The more things go “our way” for a while, the more we can believe that that is the way it is supposed to be.
And when things don’t go “our way,” which sooner or later they will not, we can get angry, disappointed, depressed, devastated……… forgetting that it was never “supposed to be” any one way at all.
Jon Kabat-Zinn, Arriving at your own Door
Heard this song for the first time this evening. Its beautiful haunting melody and sparse words speak to those times in our lives when we struggle and are sad, or when our heart feels raw. Often when that happens we contract and turn away, to protect ourselves. It is at times like that that we need friends who will not hide their face, to ground us and help us feel that we have a place.
The other day I looked
At myself in the mirror
Do not hide your face
Do not hide your face
From me when I feel sad
On the day when I call you
Answer me, please answer me
And turn your shy ear towards me
No cows and no grass to graze on
Makes me feel I’m a nomad
I’m lost and silent in the wilderness
Like an owl among the ruins
My wings lined with ashes
alone on the roof
I feel I’m a nomad
I feel I’m a nomad
I feel I’m a nomad
My days go up in smoke
My bones are aching
My days go up in smoke
My heart is breaking
Geoffrey Oryema Nomad
Had a beautifu
l stroll this morning on a trail in a forest. The leaves on the trees were shades of red and orange and yellow and the sun was shining brightly. Suddenly not far away on the trail I saw a deer. They come down into this part of the forest because it is a refuge, safe from hunters. It stood and watched me carefully, with big bright eyes. I was full of tenderness toward this timid creature, but it turned away, afraid to trust any human.
The human heart is like that. We want so much to connect, to relax with others, but we wait to see and test if they can actually hold our hearts and our fears. We seem to continually be on the alert for danger. Frequently we have moments like this encounter – with people or with events in our life – when we are faced with a choice. Do we keep the heart open or do we turn away? Can we stay open to all we encounter, knowing that everything we meet can be worked with. I know I find this hard and often say “no” to life as it presents itself in this moment and I contract and pull away.
Doing yoga this morning. The warrior pose. Widening the heart. Being open to all possibilities. We can often identify ourself with who we want to be, or could be in the future, or who our worries say we are. We can forget the strength we actually have and who we really are. The present moment is the only one we have. It is there our happiness is worked out. We lose so much of life by refusing to stay in it, preferring to live in our fears and our worries.
Throw away all thoughts of imaginary things
and stand firm in that which you are.
Kabir
In order for a secure sense of self to develop, caregivers need to be attuned to the child’s desires. They need to be able to set aside their own needs in order to have the space to respond to the child’s emotional and physical needs. On the one hand, this means that they address the child’s needs promptly, so that the child feels secure. Using modern means of communication as an analogy, at times they need to respond to the child as if they have received an Instant Message and not wait for an email.
However, as well as being able to respond to certain needs swiftly, they also have to be able to leave the child alone, without insisting that it be there for their needs. They have to provide a non-demanding presence during times of rest so the child can simply be and develop its sense of being, before any need to do anything or earn the parents’ attention. In this way the child learns to simply enjoy each moment, without any intrusive aims or fears.
Winnicott calls this state “going-on-being” and writes about the importance of this capacity to allow the child simply exist: The mother’s non-demanding presence makes the experience of formlessness and comfortable solitude possible, and this capacity becomes a central feature in the development of a stable and personal self. This makes it possible for the infant to experience …a state of going on being…out of which…spontaneous gestures emerge.
We can see here the importance of being before doing. If the parent is excessively working through its own needs then it can happen that he or she impinges on the child’s quiet time, and continually draws the child’s attention. One consequence is that the child has to attune too early to the needs of others, rather than having time just for itself. In later life as an adult he or she can repeat this dynamic in a number of ways. One is by repeating the parents’ pattern and continually create interruptions and dramas. So, for example, when a relationship is in danger of being reliable the person repeats the drama of the parents – because that is more familiar – thus preventing the other person getting too close. The parents’ dynamic means that only unhealthy relationships are maintained; sadly, ones that have the potential to grow are rejected. Or the adult compulsively neglects his or her own needs, looking after others in an excessive way. In both cases we can see that, in a sense, the child has never managed to leave home.
This is where meditation practice can help. As Jon Kabat Zinn stated again in a talk which I was present at recently, we are essentially human beings before we are human doings. Sitting practice recreates a period when we can just simply be, without having to acheive anything. We simply watch the mind and body without holding on to anything or pushing anything away. This has the capacity to recreate and heal our early life experiences. As Gil Fronsdal has said, mindfulness practice can act as an antidote to the hurt caused by parents who did not have the space to truly see their children. He says that by being mindful, by quietening the mind, by being simply present with our experience, we are loving and healing ourselves. We learn to sit with ourselves and our lives as they are, without having to be afraid of them and try continually to fix them.
As many authors remind us, relationships are the place where our practice is tested most. It is easy to be calm on the cushion or in a retreat centre but not so easy when we mix with family, friends or work colleagues. Every person we come into contact with has his or her their own relationship histories and have come to learn a number of techniques to manage their own self-esteem and control the behaviours of those they meet. Therefore it is inevitable that sometimes these dynamics can touch us and cause strong emotions to rise in us.
There is a balance to be had in inner practice, between maintaining contact and compassion for others and yet not tolerating being accused when we are not in the wrong or someone directing their issues towards us. This balance is never an easy one to get, and traditionally the wisdom traditions have been better at emphasizing compassion rather than maintaining boundaries. True, we have to work hard to keep our minds and hearts open, and notice any tendency to close down towards others. However, at the same time we have to be firm with our own needs and ensure that we are not always surrendering them in an attempt to keep the peace.
In reality, most of us, even in healthy relationships, tend to move from being open to closing up, depending on the other person’s way of relating to us. If we feel they are not being responsive or if they behave in a way that we feel is threatening, we quickly tense up and start to contract. It is not easy to love without conditions, even if we wish we could. Therefore it is even easier to close our hearts when we are dealing with someone who is angry or unpredictable.
So how do we deal with the ups and downs of relating to others? A good starting place is to have a realistic view of relationships and people. Nobody can be there for us is an totally consistent way, every day, not even those who are closest to us. There will inevitably be misunderstandings and mistakes. Expecting otherwise just sets us up to feel betrayed and disallusioned.
When words are said or something done, the practice is to stay as close as we can to the experience itself, as far as possible, noticing when the experience turns into an emotion and the thoughts and behaviours that follow. With practice we try to remain with the experience itself, before fight or flight kicks in and before the self -justificating speeches to ourselves are made. We may not be able to change the initial incident or the words said towards us, but we can stop it escalating by not running our defensive stories. We try to just be with what comes up, without adding to it, holding it in the light of awareness.
This unconditional friendliness towards our own experience provides a third element in our dealing with others. We try and maintain the same friendliness towards them. This does not mean that we have to like what is happening or what they are doing or saying. Indeed, at times it will be right to say that we do not like it. However, we can maintain a friendliness to the person who is expressing their ideas and their fear, and hold as much as we can in awareness our own reactions to the words or emotions being expressed. Mindfulness practice believes that the light of awareness has the power to change our experience. If we can be present in a greater way to the other person and listen to the emotion behind the words then space can open up. And as yesterday’s post told us, it is that space which we are looking to expand, both within us and in our lives with others.
Mindfulbalance 