Balancing the Pairs of Opposites: Spring Equinox Reflections on the Middle Path

Happy Spring! So the equinox is a time of “equal” day and night, right? I’ve been thinking about the many “pairs of opposites” lately and specifically about finding the middle point among them all—what the Buddha called the “Middle Path.” For finding this “middle ground” is the only real way to find peace, both within ourselves and in the world.

Pema Chordon writes about the “eight worldly dharmas”—the four pairs of opposites—four things we like (pleasure, praise, fame, and gain) and four we don’t (pain, blame, disgrace, and loss).She explains how we can get “hooked,” or caught up in them and also how we can learn to more consciously choose our reactions to them.

“The point isn’t to cultivate one thing as opposed to another,” Chodron says, “but to relate properly to where we are.” For example, "inspiration and wretchedness complement one another. With only inspiration, we become arrogant. Without wretchedness, we lose our vision. Feeling inspired cheers us up…feeling wretched humbles us…softens us up, ripens our hearts. It becomes the ground for understanding others.”

In this sense, we can celebrate the many “pairs of opposites,” for they all have a purpose in our lives: day and night, sun and moon, yang and yin, Shiva and Shakti, male and female, white and black, up and down, happiness and sadness, joy and despair, success and failure, and so on….The key is to let them be what they are, to honor them for the lessons they offer, and to find our peace and center, our still, quiet place in the midst of it all….

Play Time: So for today, on this beautiful day of balance, I invite you, if you feel caught up in one emotion or perspective, to just take a moment to pause, and contemplate its opposite. You don’t have to do anything about it, just invite its presence into your life. And see if even just doing that helps you to feel just a little more balanced…..

When Things Fall Apart...Relax Into It?

There comes a time in each of our lives (some of us more than others!) when "things fall apart," when nothing seems to be going right, when our lives are a mess, and we wonder if we'll ever "get it right." In times like these, we often feel lonely, depressed, confused. Yet we also tend to feel exposed and vulnerable. If we can go deeply enough into this vulnerability (which is in essence our humanness), we can find the gift of greater intimacy with ourselves—and the world.

As Pema Chodron writes in Things Fall Apart, "we can use these situations either to wake ourselves up or to put ourselves to sleep." She says "it's a kind of testing...that spiritual warriors need in order to awaken their hearts."

Since in the last six months or so, I have felt my own life "fall apart" (having to leave a place I love due to financial difficulties, being injured in a bus accident, and more), these words come as a comfort and a much needed answer to an essential life question. Just be with it, Chodron guides, stay on that brink of not knowing, of not being sure of anything, really. Just relax into that uncertainty, that impermanence, that eternally changing nature of things, and learn to find peace in the midst of it all.

I had been wondering what higher purpose or lesson could come from the recent series of disappointments in my life, things not turning out the way I thought they would—and the resulting feelings of loss and sadness and even failure. And then, I read these words from Chodron:

"Things are always in transition...nothing ever sums itself up in the way that we like to dream about. The off-center, in-between state is an ideal situation, a situation in which we don't get caught and we can open our hearts and minds beyond limit. It's a very tender, nonaggressive, open-ended state of affairs."

Well, I certainly feel in that "off-center, in-between state"(!) in my life and I am learning to view it as an "ideal situation," one from which many gifts can come, such as a re-evaluation of what's really important, needed resting time, and a chance for rewarding inner work (and who knows what else?). So I'm choosing to allow this situation to "wake me up" and open me to both my pain and my tenderness, both my sorrow and my joy, and to let myself lovingly, compassionately, become more intimate with myself, and therefore with all of creation.

Play Time: How have you allowed (or could you allow) a seemingly "bad" situation(s) to "wake you up;" to open your mind and heart to new possibilities; to connect you more to yourself, to others, to God; to help you cultivate more love, tenderness, and compassion in your life? How could you view where you are right now as an "ideal situation?"

The Mirror in Shadow Work

Ever wonder why certain kinds of people and situations keep showing up your life over and over again? Here's one explanation.

In between bouts of cold and cough over the last few weeks, I've been immersing myself in "shadow work." Last month I saw the movie "The Shadow Effect" and since then I have been reading Debbie Ford's book The Dark Side of the Light Chasers and beginning to claim or own parts of myself that I have covered up or projected onto others over the years.

Debbie Ford says in her book, "People mirror back to us what is within us because subconsciously we are calling it forth from them...The miracle occurs when you truly own and embrace and aspect of yourself. At that point, the person who is serving as your mirror will either stop acting out the behavior, or you will become able to choose not to have this person in your life. When you unplug, you no longer need another person to mirror your shadow back to you."

If we haven't dealt with some aspect of ourselves, we will keep drawing to us people or circumstances to reflect back that part of ourselves, so we can embrace it and become whole. Once we do, we don't need that mirror anymore.

I have seen this in my own life as I look back on the kinds of people I've attracted into my life; they've always demonstrated those qualities I needed to own or embrace in myself at the time—either dark or light parts of myself. And the ones who are currently in my life act out those traits that I haven't yet embraced in myself.

Play Time: I invite you to consider how the people you have currently attracted into your life may be mirroring back to you aspects of yourself that you're not fully owning. Hint: look for the things you really LOVE and the things you really HATE about the people in your life. How are the traits you notice in others also a part of you?

Bonus: Check out Reverend Frankie's blog post on this topic, "Loving My Shadow"

F.E.A.R.= (not what you think! read on....)

I just watched a great little video by Neale Donald Walsh on fear and heard an acronym I hadn't heard before...F.E.A.R.="Feeling Excited And Ready!" (I had heard of the more popular "False Evidence Appearing Real)

Wow! What an inspiring way to look at fear! In one of my previous blog posts, "Fear or Excitement: The Choice Is Yours," I talked about how fear and excitement are just really two sides of the same coin, two aspects of the same energy. This acronym really sums it up!

What many people don't realize is that when we feel fear, it usually means there is something really big and juicy right around the corner. If we look back over our lives, we can see where a major shift for the better occurred in our lives shortly after a period of doubt, frustration, and worry. How many times have we experienced "miracles" after a "dark night of the soul?" Is this mere coincidence—OR did the fear and doubt pave the way for something better to come in?

There is a saying, "When it gets dark enough you can see the stars." There is indeed something very exciting, very powerful, about the light that comes after the darkness—like a morning sunrise, offering a new day of new possibilities. In this morning light, anything can happen.

Play Time: What are you currently afraid of? Now, what is the flip side—what is exciting to you about that same topic or issue? What would it take for you to feel "excited and ready" to take action toward what you want? Are you willing to try on that excitement NOW?

Commitment is the Key!

A few days ago someone reminded me that we had only 100 days left of 2009. Inspired, I set my priorities for the rest of the year and promptly posted them on my Facebook account. Why? To make them visible, to be accountable, to really commit to them.

What happened? Already in the few days since I posted them, I checked out a new gym (will be joining today), set a new deadline to finish the editing of my first book, and got a potential new freelance job offer. It's almost as if the simple act of writing them down and making them public gives them an energy, a life of their own, wings for those dreams to take off and fly.

Here are two quotes from Julia Cameron's The Artist's Way that I love on this topic of commitment and how the Universe responds to it:

"Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness. Concerning all acts of initiative (and creation), there is one elementary truth the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then providence moves too. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one's favor all manner of unforeseen incidents, meetings and material assistance, which no man could have dreamt would have come his way."

—Scottish explorer W.H. Murray

"Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it.
Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it."

—German philosopher Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

The lesson here? "Leap, and the net will appear," as J.C. also says. Really commit to your visions and just watch and see what happens. Look for synchronicities, new opportunities, doors and windows just flying open. And fasten your seatbelt, because you're in for the adventure of your life....

Play Time:
What dreams or goals are you committing to today? If the "C" word scares you, begin by committing to just one thing in one area of your life. Success breeds success, so start small and branch out from there! (and remember to pay attention to what happens in your world when you do!)

What Do You Choose?

Do you ever get hit with the "power of three?" Here's what just happened to me:

1) Yesterday I was hosting the monthly Open Mic at Java Cat, and along with reading some of my own poetry, I read a few others, including an anonymous 19^th century Chippewa poem, translated by Robert Bly, which goes like this:

Sometimes I go about pitying myself
And all the while
I am being carried by great winds across the sky

2) Today a friend posted the following video on the "power of choice"--http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9T_ZDUOOTnc&feature=player_embedded#t=67

3) Finally, I read a friend's blog post tonight which was about how he has a choice in whether or not to identify himself with his habits and circumstances.

Well, after the THIRD message about choice, I decided that that was to be the topic of today's blog!

The poem, the video, and my friend's blog all reminded me that there is always a choice about what we focus on. There is always more than enough anger, sadness, frustration, jealousy, stress, hopelessness, and despair in our lives and in the world that we can choose to focus on.

However, there is ALSO more than enough happiness, joy, simplicity, love, support, friendship, nature, and abundance everywhere we look, if only we choose to focus on it.

This is not of course to say we should happy all the time. There are definitely times to be otherwise and we should honor them. The key is: we can be aware that we have a choice in what what we're focusing on.

Play Time:
So today I invite you to consider: What are you choosing to focus on in your life right now? Is your glass half-empty or half-full?

The Gold Within

Tonight I saw the new documentary film, "The Shadow Effect." In it, Debbie Ford and a host of other well known teachers and healers discuss the importance of reclaiming and healing our "shadow selves"--those parts of ourselves (good or bad) that we hide from other or even from ourselves.

One story in particular that stood out in my mind was the story of the Golden Buddha. In 1957, a group of Tibetan monks were given the responsibility of moving a large clay Buddha statue because a highway was being built in that area. During the night before it was to be moved, the head monk came to check on the statue, found a large crack in it, and to his surprise, discovered something glittering in the crack. He was so excited he went back to tell his fellow monks. And sure enough, as he and the other chiseled away at the statue, they found under the clay exterior a Buddha statue of pure gold. The Golden Buddha was apparently the responsibility of a group of monks centuries earlier, who hid the Golden Buddha under clay to protect it from an attacking Burmese army. The Buddha was protected but all the monks died in the attack. The statue was only re-discovered in 1957.

The story really hit home. Each of us has gold inside of us that is covered by layers of clay—all the conditioning and messages we received over the years that make us forget our gifts, that special uniqueness we each bring to the world.

Play Time: Today I invite you to consider what gold is still as of yet hidden in you—what unexplored, unrealized potential for greatness, accomplishment, joy, and fulfillment? And what steps can you take to chisel away at those layers of clay so that your true brilliance can emerge and be shared with the world?

To your magnificence!