I M Perfect lady

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  • Put a Happy Face on Hurt

    I had a saying that sat on my stove for years on a trivet, "Blessed are the Peacemakers, for they shall inherit the Earth."

    I was a young unmarried girl at the time I had gotten this as a gift, and the way I viewed it was that if you were the one to back down first or retract your wishes, it was a good thing, for it kept the peace.

    If you made things peaceful outwardly and held inside or covered up your true feelings, YOU Were a Peacemaker…for relationships settled back down.

    What I had failed to see at the time, was that while I was making outward peace, my insides were being crammed full of 'unexpressed true emotions', that I had 'settled' to calm things down.

    I had given up what I really needed to have peace.  

    I had silenced my truth feelings in order to get along.

    What I was doing was being a False Peacemaker, I was pretending to pretend that things were okay with me, when they were not.

    Oh, I can recall this feeling so perfectly, how the other person would be so happy to have her peacefulness restored, as I inwardly glowered in silence…while pasting on a happy face. 

    As I continued on into adult life, into married life I often times left arguments half done….my half was not resolved, but tucked away.

    My greatest fear was that IF I didn't acquiesce, all Holy Hell would break lose, that it was my job to keep the peace.

    Acquiesce – To accept something reluctantly, but without protest.  I had to look that up to make sure I had it right. RIGHT, OMG, that is the flavor of my first 46 years.

    Acquiesce is the perfect word to describe how I viewed being peaceful.  And here is the deal, I was the one who always had to give up 'something' AND do so without putting up a protest, to swallow silently….in order to maintain peace within our relationship.

    You have no idea how often I swallowed bitterness without protest.

    With a belly full of resentment and unspoken words and feelings I walked around 'believing' I was keeping the peace.

    What I was instead holding onto was a belly full of bitterness.

    Is that Love?

    Is that peaceful?

    Was I being even a bit authentic in my relations as I was waddling around chuck full of unresolved differences?

    When I stopped swallowing, but instead spit back my thoughts, my feelings and what I saw were our differences, my inner world began to lighten up, to feel so peaceful, while my outer world began to swirl in consternation.

    Where my mother used to see The Peacemaker, I became her Holy Hellion.  

    For you see, all the peacemaking efforts I had painfully swallowed in order to keep a loving mother and father, never produced that.  It was all for naught.  All I had done was to act in a play of pretending we all got along.

    I was the one who had made it worse.

    I was the one who hadn't spoken up.

    I was the one who kept it all a secret.

    I was the greatest pretender of all.

    I pretended that all the abuse didn't matter to me.

    I pretended to be unhurt, so we could have a family that didn't hurt.

    Yet, in the end….sadly and regretfully, all my siblings were hurt anyway.  All I had done was put a happy face on hurt…

     

     

  • Guilt and Judgment

    Yesterday as I rode along my mail route, I listened to The Course of Miracles coming from my Kindle…I have it strapped to the headrest so I can hear it without headphones.

    A jotted down a few things that seared my mind…and then this morning wanted to go back and find the text, but I haven’t been able to find all sections that caught my ear.

    Here is one I found.

    “When you feel guilty, remember that the ego has violated the laws of God, but you have not.  Leave the “sins” of the ego to me. That is what Atonement is for.  But until you change your mind about those whom your ego has hurt, the Atonement cannot release you.  While you feel guilty your ego is in command, because only the ego can experience guilt.” 

    I stopped and wrote that down. “Only the ego can feel guilty” this was an incredible thing to hear for its implications are mountainous.  No one ever has said, “sins of the ego” instead they act like our spirit has sinned and in order to get a clean spirit to heaven you have to get it forgiven. Imagine if you raised a child to understand there is an ego and there is spirit? 

    Imagine learning that there are two ways to view the world, by ego or by spirit…and to know this as a child.

    If only the ego feels guilt, what is religion for?  So when we were made to feel sinful and unworthy who were they talking to??? It has to be the ego, for if the only the ego can experience guilt, they surely were not talking to our spirits.

    I also wrote down, The ego can’t Know, that Knowing is of the Spirit.  The ego can’t know, it perceives and the spirit can’t perceive, it Knows.

    Here is something else I hadn’t considered. 

    “The ego and the spirit do not know each other.  The separated mind cannot maintain the separation except by dissociating. Having done this, it denies all truly natural impulses, not because the ego is a separate thing, but because you want to believe that you are.  The ego is a device for maintaining this belief, but it is still only your decision to use the device that enables and endures ” 

    This makes perfect sense to me, for when I was a fully engaged ego whom I lovingly call “the mental woman” I had zero contact with my Spirit…I love that they don’t know each other. 

    And imagine…the ego is a device use for separation? 

    To me it kept me separated from God and Spirit.

    Then, came a section on Judgment…

    “Have you really considered how many opportunities you have had to gladden yourself, and how many of them you refused?  There is no limit to the power of a Son of God, but he can limit the expression of his power as much as he chooses. Your mind and mine can unite in shining  your ego away, releasing the strength of God into everything you think and do. Do not settle for anything less than this, and refuse to accept anything but this as your goal.  Watch your mind carefully for any beliefs that hinder its accomplishment, and step away from them.  Judge how well you have done this by your own feelings, for this is the one right use of Judgment.  Judgment, like any other defense, can be used to attack or protect; to hurt or heat. The ego should be brought to judgment and found wanting there.  Without your own allegiance, protection and love, the ego cannot exist.  Let it be judged truly and you must withdraw allegiance, protection and love from it.”

    It seems that the church taught us to judge another, but not to judge the ego.  I love that we are to judge how we are doing by how we are feeling.

    Mostly what I listened to yesterday were the differences between the ego and the soul…and it made sense to me. 

    “Any thought system that confuses God and the body must be insane.  Yet this confusion is essential to the ego, which judges only in terms of threat or non-threat to itself.  In one sense the ego’s fear of God is at least logical, since the idea of Him does dispel the ego. But fear of the body, with which the ego identifies so closely, makes no sense at all.  The body is the ego’s home by its own election. It is the only identification with which the ego feels safe, since the body’s vulnerability is its own best argument that you cannot be of God.”

    Imagine, the ego only judges what is a threat or non-threat to itself. It could care less of how this impacts your life or your souls journey.

    It was so beneficial to my peace of mind to listen to the antics of the ego and its needs and how they contrast directly the spirit, and it made perfect sense to me in my experience.

    And when you read this book, depending upon who has a greater control in your world, the spirit or the ego, it will land differently as you read it

    I am not here to try and convince anyone, I am here to share what I heard.  It brought me peace…and it helped me understand the confusion I have with religion, for it seems to me that religion courts the ego with guilt and judgment.

     

      

  • She was Me

    I had the opportunity to be on web radio, but more importantly the pleasure of speaking with a kindred spirit about my journey, to feel the ease and flow of conversation minus the struggle of explaining.

     

    She got me…and I her.  We looked at life through the same lens…from the inside out. 

     

    Usually it seems I am the odd man out, I am seeing things from a unique angle compared to others in a room, but this time I felt her looking with me in total understanding.

     

    I was also able to see me in a broader way, to realize how far I have come, how my art has led the way, how intuitively I have walked forward and the distance I have traveled.

     

    I have been so intent on this step here that I didn’t see how far I walked, how much I have changed and how deep within I had gone, or even how I now appear.

     

    It is like working on a piece of art, but not stepping back from it…to remain close and perfecting each tiny stroke, not realizing what you have created.

     

    I knew that I had changed drastically, but I don’t believe I saw the beauty in the changes or even the wisdom. 

     

    And I was truly able to see the art in me.

     

    To see my transformation from patterns and dark colors and rigid lines to being the Lady of my quilts.

     

    I am the lady…I can see how we are merging, I am catching up to my lady.  The distance is not such a future dream and far away hope and desire, but that I am living her life today.

     

    I am free, I have self-expression, I am empowered, and passionate, I am truth, I am me.

     

    In the interview I saw my Lady speaking, and she was me.

     

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    Love her confidence and attitude…and I love that it is within me, has been…waiting for me to embrace it.

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    This is how my quilts hang in a quilt show…they never seemed to match.  The first time I seen this, I cried, for they fit in like me…not the same as the rest. 

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    I eventually was able to recognize that not fitting in was okay…but I still chuckle at

    how different my quilts appear next to others…just like me we are in a league of our own. 

  • Live in life.

    When I sort mail, I stand in a U shaped area (Case) with six rows of little slots, one slot for each mailbox all in order of my route.

    An apartment complex of 10 was added to the beginning of my route and I had to make room for it by moving every slot about 10 or so inches to the right, starting with the last one.

    It is surprising how small of a shift there was and how it threw my whole memorizing off, all my instincts of knowing are no more, I have to relearn it all again.

    I wonder how long it will take for my mind to become comfortable with this new routine? What an incredible mind that it can relearn and toss out the old obsolete info that it will follow if you are determined.

    My head actually hurt again from having to concentrate and do the hunt and search routine, and by the end of two and half hours it was already catching on.

    The name would appear and I would know which way to turn, it remembered to remember there was a new place to go to.

    The flexibility of the mind is similar to the body, it will follow your lead, and it is much more your desire to learn than its ability.

    You can become comfortable in a new routine, all it take is time and the willingness to try.

    In a week or so, I will be able to almost mindlessly toss mail, and it leads me to wonder, if you are not putting new things into your life, are you almost on Autopilot?

    What keeps you repeating the same things, being comfortable in the rote like life? How is it that we feel most at ease when we are mindlessly following our normal routine?

    It seems so counterintuitive to living to be on remote, just repeating and repeating, it is like we are stuck in a grove in an old Record Album, ‘same life, same life, same life.’

    Isn’t it odd that we call this living feeling the most comfortable with ‘No Change’.

    And can you actually call it living if there is no growth or change?

    Just as my mind was brought to the present with the slight changes in my case, I am sure that by doing new things in other areas of my life, my mind will awaken in the present and engage in a new way.

    Just as I do yoga for my body, I will have to bring my mind to new places to give it exercise too…I am open to the new possibilities.

    I guess it is up to us whether we coast along or look for new ways to live in life.

  • Tree In Tree

    By Deena Metzger

    “I am no longer afraid of mirrors where I see the sign of the amazon, the one who shoots arrows.
    There was a fine red line across my chest where a knife entered,
    but now a branch winds about the scar and travels from arm to heart.
    Green leaves cover the branch, grapes hang there and a bird appears.
    What grows in me now is vital and does not cause me harm. I think the bird is singing.
    I have relinquished some of the scars.
    I have designed my chest with the care given to an illuminated manuscript.
    I am no longer ashamed to make love. Love is a battle I can win.
    I have the body of a warrior who does not kill or wound.
    On the book of my body, I have permanently inscribed a tree.”
    Deena

    Today while delivering mail, I listened to the CD that accompanies the book, “Saved by a Poem” by Kim Rosen.

    There were many poems, or lines in the poems that spoke to me, but the image of this one stuck with me.

    If you go to her website, http://www.deenametzger.com you will see a fabulous woman who is fully embracing I M Perfect.

    She had a mastectomy and placed a tattoo upon the scar…

  • Cover Your Truth.

    The phrase, “The Elephant in the Room” what does that really mean and how is it used properly?

    Have we been taught to not speak about things that are there, due to the reaction they bring?

    What are Elephants in a room?
    What is that?

    Is it a truth that is too much to bear?

    It seems to me that IF all know the Elephant is there and will not speak of it; we are all playing a game called, ‘lets pretend’.

    And ironically, it isn’t the Elephant we are pretending about but ourselves.

    A silent unspoken agreement that states, I will pretend to like you when I know you do things I don’t agree with, if you pretend to like me for pretending to like you.

    It seems to me that allowing an Elephant/truth to sit unspoken about is to pretend to pretend to pretend that there is a common ground that slipped away with the truth.

    And in order to maintain this false relationship, the Elephant/truth must not be mentioned, we skip around the mountain, and reach the summit of social niceties.

    We then form a new relationship that requires us to not go near the Elephant or truth.

    So what are we really preserving by being so courteous?

    Isn’t it just an old relationship minus the new and changing truths?

    This Elephant in the room that no one speaks about or entertains, to me is just dancing in denial with another.

    Being in a relationship that dishonors both.

    If truth isn’t allowed into a relationship, then I have no interest there.

    I am almost positive that the Elephant that arrived in the room with my father is he is a pedophile. If many adults in my youth had spoken of this Elephant, perhaps a few little girls would have been saved.

    It isn’t so much about the Elephant, but the ones who sit silently and allow it to be there.

    Elephants don’t disappear, don’t change, aren’t healed or treated in silence, nope, instead they continue to live out their sickness in full living color, while many courteously look on, being much to kind to speak of such ills about another person, to kind, to much into the social niceties, preserving a family, saving a father, sparing a brother, keeping sweet, that which isn’t.

    An Elephant in the room is showing you what is wrong and you will either see it and respond or look away.

    Pretending there is no Elephant is denial.

    And denial doesn’t heal, cure, erase, etc to the Elephant, it says much more about you than them.

    They are being their true selves; you are not willing to see it.

    You want to preserve a relationship of old, like good memories, and not willing to be present with who they are today, for it will crack, shatter, and explode the person you need them to be.

    At some point in time, it will be harder and harder to be in a room with an Elephant, it will simply cost you too much.

    My silence is not for sale, it cannot be used to cover your truth.

  • Peace In the Present Moment

    A book by Byron Katie and Eckhart Tolle

    “The most important, the primordial relationship in your life is your relationship with the Now, or rather with whatever form the Now takes, that is to say what is or what happens. If your relationship with the Now is dysfunctional, that dysfunction will be reflected in every relationship and every situation you encounter. The ego could be defined simply in this way; a dysfunctional relationship with the present moment. It is at this moment that you can decide what kind of relationship you want to have with this present moment.”
    Eckhart

    “If your relationship with the Now is dysfunctional, that dysfunction will be reflected in every relationship and every situation!” I know this is true.

    The word dysfunctional almost covers up what is actually happening, it is like a cover deflecting the actual event.

    People fail to notice that by not being with what is actually happening, they are having a dysfunctional relationship to what is, no matter what it is and that alone makes them dysfunctional.

    They are not functioning as one with reality.

    I love how simple he breaks down dysfunction.

    In my head it was all one big vast tangle mess, when it happens little at a time.

    A moment in time presenting itself to you and you changing it into what you need it to be…

    What is so exciting about all of this is that you can stop the dysfunction by greeting what is as it is Now.

    Dysfunction begins each moment in time you fail to see the beauty of what is.

    The darkest beauty as well as its opposite.

    “The simple truth of it is that what happens is the best thing that can happen. People who can’t see this are simply believing their own thoughts, and have to stay stuck in the illusion of a limited world, lost in the war with what is. It’s a war they’ll always lose, because it argues with reality, and reality is always benevolent. When you argue with reality, you lose – but only 100 percent of the time.”
    Byron Katie