I have also picked up this habit, so next to the orchid was a spring bouquet I had gotten for him. This kind of habit brings joy and, well yes, love and connection. Sweet.

But giving flowers is not the only kind of habit. Some have more challenged!   I have had the habit of sleeping on my stomach — I slept that way  for the first 50 years of my life!  Loved it.  Then I learned that side sleeping is better for back, neck… It was hard to make the switch, because those age-old patterns have deep grooves.

But now, with the shoulder injuries I am experiencing, several body workers are in agreement that sleeping on my side will prolong the healing process, maybe even prevent full recovery.  To be in proper alignment for healing, I need to sleep on, oh no, my back!  I have never slept on my back, and actually thought it wasn’t such a good thing.  But it’s clearly called for at this point.  That’s already a lesson:  things aren’t the way they seem, what fits and works, maybe even for decades, may no longer serve.  Are there habits, ideas, beliefs, like that in your life?  Anything up right now for you?

Trying to develop this new habit, I have been though a very rough week — full of fatigue, frustration, concern, humility, and illumination.  A whopping AFGO.  Remember those? “Another Fricking Growth Opportunity”!

I used to pride myself (oops, not so good, eh?) on having pretty good control over my mind at night.  I have practices  and visualizations to relax, to calm my body and mind, and get rest even if I’m not able to fall asleep right away.  I do pretty well on airplanes, don’t experience much jet lag, because I say to myself, relaxed rest is almost as good as sleep.

Well, on my back all this flew out the window.  I attempted my practices, and soon found myself distracted by thoughts, plagued by body sensations: “I can’t do this, it is uncomfortable.  Is it really necessary? I’ll never be able to sleep well again…”  My body got restless, I flopped around, felt exposed and un-cozy on my back, the pain in the shoulders loomed larger than in the daytime…  You get the picture.  I didn’t sleep much for five days.  Fatigue writ large.  And sleep is vital for healing, so I was becoming frustrated and concerned.

On the sixth day I awoke and said to myself, “I can’t seem do this, not by myself. The usual tools aren’t working.”  Humility.  I am not in charge the way my ego believes I am.

There are forces, and habits are a prime example, that really run us, sometimes to the ground.  At those times, under stress, our mind tends to run in the same grooves.  (A superb reference in this area, with resources, and tools for immediate use,  is Laurel Mellin‘s Emotional Brain Training manual, Wired for Joy.)

was taking grandkids Lilly and Nick to school in the morning.  The next to last day however, as Lilly and I were navigating down the steep hill to her Kindergarten, I slipped on a patch of ice.  Since we were holding hands, Lilly went down too.  We laughed as we picked ourselves up.

Lilly was fine, but I had put my hand out to catch myself, and that sent a shock wave into my right shoulder, which has remained.  Good thing is that my right shoulder now matches the left one, which is still a bit compromised from an event last year. (That’s a joke. I would have been fine with just one shoulder hurting!)

Dealing with the new injury (and also several older injuries I currently still have), has been most illuminating.  I am holding the vision that I will be able to ski with the grandkids next year (even though it seemed wise to refrain this year), and that my knee and shoulders will be pain free and fully functional again.  This may not happen, of course, but in addition to physiotherapy and other alternative approaches, I am also using visualizations and healing imagery to support the recovery.  This practice is already making a difference.  It’s my belief, and understanding, that the thoughts and images we entertain, as well as the flow of emotions we experience, create a cellular environment that can hamper or aid the healthy functioning of our bodies.  Bruce Lipton’s groundbreaking book, The Biology of Belief outlines the mechanisms by which this happens.

Here’s how it unfolded. At first, when I felt a twinge of pain in the joint, my response was to cringe, contract, maybe even utter a slight curse under my breath.  I would sometimes have a thought such as ‘this really hurts, maybe it will never get better…’ and this would telescope the pain out into something much larger  than it actually was, and make the pain take up more space in my awareness, last longer, and sometimes morph into fear.

Then I realized what I was doing, and saw how it was actually heightening my experience of injury.  So with some intention and focus, I have (mostly!) switched the dynamic.  I now use any pain that I sense as an anchor and reminder to breathe deeply, relax, and invite healing energy to the area.  And that’s part of what I mean by ‘gain’!  It has really made an amazing difference.  I can actually observe the pain shift, soften, and at times dissipate altogether.

A ‘coincidence’ occurred a few days ago.  Or maybe not.  I like the notion there are no coincidences.  (Elisabeth Kubler Ross (and numerous others):  ”There are no mistakes, no coincidences.  All events are blessings given to us to learn from.”)

I began to read Eckhart Tolle’s article, Breaking Free, in the January edition of Vancouver’s Common Ground.   Tolle was talking about breaking free from emotional pain, and the “Pain Body” that we all carry around with us, an accumulation from early hurts and old patterns.  But the concept and practice of ‘breaking free’ applies very well to physical pain also.  As I read, I immediately sensed how the piece related directly to me at this moment in time.

Tolle, and many other teachers as well, suggest that if we can be with our pain, (or anger, or fear, or judgement, or any physical or psychic injury), and watch it, rather than completely identifying with it, (as is typical, and just what I was doing before), we can create some space around it.  It does not take us over in the same way; we are not trapped in its tentacles.  This practice has also been very helpful and allowed me to experience significant shifts in the pain.  (See also Jon Kabat-Zinn’s work, helpful to thousands of people with chronic distress, on how mindfulness can transform our experience of pain.)  I feel like I am clearly on the mend, and am most grateful for teachers and practitioners and the qualities of mindfulness.  (And I am not averse to the occasional hit of ibuprofen if needed!)

We are so much more and larger than any given experience, and from this expanded consciousness, we can see and hold other possibilities, such as the opportunity for mindfulness, breath, love, and healing.

Well, the Chinese Year of the Dragon has just begun.  According to tradition the Dragon brings in the Four Blessings of the East: wealth, virtue, harmony and longevity.  Another site says, “This year, we should give love, love, and love. And love will return to us. The whole universe will glow of love energy.”

May it be so.

Jill Schroder is the author of BECOMING: Journeying Toward Authenticity.  BECOMING is an invitation for self -reflection, and to mine our memorable moments  for insights, meaning, and growth.  Check the website for a sample chapter, or see the reviews to get a flavor for the volume.  Your feedback is most welcome.

A day later I took the train to Austria where my son Martin, wife Moni and two grandchildren, Nick 6, and Lilly, soon to be 5, make their home, nestled in the mountains, with a stunning view across the Inn valley.  Taking the train in Europe is always a pleasure — they are on time, clean, run frequently, are reasonably priced and well used.  Why don’t we in North America get it?

As we rolled deeper into the Alps, climbing steadily, winter descended around us.  I was struck by how quiet it was.  I’ve worn hearing aids for several years now, and I thought hmmm, maybe my hearing has gotten several stages worse since I was last here, because I hardly hear the clickety clack of the wheels at all.  It was almost silent, and the white world wrapped itself more deeply around us as we rolled along.  I later learned that it was, at least in part, the snow, that dampened the clickity clack, and contributed to the peaceful, almost other-worldly ride.

Lilly and Nick were waiting with mom on the platform to greet me, and ran full steam into my arms for what we like to call a “jump up hug.”  If you’re into Attachment Theory, I think jump-up hugs qualify as a great example of  ’self-attachment’ (a form of warm and healthy connecting after infancy), and I highly recommend them.  They are heart opening and exhilarating for all parties involved

Well, a couple of days after I arrived, and happily after pilot son Martin had returned safely from a new year’s trip to Johannesburg and Nairobi, the snows began in earnest.

For two days and two nights, and then some more after that, the white came down, steadily, almost without let up. At times blowing sideways, coating the trees with a thick layer of icing, piling up on the railings of the houses, the roof of the bird feeder, filling up the driveway, the stairway, the path to the compost…blowing and drifting. Reports had it that there had never been that much or deep snow in this little village in recent memory.

Many, if not all, of the people who live in the mountain towns and villages welcome the great white.  The tourists who have come from far and wide for cross country and downhill skiing certainly do,  And the snow clearing, ski hill and trail preparation are impressive.  For our part, we shovelled, and shovelled, and shovelled some more!  During the blizzard, and after it finally stopped, the world was wondrous. We enjoyed together many of the winter pleasures, including toasty fires and hot chocolate on returning home with ruddy cheeks and tired bodies.

One afternoon I took a walk by myself up the road behind their house.  The trees were still cloaked in white, the ground soft, the afternoon light shining through the conifers created a peaceful, ethereal world. It is a fine balance, and precious…enough snow, but not too much.

There is much that seems out of balance in our world today, over abundance and too much or not enough… I hold hopes and offer prayers that events in 2012 will build on the courageous uprisings around the world last year and further the movement toward sanity, equity, sustainability…

I felt blessed and grateful for the reflective, gentle, yes even magical, time in the woods, for the connection with family, for the opportunity to talk, play, eat, read, work, exercise together…  And check out the igloo we built as the temperatures warmed, and the snow turned from powdery to sticky.  Cool, eh?

May your new year be rich with highlights and insights, may you find your own ways to be part of the great turning our  communities, cities, countries, and planet so desperately need.

Jill Schroder is the author of BECOMING: Journeying Toward Authenticity.  BECOMING makes a perfect gift  — an invitation for self -reflection, and to mine our memorable moments  for insights, meaning, and growth.  Perfect for new beginnings, birthdays, or any time of year.

Whether you honor G(g)od, the Mystery, Nature, Love, or Life, being in touch with our joy, and making a joyful noise is a splendid way to celebrate... even as we also acknowledge the dark — in the world, and at this time of year.  It invites us to remember that light,  joy, love, are always present, and we can invite them into our hearts and lives at any moment.

So here, for you, are some wonderful ways people are Making a Joyful Noise

Do you like saxaphones and/or Deck the Halls? check this out.

Take heart with this Hallelujah Chorus way north in Alaska.

Like to laugh?  I did that a lot during this one:  Singing tweeted tips on how to keep warm, set to music from Carmina Burana — especially if you know or have sung it!

Apropos Joy:  I have recently taken a course called Wired for Joy, which uses cutting edge neuroscience to show us how to create more joy in our lives. The approach is called Emotional Brain Training (EBT).  Premise: the ways we create and handle the stress and difficulties in our lives were wired in our brains very early, and these old, outworn neuropathways run us, unless we re-train our brain to move through stress and back to well-being and joy. Good news:  this is absolutely possible and feasible!

Apropos celebration and giving:  that wily old western Zen Buddhist, Alan Watts, says in his The Book:  On the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are,  is that we are an inseparable part of the whole, deeply interconnected, and what we give is not worth much unless it comes from a place of enjoyment and acceptance.  (You can actually read a short version here.)

Finally, I have to put in a plug for my nephew, Joe Kremer, and his band Pterodactyl.  They’re just finishing up a cross-country tour, and played in Vancouver on Dec. 1.  One cool song, with a masterful video to match, is called The Break.  Joyful noises, I’d say!!  :-)

May your holidays be bright, full of love, warmth, music, peace, memorable moments, and great JOY!

Jill Schroder is the author of BECOMING: Journeying Toward Authenticity.  BECOMING makes a perfect gift  — an invitation for self -reflection, and to mine our memorable moments, for meaning and growth.  Perfect for Christmas or any time of year.

Whether or not these notions turn out to be the long sought “Theory of Everything,”  I am enthralled by these considerations – by the uncertainty, by the mind-stretching, usual reality-blowing implications of what is currently our best guess at the nature of reality operating all around us, and yes, within us!

Another thing that intrigues me is the link to the mystical and spiritual dimensions.  Last weekend, I listened to Hameed Ali, aka A. H. Almaas, author of numerous spiritual books, presenting some of his current work.  Perhaps, or perhaps not, coincidentally, the deepest dimensions of reality experienced by Ali, (and the Buddha as well) have strong similarities to the views emerging in cutting edge quantum physics. I am inclined to think it is no coincidence.  Our nature, indeed the nature of everything, is a mysterious, self-generating, dynamic flow, with no end…

I have one more weekend to go, and am very much looking forward to the second session, working with fellow students, using the practice of Inquiry, continuing to explore our own inner lives as we are led on a journey to explore the deepest nature of reality.

In the interim between the two sessions, Mike and I have been staying in a lovely home on a sweet, small island in the Canadian waters between Vancouver and Nanaimo, called Gabriola.  It has been a delicious few days, and an anniversary (our 13th last week!) get-away to remember for years to come.  What privilege, what luxury we are experiencing and sharing.

We have met to walk and inquire with friends, have had fine food, (a wood-fire pizza of prociutto, sage, brie, and sun-dried tomatoes, oh my goodness), strenuous workouts in a great little gym; we have enjoyed a warm fire, some beautiful and some blustery weather – both rich to experience, and the two cats, Mitoche and Moxie, that Mike is here to sit, (as well as the house. while the owners vacation in Mexico).  Gracie is a feral cat that the owners also feed, and protect from a big, bold Tom, called Mango Pickles

We watched the news one evening, and were both glad, afterwards, that we do not have a TV.  Hearing that the high-up executives of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae are being given whalloping big bonuses after ripping off the American people to the tune of billions and billions and getting bailed out by the same, that the Occupy movements are being forcefully evicted in many places — and that we are no closer to resolving the state of growing inequity so plaguing our times, learning that the Harper government is pressing ahead to build the Enbridge Pipeline) the Canadian equivalent of the Keystone XL, meanwhile promoting farmed salmon aquaculture even as they are denying and repressing the tests revealing ISA in BC waters, the same lethal virus that has devastated wild and farmed salmon around the world, and so on…were a radical jolt to the rest and respite, peaceful and probing places.

I have been hanging out — relishing the quiet of this island abode; the clean, crispness of the November air, the slanty, golden light, the rasberries and curly kale still for gathering in the garden; the multi-colored stones on the beach cast against the slippery kelp and the red and gold leaves… and I am filled with gratitude for all the people who are risking their lives and livelihoods that the world be a safer, saner, more just and healthy place…

Taken all together, the above could have a tendency to be crazy-making, stultifying, numbing… at the very least confusing, and in some ways deeply disturbing.  In other ways, this jumble of privilege and suffering, inner and outer, peaceful and revolutionary, is a call to Hold It All, as the title of this piece says; to realize there is no way to understand or manage what is unfolding…, no way to ’fix’ the problems or even to know what would be ‘best’ for the whole situation, if there were such a thing.

I, and we all, have, as always, the challenge and opportunity to simply be with, sit quietly, in mindfulness, with compassion, gratitude, humilty, to allow and accept.  Then to listen to the inner voice, the call or sense of guidance, toward the action that, on our part, may be called for, appropriate, or simply offered.

Jill Schroder is the author of BECOMING: Journeying Toward Authenticity. Check the website for a sample chapter, or see the reviews to get a flavor for the volume.

Facilitation of the GA was shared, and a budding conflict between a old timer (who spoke and looked as though he’d been engaged non-stop since Clayoquot Sound logging protests), and a young participant who had some dissenting opinions, was handled well.  I was moved and impressed at the range of people who had come, and the degree of caring and concern for the causes the Occupy movements are addressing. We heard from each person about what brought them there, and what they saw as pressing issues for the coming days, how to carry the movement forward and keep it peaceful.

Afterwards there were meetings about how to reach out to the larger community –the 99%.  A big sign was there to remind us all that the very rich, the top 1 %,  have influence and power, and control policy making and governments, frequently to the great disadvantage of the remaining 99%.  But 99% is a lot of people and this is why I am writing today.  This is a great opportunity and responsibility, in my opinion.

More about this site:  here is the Soup Kitchen. It was well stocked, and I love the sign: This Is What Democracy Tastes Like.  People were manning it, and serving themselves food.  I was impressed at how much organization and effort has obviously been put into this, and the other tents on the site.

There was a well stocked First Aid tent, and another one where people could go to get free materials, socks, hats, pants, clothes of all sorts, and large covered area where people were gathered and singing and talking.

After the GA, I went to the meditation tent. Periodically someone walked through the crowd and announced that there is ongoing meditation and everyone is welcome to come and add their peace, awareness, and support to what is going on in hundreds of sites around the world.

There was also a tent called “The Peoples’ Lovely Library” which was well  stocked and frequented.

Then there were many tents where people were living. There was a, what seemed to be respectful, non-obtrusive, police and fire presence, and an onsite set of security and self-monitoring as well.

So why am I writing about this?  Short answer: It touches me deeply.

Only a small percentage of the 99% have the motivation and grit to show up and stay present to voice the issues of gross inequity, the greed and dominance of corporations, and the excesses of unregulated capitalism that these Occupy Movements are bringing forward. These people, in my opinion, are courageous and most deserving of our support.  They are standing up and investing their time and energy for a saner, kinder, more just and balanced world.

What could this support look like?   You could

1. take yourself down to a site near you, stand by in support, and see with your own eyes what’s happening;
2. speak to the people there and listen to their experience and concerns, and share yours;
3. ask what is needed at the various locations and go get it, or give it;
4. attend a General Assembly and show support with your presence and input;
5. offer a workshop — communication, facilitation, conflict resolution, peaceful resistance; citizen action…or other skills that would help. This  is welcome and needed;
6. take some time in the meditation tent, or on your own, to add your psychic energy…  many people believe that meditation and meditators have a beneficial (measurable) effect;
7. write a letter to the editor;
8. go with your kids, nieces, nephews… to a site and tell them what it’s about;
9. read on the internet about the worldwide movement and talk to friends and strangers about it;
10. ??? add your own ideas and actions… there’s no limit.  One thing for sure, it will be rewarding and transformational, I firmly believe.

• Your comments and experience are most welcome.

Jill Schroder is the author of BECOMING: Journeying Toward Authenticity. Check the website for a sample chapter, or see the reviews to get a flavor for the volume.

       In case you choose not to read further, I offer this incredible musical, flash-fire graphical collage of Billy Joel’s song, We Didn’t Dtart the Fire, an homage to the 40 years of history since Joel’s birth.  It’s a masterpiece, and provides a bit of context for what follows.

1. The Occupy Movement is Too Big to Fail  Here’s hoping!  Have a look.
2. Momentum is building to convince Obama to reject the Keystone XL Pipeline that would take the dirty, tar sands oil across the middle of the US. Check this link and pass it on.  Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid recently wrote a letter to Secretary of State Clinton, expressing deep concerns over Keystone XL. He said that it would be “wiser to invest instead in job-creating clean energy projects.”   Could be good news, eh?
3. Michael Moore (he’s radical, for sure, but one of my heros), speaks of how the Occupy movement is spreading.  ”… 59% of the U.S. (according to the latest poll) is already in support of the Occupy movement… I know of no other cause in my lifetime that has exploded this fast and achieved majority support this quickly. There is much more to be done, and I invite and encourage every single one of you to do what you can to “Occupy” your towns so that the message is heard loud and clear by the banks and corporations: “This is OUR country, WE are the people — and a corporation is not a person.” The richest 400 Americans having more than 150 million Americans combined is not only immoral and undemocratic, it is an act of violence. It kills people, here and abroad. Whether it’s the $2 billion a week we throw away on the U.S. war in Afghanistan, or the 45,000 Americans who die every year because they lack adequate health insurance, the days of Greed are going to come to an end because The People have had it. “
4. In the past 30 years, 96% of the growth of average incomes in the US have gone to the richest 10% of the country. Here’s a picture of the past and present inequities.
5. Adbusters is really on the ground in the Occupy movement.  It’s inspiring.
6. As protests against financial power sweep the world, science may have confirmed the protesters’ worst fears.An analysis of the relationships between 43,000 transnational corporations has identified a relatively small group of companies, mainly banks, with disproportionate power over the global economy… Here’s the detail.  Not pretty.
7. Check out Lead Now, an exciting new Canadian, Avaaz-like group.  They are on to the big movements, and let you join in, from your seat at home, or in real time.  They’re working hard on the Tar Sands, the Pipe Line and the Occupy movement.
8. Warren Buffet has some suggestions to ‘fix’ congress and the economy.  Bet they would work!  I checked in out on Snopes, and it’s true that these are from him.

• Finally, consider these actions as well, for all sentient beings and the planet:
• - Pray or meditate
• - Vision: what would we like to see?
• - Use our social capital, especially those of us who are middle class and up
• - Mobilize our friends, church, associations, etc. for statements of solidarity, prayers, letters to politicians
• - Attend the Occupy events near you, especially in nice clothes.
• - Offer facilitation services

And from the Onion, this final piece of news.  I laughed and laughed.  I hope you do too   Laughing is healing and contagious!

Jill Schroder is the author of BECOMING: Journeying Toward Authenticity. Check the website for a sample chapter, or see the reviews to get a flavor for the volume.

What are you grateful for?  For me the list is endless (and not diminished by the acknowledgement of concurrent suffering and ignorance in the world, though at times it is a challenge to hold them both).

A few posts have come my way recently that jolted me into awe and appreciation, and I would like to share them with you.

My dear brother, Jim, sent along this first one.  Here’s the link.  It’s a TEDx talk by Louie Schwartzberg  called Gratitude.  His award winning, time-lapse photography will take your breath away.  The images and comments underscore our links to the natural world, our interconnectedness, and represent pure beauty.  A child and an old man talk to us as well, and invite us to experience fully and deeply the enormous number of gifts we receive each unique day, and then to let our appreciation ripple out as a blessing on others!  I love watching this and I hope you do too.  (Also check out this trailer for his film Wings of Life: A love story that feeds the earth — about earth’s unsung pollinators.)

Moni, my Austrian daughter-in-law, sent this one along.  Most of have two legs and arms and don’t feel all that moved by our bodies!  I enjoyed the pure movement of this duet, and then sensing my own arms and legs, feeling gratitude and presence — for my own unsung limbs and our incredible capacity for movement, healing, for our journeys of becoming.  I hope you do too!

What a grand adventure our lives are! How often are we in touch with this, with celebration, gratitude, wonder and awe?  This is the one life we’ve been given.  And this is the only today. And this is right now.

Jill Schroder is the author of BECOMING: Journeying Toward Authenticity. Check the website for a sample chapter, or see the reviews to get a flavor for the volume.

My dad died of a heart attack while visiting friends at their ranch, miles and miles from his Tulsa, Oklahoma home.  The helicopter they called never came, and the ambulance took ages.  He had forgotten to take along his nitroglycerin.  These are only a couple of the several oddities around my father’s death.  And it makes me appreciate my amazing good fortune and the incredible care I received when I had my stroke, eight weeks ago tomorrow.

Fact is, Joe Kremer is gone now.  He was a bright light in my life, and in the lives of many other people as well.  After my dad died it was not long until the cards, letters, and calls started pouring in.  From family and close friends, of course.  But we were blown away by the other people who got in touch…people we didn’t even know he knew, like the little old lady elevator operator at his office building, and the gas station attendant at the local filling station!  They wrote how his smile and warmth had often been a real pick-up in their day, about his friendliness and good nature, how they were always gladdened when they saw him coming… The anecdotes were many, eye-opening, and heart warming. He made a beautiful, warm, positive difference in many people’s lives.

One of my fondest memories is of my dad taking my hand, then scooping me up in his arms and heading out into the ocean, beyond the breakers.  What an experience — it is impressed indelibly on my soul — the support, the safety, the adventure, the closeness, the thrill, the beauty…

The kicker is the startling juxtaposition of all this to Joe’s own perception of his life.  One of the essays in BECOMING is called Finding My Niche (pg. 36).  It relates to our connection with our fathers, and invites reflection on their ‘unfinished business’.

In contrast to the stories above, my dad often felt as though he had ‘wasted his life.’  He lived with a sense that he never ‘found his niche’, a meaningful way to use his potential, to make a difference!

In the essay I explore how noticing this ‘unfinished business’, this ongoing and unresolved issue in my father’s life, gave me a jolt, because I realized I was living out the same pattern to some degree in mine.  Revisiting the issue now, after the stroke, brings new dimensions, poignancy, and, happily, softness and acceptance.

I have found it most fruitful to look at the challenges my parents faced, the issues they dealt with, in particular the ongoing ones, and then to explore resonances in my own life. Maybe this is true for you as well. On this 45th anniversery of my dad’s death, I offer these questions for your consideration:

What do you perceive as your father’s ‘unfinished business’? What role did and does this issue play in your life?  How did his choices around this challenge affect your life?  To what degree have you made the same, and/or different choices?  What would you tell your children, or a young person, about what you learned, or are learning?

Jill Schroder is the author of BECOMING: Journeying Toward Authenticity. Check the website for a sample chapter, or see the reviews to get a flavor for the volume.

But since everything seems so ‘normal’ and fully functional, I am finding an increasing tendency to return to a faster pace, my ‘forward lean.’  Even though I’m doing well without my habitual list-making, and am enjoying letting things arise, I do find it a challenge — after all those many years of hurrying, maximizing, focussing on efficiency over ease — to integrate the new mode, to live within the metaphor of flowing rather than slotting!

It is helpful in this regard to recall the ocean, the sky, the passage of the sun and moon.  Slotting just doesn’t exist or apply, yet what’s important simply happens.

Another nice thing, as I seek to allow a new ‘normal’ in my daily life:  I have noticed an internal shift:  whereas before I really loved the slotting, the whiz and buzz of my former pace, now I recognize clearly that it doesn’t serve me, that it doesn’t feel good in the way it used to. And I know that not just intellectually, but I can feel it in my gut, my head, my heart, and my capillaries!

So the trick is to catch myself at the edge, notice when I am in the middle of the shift from flowing to slotting. And not to give myself grief because or when I discover the familiar patterns returning — that would be truly counterproductive!  I was working with a classical homeopathy practitioner recently, and she helped me to see how important it is to be kind and gentle with that habitual part of myself, to actually acknowledge that it served me well for years, gave pleasure, allowed me to contribute in ways that seemed important and useful.  And these patterns no longer serve me or the greater good.

(To be continued)

Jill Schroder is the author of BECOMING: Journeying Toward Authenticity. Check the website for a sample chapter, or see the reviews to get a flavor for the volume.