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How’s That Planning Thing Going for You? – Richard’s Commentary
We are home from the last leg of our journey to the south, visiting family and friends all the way from Maryland to the “main event” in Orlando, Florida and back again. We left Raleigh, North Carolina yesterday where we spent some time with second son’s family, and plunged right back into our “normal” lives. In fact we arrived just in time to lead our Consciousness Exploration Group scheduled for the first Wednesday of every month.
It was a “busy” trip with one-night stands in several places as we drove south. Planning and coordination was key to keep us relatively on track to get from place to place. The trip went really well. Our last leg was uneventful.
We did get a little tangled up in navigating between Orlando and the Amrit Yoga Ashram, where we spent a delightful time with our nephew. Our Google Maps were not in complete agreement with our GPS guidance and we made some wrong turns on the toll roads. We spent a couple extra dollars backtracking, and, yes, my reaction was anger and frustration. I failed to take the advice Rosemary offered in her Exploration post:
Event happens. Then you React. And then you CHOOSE how you will respond.
Event (Plan seems to go awry). What is your REACTION? Anger? Upset? Depression? Denial? So many different emotions can arise and they can stem from previous experiences, even from your childhood. Reactions start at the unconscious level. But your RESPONSE is chosen consciously.
The key here is choice. The initial reaction is OK; we all react to missteps, to little, and big mistakes, to detours in life that annoy. It is the next step that matters. It is the conscious pause to move into our higher brain and consider an appropriate response, choose that response and act.
The second key is to work on shortening the time from reaction to chosen appropriate response. This seems to be the main work of my lifetime. My primary lesson is patience; and I get many opportunities to practice! Highway detours are just an example.
We will likely need to change our plans for visiting our new grandson in California. We had planned to go out for second son’s birthday, a few weeks after planned birth of Tristan. Son’s plans went into a sharp detour when Tristan decided to come into the world three and a half weeks early! Sometimes other people’s choices affect our plans!
Son Andrew seems to have handled this big change in his plans relatively well. He and Mom are home now and Tristan will follow soon when he is eating well and gaining a bit of weight (he was four and a half pounds at birth).
Of course we are easy with this change in plans; it means we get to see him that much sooner! We have to rearrange some scheduled events and reschedule the trip; fortunately we had not yet made flight reservations.
Some detours are good, even wonderful. This is what Rosemary means by “this or something better.” The best plans include this line!
MONDAY’S POEM: It is What it is
I am an Enneagram Type 1. This type is sometimes labeled “The Perfectionist.” Anger is often the first emotional response of a Type 1 person. In the Chinese and Taoist approach to “labeling” people they offer a “five-element” system. I am predominantly a “wood-type” person. Anger is often the first emotional response of a Wood-type person. Yes, I have been known to feel and display anger. But what’s the knowing that can be revealed by these systems that point at me with the same label?
My spiritual path coming out of this introspective approach and the tools I use for self-knowing is acceptance. As a perfectionist I need to accept the way things are. As I wood-type I need to learn to be flexible (like a tree bending with the wind). Acceptance, forgiveness, patience and letting go are the key words that I pull into me and work with toward resonance.
It is within this spirit of resonance that I wrote today’s poem:
It is What it is
Acceptance, letting go, realizing
It is what it is.
This is no easy row to hoe,
And yet it is the only path home.
Breath, inhaling deeply, noticing
What is, this natural state.
Open posture, belly breath
And relaxing on this path home.
Choice, accepting, admitting
There are options, nothing’s fixed.
Relaxed, deeply at peace
And knowing this is the path home.
©2014 Richard W. Bredeson. All rights reserved.
A Topsy-Turvy Week!
Remember my lesson for the year I mentioned yesterday? Yeah, it was patience. And I got another test of it today. I’d like to think it was a “final exam” but I know better!
The “slide” of the week began about a week ago with the Full Moon on Valentine’s Day. We’ve been in a waning moon cycle ever since; and the energy of the week has seemed to wane as well. How have you experienced the week?
On Sunday Rosemary and I each had excellent experiences with a Shaman friend who led a wonderful workshop. I felt the afternoon session was well done, interactive, experiential; just the kind of workshop we both enjoy. But later that evening and well into Monday I felt down and in a dark place. I had some shadow work to do. I’m not sure if I got in touch with some negativity during my shamanic journey that I wasn’t fully conscious of, or if I simply had some issues to work through.
Fortunately I did work through them and by Tuesday I was on an upswing. I had a reasonably productive couple of days mid-week. Maybe the lessons of patience in the school of Love were getting a bit easier.
Ha! Don’t be deceived. True there are times when life gives us a break and lightens up a bit on the steady stream of the lesson plan. But never for long!
Thursdays are the days we produce Rosemary’s weekly Ezine, her MuseLetter which we publish early every Friday morning. Our goal is to work on this through the week, but we usually procrastinate (we are both Leos after all!) and leave it all to Thursday night. We shoot a video, process it, Rosemary writes the article, her Mystic Message, and the news article. And I format produce and publish it through our email application. (Oh, and I usually write this blog post as well.)
Yesterday was the usual full day so we began the Ezine with the video shoot at around 7:00 pm. Then I began processing the video using iMovie, as usual. Whoa! Nothing was “usual” about iMovie! I did vaguely remember processing an automatic update to the app a few days ago and thought nothing of it. But when I opened the app I didn’t recognize it. Wow, I’ve seen make-overs before, but this is a whole new model.
So, I’m back in school, learning how to process movies all over again. And I failed my first exam, badly! I could not save the video after I had processed it. At that point I was swiftly escorted into my next lesson in patience! I wasn’t even sure I would be able to recover until Rosemary suggested using her Airbook. Yes, it still had the older version of iMovie! Back to the familiar! So, another hour or so later I finally did get the video processed.
The lessons just keep coming. In my discussion with Rosemary on this whole subject of school and lessons she said two things happen as we learn: 1) we immediately get tested on how well we’ve learned; and 2) the lessons then get harder.
It’s about growth, evolution in consciousness. And Apple seems to be pushing the limits of my growth through patience!
I hope you can take a recess from the School of Life this weekend!
MONDAY’S POEM: Patience
Patience has been a life-long lesson for me. I have committed to learn it, probably not finally but fully, this year. My “word for the year” is Patience. And with that announcement and commitment, my first poem of they year is just that!
Patience
Always rushing, always late.
Bly: “It’s already too late.”
What’s the hurry, why the haste?
Are we afraid death will win the race?
Ignore the signs, sharp curve ahead.
The moon is waxing, move briskly ahead.
But after the waxing, the moon will wane.
All that briskness; All in vain?
Waiting, always waiting, never enough.
Patience, learning patience, more than enough!
Where is the action, why just sit?
Are we afraid Death won’t fit?
Rushing or waiting, all the same.
Waxing and waning, cycles the same.
Let life catch up; it has its flow.
Be as patient as death; keep it slow.
©2014 Richard W. Bredeson. All rights reserved.
Men and The Goddess 