~ A Joy Warrior's Journey
Frost warnings went out last night.
Again, tonight, it’s a possibility.
As I walked across the lawn, I thought
it felt more like March than April.
Wait. What was that? A black netting
hanging from the jonquil. I walked
to the front of the garden, then stopped,
unbelieving. A swallowtail! So soon!
And in this cold! Oh, Springtime,
every single one of your gifts
comes as such a delightful surprise.
Because they could taste spring’s mild air even
when the world was frozen, their sap rose.
Because they spent the long winter dreaming
that robins built nests in their limbs, dreaming
that the world was green and that sunlight
danced warm and golden all around them,
buds formed at the tips of their branches.
Because their dreams were so vivid
that they heard the songs of summer winds
even as the snow piled around them,
their roots grew deeper, their trunks added rings.
Because they believed in springtime,
their leaves sprang forth.
I woke just before dawn yesterday morning. The birds hadn’t even begun to sing. I’m not an early riser. Yet here I was, wide awake. I made a cup of coffee and took it out to my front porch to experience the beginning of the day. As I took my first sip, I noticed a faint ribbon of pink just above the eastern hills, gradually growing brighter. Looking directly overhead, I saw that the sky had gone from dusky gray to a light blue graced by soft clouds. When I looked down again, a whole panoply of color was lighting the sky—pale gold, coral, robin’s egg blue, soft lavender. And as if to acknowledge the coming of another day, the birds woke and began their morning chorus.
I let myself drink in the peace of it. The world has been such a brutal place these last few weeks, its violence and mayhem loud and sickening. Yet here I was, enveloped in birdsong and sunrise, sipping freshly brewed coffee. I felt lucky, and grateful, and kind of humbled to be so blessed. But I wasn’t alone in that. More of us live unscathed by mayhem than are directly touched by it.
Most of us live our ordinary lives, attending to our daily routines and chores, relating in our usual ways with family and coworkers and friends. We share our smiles, and sometimes our tears. We share our rituals, our news, our opinions, our gossip. We play together. We squabble. We make up. All of us. All over the world. And isn’t that beautiful!
That we can go on, determined to live ordinary lives in the face of extraordinary times, is remarkable.
I read a couple paragraphs by American historian and professor Howard Zinn this week. He said:
“To be hopeful in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty, but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness.
“What we choose to emphasize in this complex history will determine our lives. If we see only the worst, it destroys our capacity to do something. If we remember those times and places—and there are so many—where people have behaved magnificently, this gives us the energy to act, and at least the possibility of sending this spinning top of a world in a different direction.”
I get the impression that Zinn is thinking of acts of high bravery and daring when he talks about how magnificently we can behave when tested. And indeed we can. But I think courage is more than the extraordinary act performed at great risk. I think it’s also the determination to go on living ordinary lives as well as we can even when the world seems upside-down. Our small acts of everyday generosity and compassion, consistently performed despite it all, are testimony to our courage.
Mark Twain had this to say about courage: “Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear – not absence of fear. Except a creature be part coward it is not a compliment to say it is brave.“
When we live our ordinary lives in the face of what seems almost omnipresent threats, we are being brave. By refusing to surrender to fear – however loudly and persistently the media screams about the world’s evils – we tell the world that it cannot take the best of us. We will behave magnificently, holding to the dignity of our ordinary lives. And sometimes we will pause to recognize that despite it all, we are surrounded by extraordinary goodness and beauty, and, sometimes, when we are bathed in sunrise and birdsong, we will savor long moments of transcendent peace.
Wishing you a week of courageous, ordinary, everyday life.
Warmly,
Susan
Everything has its own dance,
sings its own song. Listen
with your body, with your heart.
Feel the way things touch you
with the rhythm of their being.
Pay attention to the way
that they resonate inside you.
Ask yourself about the taste,
about the quality of sound
a thing creates. Take the flower
of the quince, for example.
Notice how its gentle sweetness
moves in a poignant waltz.
Close your eyes and feel its song
moving you, almost to tears.
Just days ago, the peonies poked through
the soil, their straight red shoots growing so fast
you could almost stand there and watch them
add inches. Then their leaves opened,
eager and bold, and they, too, could hardly
wait to add length and width to their size.
Yesterday rain came, and they drank as if
they were sailors and how they reeled
right there in the yard, whooping it up
with such boisterous joy that they almost
scared the blackbirds.
Under the overcast sky hauling in
its rain from the west, the colors
were subtle, as if this stretch of wetlands
was a pastel dream into which, by magic,
I had suddenly arrived. Riding
on the warm, moist air that brushed my face
was the sound of a distant train playing
bass to a chorus of hundreds of frogs.
Then raindrops woke me and I ran
for shelter through waves of grass
and dandelions, frog song in my wake
all the way home.
They were still asleep when I found them,
and although I was giddy with relief
that they were here, I quietly knelt
beside them and gazed at them.
What amazing dreams they must have
as their protective leaves open,
exposing them, for the very first time,
to light! Let them dream. Tomorrow
we will have more rain. Feel the moisture,
the dance of the air. Wonder about it.
Soon you will feel the light of morning’s
sun, and when you open and look around
the world will be beyond anything
you dreamed. And you, sweet ones,
will hold its beauty in the pastel cup
of your being. Meanwhile, sleep.
Sleep through the coming rain.
This is what got me through the winter,
the hope of one more spring, exactly
like this one, with its boisterous green
and ten thousand spring beauties
climbing the hill, afternoon sunshine
brushing them with its light.
And here it is. And here am I,
my hungry eyes drinking it in,
my face grinning, my heart
thumping out a mantra of thanks.
A whim took me off my usual route today,
just a light little tickle of a thought:
What’s up that hill?
The road leading up was potholed
and uninviting, lined with time-worn
houses in cramped, unkempt yards.
But still, I was drawn. And when I reached
the road’s end, I discovered what had called me–
a garden of phlox in full bloom nestled among rocks
beneath a blossom-filled tree.
It’s wise, I’ve learned, to follow the promptings
that playfully tease you to consider a change
of course. They often will lead you to wonders
that you otherwise wouldn’t have known.
I was half-way listening to some radio interview this week when something one of the guests said grabbed my attention: “Whoever presses your buttons is your master,” he said. How true!
Think about it. There you were, comfortably cruising along in your ordinary world when suddenly somebody stomped on one of your sensitivity buttons. Instant response! Hurt, anger, fight mode. Even if you just sat there hiding it all, inside you were engulfed in a turbulent emotional sea. And the waves just kept sloshing on and on.
When you look at moments like that—and all of us have them—the truth of the radio guy’s statement is plain to see. All your power was swept away by that button-pusher, whether he intended to offend you or not. So the button-pusher became your master.
Button-pushers don’t even have to be present to gain control over us. They can be images from our past, triggered by memory-evoking challenges or events. We store them in little brain-movies that we play over and over, and the button-pusher’s mastery goes on.
So what’s the answer? How do you break free and take back your power?
In my experience, the first step is recognizing that you gave up your self-control, your ownership of yourself, in the first place. I’ve found it helpful to say to myself, “Just because someone is offensive, I don’t have to be offended.” And by “offensive,” I don’t mean simply rude or thoughtless, although that counts, too. I mean the brutal, intentional offenses as well.
You can reclaim a great deal of your composure by recognizing that another person’s remarks or actions say far more about them than they say about you. Maybe they’re having a horrible day. Maybe they’re sick, or tired, or hungry. Maybe they’re angry at somebody or something else and you just happened to get in the way. It really doesn’t matter what the reason. The point is that you have a choice how to respond. “Just because someone is offensive, I don’t have to be offended.”
Remembering that, as I said, is the first step. But by the time you have remembered, you’re already upset. So the next step is to regain your inner peace. And the best way I’ve found to do that is to practice forgiveness.
I don’t mean you have to condone someone’s offensive behavior. I mean you have to forgive yourself for allowing their behavior to disturb your equilibrium. I like to use the mantra “I’m sorry; please forgive me,” said to my own inner self, until peace returns.
Self-forgiveness is self-compassion; it’s the recognition that everyone suffers, and that kindness is the healing balm for our own wounds as well as those of others. Compassionately forgiving yourself for your vulnerability means accepting with kindness that you were acting like a human again. (Such complex creatures!) It stops the waves of hurt and anger from sloshing and restores you to your right mind. You can brush yourself off and move on.
Then you’re in a position to decide rationally how to respond to the button-pusher in a mature and appropriate way. Maybe you’ll choose to forgive him, too. Maybe you’ll decide that you need to talk about the issue in a calm and unemotional way. Maybe you’ll decide that you need to make clear to him that you expect to be treated with more courtesy and respect, that you believe he was out of line. Maybe you’ll decide he doesn’t belong in your life at all and cut your ties to him.
Whatever you decide, once you have regained possession of your emotions, your response—even if it’s a difficult one—will be authentic, made in a state of self-harmony and inner peace by a self who is master of his or her own soul. And isn’t that the goal that we all strive for?
Wishing you a week of brilliant self-mastery and compassion.
Warmly,
Susan