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    Cause/ Effect and Integrity

    ByElizabeth

    Earlier in the week, on my way home from a conference on the other side of town,  I found on the $1 cart outside of Second Story Books, Starhawk’s Dreaming the Dark — Magic, Sex and Politics.  Though I always learn something from reading Starhawk’s books and I had not read this one yet, the book was so heavily underlined, I thought twice about getting it.

    Something made me hesitate before putting it back, and I opened it at random.  On the page was the following:  “Directed energy causes change.  To have integrity, we must recognize that our choices bring about consequences, and that we cannot escape responsibility for the consequences, not because they are imposed by some external authority, but because they are inherent in the choices themselves.”

    I wondered why this had not been underlined in full when so much of the rest of the page had been underlined because I thought on reading it:  “Exactly right; that speaks to our current condition.”

    And being in the midst this dialogue in which there has been so much discussion of integrity (along with what we might have caused and how we might have been affected by certain actions), I dismissed the possibility that the underlining would be too intrusive for my own reading because, yes, this teaching comes at just the right time in just the right context for deep contemplation of the deep truth that to act with integrity, we must appreciate our own contribution to causes and results/responses in the undulating fabric of our connected being.

  • Spam Filter (and thoughts in meditation)

    ByElizabeth

    When I have not looked at my email for several days, I am faced with dozens of emails in my two regular accounts, plus the spam folders.  The first thing I do is see what in the spam folder is not spam.  In doing that, I give some attention to everything in the folder.  Then I go through my in box to figure out what should have gone to spam.  Then I delete the spam.  Then I decide what emails from list serves there is no point in reading because if I have not read them immediately, I will have missed the letter-writing, petition-signing, event-going, offering-enjoying that is described in the email.  Those get deleted without being opened.  There is another level of emails that I open, but just skim.  Then I either delete quickly or leave to be read after I get to the important stuff.  Then there are the personal and business emails that I want to read and require my attention.  I look at them to see if they need immediate attention or can wait.

    The thoughts that arise during meditation have a similar filter.  Some are spam.  There is a certain almost mesmerizing quality about the quantity and array of the thoughts, but I just let them go — returning to my mantra or the breath because the mantra is far more delightful than the thoughts.  Other thoughts, I acknowledge, but leave for later (i.e., the proverbial “to do” list), again finding more delight in the spaciousness and light of meditation.  Sometimes particular thoughts relevant to my practice and very being will start resonating in the light itself and becomes messages.  These thoughts sometimes dissolve again into the light of meditation and do not come with me from the session in a tangible form.  Others stay with me and give me fruit for contemplation, for investigation and study, for illumination of my day, or for discussion with others for further refinement.

    Always, though, there is an acceptance that thoughts will arise as inevitably as one with multiple active email accounts and many list serves will get email.  The practice is learning which thoughts I should give heed, which to discard, and when and how to listen to those that will serve and inform.

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    Only a little rain (and vimarsha)

    ByElizabeth

    My gardening friends have been commiserating and worrying about the abnormally dry weather.   For the past couple of days, we have all been concerned that this storm has brought so little needed rain, although we are grateful to get whatever rain comes.  Other acquaintances were complaining yesterday that it still wasn’t sunny.  When I mentioned drought conditions, they had not noticed.  If they noticed once it was pointed out, they suggested reasons why for them personally, it would still be a better thing for it to be a sunny day.  Part of the reason I garden is to keep me connected with the rhythms of the seasons and the weather.  If we do not grow our own food and depend on the fruits of our labors, nor are taught the relationship between the weather and our survival, there is no reason to know it.  We become disconnected from nature and from the earth.

    For me, connection to the earth deepens my connection to myself and to spirit.  How can we know ourselves if we do not know how the earth nourishes us and how we relate to the earth?  How can we recognize the light within ourselves, if we are disconnected from nature?  At the same time, the practice of yoga, with its inward questing (antar-vimarsha — the quest to touch or reveal the true Self), by revealing to us the subtle energies and knowledge of the relationship of body and mind, can lead us back to yearning for a deeper understanding of the world around us and for a healthier relationship between the give and take between us and the earth.  We can thus reach spirit both by being more aware of the outside and seeing where we are disconnected in our practice off the mat and by reaching inward using our spiritual practice (the Anusara principles are designed to be a pulsation of reaching outward and inward for an ever growing expansion and understanding of mind and spirit) and then knowing the outside is not aligned and needs to be shifted.  All this is the process of vimarsha, like a little more rain in the drought to nourish and encourage the unfolding of spring.

One Comment

  1. Is this a gift of a lover to his or her beloved?
    A reminder that : As I know you, I love you.
    Or, perhaps it is a reminder from oneself to love oneself?
    To remember that part within us that is so nearly perfect .
    Maybe the words form a precatory command: Go forth! Love!

    Yes…I think I like That one.

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