Sunday, April 1, 2012

Parable of The Cherry Tree



To better understand Transcendental Generosity, consider the wisdom of the cherry tree. The cherry tree is one of the most beautiful and generous trees. In the winter, when her limbs are bare, she does not envy the pine trees their luscious green jackets. She does not rush to adorn herself. She waits; patiently, as the suns rays warm her; patiently, as the rain water nourishes; patiently, as her roots stretch into the earth. She takes her season of cold hibernation in stride and waits. She draws on the elements filling her self with sweetness and strength. She holds her potential within. And then, when the first touch of spring blows through the air, she is ready. She is eager and rested. Her buds are the first to appear and soon she is bursting with delicate white blossoms. She is radiant. But she does not guard her adornments jealously. She does not grasp at them and tell the world that they are for her and her alone. She does not hide them away in fear that others will think they are not beautiful, or that they will think them so beautiful they will steal them away. The gifts are simply a part her. She makes herself ready to give her gifts, should anyone be there to receive them. She is full of joy and vibrant delicacy. She is resplendent in her springtime glory, each sweetly scented blossom bright, delicate and full of life. When the wind blows gently passed her, she allows her petals to go with him. They dance, fluttering, to the ground and the whole world is struck with the beauty. Petals in the grass. Petals in the wind. Petals in the sunlight. Petals in the garden. Petals fall as though every moment is a celebration of some sacred magic. It is a gift to behold, if you are witness. And the gift is the generosity of the cherry tree. She is the source of this joy, which not so long ago was pulsing through her sap, waiting to be manifest.


As if this moment of spring-time bliss is not enough of a blessing, she ripens into summer with yet another gift; the sweet dark cherries that begin to appear on her branches. She fills them with life and makes them abundant. As they ripen, they sweeten, they plump, and then they fall to the ground and become the food to feed the birds and the insects and the squirrels and the people. And never does the cherry tree ask “What will you give to me, if I give you my gift?” Her gift is not an exchange, it is simply a manifestation of her nature. A question we all might consider is “What is my nature and what does it manifest in the world?” When we have answered this, we can begin to better understand why our lives produce the results they produce. If our nature is harsh and demanding we may constantly see people shying away from us. If our nature is gentle and soft, we may find that some will delight in this and love us for it, or that others will see it as a weakness and exploit it. If we are generous with who we are, like the cherry tree, sharing freely, expressing our gifts and making ready for those who would like to share in them, we can find ourselves drawing in just the right people to appreciate who we are. Suddenly life is much easier. We are understood in new ways. We are appreciated in new ways. We are loved in new ways. When we understand that everyone has some basic goodness in them, life becomes a matter of learning to patiently nourish that basic goodness - like the cherry tree in winter - until the conditions are right for them to spring forth. A question we might all consider is “What gifts do I have to give freely and how can I nourish those gifts?”

 
When we begin to see life as an opportunity to give our gifts to others, we   find that suddenly life is full of joy. For there are many ways to give. There are many ways to share. And we find that giving and sharing are incredibly meaningful experiences which add exponentially to feelings of general well-being.

And then what used to be a chore, like washing the dishes, is suddenly an opportunity to give to someone you love. It is an opportunity to make your space more harmonious. It is an opportunity to give someone else a rest from cleaning. And suddenly it is a joy. There is no other way to put it.

Or perhaps it could be put as in a saying I once heard “Service is love made visible.” When I began to use service as a way to make my love visible, it became incredibly rewarding.

To me, the cherry tree makes her love for the world visible in displaying her own nature. In bringing forth her own gifts she manifests love. And this is something we all could do. Anytime. All the time. The opportunities are endless. You just have to be ready to share.

Tuesday, March 27, 2012

A Day in The Life of GAD. Part 1. Waking up.

I wake up in the morning feeling anxious of the day. I am exhausted. My rest was long but unsatisfying. I am too hot or too cold. My throat hurts. I recall a few uncomfortable and depressing dreams. I want to slip back into sleep but not into dreaming. So, I try to clear my mind. It doesn’t work. I lay in bed for another ten minutes hoping I will simply fall back asleep. My mind races. I won’t be falling back into rest. I begin to peer up from the pillow. If I cannot fall back to sleep, I will have to start getting up. I experience dread. But, to be fair, it is never really clear what I am dreading. My laptop sits next to me on my bedside table. The inbox where stressful emails reside calls to me. What new missive will send me spiraling into a sick day? My cellphone gleams at me maniacally. “I have new missed calls!” It proudly announces. “Eight of them. Come check me!”

I sit up and pull my laptop closer. I open the email program and let my eyes skim rapidly over the “from” column. The dread begins to lift. Nothing looks too stressful. I delete the junk mail, skim the rest and sigh. There is nothing to add to my plate today. Good. But there is the phone. And I haven’t checked it.

Missed calls from creditors. I delete them before listening. I know that I can’t pay the bill. I have no income right now.

What else? I wonder. I don’t want to get up out of bed to start the day. It always feels like a timer starts when toes hit the ground. I only have so much time before I start feeling really sick. Usually I have a few hours after I wake up. On a really good day I can feel normal for five or six hours before it hits. On a normal day, I have two or three hours. I don’t want to start the timer. I want to make it to my 7pm meditation session, and that is many many hours away. I procrastinate. I fiddle with my computer. I reply to emails. I peruse my face-book feed. I write. And then I get hungry and finally, regretfully, I pull myself out of bed and start the daily task of foraging for food.

Friday, March 23, 2012

Sick Again and Always

I’ve been sick for the last four or five days. My body is slowly readjusting to life; standing up, walking, eating and holding coherent conversations. I’m starting to feel the glimmering hope that I will be able to get work done soon. That’s when the nausea hits me again. Waves of pain radiate from my stomach, doubling me over in pain. I can’t tell if this is a relapse of the flu I just thought I kicked or if I’m just anxious. Let’s face it. Stomach pains like this are a part of my daily life and they have been for my entire life. 
When I was a toddler my mother started carrying homeopathic sugar pellets in her purse to sooth my little fits. In elementary school, I would get sick on every ride to and from school. In undergrad the stomach pains got so intense and constant that I underwent a battery of tests to see what was wrong. Ulcer? Parasite? The doctors said nothing was wrong with me. Something was. 
Everywhere I went, I would get intense stomach aches. It seemed like a normal part of life, and I just assumed that everyone else was better at sucking it up. 
One of the most difficult aspects of having an anxiety disorder is that you don’t look sick. 
You don’t even seem sick to most people. But you are. 
You can be perfectly fine one moment, and the next you are overcome with headaches, nausea and a strange sensation that I call “static brain” in which every perception seems to have been garbled and distorted before making it to your mind. You can’t think. You can’t act. And usually, you want to start crying. But let’s face it, you are in the middle of class, or trying to check out at the grocery store, or talking to someone you’d like to impress. 
Suddenly, its decision time, and you need to make a choice about how to proceed. But alas, your decision making abilities left with the rest of your mind when the stream of adrenaline, cortisol and god knows what other chemicals started pouring into your brain.  If only those same chemicals weren’t also urging you to action; something - now! 
For me, its usually a quick excuse that I don’t feel well and the nearest exit, but its not always easy. Well, it’s usually not easy. People want to know what’s up. It’s not easy to explain. I am suddenly very sick. I am weak and compromised. My mind is cloudy and full of static. All I want to do is curl up into a ball. But there are social obligations to meet. I want to be sure that everyone else is comfortable with my situation. I want to 
be happy for room. And I really don’t want to drag anyone else down because of my discomfort. I know it happens, and it weighs on me. 
I feel like the man in Kafka’s “The Metamorphosis” who woke up one morning as a giant bug. His family continued to feed and house him, but he could not communicate and he knew they were disgusted and afraid. The tale is meant to capture the horrifying feeling of being, without intent or action, a drain on those you love; someone who cannot pull their own weight; someone who is simply broken. When I am in the depths of an anxiety attack, I feel as though I have transformed as well. It is not my fault that I am suddenly a strange worthless creature - but I am. My abilities leave me and my tongue is tied. I must rely on the kindness of those around me.  
The salient possibilities of getting sick weigh on me. Every time a friend invites me out, or I need to spend the entire weekend at a conference where I will have no hope of escape, or when I need to teach and I worry that it will hit in the middle of lecture. Sometimes it does. And I have a room full of students staring at me, wondering why I suddenly started an awkward jolting speech pattern and dismissed class early. Sometimes, I just don’t go out to start with. There are so many looming possibilities. There is so much room for failure and embarrassment and a really painful bike ride home. 
The beautiful part is that when I do need to rely on the kindness of others - that kindness is there. Vulnerability is a hard lesson to learn, but it brings so many gifts. Sometimes I hide in my room and imagine I am transformed into a strange, useless creature. But sometimes I tell someone I’m sick and they help me and I find that it is not an unpleasant thing at all. I find that they are delighted to offer help and it is a chance for our connection to deepen. Sometimes I make plans and I have to cancel because of a sudden wave exhaustion. But it's OK. There is always a way out. And things go on. Realizing that has made life a lot less stressful and a lot more beautiful. It's just not always easy to remember.