Fishpond Thoughts

Downpours of doubt....drenching me...weatherman says that there will be deluges of delusion. My ego's eaves will fill with leaves...my gutters will be clogged with care and I have lost the phone numbers of old handymen.

I sit on my couch quite alone, listening to the rain within my soul. My head is a tin roof. I begin to listen to the melody. The more I listen the quieter it gets. It becomes an adagio of thought, tempo going slower. My thoughts are slowing down.

Someone asked me exactly this, "What did your teacher teach and what did you learn?" He taught the difference between the True Self and the False Self. I learned to discern the difference between the two.

Having said that, what is left to say? There is energy to feel, wisdom to ponder, gratitude to express but little else.

Days come when the heavens seem to close their shutters and go on a celestial vacation. As if the stars packed up and moved to another galaxy, leaving just dark sky.

Well, then, what business is this exactly? Is it the business of making people happy, of granting their every wish? I don't think so. He raised the dead and healed the sick. I'm not sure that He cancelled school to give us a day off from our earthly lessons.

Maybe the sky is a giant blackboard and God is writing on it. Maybe He writes on our hearts as well.

Maybe He is saying this. "I am teaching and you are learning. When you have learned, go teach. When you teach you will learn."

Love is the lesson and the textbooks are scattered randomly. Good luck and God bless.

Some days I am quite sure that I have learned God's Lesson of Love well. I look within and see peace in my heart. Other days the reverse is true. I look without and do without His Guidance. I skip school. But God doesn't mind. He knows that I am His and that I will return to class as soon as I am a bit rested.

Once God gave me a rainbow and whispered that He would be with me always. I wasn't mad because the rainbow faded away. That is the way of rainbows. The promise behind it is different, however. It is eternal. That is what I learned from God.

When one is suffering, it is always good to look to the imperturbable and unfathomable. At least I think so. Swami Z is a good source of consternation for the mind as well. I plan on having a consult with him as soon as he gets up from his nap.

This Fishpond page is somewhat of a mystery and a grab bag at this point. Wander around if you are feeling antsy or bored. Knock on Swami's door. The last time I looked in on him, he was sawing logs. He is probably dreaming about the days before we met, when I didn't go around quoting him and wiping the crumbs off of his chin.

Swami and I should be studying cosmic issues, but sometimes I just chase him around the kitchen and demand that he put the pimentoes back in the olives. If you think that he is crazy and I should take him off of my website, you would be correct.

I asked him if he knew that his http could become kaput at any time. He said that he did and he would eat it before the expiration date. That I can believe. He is eating me out of house and home. If he had anything to do with it, he would eat the old carp...and that would be a shame. Swami Z

"Wisdom and foolishness
are practically the same.
Both are indifferent
to the opinions of the world."

"Don't ever force an event, big or small. Stay tuned to the subtle energies of a situation and believe that you are being guided because you are."

"When you force something towards an end you produce the contrary." Silo, The Look Within

With most of us, forcing is something that is part of our behavior patterns. We know that force is self-defeating and yet we continue to do it. Since we cannot force ourselves to change through violence, what can we do that will effect change?

When you can answer this question you will have no further need to ask it. The conundrum will have vanished, the puzzle will have solved itself and peace will reign. It has something to do with the reconciliation of the opposites....the reason that we are doing spiritual work.

I have been down in the watery darkness lately and it is about time that I came up. Like a sponge diver encased in heavy metal, I rise tentatively to the surface of my consciousness, careful not to get the bends.

I fling myself into the boat and laboriously take off my diving helmet and thick gloves. Let's see...what did I bring to the surface? Looks like a tangled mess of barnacled memories, for one thing. Did you ever think that sorrow would pale out into a single sigh of regret....or that remorse would become just so much blue-green sea glass?

Golden strands of guilt come to the surface covered in a slimy green. One strand is about my mother and many more are about me and my different roles in life. I never was a very good liar; instead I preferred to have just a few good friends who would put up with my staunch truth-telling.

There are little shells of self-concern that are of no earthly use to me now. At one time I thought they mattered but I was wrong. Did you ever see self-concern under the strong sunlight? It is not a pretty sight. Seaweed covers the surrendered moments and I hardly remember how hard it was to let them happen.

If anyone out there has been mind-diving lately, you will know how hard a job it is. I would not advise doing it unless you have time enough to lie in the warm sun for a little while. Let the boat bob on the waters while you consider what you gained by such a thing. I like to think it was worth the effort. For one thing, I discovered that nothing I retrieved was real.

Right now I am sitting at my computer wondering what it is going to say or do next. That doesn't make any sense, but neither do my random, compulsive movements to find grace and structure inside the mind.

Suffering can be decanted into the silence without spilling a drop. The water of suffering is changed into the wine of acceptance....but how? That we shall never know. I pour myself gently into the invisible, giving myself permission to watch the process.

At some point, I have poured myself into the void, into the absolute. I am now better able to see the liquid sorrow of my soul, as it shimmers in front of me. That is the secret--that my sorrow be kept in front of me. As soon as I turn my back on it, I begin to suffer all over again.

I am the vessel holding all that I am. My life is littered with mistakes, miscues and downright sorrow. Isn't that the stuff of transformation? If it isn't, I don't know what is.

The tao belongs to me, just as I belong to tao. In Irina Tweedie's book, Daughter of Fire, her teacher told her that he "flowed as directed." Her teacher, Bhai Sahib, was not a man ignorant of tao and he employed it to the uttermost. He forced Mrs. Tweedie into a silence so severe that it proved to be awakening for her. In her words, "I hoped to get instructions in Yoga, expected wonderful teachings, but what the Teacher did was mainly to force me to face the darkness within myself, and it almost killed me."

Being in tao is my birthright and I have traded it for a mess of thoughts centered around an illusory self. That is what keeps me in hot water. Patti Page had a popular song in the fifties called, "You Belong to Me." We belong to tao but we are not very faithful lovers. In fact, we spend our days and nights dodging tao even though we know better. Gurdjieff taught that "man cannot do." And do not disagree with this until you have spent umpteen years on the big blue marble seeing that indeed, "I of mine own self can do nothing." This is esoteric Christianity, tao, or good common sense. Call it what you like. I call it truth.

Westerners love to take the bull by the horns. Our schooling browbeats us into submission to this idea and we wonder why we are so miserable. Tom Robbins in one of his novels speaks of "a white turnip of a Sunday," and I love that expression.

Who of us hasn't sat on his couch wishing that Sunday would somehow self-implode? Sunday is not the problem, of course. "In a society that is essentially designed to organize, direct, and gratify mass impulses," to quote Robbins once again, "what is there to minister to the silent zones of man as an individual?"

Mrs. Tweedie travelled all the way to India to study with a stern Sufi master who was able to dredge up all of her self-defeating angers and depressions. Sunday afternoon itself can do that if you are serious about investigating the myth of "I can make myself happy."

So what does tao have to do with all of this? Nothing. Nothing is what we really need, want and are. We truly want to sink into Sunday and let it roll right over us wihout so much as a murmur.

No inner dialog screaming at us to wash the windows, reorganize your desk or go to the mall. We would be able to throw out the gift catalogs, sale flyers and just be.

Being is a popular concept that no one bothers to try. It will lead you directly to the root of your suffering before it begins to cure it, though. Better be serious about sticking with being, for it has a lot of passive work to do within your pyche. And it's no fun.

Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee, a student of Irina Tweedie's, has this to say, "...the essence of the mystical path is to be empty, merged into emptiness. In this state of merging, knowledge comes when it is needed." (The Face Before I was Born, Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee)

I am a lazy person physically; yet I will leave no stone unturned in the search for truth. Good thing that I am speaking metaphorically or I would throw my back out.

The tao is for those of us who desire truth more than anything else. It is the principle of non-resistance. It is the tao that sets us free from irritablility, depression and sundry other states of yuckiness.

Now I know that yuckiness is not a word, but it is a definite feeling. Teachers say that they do nothing but sit by the river selling river water. There are innumerable texts so dry that a drink of water from tao would quench a thousand thirsts, yet we prefer reading to drinking.

My own path has contained years and years of sufferings brought on by my daughter's death from cancer and my husband's long fight against it. I have clung to tao and clung to myself and believe me, the latter state is the worst.

Some days it is all I can do to betake myself to the waters of tao and sit there for a brief period of time. It always helps. I take comfort in those who have gone before me and endured the darkness until it turned to light. That is the way of tao.

We got out in the cold, rainy weather and tried to find Bob a hat and a few presents for people on our list. This reminds me of something I read in Nine-Headed Dragon River by Peter Matthiessen. "Rude weather, he ( Harada Roshi) felt, lent itself nicely to introspection and the deep study of the universe in the pit of one's own belly" that would eventually lead to letting the self go."

Our inner climate is usually not exactly seventy degrees Fahrenheit, of course. There are inner monsoons and locust plagues going on all of the time in our emotional lives. I am no exception to this and cannot fathom those who claim otherwise. Perhaps they have discovered Shangri-la, but I doubt it.

When we were at the research facility for Bob's appointment, I couldn't help but notice how dreary it was. There was a lack of cheerful colors and art and an abundance of patients who had been waiting too long. I told Bob that one had to be pretty darned strong to be a cancer patient, what with the hours and hours of waiting they have to do. It is an endurance contest of sorts that puts one out of sorts.

Perhaps this has nothing to do with waking up, but I rather think that it does. First of all, I have been asleep all this week, feeling irritable and under pressure. I have given my caregiving duties second place to Christmas shopping and that has accomplished nothing. Since I had a teacher who blasted the ego with full force, he would do nothing but snort at my pitiable condition.

Living a spiritual life requires a lot of admitting that one is not living a spiritual life. Matthiessen says this of Dogen, "Having met with his own Buddha-nature, Dogen seems to have become less judgmental, less demanding. Asked what he had learned abroad, he said, "Not much except a tender spirit."

The tender spirit can only be a witness to what is not tender, is yet insensitive and hypocritical. When I catch myself wondering what these ancient zen masters have to do with me, I am just being tough on myself once again. Buddha-nature knows this.

Who can run reality? When we remember that our thinking mind is about to drain our energy again, we are refreshed by the splash of surrender. It is always different than we think it will be. Go ahead. Jump into the old pond of your original nature. Go deep.

Inside out, upside down, behind, between, beneath the seen, I have searched for God.

On a little grave marker are these words, "Christ in you the hope of glory." When our daughter was dying, those words had come to me unbidden, so on the marker they went. This fall I stood by her grave again. I was much older and yet I have not learned much that is new, for the truth is ancient and lies within.

This Christ within is real, however; I have learned that. Unfortunately, it is neither automatic nor provable. I recognize when my life is pliant and light; when it is dappled with grace and healing. The Christ-fish flits in the waters of my soul.

I sometimes sit with sorrow and fight it mightily, using thoughts as if they were potent things, but they are not. Then anger arises and I try to stop it from happening. But beneath the anger, the tears are forming and suddenly I find myself weeping at her grave again.

She is not dead; she is risen, but so am I, so am I. My mind will never appreciate this fact, for it deals in death and desertion, doesn't it? You know it does. You know your loneliness haunts you. So does mine.

Perhaps when we have let go of all that we hold dear, we will come to a place of mysterious clarity, an evanescent acceptance. In the meantime, I like to talk about where I am and how the fish are biting. Small talk.....just small talk.

We are dappled in sunlight, swimming beneath the surface of our ego-laden selves. We are elegant, beautiful fishes offering ourselves as food to the fisherman.

The moment before we die into our being is breathless and...unnoticed. I look back on when I have been hooked and caught by Love and know that it was death and rebirth of a small sort.

Agonies of weariness, thrashing about in the murky waters, having at last taken the bait. Stilled by the tiredness and the deep knowing that we are not meant to survive...that we are meant to be food.

I have been on the hook for some time now, caught by life and death throes. My beauty is not in evading the hook but in succumbing to the bait. The fisherman's boat is very close at times and yet I do not surrender without a fight. The fight is involuntary, of course. All we do is involuntary when we think we know what is best for us.

I should keep writing if I do nothing else. These words are written in blood and scratched onto a canvas. It is time for me to take a razor and rip the canvas...to honor the whistling wind of the void. To speak the truth laid bare.

I had gotten an urge to speak about my experiences and had asked God to find a small group for me to speak to. Yet I am an introvert with much panic and fatigue on the personal level. I cannot follow through on such an endeavor. I am too busy coming to terms with a husband who has a rare and fatal cancer. He and I have been together for many years; I am not young.

In the midst of this harrowing life, I am here and I have the power to stand up and roar like a lion. My life is not about speaking to anyone other than to myself. If you feel something true in what I write, it is only your power resonating to mine. It is the power of true being....

When I sat down to write this piece (it is very early in the morning), I had no idea what words would come tumbling out, and I don't need to know. I am in pain and I am a lion. As long as I am true to this energy, I cannot fail.

These are bold words coming from a wimp like me. But you see, my life is as thin and flimsy as tissue anyway and it yields me no real comfort. I have taken a certain image and played it out well. I am courteous, self-effacing and weak. NO. That is the picture scratched onto the canvas. I am the wind itself.

I will read this piece later in the day and regret having written it. That, too, is familiar ground. It is worthless self-criticism. We all speak drivel most of the time; I am no different than anyone else. Behind the words is truth. Behind the truth is the void. It is time that I begin to honor the energy of spontaneity in a meaningful way. God help me, but I think I am on the right track.

I am standing on the seashore, using a long stick to write things in the sand. I am listing the causes of all my sufferings, scribbling into tiny coquinas and bits of seaweed. The only thing wrong with this is that with high tide, all of the excuses will be washed away. Not only that, but I am tired.

I sit down on a beach towel and wipe my face. The sun is glorious and I am opening to it like a flower. My scalp feels the heat and my veins dilate. The gulls flying over acknowledge me as just another part of the all. A small boat bobs and I find myself relaxing.

The tide is indeed coming in and my excuses are going out. It would be the same way with a list of all of the things for which I am grateful. The causes of outer joy would also be pulled out to dissolution. I wonder how many sand dollars lie perfect beneath all of this white sand?

The beach is swept clean of most of its debris and I have to stand up and move my towel. When the tide comes in again, will it bring all of my joys and sorrows back?

How can I say that I understand? I don't know whether I do or not. Some days there is a clear light coming from behind my words that illumines them as they fall from my mouth.

How can I say that I don't understand? In some hours of unendurable pain I have grasped the key to my heart and found it already open.

This talk of who knows and who doesn't know is not fit to feed the birds. They would know which was the real thing and leave the rest alone.

How can we say that we are not as smart as the angels in heaven? Sometimes we unerringly speak or write what saves another's day. And then again, how can we say that we are better than the animals that we eat and ride. For often they minister to us under our heavy load. We just don't know.

Not knowing is the way to God's grace. Undoubtedly, the mind seeks to know and never frees itself of its own pain. Knowing sounds good and we pursue it doggedly. We quote from those who know and from those who claim to know. We paraphrase until we drop. Who cares? Who indeed is there inside of this small self that has ever cared about anything but itself. But something does. The mystery cares.

Intellectualizing truth is the way to hell and heaven is nowhere in sight. We have good intentions that miss the mark. However, way down deep something is keeping score and when we hit fifty-one per cent, it says, "ah, there's hope." So we stumble on.

I never know what constitutes a good day anymore. I used to try and create one and sometimes it worked and at other times it didn't. Ultimately, good days and bad days happen and we are there to receive them. Something in us knows this.

Mystery is God's way of keeping things sorted out. Just when you think you can’t put another trouble on your shelf, you find that you can. Not only that, they have all disappeared. If you can accept mystery, you are halfway home. The light in the window is one you put there yourself.

As I get closer to home, I begin to feel better. I can smell the aroma of coffee brewing and bread baking in the oven. It is always worth the trip.

I stood at the edge of my life, wanting to fly and yet fearing to take off. After all, I was not exactly a fledgling. I looked up at the bold blue sky and wished I was that clear and free. Looking down, I saw my birdie feet encased in tennis shoes. I sighed. What's the use?

An eagle alit on a green pine tree and sat majestically. "Show me what you've got," he said (I imagined this to be what he said.)

"You know," he went on, "...tell me what you've got that is holding you down. I have to take the change out of my pockets and put it on the bureau or I will be too heavy to fly." He winked at me with great solemnity, if such a thing is possible.

"And my wife.....you don't want to know. She has to leave her pocketbook at home or it will get hooked on a limb when she least expects it. What have you got that's too heavy to make the trip?"

That was easy. "My heart," I told him....it's leaden. I looked down at my feet in their ridiculous shoes, for it felt like my heart had sunk that low.

"Nope, that's not it," he said emphatically. "Your heart is precisely what gets you aloft once you have left everything too heavy behind. Think again. Once I, too, had a heavy heart, but turns out it was all in my head." He chuckled in a very dignified way.

I looked at this eagle more closely. He was missing one foot. So he had had his own share of troubles and challenges.

"How can you say that you don't know. After all, that is very important, isn't it?"

"It is important only when I am on the ground...and then I remind myself that I am born to fly."

Lest this sounds like a cliche to you, I just made it up, so I would hardly call it that. Call it a waking dream. But I feel the lift of his wings.

I am familiar with pain and grief to the extent that I have made friends with them much of the time. I sit around the inner campfire listening to them howl. I poke the stick into the flames and warm myself by the moonlight. It is cold.

I do not make trips to the other world as often as I do to Walgreen's; yet I have picked up its scent all around me. It's skirts brush past me as I think my way through my daily pain. When they do, I beat the drum of awareness and finger the totem of my spirit. Aiee aia...

Giving voice to my spirit and to the world seem to help me in my journey. I go on vision quests where I sit in the silence and summon courage. It approaches me as a beautiful wolf and lights on my shoulder like a young hawk.

Trees surround the forest of my suffering and singing birds call down to me from high branches. I cock my head and let a tear fall down my cheek in answer. The dirt under my bare feet feels silken and my courage is felt to be merely hidden somewhere in my flowing veins.

I allow the voices of the world to come to me and all I do is listen. I let them have their way with me. I will have my turn. When I do, the outer voices are stilled and lose their power. The Great Spirit is with me and within me.

To know the ways of the world and of the spirit is to live in both. I could be wrong, but I think I have picked up the scent of both man and God. I walk carefully so as not to disturb the forest of illusion.

You may occasionally see Swami Z at the old pond. After all, he is a kerplop in my life. He happens. The first time he came to me as a character he was grossly exaggerated. I caught no nuances. He has been hanging around my heart like a piece of golden jewelry for quite some time now. You always hear that books have a life of their own and that some characters change and the authors must go where they lead, intention be damned. That is how it is with Swami.

From the beginning he got me up at night. He forced me to go to the computer and write about him. It was like giving birth to an energy that was overwhelming. I would say it was the color of orange and I am green and blue. But I always let him do what he wanted to do.

At first, we just ragged on each other and I let him get to me. But now this little person is growing me as fast as he can. Last night he made me get up and write the piece posted below. (It is also on his page). I know now that he is far wiser than I could ever be. So I follow him around in hopes of learning a little. How's that for full-blown insanity!

I have been chasing Swami around with my mental butterfly net for far too long. He is achingly beautiful and I do what I can to capture him so that I can get a closer look. You are saying, "What do you mean...achingly beautiful. Are you referring to his skinny ankles or one of his sparse hairs?" Of course not.

Swami's beauty arises from somewhere that I have never been. It is as much a scent as anything. It causes me to stop and look at him from the corner of my heart. He may be standing at the kitchen counter mixing dough or just sitting quietly in front of the fire. He knows that he does this to me and he laughs.

"Swami," I said, "why is it that you aggravate me and activate my heart chakra at the same time?"

"Never question love," he shot back, almost angrily. As if to stress his meaning, he spun around and looked at me full in the face. I looked back and the spell was broken. Now I saw what he meant. Something had evaporated and it wasn't vanilla. It was....an imperceptible movement between us. I had done this...had broken a delicate cobweb spun of faith. Dagnabbit.

I put the kettle on and sat waiting for it to whistle. Swami took off his apron and washed his hands. He came over to me and took both of my hands in his. He turned them palms up and kissed each one. I wondered. This was not in Swami's usual repertoire.

"In both natural space and time, perhaps the most difficult of all tasks is to find and know the living centers."

From a far place we come to mend that which is asunder.
White butterfly speaks with old man toad,
Pleasant it has become again for the deep-water people.

The diving is a dirty job yet it feels salutary when we finally get around to doing it. We may know that in theory we are suffering from unexamined egotism and that it needs to be dredged up from the ocean floor. But we put it off. We raid the pantry and call people to chat about nonessential, imaginary things. We hang up drained. Better that we take a long, hard look at what is keeping us from living a more vital life.

My husband's illness keeps me busy and I often use this as an excuse to put off real inner work. Today we sat and discussed a dangerous topic...death. We dove into the depths of death and came up ready to discuss it for a good two or three minutes. There is not much to say that we don't already know; but there is a great need to bring this subject from the depths to the surface. That way we make it ours and what is ours can be examined.

I honestly don't remember what we said because there is yet too much unconsciousness around the subject. Have you noticed that the bigger and more important something is, the more you fall into a state of spiritual sleep?

We should not fear to see the depths and underbelly of the ego. The descent into what never was can be made bearable only by what eternally is.

This is how it goes in the spiritual life. Listen carefully. It doesn't. This is just my opinion, but I think that all of life is suffering, just as the Buddha taught. What lies beyond my attempts to escape, avoid or eliminate suffering is unknown to my ego. Thank God. Would you want an answer that could be trampled on by the swine of your own mind?

I have many thoughts of the swinish variety, as do we all. My spirit knows better than to cast its pearls before them. They would oink all the way to the sty about how spiritual I am, etc. Hogs eat slop, period. Fine dining is beyond their appreciation. The mind has its uses, of course. It just can't lay up for itself answers that require surrender, silence and self-removal. Something else has to do that.

Last night I had a strange and moving dream. I was at a children's hospital with my daughter, who was being treated for cancer. A nurse said to me that I looked dry around my head and neck, like sand and leaves. I told her that I was alone and she told me to share this dryness with others. She gave me some sort of treatment and other nurses joined in to help heal me. I kept my eyes closed because I knew I couldn't bear it if I opened them. They knew what they were about and all I needed to do was nothing.

When they finished, I made childish noises and laughed at nothing. All of the mothers had access to this healing treatment and were better for it. It was a deeply spiritual yet uninterpretable dream. My guess is that it alludes to the first paragraphs of this piece. We need to get a diagnosis of spiritual dryness and then submit to the cure. We do not and cannot understand it and it will reduce us to rubble. This is a good rubble and we can rise from it like the phoenix from the ashes.

You have to embrace the shadow before it can give you its gold. I had no idea how true that is until I invited fictional characters into my life. They are showing me that life is indeed both theater and dream.

Larry, my erstwhile spirit guide, is supposed to be downright unlikeable. To make him ridiculous, I gave him a stick pony to ride and named him Ruin. I'll be darned if the both of them aren't the cutest things you've ever seen. Go figure. I throw my line into the fishpond and wait for the old carp to show himself. He only speaks enigmatically, and no one will ever understand him. Yet we like it when he does.

I hear nonexistent crickets when I come here and I feel this foolish love for Swami Z everywhere present. If you want to gift yourself, invite the world into your heart and call it anything you've a mind to. Alchemy happens.

If you follow my writings to any extent at all, you know that I am always one step away from a total emotional breakdown and yet I never change. But "Vicki" is something else altogether. Once I can step back from my ego and poke a bit of gentle fun at her, she, too, has things to say. Not much, but she is an effective foil for Swami Z.

Last night I didn't fall asleep until the wee hours. Someone wrote a poem about Swami and it warmed my heart. I also let Vicki and Swami become Anna and the King on a high-school gynasium dance floor. Poigant, yes. Real, no. Transcendant, possibly. We all have this place inside of us that yearns to dance with the impossible. To let tears flow into the waters of the old fishpond. To be loved.

Yesterday Swami said, "All this love is making me sick." An astute observer changed it to read, "All this sick is making me love." Indeed. The redemptive fires of love are everywhere. Sit down and bait your hook. Stay a while.

No matter what anyone may tell you, enlightenment and endarkenment are just descriptive phrases....and phases. Which self are you--the one that knows or the one that knows it doesn't know? Either way is the Way if you hold your mouth right.

My suffering has turned me into a better writer. Does that justify its presence in my life? There is just(ly) no answer to a question like that. I live in between grace notes and sour notes....inhabiting it all as if it was the first time. The soul, say the Sufis, is a knowing substance. Whatever is happening to you has already happened to the soul, that part of you that is suspended above the opposites. It dangles into the clear brook waiting for the old trout to surface. Peace and passion intermingle way down in the depths, do they not?

This morning I was working in my garden as usual. There is always too much to do in too little time. I end up fretting and stewing about what hard work it is. There are small plants to set in and water, weeds to pull and fertilizer to spread. My muscles never seem to get in tone and the sun is always hotter than I remember it being yesterday.

Soon it will be a winter garden with not as much to do. But some of the plants won’t make it through until spring and others will grow under blankets of snow. At any rate, it is my garden and I have to work here.

Today was different. A gate had appeared out of nowhere--a strong wooden gate with a lovely color. It was a soft green and looked as if it had been there forever. I was drawn towards that gate as if my feet were being magnetized. I put my hand on its latch, but I heard a voice booming, "This is your garden, welcome."

How could it be my garden; my garden didn't have a gate. I walked through the gate and stood there in amazement. It was beautiful and serene, but more than that, I was serene. My weariness had dropped away and nothing remained but peace.

"How did this garden get here?" I said to the air. I looked around and saw no one who could answer my question.

Then the voice spoke again. "You are not allowed to labor in this garden but it is yours and Mine. Just push open the gate and come in. Enjoy."

The roses were magnificent and the greenery was dewy and graceful, some dropping moisture onto the jade green mosses.

Nothing more was said by the Voice and I didn't dare to speak. Apparently I didn't have to. All I had to do was walk through the gate, leaving my garden to take care of itself.

In the dark night of this lifetime I have had a golden angel. It has come to me as the inclination of my soul to seek the light. That is how it works. You bleed and cry and faint and pray, never knowing anything for sure except that it seems to hurt to love. But that very pain is what is spurring us on. The stronger it is, the more seeking there will be. The mystery of love is that it isn't mental and it isn't physical. It does not even have to do with the ego in any way, shape or form. You might say it is angelic.

It is a good thing that we only know our angels from hearsay or we would grow too familiar. We would end up sending them to TJ Maxx looking for markdowns or asking them to help us make grilled-cheese sandwiches. I think angels should be reserved for higher things than finding parking places just to prove that they exist, although I hear that they do that, too.

Those of you who know my writing know that it is about my experiences with the spiritual path and with my family's cancer. I try not to exaggerate or overstate my case--it is a soul-shattering experience. That is why the need for angels. I have studied the books and thrown them away--memorized the highlights and stuffed them into my psyche. It has not changed me one iota. My teacher was right--the spirit is the only place that we will ever find rest. As Dr. Nicoll says, "All knowledge passes into love of God."

Angels are a reality in a higher realm than we can reach. They don't just materialize when we sing Christmas carols, either. They must be shedding their glow as our tears fall into the planet Earth. We want to do better than we are--that is why we need angels to minister to us.

Sometimes there is no other reason for love bending down to bless us--our need has called it to us and angels are funnels for fortitude and faith to pour into our lonely hearts. I am glad I have a golden angel spurring me on. Otherwise the night would be too dark and deep.

There are things about myself that cannot be fixed. Wounds made by God Himself, if you get right down to it. Introverted to the point of isolation, I turned to the spiritual path when my daughter was diagnosed with cancer at age seven. I already had agorophobia, but that seemed unimportant in the bigger scheme of things. I had to play the game of life anyway. Being a perfectionist, I have always tried to do my best and it has never been good enough--for me anyway.

For many years I studied truth with great passion. That passion has never dimmed. I now understand better the concept of the wounded healer. I have had several dreams of being a shaman. Me, an introverted, panic-driven perfectionist who wears lipstick even when she is at home. Yes, me. Who else but me--someone who lives on the Great Edge of Enlightenment, fearing to take the final leap.

Come now and now my love,
And leave your dying desert to the rain.
Give up your treasured wounds
Let go the tempting memory of the pain.

Yes, I know. I should go ahead and do that. But now my dearly beloved husband is dying of cancer, slowly and courageously. I am being wounded by the shadow of his illness falling over my soul like a dark blanket. Me, a shaman. Who else but me? But who will I heal? Is there someone sitting in their inner darkness looking for some light. I can tell them that the darkness is where you come to God. That He will meet you there.

If I am on the edge of enlightenment, can I help you heal. No, but I can bear witness to the darkness. That is all I have to do. The light will do the rest. The wounded healer knows that grace is for the weary and the sick at heart. For them who need it most. My perfectionism would have me keep my mouth shut, but what does it know about grace. No, my flaws are what can heal me, once I let them flutter over me like birds in flight. They are wings that won't let me go. Imagine that. Being borne aloft by sorrow. All I have to do is say the words, "I need to be set free."

Last night I was given a marvelous shawl. It is a rich purple and hand-knit for me by a stranger. I received it from a friend, Sue, who said that her church has a group called Knitting into the Mystery. Members of the group meet at the church and knit prayerfully for people who are facing challenges and change in their lives, whether it be a new baby or, in my case, the loss of a spouse.

Our old dream group has broken up, but we were meeting for a potluck dinner and dream-sharing time. At the end, we joined hands for a final blessing and after that, Sue went and got the shawl. She said she had asked someone in the group to knit a shawl for me. She draped it around my shoulders and read from the card:

"This shawl has been knit for Vicki by Micki Gambrell. Let us pray this blessing:

May God's grace be upon this shawl,
Warming, comforting, enfolding and embracing.
May this mantle be a safe haven,
A sacred place of security and well-being...
Sustaining and embracing in good times
As well as difficult ones.

May the one who receives this shawl be cradled in hope,
Kept in joy, embraced with peace,
And wrapped in love.

Twice in my life I have had my heart ripped from my chest. The first time it happened I was thirty-five years old. My only daughter died of a rare childhood cancer at age seven. Emily Dickinson's words spoke to me:

"My life closed twice before its close;
It yet remains to see
If Immortality unveil
A third event to me,

So huge, so hopeless to conceive,
As these that twice befell.
Parting is all we know of heaven,
And all we need of hell."

The second time I was considerably older. My husband of thirty-eight years, minus a week, died of a fatal, incurable cancer--multiple myeloma. In between those two devastations, I began walking the spiritual path. Needless to say, it was uphill all the way. But somewhere deep in my soul, I was never bitter. Sorrowful, yes--bitter, no. I just wanted to find God so that He could answer some questions for me. Like "Why are you doing this to me?"

Oh, yes, I am a curious person and there is nothing like double sorrow to hone the edges of the question. It became a piercing point in my side, a crucifixion lance. I had to watch my husband slowly but surely lose his ability to make blood cells. Had to help him in and out of bed, had to make the decison to put him into hospice. Had to call on God for strength and mercy. He delivered.

Three months have now gone by since we laid him to rest. My tears have been transmuted into drops of light. As I type these words into the computer I feel their transformative power. Given to God, sorrow becomes soft rain to make the heart flower once again. This time I am expecting a garden of white.

To be one with everything is enough. Well, isn't it? Only dissatisfaction, which is a mental state, claims otherwise. My own dissatisfactions are quite unworthy of any serious consideration. I want whiter teeth and more admiration and that is just for starters. Some days I want the world to go away and leave me alone (which it never does, by the way. It often runs its shopping cart into my car and throws my newpaper into the weeds).

I also want the world to beat a path to my door, garlanding me with love and appreciation (Hallmark cards seem to indicate how well I am doing). But I actually don't want to be one with everything, because that would be downright inconvenient. There are surgeries to be performed and bills to be paid....It's a good thing that the world is an illusion. Now wait just a darned minute. If I am one with everything and everything is an illusion, where does that leave me....on Cloud Nine with a hole in it? I need a drink.

I have given myself a small metaphysical headache in just two paragraphs, each one making a vein in my forehead bulge. If I am one with the illusion, why am I working full-time to keep up my end of the bargain. And who has the other end...God or You-Know-Who? Every day I get up thinking that I have things to do. If I don't buy food, I won't eat. If I don't put gas in the car, I can't drive. If I don't pay the bills, I will be dispossessed.

"Less possessing--less possessed.
More possessing--more possessed.
Less possessed--more assessed.

"Be still that you may be clear.
Be clear that you may clearly see the world.
When you see clearly through the world, then you will know how very poor and powerless it is to give you what you seek of freedom, peace and life."

The inchworm of my mind was crawling across the surface of my life, which is invariably a problem of one kind or another. Faithfully and daily, it inches along, cautiously humping across the bumps of whatever dilemma I seem to be facing. It is very wee and tenuous, yet how it perseveres. As small as this tiny insect is, it is greatly honored and esteemed by its colleagues. These compadres comprise the Holy Ruler of the Inchworm Kingdom.

I sit in my comfortable chair and read books that have made the best seller lists. Inchworms, as small as they are, write and publish most of the books. Their power comes from complacency, or so I have been told.

My own private inchworm belongs to a secret, invisible network of other similarly-befogged bugs. We do inchwork for the Man. Who he is, I have no idea. It is said that he is a brain, much like the one in The Wizard of Oz.

I always know when my inchworm is at work. I feel more and more stressed. If he gives me a neckache, I know that he is really covering ground. Sadly, the harder he works, the more complicated the problem of the day gets. But I seem to have no other solution to my dilemma. This may sound silly, but a yardworm might work better than an inchworm; it's just that they do not come in that size.

One of my biggest problems is in believing that I have problems that need to be solved. This is what gets the inchworm started moving over the problem in my brain. I can feel his furriness as he inches along. Once I read a book written by someone who purports to know how to really solve my problems. He said that I don't have to get rid of my inchworm. I just have to look up. If I do that, the inchworm will fall off my head!

Today found me frolicking on the surface of my life. On a hot July day, I rose from the ocean depths to the clear blue of the surface. I parted company with the water and briefly played with the shore.

I responded to human love and companionship, a great treasure in itself. But nothing compares to the depths of spirit where we live and move and have our being. We are creatures of the deeps of God. But He allows us moments and hours of sheer pleasure in the company of friends.

I saw the white, white sands of personality and picked up a precious sand dollar called "Being Understood." There is nothing quite like putting a perfect sand dollar in your pocket, is there? I touched the silken petals of the human heart beating in time with mine.

All too soon it ended and I returned to the solitary sounds of sonar and splash. I had made a momentary break with Oneness to look into the mirror of daily life. A disco ball of joy flashed on my brief time ashore. But I don't belong on shore after all. A brief return suffices to remind me of my mission here on earth. I will leave you with the mystery of what it is, for it is the same as yours.

The path begins when you study your consciousness and see what a mess it is. You try to change and find out you can't. You try to stop changing it and find out you can't do that, either. Now all you do is try and fail, try and fail.

If you are lucky, you will begin praying for grace. By now you have invited Ramana and Nisargadatta and you are picking up speed...heading in the right direction. You find out you have no head, no future or no past. And now cannot be grasped.

You begin to lie down in your mind a lot (green pastures). Nothing changes but you are getting some long-needed rest.

As Pamela Wilson says, "Rest and rapture. What else is there?" Pema Chodron says, :

"If your everyday practice is to open to all your emotions, to all the people you meet, to all the situations you encounter, without closing down, trusting that you can do that -- then that will take you as far as you can go. And then you'll understand all the teachings that anyone has ever taught."

Vernon Howard put it this way: "Go through the day experiencing every useless thought and emotion." Alchemy results. Change happens, but you are not the change-agent--awareness is.

We are standing on sacred ground, even though it may feel like shifting sand. Here is a verse of a prayer by Maurice Nicoll:

"Mortal things are fatal to the flow of God.
The spiritual man stands over all things of earth. The Divine light reaches only the highest love.
"May my soul transcend my daily anxiety!"
From Maurice Nicoll, A Portrait, by Beryl Pogson

I have not been to the fishpond for a while. I know that this is a favorite page for some of you, so I shall try and let you know where I have been. It has been ten months today since my husband died. I lay in bed last night and witnessed a summing up of how I have managed to go on without him. Strength has not been lacking, but where did it come from except the depths?

Diving deep into the waters of my own psyche has garnered me beautiful pearls. Which of them can I share with you, the reader? Perhaps you would be most interested to learn that I feel very little self-pity. Oh, it may sweep over me briefly, but it doesn’t stay. I thought that would be a big problem, but it just hasn’t materialized.

I find myself doing what needs to be done on any given day. Then I am free to rest and follow my heart. I cook and take a daily walk. If Bob is with me, it is in the simplest way.

The fishpond is a place of mystery and acceptance. As we sit and dangle communal feet, we find ourselves vanishing into thin air. Love arises as we plunge into our richest, deepest selves, for we are touching truth.

Writing was easier for me when the suffering was so inescapable. I keep hoping to hear from readers, but that is a rare occurrence. Where are you and what do you bring to the depths of yourself. What pearls do you manage to wrest from your own diving expeditions? It is the only question worth asking.

Knowing the Self is easy; it is what you do best. It’s being with falseness that is so wearying. It seems that we must travel long distances riding camels of discomfort through arid social deserts before we recognize a mirage as a mirage. “There is no water in the wilderness,” as Vernon Howard said. How right he was.

From the time I was a small child I remember the discomfort of the camel ride. In first grade, when we were led to the playground, I put my hands through the cyclone fence in the desperate attempt to protect myself. But from what? I now know that at five, I was far too young to start school. I had not even been to kindergarten. From then on, I was ill at ease in group situations. No one had the wisdom to see that I was an introvert child and that I was perfectly at ease when left alone. So I rode the damned camel.

But now I walk alone in perfect ease. Because I am alone, I am with the universal companion called God. Seems He never left me nor forsook me. But I had to make this discovery alone. I had to stop clinging to the fence and embrace myself directly. And what a difference that has made.

Sinking into Silence

Sometimes there is a misconception about spiritual work. We need do nothing but sink into the Self that we are...no effort required. Just a letting go.

At times, of course, we must ruthlessly rip off the mask of our mentation and feel the burn of our original face. Like a mudpack, it is very salutary to bare the Self to the Self.

I have no idea what the old Zen masters were like, but I know a contemporary one by the name of Vernon Kitabu Turner. He encourages me to be myself...what else. I can hear what Kitabu is saying..and it is the teacher you can hear who changes you in spite of yourself. I hear him because he is at one with himself and that unity transfers to me.

Most of the time we are deaf to what is...to the sounds of the old frog plopping into the pond or the car nosing onto the freeway. We are lost in the fog of what might have been or what could be.

Everytime I sit down at the computer to write, I wonder if I can find anything new or different to say. Tonight is no exception. I need to stop now and listen to the silence.

“Don’t change a thing,” it says. “Keep striving toward the usual; that is all anyone can do. Forget the spotlight, the headline and the climactic summation of your life. That is delusion; only live now and love will bloom in extraordinary places. Begin within and don’t stop until you have broken out of the jail of suffering. Give the key to the warden and break free. That is all.-

Vicki

A Prayer for Tuning

Help me to get my instrument in tune
This old banjo of self-remorse and introspection
Must it play a mournful dirge of yesterday.
Can it hop from chord to chord and chirp like two birds making love in mid-air.
Do I dare.

Help me to strike the note of bliss that feels like
Wind kissing starlight and rearranging its hair.
Help me enter harmony as one who knows it all
And finds nothingness to be the wisest teacher.

Shock me raw with the notes that play themselves
In between the octaves of today and yesterday.
Let tissues fall from the sky to blow my nose in praise
of conscious suffering. Two freebirds now become one.

“If I leave here tomorrow
Would you still remember me?
For I must be travelling on, now,
'Cause there's too many places I've got to see.
But, if I stayed here with you, girl,
Things just couldn't be the same.
'Cause I'm as free as a bird now,
And this bird you can not change.
Lord knows, I can't change.

Bye, bye, its been a sweet love.
Though this feeling I can't change.
But please don't take it badly,
'Cause Lord knows I'm to blame.
But, if I stayed here with you girl,
Things just couldn't be the same.
Cause I'm as free as a bird now,
And this bird you'll never change.
And this bird you can not change.
Lord knows, I can't change.
Lord help me, I can't change.”

L. Skynard

Today is just one of those days. Too much winter and not enough companionship. Time drools down the clock, or so it would seem. Forget spirituality; sometimes it is best to have a cup of coffee and some chocolate. To let sentimentality have its say. It wants to squawk about what it has lost and I am tuned in and inclined to agree. The thing is, I have never been a social animal. And walking the path is a lonely process. Anybody out there agree with that?

I know that I am giving you fodder to say, “Well, how come she doesn’t fix her life if she’s so spiritual?” I would if I could, let me assure you of that. Being an introvert is not all it is cracked up to be. It requires much time alone or you become a little crazed. I sat and read a book about women’s friendships and felt even lousier. What is wrong with me that I can’t go out and round up some friends? I had much prefer that someone come looking for me.

Winter is the time for reflection, but I keep seeing myself in the glass. And I have chapped lips and dry hair. And a suspicious pouch around my waist. It’s the Hershey Kiss Zone...my doctor will not be happy when I go in for my spring maintenance.

Tomorrow will probably find me at the mall looking at clothes and wondering what might look good on me. I will trundle home and eat leftovers and watch TV. I have already cleaned out some drawers and tidied up the house. Bah, humbug.

On days like this I am in danger of getting a puppy or something radical like that. But I have a new bedspread and recliner. When I had our last pet put to sleep, I said I didn’t want to get another. Perhaps I will do something drastic like remember that the Self is all there is. These words are just filling in the empty spaces in my head and perhaps in my heart. “I hear you,” I tell myself as lovingly as I can. “I hear you....and you are not really alone. You have your spirit to wrap around you like an Indian blanket. You can sit like a squaw in your deer-hide tent.” I step outside and look at the moon hanging white and cold. I offer it my blessings and retreat back inside.

The spiritual life is drastic. It requires surrendering that to which you are the most attached. It is a crucifixion and a cutting away from the ties that bind. But unless we can remember to step back long enough to crack a joke or tell the truth, we will spin restlessly in our misery.

Also, life lived with no awareness of the spiritual element can be just as hard or harder. That way is littered with addictions, escape and ennui. At least the dark night of the soul is held to have a dawn. In the final analysis, no one can take a step for another. As much as I miss my husband/companion, he will never again be able to shield me from the world. I stand alone now, so it must be the right thing for me to do.

My job as a writer is to strip myself down as fully as I can in order to share my wounds. In some shamanic way, I offer them for your own loneliness and questing. Go ahead and question what I just said; I certainly shall. But every now and then I have a dream that points to this shamanic quality present in me. Isn’t that weird? No weirder than being able to write oneliners or cook a well-balanced meal in twenty minutes. Go figure.

I am not sure how to wrap this piece up, so I shall strap it on my back and carry it like a papoose until I upload it for everyone to enjoy. And if you don’t enjoy it, just consider it my writing exercise for today.

The River of Honesty

The river of honesty runs through all that we do and are. We may forget that we swim in this stream, but it is nevertheless true. No one can feign for very long without betraying the root and ground of his being. At some point, when we have gone too long without love, we sit on the riverbank and weep. The river itself looks on.

We lie to ourselves about the pain that we are in. We do that because it is so hard to understand anything beyond pain. We even lie and say that we are happy living a lie. But how can we be. I watched Johnny Cash Live at Montreux 1994 on PBS tonight and realize that his music can never die. His soulful sound rings on in some holographic way and I bow to his dark wisdom and his humanity. He knew that he was flawed and in need of redemption. We know it, too.

When my husband was dying, I went through a phase of bitterness and recrimination. It was as necessary to me as his labored breathing was to him. When we raced him down the hospital corridor on the way to get him into ICU and on oxygen, I was angry, scared and everything in-between. That did not last; only love remains. Only music plays on....the discordant notes fade away. When we hang up our guitars for the last time, our loves will weep for our absence.

Honesty is the blessed policy, as my teacher Vernon Howard said. He was speaking, first of all, of inner honesty. Who among us has not sat down and wept when all alone. Who has not seen deeds undone pass before their mind’s eye and words unsaid now speak. After Bob passed away, I could not but remember how one certain day I pushed away some of his critical symptoms because I wanted to mail a manuscript to the publisher. I rationalized it to myself by saying that he was no worse than he had been a few days ago. But the next morning was when I found myself racing him to ICU. I do not think God judges me for that, because I have already judged--and forgiven--myself.

All in all, we remain mystery and miracle both within and without. Take this Fishpond Thoughts page. More people visit it than any other page. I allow it to unfold in any way that it wants to. I welcome the water of emotion...the depths of ocean and the sunlight as it dances. If I tell you that I have been less than perfect, it may make you feel better. We can open up a little more than we thought we could. We can wipe our eyes and see a bit farther.

I often think of June and Johnny Cash, now eternally united. We can be in this state while here on earth; I know that. It is a matter of tuning in to someone’s energy field. You can tune into mine and join me in the river of honesty. It bears repeating, like the music from Johnny’s old guitar, that we are love and we are one and that is all we need to know.

Love, Vicki

What Do You Do This Lifetime?

"The mind of the past is ungraspable;
the mind of the future is
ungraspable;
the mind of the present is
ungraspable.

Diamond Sutra

What do you do this lifetime? After considering whether or not I had it in me to get a book published, I sat down and allowed myself to doodle for a while...to write down anything that came to mind. Finally, I arrived at this odd question: What do you do this lifetime? I know what I have done. I have been a wife and mother. I have lost my only daughter and husband to cancer. I have studied truth and maintained a website. But truly, what do I do?

I live and breathe myself. That is what I do. It is called soul work and it is like harvesting fragrant flowers to make into exotic perfume. It has cost me limbs and grown me new ones. It has taken me into the slums of Calcutta and into the very palace of the emperor. I do not exaggerate when I tell you I am myself.

But what I do this lifetime is no business of yours. Do not try to rescue me from this job that only I can do. If I wear a cook’s apron I will serve you and if I don a sorcerer’s hat, I will bring you into the mystery. It is completely up to me.

Doing is the deepest mystery that I have encountered. Being comes naturally, while doing destroys the evidence that being every existed. Yet I must do what I must do.

If you say that doing and being are one, you offer me no hope of continuing on my way. I must find the key that opens the door of my success this lifetime or I will have failed.

What I do this lifetime is to continue on the way of being myself. The road vanishes as I travel it and no history of myself remains. When I turn around I face the Void and as I go forward, I embrace it consciously with every step. Such a journey, but it is what I do this lifetime.

Born in the Manger

I have been experiencing writer’s block for a while now. Some of you may have noticed. The reason is that I have been preoccupied with making a CD. It is hard to write and speak at the same time. There is just not the creative energy available for both.

As I was sitting lazily in my recliner, I resolved to try and break this block. Then I found this phrase in a book..“only when you are truly at rest can I be active in you.” Well-said. So sitting is quite all right. Let us sit together.

What do you do when life becomes stale, especially your inner life? If you are like me (and you are), you try and think your way out. Up above the level of thought is this wonderful place called “Awareness.” Other words for it are “the kingdom of heaven within” and the “I am” awareness. It is real. The hitch is that we don’t want to go there. The question then becomes, “Why do I avoid awareness like the plague?” Because it appears to be boring; but boring and peaceful are worlds apart. Awareness is dynamic, not deadening. It is fulfilling, not fraught with the opposites found on the mental plane.

So let us sit together by this lazy old pond...doing nothing. The old carp swims eternally here; the sky is ever-changing and we are neither young nor old. We just are. There was a time in my life when there was nothing but sorrow and fear; that time will return but not with the same force. I have changed so circumstances will change as well.

We set out on the spiritual path young and full of hope; we end with older bodies and wiser minds. If we are lucky, we discover that awareness equals love and so we become more and more content with living in the moment. It is here that the babe of truth and love is born in us. No need to proclaim it; just to feed it and watch it grow. At some point, the process reverses and it begins to care for us and our active work in the world is done. Now we can truly rest.

Presence

There is a land beyond thought. It is called Presence. The first time I found myself there I was amazed. All of my sorrow had fallen away. I could ascertain no boredom, anger or depression. Apparently they can not make it beyond the borders. How this is I do not know because there are no guards...no one checking your emotional baggage. And I had plenty.

I wanted to smuggle in stories about myself. A particular one I had carried all of my life. It was about my life. Once in Presence I found that I didn’t need it after all. The life I had told stories about belonged to Someone Else. And He didn’t need it anymore than I did.

We called him The Man Without A Story and he was rumored to run Presence, Population One. He was not a gunslinger or an astronaut or a traffic cop. He was present. You might compare him to the buddha or the Christ, but he would have none of that. Comparison lay beyond the mountains that you had to cross before entering his land. It was contraband.

There is always a first time and I was no exception. I found myself in this country on the worst day of my life, or so the story went. But just as I was about to write a sentence having to do with my story, I forgot the words. I found myself transfixed with what I saw. Everything. With no labels. I had to just see. It was unforgettable even while I knew there were no words.

The silence roared like the inside of a conch. The peace poured down like water and my clothes were melting in the sun. I was a jaybird on a branch and then the branch gave way and I flew.

Sky Fish

Today I went to Office Max and bought myself a watercolor pad and a small box of paints. I wanted to draw my essay, “And The Soul Moves.” A friend of mine had suggested to me that not only could I write it, I could paint it, sculpt it, sing it, etc. What a wonderful idea. But I am not an artist.

Home again, I made a cup of instant coffee and put my paper and paints on the kitchen table. Alongside the coffee was a mug of water for the brush. I sat there sipping and considering. What would emerge from this free-form session. It didn’t matter because I was playing.

The first thing I did was use a pencil to sketch in a pod floating on the water. I was reclining in the pod with my eyes closed. I made myself look like an oriental figure, nice and serene. Now it was time to pick up the brush and have some child-like fun.

I made the pod a chartreuse and painted my robe orange. Nice. Now I could have fun making the water different shades of blue. I mixed and brushed as if I were five years old. No more talent required. I added a layer of brown underneath the water, which gave me a bit of grounding. Was I finished?

Not entirely. Behind my head, I painted a large fish leaping from the water. It was green and yellow and purple. And I was done.

Now I wanted to write a poem to go with it and this is what came to me:

Sky fish
cloud thing
water underneath
shell sky rising

fish is flying
sky is moving
underneath the water.

and the soul moves
in its element of
breath and sigh and
rapture
nothing is easier
to capture.

I let the paper dry and put my paints away. It was time for juice and cookies and a nap.

The Inner Fishpond

At the fishpond we rejuvenate because nothing is required of us. We haul ourselves here or come joyfully. It doesn’t matter in what state we arrive. We sit down and remove our socks and shoes, letting our toes dip into clear water. We may want to cup our hands and bring the clear water to our face. We can even drink our fill. No one is here but us.

There is nothing for us to do. Now that we are here, we are grateful we made the trip, for it is a trip back home to the Self. All of our machinations to obtain love have vanished. Our plots to get pleasure have withered away. There are no more schemes to avoid our own suffering and eventual death. There is just the presence of ourselves.

There is stillness here that never leaves. Its alchemy works its magic on our bodies, for they need love unending. Our faithful servants are now quiet enough to receive the message of healing. Their cells are enveloped in light. There is music running through the bloodstream.

Prayer is heard emanating from the lips of nature. It is felt through the fingertips of the leaves. It is received by invisible hands. The etheric body is blessing us electronically in its own unfathomable way. The mystery hums.

Until we reach the inner world consciously, we have not been truly born.

Sea Change

I have been experiencing a sea change and for that I thank God. Some of you readers know that I have very little family, having lost my small daughter and then my husband to cancer. I have let this grieve and worry me for far too long. My son is a wonderful support and I am so grateful for having him in my life. And yet I worry that we don’t have a “back-up system.” So the universe has been reminding me bigtime!

I went to my fiftieth junior high school reunion and my son was kind enough to go with me. His birthday was that weekend and I had planned to get a cake and share it with relatives. That fell through, though. We went to the cemetery and hung out at the gravesides of our beloved husband and father, daughter and sister. It was a sunny day and we spoke of how deeply peaceful it was. We had not brought flowers. I stooped to pick up a tiny yellow wildflower to place on my daughter’s grave. I looked up to see a sunflower in all of its glory on a grave right behind it. My tiny flower kept it company...the microcosm and the macrocosm. Rob found a small flower for Bob’s grave. It was a nice visit.

Then we went to an Italian restaurant for my son's birthday. Our waiter was from Central Casting. He was funny, warm and had time to hang out with us. I told the waiter it was Rob's birthday and he brought a piece of spumoni with a candle in it. He led the room in a rousing chorus of “Happy Birthday.”

The table behind us was full of women all wearing tee shirts with a logo. I asked one of them to come and tell us about it. Seems the son of the only man at the table had died young. These women had started something called Turkey Trot to serve the needy at Thanksgiving. It was in his honor. I told her I understood their loss and said that we had just come from the cemetery. We hugged and wept and felt deeply blessed in that moment.

“Do you always wear your tee shirts?” I asked her. “Always,” she said. She had found her mission and I could see how fulfilled she was. I also learned a deep and lasting lesson. My universal family shows up when I least expect it and most need it. I can trust it and I am certainly grateful for it. You are among that group.

Love, Vicki

After All

"It’s you who needs me after all
and I thought it was them
forgive me and can I warm your tea?"

Vicki Woodyard

When I choose to experience myself consciously, I rest in the void. It can be no other way. This puts me smack dab in tao, whether I am ready or not. It is inevitable.

It is also inevitable that I experience healing.

This healing is always available. You don’t have to be perfect to experience yourself consciously instead of mechanically. You just make a simple choice. And then make it as often as you like.

This can be a private ceremony.

It creates a vacuum.

Staying with yourself is the joy you seek and never find “out there.”

It reduces you to zero and blesses others as well as yourself.

The perfect circle is you.

Silence Is What You Are

We do not need the intermediary of the mind to come to silence.

Words and phrases sentence us to death, while awareness resurrects us. Jesus spoke in parables, not wanting to be literally understood. Rumi was the same. Richness rises. Words fall like rocks upon our miserable bodies. We crave the kindness of silence.

Silence is not what you think. It is what you are. There are no intellectual bullies to be found. They have hung themselves in nooses of thought. The Christ prevails.

Mystery is healing to the extent that we allow it to be. Logic has been sentenced to hard labor and rest is at hand.

An Injunction

Fly higher than you have before. It is essential that you live up to your potential and the time is now. No matter how late it may seem, it is now that you can achieve lift off.

Fly into the storm while it is assailing you. Fly into the eye of God. Once you get there you will know how necessary it was to make the trip. He was waiting for you.

Fly in order to help yourself heal. If you don’t, your wings will be of no earthly good to you. Why keep them useless at your side. You were born to soar.

All of those talks about eagles and chickens were symbolic of what you need to see. That you are the former and not the latter. On the ground you see only suffering. Once you are airborne, though, the suffering is left behind.

Do not think you are not helping everyone to evolve when you leave them behind. Oh, no. Quite the contrary. You are not leaving them behind; you are taking them with you. For your wings are made of love and the wind is always at your back.

Your loved ones on the ground are depending on your safe journey back to where you belong. God knows this even while you forget. Pray for the strength to leave your suffering. Pray for the wisdom to fly into the heart of God. All suffering depends on your flight. Everything hangs on everything else.

It is your time. Rejoice that your dear ones are counting on you alone, for you can do it now. Now. Go. Godspeed.

When The Bottom Drops Out

What do you do when the bottom drops out? When you are lost in thoughts of failure, suffering and hopelessness? If you are smart, you will sit quietly with no bottom. Well, not literally but metaphorically.

The bottom has dropped out for me twice. Once when my seven-year-old daughter died of cancer and in 2004 when my husband also died of it. In both cases, the cancers were incurable. But that did not mean love would not triumph over death. The bottom cannot drop out of love.

I have spent many, many hours in deep meditation on the Self that we all are. Maurice Nicoll says that “the universe is response to request.” So I have requested an extra serving of peace. I don’t think the universe minds my audacity in asking this. Actually, I think it loves me for my audacity. We should increase our boldness in asking for spiritual gifts. Heck, we should storm heaven.

“Well, Vicki, how do I storm heaven?” I can hear you asking. You do it by doing it. I sit in my chair every morning for twenty minutes. I do not do anything but that. But at the end of that twenty minutes, I arise a spiritual powerhouse. If nothing else, a lighthouse for people who are too busy to sit. When my husband was dying, I often sat in the chemo room quietly storming heaven. It seemed to work, and I think other patients were doing the same thing. For we are all foxhole pray-ers. But I do it daily because I know how much I need it.

But back to what to do when the bottom drops out. I recommend sitting with no bottom until you see that there is no top, either. You are measureless, eternal and problem-free. Problems only exist when there is an ego to have them. Once you see this, you will hurry to sit where there is no bottom or top. Rumi said, “There is a field out between right and wrong. I’ll meet you there.”

The next time you suffer in any way at all, remember this. When the bottom drops out, that is a signal to sit in silence until you experience an inner shift. When does “shift happen”? When you are okay with the bottom dropping out. When you can wait on God. When you come into your own. It is your birthright to wait on God. Claim it.

A Silken Quilt

I spread a silken quilt upon the ground of silence. Into it I began to put my worries and my fears. I moved slowly and deliberately; consciously, you might say. As each item was calmly placed into the center, I would bow and thank the silence for making room for them.

I worked in this manner for half a day. The sun rose majestic above the quilt and its
mounting pile of anxieties and dreads. Birdsong ceased and the river flowed, but mutely. Not a single person wandered by to ask what I was doing.

The quilt was happy to accept each burden. I was equally happy to let them go. Attachment still had me in its sway, though; for there was one thing I had yet to place upon the ground.

As the sun begin to set, I saw that the quilt could hold no more. I said a short prayer, asking God to dispose of my burdens as He saw fit. But from deep within me, I heard His Voice. “Sit down, Daughter. Sit down.”

I obeyed the voice of God. I knew that what I had been holding back was holding me back from the mercies of heaven.

As soon as I sat, life begin to speak. The wind trembled the trees and their leaves began to rustle. The river murmured and a few people strolled by, talking to each other.

God had looked upon me; had spoken to me. And I had responded. So life begin to move again for me. It is called the Way.

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