Bring Back You
But for summer vacations,
Since 1970,
I have taught
Consistently.
Consider what
I am saying:
For fifty years,
Year after year,
I have taught.
Twenty of those years
I taught
In two high schools,
Malcolm X Shabazz
And
Webster
Junior High,
Both In
Newark,
NJ.
Lifetime-upon-lifetimes
Ago,
I struggled
There,
Trying
To understand
How to be
Helpful.
I was not ready
To be present
With what was.
With such discontent
And righteous indignation,
I was fixed
On what I thought
Should be happening.
Yet every single moment of those years
Brought me closer
To myself.
There was not
A moment squandered.
For the last thirty years
I taught
At Kripalu Center.
Also, a journey
Of lifetimes.
You taught me
How
To
Be
Helpful.
Connectivity
and
Collaboration.
Learning
How to be
With you,
Our guests.
Learning
How to
Together
Ponder,
Question,
Look
At the core teachings
And live into them.
OH!
How
I
Loved
That!
March 13,
With Kripalu’s closing,
Began
The longest,
The only
Non-teaching period
Of my adult life.
How many memories live,
Wrapped inside grief?
How many faces of feelings
Does grief wear?
Nowhere in my life
Did I ever find
The freedom
And
The flow
That
I found
Teaching,
And
Being
With you.
Nowhere
Was
Grace
More available
To me.
Nowhere
Was
Connectivity
So palpable.
How many memories live,
Wrapped inside grief?
How many faces of feelings
Does grief wear?
Thinking together,
All of you
And me
In the Forest Room,
Considering
The core teachings,
The simple strategies
We were given.
Tools
To ride
The waves
Of life,
Tools
To cooperate
With life,
Tools
To allow
The feelings
To come
And
To go.
How many memories live,
Wrapped inside grief?
How many faces of feelings
Does grief wear?
Grief is.
We have all lost so much
Individually and collectively.
And yet,
To hold it
Hand in hand
With mature hope,
To imagine in the loss
Doorways open to possibilities,
To new moments,
To new and more authentic
Expressions of life.
Not to bypass the feelings!
But
To give us
The courage
And
The willingness
To practice
Being
With
What
Is.
~~~
Thank you for everything you’ve given me.
Thank you for everything you’ve taken from me.
Thank you for everything that’s left.
~~
Grief, Loss and Renewal, Savoring Life’s Lessons, is a program I created with my spouse, Rasmani Orth, decades ago. We taught it as a week-long program, as a three-day, a two-day, and a 90-minute R&R session. As years passed, as I lost more, I was able to weave into this program my life experiences. And now, in this fluid and shape-shifting moment in time, I will teach Grief, Loss and Renewal in live streaming.
In this new venue, how do we collaborate to create connectivity? How do we create community? How do we craft practice? My commitment is to take my learnings from those 30 Kripalu years and to weave them into our sessions.
The program will run on Wednesdays in August (5, 12, 19, 26), noon-1:15, EST. My intention is to craft the time in between sessions to practice what we are learning together, to weave these strategies into our lives.
https://kripalu.org/content/
I hope you can join us.
~~~
Here is a wonderous offering from the One Voice Children’s Choir. When I say I played this consistently throughout the week, I mean—I played this CONSISTENTLY and THROUGHOUT the week:
https://www.facebook.com/684148120/posts/10157637575413121/?d=n
Those faces!
Those voices.
Those words.
Those feelings.
~~~
Dear Friends, what is life asking you to let go of? What are your hopes and prayers for yourself, as you most imperfectly let go? What are you noticing?
Your emails are gifts to my heart. Please keep in touch.
All blessings,
Aruni
~~~
ANNOUNCEMENTS—
PLEASE CHECK YOUR SPAM FOLDER FOR MY EMAILS. THERE IS HAVIC UNFOLDING. PLEASE UN-SPAM ME.
In order to offer you more consistent and more professional service, I will be changing emails to a gmail account. My new address is thecoacharuni@gmail.com. We will do this slowly over the next few weeks and keep you posted.
IF YOU MISSED A BLOG, YOU CAN GO TO MY WEBSITE, www.coacharuni.com/blog. All of the weekly blogs are posted there, underneath the most current one. Word has it—there are over 300!
Wisdom Circles—
Create community; connect to yourself, to one another and to the teachings. You are not alone. Thanks for considering offering a donation. My PayPal link is https://www.paypal.me/CoachAruni
This week’s Wisdom Circles are:
- Tuesday, July 14, @ 2:00 http://coacharuni.com/tuesdaycircles/
- Thursday, July 16, @ 2:00 http://coacharuni.com/thursdaycircles/