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“So Why Not Just Show Up?”*

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“So Why Not Just Show Up?”*

Title Quote by Roshi Joan Halifax

 

Oh, dear friends, hello.

It feels to me like weeks have passed since last week’s blog. Do you relate to that time-distortion-syndrome?

I was blessed and privileged to be immersed in Kripalu experiences this past week, first in the Inner Quest over the long weekend and then a delightful, deep and rich R&R class midweek.

And this blog! It is always for me a dive into a Kripalu experience. I learn so much from writing every week.

I am grateful to you who read it, who give me the opportunity to speak my truth, as well as those of you who come to my programs.

This past week, I learned so much in these two programs.

I recognize the power of people coming together, with intentionality and with willingness, to look inside.

I recognize the power of people coming together, with intentionality and with willingness, to look at others.

To listen to themselves.

To listen to others.

To receive themselves.

All parts.

To receive others.

All parts.

I recognize the power of people coming together and building the world we want to live in, if only for those 90 minutes, if only for those three days. If only for a brief blog-read.

I recognize the blessing and the privilege it is for me to be present, to support, to help create, to help mold those experiences.

In a lifetime full of blessings, I am forever blessed by being a member of the Kripalu Faculty.

And I am forever blessed to be able to offer core legacy teachings to you.

In the giving, there is profoundly deep receiving.

~~~

If you don’t know me, please know that I suffered with profound stuttering from early childhood through young and mid-adulthood.

I name this today, to bring that child, that terrified kid, that awkward teenager, that furious adult, into this conversation.

My terror of people stemmed from this root cause; I didn’t want to talk to you. I didn’t want to have to try to say words to you. Then you would then see me. Then you would KNOW. I’m not sure what you would know—but you would.

What a trip, what a blessing, what a mitzvah* it is to have outlived those recurring traumas and to know, oh, so deeply:

I am so privileged to talk with you.

To write these blogs. To teach these programs.

I am blessed to do this work with you.

And—you all give me hope.

You all give me hope.

~~~

Roshi Joan Halifax from Upaya Zen Center talks about “wise hope”, hope that keeps us plugged into the moment, hope that gives us the energy to do the next best thing, hope that launches us into right action.

Kripalu program participants… dear folks who read this blog,

You give me wise hope.

Thank you,

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you for trusting me.

~~~

Here’s a perfect article about wise hope from Roshi Joan, from the Lion’s Roar magazine. Please enjoy.

Read Here

~~~

What would it look like in your life today to practice wise hope? Just for a few moments? Be specific.

Playing for Change is the most amazing non-profit organization, committed to making music around the world, to having musicians from many countries come together to create music.

Here’s a rousing and strong selection, Riders on the Storm:

~~~

Dear Friends,

Roshi Joan encourages us:

So Why Not Just Show Up?

Let’s practice just getting there,

Just getting to the moment.

Let’s practice,

Finding our way.

Relaxing into the moment as it is.

In gratitude,

In possibility,

In wise hope,

May all beings benefit from our time together.

Blessings, all—

Aruni

 

*mitzvah, a Yiddish word that means a good deed, a blessing, a purposeful good action

To Remember the Sacrifices

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To Remember the Sacrifices


This blog post is also available on my Facebook page to make sharing it with friends and family easy for you to do.

My dearest monogamous childhood +++ friend, G., is a child of Holocaust survivors.  I spent much time in her childhood home.  I remember her mother, wrapped in silence, standing at the sink, her back to us as we sat, quietly kibbitzing at the kitchen table.  

Washing dishes, washing dishes.  Standing in silence.  Wrapped in silence.  Washing dishes.

I remember.  I remember that G. and I talked all the time, all the time, about everything, Everything, but not, BUT NOT about the war, her relative-free family, her parents’ unusual behaviors.  We were forever-friends, bonded without words by the differences each of our parents stood within.

I remember her house, silent, seemingly hollow, upscale furniture, nice things, wrapped in heavy plastic covers, wrapped in silence, wrapped in hushed tones.

G. used to read this blog.  I don’t believe she does now.  I am still wrapped in silence; I don’t want to hurt her, to offend her, to say the wrong thing.

I’m hoping after hope that she won’t read this.

Of course, they didn’t talk.  How could they talk?  What was there to say?

Wrapped in silence.  Wrapped in denial. The depth of unspeakable, unimaginable trauma.

Don’t say it.  Spare the kinder, the children.  Don’t feel it.  Don’t go there.

And it stays.  There.  Constricted.  Frozen in silence.

Speaking is the doorway.
Naming is the blessing.
Keeping alive the memories,
The direction home.

And I totally understand,
TOTALLY understand,
I’m tip-toeing around it now,
65 years later.
~~~

Ireichō
The Book of Names

“For the first time, an accurate and comprehensive list of every person of Japanese ancestry incarcerated in the World War II camps will be compiled in a book called the Ireichō.

The idea of a book as a monument is inspired by the Japanese tradition of Kakochō (literally, “The Book of the Past”), a book of names typically placed on a Buddhist temple altar and brought out for memorial services when the names of those to be remembered are chanted.

The Ireichō monument will be on display at the museum for a year. The public is invited to view and acknowledge the names in the Ireichō by placing a Japanese hanko (stamp) underneath the name of each individual in the book.

The seventy-five internment and concentration camps are represented by wooden plaques.  

(The Japanese-American National Museum)

~~~
To remember.
To bear witness.
To memorialize.

We are here to witness each other.
Forgetting is not an option.
Memory must live onward.
~~~
Please look at this page, the words, the pictures.  Please look at the faces:

Read Here 

~~~
The United States Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C., committed to keeping alive the memories.  As the survivors die, how essential, how imperative is their work.

Look at their articles, the video of the murder of lesbian and gay men during the war.

My experience in their Memorial Museum was life-altering.

Read Here

~~~
And the National Memorial for Peace and Justice, the Lynching Museum in Montgomery.  Look at the pictures of their memorial, honoring, remembering, holding close all of the lynchings

 

~~~
How do we choose to remember?
To memorialize?
To hold close
The sacrifices made?

I don’t have answers.
I only have intentions.

Where does this all land,
Dear folks,
For you?
~~~
I have no words to complete this blog, to bring closure..  This song by Sweet Honey in the Rock says it all.

Ella’s Song comes from the actual words of civil rights activist Ella Baker.  Dr. Bernice Johnson Reagon turned Ella’s words into an a cappella piece for Sweet Honey in the Rock.

First, the lyrics:

We who believe in freedom cannot rest
We who believe in freedom cannot rest until it comes.

Until the killing of black men, black mothers’ sons
Is as important as the killing of white men, white mothers’ sons.

That which touches me most
Is that I had a chance to work with people
Passing on to others that which was passed on to me.

To me young people come first
They have the courage where we fail
And if I can but shed some light as they carry us through the gale.

The older I get the better I know that the secret of my going on
Is when the reins are in the hands of the young, who dare to run against the storm.

Not needing to clutch for power
Not needing the light just to shine on me
I need to be one in the number as we stand against tyranny.

Struggling myself don’t mean a whole lot, I’ve come to realize
That teaching others to stand up and fight is the only way my struggle survives

I’m a woman who speaks in a voice and I must be heard
At times I can be quite difficult, I’ll bow to no man’s word.

We who believe in freedom cannot rest
We who believe in freedom cannot rest until it comes.

~~~
And the song:

~~~
May all beings be blessed,
May all benefit
From the work
We do
Together
And
Alone.

Thanks for your hearts,
Dear Friends,

Aruni

Sanctuary & Sangha

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Sanctuary & Sangha

This blog post is also available on my Facebook page to make sharing it with friends and family easy for you to do.

As a kid and a not-such-a-kid, there are numerous pictures of me standing apart from the group.  

Whatever group.  

Any group.

Here is a picture of my Aunt Geri, my mom’s younger sister.

Can you find me in the frame?  

I learned to hide well.

(Hint: far left, one with the trees, not so much with the people.)

I understand my Lone-Wolf responses.  I wrote books about them, taught workshops about them.  Yet now, I find myself diving deeper into my aloneness.

The aloneness of that child, who had so many reasons to hide.

The aloneness of me, the adult, who is tender and healing.

The early pandemic, living alone, I met my introvert, my tender child, differently.  It was deliciously right to hang alone, to have permission to not be with people, to be thoughtful and cautious about interactions.  I befriended her broken heart, and we had a good time together.  (Lots of take-out food ensued—I’m not sure why or how that emerged as a response to the pandemic for me.)

That time worked.

Now, back home with my dear one, I am living into a time of physical healing and transition.  

I am discovering a new portal, an unraveling of the obstacles, that have blocked me from a deeper relationship with that aloneness.

I feel quiet and almost-shy, wondering where my people are (the answer? right here), wondering why I am feeling so young as I hover on my 75th birthday.

I dive deeper into my separate broken heart.  And it is a gift, a blessing, an unraveling with space and air and breath and possibility.

It’s just—well, not my plan.  Not my mind’s plan.  Perhaps a bigger plan?  

Yes, a bigger plan!  And I am okay with it, especially now that I am feeling physically more level.

I might as well be okay with it, since it is happening, right?

The interplay of the personal and the collective, our unique separateness coupled with our profound need for connection, is a dance long-considered in the wisdom traditions.  Here are two of today’s most elegant, more relevant, most accessible teachers in the Buddhist tradition, Jack Kornfield and Tara Brach.

This six-minute video says so very much.  The first half is excerpted from Jack talk on “Sanctuary“.  The second half comes from Tara talk on “Sangha”

 

~~

Friends, for your contemplation:

  • Where are your places of individual sanctuary?
  • What do you receive for yourself in those places?
  • Your sangha?  Your choir?  Your community of comfort and choice?  What do you receive?
  • What do you offer back to your sangha, your people?

~~

With gratitude 
For what was.

With commitment 
To what is.

With the possibility 
Of what might be—

Stay blessed,
Aruni 

Dancing Together—Will & Surrender

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Dancing Together—Will & Surrender

This blog post is also available on my Facebook page to make sharing it with friends and family easy for you to do.

On a scale of 1-10, I would rate myself 13.7 on the Spectrum of Willfulness.  I learned to:

  • Do it.
  • Do it well.
  • Then do something else.
  • Keep doing it.
  • Then do the next thing.
  • Hope that maybe someone will like me.
  • Keep moving.
  • Don’t stop.
  • Make it happen.
  • Hope that maybe someone will love me.
  • Maybe not.
  • Better keep moving.

It kind of worked.  For a while.  
Oh.  At great cost.

When I was active in my addictions, I believed I was living in some cool counter-culture, some anti-silent-majority, a matriarchy of radical change.  Actually, however, I was dulled and drugged and not a member of any community, yet alone the matriarchy, yet alone, a community of self.

My willfulness in those 20 years manifested as righteous indignation.  Railing against what was absolutely spun me around and around, a cyclone of one problem leading to the next, rather than part of any fragment of any solution.

Then it all changed.  
Getting sober.
Coming to Kripalu.
Blessed be.

During early ashram days, I entered a phase of premature surrender.  Positive that surrender was the evolved stance (and then people would love me), I prayed and hoped and practiced like wildfire, ignoring my human responses, denying my need to take action, surrendering without touching into my human self.  And bingo, same pattern.  Flip side of the coin of the above list.

  • Do nothing.
  • Have no preference.
  • Have no response.
  • Have no action.
  • Surrender.
  • And then they will love me.

Time passed.  
Somewhere wrapped into those years, I incrementally realized—

ohhhhh! 

The right use of will,
A posture of such maturity and evolution!

Will and surrender
Dancing together.

Take action.
Let go of the outcome.

Attend to your humanity.
Your needs, your preferences.
And let go. 

Suffice to say—
The interplay of will and surrender is at the heart of Kripalu Legacy Teachings
And offers an effective and comfortable platform for living.

~~~
Here is the most wonderous, the brilliant, the bright light, Leonard Cohen:

“If it be your will
That I speak no more
And my voice be still
As it was before
I will speak no more
I shall abide until
I am spoken for
If it be your will.

If it be your will
That a voice be true
From this broken hill
I will sing to you
From this broken hill
All your praises they shall ring
If it be your will
To let me sing.

From this broken hill
All your praises they shall ring
If it be your will
To let me sing.

If it be your will
If there is a choice
Let the rivers fill
Let the hills rejoice
Let your mercy spill
On all these burning hearts in hell
If it be your will
To make us well.

And to draw us near
And bind us tight
All your children here
In their rags of light.

In our rags of light
All dressed to kill
And end this night
If it be your will
If it be your will.”
~~~
And now, the song, If It Be Thy Will

~~~
Dear Friends,

On we go with this
Wild, this wacky
Experiment
Of
Living
Our
Lives.

On we go,
Day after day,
Experience
After
Breath
After
The
Next
Experience.

And here we are.

Practicing.
Living.
Feeling.
Relaxing.
And
Practicing.  

Human and divine,
Wrapped in a body.

Stay blessed,
Aruni

To Sonia–Memories

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To Sonia–Memories

Richmond Pond Sunrise

 

This blog post is also available on my Facebook page to make sharing it with friends and family easy for you to do.

As a child I shyly adored her.  She was a dear and a wonderful grandmother who loved me in the fullest and simplest and quietest of ways.  But once I left home, the real gifts came–Gram as listener, Gram as friend, as confident, as deep unconditional witness of my struggling young adult journey.

Together we were the best hand-holders.  We would hold hands for a long time—our hands were about the same size and shape, tiny.  When marked against the other, a matching set of four.  We would sit on her couch and talk and talk, holding hands the entire time.  No sweaty palms, no fidgety movements, absolutely no self-consciousness at all.  Quiet hand-holding.  Unconditional hand-holding.  I have never in my 74 years found a hand to hold that fits better in mine than that of my Grandma Sonia’s.

I would come home from NYC to Scranton as often as I could.  Monthly?  Who knows?  It never felt enough.  I would spend Saturdays with her.  Eventually she would always say the same thing:

“Nan, I have nothing to feed you for lunch.”  At the time, I was a finicky, ridiculously over-committed, somewhat ungrounded vegetarian.

Inevitably, Gram would whip together a magical combination of things: a little soup broth, some kasha, a hard-boiled egg.  A feast of fabulous Gram-food.  All the while, talking and listening, smoozing and gabbing.  The food that she offered me was beyond-delicious, a gift of her kind, gentle heart.

Then, for no particular reason, inevitably, INEVITABLY, I would get swept by a wave of total exhaustion.  I would find my way to her couch, sit down and rest.  She would insist, “Lay down, rest, it’s okay.”

I never wanted to “waste” time with her by sleeping.  Nevertheless, I would almost against my will, every single time, fall into the deepest, most restful and warmed sleep, arising later to the click of her crochet needles, feeling fully and wholly renewed.  

I would joke about her magic couch.  

It is not a joke.

I know today that the profound safety of my Grandmother’s love warmed my healing sleep, as she sat, so close, forever, by my side.

(Written in 1988 after her death)

~~~

 

How does memory work?
As a memoirist, I am captivated by memory,
How it changes and dances and shifts,
How it lives so deeply inside,
Available in the present moment.

Check this out—here’s Ms. Wikipedia:

Memory is the faculty of the mind by which data or information
is encoded and stored
and retrieved when needed.
It is the retention of information over time
for the purpose of influencing future action.

So—my Grandmother Sonia does live inside me.

~~~
The Memory Project is a celebration of Ysaye Barnwell, singer, songwriter, and founding member of the magical a cappella group, Sweet Honey in the Rock.

Here is the video celebration of Ysaye’s 75 birthday, honoring her lifelong commitment to music that heals individual hearts and creates collective liberation.

~~~

“I thought that you were gone, but now I know you’re with me
You are the voice that whispers all I need to hear
I know a please a thank you and a smile will take me far
I know that I am you and you are me and we are one
I know that who I am is numbered in each grain of sand
I know that I’ve been blessed again, and over again
I am sitting here wanting memories to teach me
To see the beauty in the world through my own eyes
I am sitting here wanting memories to teach me
To see the beauty in the world through my own eyes”

The final verse.
Full lyrics available here

~~~

Like the picture
Of the Pond,

My grandmother’s love
Is available to me.

Smooth
And
Steady.

Softly
Flowing
With 
Gentle
Protection
And 
Care.

She accompanies me.
She supports me.
She is with me.

I am sure.

Stay blessed,
Aruni

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