welcome to this day

Some mornings I wake before the sun, so she too could know the feeling of opening her wide gaze on a brightness that welcomes her back. Let's all take turns holding the light, quietly standing guard through the darkness, and meeting each other joyfully at dawn. Today, my turn. Welcome to this day.

The Garbage Men

I am watching the garbage men drive backwards, taking everything we discard, without hesitation or judgement, into the wide mouth of the truck; taking everything we don't want away from us. It must take courage to handle all the things about which we say... "not mine;" to take it and give it a place to be. There is a kindness and beauty in collecting trash. If there is a place for the discarded tin cans, there must be a place on this earth for me too.

May the garbage men back down the narrow, one-way, suburban streets of my spirit and collect everything that is done; all the hollow things that just take up space. Universe, swallow up my useless in your gaping mouth, and make it useful somewhere. Let it lead forward to new things that give pleasure to someone, somewhere. Let everything I am and everything I leave behind become something beautiful and useful. Let nothing be meaningless trash. Let everything be made beautiful again, in time.

This is my prayer

This is my prayer to the universe today- When I am ready, Let it be.  Let me glow like a candle speaking light to light that is pretending to be the darkness.  And then, when I meet myself there, let me shine like the sun speaking light to every star, little lights shining brightly in their own orbits. And let me be the moon reflecting my own radiance back to me, so that I can keep my own way lit when I can't find myself.  So that I can lose and find and lose and find myself again with every healing and breaking of the day. Without terror of the dark. Knowing the way. And so that I can fall in love with the light I see reflecting back at me from me. And the light I see in you, that I needed to see in me first and endlessly in order to recognize it anywhere else. Let me be the Narcissist who has become aware of the extent of her own being, far-reaching, soft and simple like Whitman's grass. Let me stretch softly out of darkness.  In my time.  Taller and brighter and more wide-spreading than I have the courage to imagine. And let me do it Softly.  Gently.  The way light touches things. Guide me to me.   To make the beauty of everything, and myself, more visible. The way the sun or kindness does, just by being itself. When I am ready, Let it be.

Who do you love?

I received this text from a dear friend from college: "Was thinking of you in yoga today. We did a meditation and the teacher said to see a woman you love and i saw you." Close your eyes now, think of someone you love, and go tell them... go tell them that when asked, you see them. I assure you, it will mean the world to them. And trust, if asked, yours would be the face that would light the darkness of someone's closed eyes. You are someone's light. I have just closed my eyes, and I was blessed to see so many faces, more than I can reach out to right now, please know, yours was probably one of them. Each of you are in my heart and light my darkness.

Rise

Birds aren't born knowing how to fly. A part of them knows they can, but they have to learn how. They try, they fall, they try. Trust in what has been enfolded in you, trust in the winds. One day, you'll rise into what you were intended for, just don't stop trying. Gather your courage, and keep returning, over and over. I'll gather my courage too. I will meet you there and one day, we will celebrate our coming into our own, together.

Poof!

Second revelation of the day:
When you realize you are feeling and in your mind actually say to yourself "I am feeling" it frees you from being unconsciously controlled by the feeling. Try this the next time you notice anxiety rising up, "I am feeling." Poof- myth of terrifying, supposedly overwhelming emotion is broken. A part of you snuck out from your feeling and can see it from the outside. Look into the emotion and say I see you ! And you'll feel the light go on inside and the monster in the closet was just a little part of you playing dress up or hide and go seek. Not scary at all. Sweet. Almost silly. Go, try! Tell me how it goes.

Kindness

So I just noticed something, and I want to share it with all of you, because for me this is a huge revelation. This morning, I did something really kind for myself.  It was something very small, but something I knew I would really appreciate. And almost immediately after offering that kindness to myself, I felt the way it feels when a muscle finally relaxes, but it was my spirit that was relaxing.  It was as if energy was freed up inside of me, and now I had more energy.  And without hesitation, the energy manifested as loving energy toward others.  My mind started to think of some of my dearest students and friends, and I thought of each of them with love and appreciation, and couldn't help but send loving energy their way. When I offered myself love, it filled me and flowed out of me to those around me, effortlessly, naturally. The way water fills a glass or the day flows into night. Like a heart beat. Love is natural and effortless and abundant. And it all opened up when I offered myself a little kindness.