I took my
own advice this weekend, and just kept trying to come back to breathing, patting myself on the back that I am still alive. When you are living in
someone’s spare room with your three or four decent shirts on white plastic
hangers hanging from the bookshelf, and your box of books, and $25 to your
name, and a temp job starting in a week for which you won’t be paid for three
weeks, it’s a bloody miracle that you’re alive. Believe me, every time I walk
by a homeless woman, I do kind of a Buddhist bow, because I am them. Not, “this
close” to being them. I am them. And
despite the positive spin I make every effort to put on it, I have been them
for decades. I just haven’t found a place in this paradigm. For some reason,
yesterday was particularly hard. It isn’t just my so-called “reality.” It is
the knowledge that somewhere deep in my heart, I know that this extraordinary anglophile,
feminist, futurist, evensong-singing, wise woman Smith/ULondon/Parsons grad is
worthy of support, respect, and a real life. It’s the absurd chasm that drives
me crazy, not the ramen noodles.
So, just to
show the Universe I haven’t given up, I decided to join a French conversation
group at the local library yesterday afternoon. Unfortunately, once I got to
the library, I learned that it was in fact not meeting again until early
September. So I’m, like, OK, God/Goddess/Universe/Source (I’ve decided to call
it “GUS” for short), OK GUS, I didn’t
walk a mile through 90% humidity, being dive bombed by air show fighter jets
for nothing. Please, please help me put my hands on a book that will help me at
least get through another 24 hours.
What is the
first book to greet me when I walked up to the “self-help” section, but
Danielle LaPorte’s The Desire Map?! Those of you who have followed my
blog from the start know that I encountered her The Fire Starter Sessions
at the end of last year, and that book was
an enormous fire starter. I know I wouldn’t be as unashamedly clear on who I am
right now, and as willing to speak more and more openly in this blog, if it
were not for that book. That she would show up in my life right now is no
surprise. Because after enthusiastically starting down this new stretch of river
early in 2016, it has become clear that my boat is dragging its anchor along
the bottom, and I really haven’t made a whole lot of headway. What is the
anchor? That “no matter what I do in
life, what I do or do not ‘accomplish,’ or how good I am as a person, the
people around me won’t care. The world isn’t going to care. The Universe isn’t
going to care. I will remain invisible and unsupported.” That’s a pretty heavy
anchor. That’s a pretty heavy belief.
I could, of
course, spend years parsing that one, and I may do eventually, but clearly I
don’t have the time right this minute. I’ve only skimmed through LaPorte’s
book, but once again I am struck by her (to me) radical message: to move
forward, don’t focus on goals. Focus on feelings. Feelings and desire are life.
For today,
I am simply going to meditate on this, page 101:
“Decide to Rise.
Lean in. Listen up. Closely.
It’s your Soul speaking, and she
says,
Get UP!
I need you
I want you
I am you
Choose me.
Lean in.
Listen up.
Closely.
Decide to Rise.”
