I pondered what is "guidance," as I arrived on this meditational journey. Was it the inner whisperings I heard from within to go to the Peloponnese? Was it messages from four people immediately before my journey that I should go to Santorini and Crete? Was it something I'd found in a file from my last journey to Greece 16 years earlier, which particularly resonated with me now? The answer I believe is "yes."
I found important lessons in Peloponnese. I learned a lot from listening at other places. Perhaps the most surprising have been the lessons learned on Santorini. When each of the friends who advised I come here did so, I always said I liked to avoid tourist places. The answer was always that I must come here. So I did.
I admit that I was more than a little grouchy upon my arrival yesterday. I don't believe I've ever been to a more touristy spot. There was literally not a thing that spoke of integrity with the local region. Most infuriating was the perfect English all about me. Was I in Greece or a local Greek cafe in Washington?
I was immediately convinced that this most photographed place in Greece had only been accomplished by excellent cropping of photos. That would have been the only way not to include unabashed tourist-mongering.
Yet, I was sure I was sent here. How could any wise guide have brought me to such a place, I had asked in my prayer time this morning?
The answer was immediate and clear: find peace and stillness amidst the chaos. That would be a challenge. But I set about to find it.
My guidebook purported three nearby towns which required enough effort to find that only the most determined of guests attempted. Then over breakfast I found a boat trip to out-islands. I booked for tomorrow.
As I hiked to other towns, I was surprised at how quickly the noise of the maddening crowds quieted. In Imerovigli I found a small chapel where I sat for some time. I had truly found peace in the silence.
Just as I had that thought, I heard the Universe laughing at me with the challenge to find peace IN the chaos not withdrawn from it. I chuckled. There are still more ways to find peace in the chaos. The hardest lay ahead: surrounded by the tourists and the hockers.
What echoes in my mind is the parallel with traditional meditation when the mind spins, and the meditator is challenged to still the mind and find peace. It is the same lesson. I am not sure that one ever ends for most of us.
After a lunch break away from that maddening crowd, I am now ready to move to the next lesson: find peace IN the chaos.
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Showing posts with label chaos. Show all posts
Showing posts with label chaos. Show all posts
Friday, October 3, 2014
Wednesday, February 19, 2014
Expecting the Unexpected
There is a corollary in physics that order is always implicit in chaos, and chaos is always implicit in order. Most of us have probably had a time in our lives where things were going great, and all of the sudden something unexpected totally upended our lives: chaos being implicit in order. Most of us can probably also remember a time when things just seemed so crazy that they made no sense at all and then suddenly like pieces of a puzzle, everything fell into place, revealing a new reality that couldn't have been imagined just before.
My day started with almost back-to-back reports of massive protests and violence in the Ukraine and Venezuela. A report followed shortly thereafter that Mississippi seems to have reverted back 60 years with a noose incident on the statue of James Meredith, the first black student at the University of Mississippi. Of course, the incident generated protests there as well. Violence continues in Syria, the Central African Republic, and South Sudan.
When I went to bed, I had been watching stories from the Winter Olympics where the Canadian son of a Chinese immigrant trains for men's figure skating in Detroit, while the winner of the gold in that event was a young Japanese man who trains in Toronto. Then, of course, there was the Kazakhstani son of Korean parents, who has trained in Russia and now lives and trains in California. I cannot neglect to mention the Russian hockey player, who is star of the Washington (DC) Capitals, who is competing for Russia, or the Russian snowboarder whose parents took jobs in Switzerland when he was young. In Vancouver, he competed for Russia; this time he wore Swiss colors. Not only did the world seem orderly, but I felt the coming together, which I believe is our destiny to claim.
How my consciousness was jarred this morning with chaos on my clock radio even before I was out of my bed. Was this the same world that put me to bed? All day I've felt a sense of spiritual confusion. Yet, I know that chaos has been the vehicle for a global outpouring of love before. I recall the week in which we lost Princess Diana, Mother Teresa, and Sir George Schulte. For a few days the world stilled, grieved, and loved. Millions wept together. And can anyone who was alive and over 10 forget the daily crumbling of the former Soviet Bloc. That chaos, which preceded the order of new states emerging, has often been followed by more chaos, such as in the Ukraine today.
I cannot forget, personally, how the chaos of a spontaneously breaking neck led me to finally realize my passion for dance nearly 20 years ago. I am most grateful for the pain that brought me to dance.
Maybe expecting the unexpected should be the order of the day every day. If God is mystery, perhaps any time that we begin to think we know how things are is just the time God shows us that we really don't know. We are reminded to reach out. Certainly at times of change in either direction are times that we often utter prayers, either of gratitude or pleas for help and mercy. Tonight as I say my prayers, I will offer both: a prayer of gratitude for peace, order, and sanity in Sochi and another prayer for help and mercy in places plagued with violence all around the world.
My day started with almost back-to-back reports of massive protests and violence in the Ukraine and Venezuela. A report followed shortly thereafter that Mississippi seems to have reverted back 60 years with a noose incident on the statue of James Meredith, the first black student at the University of Mississippi. Of course, the incident generated protests there as well. Violence continues in Syria, the Central African Republic, and South Sudan.
When I went to bed, I had been watching stories from the Winter Olympics where the Canadian son of a Chinese immigrant trains for men's figure skating in Detroit, while the winner of the gold in that event was a young Japanese man who trains in Toronto. Then, of course, there was the Kazakhstani son of Korean parents, who has trained in Russia and now lives and trains in California. I cannot neglect to mention the Russian hockey player, who is star of the Washington (DC) Capitals, who is competing for Russia, or the Russian snowboarder whose parents took jobs in Switzerland when he was young. In Vancouver, he competed for Russia; this time he wore Swiss colors. Not only did the world seem orderly, but I felt the coming together, which I believe is our destiny to claim.
How my consciousness was jarred this morning with chaos on my clock radio even before I was out of my bed. Was this the same world that put me to bed? All day I've felt a sense of spiritual confusion. Yet, I know that chaos has been the vehicle for a global outpouring of love before. I recall the week in which we lost Princess Diana, Mother Teresa, and Sir George Schulte. For a few days the world stilled, grieved, and loved. Millions wept together. And can anyone who was alive and over 10 forget the daily crumbling of the former Soviet Bloc. That chaos, which preceded the order of new states emerging, has often been followed by more chaos, such as in the Ukraine today.
I cannot forget, personally, how the chaos of a spontaneously breaking neck led me to finally realize my passion for dance nearly 20 years ago. I am most grateful for the pain that brought me to dance.
Maybe expecting the unexpected should be the order of the day every day. If God is mystery, perhaps any time that we begin to think we know how things are is just the time God shows us that we really don't know. We are reminded to reach out. Certainly at times of change in either direction are times that we often utter prayers, either of gratitude or pleas for help and mercy. Tonight as I say my prayers, I will offer both: a prayer of gratitude for peace, order, and sanity in Sochi and another prayer for help and mercy in places plagued with violence all around the world.
Wednesday, November 20, 2013
Not-knowing as a Way of Life
Most of the time I sit quietly before writing this blog, and a topic gently floats into my awareness. Then I write. Not so today. Sometimes it feels to me like the Universe is beating me over the head with a topic that I need to revisit. So it is with not-knowing as a way of life. I've been writing about it for at least two decades, and I am still a student of its wisdom. Everywhere I've turned in the last couple of weeks, I have found myself talking about this topic. I can really tell it is serious when I start nervous eating when I think of it. I am going to save myself a few thousand calories and explore it more.
There is a relationship between chaos, complexity, and spiritual growth. I've observed it in individuals; I've observed it in groups. The simplified, I'm-not-a-physicist explanation of chaos theory says that chaos is always implicit in order. The easy way to explain this is that no matter how much we think we know how things are in our lives, every now and then, the Universe sends us a learning moment. This happened to me when my husband came home from his run and told me he wanted a divorce. He was showered, shaved, packed, and gone in 30 minutes! Wow! I really didn't see that one coming.
I had a client once who came home to his "happy" home at the end of his normally long work day to find an empty house. I am not saying no one was at home, although that was true. I am saying it was empty. Not a lick of furniture...or anything else. Four walls: that was it. He says he had no clue. Someone else was awakened in the middle of the night with a call from the police, saying that his teenager had been arrested. One of the most fit 40-year-olds that I have known was diagnosed with Lou Gehrig's Disease. You get the idea: we are coasting along in la-la land, and something is hurled at us with no warning. That creates a moment...or many moments of chaos. If we are honest with ourselves in the moments that follow, we really are clueless about what is real.
In that period of exploration--for purposes of chaos theory, let's call it complexity--we know that the world is certainly not what we thought it was, but we are in the figurative "wilderness," trying to figure out what is true.
I have observed two ways in which people explore the "wilderness." The unconscious way takes many forms, but in short, this approach uses whatever will numb the reality that our life isn't as we thought. Drugs, alcohol, sex, food, starvation, purging, the three-gallons of ice cream break-up...you get the idea. Inevitably, if we take that journey, weeks, months, or years down the line, knowing nothing more about what is real, we will have another wake-up call, telling us that our world isn't as we thought it was. Normally, a succession of wake-up calls will continue until the Universe has our full attention.
For those of you who have read my book The Game Called Life, this is the space where Lizzie found herself when she fell across her steering wheel, sobbing for help, "There has to be a better way."
Let's call that the second way, what I call "not-knowing." In this approach, we can engage the wilderness. I would like to distinguish "not-knowing" from "I don't know." "I don't know" is passive. It is the shrug of the shoulders of not caring.
"Not-knowing" by contrast is active. Instead of coasting through the wake-up call, we engage in self-exploration, attempting to know self and the world around us in a new way. "Not-knowing" embraces this transition as an opportunity to grow in wholeness. This is where Lizzie found herself after Helen answered her call for help.
If we kick around in "not-knowing" long enough, an Aha! moment inevitably burst into consciousness. Suddenly one day when we least expect it (walking down the street, and it hits you,) you will see the world in a whole new way. Almost always this new world offers rich possibilities we had not considered before.
For those who dislike uncertainty, I hate to relate that life is a sequence of wake-up calls: they cannot be avoided. "Not-knowing as a way of life" is an attitude toward life that assumes the chaos as a given. If chaos is always implicit in order, why not just accept it, embrace it, and flow with it. Life becomes a series of opportunities to learn and grow into ever expanding possibilities.
I am not a surfer, but this is how I imagine it must be life to go for ever bigger waves. What might once have been intimidating can become a real rush...without drugs, alcohol, sex, or any of those numbing agents...a natural high that leads higher and higher. Stepping into our potential by growing regularly, not just when the Universe grabs us by the scruff of the neck and says, "Hey, dude! Listen to me."
During a webinar that I took today, the facilitator teaching about improving communication and listening said, "Just assume you don't understand." She may have been talking about "not-knowing as a way of life." Just assume you don't understand, and embrace the adventure of learning and growth. What else is there that is really important?
There is a relationship between chaos, complexity, and spiritual growth. I've observed it in individuals; I've observed it in groups. The simplified, I'm-not-a-physicist explanation of chaos theory says that chaos is always implicit in order. The easy way to explain this is that no matter how much we think we know how things are in our lives, every now and then, the Universe sends us a learning moment. This happened to me when my husband came home from his run and told me he wanted a divorce. He was showered, shaved, packed, and gone in 30 minutes! Wow! I really didn't see that one coming.
I had a client once who came home to his "happy" home at the end of his normally long work day to find an empty house. I am not saying no one was at home, although that was true. I am saying it was empty. Not a lick of furniture...or anything else. Four walls: that was it. He says he had no clue. Someone else was awakened in the middle of the night with a call from the police, saying that his teenager had been arrested. One of the most fit 40-year-olds that I have known was diagnosed with Lou Gehrig's Disease. You get the idea: we are coasting along in la-la land, and something is hurled at us with no warning. That creates a moment...or many moments of chaos. If we are honest with ourselves in the moments that follow, we really are clueless about what is real.
In that period of exploration--for purposes of chaos theory, let's call it complexity--we know that the world is certainly not what we thought it was, but we are in the figurative "wilderness," trying to figure out what is true.
I have observed two ways in which people explore the "wilderness." The unconscious way takes many forms, but in short, this approach uses whatever will numb the reality that our life isn't as we thought. Drugs, alcohol, sex, food, starvation, purging, the three-gallons of ice cream break-up...you get the idea. Inevitably, if we take that journey, weeks, months, or years down the line, knowing nothing more about what is real, we will have another wake-up call, telling us that our world isn't as we thought it was. Normally, a succession of wake-up calls will continue until the Universe has our full attention.
For those of you who have read my book The Game Called Life, this is the space where Lizzie found herself when she fell across her steering wheel, sobbing for help, "There has to be a better way."
Let's call that the second way, what I call "not-knowing." In this approach, we can engage the wilderness. I would like to distinguish "not-knowing" from "I don't know." "I don't know" is passive. It is the shrug of the shoulders of not caring.
"Not-knowing" by contrast is active. Instead of coasting through the wake-up call, we engage in self-exploration, attempting to know self and the world around us in a new way. "Not-knowing" embraces this transition as an opportunity to grow in wholeness. This is where Lizzie found herself after Helen answered her call for help.
If we kick around in "not-knowing" long enough, an Aha! moment inevitably burst into consciousness. Suddenly one day when we least expect it (walking down the street, and it hits you,) you will see the world in a whole new way. Almost always this new world offers rich possibilities we had not considered before.
For those who dislike uncertainty, I hate to relate that life is a sequence of wake-up calls: they cannot be avoided. "Not-knowing as a way of life" is an attitude toward life that assumes the chaos as a given. If chaos is always implicit in order, why not just accept it, embrace it, and flow with it. Life becomes a series of opportunities to learn and grow into ever expanding possibilities.
I am not a surfer, but this is how I imagine it must be life to go for ever bigger waves. What might once have been intimidating can become a real rush...without drugs, alcohol, sex, or any of those numbing agents...a natural high that leads higher and higher. Stepping into our potential by growing regularly, not just when the Universe grabs us by the scruff of the neck and says, "Hey, dude! Listen to me."
During a webinar that I took today, the facilitator teaching about improving communication and listening said, "Just assume you don't understand." She may have been talking about "not-knowing as a way of life." Just assume you don't understand, and embrace the adventure of learning and growth. What else is there that is really important?
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