Category Archives: Suffering

Breathe In the Longing, Breathe Out the Wish

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lastretreat

Breathe in the wish, the longing to take away the suffering; breathe out the wish to send comfort and happiness. ~Pema Chödrön

I am allowing myself space on this retreat. As I mentioned yesterday, I dropped the plan, and am instead seeing how things might naturally arise. There is wisdom, clarity that will emerge if you allow it room and time. I am trusting in this.

Today I was very aware of suffering, in the world and in myself. I was touched by the suffering of others, those dealing with illness, death, loss, grief, self-hatred, fear, abuse. I was softened by my own suffering as well, so similar, so much the same. I gently contemplated my regrets, my failures, the ways I’ve lived in the shadows, stayed hidden away and closed off this past year.

Rather than beating yourself up, use your own stuckness as a stepping stone to understanding what people are up against all over the world.

Breathe in for all of us and breathe out for all of us.

Use what seems like poison as medicine. Use your personal suffering as the path to compassion for all beings. ~Pema Chödrön

I practiced Tonglen for all of us. In a video I watched, Pema Chödrön talked about how in Tonglen, we “relax into the outbreath,” and how the practice is about sending space, relief and comfort and ease, so that those who are suffering will know that their hearts and minds are indeed big enough to accommodate their discomfort, their fear, their despair, their anger, their physical or emotional anguish.

And today there was also so much joy and gratitude. I experienced compassion and comfort through the connections I’ve made in the past year, long conversations about important things, short exchanges that make me smile so big my face hurts from it, sharing our experiences, cheering each other on. So many brilliant and beautiful women who offer their support, wisdom, kindness, strength, and good humor, who fill my life with so much grace and laughter.

And later into the snow on a walk with my little family, I feel the cold air as I draw it into my lungs, warm it and release it. I feel the strength of my lungs and legs, the willingness of my whole body, my whole self to move. I revel in the company of my three boys, the beauty of the world around us, and wonder at my luck.

I live in a place where every year someone decorates a few of the trees along the trail. I live in a world where people open their hearts to each other, sharing our stories and our pain, a world where people offer each other support and help. A world where every day our hearts are broken, and yet once they are, we see that there is room for all of it, the suffering and the joy, that there is so much to love, to live for.

I’m so glad you are here with me, kind and gentle reader. Life is tender and terrible, beautiful and brutal–may we keep our hearts open to all of it, may we know that they are big enough to hold all of it.

Day of Rest

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shadowtreeWhen I’m not getting enough rest, I feel like a shadow of myself. Last week on Facebook, poet David Whyte shared an excerpt from his essay “Rest” that describes its five stages. I am dreaming, wishing, longing to somehow make it all the way through all of them, all the way to stillness and ease, fully restored, even as I have no idea how that might actually happen or exactly how to do it.

In the first stage of rest is the sense of stopping, of giving up on what we have been doing or how we have been being.

In the second stage is the sense of slowly coming home, the physical journey into the body’s un-coerced and un-bullied self, as if trying to remember the way or even the destination itself.

In the third state is a sense of healing and self-forgiveness and of arrival.

In the fourth stage, deep in the primal exchange of the breath is the give and the take, the blessing and the being blessed and the ability to delight in both.

The fifth stage of rest is a sense of absolute readiness and presence, a delight in and an anticipation of the world and all its forms; the sense of being the meeting itself between inner and outer, and of receiving and responding occurring in one spontaneous movement.

Which stage of rest do you find yourself in today, kind and gentle reader? I must admit, I find myself resisting even the first step. I’m aware that many of my habitual patterns, my ways of being and thinking no longer serve me, don’t represent the actions of a woman in love with herself, and yet I can’t seem to stop, to give up. I keep pushing. Just the other day, I pledged to stop doing this, to let go of smashing myself to bits, and this is my heart’s desire, but there is still the question of “how?” when I want so much, have so many ideas, long to make a difference. When there seems to be so much at stake, so much suffering, it’s easy for me to justify the overwork and overwhelm.

And yet, if I read through the five stages, David suggests that the only way to get to “absolute readiness and presence” is to rest, so to do what I wish to do, to ease suffering in the world and in myself, I have to rest, do the gentle work of it, prepare the ground. If I am tired, I have to rest, have to restore my mind, my heart, and my body. I need to be sure, in the case of a crash landing, to put on my own oxygen mask first before attempting to help someone else. I have to be still, listen deeply, relax, open my heart. I have to believe that I am enough, that I am worthy of rest, of love, of kindness, of joy, of life–not because of who I am or what I do or what I believe, but because I am.