Friday evening I invited a younger work colleague for dinner at my apartment. Her own spiritual journey has been intensifying recently. She has frequently asked me questions about my journey. Not that any of us are ever an expert on the journey, I do have a few more years in my spiritual journey experience bank. Since we aren't working together any more, dinner seemed to be a more appropriate solution than attempting to text about the journey, as we have since I changed jobs.
After dinner, we pulled our chairs over to the bookshelf--the one with spiritual titles, not the one with books related to work. I've been feeling spiritually fidgety for most of the year, but especially since changing jobs. As I shared with her some of my favorite titles, I was learning again for myself. When I pulled out Carol Pearson's The Hero Within, a book explicitly about the spiritual journey described through Jungian archetypes, a diagram fell out. What immediately jumped to my eye as I glanced at "Three Turns Around the Hero's Wheel," (p. 14) was the archetype of "The Wanderer," whose purpose is to provide clarity to the next stage of life.
The diagram is like a pie with each of five pieces devoted to one of five archetypes. The inner wedge of each piece/archetype describes the lessons for the first journey around the wheel. Pearson explains that we go through the journey several times each life and with each we have a different lessons to learn on each archetype. (I attempted to find a reproduction of the diagram online, but most are much more complicated than the simple-yet-clear version on yellowed pages that I have. Markings on my own render it useless to others.)
The progression of archetypes that we go through starts with "orphan," where we learn "trust." You might think about this as disappointment that things aren't as you might have thought they were but learning trust in an emerging, but not at all yet clear, world view. "Orphan" is followed by "Wanderer" where the lesson is "clarity." This is how the "not at all yet clear world view" gets clarity--we listen and learn about the next evolution of how things really are. You might also think about this as the time in the desert, demonstrated in many spiritual stories, including Abraham, Moses and Jesus, involve time spent alone in reflection.
After we have clarity, we move to the "Warrior," where we might have to fight for what we've received spiritual clarity about. Embarking on the lessons in order is critical; otherwise, we might be fighting for the wrong things. The warrior is about learning and claiming "power." The lesson after "Warrior" is that of "Martyr," where we learn about "love" and giving our lives to the Universe. The last of the five archetypes is the "Magician." The lesson of the "Magician" is "joy." Then we are ready to be "Orphans" again.
So what does this have to do with me...now?
I've spent a lot of time stuck in "Orphan." Instead of learning the lesson of "trust," the long stall there exposed me to repeated examples where I couldn't/didn't let go of the expectations I had and move on to wander and figure things out. My experience with this transition is that it requires a leap of faith, but each time I've had the courage to take it, everything has worked out perfectly. For example, when I chose to leave Oregon, buy a house in North Carolina as I'd been guided to do, and drive across the country without a job or even knowing anyone, I was taken care of. Work fell into may path within a week, but I had to wander first.
I've also spent way too much time in "Warrior" in recent years where I was fighting to survive rather than fighting for the spiritual truth I should have learned in "Wanderer." When I've made the journey successfully before, I have found my inner power, the power that comes from connection with the divine and knowing if I do what is right and true, I will be OK. When I've fought to survive, I've tried to control or manipulate things to assure I'd be taken care of rather than taking the leap of faith knowing I would be OK.
While the move to North Carolina worked out splendidly, there have been times when I have been "invited" into the desert, and I didn't follow, and it hasn't worked out so well. On February 4, 2004, I received a clear message that I should move to Washington, D.C. Depleted of resources from the dot.com bust and without a job in D.C., my reply was "I will do it when I have a job." I looked but didn't find one. Of course, that is not how this is supposed to work. Leap of faith occurs first and then it works out.
One of the scripture readings in church today was about Jacob wrestling with the angel or God. Our pastor said he always thought this passage was about our internal struggles. Do I do what I want or do I do what God wants? For the 28 months between my message to move to Washington and when I actually did move, almost everything of value was taken from me. Yet, I struggled to control the transition by insisting on having a job first. I should have wandered.
Last March when I told my old boss that I would leave my job at the end of the summer, I think what the Universe heard was that finally I had relented to go into the desert and find the next manifestation of me and my spiritual truth. As the end of the summer approached, I was totally at peace. I had accumulated vacation pay, and my financial planner and I had figured out how I could get by for several months after that. Then, the job offers started coming--three of them, and they were good ones. So I took the bait. I could leave my job, go to a new one, and I wouldn't have to take the leap of faith, I thought to myself. And, I also wouldn't learn the lesson of wandering.
When the diagram fell onto the floor Friday evening, in a flash I realized I had robbed myself of my season in the desert. While it isn't exactly the bold leap of faith that leaving my old job without a new one would have been, I leave on Tuesday for a meandering trip to the Midwest, reconnecting with old friends and one of my few remaining relatives. The wedding of the son of a dear friend lies at the end of the journey, but in the stillness of my road trip, I expect that I will find passages into my truth.
Showing posts with label hero's journey. Show all posts
Showing posts with label hero's journey. Show all posts
Sunday, October 16, 2016
Sunday, July 24, 2016
Boundaries
Washington is in the middle of a week of brutally hot weather, exceeding 100 degrees and shattering long-standing records. With the humidity, our heat indices have been even more relentless. Yet this morning I've been quite comfortably luxuriating on my north-facing balcony with a slight breeze. I breakfasted outdoors, a guilty pleasure I've enjoyed most of my adult life. As I did so, I found my mind drifting back to several patios, decks, and balconies on which I had breakfasted and to the friends with whom I had shared stories and laughed as we ate.
Before eating, I had finished a novel that I started a month ago on my staycation. In it the main characters started the book as boys, and by the end, they had become old men with failing eyesight. The book left me in a reflective space, which may have spawned my breakfast reverie. I've been thinking about this post for some time. For once I am not going to use the excuse of no time to write. If you had asked I wouldn't have known why I hadn't written, but this morning I know that I just hadn't had enough perspective.
I believe the expression "When the student is ready, the teacher will appear" came from the I Ching, but I also believe that a number of Eastern philosophies hold something similar to be true. During my outdoor breakfast contemplation this morning, the pieces began to fall into place for me. I, as the student, must be ready because lots of opportunities to learn a similar lesson have appeared.
During my four-month detail last fall and early winter, I became keenly aware that my life had spun totally out of control in recent years--to the extent that my physical and mental health were being compromised and my relationships were back-burnered, awaiting that precious "time" for nurturing. Certainly, time for writing, which really nourishes my soul, had become a low priority. I fell asleep from exhaustion when I tried to meditate. I had to be away from my long-standing, abusive work environment to get the perspective to recognize that.
In those treasured four months, I was able to see what had evaded me for so long. In my situation I had lost either the self-respect or the self-confidence to set and stick to my boundaries. When I returned to my permanent job, I wrote in big block letters with a box around them on the whiteboard behind my desk, where I looked at it every time I entered my office, "boundary clarity."
In a matter of days, I was tested. An unsustainable level of dark work again began flowing at me from very high places. Encouraged by my "boundary clarity" reminder, I began telling my clients that I would work with them, but it would be three months, four months, and even five months later. I brought in a contractor to do work with one client organization, which had needs that wouldn't wait. Still, the darkness and the volume of the work were too much.
Within a month I knew something had to change. After several conversations with my new boss, it became clear that the organization was more concerned about keeping my very senior customers happy than in keeping me healthy and happy. No relief would be coming, but I was assured that I was very good at this work. After an unusually frightening dream about the same time, I knew I had to leave. I began the process of planning for an end-of-the-summer departure. I was quite transparent with my boss and his boss about planning for an August separation.
I had no other job from which to make money, and I really need serious income for several years yet I knew I needed to take care of myself. My friends worried a bit more than I did about how I would live, but as soon as I got very clear about needing to move on, I had faith that something would work out. My big focus was on getting my clients, most of whom I'd worked with for years, to a good transition point. I learned about a month ago that the boss didn't really think I'd go, but he obviously doesn't know my courage when my spiritual path has become clear to me, and it had become very clear to me.
As soon as I had become very clear, out of the blue I received a call from a potential employer. Job announcements began falling into my email inbox with regularity. Even USAJobs, which has seldom had appropriate jobs, sent me a promising vacancy announcement. I am now just five weeks from my departure date, and I have two very strong prospects, each of which allows me to work in my "sweet spot," and each of which will be a significant increase in income. Perhaps as encouraging is that along the way as I networked with former bosses and colleagues, I found great sources for independent contract work.
In parallel, I realized how my work situation has made me unavailable for time with friends and even to pursue a primary relationship. In fact, for the first time in a long time, I added up how many years it had been since I'd had more than a date or two with someone. It wasn't an acceptable number. I began focusing my intention on at least meeting some men. I had first dates with people I would have just checked off my list a year ago. Most of them weren't serious prospects, but I was at least getting out and sending the Universe a message that I was serious.
Along the way, something else happened. While I just didn't have much in common with most of these men, there was another category. The only way I can describe them is "Really?!" The one who pronounced that he had two other women in his life but would like to add others. "Really?!" There was one who was married but said his wife was OK with him dating others. "Really?!" Last week, there was one who seriously treated me like a child. "Really?!" I wanted to add, "What do I look like?" but the truth is, I probably looked like a doormat, both at work and in my personal life.
I like to be nice to people. If I have ever been rude, it was either because I was tired or didn't realize what I was doing. In each of these cases, I just walked out. The last one in the middle of dinner at a famous-chef restaurant that I really love. As a serious foodie, that should have been hard, but it wasn't. Following each of these, someone more interesting followed. I'm still not there yet, but...progress.
In the 2006 movie "The Holiday," one of two female leads, Iris, played by Kate Winslet, has also been down on her confidence and has allowed her former boyfriend to walk all over her. In the movie, she meets an octogenarian, who is former screenwriter. He begins "assigning" her movie viewing of classic films, all of which have strong women leads. After said boyfriend crosses the line yet one more time, she kicks him out of her life. He is incredulous. "What's gotten into you, Iris?" he asks.
After a pause, she replies, "I think it is something resembling gumption." And, away she sends him.
As I've been contemplating this post over the last few weeks, that scene and those words have played over and again in my mind. Where did my gumption go, and more importantly, how did I let it go. I have been a strong woman most of my adult life. Anyone who has known me before this century would certainly have laughed at the thought that I didn't have confidence. A former dance partner once remarked (paraphrased for the general audience) "You have more moxie than any man I know."
"Where did it go?" is still a question I ponder, but mostly, I don't care. What I am passionate about is sustaining it into what feels to me like the next phase of my life--one that promises to be the best ever.
While both personally and professionally my life has been about helping others, I now know that I can't sustain my help for others if I don't take care of my first. How many coaching clients have I reminded that the airlines always warn us to put the oxygen mask over our own faces before attempting to help children around us. On this turn of the hero's journey, I've gotten this lesson differently than I had before. Saying "Sorry, I can't help me, I need to take care of myself," really is uncomfortable to even consider, but, whatever comes next, that is a clear boundary that I must enforce.
Before eating, I had finished a novel that I started a month ago on my staycation. In it the main characters started the book as boys, and by the end, they had become old men with failing eyesight. The book left me in a reflective space, which may have spawned my breakfast reverie. I've been thinking about this post for some time. For once I am not going to use the excuse of no time to write. If you had asked I wouldn't have known why I hadn't written, but this morning I know that I just hadn't had enough perspective.
I believe the expression "When the student is ready, the teacher will appear" came from the I Ching, but I also believe that a number of Eastern philosophies hold something similar to be true. During my outdoor breakfast contemplation this morning, the pieces began to fall into place for me. I, as the student, must be ready because lots of opportunities to learn a similar lesson have appeared.
During my four-month detail last fall and early winter, I became keenly aware that my life had spun totally out of control in recent years--to the extent that my physical and mental health were being compromised and my relationships were back-burnered, awaiting that precious "time" for nurturing. Certainly, time for writing, which really nourishes my soul, had become a low priority. I fell asleep from exhaustion when I tried to meditate. I had to be away from my long-standing, abusive work environment to get the perspective to recognize that.
In those treasured four months, I was able to see what had evaded me for so long. In my situation I had lost either the self-respect or the self-confidence to set and stick to my boundaries. When I returned to my permanent job, I wrote in big block letters with a box around them on the whiteboard behind my desk, where I looked at it every time I entered my office, "boundary clarity."
In a matter of days, I was tested. An unsustainable level of dark work again began flowing at me from very high places. Encouraged by my "boundary clarity" reminder, I began telling my clients that I would work with them, but it would be three months, four months, and even five months later. I brought in a contractor to do work with one client organization, which had needs that wouldn't wait. Still, the darkness and the volume of the work were too much.
Within a month I knew something had to change. After several conversations with my new boss, it became clear that the organization was more concerned about keeping my very senior customers happy than in keeping me healthy and happy. No relief would be coming, but I was assured that I was very good at this work. After an unusually frightening dream about the same time, I knew I had to leave. I began the process of planning for an end-of-the-summer departure. I was quite transparent with my boss and his boss about planning for an August separation.
I had no other job from which to make money, and I really need serious income for several years yet I knew I needed to take care of myself. My friends worried a bit more than I did about how I would live, but as soon as I got very clear about needing to move on, I had faith that something would work out. My big focus was on getting my clients, most of whom I'd worked with for years, to a good transition point. I learned about a month ago that the boss didn't really think I'd go, but he obviously doesn't know my courage when my spiritual path has become clear to me, and it had become very clear to me.
As soon as I had become very clear, out of the blue I received a call from a potential employer. Job announcements began falling into my email inbox with regularity. Even USAJobs, which has seldom had appropriate jobs, sent me a promising vacancy announcement. I am now just five weeks from my departure date, and I have two very strong prospects, each of which allows me to work in my "sweet spot," and each of which will be a significant increase in income. Perhaps as encouraging is that along the way as I networked with former bosses and colleagues, I found great sources for independent contract work.
In parallel, I realized how my work situation has made me unavailable for time with friends and even to pursue a primary relationship. In fact, for the first time in a long time, I added up how many years it had been since I'd had more than a date or two with someone. It wasn't an acceptable number. I began focusing my intention on at least meeting some men. I had first dates with people I would have just checked off my list a year ago. Most of them weren't serious prospects, but I was at least getting out and sending the Universe a message that I was serious.
Along the way, something else happened. While I just didn't have much in common with most of these men, there was another category. The only way I can describe them is "Really?!" The one who pronounced that he had two other women in his life but would like to add others. "Really?!" There was one who was married but said his wife was OK with him dating others. "Really?!" Last week, there was one who seriously treated me like a child. "Really?!" I wanted to add, "What do I look like?" but the truth is, I probably looked like a doormat, both at work and in my personal life.
I like to be nice to people. If I have ever been rude, it was either because I was tired or didn't realize what I was doing. In each of these cases, I just walked out. The last one in the middle of dinner at a famous-chef restaurant that I really love. As a serious foodie, that should have been hard, but it wasn't. Following each of these, someone more interesting followed. I'm still not there yet, but...progress.
In the 2006 movie "The Holiday," one of two female leads, Iris, played by Kate Winslet, has also been down on her confidence and has allowed her former boyfriend to walk all over her. In the movie, she meets an octogenarian, who is former screenwriter. He begins "assigning" her movie viewing of classic films, all of which have strong women leads. After said boyfriend crosses the line yet one more time, she kicks him out of her life. He is incredulous. "What's gotten into you, Iris?" he asks.
After a pause, she replies, "I think it is something resembling gumption." And, away she sends him.
As I've been contemplating this post over the last few weeks, that scene and those words have played over and again in my mind. Where did my gumption go, and more importantly, how did I let it go. I have been a strong woman most of my adult life. Anyone who has known me before this century would certainly have laughed at the thought that I didn't have confidence. A former dance partner once remarked (paraphrased for the general audience) "You have more moxie than any man I know."
"Where did it go?" is still a question I ponder, but mostly, I don't care. What I am passionate about is sustaining it into what feels to me like the next phase of my life--one that promises to be the best ever.
While both personally and professionally my life has been about helping others, I now know that I can't sustain my help for others if I don't take care of my first. How many coaching clients have I reminded that the airlines always warn us to put the oxygen mask over our own faces before attempting to help children around us. On this turn of the hero's journey, I've gotten this lesson differently than I had before. Saying "Sorry, I can't help me, I need to take care of myself," really is uncomfortable to even consider, but, whatever comes next, that is a clear boundary that I must enforce.
Sunday, June 5, 2016
Spiritual Amnesia
In her popular book The Hero Within Jungian psychologist and writer Carol Pearson wrote about a lifelong journey through several archetypes--the innocent, the orphan, the magician, the wanderer, the martyr, and the warrior. Each archetype teaches us a lesson. For instance, the Warrior archetype teaches us the spiritual lesson of power, and the Wanderer shows us clarity.
Pearson describes our journey as a wheel, and life takes us through each of these life lessons several times. During each successive turn of the wheel, we are to master a more spiritually evolved degree of the lesson. For instance, I believe (I hope!) that I am now ending a turn at the Wanderer archetype. During the first pass through the Wanderer archetype we feel isolation, even alienation. In the second turn of the Hero's Wheel, we embark on a quest, flee captivity, and find treasure within ourselves. When we traverse Wanderer territory the third time, we discover to be one's Self and to have love and community.
Since these turns of the wheel may be decades apart, at first the archetypical spiritual lesson may feel new and foreign, but my experience has been to fairly quickly recall the lessons that we have already learned as we struggle to master the next level assignment. Passage through each archetype may take months or even years, but I have felt a blinding moment of Truth in which I finally "get it," and then I am free to move on to the next lesson. And, yes, if we are conscious, there is always "the next lesson" in yet another archetype.
I have certainly experienced what Pearson describes. I can look back at periods in my life and recall which archetypical spiritual lessons I was working on at different times. However, I have also experienced a similar or parallel process. For lack of something better to call it, let's just describe them as lapses into and out of spiritual amnesia. I suddenly think that I have had an epiphany: I see some aspect of the world in a different way. I am awash with spiritual liberation, as if I have just broken free of the bonds of some aspect of ignorance. In that moment I feel like God has pulled back the veil of the Universe and allowed me to peek at how it all works.
Yesterday I wrote about using Sister Joan Chittister's description of contemplation as seeing the world as God does. In my meditation I placed myself in the position of looking at me as if from God's perspective where I was able to see my struggle as a device to gain strength for whatever is next.
This morning I took Chittister's wisdom more literally. As my contemplation continued, as each thought or person bubbled into my awareness, I stilled my mind of its normal chatter and tried to see the person as God would. Suddenly, I thought: that is the point--to see each person as a child of God. Almost as quickly, it occurred to me that to see each person as a child of God will require continuous contemplation. My meditation cannot be 20 minutes set aside once or twice a day, but instead it must become a constant exercise of looking at the person in front of me at any time as if from God's eyes.
What a breakthrough, you may think. Sadly, it is not. Only a reemergence from spiritual amnesia for the umpteenth time. Probably the favorite speech I ever gave was about just this practice. Although I composed the speech in the early 2000s right after finishing The Game Called Life, "The Walk of Faith--Living a Prayer in the Real World" felt to me at the time as an outline for yet another book. "Living a prayer" described the continuous contemplation required to live in complete consciousness.
A few years earlier I had a related epiphany that the only way we as human beings have to know God is through other humans who so reflect the presence of Love that we can feel the Universe through them. During that period I would look for opportunities to visualize myself allowing God to use me as a human vessel for allowing those around me to know that complete feeling of Love that is God. I believe that is one of the most important lessons that the spiritual teacher Jesus was attempting to share with us as he allowed us to know God through him.
These are three distinctly different periods during which I clearly knew different aspects of the lesson that I seemed to discover anew today. Why, then, can I not seem to remember it? Maybe more accurately, what causes me to forget? Most importantly, how can I assure that I do remember for more than days or months but for the rest of my life? Sometimes my spiritual learning feels like the movie "Groundhog Day," in which every day was just the same with no forward movement. I am ready to move on from spiritual stuckness.
I ended the "Living a Prayer" speech by saying there is a ribbon of love that connects all of us, heart to heart, around the world. The ribbon of love can be activated by each of us, but if any of us fails to do our part, a short circuit occurs which stops the flow of love. Whenever someone crosses my path, it is my responsibility to activate the flow of love. For years I've talked about being response-able, which implies being conscious of choosing the response I want to send into the world. I want to choose love. I want to have the force of love that is God reflected from me to everyone I meet.
Pearson describes our journey as a wheel, and life takes us through each of these life lessons several times. During each successive turn of the wheel, we are to master a more spiritually evolved degree of the lesson. For instance, I believe (I hope!) that I am now ending a turn at the Wanderer archetype. During the first pass through the Wanderer archetype we feel isolation, even alienation. In the second turn of the Hero's Wheel, we embark on a quest, flee captivity, and find treasure within ourselves. When we traverse Wanderer territory the third time, we discover to be one's Self and to have love and community.
Since these turns of the wheel may be decades apart, at first the archetypical spiritual lesson may feel new and foreign, but my experience has been to fairly quickly recall the lessons that we have already learned as we struggle to master the next level assignment. Passage through each archetype may take months or even years, but I have felt a blinding moment of Truth in which I finally "get it," and then I am free to move on to the next lesson. And, yes, if we are conscious, there is always "the next lesson" in yet another archetype.
I have certainly experienced what Pearson describes. I can look back at periods in my life and recall which archetypical spiritual lessons I was working on at different times. However, I have also experienced a similar or parallel process. For lack of something better to call it, let's just describe them as lapses into and out of spiritual amnesia. I suddenly think that I have had an epiphany: I see some aspect of the world in a different way. I am awash with spiritual liberation, as if I have just broken free of the bonds of some aspect of ignorance. In that moment I feel like God has pulled back the veil of the Universe and allowed me to peek at how it all works.
Yesterday I wrote about using Sister Joan Chittister's description of contemplation as seeing the world as God does. In my meditation I placed myself in the position of looking at me as if from God's perspective where I was able to see my struggle as a device to gain strength for whatever is next.
This morning I took Chittister's wisdom more literally. As my contemplation continued, as each thought or person bubbled into my awareness, I stilled my mind of its normal chatter and tried to see the person as God would. Suddenly, I thought: that is the point--to see each person as a child of God. Almost as quickly, it occurred to me that to see each person as a child of God will require continuous contemplation. My meditation cannot be 20 minutes set aside once or twice a day, but instead it must become a constant exercise of looking at the person in front of me at any time as if from God's eyes.
What a breakthrough, you may think. Sadly, it is not. Only a reemergence from spiritual amnesia for the umpteenth time. Probably the favorite speech I ever gave was about just this practice. Although I composed the speech in the early 2000s right after finishing The Game Called Life, "The Walk of Faith--Living a Prayer in the Real World" felt to me at the time as an outline for yet another book. "Living a prayer" described the continuous contemplation required to live in complete consciousness.
A few years earlier I had a related epiphany that the only way we as human beings have to know God is through other humans who so reflect the presence of Love that we can feel the Universe through them. During that period I would look for opportunities to visualize myself allowing God to use me as a human vessel for allowing those around me to know that complete feeling of Love that is God. I believe that is one of the most important lessons that the spiritual teacher Jesus was attempting to share with us as he allowed us to know God through him.
These are three distinctly different periods during which I clearly knew different aspects of the lesson that I seemed to discover anew today. Why, then, can I not seem to remember it? Maybe more accurately, what causes me to forget? Most importantly, how can I assure that I do remember for more than days or months but for the rest of my life? Sometimes my spiritual learning feels like the movie "Groundhog Day," in which every day was just the same with no forward movement. I am ready to move on from spiritual stuckness.
I ended the "Living a Prayer" speech by saying there is a ribbon of love that connects all of us, heart to heart, around the world. The ribbon of love can be activated by each of us, but if any of us fails to do our part, a short circuit occurs which stops the flow of love. Whenever someone crosses my path, it is my responsibility to activate the flow of love. For years I've talked about being response-able, which implies being conscious of choosing the response I want to send into the world. I want to choose love. I want to have the force of love that is God reflected from me to everyone I meet.
Monday, January 25, 2016
Getting lost
Two weeks ago was the Epiphany on the Christian calendar. For those who don't know the significance of that day, it marks the day in which the wise men or kings arrived to honor the baby Jesus after following the star as their guide. In some cultures Christmas Eve/Christmas Day marks the beginning of the celebration of the holiday, which for them ends on January 6, when Twelfth Night celebrations occur. The giving of gifts at that time mirrors the gifts the magi brought to the infant.
Anyone who has lived through the drum of Christmas carols on elevator and department store music or even read William Shakespeare's "The Twelfth Night" probably at least vaguely knows about those events or traditions. "We Three Kings of Orient Are" "The Twelve Days of Christmas," "O Little Town of Bethlehem," etc. My interest in these events is more than what I've learned from piped-in music. I've actually studied these events at some length.
I love to learn. I particularly like to learn something that adds to or alters an understanding that was pretty well entrenched for me. (For instance, maybe this week the discovery of the likelihood of a new planet.) So it was two weeks ago on Epiphany, when our pastor shared that the kings didn't actually arrive in Bethlehem directly. They actually went to Jerusalem first, which was about 12 miles from Bethlehem. They got lost before correcting their course and making their objective.
He went on to compare the journey of the kings with any spiritual journey. Sometimes we get lost. Yesterday I wrote of getting lost on my journey to be present and grateful. I think there have been times when I was very good at that. Then I got lost. I am sure the kings didn't know the first step that took them away from their intended destination, but as some point they became aware that they were 12 miles from where they wanted to be. I don't know when I began to stray either, but I clearly had.
What I do know is that it was easier when I had my own business. I worked very hard, but I could pick and choose my work, and I could delay work when it would keep me from being really focused on something I was already working on. For many years, clients booked several months in advance to do my intensives or to schedule a speech, usually around my schedule.
I've made it up that I can't do that when someone else is my boss. I say I've made that up because I mostly haven't tried saying to my boss that I am overbooked when being given a new task. I haven't been clear about when my boundaries were being crossed. I haven't said to someone that I want to talk with them later but right now I need to be present to what I am doing. I can't say that I could be more present because I haven't tried all the things my colleague has demonstrated to me so nicely.
I also wrote yesterday about circumstances being laboratories for personal growth. Yes, it was easier to really be present when I controlled most of the variables, so that may have been "Being Present 101." My real job that I will go back to next week will probably be the graduate school version of that lesson.
In one of her books, Carol Pearson wrote about the Hero's Journey like concentric circles. She says that we learn the same lessons (or live the same archetypes) over and again, but each time what we learn is supposed to be different--a more advanced lesson. I like to think that maybe I've just been in a more challenging lesson, but when the pastor spoke of being lost, it really resonated for me. I have felt lost, but am learning.
While there is something heavy about the inevitability of learning the same lessons over and over again like "Ground Hog Day," I find it uplifting that if I am awake enough to see the lessons and learn them, I keep growing...and I will keep growing for as long as I notice the lesson. For someone who likes to learn, that is a delicious prospect.
Anyone who has lived through the drum of Christmas carols on elevator and department store music or even read William Shakespeare's "The Twelfth Night" probably at least vaguely knows about those events or traditions. "We Three Kings of Orient Are" "The Twelve Days of Christmas," "O Little Town of Bethlehem," etc. My interest in these events is more than what I've learned from piped-in music. I've actually studied these events at some length.
I love to learn. I particularly like to learn something that adds to or alters an understanding that was pretty well entrenched for me. (For instance, maybe this week the discovery of the likelihood of a new planet.) So it was two weeks ago on Epiphany, when our pastor shared that the kings didn't actually arrive in Bethlehem directly. They actually went to Jerusalem first, which was about 12 miles from Bethlehem. They got lost before correcting their course and making their objective.
He went on to compare the journey of the kings with any spiritual journey. Sometimes we get lost. Yesterday I wrote of getting lost on my journey to be present and grateful. I think there have been times when I was very good at that. Then I got lost. I am sure the kings didn't know the first step that took them away from their intended destination, but as some point they became aware that they were 12 miles from where they wanted to be. I don't know when I began to stray either, but I clearly had.
What I do know is that it was easier when I had my own business. I worked very hard, but I could pick and choose my work, and I could delay work when it would keep me from being really focused on something I was already working on. For many years, clients booked several months in advance to do my intensives or to schedule a speech, usually around my schedule.
I've made it up that I can't do that when someone else is my boss. I say I've made that up because I mostly haven't tried saying to my boss that I am overbooked when being given a new task. I haven't been clear about when my boundaries were being crossed. I haven't said to someone that I want to talk with them later but right now I need to be present to what I am doing. I can't say that I could be more present because I haven't tried all the things my colleague has demonstrated to me so nicely.
I also wrote yesterday about circumstances being laboratories for personal growth. Yes, it was easier to really be present when I controlled most of the variables, so that may have been "Being Present 101." My real job that I will go back to next week will probably be the graduate school version of that lesson.
In one of her books, Carol Pearson wrote about the Hero's Journey like concentric circles. She says that we learn the same lessons (or live the same archetypes) over and again, but each time what we learn is supposed to be different--a more advanced lesson. I like to think that maybe I've just been in a more challenging lesson, but when the pastor spoke of being lost, it really resonated for me. I have felt lost, but am learning.
While there is something heavy about the inevitability of learning the same lessons over and over again like "Ground Hog Day," I find it uplifting that if I am awake enough to see the lessons and learn them, I keep growing...and I will keep growing for as long as I notice the lesson. For someone who likes to learn, that is a delicious prospect.
Friday, January 30, 2015
Knowing My Shadow
Personal growth has often been described as being like an onion: every time you complete one layer, there's another under it. The one under it is smaller but more intense, challenging the person on that journey to use everything learned in other layers to continue to progress. Often, it is so much tougher, the traveler doesn't feel like it is actually progress.
Jungians describe personal growth as a "hero's journey," also a circular sequence of lessons, but they would say that the one on the journey of growth is learning a series of successively more challenging lessons in a repeated set of archetypes, such as the lover, the warrior, or the magician.
One of my weaknesses is my appetite for books which significantly exceeds my time and energy for reading. Another is that I am easily distracted by the lure of a new book when the one I am reading ceases to fully engage me. The consequence is that, at any time, my nightstand hosts anywhere from six to ten books in some stage of reading, often overflowing to the floor beside it.
At the first of the year, while flirting with another new book, I looked at the daunting pile, and, after a deep sigh, I decided that I had to surrender to some of the ones on my nightstand before starting another. I slowly looked through them, sorting into two stacks--ones that I really wanted to finish and ones with which I'd become bored and was ready to quit. Sadly, when I finished my sort, they were all in the same stack--those that I really wanted to finish. After another deep sigh, I decided to pick one to concentrate on finishing first.
The one that I chose to start with had been a gift from friends who are also consciously on a growth journey. Falling Upward by Richard Rohr takes a different spin on the journey. He says we have one set of lessons in the first half of life and a different set for the second. His book was to be a guide for the second half.
I remember struggling with the first third of the book. I wanted to stay with it because I knew that, if my friends thought it was a fit, there must be something of value for me. Yet struggle I did. Although I was solidly in the second half of life, was my resistance to admitting so?
For whatever reason I found the book difficult, I've picked the book up a few times a year, read a page or two, and then placed it back in the stack for a few more months. And, for whatever reason that it has a different appeal to me this time, Falling Upward has completely engaged me. There is an Eastern philosophy that says, when the student is ready, the teacher will appear. Perhaps I had finally gotten to the place in the book that was interesting to me, or perhaps, I as the student was finally ready to hear its message.
The content that has intrigued me is about the role of exploring the shadow in the second half of life. The shadow is also a Jungian concept, but I've most often heard it described as our dark side--thus the name "shadow."
Rohr, by contrast, proposes that our shadow side is comprised as our weaknesses. Think of my overactive hunger for books and my habit of abandoning one I am reading for another. Those, who have read this blog for awhile, might also remember my addiction to sugar or my struggle to get back to my 30-year fitness regimen which was abandoned when I started working ridiculously long hours two years ago.
Suddenly, I had a whole different perspective on the shadow, and, almost as quickly, I realized much, if not all, of my posts in this blog have been an exploration of what Rohr described as my shadow side. It would seem that I have intuitively stumbled into this second half of life work without realizing what was occurring.
As I've laid my struggles with my "weaknesses" out in front of me for the whole world to see, I've often wondered why I would want to do that. Rohr says that owning our weaknesses results in a humility that is characteristic of the second half of life. I have certainly been humbled by my "weaknesses," which I prefer to call my life lessons.
While I haven't finished Falling Upward, I am near enough to know there is real truth in the shadow work. Yet on my journey, I've experienced a real sense of urgency about fully using my gifts and talents and being of service--an urgency to assure that I don't squander the precious opportunity that this life offers me to leave the world a better place--while feeling myself regularly thwarted in that resolve, often by my shadow.
A couple decades ago, someone wrote a book entitled something like The Destination is the Quality of the Journey. I never read it but I've loved the title. I have discovered that at this point in my life I am much less tolerant of goals and making things happen than I am with allowing and enjoying what wants to happen.
That change in perspective has certainly been enabled by the humility of admitting that some things are just not going to happen or at least not going to happen in my schedule. There was a time when I thought that determination and perseverance were good things. Now in my second half of life work I wonder if they weren't just part of my shadow, robbing me of the freedom to just enjoy life.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
Jungians describe personal growth as a "hero's journey," also a circular sequence of lessons, but they would say that the one on the journey of growth is learning a series of successively more challenging lessons in a repeated set of archetypes, such as the lover, the warrior, or the magician.
One of my weaknesses is my appetite for books which significantly exceeds my time and energy for reading. Another is that I am easily distracted by the lure of a new book when the one I am reading ceases to fully engage me. The consequence is that, at any time, my nightstand hosts anywhere from six to ten books in some stage of reading, often overflowing to the floor beside it.
At the first of the year, while flirting with another new book, I looked at the daunting pile, and, after a deep sigh, I decided that I had to surrender to some of the ones on my nightstand before starting another. I slowly looked through them, sorting into two stacks--ones that I really wanted to finish and ones with which I'd become bored and was ready to quit. Sadly, when I finished my sort, they were all in the same stack--those that I really wanted to finish. After another deep sigh, I decided to pick one to concentrate on finishing first.
The one that I chose to start with had been a gift from friends who are also consciously on a growth journey. Falling Upward by Richard Rohr takes a different spin on the journey. He says we have one set of lessons in the first half of life and a different set for the second. His book was to be a guide for the second half.
I remember struggling with the first third of the book. I wanted to stay with it because I knew that, if my friends thought it was a fit, there must be something of value for me. Yet struggle I did. Although I was solidly in the second half of life, was my resistance to admitting so?
For whatever reason I found the book difficult, I've picked the book up a few times a year, read a page or two, and then placed it back in the stack for a few more months. And, for whatever reason that it has a different appeal to me this time, Falling Upward has completely engaged me. There is an Eastern philosophy that says, when the student is ready, the teacher will appear. Perhaps I had finally gotten to the place in the book that was interesting to me, or perhaps, I as the student was finally ready to hear its message.
The content that has intrigued me is about the role of exploring the shadow in the second half of life. The shadow is also a Jungian concept, but I've most often heard it described as our dark side--thus the name "shadow."
Rohr, by contrast, proposes that our shadow side is comprised as our weaknesses. Think of my overactive hunger for books and my habit of abandoning one I am reading for another. Those, who have read this blog for awhile, might also remember my addiction to sugar or my struggle to get back to my 30-year fitness regimen which was abandoned when I started working ridiculously long hours two years ago.
Suddenly, I had a whole different perspective on the shadow, and, almost as quickly, I realized much, if not all, of my posts in this blog have been an exploration of what Rohr described as my shadow side. It would seem that I have intuitively stumbled into this second half of life work without realizing what was occurring.
As I've laid my struggles with my "weaknesses" out in front of me for the whole world to see, I've often wondered why I would want to do that. Rohr says that owning our weaknesses results in a humility that is characteristic of the second half of life. I have certainly been humbled by my "weaknesses," which I prefer to call my life lessons.
While I haven't finished Falling Upward, I am near enough to know there is real truth in the shadow work. Yet on my journey, I've experienced a real sense of urgency about fully using my gifts and talents and being of service--an urgency to assure that I don't squander the precious opportunity that this life offers me to leave the world a better place--while feeling myself regularly thwarted in that resolve, often by my shadow.
A couple decades ago, someone wrote a book entitled something like The Destination is the Quality of the Journey. I never read it but I've loved the title. I have discovered that at this point in my life I am much less tolerant of goals and making things happen than I am with allowing and enjoying what wants to happen.
That change in perspective has certainly been enabled by the humility of admitting that some things are just not going to happen or at least not going to happen in my schedule. There was a time when I thought that determination and perseverance were good things. Now in my second half of life work I wonder if they weren't just part of my shadow, robbing me of the freedom to just enjoy life.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
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