There is a Place to Rest Behind the Mental Drama

Carina,

What does one do when “sweet nothings” seemingly meant nothing?

When good memories are questioned?

When plans are left to wither?

When an exciting future is devastated?

When love is left alone in the cold?

*****

Dear Friend,

Thank you so much for your letter. I’m certain that many readers relate right away to your questions. Anyone who’s willing to be in intimate relationships with others experiences, on some level, this disappointment and confusion. My friend, I can tell that this is weighing on your heart and your mind.

When you’re broken-hearted, the only thing there is to do is be broken-hearted.

That probably doesn’t seem like good news, but that’s the deal. There is good news too.

The good news is that you can actually use this heartbreak to access deeper peace than you might have found had you not had this suffering. When life is going along swimmingly, we aren’t challenged to go deeper. But the desire not to suffer will have us knocking on doors that we wouldn’t have otherwise. And this can be a great blessing.

Some questions are unanswerable. These can be the most useful kind. Use the thoughts and the questions to access peace.

When you notice that you are on the painful thought train – which may be quite often these days – you can allow the noticing to be a bell of mindfulness.

Simply notice, “Oh, I’m doing that again.” No judgment, no assessment, no shame, no should. No trying to stop it. Simply notice, “Ah, there goes my mind again.”

Regular use of this very simple tool has a cumulative effect of opening up the space of peace that exists right in this moment, and we can experience it when our minds are quiet enough for us to feel it.

But don’t make yourself wrong if you’re not feeling it right away. You may not get instant relief. But you are training yourself to observe the mind rather than be completely consumed by it.

The next step is to get into your body. There is immense wisdom contained here.

So again, when you notice the churning mind, you can call your attention away from your mind and into your body. Then simply observe the sensations, and two things will happen.

First, you will have disidentified from the mind, however briefly. Anything that stops the relentless thought cycle is beneficial. This creates the room for space and peace to enter. Second, you are now in a place to observe the true nature of all things in the world of form: constant change.

In observing body sensations without labeling or judging or wishing they would go away (even though we do!), you can begin to train yourself, on the experiential level, in the wisdom of anicca, a Pali word meaning impermanence. As you notice, for example, that you feel a fluttering in your belly or a rushing sensation in your arms or a tightness in your shoulders, you can quietly observe, and you’ll notice that sensations that seem fixed are in fact constantly changing and shifting.

This is true for thoughts and emotions too. This teaches you that you will not feel heart-broken forever. But this is what’s so right now. And it is your access to deeper peace and connectedness.

Storylines are not real, and thoughts and feelings are passing. Do what you can, one moment at a time, to be the observer, watching the experience unfold. There is a place to rest behind the mental drama.

Now, let’s have some fun! As I’ve been writing this, I’ve been sitting back every few moments and blowing bubbles with my Thomas the Tank Engine bubbles that I bought for $1 at HEB. The tip of the wand has a picture of Thomas on it and the words “REALLY USEFUL!” I recommend that you find something similar for yourself. Play with your toys. Get into things that you used to love as a child. Get into things you’ve always wanted to get into. Get messy and dirty and creative.

Do the dance between being still and being with your sensations and escaping into silly delights. Sometimes when the heartache is so raw, we really have to force ourselves to reach out and start creating. But some of the greatest paths set out from this point. I first joined a gym in the midst of a broken heart. I first started meditating during another one. Some fifteen years later both of these habits are still serving me.

So take really good care and know that there is depth and beauty within this situation when you can give that mind a rest and allow the infinite calm and space within to soothe your gentle soul.

If other questions arise from this writing, please email
nowstayopen@gmail.com.

Willingness

In peace I write to you.

Yesterday I took my love to the airport to send him home to New Zealand after a long visit. When I got home from the airport, I sat on my bed facing the warm sunflowers in the back yard, my system shocked with withdrawal from the drug of love I’ve been mainlining for the last three weeks. It was a sunny, bright Saturday afternoon and the room was light and spacious and cool. Sobs soared through my mind and body.

And I said, I'm willing.

This is it, I knew. This is the work. Stay open.

I thought of you, my readers, and knew I am living this for all of us.

My chest rippled with waves from my gut. I let just enough thought come in to keep igniting the fire under the flame of heart ache. It didn’t take much. Otherwise I dropped the story line and felt. I watched the ripples rise, let the waves move over me, like lying in the surf on a beach in Maryland when I was ten-years-old.

I kept breathing. Sometimes I felt like I was losing my mind. Have you ever been gripped with heart ache? Yes, and doesn’t it overcome a body and mind? Everything seemed shocking and upside down. And the sunflowers smiled and waved warmly and their green stalks greatly matched the bright hot blue Texas summer sky. It was all happening at once. I craved my boyfriend terribly and at the same time I swam in the unquestionable perfection of the moment.

And I continued to be willing. I took care of myself. When I felt like I really needed it, I called up some trusted friends and went to see them. Another house where I could cry my eyes out and keep my heart open but not be lost to my mind in the solitude at home.

We ate good food, I cried some more, and we spoke of truth and allowed presence in. Trust allows us to settle back in its arms when we're willing.

Be willing. The emotions are not there to take you out. They are there to tear open the door, like Hanuman tearing open his chest: the Divine lives in there. Right there. It's asking you to trust.

Do what you need to do when it comes time to rest. And as long as you can, stay willing.

Be willing, in fact, also to rest.

I wrote the word willingness on my leg today in my car with a marker to remind myself to write this. An hour later I read an email about a conference call I’m on tomorrow. Each week there’s a different topic and the email told me that this week’s topic is willingness. This is what happens when we’re willing to feel our feelings. Synchronicities flourish through the cracks in “reality” that appear when we are willing to rest even in feelings of turmoil. Even when it seems like we can’t stand it, we keep breathing, we stay open. And our trust in Source rewards us with the ultimate gift: presence, which = love.

Are you willing to go in so that you can come out the other side? The "other side" really is within. Stay open.

Breathing consciousness into the unconscious

Dear Carina,

How does one keep the heart open after a man has been less than honest with her during a break-up, especially after trust has been established? My inclination is to close off to the possibility of romantic relationships and distrust men, although that is not what I want nor what I want to put out in the universe. If a man says I'm fabulous, but he can't be with me because of issues he needs to work through, and then it becomes clear that he just isn't interested in me and it isn't about his "issues" at all, how do I make sense out of all these mixed messages? How does one sift through the stories told to discern what is true and what is being told to hurt someone less, in order to make corrections during the next encounter? Put another way, if I'm so fabulous, then how am I suppose to change what I'm doing wrong in order to attract the right man? Am I attracting the wrong men? Maybe I'm not fabulous? Or am I doing what I'm supposed to be doing, and these "not-quite-right" men are just part of the path to finding a long-term soul mate/romantic life-partner? I'm sad, frustrated and confused and I don't know how to move forward.

With gratitude and love,

Michelle

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Dear Michelle,

Thank you so much for writing. I love your letter.

What you're experiencing is so human! I could feel it! Let's go ahead and get some space in here.

What is clear to me upon reading it is the mental and emotional whirlpool you were sitting in in that moment. It's beautiful how clear that is. And all there is to do is to observe that, gently. We can use our churning mind like a bell of mindfulness. When you become alert to a familiar mental story line - freed momentarily from being identified with it - you come awake for a moment.

Any level of observation takes us out of the muck, even if we immediately slip back into it. The practice is in noticing again. And again. And okay, there it is again. And ahhh. And okay. And oh man. Lovingly. Breathingly. Gently noticing.

This is all there is to be done in these moments. The details can swallow us whole. I've been there. Every person has been there. And I'm pretty sure we all will again.

When we simply observe our mental/emotional trying-to-understand churning, when we notice that we're trying to solve or blame or figure out, we are breathing consciousness into the unconscious. And that is our true source.

I could go further into the details of your questions, but for this discussion, let's keep it very simple.

This practice is what will keep your heart open. It is what will allow you to know the perfection in each moment, in every relationship. It will allow you to be in your own heart. Because there's no other way any moment could be. You're not doing anything wrong. There's nothing to do but come into this moment, again and again. All heart arises from here.

Thank you so much for writing. Your generosity in asking benefits all.

Love,

Carina

If other questions arise from this writing, please email
nowstayopen@gmail.com.

This is a conversation with you and God.

Dear Carina,

I feel like I am really going through a "Dark Night of the Soul". It seems that I am releasing so much stagnant energy, frustration and rage - all of which I've bottled up for years. Now it feels like it's gushing out of me, and I can no longer suppress it or control it. It's a bit unsettling, but liberating at the same time. Do you have any advice on how to navigate these choppy and unfamiliar waters?

Warmly,

MM

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Dear MM,

What a beautiful letter. Thank you so much for writing and for your absolute courage and heart.

You ask this question from a place of knowing, or you would not have come to me.

What could be more painful than not being able to access the peace that you've come to know, to feel disconnected from source. Dark Nights of the Soul are experienced by those who know the light.

Gosh, just a few weeks ago, I quoted Rumi on this very topic:

Listen to the story told by the reed,
of being separated.

"Since I was cut from the reedbed,
I have made this crying sound.

Anyone apart from someone he loves
understands what I say.

Anyone pulled from a source
longs to go back."

And I said then, and will repeat now: this is the most basic of human experience. I think it is uniquely troubling when it's experienced by someone who has known her true essence. Who knows her true essence, I should say. Again, if you did not know, you would not have written to me. You would not be seeking ways to breathe through this experience, you courageous journeyer.

Friend, we are so trained to distinguish good and bad feelings. One being desirable, the other most certainly not. This is a mistake of human thinking. But the fact is, most of us have our reactions, thoughts, body sensations and emotions so tightly tangled up, we cannot notice the separate parts, and we cannot sit in neutrality as the experiences arise and pass away. Mostly we just resist the "bad" feelings (and cling onto those good times, a folly in and of itself), and that just plain hurts.

So what can we do to soothe, then, in this universal predicament?

Bump up your self care.

I like to think of going through a depression as sort of like having the flu. You need to rest, listen to your body, eat nurturing foods, perhaps tune inward. In fact, this tuning in is what's demanded in this heavy emotional time. This is a conversation with you and God.

Prayer works.

Supplication works. When I can't feel the Beloved's loving arms, especially when I most need them, I lay a blanket down on the floor or the grass outside and I surrender my body to the earth and ask for help. Entreat the good Lord to help me. Because I know that this is really the only place to go.

Love is in the arms of the Divine, not in our thinking, judging, resisting mind. Still, we can turn our love toward that part of the self, too. It can't help it.

Drink lots of water. Get some exercise. See health care practitioners you trust to care for you. Let the Universe care for you. It is not separate from the hard times.

The other side of this is peace, and, in fact, it is there now. It does not matter that you cannot feel it.

You are not separate from the One, and you are supported from the inside.

Please take good care and thank you so much for writing. We are experiencing all of this together now.

Love,

Carina

P.S. One of the greatest books you can read when going through such hard emotional times is Pema Chodron's masterpiece, When Things Fall Apart. She radically and compassionately guides us first into and then out the other side of our suffering by teaching us what we fear most: to sit with it. Paradoxically it is all love.

If other questions arise from this writing, please email
nowstayopen@gmail.com.

Noticing is All That's Necessary

Dear mk,

Thank you so much for writing. I like your language: "feeling a bit under the weather today.. kind of sad too.."

There's something so sweet and humanly poignant about those words.

I thought about you today and about your letter when I found myself ruminating on what seemed to be a problem in my world. I was into the details of it and into why I was justified in feeling stressed. And when I thought about your letter and thought about what I wanted to say to you, I got space in my own world. So I thank you for that. We are in this together.

What I want to share with you is simple: if you are able to notice when you are spinning your mental and emotional wheels in attempt to solve a situation, it's likely that you are simply caught up in the details of the situation. And noticing is all that's necessary. All enlightenment is right there.

These tiny moments that shift our perspective from the level of words, thoughts, stories, complaints, judgments, offense, defense, justification, . . . give our consciousness a chance to breathe, to come out and stretch. Just a momentary breath is access to infinity.

This noticing includes noticing when you're making yourself wrong for how you're feeling. This self-judgment is often such a natural place to go, we seldom notice it's happening, but it will take a person out like nothing else can.

A bit of faith and trust is useful here. And you can take my word for it. There seems to be a cumulative effect of moment upon moment of noticing, of coming back to quiet -- even just for a second -- out of the noisy conversation of the mind and emotional reaction, no matter what the topic. That cumulative effect is peace.

The trust comes into play because you might not seem to get relief immediately in the moment, but any moment that you are able to disidentify with the mind, you are giving yourself the ultimate gift possible in the human experience.

~~~

Now, regarding the relationships, I wonder if you are "trying to understand others' positions and allow him respect, space, etc.. " out of an underlying should?

What I see here is an opportunity to allow what you're feeling. Here's the trick, though: allow your feelings while still observing them. That is, when you are able, simply notice. Notice the feelings and the thoughts that are going along with them. Allow them, feel them, experience them, quiet down the mind for a moment so you can really feel what your system is experiencing, keep breathing, and allow it to pass through you.

And when it comes back, keep breathing.

This is the paradox and miracle of the painful experiences in life: heartbreak leads to divine love, if we're willing to bathe in those warm waters rather than fight them.

This all ties to your question about tucking into your shell and re-grouping. It's my experience that the quieter the mind and the more room we create for our deepest nature to arise and guide us, the more valuable that quiet time is. Or it may be that as we quiet down and let our deepest nature guide us, we no longer have the need or desire to reach outside of ourselves as much.

This does not make it so we no longer connect. In fact, we are able to connect most deeply when we are being truest to ourselves. You may find in doing so that those relationships that feel draining or feel like failures either transform with your own opening heart or they naturally fall away.

I like to think of people as 6.7 billion fingers on the hand of God, each one a unique and detailed creation. There is no set program by which any individual should live. In other words, my dear mk, your intuition and instinct know exactly how to live in the best way for you.

So if your shell is calling you, I say, grab some comfy blankets and a couple seasons of "The Office" on DVD, and get on in there. Your self-care benefits all.

Thank you so much. I'm grateful for your message.

Love,
Carina

If other questions arise from this writing, please email
nowstayopen@gmail.com.

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Hi Carina,

feeling a bit under the weather today.. kind of sad too.. I try so hard.. my boyfriend from the middle east (on work assignment from Illinois) .....hasn't written for weeks.. he's busy and doesn't have inet at home..............but gosh, i want to be mad and delete the emails from the last year, .........but i can't nor do I really want to .......... trying to understand others' positions and allow him respect, space, etc..

For me, i am the kind of person who has a few really, really good friends and sometimes i try so hard to build that friendship when others just seem to have acquaintance friends (I guess)......I am frustrated that i try so hard actually, have tried everything... and now i just have to let go ... fine.. why do i spend so much energy on people?.. I bend over backwards in accommodation and now just feel like i put myself in jeopardy and am a bit exhausted and sad ....and somewhat pissed... (i can't expect anything).... just want to get into my own shell and re-group.....what do you think?.. monks-kolson