Tag: Christ Consciousness

artist residency

When you are where you’re not quite there.

by ErinLeave a Comment on When you are where you’re not quite there.

I shared on my IG a couple months ago a stream of consciousness doodle about how growth isn’t about arrival but about progression and how the fragmentation you may see or recognize in yourself is actually the art of being whole.

The past two weeks have involved a high level of change for me. My basement study, adorned by a water heater and directly below one of the kids’ bathrooms (making for excellent water sound effects in meditation recordings, let me tell ya) evolved to a study in a neighborhood boutique yoga studio, OM Old Orchard.

With an exposed brick wall and space for two chairs, a microphone and a yoga mat, I moved in on Friday, starting a new chapter of assuming the growth / arrival / progress combo. Of being there and not yet here.

I think it is important to remember the balance of alignment. The sanskrit term “samatva” is about an even state of the mind regardless of what is going on around you – it’s not about indifference, but about stability. I have found myself very aware of this, this past week.

Part of the reason is because – like most people – the courage to take creative freedoms & initiatives rarely comes without at least one darkish night of the soul where you feel the failure of the work you were enthusiastically calling your mom about the day before. If not that, you wonder who are you to do this work – you see other people with similar work and think they know more, they have already done and given the world what you were thinking about. You could stop.

And so evenness / stability of the mind in this sense requires the self control to recognize this is a pattern of the mind, this is a survival (risk averse) technique of the mind and to take all of the energy relative to being forlorn or lost and assume it right back into the root belief that powers the inspired thought. And to have an evenness / stability of the mind in such case also requires one believe in their work regardless of what transpires. The notion that you cannot be wrong unless you’re trying to be right comes to play here. Be authentic.

Be authentic.

Be authentic.

So – one of the deals I am working out right now is how to take some of my innovative ideas for how to offer restorative yoga to people and test them out in OM Old Orchard / from my new study. Already, we have hit brakes and gas / gas and brakes and I could feel a sense of need for control rise up. The need to explain. The need to convince. The need to protect. The need to establish.

Sattva. Evenness of the mind. I think it is so easy to be in something new and recognize that it is not what you thought without really crediting the fact that it needs time to grow. How many times I have seen folks in the yoga world give up on an idea or a model because it didn’t seem successful right away, when the seed was definitely in fertile soil, when the listening was nourishing iterative change & positive growth.

I recognized the need for control and threaded it into the integrity behind the ideas. Remembered that the only control needed was self control. To be thoughtful about what I felt God has put on my life. To listen well. To iterate wisely. To suggest. To tend to. To direct, ultimately – and to offer.

“Commit to the Lord whatever you do, and your plans will be established” Proverbs 16:3 was a key for me this past week and will continue to be so… we only get like this one shot and being who we are, where we are and how we are. We only get one life with these stories, these parents, these people.

Using the body to notice our intuitive voice & align our actions and interactions with a motive we willingly surrender to be examined I think is the one thing I have learned that gives me peace of mind every single day. Every single freak out. Every single clutch of “will this make money”. I go back to the body.

Back to the breath.

Back to my yes. My no.

And proceed.

Till next time. Thanks for listening :)

PS: Enjoy these pictures from move in weekend. That is my dear friend Jan, who did not know she was coming to my new study but had serendipitously brought me a gift of a singing bowl & perfect fall leave & bundle of palo santo. One of the first projects is to bring the recording of Words that Rhyme to completion!! Praying for that because Lord knows I have been dilly dallying.

Words in Sentences

Send Her All of Her Might

by Erin1 Comment on Send Her All of Her Might

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Lucy and I were praying for a dear friend one night in August. I had led the prayer the night before so, on that particular evening – all tucked in bed, Lucy led us. Hands clasped, eyes open.

As she sweetly tumbled through her prayer, hitting strides of addressing this friend’s pain, she firmly requested, “…and God, please, just send her all of her might.”

This stuck with me.

“Send her all of her might.”

When I think of “might”, strength – power – brute force, I typically associate it with a universal power source. As in, “God, send me strength”.

As such, I think of it as strength from outside of me, strength that is not my own, strength not readily available to me.

Strength I need.

So, when Lucy revolutionized my understanding of might, it was because she was asking God to make it so that our friend had all of her might. As if she has a bank of might available to her that she can access.

It made me think, “What if I, through relationship with the supernatural, through my awareness with the physical body and its ability to be stunningly miraculous, can access reserves of my own might as divinely given to me from birth?”

At first this seemed to be a cute idea but not really practical or not really as elegant of a model for how we may consider petitioning for strength. I thought of how the model looks in real life. For example, I know I often request the gifts of other people that, in some way or another, I have within myself.

I do not do this in a lazy way or from an insecure place, however. I see that a friend is obviously artistic or a friend is obviously wise and so I solicit their technique and advice. But do I know that I equally can attempt the art? Search the heart? Yes. I do.

(Especially with the right Sharpie style marker.)

Though I firmly believe there is power in believing in a strength bigger than what resides within us, what if we first requested all of our own strength, our birthright might, be present and accounted for before we ask specifically for the divine’s?

And – before anybody cringes at the idea of doing something on our own and “what about Jesus” or whatever – just hang tight for a moment and realize that in doing such a thing, we actually are asking for the God’s strength *with specific awareness* that our strength and our help comes from the Lord to begin with? (Psalm 121:2)

What if in requesting all of our strength be present, we started to understand that our intricate design as individuals has a power source into the great connected universe? Charged by God’s right hand?

What if, in prayer, we began to understand internal cruxes that block and cross our wires? So that we can untangle and calm the mind stuff?

What if, in pursuit of our might being full, we learn things about ourselves that have been preventing us from operating on a full tank of strength?

What if we can come into a next iteration of our life by understanding the personal strength that lies in our own emotional fortitude, in our physical temple? 

I mean, really. I believe we need to be careful to not praying for God’s strength over and over and over while remaining unaware of the personally designed, tailor made strength and skill set we were given to not only survive, but to make a difference in this life… to step into our purpose out of our pain.

<Deep breath.>

I believe the look of “boldly approaching the throne” when life is at its hardest changes when we do our part to cultivate the might and open-heartedness available to harness in this physical life. Lock that root in and draw that energy up.

There will be times we need increased strength for our weary bones and power to our spirits. (“Even the youth grow weary” Isaiah 40:30)

When we take a personal step to align with the divine strength in the body and energy body to begin with, and – from that place, petition the divine to reinforce, supplement and support, I believe we can come into a new level of hope, soaring on wings like eagles, running and not growing tired, and walking and not being faint. (Isaiah 40:31)

So much love. erin