... has a way of pouring out, whether you intend it to or not.
Much has been shifting for me lately. I'm learning to observe myself. It has created a space for joy to fill. Real joy. Genuine joy.
I was driving back to the CapCorps house after yoga this week and experiencing that joy in me. I parked around the corner from the house, where I always do, and as I was getting out of the car, I accidentally hit the horn with my elbow. Mind you, I am not a clumsy person AT ALL, nor do I ever really use the horn when I'm driving. Well, it just so happened that two guys were walking down the street and turned around when they heard me (accidentally) honk. For a split second they looked intensely at me.
Hey! My bad! I didn't mean to do that, I said.
Hey! How you doing? They relaxed, and laughed.
I'm great. Have a nice day.
You just can't keep genuine joy to yourself. It will find it's way out.
Saturday, April 21, 2012
Wednesday, April 18, 2012
In Lak'ech
Tu eres mi otro yo.
You are my other me.
Si te hago daño a ti,
If I do harm to you,
Me hago daño a mi mismo.
I do harm to myself.
Si te amo y respeto,
If I love and respect you,
Me amo y respeto yo.
I love and respect myself.
You are my other me.
Si te hago daño a ti,
If I do harm to you,
Me hago daño a mi mismo.
I do harm to myself.
Si te amo y respeto,
If I love and respect you,
Me amo y respeto yo.
I love and respect myself.
Tuesday, April 17, 2012
chronic pain
I help once a week at a place called the Community-based Chronic Disease Management Clinic (CCDM Clinic). The name explains itself-- we help people manage chronic diseases such as high blood pressure, diabetes, and high cholesterol. I basically help with the flow of the clinic, taking initial info, weights, blood sugar checks, signing women up to get mammograms, and setting up appointments, that kind of thing.
I come into contact with pretty much everyone who comes into the clinic. Often there is enough time to talk a little with people and hear some stories about what is going on in the neighborhood. The stories are also often heartbreaking. Police brutality a couple blocks away, deaths, racist treatment from doctors. Sometimes the stories are lighthearted-- A week ago one woman insisted that I looked just like her granddaughter, Kobe, when I smiled at her. She whipped out a picture and it was as if I was looking at my 2nd grade self. She called out, "Bye, Kobe" when she left, and I told her to take good care. Oddly enough, this happened again to me this week by a coworker who was "freaked out" by how much I look like her granddaughter. It is interesting to me that both the grandmothers were black and both the granddaughters were biracial, but none of us would be considered the same race. Just goes to show how un-scientific (but not insignificant) race is. But I digress.
Working at the clinic makes me think quite a lot about chronic pain, what is really at the root of that pain, and what is really causing it. I mean, come on, OF COURSE the people who come into the clinic have heart problems and tension, just listen to the stories they tell. Their hearts are hurting. But instead of undoing racism and poverty in our communities, we tell people to take medication and eat better. That way, they are told it is their fault for the condition they find themselves in, someone profits off of their suffering through pharmaceuticals, and we don't have to lift a finger working to change our world.
I encourage you to check out some talks I've been listening to by Dr. Gabor Mate, who understands that we cannot separate the mind from the body and we cannot separate individuals from their environment. He specifically talks about high blood pressure and cholesterol and diabetes as a result of chronic stress manifested in the body. It is well worth the time listening to him if we are going to learn how to heal.
To be most honest, the reason all of this interests me so much is because I'm searching for how to heal my own chronic pain. I've had persistent stomach problems since coming back from Peru, and I know it's not really about diet or bacteria. Something deep in my human organism is crying out and my gut enflames. I understand that if I am to be a force of healing, I must heal myself.
I don't know how to heal myself, but I'm learning. I know I have everything I need to heal. I know healing comes from within, that I actually have to want to heal. Or at least be willing to be willing. To release the need for this in my life. I know I belong here, now. I know we belong to each other. I know I need to relax. I know it is okay to feel. I know that the longer I try to hide from pain, the longer it festers in me. I'm noticing my defense mechanisms. I know my body has knowledge beyond me. Something lately has been really shifting for me. I can't and won't explain it, at least not yet. But I am observing the sensations of my body, whatever comes, whenever it comes.
I pray. I meditate. I move. I notice.
I'm going to create more space at the CCDM clinic to connect to people. To hear stories, to listen. I think its that connection that helps us heal, not just manage.
We belong to each other.
I come into contact with pretty much everyone who comes into the clinic. Often there is enough time to talk a little with people and hear some stories about what is going on in the neighborhood. The stories are also often heartbreaking. Police brutality a couple blocks away, deaths, racist treatment from doctors. Sometimes the stories are lighthearted-- A week ago one woman insisted that I looked just like her granddaughter, Kobe, when I smiled at her. She whipped out a picture and it was as if I was looking at my 2nd grade self. She called out, "Bye, Kobe" when she left, and I told her to take good care. Oddly enough, this happened again to me this week by a coworker who was "freaked out" by how much I look like her granddaughter. It is interesting to me that both the grandmothers were black and both the granddaughters were biracial, but none of us would be considered the same race. Just goes to show how un-scientific (but not insignificant) race is. But I digress.
Working at the clinic makes me think quite a lot about chronic pain, what is really at the root of that pain, and what is really causing it. I mean, come on, OF COURSE the people who come into the clinic have heart problems and tension, just listen to the stories they tell. Their hearts are hurting. But instead of undoing racism and poverty in our communities, we tell people to take medication and eat better. That way, they are told it is their fault for the condition they find themselves in, someone profits off of their suffering through pharmaceuticals, and we don't have to lift a finger working to change our world.
I encourage you to check out some talks I've been listening to by Dr. Gabor Mate, who understands that we cannot separate the mind from the body and we cannot separate individuals from their environment. He specifically talks about high blood pressure and cholesterol and diabetes as a result of chronic stress manifested in the body. It is well worth the time listening to him if we are going to learn how to heal.
To be most honest, the reason all of this interests me so much is because I'm searching for how to heal my own chronic pain. I've had persistent stomach problems since coming back from Peru, and I know it's not really about diet or bacteria. Something deep in my human organism is crying out and my gut enflames. I understand that if I am to be a force of healing, I must heal myself.
I don't know how to heal myself, but I'm learning. I know I have everything I need to heal. I know healing comes from within, that I actually have to want to heal. Or at least be willing to be willing. To release the need for this in my life. I know I belong here, now. I know we belong to each other. I know I need to relax. I know it is okay to feel. I know that the longer I try to hide from pain, the longer it festers in me. I'm noticing my defense mechanisms. I know my body has knowledge beyond me. Something lately has been really shifting for me. I can't and won't explain it, at least not yet. But I am observing the sensations of my body, whatever comes, whenever it comes.
I pray. I meditate. I move. I notice.
I'm going to create more space at the CCDM clinic to connect to people. To hear stories, to listen. I think its that connection that helps us heal, not just manage.
We belong to each other.
privilege as wound
I've been thinking a lot about what privilege does to us. Mostly I've been thinking about his because I've been trying to understand the White Wound so that I can come from a place of compassion towards white people. I've noticed a couple of different mindsets some people have around privilege. I bet there are a lot more than the two I have noticed, but here they are:
1. Some people, knowing that others do not get the same privileges that they do, feel incredibly guilty. Sometimes people try to hide their privilege because of their guilt, sometimes they try to convince themselves that they really earned their privilege, etc.
2. Other people feel very blessed for the privilege, either wanting to use it to help others get to their level of comfort or just feeling very lucky.
I think there are some real problems with both of these mindsets. I could write an essay on the problems, and maybe one day I will, but for now I'm just going to talk about how I've been thinking about privilege. Hopefully you can help me see where my own perspective is limited and complicit.
Okay, privilege is a wound. I'm not quite sure yet if all privilege is a wound, but I'm starting to think that most privilege is. It is the kind of wound that we are taught not to notice, but nevertheless we still feel it somewhere inside of us. I think the depth of the wound comes because privilege teaches us that we do not need each other.
Let me give an example. For the first time in my life, I have access to a car almost whenever I want. I'm taught to think that kind of mobility is a freedom, a good thing to have, again something that makes me more free and independent. I don't have to depend on bus schedules like I have before, or the kindness of others to pick me up, or my own legs to get me where I need to go. I can be independent of all of that. But independence is a great American lie. I actually depend on a lot of other people to drive that car. Dependence on fossil fuels, on the workers who extract them from the earth, on the people whose environment and homes are destroyed, etc. But because I don't have to see them, I can pretend I am independent of them. I learn that I don't need others.
But we do need each other. We come from the same source of Love called God. We need each other because we belong to each other. All of us.
As long as I don't have to think of my privilege as a wound, I will want to keep my privilege, even if I try to keep it in order to make other people's realities "better." As long as I don't think of my privilege as a wound, I can stay sick without even knowing it. I can convince myself I'm right.
How is that working for you, Jess?
Yea, I didn't think so.
1. Some people, knowing that others do not get the same privileges that they do, feel incredibly guilty. Sometimes people try to hide their privilege because of their guilt, sometimes they try to convince themselves that they really earned their privilege, etc.
2. Other people feel very blessed for the privilege, either wanting to use it to help others get to their level of comfort or just feeling very lucky.
I think there are some real problems with both of these mindsets. I could write an essay on the problems, and maybe one day I will, but for now I'm just going to talk about how I've been thinking about privilege. Hopefully you can help me see where my own perspective is limited and complicit.
Okay, privilege is a wound. I'm not quite sure yet if all privilege is a wound, but I'm starting to think that most privilege is. It is the kind of wound that we are taught not to notice, but nevertheless we still feel it somewhere inside of us. I think the depth of the wound comes because privilege teaches us that we do not need each other.
Let me give an example. For the first time in my life, I have access to a car almost whenever I want. I'm taught to think that kind of mobility is a freedom, a good thing to have, again something that makes me more free and independent. I don't have to depend on bus schedules like I have before, or the kindness of others to pick me up, or my own legs to get me where I need to go. I can be independent of all of that. But independence is a great American lie. I actually depend on a lot of other people to drive that car. Dependence on fossil fuels, on the workers who extract them from the earth, on the people whose environment and homes are destroyed, etc. But because I don't have to see them, I can pretend I am independent of them. I learn that I don't need others.
But we do need each other. We come from the same source of Love called God. We need each other because we belong to each other. All of us.
As long as I don't have to think of my privilege as a wound, I will want to keep my privilege, even if I try to keep it in order to make other people's realities "better." As long as I don't think of my privilege as a wound, I can stay sick without even knowing it. I can convince myself I'm right.
How is that working for you, Jess?
Yea, I didn't think so.
Thursday, March 22, 2012
Healing
This is a year of Healing.
Healing from my own trauma. Healing from the traumas I have shared with you. Healing from the stories I hear and the ones I tell.
One story liberates another.
Internalized racism, sexism, ableism. Trauma of the oppressor of classism, heterosexism. The complexity of ageism. All the limitations of who I can be and who I can't be.
This is the year of Healing.
Medical trauma. Sexual molestation. Abandonment. Worms of fear and abuse eating away at my insides.
Medical trauma. Sexual molestation. Abandonment. Worms of fear and abuse eating away at my insides.
Why do I look for freedom outside of me? As if it is a gift someone else can give me? As if it is something that others can take away from me?
This is the year of Healing.
There is a rhythm of dying and rising that happens in our daily lives. It is so common we tend not to notice it. That is why the Paschal mystery is so powerful, not because what Jesus did was so extraordinary (although it was), but because it was incredibly ordinary.
This is the year of Healing.
There is a rhythm of dying and rising that happens in our daily lives. It is so common we tend not to notice it. That is why the Paschal mystery is so powerful, not because what Jesus did was so extraordinary (although it was), but because it was incredibly ordinary.
So ordinary that in every moment, I die and rise faster than I know. Every moment changing. Once I know who I am, I no longer am what I thought I was.
Everything you touch, you change. Everything you change, changes you.
"More grows in the garden than the garderner knows he has sown." Spanish proverb.
At some point, we must let go of the darkness, let go of the struggle, let go of the journey and arrive to the place that has always been inside of us.
Yes, its about the journey, not the destination.
But we do arrive. We cannot cling to the journey so much that we forget the destination.
Let go.
I cannot change anyone but myself. I am the one to work on. I am the only one who knows how to heal myself.
Listen. LIsten to the God in you.
Breathing is enough to be loved.
Let go.
This is a life of Healing.
Yes, its about the journey, not the destination.
But we do arrive. We cannot cling to the journey so much that we forget the destination.
Let go.
I cannot change anyone but myself. I am the one to work on. I am the only one who knows how to heal myself.
Listen. LIsten to the God in you.
Breathing is enough to be loved.
Let go.
This is a life of Healing.
Sunday, March 18, 2012
a day by the lake
A year ago, I arrived in the United States after medical trauma in Peru. JVC, for their own reasons, decided to terminate my term of service at that.
I have not yet told the whole truth of that story to you, but I will soon. Not now, but soon.
Today, a year later, I spent most of the day on the lake shore in Milwaukee. It was a sunny day, the shores were full of people trying to get some sun, excited about the heat and eager for the summer to come. I joined them, eager too for the heat, though it was still too cold for my liking. And it was the first time I think I've seen a beach full of people but with absolutely no one in the water. Weird.
I sat on the sand, moving it between my toes. Friends joined me. Peggy, Tia, Crystassany. Erin couldn't find us but made her own offering. I sang some songs. drew pictures, wrote a little. I offered my last writings in Peru a year ago to the lake. Peggy offered her own poem of the lake's wisdom. Reflecting on the new life that has come, what I wouldn't have learned otherwise, the blessings next to the wounds. A new gift of rose petals from my birthday, the old pills that overpowered me. An offering to the lake, to the God of the lake, the God of creation, from which all things come.
I feel the sun on my back.
I've walked these shores before.
In times of ice
and burning winds.
Then I was here alone.
Now the shores are full, desperate for sun touched skin.
But we still walk with our shoes on.
I don't recognize this place,
though
I have been here before.
Maybe that is the lesson.
To trust myself.
Te quiero,
Peru.
The waves wash the first part away. I wait for the lake to touch the second line. It doesn't. The country's name remains. The sun falls and I choose to walk away.
I have not yet told the whole truth of that story to you, but I will soon. Not now, but soon.
Today, a year later, I spent most of the day on the lake shore in Milwaukee. It was a sunny day, the shores were full of people trying to get some sun, excited about the heat and eager for the summer to come. I joined them, eager too for the heat, though it was still too cold for my liking. And it was the first time I think I've seen a beach full of people but with absolutely no one in the water. Weird.
I sat on the sand, moving it between my toes. Friends joined me. Peggy, Tia, Crystassany. Erin couldn't find us but made her own offering. I sang some songs. drew pictures, wrote a little. I offered my last writings in Peru a year ago to the lake. Peggy offered her own poem of the lake's wisdom. Reflecting on the new life that has come, what I wouldn't have learned otherwise, the blessings next to the wounds. A new gift of rose petals from my birthday, the old pills that overpowered me. An offering to the lake, to the God of the lake, the God of creation, from which all things come.
I feel the sun on my back.
I've walked these shores before.
In times of ice
and burning winds.
Then I was here alone.
Now the shores are full, desperate for sun touched skin.
But we still walk with our shoes on.
I don't recognize this place,
though
I have been here before.
Maybe that is the lesson.
To trust myself.
Te quiero,
Peru.
The waves wash the first part away. I wait for the lake to touch the second line. It doesn't. The country's name remains. The sun falls and I choose to walk away.
Wednesday, March 14, 2012
Something shifted.
We do not protect ourselves or others with lies or half-truths or silence. Only the truth frees us.
I did need a mother. But I needed my own mother.
I'm paying attention to who shows up. And who doesn't.
Something shifted.
Today the sun came out and I felt warmth. I had forgotten the feeling of warmth. I didn't realize I could forget that. But the sun came out and bore down to darken me back into who I am. And who I am not.
Why am I afraid to speak truth? I think I risk losing the lies we cling to. And I risk freedom.
She says if you need courage, do Virabhadrasana II. Warrior.
My mother came to visit me in Milwaukee for a week for my birthday. It was the best birthday present I could ask for. There were many gifts that she gave me. The gift of presence, of time, of conversation, relaxation, of a ton of really good food, chorizo, pavo, nacatamales, gallo pinto. Laughter, tears, the right values of spending time with people instead of going out to see stuff. That's invaluable. I am my mother's daughter.
I got out of the yogashala today and I didn't put my shoes back on. I walked barefoot for almost 3 years back in the day, but I started wearing shoes again when the heightened risk of hookworm scared me into disconnecting again from the ground that sustains me. The cold was unbearable to my skin, so the disconnection was sustained. Today I took off my shoes again. I had to pay attention to the ground. And walk without fear.
I sign my emails "Courage" because that's always what I think I need. I used to pray always for strength because that's what I thought I needed too. But I think I'm wrong. I don't need strength or courage. I think I'm good on those. There is something else that I don't even know I need. But once I know that I need it, I will no longer need it.
Freedom? Peace? Love for all people, all of creation? Healing?
I will still practice Virabhadrasana.
I did need a mother. But I needed my own mother.
I'm paying attention to who shows up. And who doesn't.
Something shifted.
Today the sun came out and I felt warmth. I had forgotten the feeling of warmth. I didn't realize I could forget that. But the sun came out and bore down to darken me back into who I am. And who I am not.
Why am I afraid to speak truth? I think I risk losing the lies we cling to. And I risk freedom.
She says if you need courage, do Virabhadrasana II. Warrior.
My mother came to visit me in Milwaukee for a week for my birthday. It was the best birthday present I could ask for. There were many gifts that she gave me. The gift of presence, of time, of conversation, relaxation, of a ton of really good food, chorizo, pavo, nacatamales, gallo pinto. Laughter, tears, the right values of spending time with people instead of going out to see stuff. That's invaluable. I am my mother's daughter.
I got out of the yogashala today and I didn't put my shoes back on. I walked barefoot for almost 3 years back in the day, but I started wearing shoes again when the heightened risk of hookworm scared me into disconnecting again from the ground that sustains me. The cold was unbearable to my skin, so the disconnection was sustained. Today I took off my shoes again. I had to pay attention to the ground. And walk without fear.
I sign my emails "Courage" because that's always what I think I need. I used to pray always for strength because that's what I thought I needed too. But I think I'm wrong. I don't need strength or courage. I think I'm good on those. There is something else that I don't even know I need. But once I know that I need it, I will no longer need it.
Freedom? Peace? Love for all people, all of creation? Healing?
I will still practice Virabhadrasana.
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