It’s not about me.

Coming to the place of knowing it is not about me has been a journey. I have had to work at knowing how to not take things personally. I can remember a time when I took everything personally, and that was definitely about me. Whether someone said something positive or negative would have an impact on how I saw myself or how I felt. I was allowing others to control my sense of self, rather then owning my own life and the direction and experience of it myself.
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Parasite Removal

I was lying in bed the other night nursing a sinus headache paying attention now and then to the television in the background. Sometimes the commercials are more entertaining then the shows and sometimes there seems to be more commercials then show, but I will save that for another time. last night, it was the Terminix commercial that resonated with my spirit. Not because we have termites, at least I do not think we do, but there promise of how they can come and remove all the termites from your house, keep them away, and if their treatment does not work they will pay for the damage. As I was sitting there watching this commercial, I found myself thinking that it is too bad there is not a parasite removal plan for our lives.
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These are my vows to me.

For the last few weeks, I have been spending quite a bit of time reflecting on the agreements I have made about perfection. It has not always been easy, but it has enabled me to release some things I did not know were still part of my agreements. It also enabled me to see how much I have grown, how much I have already discarded, and what I still need to work on. What I had come to realize is that this image of perfection sets me and everyone else up for failure. Once we are domesticated then we are not perfect for others or ourselves. Nobody is perfect in our eyes and we are not even perfect in our own. As I came to think through this, I came to a new understanding of what perfection is for me and that is love.
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Taking my masks off.

I have this relationship with Don Miguel Ruiz’s book that defies description. I can’t quite describe it as a love hate relationship because I never hate it. It is kind of like going to a psychological and spiritual gym. You go, you do the work, you feel good on so many levels, but there are some parts of the workout, which require you to work a little harder and dig a little deeper then others. This is how I have felt about his section on social masks. My initial response was – I don’t wear any social masks. That is too simplistic of an answer. Ok, so what social masks do I wear and how do I know when I am wearing them. One of the clues he suggests is when you feel false, frustrated, or dishonest. When are we faking the funk and being what we think others want us to be and not who we really are?
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Thanks Cousin Bruce

Dear Bruce, I just wanted to thank you for our conversation this past week. You said something that really touched me and got me thinking about how far I have come in my own journey. You talked about my aura and how it drew you to me and how you thought it drew others to me as well. I am not even sure if you will remember saying that or not. I can remember a time when I was probably more Eeyore and feeling like my whole world was woe is me. I had to work so hard on myself to look at how I was practicing a theology of sadness to get to a theology of joy. I had allowed myself to internalize other people’s lies and negativity. It had eaten away at my sense of self and the perception of my relationship with God. I had to remove all this from my spirit and replace them with those things I knew to be true.
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No more documentaries

Trying to undo all these years of internalized negativity and oppression is not always easy. I have clearly made progress in my pursuit of living the four agreements. I have made significant progress in terms of never saying anything negative about others. It seems like that was the easy part, although there are a few times when a student will say something, which I allow to get on my nerves for a moment. Then I have to stop and ask myself “why are you taking this personally, this is not about you?” This just happened to me recently and as I worked through it, I realized that I had internalized some fear from a conversation with someone a few years ago. I had to release the fear so that I could let it go. The thing I am happiest about is that I have learned how to make these moments commercials and not allow them to become full-length documentaries that take over my day.
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Releasing Judgment

One of the lessons I remember learning growing up was how we should not judge others if we did not want others to judge us. For some reason, I found that hard to believe as I figured they were going to judge me anyway. Now, I realize that what others do is about them. My judging is about me. What got me thinking about this was something don Miguel Ruiz wrote in the Companion Guide to the Four Agreements. “We judge others according to our image of perfection as well, and naturally they fall short of our expectations.” It made me stop and think about what my image of perfection is for those in my life. What is my image of the perfect partner? For my children (that includes all those who have adopted me as their mom)? For my parents, when they were alive? For my closest friends? For my brothers? For my relatives?
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Simply about Perfection

Recently a client asked me if I worked as hard on my own spiritual evolution as they felt they were. I found my heart smiling. I had to giggle because for the last few weeks I have been grappling with a single word – perfection. Don Miguel Ruiz wrote, “Our image of perfection is the reason we reject ourselves; it is why we don’t accept ourselves the way we are, and why we don’t accept others the way they are.” In his Companion Guide to the Four Agreements, he challenged me to think about what my image of perfection is. I could not begin to answer that question or any of the other questions he asked because I could not find the words to define perfection. There have been days when this single word made me wonder if I really wanted to grapple with it and was this challenge going to be enough to stop me in my journey.
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Valuing my qualities

Don Miguel Ruiz wrote, “The most important agreements are the ones you make with yourself. In these agreements you tell yourself who you are, what you feel, what you believe, and how to behave.” As I have been exploring this in my own life and working to become aware of my own agreements, I have been thinking about the qualities I was taught I should embody, those I think I embody, what others think I have and those I wish I had. Growing up, I was taught to be compassionate and caring. That came more from my mother then anyone else. She was a very loving and compassionate woman and they are qualities I continue to embody and embrace today. I think, or at least would like to believe that this is how others see me as well.
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Remembering when my roots grew deeper

I remember 1991 as if it were yesterday. Well actually, I think the winds started blowing in my life the year before. My mother had become increasingly ill, my long-term relationship was eroding before my eyes for reasons I did not understand, and 1991 was to be a year of major changes in my life. for the first time in decades I was living on my own, my mother was dying, my father was doing all he could to stay strong and care for my mom, I was back in school working on my fourth degree and felt as if what was keeping together was my commitment to just taking it one day at a time, sometimes one minute. My first semester in seminary I was told to leave my church, my mom died, my car was stolen, and my son had a near death experience.
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It's my story!

I just had this awesome conversation with my brother and it reminded me of how we each have the opportunity to co-create with the Infinite and with life. How I talk about my life, how I tell the story of my life is about me and it is a work of art. Nobody can tell the story of my life as I can. Your story about my life is your story and your work of art. I can observe it, but I do not participate in it. It is your story. How I tell my story, how I create my story is about me. I am the one who decides how to paint the picture. I am the one who decides how to explain what I perceive to be real. I am the one who decides how I am going to justify what I do or do not. It is my life and my story.
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There is no mindfulness in multitasking.

Every once in a while I get a fortune cookie, or a thought for the day on one of my FB apps that just kind of slaps me in the face and shouts it’s pay attention time. This morning was one of those moments. I was going through my morning FB ritual and my Zen thought for the day was “When walking, walk. When eating, eat.” Hmm, I guess it was no coincidence I read this as I drank my water, ate breakfast and FBed, all at the same time. Then I started thinking about how many times in my day I am not being mindful because I am multitasking. Like when my son calls and is telling me the details of his day and I am not fully listening to him because I am also cooking dinner. Or how many times has Zoë been talking to me about something and I have not stopped what I was doing to fully listen. Or how many times have I been doing two or three things at one time. I guess there is a reason that Zoë sometimes calls me the queen of multitasking.
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The force is with me.

For whatever reason this morning, I found myself thinking about this line from star wars – may the force be with you. I can’t remember the last time I saw a Star Wars movie; they were never my favorites. It is funny though how lines from movies you have never seen somehow manage to get into the recesses of your memory banks. I am not even sure what triggered that thought for me. Maybe it was the conversation I just had with Reggie about Tim Tebow, Louis Farrakhan, dogs, and the moon. Who knows? What I know is that the force is with me or as Zoë would sing if she were awake with me this morning, “I’ve got the power.”
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My emotions are speaking

It is amazing what I find when I straighten things out, or perhaps I just wasn’t supposed to find them until now. The reality is that I think I always knew they were there, but for some reason did not feel called to look at them or open the box. Today, however, I felt drawn to open them and there was that card staring at me. It said, "Our emotions tell us how we are doing in life." On the back it said, "If we don’t like our emotional reaction, we need to clean up the lies we belief. By following our emotions, we change our beliefs, and our circumstances change." As I read this card, I found myself laughing inside. Hmm, isn’t that what I had just talked about with my client this afternoon.
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The power of the past and the importance of the present.

Once again, I have learned how easy it is to be sucked into the power of the past and forget that none of us is the same person we were in the past. The other day, my son called crying and then hung up on me and immediately I became concerned for him, his caregivers, and the other young man in his life. Why? Because I remembered all the other times he had lost control when he was with me and how he was. I remembered the time he nearly hit me over the head with a 2 x 4. I remembered all the other times he had become angry and became physically aggressive with myself and others and I assumed that this was what was happening again. The next day when I spoke to his caregiver, I learned that he had not been physical at all. He had been far more appropriate then I have ever known him to be.
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A prayer for my son

Tonight has been one of those nights when I have been reminded of how powerless and out of control, I am. It has been one of those nights when the only thing I can do is stand on my faith and know that the Infinite will work it all out. It has been one of those nights when all I can do is pray. Being a parent has its moments of deep joy and those moments where all one can do is stand on one’s faith and know that everything is going to be ok. My son, Nicholas adopted me about 19 years ago. He gave birth to our relationship in his heart and while legally we will never be related, don’t ever try to tell him I am not his mom, because he will tell you how wrong you are in a heartbeat. He has had one of those lives that would make a lifetime made for TV movie and not in a good way. He has lived through more things then you could ever wish upon anyone and yet in the midst of it all, he has managed to stay surrounded by messengers of love who have used their gifts to help him heal, grow and evolve to the young man he is today.
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In the quiet of the morning

It is scary when you find yourself telling others exactly what you need to tell yourself. Makes you go hmm, ok God are you having her say this so I can tell myself what I need to hear. A friend of mine from the Whole Living Community was talking about not being productive because she had taken too much time for herself this past weekend and not gotten her normal weekend chores done. As I was writing to her, I found myself convicting myself especially when I realized it had been weeks since I had claimed the time to write in my own journal. Here this private space that is just for me to write my own meanderings about me. And then I remembered that one of my promises to myself had been to take time for me everyday. So when did I start agreeing that I was not worthy of paying myself with some personal time for me. Not Sharon the professor, the mother, the partner, the spiritual director, the sister, or any other role I play for people, but just me.
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Using my Bubby wisdom

As I lay in bed this morning, feeling Zoë’s arms wrapped around me, feeling the warmth of her breath on my neck and the gentle sound of her snoring, my heart just overflowed with love. I didn’t want to get out of bed, but I did have to go to the bathroom. One of these days, we will figure out how to be able to do both things at one time. Until then, I guess I will have to do with interrupting those special moments. It is not that her touch, breathing or snoring is any different then it has been for the last 10 years, it just has taken on a completely new meaning. My Bubby, Yiddish for grandmother, used to tell me when you can see the good in a bad situation then you know you are going to be ok. I am not going to lie to myself or anybody else.
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Getting To Know the Courage in Me.

Since Zoë was diagnosed with breast cancer, I have strived to be as loving and supportive of her and this phase of her journey as I could. The day we got the news was the worst day. It was the day we felt our whole world and life change. I remember how one minute we were sitting in Starbucks dreaming about what we were going to do to the backyard next year waiting for my paratransit bus to arrive to take us home. Then the phone rang and the diagnosis came. At the same time, the bus arrived. While we only live a few miles from the store, it was the longest and quietest ride home. When we got home, we talked, cried, processed, and prayed. We made one commitment to each other that day that everything we said and did would be about keeping and maintaining a positive attitude in ourselves, our home, and our interactions with others.
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