Part Two
Survival lies in
sanity, and sanity lies in paying attention.
Success or failure,
the truth of a life really has little to do with its quality.
The quality of life
is in proportion always, to the capacity for delight. The capacity for delight is the gift of
paying attention.
The reward for
attention is always healing.
Even the slightest
attention to our impoverished areas can nurture them.
Anger is meant to be
listened to. Anger is a voice, a shout,
a plea, a demand.… Anger is a map.
Anger is not the
action itself. It is action's
invitation.
The universe is
prodigal in its support. We are miserly
in what we accept.
Those of us who get
bogged down by fear before action are usually being sabotaged by an older
enemy, shame. Shame is a controlling
device. Shaming someone is an attempt to
prevent the person from behaving in a way that embarrasses us.
When people do not
want to see something, they get mad at the one who shows them.
This surge of sudden
disinterest ("It doesn't matter") is a routine coping device employed
to deny pain and ward off vulnerability.
Many blocked people
are actually very powerful and creative personalities who have been made to
feel guilty about their own strengths and gifts.
Growth is an erratic
forward movement; two steps forward, one step back.
Very often, a week
of insights will be followed by a week of sluggishness.
Easy does it is
actually a modus operandi. It means,
"Easy accomplishes it".
Okay is a blanket
word for most of us. It covers all sorts
of squirmy feelings; and it frequently signals a loss.
Extreme emotions of
any kind -- the very thing that morning pages are superb for processing -- are
the usual triggers for avoiding the pages themselves.
Kriya, a Sanskrit
word meaning spiritual emergency or surrender…. We all know what a kriya looks
like: it is the bad case of the flu right after you've broken up with your
lover. It's the rotten head cold and
bronchial cough that announces you've abused your health to meet an unreachable
work deadline.
When the
search-and-discard impulse seizes you, two crosscurrents are at work: the old
you is leaving and grieving, while the new you celebrates and grows
strong.
The desire to
worldly sophisticated, and smart often blocks our flow.
Spirituality has
often been misused as a route to an unloving solitude, a stance where we
proclaim ourselves above our human nature.
This spiritual superiority is really only one more form of denial.
All too often, we
become blocked and blame it on our lack of money. This is never an authentic block. The actual block is our feeling of
constriction, our sense of powerlessness.
Creativity lives in
paradox: serious art is born from
serious play.
Perfectionism has
nothing to do with getting it right. It
has northing to do with fixing things.
It has nothing to do with standards.
Perfectionism is a refusal to let yourself move ahead.
We must be alert to
flag and mourn our losses.
Every end is a
beginning. We know that. But we tend to forget it as we move through
grief.
Whenever I am
willing to ask "What is necessary next?" I have moved ahead.
"I'm too
old" is an evasive tactic. It is
always used to avoid facing fear.
The grace to be a
beginner is always the best prayer.
There is a
connection between self-nurturing and self-respect.
