This morning’s meditation brought a sense of deep peace to my heart.
With that wish sent winging on its way, I remembered all the times in my life when I did not experience or value serenity. Especially in my 30’s...My burned out ego and left brain were in the driver’s seat for long stretches on my quest for a meaningful life, telling me I was not rich enough, talented enough, pretty enough, young enough (even in my 20’s!), and when it got to be too much I blocked the growing despair with action and stuff. Any impulse to experience joy, mindfulness, or self-fulfillment was met with severe abuse from some inner voices that, thanks to my upbringing, I was deeply afraid to ignore.
Interruptions were insistent - an illness that forced me to decline a job, the urge to take a different route the night a tiny, injured cat found me and came home, and, most of all, the moments when, while I was in my most distracted state, the world as I knew it would drop away, taking my breath, and leave me in a cool, blank mist wondering how and if what I called life was even possible.
The ego dispatched inner critics to say something was wrong with me. I had known since infancy there was something “more.” I never spoke of it - if I had, who knows what would have been done to “fix” me? The ego is spawned to protect our life, and sometimes it works in mysterious ways. At others, it needs to be acknowledged and asked to step aside, because it has the unwitting power to destroy us.
We all have those voices inside, they were acquired by our egos on the learning curve of life. We can choose to let them go now that we know better. There are always people on the outside ready to echo them the second they see us growing. But it’s your job to remember that obedience does no good and a great deal of harm, it is better to get distance from a person than damage yourself and the rest of the world.
Speaking of the world, the one we find ourselves in at the moment is enough to trigger anybody’s defensive impulses. But, “God is in the details.” On the subway tonight I randomly recalled someone who made wonderful cookies I loved when I was a little girl, then others who had shared abundance and beauty during my lifetime. Soon it became impossible to feel anything but gratitude, hope and love -- try it!
Namaste.
