Category Archives: compassion

Is pain necessary for growth?

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The reason I bring this question up is that today, my left leg hurts, and I have a story about it.

The story starts small. My left leg hurts. Specifically it hurts above my knee and on my inner shin and on my outer calf. It’s a dull achiness that comes and goes.

The story gets bigger. I attribute this pain to adhesions in the fascia between muscles in my leg, and I attribute these adhesions to misalignments in my body’s structure. I’ve already straightened my spine with NUCCA. Working with my AK chiropractor to align my body is going well, but my leg is where the twist is showing up now that my pelvis is getting more aligned. My leg needs to unwind. And it’s Saturday.

(By the way, it feels true to me that the musculo-skeletal system is arranged in spirals. I dreamt a couple of months ago of seeing my left leg skinless, bloodless, with all the muscles showing individually and the bones visible. Then I went to the Our Body exhibit and saw a body with a leg just like in my dream.)

Here the story grows. My pelvis and spine have been twisted due to several factors. A car wreck in 1996 created much soft tissue injury around my sacrum and sacroiliac joints. Long before that, I experienced a severe shock to my system in my childhood, a sudden violent death of a family member. Trauma has deep and sometimes unpredictable affects on the human energy field.

And now the story gets even bigger. I was born prematurely, and it seems that I had an injury to a nerve going from my sacrum down my left leg from the time I was born, or before I was born, or shortly after I was born. I don’t remember, and my parents are gone. I do not know what happened or why I entered my lifetime with this nerve shut down.

I’m aware that some people claim to know all about past lives and karma and would probably be more than happy to tell me in a way that would alienate me from them. (You know what I mean: “I was just being honest, trying to be helpful.” I’ve done that kind of thing myself, and it’s usually deeply out of rapport with the recipient. You may be right, but you’re an asshole.)

The good news is, the nerve can come back alive. It’s not dead, it’s just been dormant. How much of our potential is like that?

Pain is a teacher, a signal that something is out of congruence, out of alignment, misfunctioning. And it is instinctive to want to avoid it. That’s why it’s such a good teacher. Pain is a kind of feedback that’s hard to ignore.

Pain is not bad. It’s just pain. It’s the nervous system doing its job. Pain feels yucky, but it has some positive points to it.

Pain motivates change. Pain motivates me to do something different, to learn something new. My specific SI joint-spine-leg pain has motivated me to do yoga, to get rolfed, to go to chiropractors, to work with Alexander Technique and Feldenkrais practitioners, to experience an array of alternative healing methods.

It’s motivated me to hang upside down and surrender to gravity pulling my body from the other direction. It’s motivated me to learn the trauma releasing exercises, and it’s drawn me to work with Patrice, my acupuncturist, who first told me to hang like a bat and to hold pigeon pose twice as long on the left side and who does myofascial release on me. (And who I can’t get hold of now either.)

I think I’ll go hang, do pigeon, and do the trauma releasing exercises.  Pain provides contrast. How would you know how good you felt if you didn’t have anything to compare it to?

Cat love

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Woke this morning as I often do, to my pushy but loving cat Mango snuggling up close to me, then gently touching me with his paw (claws out), to which I recoil and push him away because it hurts. Repeat several times. He loves to snuggle. His claws are too long. I don’t think he knows that it hurts.

How much patience he has with me, getting pushed away morning after morning. He usually just keeps coming back. Occasionally he leaves the room, and then I feel bad. I’ve driven him away when all he was doing was trying to love me and be close. (And get me out of bed to feed him his favorite cat treats — he’s always got plenty of dry food in the bowl, so he’s not starving.)

I make sure that I don’t pet him in my bedroom very much. I’d like for him to get a clear idea that petting, scratching, and massage are for when we’re on the sofa, and the bedroom is just for sleeping. But it’s not working very well.  He loves my hands. They are the source of love, and he seeks them out. I hide my hands from him under the covers or pillows until I’m ready to get up. It’s a little game we play.

He loves me for my hands.

Yeah, I’m okay with that. He gives good eye contact , shows his appreciation, and loves a good cuddle. Sometimes he even drapes himself across my chest with his head over my shoulder, just to get more body contact. He hugs! (I think maybe he has abandonment issues — he was a stray that I adopted, and he seems to show me his gratitude every day, which I love.)

But I don’t love his paws because of his sharp, long claws.

I could lock him out of my bedroom and sleep a little later. Or I could trim his claws. Not my favorite thing to do because I don’t do it well and have hurt previous cats, accidentally cutting into the quick. Since he spends a lot of time outdoors, I assumed he didn’t need his claws trimmed. But hmmm. Mango is not a tree climber, not an athletic cat. My daughter makes fun of his fat-boy walk. I tell her he’s not fat any more, just big. (He overate when I first adopted him from the streets, but he’s slimmed down a bit.) She still loves to watch him walk.

If I trim his claws, he’s the perfect cat. Affectionate, snuggly, sweet.

I think I’ll do it. Learn how to do it without hurting him. I can do that. I can do that.

Making friends with myself

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The third wheel of attention in meditation, according to Chogyam Trungpa, is making friends with yourself.

After six months of daily sitting using the technique of whole body awareness,  I have gotten views of my whole life that have deepened my compassion for myself and for other human beings.

When I was a child, under the surface of civility and compliance, all sorts of disturbing awarenesses arose. Confusion, doubt, helplessness, inarticulateness.

For instance, at times I concluded that something was wrong with me, that I wasn’t good enough, that I was being judged and didn’t meet the standard, that no one understood me, that it was not enough just to be myself, that what I felt didn’t count.

These are painful thoughts to think and feel about oneself. Yet show me the person who has never experienced this.

These thoughts occasionally arise even now, on and off the cushion, and I now am quite aware of the emotional pain that accompanies them.

Maybe the most worthy response to awareness of suffering is compassion. I don’t believe there is really a purpose for suffering. It just happens as part of the human experience.  And, it is often a catalyst for growth.

So for all children, and for all those who have survived childhood, I feel compassion. It is hard to grow up. If you’re reading this, congratulations on making it.

I notice fluctuation in how I feel about myself. Some days, full of confidence and vigor, other days, full of doubt and sorrow. Many days, both. Whatever it is now will change.

Part of making friends with myself is beginning to see how I create my own suffering. How I have punished myself, how I have viewed myself as being much smaller than I really am.

I have sold myself out by not dreaming big enough and believing in my dreams.

I can now stop doing that each time I become aware of it. It feels great each time I stretch into my Large Self!

I love this quote from Mark Twain:

I am an old man and have known a great many troubles, but most of them never happened.

The task now is to know which ones never happened, and to respect the ones that did happen and note their lessons, and all let these past troubles go.

Six month assessment

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The year 2010 is nearly half over. I have meditated daily for 30 minutes consistently if not perfectly for 6 months.

It’s time to assess my own progress: I have entered a period in my life that is marked by experiencing myself as more whole, healthy, happy, grounded, centered, engaged, energetic, positive, loving, playful, present, alert, aware, appreciative, grateful, and full of equanimity, vitality, wonder, and compassion than I was before this year of meditation began.

Some things have remained the same from the start: I’m still working where I work and living where I live, although I have spent time really examining these two major components of life and I feel open to change. I know myself better and might make different choices now, and I can live with the choices I made in the past for the time being. I appreciate what these choices have allowed me to experience.

I’ve been fairly regular in weekly attendance at Appamada on either Wednesday night or Sunday morning and having a practice inquiry session (“meditation coacing”) with Peg each time.

I’ve continued my association with NLP: I finished assisting for the first time at Best Resources’ NLP practitioner training in April. It was more relaxed to learn it all the second time and to help newbies learn it.

I feel closer to my family than before.

I still go monthly for acupuncture and cranio-sacral work and every 3 weeks now for chiropractic treatment.

I still have my yoga practice.

Things that have gone by the wayside: I joined a gym in February. I went when the weather was cold. I haven’t been since late March. I should quit and save that money.

I also went to a couple of Flint Sparks’ classes at Appamada on the Diamond Sutra. Not sure why, but it just didn’t jell. I dropped out.

I’ve undertaken a few new endeavors since beginning this year of sitting: I agreed to be the program director for the Austin NLP meetup.

My friend Katie and I started a Peripheral Walking meetup here in Austin in January, and I assist her with our monthly meetup.

After 12 years of doing mostly Iyengar-based yoga, I began yoga teacher training this month. That’s a big commitment — in time and money. I’m deepening my practice and learning a skill and gaining a credential that I will use in my future.

I also committed to participate in the Zen precepts program at Appamada, which meets monthly for a year and includes journaling and self-observation. We’ve had one meeting so far. The course is based on the book Waking Up to What You Do. I will write more about this because it ties in with this blog really well.

I’m also taking part in an advanced NLP study group taught by Keith Fail on strategies.

So I’m full, overflowing even, with wonderful activities, learning, and sharing.

I know myself better and see a path into my future that I like, and that path leaves a lot of space for the Universe to teach me as well.

If those of you who know me in person or who read this blog notice anything that I’m not noticing, please feel free to bring it to my attention in the comments.

Link: Best times to meditate

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Waylon Lewis of elephantjournal.com, an online “magazine” with a Buddhist orientation, writes about the best times to meditate. I catch elephantjournal by friending it on Facebook. Sometimes there’s too much to read, and sometimes articles really catch my eye. Here Waylon articulates well (and briefly) how meditating first thing makes him a better person in his later activities and interactions with others.

I’m an a**h*le when I don’t meditate in the morning.

Sitting after a disturbing dream

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I am feeling the aftermath of an unnerving dream, in which I make a decision that results in a pregnant woman being put in danger. As time progresses, her husband, and then I, after seeing his tears, feel increasing grief, and as a result I change my decision.

Feeling grateful for the change in decision and the wisdom to recognize a parts conflict. Thank you, dream maker, for bringing this to my conscious attention!

I have some processing to do. See you in a few, after sitting.

Okay now. First thought: Never sacrifice the Pregnant Woman. That’s a bad strategy. She brings new life, new energy. Even if I don’t know what kind of energy, it is needed in this situation or she wouldn’t have shown up pregnant.

But in this case, she doesn’t seem to know (or be empowered) to just get out of the car and walk out of the building before it is demolished. She is passive, helpless. She gives The Decider way too much authority over her.

The Decider in this case is ham-fisted, full-speed-ahead, blinders on, reckless with others’ lives. Not unlike a certain former president of the United States!

The Decider consults head, but not heart or gut. Doesn’t understand the emotional and relational consequences.

This part harks back to how my father made decisions. But it’s me, too. The Decider is an unintentional tyrant who sees life through a simplistic lens. And has a lot of yang energy!

The Crying Man loves the Pregnant Woman very much. Yet he too gives the Decider too much authority. Only by showing his feelings can he influence the Decider to change the decision.

Outcome: I’m spending the rest of today inviting harmony between yin and yang.

Practice noticing

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These days, when I meditate early in the day, my sitting experience is very body centered, as I have mentioned before.

Of Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche’s four attentions of meditation–technique, relaxing, making friends with oneself, and being open–I realized I’m doing it!

The technique Peg gave me is whole body awareness. Seeking whole body awareness includes relaxing, making friends with myself, and being open. Wow, brilliant direction, Peg!

In seeking whole body awareness, my attention is drawn to a part, to some specific country, mountain range, or river on my whole body map.

Breathe into it and soften it, if pain or tension is there. That’s relaxing. So is allowing my breath to slow and become effortless.

Making friends with myself means noticing my actual experience and accepting it, unjudging. I notice sensations, thoughts, emotions, my subtle body, the flow of changing experience, moments of stillness, bliss, clarity, moments of catching my attention caught by a thought, moments of coming back to center. I notice noticing.

Being open is part of noticing to. I notice pleasant sensations arise with pleasure and then fade, and another experience arises. Same with pain. It all changes.

Another book influences meditation

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I recently read the book Trauma Releasing Exercises by David Berceli, kindly lent to me by John Daniewicz, a member of my sangha, after we had a wide-ranging discussion that included healing from trauma.

Berceli came up with a set of seven physical exercises based on bioenergetics whose purpose is to tire the leg and hip muscles so that they tremble, quiver, and shake. He did this after spending time in war zones in Africa and the Middle East, wanting to find a way to help victims, witnesses, and caregivers release trauma energy from their bodies without psychotherapy. Some cultures don’t include psychotherapy, and some circumstances make it impossible.

The trembling releases the energy frozen in the body from trauma or prolonged stress (which in my view and some others’ has the same effect on the body as a true trauma).

I’ve been doing the exercises a couple of times a week. They take 20-30 minutes to do. At the end, I lie on the floor, knees up, with my legs going through cycles of fine tremors, visible quivering, and gross muscle shaking.

When I feel done, I just straighten my legs and the trembling stops.  I feel more present.

Berceli has a newer, more sophisticated version of the book, The Revolutionary Trauma Release Process. Both are available on amazon.com.

The exercises are pretty much the same in both books. (By the way, the latter book got 5 stars from all 21 reviewers on Amazon, pretty remarkable in itself.)

There’s a video too, which I haven’t seen.

I think everyone should at least know about the exercises, and if you’ve ever had trauma in your life or been a caregiver to traumatized people or been under prolonged stress, please consider actually doing them, no matter how long ago it was.

This is definitely remedial work, but the more we can let go of the past, even as it resides in our bodies, the more capacity we have for being present, in my opinion.

And that’s how I tie this topic into my meditation blog. It’s about cultivating presence, and this helps.

Opening to possibility, opening my heart

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I notice another effect of meditation. I have become more aware of repressing my thoughts, the kind of thoughts that occur to me that I immediately dismiss as impossible.

How do I really know anything is impossible? I don’t. This is definitely something to examine.

We all have internal struggles between freedom and responsibility. Sometimes those struggles can be heroic. I’m thinking of the times when doing the right thing as a parent means foregoing some self-centered pleasure.

Sometimes sacrifice becomes habit. One of my friends identifies herself as an over-functioning adult. That might fit me too.

Meditation has also made me feel more aware of my heart center, of when it feels tender,  vulnerable, and open. Just sitting with my heart center, letting it express whatever energy it’s expressing. Sometimes I don’t know the story, I just feel it.

If it’s too intense, I tap my chest, like in EFT. It helps.

Thoughts on balancing attention

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I’m still absorbing the brilliant wisdom of the Chogyam Trungpa quote I shared earlier this week, about putting 25% of your attention in meditation on each of these 4 areas at the same time:

  • whatever technique you are using
  • relaxing
  • making friends with yourself
  • being open to the possibility of something happening during this session

That’s just 4 things. The human mind can hold in awareness 5 to 9 things at any given time, so this should be easy breezy! Right?

I like that he included making friends with yourself. I feel like I’m doing that during my sessions by paying attention to what I’m actually experiencing — thoughts, sensations, the movement of energy, emotions. When I am curious and accepting about my actual experience, I notice more repressed thoughts and emotions become conscious, so I have more awareness. It’s a good thing!

What are the old dreams you had that you put up on a shelf years ago? Take them down and dust them off. It’s not too late.

I notice energy movement inside my body. It could be my energy body or my nervous system — I don’t know that I can really tell the difference. It feels like parts are connecting to each other. It feels soothing, calming, relaxing. And occasionally I reach that state of being full of/held in complete love.

I notice that in some sessions, not much seems to happen. I wonder now if I’m not letting go of expectations enough at these times.

I use the “whole body awareness” technique, yet when I notice I’ve strayed badly and been totally unpresent for what seems like several minutes, I bring myself back to whole body awareness through attending to my breath.

And of course, the advice to put 25% on each area. Ha! No one can measure this!

So it’s a guideline, and a fresh way of understanding the meditation experience. This is welcome.