job?
To reckon with this sort of spiritual guidance means to take a different perspective altogether, and this is always hardest to do when the vicissitudes of the outside world seem to have control of you. When you feel controlled by circumstances, your defenses go up, and when your defenses are up, you lose contact with your inner being.
Whatever the circumstances, your inner being is steady, calm, perceptive, and wise. It waits for you to find it, and when you do, it will guide you to the extent that you stay open to it. Your inner being knows that a more flexible you negotiates storms effectively, "rolls with" them. It knows that when you are centered in yourself (not "self-centered," but centered in the depths of your inner being), you can let the outer world "be" and draw strength and courage from within. It allows you to discern truth from falsehood, right action from re-action, and your responsibility from that of others. In being with your deepest self, you are living in the moment.
As I write this, the First of the Twelve Steps comes to mind. It is openness to my inner being which allows me to admit that my egoic self, made up of all the defenses I have learned over a lifetime, is powerless and that manageability can come about only when I let my defenses loosen their hold.
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