50 Feet to Letting Go

Around Boulder, CO, there is a joke that garages aren’t for cars. We have so many toys – bikes, kayaks, camping gear, and more – that it all goes in the garage, and hence the car remains outside. As a seven year resident of Boulder, I happen to fall into that category where my car has never been in a garage, until recently. My garage would get filled with bikes and some storage, and become a workshop. If I had arranged everything well, I could fit my car in, but it would be tight, and it really wasn’t worth it.

About a year ago I moved into a house that had a huge garage with tons of extra space. Enough that I could store everything AND get my car in! I was thrilled about the idea that in the summer I wouldn’t wake up with a very hot car, and in the winter I wouldn’t have to scrape snow and ice off! That there was still plenty of room for bikes and tools and room to move around.

The garage though was not attached to the house. Between the garage and the house was about a dozen steps and a long walkway, so perhaps 50 feet from the garage to the front door. Upon leaving the garage, either I could walk out the side door where the garage door openers naturally are – or walk out the actual garage door, which was far more convenient. I choose the latter. What this meant was that I could use the garage door opener that was velcroed to the wall in the entry way. That all sounds so convenient and easy.

Yet for most of the first six months I lived in the house, I would very frequently FORGOT to close the garage door when I came into the house. Later on in the evening I’d have a thought – did I close the garage door, and then I’d walk outside to check. Sure enough, it was open. Now I wasn’t worried about stuff being stolen because I was quite far from town and the neighborhood was very safe. I was worried about bears and other critters getting into the garage, so it really was important to close the garage door.

I started reminding myself when I walked out the garage door to close it when I arrived at the front door. Occasionally this worked, meaning maybe a quarter of the time. So the reminders became stronger and stronger. My housemate would also forget so for a while we even had notes in the front to remind us to close the garage door! And finally after about eight months of doing this it became automatic to walk into the house and close the garage door. It actually became so automatic that I would forgot that I even did it, and then would later have a thought – did I close the garage door?

This whole process has been bewildering and bizarre. Between the garage door and the front door, about 50 feet, how could I forget something so simple so often? You know the Buddhist saying – chop wood to chop wood, carry water to carry water. I thought remembering could be that focused. But in that 50 feet I have to concentrate on steps, what I’m carrying, getting out keys for the front door, and ultimately amusement at seeing my dog smiling and wagging her tail as I approached the glass front door. It’s easy to see how I could forgot, but still!  

At the same time I felt great beauty and ease in that forgetting. Letting go of something so easily. It had importance and it didn’t. Like seeing a flower, taking in its beauty and then flowing to the next moment and the beauty there.

For me, it also brought up the question, why it is we can’t forget other things that easily. Like when I’m scared to bits by a lightning strike so close that it shakes the house, or the person who cut me off in the car earlier in the day, or the unjustified comment at work. I can hang on to those for hours, or days, … or longer, as we do. It’s fairly certain that those things have more meaning (meaning we give them) and with that an emotional context, and so the body and mind hang on.

The question is there though – could we learn to let go? Maybe not to forget, but to let go so it doesn’t became a lingering gremlin. Maybe it really is the count to 10 method, or the the idea of just breathe, or any number of similar concepts. It has been a great reminder for me, and maybe now for you.

Just 50 feet … a small distance measured in time or space – to bring our lives into a great ease …

Just 50 feet …

The Bunk of Positive Affirmations

Imagine that you own a home, and after being gone for a few weeks on vacation, you come home to find that several walls have mold growing on them. It doesn’t matter how much, but there’s mold. Would you just grab some paint and paint over that mold?

That’s the analogy to start with for thinking about positive affirmations. Positive affirmations can be just like putting a cover coat over all those negative thoughts or ideas that you continue to have.

If you leave the paint long enough, the paint will wear off and the mold will continue to grow again. You can take it another direction and every year lay over a new coat of paint. But you know what – that mold is STILL there. It’s still growing and affecting the environment and sooner or later it’s going to have a real effect.

You can do the same with positive affirmations. Use them for a while and then forget and the old patterns come back. Or keep practicing and adding new ones. But you know what – those old thoughts are STILL there.  They are still under the surface, and just like instincts, sooner or later they will come back out in a moment of stress or tiredness or pressure.

Let me back up a little – I’ve NOT saying positive affirmations, or any similar behavioral change is not effective or useful. They can be incredibly useful and empowering. What I want to you to understand is that unless you clean up and address the underlying state of affairs – the mold in the paint analogy – the old stuff is still there, and will come back.

What do I mean by underlying state of affairs? I’m talking about beliefs, patterns, values, ideals, promises, rules that you have committed to throughout your life. In all likelihood you have consciously forgotten most of these. They are still part of your memory and your body awareness. Here’s an example – think of that time in third grade when you were embarrassed in front of your classmates and you swore you’d never do anything to look stupid again. Maybe you didn’t say it out loud, but somewhere in your being you said it. And it stuck, it became part of your bodily and cellular makeup.

Now I hate computer analogies, but think of those beliefs or rules, etc., like a virus on your computer. It can be fairly innocuous, but it’s still there. You’d never knowingly leave a virus on your computer. I’m also sure you’d never knowingly keep around a rule for yourself that is like that mold. The clue here is knowingly – you don’t consciously know you are following those rules.

Still, if you are using positive affirmations, you have a desire for your life to be different in some way, even better. The question is, how much does it matter to you? Finding and addressing those rules, promises, values, etc takes courage. Sometimes it’s easy, sometimes it’s hard. And it takes time.

So how do you address those beliefs, ideas, patterns, and more? There are many ways and any deeper discussion is way beyond this article, but here are some techniques, clues and ideas to research and look into. Natural Linguistic Processing (NLP), cellular memory and cellular healing (books: Biology or Belief, and Molecules of Emotion), Somatic Therapies including Hakomi, Cranial Sacral Therapy, The Journey, NeuroSculpting. An especially important idea is Forgiveness (book: Forgive for Good). There are many, many more, but these are the ones I’ve worked with and found to be especially effective.

Working with positive affirmations is good, but he question stands – how much does it really matter to you? The idea of courage, which has roots in the word for heart, is that courage is not the absence of fear, rather the knowing that something is more important (Ambrose Redmoon). What is it that’s important that you are willing to move towards?

The Privileged Language

My first trip overseas to a non-English speaking country was fifteen years ago. I arrived at the Geneva airport for a trip into the Swiss Alps. Now I knew a little about Geneva including that it was an international center for business and politics, and that it sits near both Germany and France. On the airport signs I expected to find a mix of German and French. I was living in Seattle at the time and the Seattle airport had multiple languages on most signs, so I figured this would be true elsewhere. Upon landing and walking through the airport, I was astonished to find that the primary language on almost every sign was English! So maybe this was more of an international city than I had expected.

 

I've since traveled to 6 continents and 20 countries. Amazingly almost every airport I've been to has English on the signs. This includes Peru, India, Nepal, Tanzania, Costa Rica. So Geneva was the center of international commerce, but I truly didn't expect to see English in India, or Nepal, or Tanzania.

 

The same goes for almost every airplane I've been on! The announcements are first spoken in the native language, and then spoken in English as well. I remember on Ethiopian airlines traveling within Africa, English was used for the first set of announcements, then Ethiopian!

 

Alright, so airports are centers where many people traverse through.

 

Now my trips are often into remote areas - the Kilimanjaro area, the inner reaches of Peru, far north Vietnam, the Cambodian templates, the remote trails of the Himalayas. But I've also been to the mountains of France and Switzerland, Chile, and more. So there is a full contrast of areas with minimal modern conveniences with little or no electricity, and areas that are completely modern. Still - most of these places have English on signs! My most recent trip was on the Manaslu Circuit around Mt. Manaslu in Nepal. Every trail marker was in English! Every little village I came to had signs in English! Every menu for the little cafes was in English! In Tanzania, around Mt. Kilimanjaro, the road signs are in English!

 

No matter where I go, I continue to be absolutely amazed at the prevalence of the English language. This includes the signs - AND it includes the number of people who speak some English.

 

English in the primary language in only a handful of countries - mostly English colonies at one point or another. The United Kingdom, United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand. That means about 5-7% of the world population has English as a primary language. And still another 25-30% of the world can speak English. English isn't an old language, modern English is only several hundred years old, and still it's one of the newer languages spoken.

 

There's no doubt the financial and political influence of the U.S. and English speaking countries is immense, and still I'm amazed.

 

Living in the U.S. and being an American truly is a privilege. I hope those of us who speak English never forgot or misuse that privilege.

 

About Me

The profile are of Blogger offers limited space, so here is an introduction ...

Among the many roles he plays in this life include software developer, bodyworker, athlete, yogi, and writer. He is a seer, believer, visionary, connector, healer, and artist of life. Sitting at the crossroads of the breadth and advances of science, timeless wisdom, modern technology, extreme athletics, progressive thought, and energetic health he discovers new connections and relationships while questioning it all. He regularly explores edges and perceived limits. A spirited agent provocateur graced with a foundation of deep stillness, an unshakeable peace, and a fierce passion for life; an everyday warrior guided by integrity and heart and soul who relishes the immersion in this epoch, feeling both the intensity of centuries of devastating heartaches and inspiring joys. A being developed on courageously meeting his own struggles, pains, fears, insecurities; the insight of dozens of teachers and guides; and decades of being human. He believes in the vibrancy of every being; and our ability to harness our common desire to live in a beautiful world to shift towards that dream. He lives on the principles of Service, Presence, Truth, Love, and Devotion with a whole lot of Faith thrown in.

Here are a few other posts about me and this blog!

More of my life experiences.
http://fiercewolfspeaks.blogspot.com/2012/02/more-introductions.html

Why do I write this blog!
http://fiercewolfspeaks.blogspot.com/2012/01/why.html

More about fierce and what it means to me.
http://fiercewolfspeaks.blogspot.com/2012/01/fierce.html

Questions are the Answers

During the second session of a Coaches Training Program I recently began, we held a discussion about what it means to be a coach. The leader of the training put forth the idea that coaches are guides or facilitators, and that their primary tools are to ask questions to help the client discover their own wisdom and reveal what they know to be the best answers for themselves. While I’ve never formally coached anyone, when I talk with friends and they express something they want to change, my curiosity tends to lead and what comes forth is lot of questions. I innately know this idea and wholeheartedly resonate with the idea and approach.

As happens, this idea started to have analogies elsewhere in my life as well. That is whatever I’m doing I am a ‘coach’ just helping the activity ‘answer’ itself and find its own way! It is a rather fascinating way to approach life!

Let me start with something like cooking. First there’s the question of what do I want to eat? My body knows and so I listen to some possibilities. Open the fridge and ask, what’s in the fridge? Followed by what would go well together? Soon the meal starts to develop on its own. When it comes to spices, it’s the same – open the spice cabinet and just ask, what would be good on dinner? Most of the time I am pleasantly surprised by what the result is! And without opening a cookbook, or having to think at all.

“Have patience with everything that remains unsolved in your heart. Try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books written in a foreign language. Do not now look for the answers. They cannot now be given to you because you could not live them. It is a question of experiencing everything. At present you need to live the question. Perhaps you will gradually, without even noticing it, find yourself experiencing the answer, some distant day.” ~ Rainer Maria Rilke

Considering the more personal side of self-discovery and self-growth, it is very similar. It is a plethora of questions. Sometimes the answers pop up quickly, sometimes they are incredibly clear. Other questions require time, to let the question stew and gather experiences before there is a semblance of articulation. There are times when writing helps as well. Really though what is revealed is revealed on its own, not by thinking.

Even in my career where I write software, the process is nearly identical. Our team is presented with an idea, something that needs to be written to support our products. We all begin with questions – what does it really need to do, what kind of performance is needed, how soon does it need to be finished? These do require input. Once we begin the coding it becomes a different kind of question – how do I write code, create a solution that implements the desired result. For any problem there are dozens (hundreds?, thousands?) or ways to get to the result. Most of the time, just asking the question of what the result needs to be begins the process of getting to answer. Then my fingers start to fly over the keyboard, my mouse moves across the screen – and then it begins. The code writes itself! Not entirely, but there is a large degree of truth to this.

The answers don't always come quickly, and they don't always appear as I would expect, nor are the answers themselves what I would expect - but with patience and faith, they do arrive.

Does this sound familiar? If so, great – see if you can engender this trust in the answers to reveal themselves!

If this sounds way out there – give it a try! Just ask the questions – and open up to answers. You actually probably do this and don’t realize it. When you go to a restaurant and you’re handed a menu, we scan the menu – what do I want to eat. Something usually pops out. It’s the same – let the answer pop out!