Showing Up Daily

I woke up just a short time ago with a powerful feeling of self doubt. The accompanying familiar feeling of criticism and analysis arrived quickly on its tails. That gave way to a knee-jerk response to fill my head with thoughts about unrelated crap. Simultaneously I am illustrating examples of the things that I did yesterday that reinforce this self misperception. I am building the case that, in fact, in the face of all this inquiry and curiosity and embodiment and practice, I do suck after all.

It’s been a long time since I have slipped into this old state of devaluation. It’s a nasty limbo of unfair and unrealistic comparisons combined with embarrassment and shame that create a cloud of trepidation that requires an armoring and defensiveness that usually leads to a strong stuffing of emotions and resentful stiffening of an upper lip. Then my day is spent with my fists balled ready to fight: usually I just swing punches at myself.

This is a crappy way to wake up, and a worse way to go out into the day.

I’d like this morning to subvert that chain of events. The self loathing and anger is familiar, not inevitable. This morning shall be about setting some different intentions for myself in the face of these old fears.

The familiar soursweet glass of lemon water will set the tone that today is about nourishment and growth. A long hot shower will provide a moment to pause and collect myself while I wash away the grime of defensiveness and judgment and expose fresh clean skin to a day of excitement and inquiry. I’ll be sure to leave the chainmail in the sock drawer as I dress for a day free to share my vulnerabilities and support the accompanying moments of doubt. What color socks are best matched with tenderness? That will be followed by Q-tips to clean out the angry voices in my head and make room to listen with a clear passage to my heart. The toothpaste today will not only polish and whiten, but shall prepare my mouth to speak not quickly but carefully and full of attention. I’ll slip on some shoes that will aid my nimble footed dance in the world and head out the door.

Today is a day for curiosity and exploration. Something tripped a nerve this morning. I’m close to something fragile and tender, and just a half a step beyond that is a threshold that I have been waiting to cross. Instead of slamming the door in my face, like I have grown accustomed to, today I’ll lean into this edge and maybe even pass through. I hope I’ll see some of you on the other side.

Rabbit Rabbit Rabbit it’s April 1^st!

Standing on this promontory arrived at after the last month’s writing practice, I feel a sense of satisfaction. I’m not satisfied that I am complete, however. With continued curiosity, but also a little trepidation, I realize that the natural outcome of a practice like this one is no outcome at all, it’s a call to continue in some way.

No, It’s not an April fools prank, I am going to keep writing. I would like to change the orientation a bit, however. The premise remains the same, showing up daily. I will continue to explore the inherited streams of my past and the emergent qualities of my artistry. I would like to add a bit of focus to this month’s inquiry and I have a request from you all, dear readers.

This month I am going to hold the intention to explore my relationship to my vocational identity. Vulnerability is not a discarded concept. For me, one of the greatest, and most challenging, places for me to be more vulnerable is in the conversation about how I would like to marry my gifts to my work. I will be working a tender edge of my becoming in this conversation.

I have had a fluid relationship with work. Fluid may even be too structured of a word. I have been involved in so many different kinds of projects with different kinds of people over my life. When I think about my resume, the operative language at this point is, “breadth over depth”. For many years now I have used that description as a detractor, a negative judgment. When I am forced to talk about my work, which right there you can see my own personal resistance in using the word “forced”, I deflect and diminish and justify and sometimes even deceive because it is painful to talk about.

The pain is that I don’t feel a sense of pride and excitement discussing the things I’ve done vocationally because I haven’t allowed the time or the attention to make the connections between what seem like disconnected projects. I have been desperately seeking what I have been calling the “red thread” that connects them all. The set of skills or intentions or aspirations that sew these seeming disparate scenes in my work history together.

My first request is to tug at the threads gently. This is meant for me more than any of you reading this. I am wading into some murky waters that conjure up a lot of demons. I will endeavor to stay aware of what is emerging and give myself the kindness of attention to it, not distraction from it.

My request to you all is one of insight. I would would welcome any ideas and thoughts that emerge from your reading along this next month. Would you be willing, from time to time, to take a moment to share from your own vocational legacies anything that may be triggered by my inquiry into mine?

Where was the parade? There were no fireworks. There was no cake. There was no band playing and no applause. I’ve done this for 31 days in a row, shouldn’t there be something?

And slowly today I have come to the realization that there is something. Just not outside myself. At the end of this cycle, there is not the “aha” that I thought would be there. I have done some great work. I have explored with an eye and ear to the quieter voices and emotions within myself. And my reward is the opportunity to keep going deeper from this new place of awareness. I only need to take it. But that is a pretty big only.

The part of me that wants the gold star for achievement is the same part of me that is scared to continue on, that doesn’t want to feel the discomfort of change. If I’ve reached the proverbial summit of this practice, then I can stop all this inquiry business and get back to the old patterns of life that are familiar and safe. Although…

After these 31 days that is not going to be possible. So boy am I both really excited and kinda screwed. Something has shifted, albeit slightly. I don’t engage the world in the same way as before. It’s less comfortable at times, but has an authenticity that can no longer be ignored. After this month’s practice I now hear questions brewing just below the surface that hunger to be considered.

I now realize that developing language to respond to these beautiful questions is the key to my own ability to articulate meaning into the world and ask for its help. I feel the first inklings of dormant invitations waking up with the quiet patient rhythm that resounds in my developing practices of presence.

I only need to take the first step toward it. I only need settle in to these newly discovered ancient relationships to my place in the world. I only need be a half a shade braver and a half a beat slower and embrace the quiet voice that comes from deep inside the well of my experience. I only need to let it ring out into the world, letting my body be the resonance chamber that will carry my tune as I learn to harmonize with the world. And I don’t have to do it all by tomorrow.

May we all continue to patiently unfold and step down into our only…

I’d like to share a heartfelt bow for each of you that has been sharing this month. In posting, and in comments (online and offline), each of you has supported me by providing stories to riff off of and inspiration to consider. We all know its not always easy to share. Your courage, in the spirit of vulnerability, has given me a scaffold on which to show up daily. On that I have found some of my own lost voice, and that is a gift you each have given me. For that I am honored and grateful.

There is a child inside of me that has a hard time settling down and doesn’t like to share. I woke up this morning feeling blue. There is no way to say it better. It was rough. I’m not proud of it, but it was an old cocktail of lonely, sad, and a little afraid. I guess I poured myself a double. I know we all taste this bitter brew from time to time. For me, those are the kinds of feelings that kick this version of young Jonathan’s little butt to the foreground, tantrums and all. When he is around, there is often little that I can do to get rid of him. This morning though, I took a pause.

I decided to give him some attention. More than that, I decided to give him some room to breathe. Instead of the usual cold backhand slap of judgment that I toss him, and get into an internal conflict, I listened. It was a practice to not boot this emotional character out of the way in service of a more pragmatic character who will organize the taxes I need to file, the emails I need to respond to, and the plans I need to make for the future. Trying to bully him with reason usually ends in a standoff that leaves me in a state of getting nothing done, easily angered and a resonant feeling of sadness that is really old and unresolvable.

Well I’m here writing now, and I think that is a good sign. Today I was just a half a step better at not falling into an old conversation, and in fact I stopped having it on a few occasions. In those moments I did not persecute myself, but I also did not recoil into a state of inactivity. I’m not sure I can recount an exact formula or steps I took, but I can just say that it was different. I invited this young lad to participate in some of the things I had to do today:

At the gym, I rowed harder that I have in along time, I showed up for a meeting with a confidence and passion for a particular position and I went grocery shopping for the week. Now I’m a bit sore, maybe pulled a muscle, I may have taken the wrong stance at the wrong time, and I have more pumpkin seeds than a family of four needs for a week. But I took the little guy out for a walk.

Today wasn’t perfect. I still didn’t get my taxes done, I still haven’t a clue what I’m going to do with my life, and I still feel a little sad. But instead of pushing this child out of the way, I invited him to come along. You know what? We had a pretty good day together. I’m going to go make him a cup of tea, and try to read him a story while he falls asleep.

Last night was full of a vivid sequence of dreams. They were in full color with soundtracks to match each scene. But waking from them at first I wasn’t sure that I was really awake. The sounds of the waves on shore and the seagulls’ morning meeting on the dock outside the cabin reassured me that in fact I was awake, so what then was going on?

Something had changed inside of me. There was a melancholy to it, a mourning for something lost. There was an anticipation, a deep curiosity about what lay ahead. There was a shade or two of fear and excitement about what it all meant. All of it had me on an edge of my own self and indicated the emergence of some self discovery and change. I wasn’t sure if I wanted any of it.

I thought that I could shake it by going back into a dream, but the warmth of the comforter did not wash it away, it nurtured this strange feeling like a nest and it grew. It was time to emerge with it into this new day. It was time to go back and carry this new feeling of wonder and excitement forward into the more established patterns and practices that I have been developing at home.

Before I left I had a chance to walk a labyrinth that lay at the end of a beautiful forest path laid out in a sunny quiet meadow. It was the perfect location to unwind my journey here on the island and wind up my heart to travel back home. So many magical moments came to me while walking the labyrinth’s path.

I walked through the woods of Wonderland, but did not discover its secret. I softly held back a tear on the beach at sunset, while inside, I was crying out for a sign of what I should do next. I fell to my knees at the feet of Orion asking for the meaning of the life he had witnessed these many years. I quietly listened to the ravens across the forests trying to decipher the message in their call. I saw the beauty and challenge of what it takes to make a house a home and wondered If I would be able for this when the time came.

As the ferry pulled away from the island I finally had to admit that it was time to go back. The bubble had burst and I was really headed home. There remain only the echoes of my gratitude flying along on a strong westerly wind back to the land and sea and beautiful creatures who let me glimpse through their window on the world. The change in me that I felt this morning was not because of these things. It was the catalyst for these special moments. I can now extend some of that gratitude to my self as well and carry that home.

Drifting in and out of lazy afternoon sleep watching the wind gently whip the sea. The sun through the southern windows warms the spot on the couch to the perfect temperature of that just shouts naptime. The cushions pull me deeper and my eyes soften. My eyelids grow heavy…

I am fighting sleep. Not very hard, mind you, but I haven’t let the keyboard leave my lap. While a quiet house is a perfect time for a nap, it is also a good time to do some writing. But I am not feeling quite feeling it.

It’s my last day on this island, and I’m sitting with my computer instead of soaking in the beauty of where I am. I’m going to let go of the obligation to produce something and settle in to the opportunity to just be right here. There is a chair at the bottom of the hill on the edge of the water that has my name on it. So I’ll sign off now, and wish you all well and head outside. If the sun is shining where you are, I hope you’ll do the same.

Easter Sunday. The rock is rolled away from the cave and nobody is inside. Huh? But that’s not true. Those of us who choose to ask ourselves the beautiful question and venture inside are there, confronting our own vulnerability. The spirit of divinity did not disappear, it just awakened in each of us who decide to drop in, gather and have the conversations that bring each of us alive.

Tonight, sitting around the table with a group of absolutely luminary characters, I was reminded that in the gathering and sharing, we can see our own growth reflected by the others with whom we congregate.

Whether it’s shoulder to shoulder spiraling around the kitchen preparing the meal, or tea after dinner around the fire talking about lemurs with Canadian mining tycoons, the quality of the exchange is directly connected to the quality of my own comfort in my vulnerable self. It’s me and you together looking inside, crafting the conversation together. If I am settled into myself, if I am speaking from my voice of artistry then you can be both known and unknown. In our time together, if you feel alive, I can be unknown for you you as well and reflect your beautiful, best self.

And so it is us together, close in, inside the cave moment by moment dropping deeper and deeper. It’s the conversation that’s the magic, the mystery of the cave. The more we choose to be at peace with the unknown we bring to each other the less concerned we need to be with symbols and stories of messiahs and paternalistic gods. What resurrects, if we stay close in, is our covenant and relationship with life, with possibility.

So as we launch into Spring may the spirit of fertility and creativity fill you with the curiosity to stay close in, touch your vulnerable beautiful self, and share it. Find your cave where you think that spirit dwells. Go inside and be that spirit yourself. Be filled with hope. Be the light. Be the change. Know that it is you. Know that the unknown waits for your questions, and is ready to reply.

“It all gets better.”

He was sitting on a bicycle on the corner of the street at the intersection between the heroin dealers and the crack dealers. The rain was just starting and the sun had gone down. He was in some way involved in some number of the iniquities going down on that corner.

A young couple walked by him hunched from the rain’s arrival with a look of consternation on their faces. They could easily have been guarded against a feeling of fear walking among this gathering of folks truly down and out and maybe up to no good. But he read their look as one of heaviness not one of disdain, and no matter what weight lay on his shoulders or what trials lay ahead in his path, he gave them, with a tone of benevolence and regard that simple line, “It all gets better”.

That was the line to sum up today. And it was so profound because today has been one for the record books on awesome.

With the sun painting golden light on snow covered mountain tops and the sounds of waves gently lapping at the beach, I rose. After a cup of tea and the light show across the sound on the islands to the west, we ventured out for a wander around a beautiful lake. Strolling through fairy groves of moss covered cedar, and along raised walkways through beaver developed dams and bogs. The geese and ducks set out cadence with their calls across the water and the birds of the forests replied with their own melodic tones. Sun dappled trails opened up to the hills and forests beyond, and watercolor quality views of this splendid scene greeted us in perfect intervals along our hike.

The afternoon was back in the garden. Hands and wheelbarrows full of fresh compost and soil became newly prepped beds ready to receive the planting of this seasons bounty. A shower and a change and off to the big city. The tall forests gave way to tall buildings and the cars multiplied and drove faster and faster. And so did we, into the heart of the urban jungle for one of the greatest restaurant experiences I’ve had in a while. The food was not too much, the attention was not too little and the company was of the highest caliber.

We were on foot to find our evening meal. We dodged rats roaming the curbs and homeless guardians of alleys and parks. There were drug dealers and buyers, pimps and whores. These were the folks who had fallen down, way down. This fellow was among a prize collection of the urban unwanted. He was in thick of the mess. And from his position, from his bicycle perch, he was able to offer a blessing, a message of hope.

It all gets better. It really does. This fellow could remember it, as well as share it. I hope that I can too.

Today is Good Friday. It has been, in fact, a wonderful Friday. I hope and trust it has also been for you all.

The Christians among us have a special relationship with today. It marks the commencement of a deep reflection about one’s relationship to the divine, about the scale and grandeur of a simple bond and trust in faith. In just two days there will be the celebration of the power and possibility of resurrection.

I won’t attempt to comment in more detail on the meaning of the second most important sacred moment in Christian liturgy and practice. Perhaps calling it second is already too far outside my expertise, but I just would like to share a moment about how I have commenced my own period of reflection.

This morning I took some time to work with my hands to help build a garden. Moving the soil that with yield food for a family that I care about was a beautiful deep and quiet gesture toward divinity. A small act of service as the symbol of my faith in the power of stewardship and community.

This afternoon, a long walk along the coastline of this exquisite island left me humbled and inspired. Sunlight glistening off the water danced with seagulls and geese. Eagles and ravens crisscrossed the sky and forests above while the air was cool in my lungs and the sun warm on my face. With each inhale great memories came rushing back, and each exhale brand new ones were etched into my mind as heirlooms to save for my future becoming self. I was heart and body. My head had no need to judge, discern, or derail. I was very much at peace.

I want to share my gratitude and honor for being a part of this group with you all. I want to share that the questions still remain, those savage and beautiful questions. They remain but within them I remain as well. I am slowly, quietly a little at a time recognizing how I can also deepen my experience while being open to the unknown. That for me “resurrection” is not a dredging up or a repeating, but an emergence mixed with a remembrance in the face of the divine.

How can reflecting on our inherited experience serve the practice of becoming our new emerging self? What does it feel like to both be actively engaged in leadership in the world while settling in to the to faith and constancy of a supporting role in the play of life?

Early rising to the just past full moon filling my tired eyes with the excitement of adventure far too early in the morning. I swerve between taillights and toll booths to arrive in time to board a plane bound for the Great Southwest. For those of us picturing adobe homes, prismatic ferrous shades throughout sculptural rock formations, cactuses and epic sunsets, I must correct that vision as it is the Great Southwest of our neighbor to the north, Canada.

I settle in to my seat. Catching up on one of the lost hours of rest is never as good but serves to fill, a little, my sleep depleted tank. Not enough however to erase the dreamy quality of arriving and walking through either a museum exhibit of the first nations peoples of southwestern Canada or an airport. In reality it was an abstraction of both that held together long enough to land me safely in the care of a good friend.

Now it’s on to conversations fueled by friendship and inquiry into the vulnerable. Propelled by deceitful diesel engines we travel through tunnels and on ferries our adventure punctuated by conversations with backhoe drivers and with folk-rock heroines.

Arriving at the beautiful home on the beach cradled by the cedar forest, my shoulders settle. The beauty brings a calm and rested feeling to my heart. Now my legs need to move or my belly needs to eat. Movement prevails to explore this beautiful seaside sanctuary. Face to face with the beauty and savagery of the natural world, we bring in the last egg laid by mink mangled headless chickens. Lamenting their loss, we are reminded that while they will no longer lay for the family, they will make great compost, nourishment for gardens and orchards to come.

After lunch we take a walk through the hills bogs and forests of this beautiful island. I’m living in the redwood forest these days. I love the cool relief it gives from warm California sun, but I forget the deep magic and moisture and intensity of the cedar forest. It is a special medicine. Grey clouds and cool temperatures filtered through emerald hues of green moss are punctuated by the patter of a light spring rain and the sound of creeks carving the landscape under their fluid pressures. From under the cover of the canopy I am reminded by views that I am in a forest “floating” in the sea. The salt air mixing with the wet forest soil fill my nose with a fertile brine and I see old trees, rotting nurse logs, supporting new spring growth on the forest floor.

In this time of change, in this practice of becoming, what conversations need to be turned into compost? What old patterns and old stories should be allowed to decompose to feed artistry and support new invitations in my life?