Category: Another’s view

"Discovering your Soul Signature" by Panache Desai

"There is an exquisiteness to sadness and pain.  It has a quality and resonance that is unique. It's a way we all can relate to one another, because we all feel sadness. Were it not for our judgment of that emotion, no one would have a problem feeling it.  Sadness is socially unacceptable – we're conditioned from day one to understand sadness as a sign of weakness – so people refuse to experience it, and it accumulates weight. Its density grows in the body. Look at the body language and posture of someone who is experiencing a depression: They seem to carry a weight on their shoulders. They're hunched over.  They can hardly get out of bed. It's like a weeping willow tree as opposed to the mighty oak. the weeping willow has allowed the burdens of life to bend it."

"The key is to shift your experience of sadness. Grief? Loss? Tears pouring down your cheeks?  Good. Feel it all. Know that you are one of 7.2 billion people on this planet who experience the same thing. The rejection of sadness further separates you from your own wholeness. Lean into it. Breathe. Accept. Embrace and embody the blessing of sadness, because where there is acceptance, judgment no longer has any power. When you let this energy wash over you, there will be an intensity to it, but as you keep allowing it to flow through you, it will eventually diminish. Allow life to do its job."

"As the Buddha said, life is suffering. But there is a magnificence in that suffering. And what's more, there is no true turning away from it. It is in turning toward suffering that, paradoxically, we discover our most vivid, alive, electric, feeling, sensitive, sensual selves."

"When sadness arises within us, we are being given an incredible opportunity to integrate the wounds of the past. We are being allowed to experience the very fabric of our story. Perhaps you woke up this morning and, for no reason, seemingly out of the blue, you felt sad.  Your natural tendency would be to tighten up in the face of it. Buck up, old chap.  Think about the way we cry. Either we stuff our tears and swallow the lump in our throats, or we allow our tears, which stream down our faces, real and true and irrefutable."

"Take a moment and put down your cup of coffee. Unless you are driving, close your eyes. Feel the swells rising and falling within you. Riding those swells is a feeling you like to keep at bay. What would happen if you felt it? Envision a tiny boat, tossed about by the crests of the waves that are always inside you. That boat is an intricate thing of great value and beauty. It is honed and colored by what it means to have been given this precious gift of life."

"I am asking that, as you move through your day, you allow life to impact you.  When you see a young child reach for his mother's hand, allow your heart to open. When you see someone struggling in the street, allow your heart to open. When you receive a disappointment or a setback, allow your heart to open. This is the exquisite doorway through which life becomes larger and richer.  Your sadness doesn't make you less of a human being. In fact, it makes you more."

"More expansive."

"More connected."

"Painfully beautiful."

"Raw. Open. Completely alive."

"Allow life to touch you. And when life touches you, meet it with softness. Meet it with authenticity. Allow your heart to merge with the hearts around you. See yourself in the faces of your fellow human beings. Just for today, live in the truth that there is nothing to defend. Live in the truth that vulnerability is power. Live in the truth that your sadness makes you human. As you leave for work, your child calls out, "Bye Daddy! I'm going to miss you!" Feel it.  Allow your heart to break open. As you drop your older child off at school, notice the mother walking her disabled eight-year-old through the school's front doors. Don't look away. Feel it.  Feel it as if that is you – because it is you. When you stop at the market, notice the elderly couple shopping together. They've been married for sixty years and are still holding hands. Feel it.  This, too is you. Drive past the cemetery where your parents are buried. Look out at the thousand of tombstones, the lives once lived. Feel them.  Feel them all."

"These feelings are not going to kill you."

"In fact, these feelings are going to connect you."

"To your own story, and the stories of others."

"Allow.  Just for today, allow all that sadness in. Whenever you feel your heart, your body, and your mind hardening against what you're seeing, soften.  Relax your belly. Breathe into your heart. Become aware of the soft and tender place that is always inside of you, like a pilot light, softly burning. That light is waiting for a moment of conscious recognition. Receive these moments. Experience them. Live the blessings of your exquisite life."

Night

"I am the tears you will not shed. I am the result of a life unloved. I am the experience of trying to please everyone else. I am the feeling of being lost. I am inconsolable. I am the part of you that you will not put on display, for fear that I may quickly turn into a raging river. For the fear that I might drown you. I am the part of you that you always keep secret. I am your secret lover. I share space with you on your pillow at night. I am present in your heartbreak. I am present in your loss. The accumulation of me leads to your grief. Without me, you would be lost."

"I reside in your lungs. I suffocate you from within. When I arise, a tight pressure and viselike grip surrounds your neck, encircles your throat."

"I render you mute."

"I steel your voice."

"You're all choked up."

"You will do everything you can to push me away. You will drink. Smoke. Have sex. Overeat. You'll try to outrun me, only to discover that you cannot. I linger within you. I linger within all of us. Moments of vulnerability expose my presence. Relationships draw me up and out. I reach a point when you no longer can contain me. When you no longer can hide me. When you have no choice but to admit that I exist."

"I am real."

"I am here."

"I am a part of you."

"You can run no more – and it's okay."

"I was present at the birth of your children. I was present at the death of your mother. I was present in the moment of abuse and trauma. I was present when the world rejected you and shunned you. I was present on the playground. In the cafeteria. In the locker room. I was there when the news headlines reported tragedy: the gunned – downed children, planes flying into buildings, young girls sold into sexual slavery. I was the uninvited guest at your wedding. I was there at your child's graduation. At the death of the family dog. At the birth of your grandchildren. The loss of your wife. The ringing of the phone. The officer at the door. In the hospital. On the cold, cold ground. I have been there every step of the way."

"I am your sadness."

"I am your tears. I am your grief. Your loss. I am you. I will exist until your last breath. To be in human form is to feel me."

"Allow the dam to break. I need to move through you. Come home to me. Come here. I have something to show you."

"Come"

"I have been waiting for you."

"Allow me to lead you home."

"Open to me. Allow me to flow. Allow the stream of me to move through you freely. I need to be free. Don't be afraid of me. Allow me to go. I must go now. Don't worry – I'll be back. I can never really leave.  You will always feel me – but feel me like the wind on your back, or the lake surrounding you, the simple air you breathe. I always want to be moving. I always want to be in motion. Don't hold me back. It only hurts both of us."

"Let me go."

"Let me go."   

Panache 

Here is what I know.  You are not alive if you don't feel your sadness, the lower levels of grief and loss, the vast emptiness of sorrow.   And, I also know, that when you can feel this; you can feel the highest feelings as well.

And, you simply can't be your authentic self, if you push away these feelings of sadness.  It is a huge part of who you are. And, the not allowing it to flow through you, is to stop living.

This is the first I have read about the beauty of sadness…how it is the exquisite part of living.  I totally agree.  It is what I call brilliantly tragic.  

To meet a person who is afraid to show their sadness, is to meet a partial person.

"Vulnerability is Power."

It is to be a whole person!

From The Conscious Parent by Dr. Shefalie Tsabary….

Chapter 17 The Two Wings of the Eagle

"To develop conscious behavior, a child needs two streams of learning.  I like to think of them as the two wings of an eagle. authenticity and containment. A child missing one or the other will flounder, never soaring to the heights of its potential."

"So far in this book, we have focused on authenticity, which springs from a strong connection to our inner being.  For a child this means learning to recognize their own inner voice, which will teach them how to expand their presence in the world.  As children increasingly relate to their inner being, they learn not just to accept themselves, but also to embrace their own will and manifest this in the world. They develop the ability to forge a meaningful connection with others, as well as with life itself."

"Containment, is the other wing of the eagle, is the means by which we absorb the will of another. While authenticity requires us to respect our own inner being and express who we are, containment allows us to contour this in relation to will of those around us."

"Our children need to learn both the are of connecting with themselves and connection to others, which are the two pillars of all relationships.  The ability to relate to another is linked to our ability to connect with ourselves, which is the springboard of authenticity and the key to our ability to maintain meaningful relationships."

"Even as our children need to foster a sense of inner connection and the ability to be authentic, they also need to learn how to live in  a world of rules and get along with others in the sandbox of life.  For this to happen, children need to listen to their own voice and in equal measure, absorb the voices of others.  To foster the ability to surrender to one's own will  and to that of another when appropriate is a key element of discipline. This is very different from just getting children to "behave."

"When children have been taught to express their voice, it's only natural that this voice will at times be the cause of dissension with their parents. This is the inevitable fallout of raising a spirited and confident child.  But as our children discover that the world doesn't revolve around them, they learn to tolerate frustration. They accept that, since they aren't the only ones who have wishes and needs, they can't achieve instant gratification all the time."

"To the degree that we as parents connect with our children, providing for them a safe container in which they are seen for who they are, they learn to be comfortable with connection. They understand the dynamics of a give-and-take relationship and are better able to thrive amid the difficulties that arise.  They can tolerate being depended upon, and in turn trust that another can be leaned on."

A CHILD CAN'T SOAR WITHOUT CONTAINMENT

"Stephanie and her husband Phillip have three young boys who are out of control.  Because the three are always fighting with each other, play dates are a nightmare and mealtimes a disaster.  There's no order in the house, the children rule the roost, and chaos reigns.  It's a household that's completely lacking in respect, either on the part of the children or their parents."

"Overwhelmed, Stephanie is in tears on a daily basis.  Having grown up with a controlling domineering mother, she has little sense of empowerment and feels easily victimized.  Since conflict frightens her, she does her best to avoid it. Similarly, Phillip grew up in a home where emotions were rarely expressed, which means he's uncomfortable whenever he has to articulate his own. Because both Stephanie and Phillip lead emotionally constricted lives, they are afraid to find their own authentic voice with their children.  Of course, this couple's children being spiritual gurus that children are, act in the way they do precisely to challenge their parents to address their emotional baggage. When I observe these parents with their children, it was immediately clear there was no system to the parent's discipline.  The children had no clue how they were supposed to behave. For instance, the three boys were playing in the family room when, before long, they began throwing their toys all over the room and climbing the furniture. When Jacob, the oldest and leader of the three, began to shake the lamps, Stephanie entered the room, saying, "Please don't do that Jacob." Jacob paid no attention.  Again, Stephanie spoke up: "I said, 'Please.' Please stop this behavior or you will get a time out."

"None of the boys paid any attention. In a pleading voice, Stephanie repeated, "I said, 'Please.'"

"When this had no affect, Stephanie turned to me, helps, her eyes begging me to understand, as she explained, "I'm trying to discipline them, but no one listens to me. do you see how hard this is?" A moment later, the lamp fell to the floor and Jacob hurt his foot.  Now Stephanie ran to him to take care of him. Jacob experienced no consequences, only hugs and kisses."

"After a short while, Jacob returned to his play, engaging in the same behavior. Within minutes, there was another mishap, this time as a result of a fight between the three boys.  Again Stephanie appeared at the door and said, "Boys, please don't hurt each other." The boys continued fighting. Still standing a distance away from them, their mother again pleased, "Please don't hurt yourselves." No one listened."

"Out of the blue, Stephanie strode over to the boys, pulled them off of each other, slapped Jacob across the face, and yelled, "You are a bad boy! You are always making me upset. You are in 'time out' for the rest of the day."

"Not having seen this coming, Jacob was stunned. Screaming back at his mother, he protested that he was being singled out and it was unfair. His mother, still nursing residual emotion from the mishap in which he hurt himself, became enraged, quivering and shaking. Jacob hit her.  She hit him. As the other boys cowered in fear, Stephanie broke down in tears, blaming her sons for hernia as all three hung their heads in shame."

"Stephanie had no idea that the present scenario was one in which she had recreated from her own childhood of feeling disempowerment. Superimposing the helplessness she experienced when she was young onto her boys, she was unable to separate their behavior from her own feelings at that moment. Because every move on her part was driven by emotional avoidance, she couldn't respond as the boys needed her to."

"I meet many parents of older children especially who feel helpless in the face of their children's "bad" behavior. When I observe these parents, I notice that their common errorless in their inability to engage in swift action in the moment. For example, an eight -year old girl was snatching the toys from her younger brother, but the mother ignored it, which she continued to do until it escalated into a fight. In another situation, the mother of a six-year-old watched him drop crumbs on the floor, saying nothing about his behavior until, after he scattered crumbs everywhere, she exploded at him. Though it's often wise to wait until we are no longer reactive before we engage in teaching our children a more appropriate way to behave, there are times when delay is counterproductive.  Instead of allowing a situation to escalate, the conscious parent takes action the instant it is required. In Stephanie's case, had she been aware of her emotional patterns, she would have approached this situation with much greater firmness from the start. The moment Jacob began violating the rules of respect for home and safety of self and others, Stephanie could have been authoritative. Coming from her inner strength, she could have declared, "Freeze, right now. Everybody stop what you are doing."  With play stopped, she could then have reiterated the parameters for the boys' behavior. Telling them to repeat after her what was expected of them, she could have made sure they understood the consequences of a further violation, making it clear that any deviation from these expectations would bring a quick termination to their play.  We cannot be a "pleaser" and "pleader," then expect to have any power with our children."

"Afraid of owning her emotional boundaries, Stephanie let the boys abuse her. So accustomed was she to feeling disempowered that she automatically embodied a position of weakness, whereas her sons needed her to be strong and clear.  Even when, having missed the cues, she finally exploded, she was still unable to own her emotions, instead displacing them onto her children, causing them to feel guilty for "making" her so upset.  Far from being "bad", the boys were just doing what boys do, whereas their mother had failed miserably."  Shefalie

I love this book.  It clearly shows how when the parent hasn't faced their own emotional baggage, just how out of balance life is upon the child….and how it affects the child's inner world.

This chapter shows how badly I mothered, until I was able to face my own emotional stunted growth.  

It was so powerful to know, that I WAS the problem; not my child.

Children need us to model our own Eagle Wings!