Joyous Completion

I am a starter.  I love new ideas, new projects, visioning, and discovery.  Closure, completion, and creating order requires my conscious diligence and in the past, some amount of suffering. Completion, putting away all of the dishes and things from breakfast, is what creates the open canvas upon which lunch can be created. Completion is honouring my work and collecting accomplishment,  enough to put my name on the paper and turn it in for grading.  Neither of those were things I looked forward to.

I have become aware that in the past I placed barriers in front of completion because I feared collecting accomplishment and judgement. I feared both success and correction. Seeing the incredible talent around me, I worried my work wouldn’t be good enough and so was paralysed.  I was admiring the skills of  amazing woman last week and wished I too possessed those talents, my dear friend and mirror said, “Tirza, for everyone there are  aspects of our lives where we are at PhD level and others where we are in Kindergarten.”

In Kindergarten, there is joy in turning in work and it putting away the paints. So now,  I think of myself as being in Kindergarten. With the joy of the Kindergartener, I do my work, with pride of workmanship, share it with the adults around me and I anticipate their useful encouragement and correction.

Dear Divine,

Open my eyes to the joy of completion.  With gratitude, I  value my resources. I ensure that my work product is deployed, my remaining stock and scraps are stored appropriately, and my tools are cleaned and put away.

Help me to receive fully and with gratitude, the encouragement, critique, and praise that comes with completing and sharing my best work. And let me remember, whenever I am offering a review of another’s work, that before me is a Kindergartener who deserves to have their spirit nourished and their talent encouraged. 

Exercise:

Reflect on projects in three different areas of your life: your primary occupation, the kitchen, and a hobby or creative pursuit.  Write down 10 steps for completion in each of the projects.  It will likely be easy to think about 4-6 but keep going and think about more steps.  Which are easy and which feel hard.  Ask yourself why the steps that are hard are challenging.  Ask again, why that is.  Ask again, until you begin to reveal something new.

Are there common themes that emerge?

How Sweet is a Half a Candy Cane?

“But its not how much I want!”

So clear, as he pushes my offering back at me and demands an entire candy cane.

Alon, my 4 year old son, and I had many conversations these past few weeks about the size of my offerings.  The cocoa cup wasn’t full enough, the candy cane not complete enough, the pears slices were too few.  For me, these conversations are deeply frustrating, sometimes I only have the amount being offered and other times I am offering an appropriate amount. I have begun to ask before offering a treat if he is prepared to receive it as it is, with gratitude.  Setting the tone has helped.

Last Friday, I set out to clear my mantle and discovered that a desk which crowded and dominated the room contained two, counter height cabinets of exceptional quality.  (Thanks for the eyes that see!) My kitchen, in contrast, had no cabinets. It came that way. Chris and I started moving things around and by the end of the weekend the 8×8 custom cedar wood desk was installed in my kitchen. The tiny bookcase that had served as my only “cabinet” now an appropriately sized island.  We thought we would complete the upgrade and install the dishwasher that had been purchased during a tax holiday 15 months ago and languishing in the garage ever since.

Chris levels the hutch

The new dishwasher has a stainless steel interior and is a quiet beauty; my old dishwasher had a stained plastic interior and was so loud we couldn’t have a conversation over the din.  I was waiting to install it till we could “redo” the kitchen.  Instead of receiving the half of the candy cane, I was waiting till I could have the whole candy cane. Now I contemplate, where else am I denying the gift because it fails to meet some expectation my mind has conjured up.

My kitchen is now infinity more functional and beautiful than last week and we spent a total of $10 on plumbing parts.  Now we can think about replacing the floors and creating the few cabinets we are missing, while deploying the resources we already have.  Creating for myself a path of reuse and a story of a desk that has been in every room of my house and was made by young man with his master furniture making father.  This is more beautiful than I could have imagined.

Dear Divine,

I am filled with gratitude. I am joyously receiving the support and gifts of my friends and the universe, with eyes open to beauty and utility. Please, give me eyes that see things for what they are, rather than compare them to an idealized fantasy of what they could be. I rest assured, that whatever I can imagine, you have already imagined it infinity more beautiful.

Exercise

This week, take notice of the times when you are given a seat, a gift, a cup of tea, and your young voice pipes up, “this is not what I wanted”.  Notice, if there are times when it goes the other way, when you offer a gift and you can feel the receiver’s small voice begins to compare the gift to their own idealized picture.

Scan your belongings, can you find things which you are waiting to fully receive until you get the whole candy cane?  Candle sticks you are waiting to use until you have the perfect tablecloth.  A shelf not installed until you can remodel the bathroom. A shirt unworn till you get a new suit.  What would it feel like to receive and deploy the gift now.

The First Step is a Doozy

Dear Divine,

“Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding.”

Khalil Gibran

Aquarius opens up for us the possibility of quantum leaps – a sudden stepping into a new year and a new way of being.  Full moons always offer the opportunity for graduation and completion.  This past full moon was immense for me.  Myself and many of my friends took great strides into new roles and new realities.

With this full moon I experienced a full shift in my internal conversation about my needs.  In the past I have had conversations that dismiss, undervalue, or deflect my needs. The words I chose and my own mindset invited others into the same pattern.  This month, I did deep neural linguistic reprogramming around needs and value. Yes, Divine, you saw me.

I  was  clearly ready to graduate to the next lesson, because on the full moon, I lashed out.  I heard my partner denying my needs (again) and I reacted to that with fierceness and a message of  “this goes no further”.

In that moment I was, however,  blaming the him for denying my needs, rather than taking ownership for my own conversation.  I recognized this and apologized.  He was not denying me anything, the words I was choosing suggested my experience and my needs were universal.  This is the ego centric world of the very young child. I left him no choice but to show me that his needs were different.

Later that day, I was confronted with the fierceness of another who is changing her own internal conversation.

Sometimes the stepping into a new conversation comes with a percussive break with the old.  Sometimes we have to take a deep breath to cross the ravine between the old and the new and sometimes we scream.

Give me support so I am kind and patient as I step into new conversations and ways of being. Make my eyes gentle so I view my own stumbling attempts with the same endearment I would view a child learning to walk. Let me offer sweet words of encouragement to others and to myself, even when we innocently knock over the flowerpot.  That first step is a doozy.

Exercise

Try to do these things with your non-dominant hand:  brush your teeth, eat a meal, button a shirt. While you are doing these activities notice how much you have to think about it.  Notice how much effort goes into motor planning activities you do everyday without having to instruct your hand how to work.

Are there habits of mind or action you would like to change?

• Write down three creative strategies for learning the new way of thinking or action.
• How will you gently and patiently correct yourself when you revert to an old pattern?
• What teachers or allies can you enlist in stepping into a new way?
• What is the reward of making the change?

My experiences are valuable

Dear Divine,

I have seen, that experiences are valuable.  And having made choices, I have had experiences.  My experiences are valuable and therefore I am valuable.

A year ago I was in the midst of an incredibly dark period of my life. Paradigms and values that had been handed down to me through generations if not millennium no longer served and I found myself in a life that no longer felt authentic.  In the thrashing about as I found myself and renegotiated my relationships, I made choices that led to painful experiences for myself and others.  Now at the anniversary of that time, I am going back to value the painful experiences and honor that I got those experiences innocently, doing the best that I could.

Please help me to learn from my experiences.  Let me make myself safe through the pain and the joy, the loss and the love.  If I am safe, I can see the lessons of the past more clearly and see that I can make different choices.  Help me to choose the path of love in every moment.  

Exercise

As always these exercises are meant to take 30-60 minutes and provide a  reflection on the theme of the prayer.

• Write down an experience that brings you joy?  What were the choices that you made that brought you to that experience.
• Write down an experience of pain?  What were the choices that you made that brought you to that experience.
• Describe an occasion where you lead yourself and another, well.
• Describe an occasion where you experience tyranny or loss of choice.  What could you have done to open up new paths for choice?

Let me be Creator of Beauty

Dear Divine,

In contemplation about my vision for the year last week, I asked myself, what do I really want to create?  What returned was beauty.  Beauty as a reflection of care, and love. Beauty as intelligent order. Beauty as intentional container.

In my teens I was introduced to the concept of Tikkun Olam, the concept of repairing the world or finishing the work of creation.  So much of what humans have added to creation has done little to make the world more beautiful.  Our lives are easier, more comfortable and with more potential for self expression.  But there are so many manifestations of our creativity which would be different if at the moment of intent, the designer was considering how to add beauty to all of creation.

Let me be creator of beauty. In my interactions with people, let me always leave them feeling more beautiful than before. When I leave a space, let me leave no trace or let me leave it more beautiful than when I entered.  In my creations, help me to see the far reaches of my impact, that I may create things that truly leave the world more beautiful.  As I make purchases, help me to use discernment and patience that I may buy only those things which make my family’s life more beautiful and the lives of others. Please, let me be a creator of beauty.

Exercise:

How could you do three routine tasks differently, such that they would feel more beautiful?

• I could take my coffee from the prettiest mug.
• I could make a cup of tea for my partner when I made my morning cup.

Look around you and notice beauty.  List five things in your view that are beautiful.

What are three things you could do that would make the space you are in now even more beautiful?

 

Eyes That See

Dear Divine,

I have heard it said, ” Ask and you shall receive” and so I am asking, please give me eyes that see.

Clear vision has been a theme in my life this season.  A severe eye infection prevented me from wearing my contacts for weeks and unaccustomed to wearing glasses all day, I often went without corrective lenses despite my -6.0 prescription (20/600).  Dark houses, dust and wind all kept showing up as reasons I could not see. At the same time, my life is transitioning and I am seeking a 5 year vision for my businesses, my family, and my life. Yet, I have found it hard to envision even the week.

Divine, now, more than ever, I desire to see.  Help me to see the details and beauty around me in each moment.   Release me from any confusion between past and future. Help me see my past as a story I tell and my future a wave of possibilities I create in each moment.  Give me the creativity and the courage to see that wave well into the future. Provide me with clear mirrors that I may see myself, my habits of mind and rituals of action.  Let me see all the subtle energies and interconnections.

The exercise.

Pick a room in your house or your office, sit down and write down every detail you notice for 15 minutes.  Try for at least 50 details.  If you are inclined to drawing, you can draw instead.

Now, invite in the goddess in whatever form you find her – mother, creator, lover –  Goddess of grain, storm, or music.  Whatever tone comes to mind is the right one.  Invite her in.  Now, imagine the same room and write down every detail you can.