Recommended Reading

Today I need to recommend this article, "On the Invisibility of Middle-Aged Women," by Dorthe Nors, a writer I had never heard of.

http://lithub.com/on-the-invisibility-of-middle-aged-women/

OK, even in its light-ish tone, it's a bit hard to read. There is too much truth in it.  However, somehow in the midst of it, I think she distills what it is that so many of us women are trying to do in a society that sometimes seems to want us to disappear into the mist: we want presence.  We want who we are to matter. On the divine plane, and right here on Mother Earth.

At 60, in the face of the temptation to go smaller and to start the process of disappearing, my hunch is that I am called to go much, much bigger. To use Nors' words, how can I "grow without being controlled by the needs and expectations of others"?

I'll say this for this era of social media; when you start thinking and writing about the things that really matter to you, you begin to magnetize the other people on your wavelength. I'm thankful for this writer showing up at this moment, and giving me some camaraderie on the journey.

Thank-you notes

Yesterday afternoon, after meditating on a few more passages in Danielle LaPorte's The Desire Map, I sent a thank-you email to her and her staff. I've already received a response, not from her personally, but from an assistant, and that was lovely. I'm the queen of thank-you notes. OK, so they are the dollar store variety, not Crane stationery, but whenever I can remember to do so, I thank people for what they have done for me. It's often (apart from household chores) all I can do, but I don't want to forget gratitude, even the WASP bread-and-butter note variety.

I say this because I realize (a risk of blogging, I guess) that something I said yesterday might be easy to misconstrue. Many, many friends over recent years have generously extended care-filled hospitality and "next steps" to me. I wouldn't be here if they had not. So, talk about gratitude...but the heavy anchor I was referring to really starts at the top. Despite years spent in church and many subsequent years spent on an intense spiritual journey, divine love still hasn't infused my own heart. I can understand it intellectually, and I believe my heart is open (not blocked by fear or hatred) but a lifetime of feeling I was abandoned by God is simply not reversed overnight. The love extended by friends felt -- due to my own history -- kind of like assistance building a rickety bridge over a raging river. Hopeless. Eventually Liz's little bridge would fall into the foamy waters, never to be seen again. And on the divine plane, no one would notice.

So you can see how amazingly, astonishingly, novel it is to read words like these: "On the other side of deciding to rise is illumination, ecstasy, insight. And the angel of your strength is there, waiting, smiling, applauding...life wants you to win." (101) Imagine being applauded for being your highest self. Imagine being applauded for being you at your most extraordinary, your most "out there," your most unconventional, your most love-infused. And of course, this being the new age it is, this is not about the Universe being on one person's side and not on another's. It is completely all-encompassing. No one on this planet is meant to fall into the river, I am sure of that. There are thousands of authors whose words might have resonated with this reminder at this time, but for me it seems to be Danielle LaPorte.  And I have still only really focused on one page of her book!

Monday, Monday

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.”

OK, Soul. I sure hope you are friends with GUS. On this Monday, I have decided to rise. Thank you, thank you for this particular book at this particular moment. Clearly you do care.

Wake-up call

On a hot August afternoon, I am feeling kind of overwhelmed, not so much on a personal level, but on a global one. I'm one of those people who no longer deliberately follows the news, but it follows me. It follows all of us. You know what I mean. You just cannot get away from it. 

Despite some good things happening in my own life, like getting a temp job that will keep me going into September, I feel (like, literally feel) a major shift coming in our world energy. You know, many years ago, I wrote several things about how the period from about 2015 to 2025 or beyond would be "the transition" -- a time when our civilization would be transformed for the better, but the process would be very, very hard for people holding on to the old paradigm. I cannot find those old writings (they may be long gone) but I'll say it again. The next decade or two will be quite a wild ride. It's almost like every old societal hurt, every injustice that was swept under the rug in the past is now rising to the surface. There's so much that makes me jump for joy, like the emergence of powerful, outspoken women. And yet reactive, violent, hateful sludge is seeping up with a vengeance. Even when I just briefly scan the news headlines, I not only relive trauma from my own life; my body remembers historical traumas experienced over centuries by my "constituency" (brilliant spiritual women).

My head and my heart are on board with holding on for dear life and trying to rise up high enough to observe events with compassion. But on a day when I pulled an oracle card that means "wake-up call"; when (evidently) Saturn is moving from a four-month retrograde cycle into a much more active time; and when an air show is starting nearby, with excruciatingly loud fighter jets swooping in circles overhead -- on this kind of day, you realize that compassion won't be enough in the upcoming months and years. It will take enormous inner strength to avoid "fighting" the old sludge, rather, to exemplify a more love-filled future with confidence and grace. The wake-up call is not a call to arms or destruction of the old. It is a call to consciousness and creation of the new. To get conscious, we need to keep breathing, so that's my call for this weekend. Breathe in. Breathe out. If you, too, are feeling overwhelmed, please know you are not alone. Once again, let's just keep breathing. 

Our bodies...

I guess if you are 60 or thereabouts, I don't have to tell you how our bodies are changing. There is a reason most Olympians are young. You watch the gymnasts, and know for certain (quite apart from age) that they are from another planet. I wasn't athletic in my teens; to say I am less so now is an understatement. I watch what they can do with absolute astonishment.

It seems everyone I know in the late-50's to early 70's range is fighting an illness or physical condition, or more than one. Among the many tightropes I walk on my path is how to respond to friends telling me about their conditions, the visits to physicians, and the courses of treatment. You see, I'm pretty fully on board with Louise Hay-style interpretations of disease -- that there is a deeper meaning behind each condition. Yes, taking this route started decades ago when I left the corporate world and ran out of health insurance. I knew right away that I would need to be strong, and to keep learning from my body in an unconventional way. Along the way, I came to believe that there really is no such thing as death (something I'll write about soon), so for the most part, I lost that fear factor around illness. I've come to believe that my body isn't something to fight, that it is on my side. So references to "fighting disease" have been harder and harder to hear over time.

I guess the way I look at it, disease is essentially a loving message from the Universe, our inner source of Love, not something caused by an outside, negative or random factor. When I am sick, I am out of optimum alignment, but with no judgment to that. I look pretty carefully at where and when a condition starts, and the symbolism behind it. If my stomach is upset, I try to figure out what it is I cannot "stomach," literally. I try to pinpoint exactly what time the situation started, and what was happening in my life at that moment. The other day, I was stung several times by a bee or wasp. My right hand ballooned up immediately and hurt like heck. Once I washed it in cold water and put a baking soda poultice on the area of the sting, I sat down to try to reconstruct what I had been thinking about (with my left brain!) at that moment. Sure enough, in the seconds before the bite, I had been perseverating on how to use my leadership qualities to "help" in a situation that was not only not being asked for, but was probably not going to help me or the others involved at all. Was it an accident that all of a sudden my right hand was out of commission, barely able to grab a spoon or type on the computer? I don't think so. The message was clear: "Don't move any further forward in this direction, dear one. Take the time to rethink your next step."

This way of looking at illness is hard to admit to. I've kept it to myself for the most part. A bee sting is one thing, but these days, many of my friends' lives are being turned upside down by serious accidents and diseases. I find I've gotten pretty good at analyzing, even to some extent "diagnosing," what is going on in these situations, but does that mean that most people want to hear what I have to say in the heat of the moment? No. I care so much, and want to share my insights, but only if they are asked for. So I walk my own inner balance beam, listening to accounts of conventional medical treatments, which are obviously so right for most people in many situations, while at the same time running an internal dialogue -- almost a computer scan -- about what I see happening under the surface. I've come to trust all my instincts. But (as has been the case with so many things) the question is, when do I open my mouth? I guess the only place to do that, for now, is here on my blog, or on demand.

Meanwhile, how thankful am I to all my body's parts and abilities. Perhaps I cannot break records and the boundaries of human physicality. But today, I can walk, I can see, I can breathe, I can digest, I can hold, I can think clearly, I can write, and the bee sting has all but gone away. There's an Olympic gold medal in there somewhere! 

Liz World

Back when I taught at the community college, I would make occasional references to “Liz World.” It might happen when the class discussed a tragic event, or something close to my students’ hearts, like the burden of student loans.  I’d say, “That wouldn’t happen in Liz World.” Students would pipe up that they’d rather live in my world, and we’d all have a little chuckle.

It’s a hot Friday afternoon, so I won’t go over old ground. You’ve heard enough of my journey to realize that Liz World has actually rarely been easy. I have just about the worst connection with money (or the desire for it, per se) of anyone I have ever met. I should never have been let out into the world alone! The good news is that I think I figured out “why” a while back, but am only beginning to have the courage to articulate it.

I don’t know how it is possible, but I think I have experienced a future construct beyond capitalism or communism. Truly, I feel like I “remember” a time when a wise and sophisticated human culture had no need to use money at all, because they didn’t fear the future. It wasn’t necessary to “keep score” about worth any more. Society nurtured each human being just simply because they had had the courage to be born. People didn’t have to “earn” the right to live. People’s “work” was to discover what they loved to do, then to do it, period. People of all levels of motivation, functionality and skill were loved, supported, and encouraged. The profit motive was unnecessary because society’s overall motivation was joy and joy alone. When you did something great for someone else, they thanked you. When they helped you, you thanked them. People loved turning around and doing more for the next person, just because. The essentials were performed by people who loved doing them (building sewers or electrical grids) -- or our human ingenuity found easier, more enjoyable ways of accomplishing them so that there was more time for following our passions. Everyone just chipped in. In this paradigm, people were loved and the earth was loved. There was no “price to pay.” There was no competition. Everyone felt rich. I have to say, I sure liked it a lot.

Ah well, you say, Liz World doesn’t exist. True. Not yet. And maybe not in the near future.  But I wholeheartedly believe it is coming. Meanwhile, I intend to open my heart to a larger set of options, and to new ways of loving whatever I do while helping the world move forward. I intend to keep seeking out really progressive thinkers and creators. If people, jobs or situations are too hard for me to love, may I bless them, turn around and gravitate toward love and joy. I intend not to lose heart about my own dreams, or how hard it has been to relate to money. I am so thankful that I have had the courage to try to model a new way of operating, even if it doesn’t quite work yet. However imperfectly, love is now my real currency; for now, may love be involved every time money flows in to or out from me. Maybe once a few of us break the ice, such a way of life will get easier and easier.

New Moon Thoughts

The new moon signifies new beginnings, and making intentions for the next month. In a "normal" time, this would be important. In a time that it's almost impossible to find words for ("astonishing"?), it is crucial. I approached today with the sense of freedom having come from shaking off a number of lifelong bonds in recent months. And not too surprisingly, spiritual housecleaning has brought me out towards the center of the river, where the water runs fast. I'm nearly being swamped with insights, ideas, and realizations, leaving me antsy and extremely restless, but hanging on to the tiller for dear life. It's time for new intellectual and material challenges, yet the old things I love are still on board with me. I feel I am readying for something enormous. I prayed this morning to all the powers that be, "This water is running fast and I've expanded. Please help me to know how to stay this course, and share what I am learning."

I pulled two oracle cards from two different decks: Shaman, and The Sun. My interpretation of this? That I must continue to try to align with Source, find and express love wherever I can, and live between realities (and in paradox) as successfully as possible -- and be fearless transmuting my pain into expressions of light and clarity. I sense that we are heading into a time of such monumental change that human life and societal constructs may be nearly unrecognizable 20 or 30 years from now. I've been living largely outside the accepted paradigm for almost that long, and I just have to hope that at some point, people will start to see me as a powerful resource. Until then, I will continue to play out my wonky variation on the pattern of the medieval holy women I admire. In the end, today's new beginning isn't about breaking with the past, just continuing the spiral upward, and continuing to incorporate a vast, diverse wealth of spiritual resources.

The other day, I happened upon a marvelous image, a spoof on the Peanuts character Lucy's advice stand ("The Doctor is In.") Instead of Lucy, a cartoon medieval nun is pictured in a lemonade stand that says, "Advice 5 cents -- The Anchoress is In." I'm, like, "that is so me." No, I still haven't gotten up the courage to open this blog up to comments and questions. My life is still on such fragile footing that I just can't quite do it. But for me to live my own prayer will mean being more fully in dialogue. I know that. I suspect by the next new moon, ideas will begin coming to me about how to do that in a way that feels right.