walls and doors

For those who are walled up, everything is a wall…even an open door.  Rene’ Char

 To receive what I desire from life, I need to get rid of my defenses and open myself to new ways of looking at things.  The walls that surround me were built early on to protect me from perceived harm.  Like keeping to myself so that I won’t be rejected or not trying a new thing so that I am not humiliated by not being able to do it well.  These walls act as a barrier that I once needed to feel safe but now shut out what is desired and keep me locked within.   I have so much fear.  Fear of starting out on new adventures.  Fear of failing, of not doing well, or even of just being mediocre.  Once, when meditating, my mind painted this picture for me: 

While sitting quietly, I suddenly saw myself in a house. I had left the room that had been my old life and was standing in the hallway. I was trying to break out of this old life and into the new. I had the sense that I had been in the hall for quite some time. Another door stood before me. The door opened and instead of a room I saw endless space…stars, moons, limitless space and I was afraid. Afraid to step through this doorway into the vastness of this unknown, like stepping off a cliff into utter darkness. As I stood before the door I began to see what my initial fear had blinded me to. I saw the ground. There now, that’s not so bad after all. Solid ground to walk on, stars and moon to guide me. Just before it ended I noticed I even held a flashlight in my hand.

The lesson here seems obvious.  Trust in the ground to be there.  Trust that the moon and stars will light my way.  Trust that I will have a flashlight, that I will have the tools that I need to find my way.

So the encouragement I am trying to give myself today is to give attention to the walls that I have built in the past, to try to let things in, to try to inch my way past them.  And to be receptive to new things, new ways of looking at life.  To expand my vision of what is possible.

On dying

I dreamed that I died. Wow. That’s never happened before. Never have I dreamed about dying and made it all the way through. Strange. My death was assumed, I knew I was gone and I was observing those left behind.

Tom was lost. His pain was so raw and all-encompassing that I fled from it.

I came to Josh, my son who is married to a charming Cajun girl and is wrapped deeply in the love of her family and their church. His pain was also great. Yet, there were those to whom he could turn. He was being comforted, both by his faith and by his Cajun family. I stayed with him for awhile. I thought of things we’d shared, times of laughter and fun. Times of deep discussion. I thought of the ways I’d tried to raise him as a man of sensitivity and largeness. I saw his heart, as large as the ocean and as soft as a down pillow. I felt peaceful. I mourned the loss of time with his future children, then I moved on.

I came to Lisa, my oldest. She is in a place that is troubled and uncertain. She carries new life within. I’ll not hold this child, either. I thought about Anthony, her teenaged son. I felt regret at not having had more time with him, more of a chance to impact his life. Lisa was shell-shocked. She wasn’t able to process my departure. I knew I would need to return to her later.

Then I came to Desiree. I felt a great loneliness. Her loss felt to her like an amputation. She was having difficulty imagining life without me. My heart flew to the future, to all those times she might need me and I wouldn’t be there. I began to wonder about the things I’d never told her. I suddenly realized there were many conversations we hadn’t yet had, talks she needed right now and in the years to come. I wished I’d left a letter, at least. I longed for a way to tell her all my heart felt and I yearned for a way to help her through this time. I could do nothing.

Taylor, my granddaughter and twin soul, was broken. I knew she would be alright, though. I felt peaceful, realizing that I had touched her life in some small way that wouldn’t be taken away by time. I wished I could cuddle with her again, read her another book, lay giggling in bed with her until she drifted off to sleep. I watched Daniel, her younger brother. I felt sad, knowing he wouldn’t remember me at all.

I was on my way back to Tom when I woke up. It was 3:30. No more sleep for me today. My mind is full of wonderings and my heart seems ready to burst. I know that death is inevitable, yet this dream was so real, so full of what I might leave behind. It has me thinking. Are there things I need to see to, right now? Words that need to be said, actions that need to be taken? But if I find every word and say it – if I think of every action I need to take and do it, would it really be enough?

To Sleep, perchance to be paralyzed

This painting is titled Nightmare if I remember it correctly. And isn’t that just what it feels like? I’ve still been thinking about dreams and it brought to my mind a sleep disorder that I have suffered from. It hasn’t happened to me for quite some time now and I hope it never does again. It’s called sleep paralysis.When we go to sleep, the brain releases some thingy or another that causes our body to be sort of paralyzed, except for the eyes. I suppose this is to keep us from beating our spouses senseless in the night. Or to keep us from cooking 4 course meals while dreaming. Sleep paralysis is when the brain awakens but body paralysis is still occurring. You are aware but unable to move. What makes this even more fun is that it is usually accompanied by specific hallucinations. This usually lasts no longer than a few minutes, but thanks to being stuck in this netherworld state the sense of time is distorted, so it seems to last much longer.

Some common hallucinations:

• vividness and fear
• sensing a presence in the room, often malevolent
• impending sense of doom or death
• auditory hallucinations such as footsteps or indistinct voices
• people or shadows moving about the room
• pressure on body (look at that painting again. shudder)

Just in case you’re feeling relief that you don’t suffer from this, most people will experience sleep paralysis at least once or twice in their lifetime. It can be brought on by stress and intense life changes and most commonly occurs while sleeping supine (face-up sleepers beware). Those who suffer are encouraged to avoid naps, which can bring it on.

To cope: sleep on your side, avoid naps, deal with stress. If caught in an episode, think about what is happening. Some have been able to break the spell by moving the eyes back and forth rapidly or by trying to move small muscles like the fingers or toes or even the tongue.

Now that the technical stuff is over, here is what it was like for me. I would be napping on the couch and suddenly the TV would come on. I would hear movement nearby, mumbling. Often I would see shadows or animals, cats especially. Of course, when awakening, all would be quiet. A recurring auditory hallucination was barking, snarling dogs at the window. There was the sense that they were trying to get in to me. One time it happened while a friend was over. He said my eyes were open. I could hear a mumbling, there were dogs snarling, and he had an evil demented monkey head.

Oh yeah, I’m so glad it hasn’t happened for awhile. I can’t begin to express how relieved I was when I found out that this was an actual sleep disorder. Much better than wondering if I was possessed or merely insane.

Pepperoni Visions

I had to smile at Peg’s comment on my last post. (why should I delete it?…it was funny) Still, a word of explanation seemed to be in order.

Seeing pictures in your mind isn’t necessarily confined to “non-heathens”. I often feel quite heathenish. Rather, it has more to do with getting still. When one meditates, whether Buddhist, Yogi, Christian, Hindu, Taoist, Sufi or just plain old folk without title…what seems to me to happen is that the mind is set free from the dashing around it so loves to do. My mind seems overflowing with speeding, disjointed thoughts, rather like a rabid squirrel scurrying about for that last acorn hidden in the fall leaves. Sitting quietly and applying gentle concentration calms and clears the mind. I see it like the quieting of the wind over a lake’s surface, resulting in a placid, tranquil surface that more accurately reflects the serenity beneath. (See, I even think in pictures!) Or as Rilke said in sonnet, “Instead of words, discoveries flow out, astonished to be free.”

Anyway, I think when the mind is stilled, the imagination is free to be availed of by a deeper wisdom. Some think of it as inner wisdom,sort of an inner Grandma Sage. Some think of it as a message from a helper, be it God or Spirit or inner witness or whatever. The point is, you don’t have to belong to a spiritual tradition of any flavor to enjoy the benefit of insight during meditation. I just happen to “see” my insight a lot of the time.

So, for the benefit of any dear reader who was sketched out by the description of mental images given at moments of receptive quiet…Sorry I made it sound so mystical and mysterious. Insight happens. It’s quite ordinary, really. But ordinary in the way of a sunset, which we are given every day but yet never loses its capacity to inspire.

Hope this de-mystifies the concept somewhat. Thanks for the reminder to be real, Peg!

Pictures/Visions 2

Last year I had one of the most tremendous visions I’ve ever been given. As I sat quietly, I was suddenly sucked into a vortex or wind to the top of a towering mountain. I was aware of One standing alongside and that the One was presenting this vista for my view. It was remarkable, quite impossible to describe. The scene before me was so other-worldly I wondered if I were seeing another planet. There were all of these magnificent, flattened cliffs with massive chasms between. The colors were deep and brilliant, reds and golds, Arizonian. What was most mind-boggling was this sense of infinite, boundless space. I can’t really put into words how vast, how expansive this place was. It was staggering. Like the first time you notice the night sky as a child and you hurry to lie on your back because of the vertigo, because the heavens are just so monstrously imposing in their far-flung panorama and you fear falling off the earth into that velvety, dark infinity. Just like that.

Then, with a suddenness that caused my eyes to pop open and an involuntary “oh” to slip out, I knew that this place was not some other planet far out in space, but was in fact interior space. MY interior space. I can still feel the breeze in my hair and the wildness of the place. I’ll never forget it. It made an enormous impression on me.

Then yesterday while in meditation I saw a variation on this picture. This repeat of a vision has never happened to me before. I saw the original scene, along with the One standing alongside. I heard the word “jump”. Unbelievably, I did just that, immediately, without thought or fear. As I soared down, down, down, I became aware of a change. The immense chasms were now filled with water! I struck the water, slicing through it like a knife through warm butter. Just before the vision ended, I noticed I could breathe in the water. I had gills, which had been hidden on the sides of my neck.

What does this all mean? I’m sure I don’t know, yet I feel touched with a sense of hopefulness and anticipation. 

Pictures/Visions

Illumination. Isn’t it a lovely word? To illuminate is to enlighten spiritually or intellectually. To make clear. To shine light, to make luminous. The way this often happens to me is that I see pictures/visions while sitting quietly in prayer or meditation. It’s when my overactive mind is calm that I am sometimes overtaken by this mysterious gift.

While looking over an old journal to find a reference, I came across this description of one such time: I thought the words, “I am” and I suddenly saw a picture. There was a gated enclosure looking out over a meadow. Inside was a stallion, tall, strong and free. But was it free? It was waiting for the bondage of a beast of burden to be put on it. A plough. This picture made me deeply sad. I felt instinctively that I had been created to run and gallop over the meadows but instead had become an animal of drudgery.

Then a few days later I recorded this: While sitting quietly, I suddenly saw myself in a house. I had left the room that had been my old life and was standing in the hallway. I was trying to break out of this old life and into the new. I had the sense that I had been in the hall for quite some time. Another door stood before me. The door opened and instead of a room I saw endless space…stars, moons, limitless space and I was afraid. Afraid to step through this doorway into the vastness of this unknown, like stepping off a cliff into utter darkness. As I stood before the door I began to see what my initial fear had blinded me to. I saw the ground. There now, that’s not so bad after all. Solid ground to walk on, stars and moon to guide me. Just before it ended I noticed I even held a flashlight in my hand.

Those two picture/visions speak strongly to my heart, in view of the deconstruction I have been enduring concerning my faith and spiritual life. At the time, I wasn’t at all certain what they meant, I just knew that they resonated in me and gave me an ache in my chest.

Another Tough Night

What was that? I’d been sleeping for several hours when I was awakened by the shuffling. I had drifted off on the couch, reading. Late night reading is so delicious, a stolen treat. I could hear Tom gently snoring in the next room. Opening my eyes in a slit, I chided myself for being so easily spooked. This old house moans and creaks all night, after all. But then I heard it again, closer this time and more distinct. It was definitely the sound of someone carefully picking their way across the room. There was no moon tonight and it was pitch dark in the room. Which didn’t matter in the least, since I had squeezed my eyes shut tightly at the sound of the furtive, creeping steps. My breath caught in my throat, my mind was spinning. I was still trying to reason with myself to stave off panic when I felt it. Something light, like a scarf or bandanna, smelling faintly of cigarettes, being spread carefully over my face.

Instantly I realized the intent. I felt it, a deep inner knowing. I was about to be raped, my God, I was about to be raped! I felt his hand, large and warm, covering my mouth through the cloth. Shh, he whispered soothingly, as if it were a perfectly normal request. Then his other arm came down across my shoulders, fixing me securely to the couch. No, no, this can’t be happening! Not again! My throat constricted with fear and I was covered with an instant, cold sweat. I swallowed convulsively as my mouth filled with a strange metallic taste.

Then he lifted his arm, shifting his weight. He was doing something with his other hand; I dared not imagine what. Preparing. For what was to come. This is your chance; it’s now or never! Try to wrench yourself free so you can scream. Tom will come. But what if he has a gun? What if he kills Tom? My inner turmoil seemed futile as I lay there so paralyzed by dread that I stopped breathing. Then hot breath touched my neck and the scent of stale cigarettes and beer wafted up to my nose. God, this is it! This is happening, it’s really happening again! No, no, no, NO, NO, NO….

The sounds of my whimpering woke Tom in the bed next to me. Honey, wake up. Wake up, you’re dreaming again. I woke up, the sheet over my face, my chest pounding, my breath ragged.

It was another tough night last night