I Need to Sleep with Competition

picture: A tree grows in the Negev: this poem was written as a weaving of the study of Sarah, the first Matriarch of Hebrew Wisdom and this author's spiritual autobiography.

I need to sleep with competition
I want to know her intimately
her curves, lines and jagged edges
Her ins and outs
The dark hidden places and those that protrude

I need to embrace her, love her
for unless i really know her
she will constantly be there ready to trip me up
make me small and limit my possibilities

I need to clean myself of the sin of
Adam who thought he was not good enough
to eat the fruit of the tree of knowledge

I need to heal my self
from the pain of separation Kayn felt
from his brother as he compared
came up less and then destroyed a part of himself

I do not want the pain of your envy
to constrict my heart
to keep me from seeing the beauty
of the One who held me before i was born
who loved me before she knew me
whose heart was broken by the one
she trusted to care for her and all she loved.

Dear Sarah, what was it like to compete
with your sister-friend Hagar for God's gift to each of you?
What happened and has never been mended?
Was it the man who divided you because
he did not know how to love each for your unique gifts?

Or was this God's plan all along - we were
never to do it right - only learn from
life and missed opportunities.

Blessings of the Vav: we are all One, connected to the each other, impacting, responding, blessing, intruding.

Taking the Crap off the Soul

Blessing of Being Awake: So for two days I have been crying and wiping my nose! I am not crying all the time and yet when i do start to cry it is deep and long, and I am coughing-up whatever i have been holding in! It must be purging time! Spring is here and love is around the corner.

Spiritual Challenge: I am walking in the confluence of two streams; the deep dark night of the soul and in the eternal light of a pure soul. I know that what I am experiencing, major unloveable-ness, relates to the grief around my mother's death and her unworthiness I am trying to peal off. It is not the whole truth so i am not giving in to self doubt, just watching. I must admit i am also trying to figure out how to get through this.

Spiritual Practice: This is the moment i have been practicing for. I will call friends to cry with, just for them to listen. I will sit outside and get some sun. I will take a bath and soak in the water. I will only care for me as there is no energy for anyone else right now. I will love me as I make my way through the darkness that covers parts of the soul and i will breath deeply and hold on, the roller coaster has just hit the top of the hill and I will be coming off my seat as i hold on for dear life! And I will hold on.

Blessings of the Vav is that this too will pass, i am making a friend of time and there is a deep learning here and there is a hope that maybe I can speak from an authentic place to help someone else through their dark, dank and narrow place. And all of this is love!

Endless Exciting Dreams

Blessings of Being Awake: In Greensboro a few weeks ago I went with Gay to a wonderful art show called Embodying. Yes!, I said to myself as I walked around the art space, and was inspired by the amazing creative and daring artists! I began thinking about my unfinished projects at home and how to pull them together. I going to introduce the quilted circumcised heart with the paper mache' bust! I felt the excitement of new beginnings and thought 'Art, that is my new love!!'

Last week on the cruise, Geri needed some health support and i offered to do some energy work and also to use some new healing cream on her sore places. As I rubbed the cream into her skin, she commented on how good it felt and asked if I was trained as a message therapist. 'No', I smiled and said shyly, that I had gotten that commen before.' I love choosing the people I touch for healing and thought, maybe this is where i need to put my energy!' I could study and be a good massage therapist.

Before i went on the cruise i facilitated the coaching skills group and I got high on the collaboration with the men i worked with. It was fun and I came home thinking i need and want to do more more of this!! And i began thinking of who i could expand my practice and do good int he world.

Spiritual Challenge: When I first came out i bought a t-shirt that said , 'So many women…So little time.' I was just beginning to imagine what i would 'do' with all these women and I certainly appreciated the idea!!

Now I am feeling 'So many loves….So little time.' And I want to go deep with the time I have left on this earth. I want to be good at one thing and be noted for it and i want it to be something that gives pleasure and energy to people as it heals them and I.

I have so much to learn to be able to do that. What shall that be? I ask myself 'what am I playing with already that needs to be opened further, like the vagina upon giving birth. What am i about to drop from my womb? Who will i be, where will i live, who will be my lover or friend? So many unanswered questions, so much to learn. How do I discipline the mind?

Spiritual Practice: So today the question arises, tomorrow another piece of the puzzle will arrive and for today all i have to do is be in receiving mode! So I am noticing my heart open and tears falling, emotions high. And to notice without judging myself and just expanding into the love that is already there holding me.

Blessings of the Vav: whether hidden or revealed the Vav sparks an unending-ness to life and pushes the game of wonder from the back burner to the front!! It is boiling and i cannot not help but to notice it!

And G!D was in this Place and I i Did Not Know

Blessings of Being Awake: as we relaxed under the Mexican sun, Alexis spoke her wisdom into the group, 'women are naturally competitive' and everyone agreed and I had to catch my breath. I had never thought of us in that way. I know my aunts are competitive with each other, my mother was competitive with me and my daughters are competitive with me. Yet, I had never thought of it as a characteristic of all women. I spent several days musing on her words becoming lighter, no longer weighted by 'just me' syndrome and more enlightened with each breath.

Spiritual Challenge: Feelings of competition and envy are why i asked Phyllis if we could adopt each other. I wanted to do something with these feelings that were interrupting my end of our friendship. I love Phyllis, like I love my daughters, i love my Mother and I know the many times i sensed its presence and steered around it, never exposing her, always aiding this turret, letting the walls remain between our hearts. I remember in my writings on Sarah for my ordination expressing in a poem the toxicity of competition with a deep need to get to know her deeply, every crevice so that there would be little unknown rocks hidden that could keep our hearts apart. Now having a perspective that these feelings were female-relational linked and not just mine was so freeing. I felt as if someone had had just cleansed an opaque windshield that had prevented me from seeing the whole picture and in this moment my soul felt cleansed from the toxic energy that keeps me in judging mind and separated from my sisters everywhere!!! I felt as if i had found the holy grail for which I did not know i had been searching! And i thought how can i hold onto this truth and not let it slip through the cracks of life. Drink for it!

Spiritual Practice: Laugh, what else can i do but laugh at my-our competitive spirit and then laugh some more no longer constricted from seeing my own beauty by these feelings. And then remember the wisdom of; 'do not covet' and 'be the best you that you can be' and 'your success is your deepest fear' and it is all about 'personal best' and consider 'power with' not over or under as Starhawk teaches. To live 'together anything is possible!'


Blessings of the Vav: In Hebrew Wisdom we are told we carry two notes, one in each pocket. One note says 'I am just dust' and the other 'the world was created for me'. This interpretation of humility, 'knowing your place and taking your space' is untying me from past thinking and behavior. No longer strangulated, i am empowered with this information that can only save my life and perhaps that of others. And I am so glad i was listening as my new sister-friend spoke truth into the wind and i heard and wove her wisdom into my being. May I continue to live the truth that the Divine lives within everyone and I can learn from everyone including me. I am a Vav-nik, standing tall in my uniqueness and hooked to every other Vav-nik healing our world!

Being Distracted

Blessings of Being Awake: "So you lost both your parents in the last 2 years …that is a lot, especially for an only child," a new acquaintance said in response to telling her how I ended up in Florida. I was so pleased that my sunglasses blocked her from seeing the welling up in my eyes as my throat tightened and I did not speak as we turned to focus our attention on getting organized for the kayak expedition.

Spiritual Challenge: My neck is tight, my shoulders have rocks in them and I miss my mother. And i get a massage for the shoulder pain and what do i do with these feelings? And I wonder about how I can remember the gift she gave me of unconditional love and let that soothe the ache in my heart that arise spontaneously.

Spiritual Practice: Taking time to be gracious with myself by mourning and grieving for this primary relationship. So I have committed and set an intention to creating an art piece in her memory. She would love that a lot since she too was an artist.

Blessings of the Vav: Being able to hold the pain of loss and the joy of our relationship as all is truth, the whole story. So in her memorial i will show pictures of both cemeteries, not well cared for and the joy of being alive! The Kaddish as a work of art in awe of the awesomeness of life given.

Going Deeper With the Words

Blessings of Being Awake: He looked about my age and came with his wife to my meditation class. From his speech pattern I assumed that he was either a Sabra, native born Israeli, or had learned Hebrew at a very young age. His tender heart asked me a question: would you mind answering a question and you do not need to answer if you do not want.' I knew that I would tell him anything he wanted to know.

What do you mean 'meditation saved my life?' he said with a curious, sad tone? As I started to talk I felt awkward as if I was walking into the unknown. My thoughts rambled; one time i knew the answer to that question, What does it mean? What am I willing to share? How vulnerable am i willing to be? Who am I talking with that would understand what i experienced that is so hard to put into words.'

Then, I remembered those ten days in Thailand that brought a peace within me that i had wanted and yet did not know nor how to access. Rosemary and Steven at Wat Koh Tam had created an emotionally safe environment for me to learn what they taught of Buddhism, a process of thinking that I would utilize for my whole journey around the world and it would bring me to moments where my heart was softening and that fired the embers of choosing life and wanting more.

Spiritual Challenge: And then I casually said to him 'I am still alive and I am here telling you my experience.' He smiled as we looked at each other. I then spoke these words, 'I am learning to love me so I can love the stranger within and without.' And he smiled again and spoke the Hebrew text, and you shall love the stranger as yourself. We smiled and let the others in the class know this teaching of Hebrew Wisdom. I thought truth comes when the right questions are asked.

Spiritual Practice: To breathe deeply and go within, remembering the Divine dwells there, in my body, with me and never leaves. I am never alone. Healing is placing myself back into my loving heart. That is how I save my life, breath by breath, moment by moment.

Blessings of the Vav: When I stand with the intention of authenticity and with the thought that nothing can stop or kill me except myself, then i am able to link with another who is in that same place. I am making a step toward mending the world.

Choices

Blessings of Being Awake: When I got up to relieve myself early this morning I thought it would be easy for me to go back to sleep. We had gone to bed late after a full first day of new experiences, meeting people, dancing and exploring of the ship where we would spend the next five days. Yet the rolling of the ship and the vibration of the motor left me restless and awake. I kept moving from side to side trying to find the perfect placement of my body that would invite back the deep sleep and great dreams i had just been embroiled in. I was angry at the boat, our room and the designers of this ship that kept me awake.

Spiritual Challenge: It is easy for me to respond to the angst of the mind by joining with it and making up all kind of stories. "Yeh, you're right, we were done wrong, I will never get used to this movement, i will stay awake forever" were some of my more dramatic thoughts. I took a deep breathe, listening to the voices and thought I am not going to play this time! I started breathing deeply and was aware that in my angry place i was tight. I was holding the tension i had just had a massage to relieve. I laughed, silently, not to awaken my sister, and then began to notice that as i breathed i became more relaxed and instead of being a board torn by tempestuous seas, i was rolling and following the rhythm of the boat's movement.

Spiritual Practice: To remember that I am Shalem - whole and a symphony of separate parts - one very busy mind, one wise body and one very alive spirit living together with the Indwelling Presence. And we all must learn to live with each other. We are in relationship with each other and in any relationship there are moments when tension is high and flow is limited. Yet, this is also a moment of potential freedom of working together for the greater good, to be at our highest good. Each moment can be an inspiration.

Blessings of the Vav: In every moment there is a possibility to move beyond the habits rather than remain in my old comfortable rut. In each moment I can call on the Vav, the emotional connector, to help me find what comes after I say 'and' and to go deeper with knowing what my unique soul can be.

I Am Smart Just By Asking the Questions

Blessings of Being Awake: Where did they go, my sister asked, after the camps were liberated? It was early this morning when the man brought the coffee and tea. I had not wanted to get up and and there I sat wrapped in the terry robe, sipping my hot water and eating freshly cut fruit, talking about deep questions.

When ML decided that she was not going to be a living-walking-on-this-earth-being she reactivated in me many emotions and thoughts related to life and death and the choices we make.

When my mother decided to walk across the eight lane boulevard not at the crosswalk and met a car, she changed how i looked at her life and a paradigm shift began to happen within me.

Spiritual Challenge: I want to stay awake to living on the edge of not knowing. I want to stay fascinated about how opening a door, walking around a corner, crossing a threshold, having a thought change ones perspective and behavior. And how can I keep the door open to possibilities and continue asking the questions and not just accepting what is and moving on. My sister is a good role model for asking the questions.

Spiritual Practice: What does one do early in the morning with these deep thoughts that stir the soul and mind with wonder. Keep asking them and not needing to find the answers.

Blessings of the Vav: Asking the questions is important, knowing the answers is not. Vav allows me to ask without knowing the answers so i can stay curious in this abyss of life. And……………...