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Acting, Letting Go (and a possible reference for rose garden)

A co-worker of mine said today that he hated that everything we do gets criticized by someone.  During part of the conversation, he also mentioned that once something written was made public and then questioned, an alternative meaning to the one meant (the alternative then necessitating clarification) often happens.

Writing, art, and other expressions do seem to have a life of their own.  We need to do our best to be clear and then just go with the flow as what we say gets interpreted and passed on.  An example, for me, was that until the change in administration, no one thought to ask me whether the name “rose garden” yoga had anything to do with Washington, DC.  After the shift in January, a few people noticed how DC it could be and asked if my intent was to refer to the White House Rose Garden.

It was not my original intent to have that be one of the many things that came to mind when I chose the name, but I it works well enough if people think of the Rose Garden as one of the many possible referrents.

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    The speaker representing Hindus for Human Rights said this was a shanti yatra—literally a pilgrimage for peace. Every step, every action, every word for peace a prayer embodied.

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    As I have walked around town enjoying the spring surge of blossoming trees, I found myself remembering that our most famous cherry blossoms were a gift from the Japanese, which remembrance sent a deeper yearning to help send healing.

    At one sunny, pink-blossomed drenched moment yesterday, I found myself asking how could one’s heart not reach out to a people who brought us such beauty. I then thought that this country had no problem incarcerating “those” people on “our” soil and bombing their country when the arrival of the gift of our famous cherry trees was still in living memory. At that time, “they” had become our country’s enemies because of the actions and statements of those in power. The gift had become irrelevant in the context of war.

    The peril in both thoughts is that they distance us from opening and relating to the essential identity and humanity in all of the individuals we meet of various nationalities and alliances–whether in a time of gift-giving or in a time when we cannot abide the actions or ideas of those in power.

    Peace and light, E — Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry.

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    Curiouser and Curiouser…

    Last night, I took some lovely photos in the rain when I was walking to get a massage (it is pretty awesome to get a massage on a Monday night; try it sometime and see how it changes your perspective on the work week). After I came home and had dinner, I resisted the temptation to curl up on the sofa with a book. Instead, I got on the computer to take care of email correspondence that had accumulated over the day and the weekend while I was at the workshop with John Friend. I uploaded the photos from my walk and tried to post an entry. I got a message when I was in WordPress saying that the photo upload had failed. I exited from that screen and tried to access the file uploader. I could not get in. I then exited the prompt that I had failed. It would not let me cancel. Next, I exited the admin portion of my blog. The computer was not happy about that, but eventually it seemed to close the program. After that, I could not get back either to my public page nor to the admin page. I tried several times, but to no avail. I sent an email to my website designer–could she get in?

    I woke to an email from my website designer saying no problems for her. After I did my morning practice and before heading into the office, I tried again. On my home computer, no access at all to either the public or administrative portions of the site. I reloaded Firefox. That did not do the trick. I scanned my computer, but it showed no errors. I have access to the blog from my Blackberry, my office computer, and my IPad, but not from my home computer–my central place, the place where all my files and photos and bookmarks and maximum computer capabilities are one.

    As Alice (in Wonderland) would say, “curiouser and curiouser.” I am sure with research and trying lots of alternatives, we will find a solution to this peculiar glitch.

    I think staying fully connected to the ultimate loving ground of our being can feel like this strange denial of access to my blog. We get glimpses. We have studied enough to know what it is on an intellectual basis. We feel connected when we are at a big workshop (or sometimes it looks like every one else has found the bliss and we are the only ones who are not tapping in–note to self, usually that’s not true) or are in class or practicing, but not when we get challenged by daily life.

    Two things serve to bring us back to center–the first is to keep practicing and making the effort, just as expanding knowledge and trying different strategies will get me back my full blog access; the second is grace (and being open to receive it). And when grace comes, we then need to keep practicing so that we stay connected and can live in and from grace more and more of the time and remember and reconnect more easily when we get disconnected.

    Peace and light, E — Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry.

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