Reflections on a Mother...

After a rather poignant moment at Christmas, when my mother squeezed my hand after we hugged good-bye, an unheard language was transmitted through the hands: Love – something not easily expressed between us - and I had these reflections…

I wish I could have had a different relationship with my mother – more open, authentic, and loving…  I feel sad that it couldn't have been different.  Because of our personalities and the dynamic in the relationship from the beginning – an unseen dynamic unfolded between the two of us; which has now softened as she becomes more fragile.  She is losing more and more of her vision, her abilities and faculties.  There is less cognizant ability to understand what is being asked of her.  Her brain cannot handle too much information or stimulation.  But maybe love is emerging…  Maybe that is what is left when the body-mind mechanism begins to fail…

She covers it well, talking mostly in clichés – turning the personality on – speaking from the face – the mask.  But don’t ask her what she had for breakfast, or what she did yesterday, or what the doctor told her – it will scatter and scramble her brain.  And she will hide from you…  and turn the conversation back to you and ask:  And how are YOU doing? – just to avoid the difficulty of holding a conversation…

Sometimes she gets frustrated and angry because she is losing her abilities.  I feel the frustration too, as well as sadness and compassion for her fragility, vulnerability and woundedness – and the relationship we never had, but which now seems to be emerging in an unexpected way.  There is a softness between us now – sometimes - a caring, a loosening of defense mechanisms that served to protect each other from each other - sometimes.

And now in her “failing” years I wish it could have been different – that I could have been more present and more open to her, to not have closed off my own heart, but to have really seen the illumined heart of love that was really there, in both of us, behind the dynamic without the mask that veiled that Love.  I know that when she dies I will grieve that, and the relationship we never had – and maybe even the one we lost – and the one we might have had. 

In some ways my heart has already started to grieve the love we missed: a  genuinely loving mother-daughter connection; and yet it is not over…   Maybe, just maybe, our hearts will open to each other.  It seems they are beginning to...

Photo:
 a picture of my sister-in-law’s and mother-in-law’s hands…
My mother-in-law is in a Nursing Home with Alzheimer’s,
and yet there is still a “connection” through touch…

I made comment to my sister-in-law that it was interesting that
in some cases we can’t really connect with our mothers
until they are fragile and vulnerable,
and become like children again…

Blessings to Mothers and Daughters

Christmas Cheer!

My 87 year old mother seeing her son
for the first time in 6 years

Via FaceTime on cell phone

It was a poignant moment...

 Joy, Laughter and Tears…

with Dad looking on from "on high"... 

My sister playing with her cat "Shadow"
in the bag

A special visit from “Biscuit” the deer
at the door, waiting for a hand-out – literally J
She is hand fed through the door…

   

A Merry time was had by all...

Just a little peek into my world... 

"Holi"-day Wishes...

Whatever your Holiday tradition is -

May the Mystery and Wonder

 of
Existence ItSelf…

fill
 you with
 Light
 Love,
and
new

Joys
of the Heart

~

Peace and Blessings to All…

Mystic Meandering

Solstice - Shimmer of Light...

We are the Grace of Love fulfilled,
the shimmer of Sacred Light,
lustrous uniqueness in a field of
multitudinal Divine Shimmers
in glittering oneness…

We are the twinkle of liberated luminosity
radiating from the Heart pulse of the
Divine Mystery…
We are created and create from
the glowing embers
of the furnace
of
Love’s
Fire

Touch the Holiness of the Solstice,
its symbolism,
upon which all the other
”holi-days” are based;
the real reason for the Season:
the symbolic return of The Light…

Let it awaken you to your Inner Brilliance,

Your Divine Nature,
Your Shimmer of Light…

Mystic Meandering

for Winter Solstice 2015

To Touch "The Divine"...

To touch “The Divine” imbues
a quiet stillness of being;
feeling the pulse of energy

coursing through your body,

feeling yourself in the
 formless field of Silent Aware Beingness,
feeling the Living Presence hum through every cell,

being absorbed in Its Rhythm of Silence;
and feeling the body respond
to ITs Touch…

To touch “The Divine” ~
not an entity - as such,
not a “god” or “deity” – as such
but a formless field of energy
that we float through
and that floats through us,
brings a harmonious wholeness
in reciprocal
 oneness

To touch “The Divine” in the
 Great Silence
is complete rest,
complete release,
complete equanimity,
surrendered wholly to
”the Divine”

Not a surrendering – as such,
only allowing oneself to be
Touched;
to feel the
The intimate Touch of

 “The Divine”

 within ~

It can’t even be called “Love” – as such
It is way beyond “Love” - as we know it...
It is a sublime energy,
a deep stillness
that cannot be
described,

 or named
by words

Only felt,
experienced,
in the body,
in the energy field
and substance of the body,
through direct awareness…

And all one can do is breathe
and say thank you~
Thank you for the Mystery of
this wondrous, ineffable
  Divine Touch

Mystic Meandering
Meditative Writings
Dec. 15, 2015

Rest in the Great Heart...

Rest in the Great Heart – and wait…
Entrust yourself to
the Heart of the Great Mystery ~
The Ineffable Mystery
That which infuses all life
with the greatest Mystery~
Existence…

Let yourself be held by the
rhythm of the Cosmos
Let it
take you ~ carry you
in its music

Be absorbed in its rhythmic
fluidity of Silent Awareness
beyond time and space…

And be still

Embrace your Fear
and allow ~
The “answers” will be revealed
in their own time
by the movement of
the Universe -
the movement of Life ItSelf ~ within you…

Rest in the Great Heart of the Mystery…

Trust…

All is held in place by
the Great, ever-lasting
Mystery of Existence
like the stars suspended in space…

Let go
 into The Mystery
the Unknown…

Be absorbed in it – by it
Dissolve in it…

Experience
the “energetic rhythm”
of the Great Heart
that never
ceases
to
BE

Mystic Meandering
Meditative Writings
Dec. 10, 2015

Take a Lesson from the Cosmos...

Take a lesson from the Universe, learn from the ways of the Cosmos.  If you look at it, really see it, it’s all about ever-expanding Awareness.  There’s no “closure”, no convergent anything.  It’s all divergent, synchronous energy, ever-expanding, ever aware.  It’s an organic energy that wants to be expressed.  What’s in us is the same energy of the Universe that wants to be expressed.  All we need do is – become aware - of the energy of Awareness that IS the Universe/Cosmos, in us…

There is Dissonance *and* Harmony.  The synthesis of Dissonance and Harmony creates the experience, not static energy, not either/or concepts.  The totality of the experience *includes* both –  duality and non-duality, sadness and joy, light and dark.  They are just energetic experiences.  Essentially they are one movement, one rhythm, functioning synchronistically.

My husband J

Photo - Moon, Jupiter and Venus June/July 2015

"No More!"...

I heard a voice of a young child as I was waking from sleep yesterday morning.  It yelled “No More!”  The voice came from *inside* - How strange I thought.  I wondered if this was a message for me, or, if it was me screaming from the inside – “No More!” – enduring a particularly stressful time at this moment in life. Or was it my inner psyche calling out to a world gone mad; witnessing a species apparently turning against itself, apparently trying to destroy itself in so many different ways – or so it seems.  And the rest of us – onlookers – enduring the dance of darkness that plays itself out – forced to face the darkness within and without.  I pondered this all day, turning my awareness inward to the fear inside – repeating the phrase internally – “No More!”  At the end of the day’s reflection was the sense that sometimes all we can do is endure the way life is – day to day.  And I wondered why - why that is true, why is it that we must “endure” such pain, such suffering, both within and without…  But there was no answer….

 Maybe the voice was from a dream I didn’t realize I was having.  And maybe that really is what life is – a dream we don’t realize we’re having – that we must endure for as long as the dream lasts, until we are awakened from the dream by a voice saying “No More!”…  I don’t know…  I cannot presume to know anything anymore…

~

Below is a “poem” I wrote from my meditative writings
sometime between 2004 and 2006 that gives a
different perspective.

Entropy

The shadows have come to roost

and

 *everything*

 is

 collapsing

~

~

~

~

The tides and ripples of entropy will continue

until all is returned to Source again ~

the Primordial State:

Pure Life Energy…

Entropy is not necessarily a bad thing.

It is the way of Existence.

It is a

T

E

L

E

S

C

O

P

I

N

G

 of everything that is,

back to its original Source/State;

a re-homing of all that was created in form,

the conceptual structures,

so that only

the Eternal

Essence

 remains

Do not be alarmed by the seeming destruction

of what you have *believed* to be real.

The false must be released, shed – like dross.

In this there is a sense of chaos, destruction, loss, and death;

the crucible affect;

a state of alchemy,

the refinement of all things in existence

to its Original Nature.

Nothing is lost in the process.

All is coming Home.

The

Divine

 Outbreath

Has

 Been

 Re-called.

Bring your awareness to the place of Stillness within.

Don’t try to create order in the chaos.

But be still and let the chaos pass.

”Order” is found in the Stillness,

in returning to deep Stillness

The healing of mankind

is

 in

 the

 *recognition*

 Of

 The

 Truth

 of its Eternal Essence -

Infinite Beingness…

Entropy is the crucible of that healing…

Allow it…

~

The invitation

 is to expand our view of reality

and return to the *awareness* of

our Eternal Being…

Mystic Meandering

taken from my

Meditative Writings

written between

 2004 and 2006

The Portal of Wholeness - Matt Licata

At times, you may be asked to travel into the very groundless and contradictory landscape of the emotional world, without any understanding of what is being asked of you.  It is so open here, but simultaneously disorienting to the mind that is longing for answers.  It is as if everything you were so sure about only days before has fallen away…

Unmetabolized feelings, orphaned sensations, and vivid images are surging in the somatic field, seeming disconnected and…..chaotic.  But things are not always as they seem as you approach the threshold of wholeness. The invitation has been made: trust in the process of disintegration and the intelligence of immediate experience.

Yes, it may always be disturbing to stay embodied to the burning feelings and sensations that appear alongside the dissolution of old dreams and the way you thought it was all going to turn out.  But in the commitment to meet what is appearing with presence, you may discover that this destruction is sacred, unbearably creative, and soaked with reorganizing wisdom.

Before you turn from the confusion and scramble to transform or heal it with learned process, open into the uncertainty, the hopelessness, and the breaking of your heart.  It is there you will find life, longing to erupt and shatter the dream of partiality [fragmentation].  For each visitor of the inner and outer worlds is unfolding in the radiant [moment] as an unprecedented portal of wholeness…

Matt Licata

~

Photo - reflection of the sky on the hood of a car
Photo upside down :)