Sitting Quietly, What Did I Learn?

Saturday Night Dream
Condoleezza Rice appeared in my dream last night! Given my long standing distaste for all things Condi, I really had to laugh. Whenever she appears on the TV news or in the newspaper, I have a standard rant: "She says the obvious! She never says a new idea! Her quotes are so flat, like, 'If there is a surge in violence, stability will be at risk.' Duh!"

So, when Condi came to Dreamland, I had to listen to her, because she says the obvious, the proven and accepted fact, right?
"Bethany, " she whispered in a courteous and kind, low voice, "I think you should sit down and be still." I ignored her, jumping up to greet friends as they came into a large gymnasium where we were all sitting, Condi included.
"Bethany," she gently persisted, "You can relax, take it easy." I continued to resist her advice, and even launched into a talk about how I was just excited to see people, and this was my personality and blah blah blah. Then, I looked into her eyes, I saw how much she knew me and cared about me.
Somehow, Condi morphed into my friend and landlady here in Bangalore, Sujata Naidu. I decided I would just relax and sit still. Which is how I spent today, and I loved it.

Reduce Craving for Food
A friend wrote about losing weight, and said that while he was exercising, as long as he overate, he, "continued to grow." When we end our craving for food, our obsession with food, our compulsive attention to food and eating, we not only find our sanity, but we reduce the power of all craving in our life. To limit our cravings and aversions is the beginning of true joyous living. Peace comes when food loses its grip on our psyche.

Sadness is My Illusion
Being committed to my skewed view of the world, the way I think things Should Be or how they Should Go is the shortest route to sadness. Who the heck am I to think that I have the best view or image of how things should be or go?? Do I actually believe I know how a person Should Act or Should Behave? Is it possible that the pain they are feeling is essential to their growth? Could there be something going on that I can’t see or understand?

Truly, my rigid expectations can cause me great sadness. I am disappointed by someone’s “perceived” lack of caring, by what I label a “mean spirit.” I then carry and bury these unhappy feelings, these negative emotions, which pile up and fill up my insides, creating a Sadness Reservoir.

Today, I pledge to stop the habit of labeling and classifying what I see. Rather, I will see it, as the tree sees me. As part of the majestic pulsating Oneness that eludes all of my tiny ego’s assessments and narratives. And in this simple pledge, I can end my need to carry sadness. I will accept what is as just that. Who am I to challlenge reality?

The Bonus: like the free steak knife set that comes with the purchase of a juicer, once I give up my need to Find Sadness, I can also discard my need to end sadness, fix sadness, and jolly friends, family and strangers out of sadness. Rather, I can be with the person as they go through their important process of healing from the inside out.

At my friend Bubloo’s this weekend, I had hoped her budding roses would be in bloom. After all, I had seen them last weekend. I expected a blossom Friday! But like the rest of life, the roses have their own time, outside of any immature, egocentric wish I may hold. So, I can now see others who are suffering with a tough situation as roses in bud. I play no role; I cannot rush them through to completion. We all have our path and our own pace.

Bubloo awaits the Rose.

Watching Someone You Love Suffer
Much of this awareness was triggered by an email from a friend, who spoke of a sibling’s painful divorce after a very brief marriage and a parent’s need to deal with alcoholism. Watching people we love suffer can be tough, we want to speed the healing, to help them move forward and stop aching. But again, the rose bud is our teacher. Yes, we can help create good conditions, providing a safe, warm, nourishing place to bloom. But there is no healthy way to rush the work that must be done. We can be the silent, loving witness. Awake to this truth: that there is nothing wrong with what is happening, no need to regret, grieve, fear or deny. It is what it is: reality. It is what so. So what?

Another friend wrote about her adult children all being “stuck. Hard to think I didn't raise them to be more adventurous or ambitious or something.” Again, we humans have such a propensity for sizing up and marking up ourselves and each other. Imagine if every caterpillar did this, while stuck in the cocoon? “How did I get into this? Why wasn’t I content eating leaves all day?”

Does the tree grieve the falling leaf? Does the sky resist the cloud, the day mourn the setting of the sun? I have come to find such comfort and wisdom in the natural world. Eckhart Tolle wrote this, in Stillness Speaks, “This is the miracle: behind every condition, person or situation that appears ‘bad’ or ‘evil’ has concealed a deeper good. The deeper good reveals itself to you---both within and without---through inner acceptance of what is.” That’s just what I’m learning.

Outside my bedroom window, two small cats come and play on the roof of a nearby shed. They sit for long periods of time staring at each other, as if looking into a mirror. A playful fight ensues, then they resume their stillness. I have enjoyed their time together, and feel quite certain neither has labeled the other.

Tolle teaches us more:
“Suffering begins when you mentally name or label as situation as somehow undesirable or bad…Naming and labeling are habitual, but that habit can be broken. Start practicing ‘not naming’ with small things. If you miss the plane, drop and break a cup, or slip and fall in the mud, can you refrain from naming the experience as bad or painful? Can you immediately accept the ‘isness’ of that moment?

“Naming something as bad causes an emotional contraction within you. When you let it be, without naming it, enormous power is suddenly available to you.” Amen.

I Love You and I Don't Miss You

Last night at Satsang, Manize spoke of being honest when we love. She asked if love means being dependent.

Immediately, the answer within was, “No!” Certainly not.

Love also does not require physical presence. Living half the year on one side of the globe and commuting to the other side for the second half of the year, I know this truth. Shutting my eyes, regardless of where I am, all friends and family show up, for they reside in the heart.

This morning, I woke with this awareness, “I love you and I don’t miss you.” Why? Because we are emotionally complete, when we are together, we love one another’s company and have a grand time of being together. When we are apart, we still love one another. Nothing has changed. To demand physical presence of all whom I love is unrealistic and a sure way to create misery for myself and others.

An old Winnie the Pooh story has a picture of Pooh and Piglet, viewed from behind, walking down a lane. Piglet is reaching up for Pooh’s paw. “Why?” Pooh wonders. “I just want to be sure of you,” says Piglet.

True sureness or certainty comes from loving ourselves so fully, the love of others is a luxury, not a necessity. We love our own company, our own stillness, our own presence.

How is this sense of security possible? Because the experience of our inner self is in truth an experience of the harmony and wholeness of the entire Universe. Sitting alone, we feel the vibration of the entire planet, the pumping of our heart, the pulsing of the tides, the purring cat, the throbbing of the singing bird, the flutter of the butterfly.

“What Buddhists have always known, physicists now confirm,” writes Eckhart Tolle in Stillness Speaks, “there are no isolated things or events. Underneath the surface appearance, all things are interconnected, are part of the totality of the cosmos that has brought about the form that this moment takes.”

How can we miss anyone when we are all interconnected? Only physical presence is lacking. My love comes to you and yours to me on a golden two way beam, streaming to and fro. Only our tiny minds fight this truth.

“The thinking mind is a useful and powerful tool, but it is also very limiting when it takes over life completely, when you don’t realize that it is only a small aspect of the consciousness that you are,” Tolle adds.

I love you and I don’t miss you, because we are One.

Dedicated to my husband, Thurmond, who is always with me, no matter where I am.

When Another Human Being Hurts You

I’ve often said I prefer to be hit by a terrific natural disaster, like a tsunami or a flood, than suffer pain caused by another human being.
Within the past two days, I have received letters from two friends, both betrayed by someone who once professed they loved them. These women are reeling from the unexpected punches….one close to knocked out by fear. “I am in an all or nothing situation,” she writes, “I cry all the time, even in my dreams, I cry.”
A third friend spoke about her sudden infidelity, and how much she hurt her husband when he discovered what happened.
And this afternoon, a new friend told me of his wife’s unfaithfulness, and the jealousy and rage it has triggered.
How To Make Sense of the Blow?
How do we make sense of such moments of agony, when we receive a blow to the solar plexus from someone we thought loved us dearly, someone we trusted with our lives?
My short answer is, accept the moment as another opportunity to grow and deepen down into self love. Use this stinging reality to wake yourself up to how much your self is waiting for your love.
No one is more deserving of your love than you. When we love ourselves fully and completely and effortlessly, these betrayals aren’t life threatening. If you like, you can spend some time in disappointment and grief, anger or regret. How long you experience misery is 100 percent your choice.
If, on the other hand, you decide to learn all you can from this unwanted lesson, you can end the misery immediately. The fact is, you cannot control another person or what has happened. Crying, screaming, wishing, scheming, retaliating…and all their outraged cousins….will not change what happened.
To change how you live with what happened is to look carefully and thoughtfully for the Truth that you have wanted to discover. What did you pray for? What have you wanted to better understand? The answer will lie in this painful moment. Perhaps you have been wondering why your life feels joyless or what you are supposed to do to earn a living.
Now, in the center of this shakeup, you have an opportunity to review your relationship with the world. How honest have you been? How much have you been ignoring? How long have you been pretending? The betrayal does not come out of no where…it has been growing in the backyard for a long time.
Perhaps you have wanted time to yourself, and not taken it. Now, with this loved one out of the picture, that desire for time alone has been fulfilled.
Perhaps you have been avoiding that awkward conversation about the state of your relationship, and now this explosion has forced the conversation to occur.
Rest assured, that even this extreme moment is here to serve your Highest Good. Yes, your highest. The lies are over. The Truth has emerged, victorious.
Will You Choose Suffering?
How you choose to learn and process this moment is yours. You can accept what has happened for what it is: an announcement of a major change, possibly an end. Unwanted changes and endings happen all the time. Do you think the Kodak Company has been running around crying about how their previous film customers betrayed them for digital, filmless photography?! No, they moved on, creating a niche for themselves with online photo galleries. Copy Kodak…be in creation, not reaction.
In his brilliant book, Power, Freedom and Grace, Deepak Chopra challenges us on virtually every page to break free of our conditioning and delusions and be happy: “How do you break free from captivity? You break free by choosing to identify with your inner self, the REAL you. You break free from the prison of conditioning when you feel neither beneath anyone nor superior to anyone, when you shed the need to control other people, who you create space for others to be who they are and your real self to be what it is.”
Dr. Chopra explains that you feel miserable, angry, jealous, guilty and afraid when facing a situation like betrayal because you have allowed your happiness to be controlled or determined by someone other than you. He calls this, “object referral” rather than “self referral”: “Somebody says, ‘I love you’ and that makes you feel happy. You win the lottery and make a million dollars; that makes you feel happy. This kind of happiness is an expression of object referral: You’re happy because of this, you’re happy because of that. But inner joy is independent of the situation, circumstances, people or things. When you experience inner joy, you are happy for no reason. Just the mere fact of being alive to gaze at the stars, to experience the beauty of this world, to be experientially alive in the miracle of life itself is your happiness.”
Take this moment of unwanted pain and accept all it has to teach you. See that you no longer want to have your joy or sadness be remote controlled by someone else. See that loving yourself is the steady way of life. Spend time communing with yourself, enjoy the beauty of your own company. Let you heal you. Sit quietly. See that you are still whole, perfect and intact. See that you are strong and still able to love. Forgive yourself. Forgive others. Be free.
(Dedicated to all those I know and don't know who are entering a time of unwanted change, who feel unloved, unlovable or unloving. Take heart! You will look back and see this was all for your Highest Good.)

Valentine Photo Bouquet

Scenes from the garden on this Valentine's Day....all of us send love to you...every flower, every petal...even dear Lakshmi, our cow.

See The Playful Divine

In the end, each one becomes the other.
Becomes, in both senses---
‘Appears as’ and ‘evolves to’.

The baby’s brown eyes become the teak table and the soil of the Earth itself.

The pink hibiscus becomes the puppy’s tongue and the morning sky.

This moment stands alone, representing the Whole.

Rocks smile, birds speak, trees feed us breakfast, then take our breath away.

Carbon, Hydrogen, Oxygen, Nitrogen in endless Creation.
Earth, Water, Fire, Air, Ether.

All elements become One Element.

Look at the rose, she is your Sister.

Look at your neighbor, he is your Mirror.

Look through all Matter, see the Playful Divine.

Bethany

Awaken, O Human!

One Life, One Planet
Life Vibrant Everywhere
One Life, One Planet
Light Shining in Every Creature
One Life, One Planet
Love Embracing All in Oneness
One Life, One Planet
Planet Home for Us All
One Life, One Planet

---by Manize Sait, founder of School of Ancient Wisdom

Wise and wonderful teacher Manize Sait prays for us all in this New Year’s psalm.

As the creature with the most potential to serve others, our duty to uphold and protect life is an awesome honor. We are the ones who litter. We are the ones who waste. We are the ones who consider everything else our resources, not fellow guests of Mother Earth.

An article in the Feb. 5, 2008 Bangalore Times spoke to our careless “fowling of our own nest:”

Garbage tip in Pacific Ocean 'growing at alarming rate'
London (PTI): A drifting "plastic soup" of wastes, stretching from Hawaii to as far as Japan, is growing at an alarming rate in the Pacific Ocean, American scientists have warned. The garbage tip -- "the world's largest rubbish dump" -- was discovered by the US oceanographer Charles Moore while taking a short cut home from a Los Angeles to Hawaii yacht race in 1997.
"… It is almost like a plastic soup. It is endless for an area that's may be twice the size as the United States," 'The Independent' quoted Marcus Eriksen as saying. Eriksen is a Research Director of the US-based Algalita Marine Research Foundation which Moore founded.

"It moves around like a big animal without a leash. The garbage patch barfs, and you get a beach covered with this confetti of plastic," said Curtis Ebbesmeyer who has tracked the build-up of plastics in the seas for over 15 years. The "soup" is actually two linked areas, either side of the islands of Hawaii, known as the Western and Eastern Pacific Garbage Patches. About one-fifth of the junk -- which includes everything from footballs and kayaks to Lego blocks and carrier bags -- is thrown off ships or oil platforms. The rest comes from land.

Our Love Affair with Plastic
When I was a young girl, the first Macdonald’s opened in my hometown of Kalamazoo, Michigan. How well I remember the excitement of the 15 cent hamburgers, French fries and milk shakes! And even more tantalizing for me was the abundance of free colorful plastic straws…swirled white, yellow and red. We could pump the dispenser forever, and take all we wanted home. One straw would surely have been enough…they never wore out….but I was gaga over plastic, caught in an American epidemic.

Learning that, in the America of my childhood (1960s) we produced about 2.7 pounds of trash daily per person….compared to more than 4.5 pounds today.... is no leap in logic for me. Whether we want it or not, consumers are swimming in excessive plastic packaging.

The turtles, birds and fish of our oceans are also swimming in this nonbiodegradable, nonrecyclable soup…and faring much worse. Mistaking floating litter for food, marine families are suffocating and starving. Natural immunity and rates of reproduction have dropped, too.

Watch this 6 minute video on the Plastic Soup Sea to learn more.

Deadly Love Affair Must End
Taking notes while watching this video in my Bangalore bedroom, my fountain pen ran out of ink. I was so happy to realize that I simply refilled the ink, rather than tossing a plastic ball point pen in the garbage, that would end up where? India is nearly an island itself: only on the north is she bordered by land.

Making simple choices in our daily living might appear small, but when we all become conscious of our plastic consumption, we will save lives around the planet.

Friends in the US tell me of campaigns to reduce the use of plastic bags, items that live longer than we do. I have struggled with what to do with mine, opting to use them as packing materials. Our dear late Aunt Lulie DePamphilis used to crochet handbags and doormats!

I’ve often thought we should engage post offices in helping with recycling. These fellows are at our door daily, and leave empty handed. Why couldn’t they take back tightly rolled up plastic bags…lightweight and easy to stuff in their sacks? Recycling of such bags is a growing business, particularly in California. In parts of the European Union, consumers bring their own bags to the markets, and are charged more at checkout if plastic bags are used.

Down the Storm Drains, Out to Sea

That plastic spoon or top to a yogurt container left on the park bench gets blown to the ground. The rain eventually washes it to the storm drain. Soon, the remains of your lunch are journeying to the sea. Eighty percent of all the garbage floating in the sea came from land; and 80 percent of all that garbage is PLASTIC. After joining the plastic soup and harming so many see creatures, some of it is belched back up on our beaches. What a deadly, messy reminder of our carelessness.

Creating excessive, dangerous waste is a sure sign that we are living in an unconscious state. We are simply not awake or aware of the consequences of our choices and actions. We want to open our plastic wrapped batteries while downtown, and there is no trash receptacle in site. How easy it is to drop the rubbish on the ground?

Our great challenge and privilege as human beings is to see and make connections. To see the total interconnectedness and interdependency of this throbbing sphere we all call home.

Native American Nations Created No Waste
The great red skinned tribes of North America created no waste during their stay on Earth. Seeing an exhibit at the Smithsonian Institute years ago, I was stunned by how the natives used Every Piece of the Animals they killed. Even the snake’s neck bones became a child’s rattle, the buffalo bladder a purse. When the tribe moved from one location to another, to follow the sun or source of food, they left no sign of their previous occupation. They kept America Beautiful.

Awaken, O Human! Become conscious of your contributions. Awaken to the blessed kinship with land, sea, sky and all who dwell within. Awaken and use the power of love to share and care for the Garden of Eden.

Happy Tibetan New Year, Today!

(Left) Beautiful Buddha, painted on a temple wall in Sri Lanka.

Today began with prayers from all faith traditions, in celebration of the Tibetan New Year.

One of the pleasures of my Indian winter is all the time I have for reading. While visiting Sri Lanka, I got a copy of Buddha's teachings, The Dhammapada, in the original Pali language, translated with stories and notes. Such beautiful scripture, so simple and clear.

In honor of my Tibetan neighbors to the north, and with special blessings for the Dalai Lama, whom I joined twice for Peace Pilgrimages (India 1998, Belfast, Northern Ireland 2000), I share these verses from The Dhammapada:




"As a solid rock is not shaken by the wind, even so the wise are not ruffled by praise or blame." 81

[Isn't that freeing?! We are unmoved by what we would call good days and bad days, but those who appreciate us and those who criticize us. We remain.]
Meditating at the feet of giant reclining Buddha. (right)

"Though one should conquer a million men in battlefield, yet he, indeed, is the noblest victor who has conquered himself." 103

[Disciplining myself, being able to know and love and manage myself is the greatest gift I can give myself, and all in my world. When we self conquer, we bring pleasure to the lives of everyone we meet.]

"My mind has attained the unconditioned. Achieved is the end of craving." 154

[The Buddha declared this personal truth when he realized he had found Enlightenment. By ending his craving, he ended suffering, and thus lived in a state of Enlightenment, or True Happiness. When we reflect on our own misery, it is always linked to this simple truth: we are either not getting what we crave, or getting what we don't crave! Once we stop WANTING or CLINGING or CRAVING, peace descends!]

And again we read

"The disciple of the Fully Enlightened One delights in the destruction of craving." 186-187

[This doesn't mean you abandon those values and standards you live by, not at all. We simply let go of that mindless desire for MORE MORE MORE. Think about what you currently want. Can't you easily live without it? Now, feel the peace descend. The chase is over.]

"By degrees, little by little, from time to time, a wise person should remove his own impurities, as a smith removes the dross of silver." 239

[I especially appreciate the Buddha's wisdom here, as he reminds us all to be gentle and loving with ourselves. We need not create drama or hardship for ourselves by rushing into harsh, over-reaching and unrealistic change. Step by step, one day at a time. We slowly free ourselves from the binding of the mind, from our worrisome thoughts and desires.]

The prayer I made at the beginning of the Christian New Year is the same one I offer today. Some might call it a Resolution:

May I experience no misery. May I cause no misery.

Happiest of New Years!

Bangalore's School of Ancient Wisdom

This Buddha and poem by English poet Sir Edwin Arnold was to the left of the door to my room. The other photos are from my balcony.

I spent an incredible weekend in the Garden of Eden! Known as the School of Ancient Wisdom, schoolofancientwisdom.org this nine acre paradise on the edge of the Bangalore is a haven for students and seekers. Through the utmost in good fortune, I was invited to visit. We watched the movie version of Neil Donald Walsch's Conversations With God, listened to beautiful music, heard lovely talks and spent time in the green silence. My heartfelt thanks to the founders of the school...what generous souls they are, to have made such a resource available to all. Here are some pictures, which don't fully convey the majesty of the place. Why don't you plan on coming?

Morning Meditation, February 1, 2008

Sitting comfortably, hands relaxed, breathing through the nose only, read this poem silently to yourself.

With each line, enjoy a full breath, inhale and exhale. Ah!

Be still and know that I am God.

Be still and know that I am.

Be still and know.

Be still.

Be.

[A photo of the morning sky, smiling at you.]