"What's Love got to do with it?" or October Wild Card (by: Bob)

October Wildcard:

For starters, let me just say that I feel the paralysis of limitless choice. A little sliver of that circumstance that you might have felt, too, when standing in the toothpaste aisle of the Super ShopRite with no coupons, sales, or preferences to guide you. Which one to choose??? Paralysis sets in. Suddenly my quick trip to the grocery store ends up with the beleaguered staff escorting me to the checkout counter with the stink eye because they’d really like to go home.

Just sayin’, love is a fairly broad topic. I’m gonna given it my best shot, amiga.

Here goes:

To be open to the real possibility of love, maybe we also need to be open to the real possibility that love does not exist. Consider if you will for a bit that love is dead. Or that it never existed at all, except that we needed to name the filling of a need, or the fulfilling of a fantasy, so we developed this construct called love. For all of the evolutionary benefits that the love-construct brings us, it make sense that over millennia of human existence we have taken the blend of belonging, deep attachment, ecstasy,  and affection and held it up as the pinnacle of all human emotion.

Maybe give yourself a deep moment, if you never have, to just imagine that love is not real. Just take that word out of the times and circumstances that you are accustomed to using it, and replace it with another for the various relationships, circumstances, and events that we had heretofore labeled ‘love.’

If, in meditation on this question, we might allow ourselves to descend into the depth of the thought that love does not exist, we might there posit a suggestion that would have us examine the question: so what? What is love really good for? What function does it or could it serve? In substitution, what other words or ideas reflect another aspect of thing that we might have called ‘love’ – that we might enjoy, or find elusive, or take for granted. Consistency? Interdependence? Euphoria? It has occurred to me that these other names for the generic ‘love’ might be more useful in understanding what it is that any of us is really seeking, or missing, or grateful for. So then, naming it differently, what is the thing that we like, or need more of, or need to experience differently in our lives?

 So, Shannon, when you write about saying "I love you", the challenges of partnering, and really "letting someone in" -- maybe it would clarify things to think about these areas in terms other than love, and to really sit and understand the things that lie behind the term. Alternatively, all this mucky-muck of mine might be crap, too, so feel free to ditch it all and ignore me, and just be your blissful self.

I really do believe that within each of us lies the capacity for the entire gamut of human experience and reaction, given the right circumstances.It’s too “heady” way to approach this topic, right? Bah, humbug! One might argue that this is an over-intellectualization of emotion, but I must say that have never believed in the heart, per se -- i.e., it has never made sense to me to tease out thoughts from emotions as though they were generated from various organs within us. Who’s to say that our thoughts about our feelings, and the biochemical substrate that underlies them all, is able to be parsed out from each other?

This is not to say that love is not real – or, more precisely, that there is a very real thing that we experience, and that the lack of it is not good for us. The ache of a broken heart is certainly as real a physiologic process as any, and it can indeed even kill us (google “takotsubo cardiomyopathy” if you don’t believe me! I had to get something nursey in there!)

Anyway, I LOVE this project, and LOVE your openness and willingness to invent yourself anew. Really. LOVE IT!! Besides, you can’t call me a Wildcard and have me not attempt to deliver on the name, right?

Love. You.

The middle of the month draws near and I have thoroughly enjoyed my chapter writer's suggestions. They were the speed and the amount I needed this month. Her directives were small but fierce. Kinda like her.

She asked me to LOVE me.

This should be easy. For me, I realize that it is not as easy.  I take care of others before me. And it is right to take care of me. All my parts. Love. First.

I know that Love is doing what you love and trusting in yourself enough to follow that intuition. I am making efforts to do that more. Breaking down the scaffolding of old ways and being open to what I can see and hear if I let go of the old patterns and that mask of me, and let the real me shine. The one that doesn't need a unitard to let her true self shine...though I sure like my unitard.

I've finished the Tao of Pooh. Dressed in my sixties gear to dance and eat donuts, beer, and tacos at Boise Bicycle Project's 6th anniversary. (used this for inspiration when getting ready:

 I've snuggled at night with my nugglebuddy and breathed in fresh air. I've marveled at the changing leaves. I've been more present and open to the change I need internally for love. Danced with Trey McIntyre's Troupe to Queen.

Trey McIntyre's Making Wild Sweet Love

It is what we all must do really, is be ourselves and learn to know what that is, risk for it, and invest in love deeply. Perhaps you will share with me on OBP how you do this and found it successful. I'd love to hear and encourage you to reflect on if you do.

As Pooh says,

 To know the Way,

We go the Way;

We do the Way

The way we do

The things we do. 

It's all there in front of you,

But if you try too hard to see it,

You'll only become Confused.

I am me,

And you are you,

As you can see;

But when you do

The things that you can do

You will find the Way,

And the Way will follow you.

Workin' on Lovin'

 
 

 
 

Week 4, Finale of Faith

I'd like to say that I've come to the end of this month with a renewed and complete by-in to unfaltering faith. Not so much. However, I have been reminded of the need for it for many and myself. I've visited a Buddhist Center, a Hari Krishna Temple, a Christian Church, a Catholic Church, and the great outdoors. I've read the Book of John, select Proverb quotes, and a bit of the Tao of Pooh, Rumi, Oriah, and Twenter. I've thought about the 5 C's a lot, meditated - but not enough, listened to and thought about Dawn's CD compilation, Lone Bellow, and Billy Elliot, and worked on just believing.

Just Believing that is what everyone of the 4 centers I visited preached - as did the great outdoors with just its showing of the reason to believe, as did the songs, John, Proverbs, and Pooh. I guess if it is in this many places, two things are true. Yep, you need to just believe. Two, it isn't always easy to do or there wouldn't be this much talk and advice on it.  We are asked to trust that there is a plan that is hard to understand in the moment with our mere brains, but it is the belief that makes it workable.

What was most impactful about John's readings were that Jesus was willing to die for what he believed. I've heard this numerous times through my Catholic education but today it had different meaning. You have to stand up for what you believe even against those who love you the most and even when it is killa hard. Hard to do, but you must trust in your beliefs. It is modeled after a leader who represents gentleness, acceptance, and discipline in belief.

I've been reminded I'm called to be an anthropologist in my own way. I am reminded that my faith and my sister-in-law's seemed to carry my family through a challenging spring. And I did not waiver there, not for a minute. I just waiver when it is for my self-interest, for my soul. This is where it is the most important - to believe, to die for what your soul speaks.  I am reminded of love - Kellie and Dawn's time to write these chapters, friends to listen to these thoughts, and self-love when I choose to see the magic and act. I am reminded that career, character, and calling seem easier for me to quickly assess, but community and companion were harder to write and my deepest wants. This is where my faith wains, as I don't understand their void. Yet, I am choosing to believe that it is trusting and my own actions based on my soul that will get me there. It's not about trusting in things that don't feel right and forcing yourself to feel it, but trusting in what is hard, yet still worth doing. I am trusting that my God would want me to be loved, a wife, a mother, and  in a community that gets me. I am trusting that it is coming. I have to choose to see it. I am being reminded that Open Book has helped me see what I feel strongly about and must stick to, and also, rightfully, where change is needed to leave that comfort zone of control. This has taught me to choose to trust your soul and not let the brain overpower, because the soul is just as, if not more, important.

And when all else fails, watch some Billy Elliot...

 And I'm ready to boldly step into October's theme of love...let's hope Paige and Bob are gentle with me while pushing me in the places I need pushed.

MISSION: A MONTH OF LOVE = LIVING IN LOVE (author: Paige North)

MISSION: A MONTH OF LOVE = LIVING IN LOVE

“If someone told me to write a book on morality, it would have a hundred pages and ninety-nine of them would be blank. On the last page I would write, 'I recognize only one duty and that is to love.' And as far as everything else is concerned, I say no.” —Albert Camus

If someone – a dear friend for instance -  asked me to write a monthly prescription for love, it would be a book with an infinite number of pages, because heck, that is what love is: a generative process that has no real start, no real ending, and no real definition. One cannot take the love one gives back, and I like that. That love, whether it beats still or is extinguished fully, is somewhere out there in the universe,  burning brightly like stars in the sky. And it did something good. It made someone better. And if, as Camus rightly put it, we understood that love is indeed a duty and not a “happily ever after” script written for us, we would be writing so many love stories that our hearts would ache at the thought of it. It is our duty to love. We have the bandwidth to do it, but we sometimes forget that like most things learned in life, love is a task, not a story mapped out with a predictable ending. It is a task in that we have to do it in order to become better at it, and we have to write our own love story with mindfulness and intention.

PREFACE (Every good love story has a preface): October is a good month for love. Red maple leaves against azure skies open one’s heart. They. Just. Do.  The smell of a nearby bonfire does the same. October is good sleeping weather, when open windows at night somehow open our hearts with a magic I really don’t get. But I know I wake up feeling more in love with the world the next morning. October is a love tonic if ever a month can be called one (screw February on that front, by the way). So here, dearest Shannon, whose truest of hearts has a romantic compass that is equally steadfast, is your “script” for the month of love:  

I.                    Sleep with your windows open – even if it is only a crack. This simple act of letting in fresh night air also requires a bit of mindfulness in that as you open that window at night, I want you to think about opening up a piece of your heart. Tackle the pieces that require some tugging, and as the windows open each night, imagine your heart is a little lighter.

II.                  Buy yourself this: http://www.amazon.com/NUGGLEBUDDY-Microwavable-Aromatherapy-Patterned-Aromatherapy/dp/B00ANY20S8/ref=sr_1_79?ie=UTF8&qid=1379639115&sr=8-79&keywords=lavender+heat+pad. I am wholeheartedly convinced that heating pads – particularly those with the distinctive combo of lavender and wheat (who knew?) – can open the most hardened of hearts. So, alongside the open window practice, I want you to warm up your heating pad and place it on your chest each night. Physically, it relieves tension, smells good, and helps you to sleep well. Metaphorically, it softens the edges of a vibrant, full, beautiful, but hardened heart.  Here, my friend is the key: to love, we have to let go of some of our sharp edges, those pieces of our hearts that beat out of angry habit. And this is painful stuff. Since it is a little like walking on glass or listening to fingernails on chalkboards, we may as well smell like lavender. Fin.

III.                Fall in love with the things around you. And take note of them. You have the marvelous ability to delight in the big and the small beauties of our world. I challenge you to fall in love with them. Because really falling in ALL-CAPS LOVE is about seeing love in many places. Again, use October as your backdrop for this. You’ll be in love with the world in no time. If I were to fall in love with a month, October would be my hands-down winner.

IV.                SHARE this feeling of being in love with things, feelings, moments, experiences WITH people.  This is the key to an open heart: it cannot just love in a vacuum. It is okay to say “I LOVE this pumpkin latte!” because in that moment, maybe that first sip is like a first kiss: perfect, warm, new. The capacity to BE in love resides in the ability to love your world. I was reminded of this when my sweet two year old exclaimed with a raw passion “I LOVE CRICKETS!!!!” this evening. Yes. Yes, you love crickets. And shouting your love of crickets from the rooftops is your duty (back to Camus), as much as it is reason for another soul to fall in love with your love of crickets. Or beets. Aka: YOU.

V.                  Dude. You have to fall in love with you. Plain and simple. The “Dude” was just for effect because this I’m snapping my fingers right now in front of your face. With bossy-boots vigor. Fall in love with the things about you that are amazingly lovable. Twenter, there are so, so, so many. So many. You have to fall in love with what makes you YOU in order for others to see and embrace them. This is perhaps the hardest task, but I want you to – on a daily basis – DO THIS ONE THING. See the sparkle in your eyes, the fun you bring to any occasion, the spontaneity and love of the little things that you share so freely with other. And love these things.

VI.                This one comes from Alex (but I fully agree with him): every morning, look at your bleary-eyed, beautiful self in a mirror and say, “I accept myself unconditionally right now.”(source: www.hungryforchange.tv) Self-explanatory.

VII.              Soundtrack. This is my personal (abridged for the purposes of this project) love soundtrack:

a.       Billie Holiday, Easy Living because she and October are soul mates, if ever there were. This song, with its lilt and grit, makes my heart dance. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RX7TA3ezjHc

b.      Ani diFranco, Everest http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ozmEVdXcmPk – Holy cow. Heartachingly beautiful, and really, one of the most honest odes to love set to music, in my humble opinion.

c.       The Cinematic Orchestra, To Build a Home. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cG2bTlOcLnE Pure poetry.   Somewhat maudlin, but I’ve decided that the thing about love is that yes, it sometimes slips through our hands like quicksand and the ache in your heart is a reminder that you have loved. That you are capable of such a primal emotion. Pieces of that love remain in you, and using the metaphor sustained throughout the song, homes are built, trees grow, things change and hearts still beat. And it’s up to you to take those pieces so that you can love again.

d.      Sigur Ros, Hoppipolla. Because love is about being young and being old and feeling free, because this song makes me in love with the world, and frankly, because there are leaves in the video (very autumnal):http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qmXMA34CeoQ

e.      Philip Glass, Mad Rush. Someone shared this with me when I had a broken heart, and when I hear it, my heart still breaks, BUT the thing about love is that sometimes (most of the time), there are no words:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jXN1QdtPyGk

f.        Jeff Buckley, Hallelujah. Love requires faith. And though I am not a religious sort, love is religion in a sort of universal way. This song pretty much says everything there is to say about love, all in a voice that makes your heart just want to risk it all. And because track 6 is typically my favorite on an album, I stop here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y8AWFf7EAc4

Love is what you make of it. Falling in love, and BEING in love is not going to make you a better person, necessarily. It can, but that hard work – even with your soul mate alongside you – falls in your lap. The lucky “HE” cannot be your compass. But the act of love, and the duty of loving can. So predictably, I leave you with the sage words of my main man, Thich Nhat Hanh, for further reflection. I’ve read them over and over again…and I can’t say I fully get it. Yet.  And like love, that is as it should be:

“True love includes the sense of responsibility, accepting the other person as he is, with all his strengths and weaknesses. If we like only the best things in the person, that is not love. We have to accept his weaknesses and bring our patience, understanding, and energy to help him transform. Love is maitri, the capacity to bring joy and happiness, and karuna, the capacity to transform pain and suffering. This kind of love can only be good for people. It cannot be described as negative or destructive. It is safe. It guarantees everything.” – Thich Nhat Hanh

Week 3: A New Type of Church, Some Tears, A Week in the Wilderness with an Ipod of Wildcard's Faith Music

        As I enter the 3rd week of Faith with Kelly's directives and Dawn's - our WildCard - new additions, my feelings can best be summed up with challenges trusting in the God of Catholicism/ Christianity but seeing the value in faith itself. I feel like it urges me to trust but somehow I associate this with having to trust in a way of life that is safe and may not serve me best. The readings in John's section of the Bible continue to promote believing even when you can't see. (Perhaps my Missouri home state's motto of Show-Me-State make this a bit harder!) Also,  all of Dawn's songs urge me to believe that by trusting in God things will make more sense and challenges will bring you to what you need.  I have been choosing to trust in being where I am supposed to be. I have been choosing to be open and trusting in what I don't understand. However, I still am challenged to understand how that works with also listening to my strong intuitive heart that sometimes speaks the opposite, or some of the challenges I've faced, and being what seems so far away from the community of friends, a partner, and kids in my home that I desire.

      I visited my 3rd spiritual location - the Calvary Chapel - and it was quite a different experience for me, as it was a huge church including shuttles to get you to the church, a tv screen so all could see in the large room, and a different type of service I had not experienced. Much of it was uncomfortable for me, and therefore not always enjoyed. However, when the pastor spoke, I was driven to tears. He said a lot but he also gave 5 directives: 1) Know God to Believe in God: try small acts of faith to get to higher faith, use meditation to help you with this 2) The Source of All Problems is Lack of Belief: More concern about condition of heart than if something is done right or wrong 3) When You Harden Your Heart, You Are Dead to Feelings: You must use your heart and accept it is okay that there are those who will challenge us, which is better than closing our feelings to others. 4) Faith is Action:  Through trust and action, things can change. 5) He's preparing you for good work. What made me cry the most, was listing to the hardening of heart. I want to believe directives will do it, but directives have also been hurtful to me as I know life is more fluid than that.

    I believe I am being reminded how much faith is needed in my life, but it also must be in a spiritual vein that allows me to not have set directives, is open to the changes of life and needs of our society, and is open to all. I have to work to build a community to discuss this with which means being vulnerable and open. Kelly has told me I need literature/scripture and people to make my faith work, and she is right. Dawn reminds me that faith is just trusting, as well, and using that trust as a vision and attitude for your life. Calvary Chapel's message was one I could feel, but still it seems not a good fit for me. I want to choose that I shouldn't flog myself for this but that I haven't found a good fit, but I will.

    Future writer Erin said "Faith and Fear cannot live together", and she is so right. I must choose to select faith over fear. Therefore I must choose to believe that there will be a faith that will want me to choose what fits me best and not set directives that make me feel I must hide myself.

Dawn's songs urged me to step out of my comfort zone, let go of fear and see the adventure of possibility and purpose, and believe in what I want is coming, if I am true to myself and trust that I may not have the capacity to understand my challenges and why my road has gone and is going this way, but some greater being does and is helping me if I choose to let and trust them.  I am working through feeling too weak to try and to love again, but am choosing to trust that faith will help me be me, instead of crippling me.

      And finally, the C's of this week - most from my week in the wilderness on a ropes course with my students, with a few (parentheses) of moments that just came to me through the week:

Character: I'm one who is an anthropologist, an orienter, an explorer. I'm empathetic, sentimental, sensitive. I love reading, dancing, swimming. My car's bumper is full of pride of a Fluid Movement performer, yoga instructor, trail runner, KC beer drinker, Baltimore lover, kayaker, Idaho Blue girl, and an arts/earth appreciator. I am many parts. My scarves that I look at each morning remind me of my journey and friends along the way: a Red Tree scarf from the Avenue in my neighborhood of Bmore, 1 from my mom, another from my brother's World Cup trip to Africa, a Moroccan scarf from my forever roommate, another from Austria that was accompanied by a rainbow pic, Mindy provides two -one from Spain and another from our Pickles vaca in Illinois.

Career - I embraced the present moment of our students abundantly growing on the trust walk and sharing as a community. (Marfa trip did me well.)

Calling- When I cry watching my students on the 1st element - trust wall, I know using my emotions are part of who I am.  In completing the element Leap of Faith, I know I am working on that for myself.

Character - A mother remarked on my ability to read kids and know when/how to encourage and when they needed comfort and a release from their discomfort on the ropes course. Her words reminded me of my spark and to remember my strength, bravery, and passion in Ireland and NYC.

Community - My 2 coworkers who have run the Junior High for 10 years on their own with staff who have come and gone referred to the rest of our team as sisters. They are offering community. I have seen trust, courage, and compassion in kids. I'm reminded to bring more compassion back to my classroom and my life. Community is around me, yet, I still struggle to embrace.

(Ireland was me being me and when I do that I live happy and light and with all my strengths. I need to do that more.)

Companion - I spoke with a new friend in Boise about my need to try and date again and how I am so resistant to online dating though I've been dabbling in it. Yet, I realize I prefer to find a dating partner through doing things that I like. I spoke of finding this through Fluid Movement, biking, and friends. I spoke of needing to find my synchronized swimming in Boise, whatever that will be. which I believe will lead me to love. Faith has been challenged by seeing all my Bmore friends with their mates and/or kids, and believing that if I hadn't left that'd be me and trusting that my path will still lead me there.

Community - My heart yearns for it. As I relax from my week in the wilderness, I look through Boise's newspapers to find things I enjoy, excitement to go to theatre tonight, joy in knowing I built it once in Bmore, and a belief it will come again. Finding community in staff with three Peace Corps members, converts from Catholicism, another who searches to understand our missing of the East, another who didn't go to Harvard, and a belief in using our valuable hearts and time to help kids find themselves. 

Reminding you what is important (from Amy Poehler via cHAd)

Amy's Reminders

I saw this today and many of them have thematic parallels as to what our Open Booker is trying to accomplish.

For all to enjoy...