Category: Uncategorized (So Far)

I promise you, if I can do it, everyone can do it.

I lived with blocks for so long, and carried the weight of the despair the blocks engendered, a deadweight that first crushed out joy and its myriad colors, leaving only a flat gray numbness, and then under that relentless pressure, the numbness crystallized into the blackness of annihilating depression, almost uncuttably hard, an anti-diamond in the heart of the soul.

For years I tried to figure my way out of the problem using my big ol’ brain, not understanding–indeed, incapable of understanding–that a major part of the problem was the big brain itself. You’ll never solve the problem of lack of feeling by thinking about it.

For years, I struggled. Then, one day, a generous teacher showed me the door to feeling. It was like: HOLY SHIT, THERE’S A DOOR.

Once the door was open, it was pretty easy to walk through. I mean, what other choice did I have?

In recent weeks I have watched with joy and pleasure and wonder as the flow in my life has expanded and expanded and expanded. But I’ve seen little change in the flow around and within my daily work.

I’m seeing growth throughout my life, except in the area of my work. Surely that is indicative of a block, yes?

Yet I believe myself to be poised on the cusp of change there, too, a change as devoutly desired and as necessary as any in my life.

So then, what can I actively do to most effectively bring about that change?

The expansion in my life doesn’t feel like something I have created, per se. I mean, I continue my practices–I center, I meditate, I cultivate energy and flow consciously through my body whenever I think of it. But what I am receiving now in return seems like far more than I have put in. The other day I wrote, “Take one step toward the universe and the universe will take one million toward you.” That’s a nice turn of phrase, easy to say, but when I really confront it and accept that it appears to be true, I find that it opens up a whole lot of questions about who we really are and what our role during our time on this planet is really supposed to be. Big questions. The biggest.

When I look closely, it feels like the main action I have done to cultivate this expansion is to welcome it. To delight in its presence, to tell it, “Come on in,” that it is always welcome here. As I’ve gotten to know it, I invite its presence more and more.

The major stuckness in my life is in respect to my work. I haven’t much seen an opening there, even as everything else has opened. I want that opening. I’m ready for it, even as I acknowledge that, because I have been blocked there for so long, it is likely to be a hell of a ride when the opening starts.

Okay, then. I’m ready. I’ll strap in.

Welcome, flow. I invite you in.

Here we go.

I have been writing since maybe the summer solstice of 2015 about the benefits that would accrue to my work here if only I would get off the treadmill of having to finish each day’s piece on the day I’m publishing it. I’ve written about it and written about it … but I’ve never really done anything about it.

When we declare that we’re going to change, but we do not change, it’s worth asking ourselves, What is the payoff for staying where I am? Because clearly I am actually choosing that payoff over changing.

In recent weeks I have been watching the flow in my life expand and expand and expand. Obviously I have made space for that expansion. But in my writing, I am doing the same thing I’ve been doing since I started the Free Refills project. I wonder: Why am I not making space for expansion in that area? And what would it look like if I did?

If the story I told yesterday was a description of what happens when life is lived in deep flow–and it was; the magic of that weekend did not begin with the coincidence of discovering Bishop Briggs performing in Portland the next night–then surely it requests we ask the question, “What else could we create in our lives if only we opened ourselves to that flow?”

These past several days, I have been in Portland, having the most excellent adventures. On Sunday, during Omelet Day, Marie and I were listening to Bishop Briggs (whose goddamn sexy music you should listen to), and I said, “I’d really like to see her live. I should look up tour dates.” So I did. In a delightful coincidence, she was playing in Portland Monday (i.e. last) night.

My flight back to Denver was scheduled for Monday night, so on Monday morning, as part of my practice of saying Yes to opportunities, I looked into changing my ticket. Well, my budget fare would have dictated that I more or less had to buy a new ticket entirely, which meant I was facing spending about $300 to see the show, which felt a little steep. I said, “Oh well,” and let the idea go.

About half an hour later, I got a call from the airline, offering me a voucher in exchange for postponing my flight until Tuesday morning.

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That’s enough, right? That’s a complete story right there. The airline called me. Ever hear of that happening before? Me either.

But the story continues: I bought my ticket to the show straightaway, but Marie wanted to think about it, and then didn’t have time to check for herself until later. By the time she checked, the only seats still available were the next price-tier up from what I’d paid–too much, in other words. So I said, “Come with me to the venue. When we pick up my ticket from will call, we’ll see if they’ve released any other seats, and you can decide then whether or not to join me.”

When we went to get my ticket, I asked the woman in the ticket booth if there were any seats available at the same price as mine near where I’d be seated. She looked at the seating chart, then looked up at me. She said, “The seat right next to you is available.”

I believe the look on my face was what we call a knowing smile. I glanced at Marie. Marie, who understood completely, smiled and handed over her credit card.

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And because you were wondering: Bishop Briggs absolutely killed it.

Late last week, in the aftermath of the terrible tragedy in Las Vegas, I asserted that the only way forward, the only thing likely to ever truly help, is love.

My declaration was a bit tepid, weighted with sadness as it is. “Love?” some part of me responded. “The earth is bathed in blood. Don’t talk to me of love.”

But nevertheless I sought out wisdom on the nature of love, and found it.

If your heart hurts, as mine does, may these words be a salve for you, as they have been for me.

If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing.

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears. When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me. Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

–1 Corinthians, chapter 13

I do not particularly call for gun control. First of all, Second Amendment jurisprudence is what it is, and seems unlikely to change. Second of all, any proposed legislation has to actually help solve the problem. All too often, after a horrible event, we hear people say, “We have to do something.” No. We have to do something that works.

But mostly, my rationale is cultural. There are many, many law-abiding gun owners in this country, and many of them have been conditioned to believe in a terrible angry fear that we are coming for their guns. Would anything genuinely good happen if we actually were?

There can only be one truly positive way forward. We must meet their fear with love, again and again and again.

I haven’t forgotten that just yesterday I questioned the value of this very approach. Sometimes it feels so toothless and naive. But what else is there?

Late last week and and through last weekend, I experienced a rush of positive energies. At drop-in tennis that Thursday, I found my way to an energetic shift like I’d never experienced before. On Friday, during my drive back from New Mexico, I made space to do some processing of the events of the past few weeks. (The northern New Mexico landscape, beautiful and remote, supports that space. Even the interstate is nearly empty, making the drive between Las Vegas, NM, and Raton a great time to sink into whatever you’re feeling and thinking). And then it was a great weekend, two days of open energy, including a fun party and some good times with friends. I went to bed Sunday night exhausted but with an open heart. I woke up Monday morning feeling similarly open-hearted, and, yeah, went straight to my phone to see if any of the people I’m currently thrilled to hear from had sent me a message since the night before. No messages. Since the phone was in my hands, I did a quick glance at the New York Times website, and that’s when I learned of the massacre in Las Vegas.

It hit me with the weight of fist. The bruise it left on my heart, remains tender with sadness.

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As I have watched the expansion of flow in my life, manifesting in ways that are often indistinguishable from magic, I know that this exact same expansion is increasingly available to all who seek it. We have only begun to glimpse our highest potential.

In the same world in which flow expands by the day, a man possessed by some cold demonic hatred brought an arsenal into a hotel room and rained death into a crowd whose only crime was enjoying themsevles.

On my good days, I believe the increase in flow is a great gathering wave, ready to sweep toward a better world all that lies before it.

On the bad ones–like when I wake to news of a bloodbath–I wonder if this will forever be our fate: that every step forward will be met with a commensurate act of resistance. If our surging movement toward completeness evokes a sickness of annihilation.

I pray: can not the surging wave of love put an end to all this evil? But also: what other choice do we have, but to try?

I’ve always enjoyed myself in Las Vegas. Yes, it is less a city than a giant machine to separate people from their money, around which a city has been built, and it is crass, sometimes even hideous, but people go there to have a good time, and I believe it is a good thing when people go somewhere and have a good time. I’ve gone to Las Vegas for many reasons, including for concerts, and when I’ve gone to Las Vegas for a concert, I’ve always had a really good time.

I wonder, then, if an attack like this is not just an attack on the people at the event nor on people as a collective, but on the very idea of the goodness of the experience itself, that it is good and pleasurable to go somewhere with thousands of other people for the express purpose of experiencing joy together. If the goal is to make us cringe at the offer of connection and choose instead fear and pain. If the demon that possessed the body that fired all those bullets sought not only to kill people, but also to destroy all that is good and joyful, and in so doing sought to drive us into the demon’s own madness, and thus perpetuate itself in the world.

Yesterday I posted a joke, though it did not really feel like a day for joking. I had wanted to acknowledge my sadness about what happened in Las Vegas, but every simple expression defied me.

I posted a joke because I couldn’t find a way through the sadness to say something useful. It seems I still can’t.

I’m trying, though. My drafts on the subject stretch on and on. I feel an obligation to speak, but nothing I say seems to matter at all.

Yesterday I posted a joke. Today, I wish I had another one to tell.