Tag: freedom

  • What Love means to Me.

    Mothering adult children has been a perplexing inner dilemma…of what to do and when, and when to hold on and when to let go.

    Letting go doesn't mean I don't care. Letting go means I care enough to let them be free.  Free to choose, free to experience, free to learn and to grow, free to make choices that suit their needs.

    Letting go means letting them do their lives…

    I think, I thought, letting go meant giving up.

    I also think, the letting go that I experienced was that I was cast out in the careless sea.  I wasn't let go for my own good, but let go  when I was too small…before I was ready to make it on my own.  

    So, to me letting go is scary and fearful.

    Letting go in a healthy way, means to allow…to release my grip on their lives.

    My middle daughter turned 23 today. She has made wonderful choices in her life…clearly showing me how capable she is in finding her way, in her time, doing what she feels is best for her.  And yet I worry, fret, think, conjure up situations out in the future, that I can't possibly know.  I get lost in the tangle of her life choices…wanting to protect and keep her from 'harm'.

    However, if I had my way today, I myself would have caused harm in stepping into her life unasked.  But the Universe protected her from me, in small ways, like the printer not working…etc.  It spared her from my 'knowing' best.

    In giving up, and allowing, I can be a woman without control of her world, and just someone cheering her on as she makes the best choices for herself.

    I should know by now, that my 'good intentions' are really control issues and my fears.

    Letting my children decide isn't caring less, but actually caring more.

    Letting them have a voice and a choice based upon their feelings, not mine.

    As I let it all go today…I felt free from the responsibility and was once again free in my world and it left her free in hers.  Happy Birthday Honey…I love you. Letting you be you…is what love means to me.

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  • Seek to Become more Aware.

    Jason Torola put it so clearly, "

    Beth, You'll get the last word. You always do. But know this; I've seen what you wrote. I've seen what you tried to do.

    A wise man told me, "You can fool the fans, but you can't fool the players." Beth, we are all players here.

    I don't have to get the last word, but people usually stop talking and I can't make them talk, so is it really my problem that I get left in silence?  

    His reference to what I wrote isn't something I feel would be beneficial to post on my blog…it isn't my journey…I myself have no problems with airing it…but it isn't mine to air.

    And he is very correct in stating "We are all Players here."

    Yes we are. And how you play the game will define your integrity and your authenticity.  And I love that there are no fans to fool.  For you truly are not fooling anyone…you only look foolish.

    I know what my intentions are and how I personally play the game and furthermore, who I like to play with.

    I am not interested in the struggle of convincing someone to do or say or be a certain way.  I used to.  I mothered that way.  I gave it up five years ago…and in its place granted freedom to all who have a relationship with me.

    You Jason get to be Jason…please do and say and be exactly as you feel.  I truly would not want you any other way. The same goes for the rest of your family and each person and family in the church and out.  

    I have no desire to change a hair on your head.  However, IF it is YOUR desire to change and want a cheerleader, I will cheer you on as you play this new game.

    But, if you want to continue in the old system of seeking power and control…we part ways.  I don't play there anymore.  And I will not tell you you can't play there.  Play away.  Demand, rage and work to bend and control OR give up your power and people please and play that way…either way it is a game I no longer play.

    It is my goal, my intention to completely take myself out of that old game. Certainly there will be times when I slip and fall and veer off course and find the old me wanting to control, or feeling above others by making them feel less…but it doesn't feel good inside of me no more.  I have lost the taste for that old game.

    It has taken a great deal of work to get out of that game and its cost to my life were way too much…If and when I find myself playing that old game, I quickly work to exit out.

    Jason I was a very forceful player in the old system….and I can certainly see how you can see me that way.  But in the past 7 years I have been feverishly working to remove all desire to play that way.

    I am making choices that are the opposite of how I used to live life. I was completely exhausted and totally without a clue as to how to change and control so much dysfunction….I walked out.

    I gave up control and found freedom.

    I concentrated on my self.

    I began to save only me.

    To control only me.

    To play only for me.

    And it worked like magic…I became a player that no longer needs to find its power by controlling other people.  My power is gotten by being free.

    I truly, truly wish for you and all…the experience of being free.  It was not then or is now my intention to break up families. It would be my greatest joy to see one family make it through this journey intact.

    It wasn't to be that way for me.  It is not now or ever a walk I want for one other soul…but It isn't up to me.  Remember Jason, we are all players…and what we put out comes back into our lives.

    Play well…there is no fooling the fans.  We are aware of the truth, whether we show it or not…it is there.  Each of us will have the choice to follow our awareness or to sit this round out….but awareness is yours to pick up…or yours to ignore.  

    Awareness is the Gift I have discovered…placed there for when you get tired of being in the old game.  It is automatic, you don't have to be cute enough, good enough or wise enough….it is just there.

    It is there waiting for you to glance its way…to begin to see life in a whole new way.  You lose the fight and seek to become more aware.

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    This is a quilt I titled, "Awareness"  my daughter owns it.  Photograph by Hannah Jukuri

  • Your Own Life.

    The heeling of a dog on a leash is the perfect analogy of how I was raised and then how I raised my own children.  

    Certainly there is no real leash, but the feelings of being led around are very present.

    You are unable to move freely without a struggle and face the wrath of the leash holder; for it is expected you follow their lead.

    It goes much easier if the one on the leash has no voice or choice or mind of their own…mindlessly follow.  

    Breaking them in, beating them down, taking away their freedoms begins very early on.  We put them in leashes as little children…and they are taught to follow, not lead.

    And it certainly makes a difference if you are on the leash or holding the leash in your hand.

    Holding the leash in your hand, you don't want the person on the Leash to fight you, but to heel and acquiesce…

    I shudder at the way I raised my children, to be nice folks on a leash, to 'go along' without confrontation, to 'respect' authority, to be a good boy/girl; I showed them how best to live FOLLOWING me…rarely did they get to run free.  

    Well, they were free in the things I didn't care about….or would reflect back to me. But mostly I had a strong hand on the leash and expected and needed them to act a certain way.

    What is also very haunting is that when I took off their leashes, they didn't believe they were gone.  

    They didn't immediately go and run freely and make choices on their own…OR certainly didn't feel comfortable going against me….they were waiting for me to jerk back their chain and get them quickly back into MY choice.

    And in the past, being a good girl on the leash elicited loving praise from me.  I liked it when they did what I wanted without a fight.  And when they didn't I hollered until they obeyed…got back in line, behind me.

    Once free, they didn't know where the love would be found.

    In the past fighting the leash, love was withdrawn and my anger arose full force…love was delivered if you quietly went along.

    So, when you take of the constrictions and constraints, they don't know how to judge their own actions…or mine…and now what does love mean? Or where do you get it???

    Removing the force from the relationship left us all in an odd place.

    I didn't know how to mother letting kids do as they wanted….any more than my kids knew how to be free kids.

    It took time, like six years and counting to undo the damage of the leash.

    When you are praised and loved for not fighting for your own feelings and life…you feel its unloving to embrace your own set of values, feelings and choices.  It seems harsh and angry NOT to follow the woman with the leash in her hand.

    What was so interesting in my life, was that I was learning how to be off the leash with my mother, while I was letting my children's leashes go.

    I was able to see what I needed and could give the same to my children. For you can't just unleash yourself from your family of origin, and keep your children on a leash.  

    The disconnection has to be complete…no leashes and total freedom to move. If you are still holding the leash, you are both prisoner to the dysfunction…and the legacy continues.

    This was perhaps the hardest lesson to navigate; to restore freedom in my family.  Oh it was hard won…and stilll continues to be.

    I have the unnatural instincts to control and to want everyone moving with me.  Leash lifestyle is comfortable for me…all moving as one.

    I feel anxious at times and unloved when they leave and do things that are not what I choose to do…forgetting that love is freedom.

    My mind still has a hard time without a leash in my hand….although, I am way fine with having removed mine from my mother's hand.

    Imagine in order for me to be free, I had to cut the leash and move away from my mother.  She didn't set me free, untie the leash and wish me well…instead she feels unloved now that I am free.

    Her feelings of Love was to have me on her leash…ME doing what makes her feel good, loved, happy…it had nothing to do with me.

    The hollow hole that is left when you leave the leash is almost unbearable, for you realize that all of the things you did for love was all for naught.  Sacrificing your freedom and self in order to win her love, was in and of itself abuse.  She didn't love you, she controlled you.

    And while giving up your life to be controlled you believed you had piles of love to relax upon….for you had given so Much…only to find nothing there.  Just cold piles of giving up…a cold and empty life.

    There is no life filled with love once the leash is gone.  Once the leash is gone, you are alone and separated, lost and unsure, but free.  

    It is then, that you begin to have your own life.  

     

     

     

     

  • Parents Call Family.

    I came across this paragraph in "Codependent No More" by Melody Beatte. 

    "Codependents are indirect. We don't say what mean, we don't mean what we say.  We don't do this on purpose. We do it because we've learned to communicate this way. At some point, either in our childhood or adult family, we learned it was wrong to talk about problems, express feelings, and express opinions. We've learned it was wrong to directly state what we want and need. It was certainly wrong to say no, and stand for ourselves. An alcoholic (abusive) parent or spouse will be glad to teach these rules; we have been too willing to learn and accept them." MB

    Communicating poorly was taught to us.

    To NOT communicate how we felt was demanded of us, expected of us.  This was dictated by the abusive parent who needed us to not mention how their behavior felt to us.  Or god forbid, speak of it to another person, share our experience, express our feelings… and communicate about abuse.  

    Even the spouse of the abuser will follow the rules.  They too will not talk about the 'problems' and the child then has no adult to which he/she can communicate directly.  

    Direct communication becomes extinct.

    If you communicate directly to these such folks, (abusers and their partners) you will be snuffed out, silenced, tossed to the curb, annihilated from their lives.  They will easily get rid of you so as not to hear a direct communication about a 'problem'.

    Their problem, their abusive behavior, their cover up, their lack of paying attention, their lack of doing nothing, their lacks in allowing abuse to continue on.  They certainly don't want to hear about it OR how it has affected the lives of so many and how it is now trickling down into the next generation. 

    Abuse has its own island, and while we were born upon that island, we can't tell anyone what happened there, how we lived, who was there and what happened…it is like we fell from the sky, but not raised in abuse. 

    Yet we spent the first 18 years of our lives there…and it is as if 'nothing' happened.  As if our early years are meaningless.  Our parents don't want to know that they indeed left a permanent scar

    Our battle scars are wounds that go unhealed, for the very thing we need to heal is forbidden.  We are not allowed treatment.

    Imagine, one parent wounds you and the other refuses to treat you…a child is left on the island unable to communicate, or it will be tossed out to sea, the sea of estrangement.

    And guess what, it matters not how many years pass on, whether you are now married with children, IF you ever dare speak of your life on the Island of Abuse, you will be banished…

    Many feel it is better to live among those on the Island and speak indirectly and without meaning, than to speak their truth and fall into the sea.

    Those are our two damn choices. 

    Pick one.

    The sea of estrangement brought me back to me.

    I still see the Island and hear about the Islanders, their parties and their lives…and in the early days of swimming alone, I longed to go back, but each and every time I considered it, I knew that I would have to leave the new me behind.

    The rules on the Island forbade the use of direct communication or expression of ones feelings or to discuss problems.  If I were to go back, I go back as a voiceless, choiceless, indirect and meaning not what I say girl.  I can't.

    Once you get used to swimming in the sea of freedom and truth, it is impossible to be happy on the Island of Abuse.  

    Which I know is why many parents are scared spit-less for their children to speak up and be direct, for it means they are heading to the open sea…and when they get a taste of being free, they will never return to the dark Island of Abuse. 

    One that the parents call family.

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  • As far as I can tell.

    From David Hawkin’s book, Truth vs Falsehood a chapter called, Spiritual Truth.

    “While the majority of people in the United States believe in God (90-92%, CNN News, April 2004) and therefore tend to look to established religions for the highest truth, the source of the truth upon which all religions depend stems from the even higher primary source of spiritual reality itself. Thus, religion is the institutional consequence of spiritual truth rather than is origination or primary source. However, because religion incorporates the truth revealed by its founders, the derived teachings are sufficient and satisfactory for the great majority of people for whom the information is facilitated and made available as scripture by institutionalized religion.”

    “There as been a great deal of research into the historic origins of the scriptures of all religions, resulting in much discourse and debate over the centuries as to specifics, such as dates, people, and authenticity. Some finalized versions of scriptures were formalized by exclusive councils and became “canons” by virtue of scholastic authority. Technically, interpretation of their meaning is the providence theology, epistemology, metaphysics, and ontology (the science of life).”

    “All the great spiritual teachers throughout history were mystics, and the source of their awareness of spiritual truth was the result of Enlightenment and transformational Realization of the Reality of Divinity as the subjective knowingness that ensues from advanced consciousness by virtue of being at One with that Known. Thus, the avatar does not speak from knowing “about” but from the actual Presence within, which radiates forth and constitutes the Essence of that which replaces the mind as the source of understanding and Knowingness (the classic Purusha). The process whereby this transformation occurs has been described in the history of each saint, safe, and divine teacher and is often included in the scripture itself.”

    “From a purely research viewpoint, the calibrations of levels of consciousness can be aptly applied to verify the reality of any spiritual teaching, including their traditional scriptures. Each level represents the actuality of the possibilities of consciousness and the progress from the linear to the nonlinear context, which is infinite and beyond space, time or location.”

    “The source of the highest spiritual truth is non-mental, and the intellect has difficulty comprehending this critical fact because the mind is intrinsically dualistic and limited, expecting a “this” to come from a “that”. In the advanced spiritual Reality, duality dissolves because the “this” is the “that.” The seeker and the Sought become One with the transcendence of the limitation of duality, i.e., Realization of the Self, Illumination, and Enlightenment, i.e., “The Kingdom of God is within you.”

    (he list some calibrations, I will post a few that I recognize)
    A Course in Miracles, workbook – 600
    A Course in Miracles, textbook – 550
    Bhagavad-Gita- 910
    Bodhidharma Zen Teachings – 795
    Dead Sea Scrolls – 260
    Gospel of St. Luke – 699
    Gospel of St. Thomas – 660
    King James Bible from the Greek –475
    Lao-Tsu Teachings –610
    New Testament (King James Version after the deletion of the Book of revelations) 790
    Torah – 550
    Trinity (concept) 945
    Yoga Sutras, Patanjali – 740

    “Displayed above are integrous calibrated truths available to humankind, some for over thousands of years of evolutionary history. Any single selection is, in and of itself, sufficient for a lifetime of study and spiritual endeavor. As aspirants discover, it is one thing to know about the truth and quite another to understand it or, even more importantly to become it. Spiritual progress is simultaneously simple yet complex, subtle and yet cataclysmic, inspired and yet intimidating. To transcend the limitations of the ego requires intention, integrity of purpose, and resolve (plus grace: the assistance of an advanced teacher and positive karma). The journey often starts seemingly accidentally or as a consequence of curiosity. It then gathers interest and finally involvement, followed by commitment and the discovery of undreamed-of rewards.”

    “To facilitate this endeavor, scriptures and the great spiritual classics supply critical information. Commitment to the goals of spiritual progress, in and of itself, has a transformative effect on brain physiology and attracts spiritual energies that shift alignment and power of concordant attractor energy fields. These recontextualize subjective reality and optimize realization.”

    “From the calibration levels, it becomes evident that the great sages from the early Aryan culture of ancient India represented the first major emergence of the highest spiritual awareness available to man recorded. The same truths emerged later in different cultures and eras, completely and separately from each other, and yet the realization of the nature of the highest truth was essentially identical in each case, with some variations of expression that reflected cultural and linguistic differences. Thus, truth as such is not exclusive but universal, or it would not be truth. Therefore, spiritual or religious claims of exclusivity indicate the interference and errors of the egos of later followers of the original sages.”

    “Truth by definition, has no limitation or qualification and is not discriminatory. Inasmuch as everyone already has a calibratable level of consciousness at birth, the circumstances of that even would imply that they are not accidental but consequent to patterns of spiritual evolution as they manifest in the physical world as culture, family, time, and circumstances. (Consciousness research reveals that the particulars of every individual’s birth are absolutely, perfectly karmically just and maximally advantageous, despite appearances or personal opinion to the contrary.)”

    “The calibrations of the world’s greatest teachers are concordant with human experience and validation over great periods of time despite the major cultural changes to which they are relatively immune due to their nonlinear essence. Because truth exists independently of its discovery, like gold, its rediscovery elicits excitement and attraction to a new source.”

    “Advanced spiritual students value all sources of truth and often study combinations of them. Thus, the study of Christian mystics clarifies the truths revealed by the Vedas, and, in turn the Vedas clarify Buddhist teachings that then clarify the teachings of Jesus Christ.”

    “ The limitation of traditional religious practice has been that it often gets involved with the peripheral issues of times, places, personalities, and ethnic propensities (i.e. form and content). Of greater significance is the study of material that is intrinsic of the truths revealed (i.e., the field) and not the circumstances of the events, as anecdotally interesting as they might be. These trappings, which are actually extraneous, have a negative effect in that they are deceptive, diversionary, and lead to such absurdities as people killing each other over whether or not one should wear a bear or worship on a certain day of the week, the designation of which did not even exist at the time of the appearance of the great avatars. In Realty, which is nontemporal, there are no “days of the week.”

    “Religious zealots who kill “nonbelievers” for trivia, such as hats, beards, diets, and designated days of devotion, display the negative fallout of undue emphasis on cultural eccentricities. As readers of the original scriptures can see for themselves, every day is a day of devotion; every day is Sabbath. In the hands of barbarians, trivial differences are magnified and then become merely tools of war that “justify” serious sacrilege and violation of even the simplest of spiritual principles. Perhaps transmission of spiritual truth is best done by example and attraction rather than by promulgation to the people who are incapable of appreciating its value, appropriate use and intention.”
    “True missionaries spread valid information and teach by example. Those who are incorrectly motivated become sources of oppression, which leads to revolt (e.g., the Boxer Rebellion).”

    “Missionary zeal reaches it ultimate expression as theocracies and the establishment of state religions that utilize force and punitive government regulations. The history of Europe reflects the utilization of religion in the name of monarchies and power struggles involving the nonintegrous exploitation of church authority. Religious conflict has led to religions wars, which have traditionally been the worst of all wars over the centuries and in almost all parts of the globe, even as reflected in current events arising out of the Middle East. Spirituality unites, whereas, unfortunately, the downside of religion divides. Severe distortions of religious truths lead to them becoming the exact opposites in practice.”

    “Questionable Scriptures and Notes on the Christian Bible”
    Old Testament – 190
    Book of Revelations – 70
    David Hawkins

    What is so amazing is that it seems instead of seeking the truth that the great masters and sages sought, religions are fighting over semantics on the masters journey, completely failing to see the journey of truth while fighting about how they got there.

    Religion has done more damage to the truth in life than any other source as far as I can tell.

  • In Peace I walked Free!

    After my last post about the Civil War in abusive homes, I had to look up the meaning of Civil to see what it means to be in a Civil war.

    Civil -polite: polite, but in a way that is cold and formal.
    And then I looked up the combination of the two words, Civil War,

    Civil War – is a war between organized groups within the same nation state or republic or, less commonly, between two countries created from a formerly-united nation.

    The formerly united family is now at war with themselves, brothers against brothers, sisters against sister, children against parents for some of the blind can now see, some of the brainwashed are beginning to think on their own, an awakening is happening, and this causes a war within a war.

    I don’t want to leave the feelings that in this Civil War no peace is found, for it is. Peace is found in no longer remaining silent. Power is replacing the forced politeness…children are rising up and finding their true self, they feel the stirrings of their Spirit.

    They are finding their unused voices, speaking forbidden words and names, identifying the enemy and no longer remaining civil – polite cold and formal.

    They will become warm and informal, perhaps become unconventional and different, they will be marching to their own drums, hearing their own music for the very first time.
    Hearing the stirrings of inner freedom and expression, of passion and of self-awareness, they will fight now to be free from being held prisoner to another.

    This civil war will end for the lucky ones, for the ones who can find the thread of their soul, the inner knowing that their very aliveness depends on them leaving the family, that if they stay they may as well die.

    There wasn’t a moment of hesitation when I left my family, there wasn’t a drop of doubt, for to the depth of my being, I knew I had been one of the living dead and staying there aware would be to be buried alive, for now I knew I was alive but dead.

    What I had found that day back in December of 2004, was a dead me. A me that had no me in it. A me that was full of the definitions from my parents, the beliefs and thoughts of my religion, but there wasn’t but a speck of me there.
    Not a part of me that defined by me, just me.

    I was a body being used by my family and a religion, but I wasn’t alive and now I was aware of it. And once I knew, I could no longer not know. And when you know you are then awake of how asleep you have been.

    And when you are awake, you see the civil war you lived in.

    Imagine being in a war but unaware you are at war. Or even aware that you are scarred and lame due to the battles you unsuccessfully fought.

    A civil war refugee that finds its imperfect self is on the path to perfection.
    “Coming from whence you came…” you should act, be and walk and talk like the walking wounded.

    You are the perfect representation of an abused child. You are the signpost or the poster child for abuse. You have displayed yourself perfectly, the perfectly abused.
    Perfectly abused people act perfectly abused. When you are aware of how abused you are, you can then begin to heal.

    Denying your brokenness is denying your self.

    I found myself in a completely broken state and complete freedom arose, for I no longer had to strive for perfection instead I embraced my imperfections and found them to be perfectly me.

    In agreement with my history I found peace…and the freedom to be myself.

    To walk my walk.

    To talk my talk.

    To be a me I had yet to be.

    An individual, a free spirit, with a clear mind no longer washed by others, in peace I walked free.

    Freedom’s just another word for nothing left to lose!

  • My expectation.

    There are two ways to live, one with your expectations packed and ready for each day and each encounter… leaving very little room for surprises or impromptu circumstances, a very rigid needy control expecting life to follow your lead.

    You have plans and life works much better when life falls into step behind you. You are the mover and the shaker and all need to bow to your expectations.

    Expectations are very selfish little things that steal freedom from others, one little need at a time. Especially if you throw a tantrum when they are not met, or spunk or sulk in silence.

    The odds of our expectations being met are slim to none, unless we have become a tyrant and have stolen the lives out of those we love making them march along with our expectations.

    The other way is to follow life without expecting a certain flow, without scripts written and people’s parts picked out, instead it is all improvised as you go.

    When I found my freedom within to say no to others expectations of me, I also have freed others to be free of mine.

    It wasn’t an easy won battle within me, but I simply became overjoyed with my newfound word…NO and the freedom it brought to me.

    I loved not having to meet expectations of others and in disappointing them I grew to like me more and more.

    Each time I find myself unhappy, I look and see where I am stuck, what am I saying or doing that is stealing my freedom and whose expectations am I catering to?

    You would be surprised how much of life is lived with an expectations floating out ahead of us, a little thought that becomes a giant storm.

    Mostly the landscape ahead of me is blank. I have no expectations planted out ahead of me.

    I can’t plan the weather so that is out.
    I don’t own others actions so I am free there.
    I can’t even know for sure if I will do what I plan for what I know for sure is that there are a million things that can waylay me along the way.

    Greeting each day and each moment without expectations allows you to have your hands free to carry what comes in.

    If you are standing there with an armload of expectations…how open are you to receive?

    I didn’t on my own get rid of expectations, but rather all my expectations were unmet and unrealized, so it was either suffer or drop them.

    I thought confusion and mayhem would erupt if I had no expectations and instead peace, love and joy grew inside of me.

    When I let go…I was free.

    I was free to receive what is.

    What is is enough for me, no matter what it is.

    My new expectation is to be a peace with what is.

    To have no more expectations above what is or beneath what is.

    What is, is my expectation.

  • A field with no rules.

    Rewrite, Rewrite, Rewrite were the last words spoken in our final writing class for the year, they echoed and bounced around in my head, unsure if this was encouragement or a reprimand.

    We had just sat though an hour and a half of listening to the words the students had written. Words of emotion, of defeat, of growing up, of unique perspectives, of finding their way, and to me there was no need to rewrite a thing.

    They had given me pieces of their lives told with feelings and said out loud in fear or with great bravado, with pride and with youthful expression, to me it seemed they were perfectly perfect fitting into their life experience.

    Where they were in life fit perfectly in how they wrote. I am not sure rewriting is the answer, it seems that if you say, rewrite you are rejecting what they wrote.

    Rewrite, redo, and reword it…

    The juxtaposition between the enthusiastic teacher, her encouraging voice, and her caring eyes, and the words, Rewrite struck me with contradiction…like a smile with a slap.

    I then wondered how often I had done this, ‘rejecting the project’ while trying to teach technique.

    I began an Art Quilt group, and my intentions were to be with ladies who enjoy creating quilts without patterns, to let go of the ‘rules’ of quilting and just play with the fabrics and even mix metaphors and jumble up what those who came before us defined as perfect quilting.

    Rebels, daring to not follow the well-trodden path.

    When I began quilting, my Aunt told me that I could do anything I wanted, that I didn’t have to follow or adhere to any quilt rule or pattern, that quilting was making a sandwich, putting fabric batting fabric, and I was the creator.

    She taught me without teaching me rules.

    I wonder if you can do the same with writing, if you could just use the same writing instruments; words, paper, pencil and then allow writing to come what may.

    Let the writer go free, allow the writer to follow what feels right for him, to not make him bend and twist into a forgone conclusion of what writing needs to be.

    Whether it be writing, quilting or living life, we seem to neglect the person for the skill, toss out the personality, the Spirit, the essence in trying so hard to get to perfect.

    Maybe it isn’t the writing or the quilt or life but it’s getting to Perfect.

    Is there a way to teach without spoiling it with perfect?

    I guess what we all fear in life is not being able to measure up to perfect.

    I say, once again, kill perfect, declare it a swear word…

    Imperfect has to replace it; it will free so many from the fear of failing. Whether you are writing or creating art, if you let go of perfect you will set free in wide-open fields with unlimited possibilities.

    Lets all play in the field of pure potential as the wise masters say…a field with no rules.

  • Unbelievers Live Free.

    In my old religion, those who left the church or perhaps those who never entered were called Unbelievers.

    These Unbelievers didn’t believe like we did, and in doing so didn’t move about the planet like us. They were ‘allowed’ to do things that good Believers were not allowed to do.

    Unbelievers were easy to spot, they had pierced ears, painted fingernails, colored hair, they were allowed to do things with their bodies we were not allowed to do.

    Unbelievers also had a say in how many children they would have, or if they wanted any. They had freedoms in their lives we didn’t have.

    You could almost see the Believers being stuck and the Unbelievers being free.

    It all began and ended with my mind.

    When I believed my mind, its thoughts and its beliefs, I gave up my body and my free will. When I didn’t believe, when I became an Unbeliever, I had my freedom back.

    It resembles an addiction in how it takes over your life.

    My mind became addicted to limiting thoughts.

    What is so extremely debilitating is how we are afraid to not believe those thoughts, for those thoughts were taught to us from a very young age.

    The thoughts and beliefs become who we are, and to let them go seems to be killing yourself.

    Being held prisoner in your own life by thoughts is being the jailer and the jailed.

    You have to become an Unbeliever to be set free.

    We were taught; Unbelievers go to Hell, so who wants to be free only to spend eternity in Hell.

    Isn’t there a saying “What is bound on Earth is bound in Heaven”?

    Being bound on earth is how I lived for the first 46 years of my life, being a good Believer of a very mind controlling religion.

    Becoming unbound has been a long process and one that has brought me much peace, love and joy…

    Unbelieving is unraveling the ties that bind.

    Unbelievers live free.

  • Until she can find her own.

    The hardest part of being a mom is when your child takes an exit that you didn’t see coming and they seem to disappear from the usual landscape and it leaves you separated.

    And I am not even sure what exit she took, where she is or what her intentions are, just that she has left the lane of what was and is now heading down a road that neither of us are familiar with.

    As I continue to travel down my regular road, off to the side is this other lane of unfamiliar nagging at me, this road from my view is full of potholes and hairpin curves with disappearing drop-offs and my daughter seems blind to all its hazards.

    I am not certain if she is at a wayside unsure or if she is going forward with a full head of steam.

    I am not even sure what is making me uneasier, her being on that road or not knowing if she is sitting down in wonder or going further into its complicated bends.

    Our voices have been silenced. But all that seems to be happening now is a silent movie, where the drama continues, but I can’t hear the words.

    The not knowing is far worse, I believe than knowing.

    In the knowing, I know and can deal.

    It is like her life has slipped from my view.

    This almost seems like the far end of a spectrum, one being you are doing too much in a child’s life, overtaking it and this is the complete opposite, where you are completely taken out.

    In the middle of the spectrum are two people who allow the other their lives, we share and explore and understand their individual journeys.

    I am wondering how to hook our roads back up, how to join them together in a way that honors and gives space, in a way that respects our differences, but allows us to trust each other.

    Is there a way two people can be together on two different roads?

    As women we have lots in common and I am sure it is harder when I have more experience and I have been her superior as her mother for all these years, but is there a bridge that we can stand upon and share our views?

    I will have to let go of my fears and my ‘know it all’ attitude and let her show me the landscape of her new world, I will have to be a visitor to a foreign land.

    It truly feels like two distinct worlds.

    Yet I believe and feel that I have traveled the world she is going into, so it isn’t that foreign to me, perhaps it is only new and exciting to her, she is the foreigner not I.

    What is so perplexing is that you never leave reality, this is an inward journey, you are traveling away from your essential self.

    Away from your morals, your values, your worth, your self esteem, your dreams, your passions, your soul. Into a world of secrets, lies and deceit…heading towards a self that is unfamiliar, foreign.

    It is the road to no you.

    You are being lured down this road by a friendly face that is the façade of negative energies, manipulating you with false promises and pretty lies.

    If she were to travel this road alone, He would be her only guide.

    What I want is to walk with the two of them and give the real story, like Paul Harvey’s ‘the rest of the story’.

    Yet he knows and perhaps she knows too, that I will be the story wrecker, I will unveil the pretty lies and unravel the promises and make them as they are empty.

    So what scares me the most is that my familiar voice will be drowned out by his, that she will tune me out and turn a deaf ear to my words and cling to his.

    Her life in its innocence doesn’t have a voice of her own.

    I am sure she feels the pull between him and I, both of us wanting her. And what I want the most is for her to have a separate voice from both of us, but I don’t feel she has one for her self as yet. I see her as a girl who confused and twisted and wants to have love and attention but it comes with such a price tag, her self worth.

    I can almost understand the twist between what he says and how she feels.

    His promise land is a secret place and it can’t reach the light of day.

    In order for her to travel down his road, she lies to me.

    What I want most is for the lies to stop.

    Lies to herself and lies to me, both are taking a toll on her.

    It is so telling to see what lies can do to your spirit, you can literally see her growing darker.

    The truth will set your Spirit free!

    The two roads I see in my minds eye is the road of lies and the road of truth. One road darkens and leads you away from self and the other will support and Lighten who you are.

    You wonder what makes some travel into the darkness and what makes others travel towards the Light. What decides this and can they make a U-Turn?

    I will do as any good mother or women who see another descending into the darkness will do. I will give her my voice until she can find her own.