Thursday 21 September 2023

I am the one

 

I am the one
Who is neither
ease nor difficulty
Yet contains them both.

I am the one who is neither
ease nor difficulty
Yet can hold them both.

I am the one who is neither
ease nor difficulty
Yet can touch them both.
And be touched by them.

I am the one who is neither
ease nor difficulty,
Terror nor safety,
Pain nor joy,

Yet can allow them
To meet
to dance together,
And sometimes
to rest.

Saturday 5 December 2020

Waves

This experience just happened.  It was both remarkable and unremarkable.  It revealed things that I had discovered before...and had seemingly forgotten regarding pain and how convincing it is.  So the insights are both new and not new to me.  At one level obvious and at another level a revelation.

And this poem arose - perhaps not the very best or most polished poem, and yet written in the immediate aftermath of the experience as it revealed itself – so containing something of the fragrance of the revelation.  So I share it here as a reminder to myself and in case it touches anyone else.


~


Waves


Waves of intense emotional pain.

Arising from…

Who knows where?


For a moment,

the feelings of despair, desperation and anguish

Seem utterly convincing...


… until

by Grace

I find myself embracing 

and feeling the pain,

Pure and simple,

Intense and clean.


And then I see that the pain 

is just pain.

It doesn’t mean anything.

It doesn’t signify anything.


Those feelings of 

desperation, despair and anguish 

are simply memories, 

from who knows where 

and who knows when.


I feel the pain again.

It surges and swells.

I let it flow through me.


It subsides.

There is releasing.

There is opening, 

to the world outside and its beauty. 


There is gentle strong joy. 

I am home. 


~


With surrender, joy and gratitude

Daniel x

Tuesday 25 August 2020

Desperation, Despair and Gratitude

I’m beginning to realise just how desperate I often felt as a child.  It feels strange to look back and recognise that I was feeling things so scary to relate with that I couldn’t even admit to myself that I was feeling them at the time.  To acknowledge that I was feeling as desperate, despairing, alone, angry, scared and confused as I felt.  And hateful.  The deep fear that at my core that I wasn’t worthy of love and that if people knew how pathetic and awful I was they would despise me, and I would be friendless, isolated and alone for ever.

It wasn’t that I felt this way every moment of every day.  There were carefree times of simple playing, pleasure or happiness.  I’ve seen childhood pictures where I am genuinely smiling and I don’t have a care in the world.  I believe that in those moments I was simply happy.

 

But many times, especially in social situations these intense and difficult feelings were sitting in the background, like scary movie music that set the mood but I couldn’t quite consciously hear anymore, meaning I was often trying to have a conversation with these voices whispering in the background. 

 

And they often came with me into the spaces when I was alone – a gnawing sense of desperate isolation and confusion.  My mantra when alone would often be “I don’t know” (said over and over again in a voice of bewildered lost-ness).  I’ve recently seen some photos of me at school at age 12 or 13.  I don’t know what others could see at the time, but looking at them now, I can see a little boy who appears bewildered and lost.

 

And I’m realising that these feelings haven’t gone away as I’ve grown up.  This background of desperation and despair has accompanied me throughout my life.  Many of the things I’ve done, good and bad, have been done acting out of this sense that I have to do something to “save myself”, even though I don’t really know what it is, and even though I don’t know what I’m trying to save myself from.  My sense of driven-ness to achieve, which has fuelled much of my worldly success, has come out of from a desperation to escape from these voices or to prove them wrong.  Like many outwardly "successful" people the fuel for achievement comes from a deep sense of unworthiness, and there's a cost.  I often feel like I’m “trying too hard”, even though I am very competent to do what I’m doing, and it’s pretty exhausting. 

 

And these feelings are intense!  On a scale of 0-10 most of the feelings are at the 9 to 10 mark, when I get close to them and actually feel them.  They are only being felt by a small part of me, but that part is feeling them very very intensely.  It’s hard to say in the experience of them if they are present time or memory, and if the memories are from all from my lifetime or partly my ancestors’ experience.  The part that is feeling the feelings doesn’t seem able to distinguish what time they relate to, so it’s “as if” they are all happening now.  And to that extent they are.

 

The feelings are all interconnected like a ball of twine.  At times it seems that one is primary but in truth they all feel inter-linked.  The desperation is a sense that “everything is awful” and it’s a response to pain that feels overwhelming, and a fear or belief that the pain will continue forever.  The pain is a pain of loneliness, of feeling isolated and alone and is deeply linked to a belief that I’m not loveable.  A belief that I am fundamentally broken, “pathetic” and disgusting in some way.  A belief that I am fundamentally “bad”, without really knowing what that means.  There is a rage that all this is happening, coming out of this sense of powerlessness.  There is a desperate wishing for love and support, whilst at the same time believing that it won’t and can’t be forthcoming, followed by a sense of despair. There is a frozen terror of being all alone for eternity with this pain.  It sounds dramatic and to my mind "over dramatic", but this part of me really does believe these things and really fears them.

 

I have a sense that many of these feelings and attitudes were passed on to me by my parents and probably to them by their parents.  That I grew up in a background atmosphere of this (as presumably they did).  I certainly recognise many of these flavours being present in my mum and dad as I recall my childhood.  And from their stories of their childhoods, I can sense that they were probably there as they grew up too.  And so there is a sense that this is not just about my immediate history, but also an ancestral story too, of collected inter-generational pain and suffering.

 

And this has all been so difficult for me to see up until now because it has been wrapped in a layer of shame.  I did not dare to admit to myself that this was happening for fear that it would confirm just how “broken” and “awful” I was, and therefore how unworthy of love, care or respect. 

 

Additionally, these feelings were also wrapped in layers of control and resistance.  Parts of me that were terrified that to feel these strong feelings, because they were scared that they would wipe me out and destroy me.  So the clamped down hard on those feelings so I shouldn't feel them.  Or there was a sudden urge to distract myself from something unpleasant...but I couldn't quite feel what.  Sometimes it just manifested as an urgent desire to check the newspaper, my email or facebook!

 

I now recognise that much of the time I am not (and have not been) feeling the pain of feelings themselves, but the pain of the fighting them.  The pain and suffering of the contraction around them - the aspect that is desperate that I should not feel them.  I often forget this, but when I remember there is the possibility of meeting the aspects that are resisting and fighting.  The possibility of including them and thanking them for trying to keep me safe.  And the possibility of some of that fight relaxing enough for me to feel and include what was hidden underneath.

 

In the revelation of this pain and suffering, there is a sense of relief.  As if something that has been hidden from me “out of the corner of my eye” has suddenly become visible.  “Ah…so that’s what it was!”.  It makes sense of much of my experience growing up and subsequently, and also of the behaviours I developed to deal with this experience that formed the background hum of my existence.

 

There now arises the possibility to be with these aspects of my embodied existence more directly.  To listen to them with kindness and compassion and to support them with love.

 

And although what has been revealed is intense and painful there is a sense of gratitude that I have been ready and willing to see it and feel it, or at least to start to see it and to feel it.  And the possibility of coming home and resting in myself and with myself.  To let go of the trying and to relax into a simple joyful being in connection with myself and the world.

 

And at the same time, it also often feels sobering, to see how intense things have been in the background, and how intense it continues to be there.  To see that the resistance and the fear to feel still continues, and how habitual that resistance and suffering has been and continues to be.  And to do my best to meet that too with kindness.

 

So here I sit in the midst of it all, seeing and not seeing, resisting and surrendering, tight and specious, including and acting out, daunted and grateful.  And right now, in this moment, mostly grateful.

Tuesday 9 July 2019

Pain...and my relationship to it

At a retreat a couple of years ago in Devon my teacher suggested to me that I had a somewhat suspect relationship to pain.

And I realised that he was right.

I mean, hardly any of us like pain, but it is a necessary part of life and if we are denying it and doing everything we can to avoid feeling it, we're not living our lives as free, but as some level "on the run".  And that's where I was at.  At some level addicted to my identity as "suffering" but not willing to drop underneath that and simply feel the pain (along with the pleasure and the more neutral feelings).  I wasn't willing to feel everything, which is a pity, because life is everything from intense pleasure to intense pain and through every shade in between.

I feel like I've been reassessing and renegotiating my relationship with pain since then.

I wouldn't say that even now it's always healthy or functional, but it feels like it's more in that direction.

Here's a poem at arrived this morning which speaks a little to where I find myself on this now:

~

It’s not about 
whether we carry pain.
We all do. 

It’s about whether we are
Driven by it
Into tiny acts 
Of Desperation

Or whether we can find the space
To listen and meet that pain 
With love 
Whilst loving the space and the ease
That were always here too, alongside.

Whether we can find the joy of living
In the midst of the pain and the pleasure...

Ending our negotiation with life,

Instead submitting
To be free
In our little boat

Riding the waves. 

~

With love and (more inclusion)

Daniel

Thursday 29 March 2018

Self Concern...and true Inquiry

This is poem that wrote itself at about 5am on the last day of a stunning (and very challenging) 2 week retreat this February.

I feel very vulnerable sharing this because it feels like a very precious revelation and because my mind is fearful that I can't or won't live it.  And living this revelation is what my heart yearns for over and above anything else. So here it is...


Self concern 

Tonight at 4.30am I experienced 
True inquiry
Perhaps for the first time. 

It was touching. 
It was beautiful 
It was stunning. 
It was undeniable. 

Awareness noticed that the being was indentified
So it remembered itself
It entered life through the heart as Presence 
And simply recovered intimacy with itself
And wept as it remembered
The heart of intimacy. 

Tears of gratitude. Coming home. At last. 

Then it said:
“From here we can start”
Touched it cried gently again and said:
Now we can start”

Awareness as love
Noticed an attitude of self concern arise 
Gosh! It said. 
Interesting!
What’s that?
So it started by asking “what’s it like?”
And by becoming in it and as it very soon 
From the inside it simply knew. 

But the inquiry didn’t stop
It continued dropping 
And unfolding
By itself 
Until something like a deep resting place was found 
And awareness was satisfied 
And touched. 
That it understood. 
Then inquiry went on inquiring into other things 
Such as appreciating the nature of inquiry!

Stunning. 

It wrote the above 
With the help of clear rested mind
At 5am
When being decided it had better things
To do than 
Sleep. 

~

The self concern:
“Am I ok?” is
Really “Am I fundamentally broken?”
Fundamentally useless and unloveable 
Will I be left alone and unloved?
A broken thing
On the scrapheap 
Alone, lonely and suffering 
Forever.

From a place of self intimacy 
It can be seen that this was never true. 
I was never broken/wrong/
That this was just a painful untrue cherished belief 
At the core of who I thought I was
And who I have habitually taken myself to be

I didn’t discover the truth of this 
Love discovered the truth of this 
Through inquiry 
Because it wanted to find out 
What was at the heart of suffering
Because love is interested 
In everything 
Including pain. 

Inquiry did inquiry 
Being discovering itself 
Because it wants to find out
Because it cares. 

Awareness was doing inquiry 
Into “me”. 

~

Having been fully understood. 
From the inside
The attitude of self concern
Need not 
Ever be taken seriously 
Again
Instead it can be consumed
As the first course
Of the banquet
Of the remains of who I was.

Looking after the vulnerable and young parts...

Over the past 5 years I've had a series of increasingly touching set of meetings with the vulnerable "young" parts of my being, which psychologists or psychotherapists tend to call "the Inner Child".

My understanding of this framing is that the parts of us that get emotional (and especially scared) never really grow up and forever function as if they are a small child.  That's certainly how it feels to me when I meet these parts of me.

This "child" doesn't really engage via rational reasoning - it's too young for that.  The main language it speaks is feelings and the main things it needs are being listened to with love and reassurance that it is OK and loved just as it is, and that in the midst of the fear it is feeling, all is in fact well.

This is essentially the way we would relate with a young pre-verbal child - love, warmth, attention and hugs.  And it makes the most beautiful difference.

I had some very touching realisations about this following a recent retreat and two poems arose.

Here they are:

Running and Resting

I have spent 
the whole of my life
until now
running on empty

driven by the distress
of a child inside me
desperate to be held
and stroked 

and told “It’s ok, I’m here”
and told “you’re ok exactly as you are...
...I love you
just like this.

No need to move a muscle
No need to change a thing
You are safe
You are so very very loved
Just like this.”

Rest now honey.
No need to run
Ever again. 

I’m with you. 

We can rest
together. 


With love, gratitude and gentle resting. 

 ~

He

He
My little one
Is my first priority.

He had had some 
Pretty scary experiences
Coming into the world 
So he’s often not sure
If he can trust
Life. 

If left without reassurance 
He spends most of his time
On amber or red alert. 
With alarm bells ringing. 
Which is really understandable. 
In the circumstances. 

When doesn’t get the reassurance,
That he needs 
To feel safe enough,
he feels desperate.
And desperate measures are called for...
Something, anything will do
To switch off the alarm
Or distract from the pain.

Life for both of us,
He and me,
Becomes a scrabble 
For safety -
Doing deals
Trying to manipulate or control the world 
Trying to get reassurance “you’re ok”. 
Yet it is never enough. 

When I remember that he
Is only a part of me
When I remember myself
As the vast open space
When I fall in love with silence...

I can hold him 
so very gently
with no agenda 
other to be with him
and everything else 
that appears in me
exactly as they are. 

And everything can feel held
In love. 

And can feel safe enough to
Come out to play
And dance
With no motive 
Other than to be life 
Meeting life. 

Like waves waving 
And meeting
On a vast ocean. 

The ocean doesn’t mind
 a few choppy waves 
The ocean doesn’t mind being a huge tsunami 
The ocean doesn’t mind being as flat as a millpond. 

This is how god loves us. 

This is who we are. 

~

With love, tenderness, wonder and vast vast space 

Daniel

Saturday 7 May 2016

Tasting silence

I sit
Appreciating the silence
That forever
Underscores
Sound.

As the M1
Thunders and swooshes
Around me

As feelings
Thoughts
And sensations
Dance, sparkle
Fight and play
Within me.

I sit,

And luxuriate
In gratitude
For the silence
That has never left me.

That has always
Generously
Accompanied me.

The exquisite bridge
Between the world
And eternity.

A tear forms.

I know
I am home.