self: “Isn’t it great that you’ve had fabulous home practice all week? You’ve enjoyed it and – hee hee – you haven’t even done abs once this week!”

Buddha Mind: (with a big grin) Yeahhhh…….

It’s official. I am not a cool mom. I am going to be known at the high school as the strange, Buddhist, Pacifist mom.

My boys are big gamers and are always scheming to get the latest game for the Wii or their DSI’s. Problem is, so many of the games are fight – simulated. Even the E rated games.

I try to be resonable, but at the end of the day, I just think war is insane, 90% of the time. Is somebody seriously threatening our freedom? Let’s become warriors. Is there terrible, horrific injustice or genocide going on somewhere? Warrior time. We THINK some guy is threatening America and stock-piling nukes, but we have no proof? Definitely time to chill out.

At the end of the day, I don’t want my kids pretending to shoot things, kill things or strategize for destruction for a good portion of their day. I don’t want to pass by their room, in my house, and hear “Kill him!” or “Got him!” I don’t want my 4-year old daughter exposed to that. And – even if the target of all of this is just monsters, even if there is no blood – doesn’t make it OK.

There are so many things that I am relaxed about, but as far as being a warrior goes, it’s time to defend my house. I want to raise thoughtful, mindful, loving people. I want to give my kids the skills and ability to question the status-quo, American style of pillaging and plundering and living a defensive life. If they grow up, move out, and set up every violent game on the planet in their dorm room, if they want to join the army – so be it. I can handle that. I can’t handle them leaving the house and knowing that I didn’t do what I could to teach them about loving-kindness, non-violence and looking at conflict in a new and productive way.

Until then, I’m OK being the kill-joy. Pun intended.

I don’t know why this makes me laugh…

Me: What should we have for dinner?

Kieran: Something healthy.

Drew: Olives!!! I want olives for dinner. Wait… I want bacon. Bacon for dinner.

Reminds me of last week when Drew went to Trader Joe’s with me and insisted on carrying the bacon home with her cradled in her arms like a baby. It’s the only meat she’ll eat and she asks for it all of the time. We don’t make it often, so it’s a huge treat. I think she’d rather have bacon than chocolate. Is she really my child?

—-

A few weeks ago, my body was craving meat. I started eating better and my body still craved meat, my BODY was asking for it. So, a little bit of chicken here and there has made my body much happier for now. It’s interesting to try to listen to intuition and just honor what my body asks for without morality judgments. It definitely feels good to not have to worry SO much about what to serve for dinner to please everybody.

Something healthy with olives. And a small side of bacon for the princess.

Why am I constantly surprised when I find the words for things I can’t find words for? So what if I wasn’t the one to use them first..

My beliefs have radically changed over the last several years. As a result, things have become more clear and I am less attached to my beliefs. When my old paradigm dissolved, it went with a big fight. I was really convinced that the belief structure I was clinging to was absolute truth. I had a long list of reasons why. I was still open-minded, but there were certain core beliefs that were Dogma for me: doctrine set in stone. Any new information I was considering would only be accepted if it fit into that given construct of what I already viewed as True. (And why I couldn’t for the life of me fully grasp, The Power of Now the first time I read it!)

Thankfully for me, I hit a huge, massive depression. It was either drive off of the freeway and leave this earth quietly (which seemed like a refreshing thought at the time), or try anything and everything to survive and scramble some semblance of happiness together. I looked at my little boys and I knew I wanted to figure it out. For me, healing started with physical yoga and opening my mind to try ANYTHING that might help. I was in desperation and I knew it. I tried aura readings, meditation, counseling, medication. Piece by piece I was able to glean little things here and there that helped. What I discovered was that my past spiritual framework provided me with very little REAL knowledge on the subject of happiness, what it was, where it came from, and how to live in it’s abundance. I had no clue before hand, what the architecture of the Spirit, or the Mind were. I started to wake up to things that were right in front of me that I never saw before. I couldn’t get enough yoga and buddhist philosophy. I still can’t. Not because it’s superior, not because I feel that it’s truth with a capital T, but because I see so clearly that much of it is helpful, and much of it matches up with reality. I have found that by living what Thich Nhat Hanh said, “Your own life is the instrument for which we experiment with the truth”, that I’m waking up more every day as I work honestly through these teachings.

Now that I’m well versed and practiced in this yoga world of mine, and I feel very little suffering in comparison to years past – I’ve been wondering… Have I become a DOGMA SHOPPER? You know, switching one paradigm out for another, hanging on to my new beliefs and dogma so tightly that I can’t see the clarity around me? I’ve decided that I’m hugely relieved to be asking myself that question. 

A while back, when having lunch with a friend who shared my old belief system and had really helped me back during my dark depression days, she was asking about my shift and I was able to share with her how happy I am now. Her response was “I’m sorry”. She was so upset that I had left behind what she saw as true, that she couldn’t see happiness right in front of her.  It’s true, we need some structure of belief in order to function. We need a helpful viewpoint of the world in order TO function in peace and happiness. Having said that, I don’t want to end up living in a kooky world of magical thinking, replacing one set of self-soothing man-made beliefs for another, but still having no proximity to deeper awareness. I do not want to spin my wheels in quicksand.

It seems to me that the key to functioning healthfully within the given belief structure, is to just hold on softly and gently. To hold those beliefs in your hand and keep looking at them from every angle. Work them. Feel them –  but never feel that they are yours to hold on to for dear life. Only hold on to what works and what is simple and clear right out in the open. Dogma seems to be the death of personal enlightenment and to be a little selfish here, I don’t think I can go on living without those a-ha moments. Those times when we discover truths so obvious, so simple that they are hiding right out in the open, under our noses. A-HA… click, got it! 

No, I don’t want to just be a dogma shopper, simply replacing one set of beliefs for a new-improved version. I want to experience more clarity. Not because I want Truth, but because I want peace. I want happiness. 

In true yoga fashion, things are working in synchronicity. I found myself listening to Adyashanti again tonight, and of course – he is speaking much more eloquently, the exact ramblings of my mind. 

Not to be confused with Little Bean.

A good dharma talk can stick with me for quite a while. Today I’m resonating with something Adyashanti said in answer to a question about how to deal with anger. The woman dealing with anger said, “I keep trying to let it go, and it doesn’t seem to be working.” Adya responded quickly (and comically) with “Forget about letting it go! Letting it go is SO over-rated. Let it BE. What you allow to be readily be, then falls away.” He described the attempt to let something go as holding a piece of sticky fly paper. You’re holding on to it and it’s sticking to you and no matter how hard you’re trying to shake it off it stubbornly sticks. He said that when you allow those things that are perceived as negative to BE, the letting it be is what actually allows it to transform. He said, “letting go is the only way to go, because it’s happening anyway. Anything else is insane.”

The interesting part was when he expounded a bit. We’re all sitting there, wondering – OK… but how do we let it be? Adyashanti suggested that we find out what surrender was. When we’ve got that concept - this is surrender – then DO a little less than surrender. From that, I seemed to grasp that it’s not in the effort of surrender at all, but in the awareness of surrender. In my understanding, the minute I effort into surrender, it is no longer surrender!

I had such a great experience tonight listening to a Dharma talk with Adyashanti this afternoon. I was left wondering in all of my seeking and spiritual experiences up until now, have I experienced awareness experiencing Laurie, or Laurie experiencing awareness? Truthfully I think it’s been both – that seems to be the big difference between those a’ha moments that shift consciousness and dissolve the big ME, and the cognitive understanding of all things spiritual that never quite hits the nail on the head exactly.

This path of being a yogi in the modern world can be a lonely one. There’s no correlated, prescribed path – just one person at a time attempting to carve their own trail and keep their eyes wide open at the same time. It is an adventure to be sure, and a courageous and playful way to live – but it is not a common approach to life.

Living like a yogi means paying great attention. It means not talking smack about those around you. It means finding the most healthy solutions to your issues in life. It means being willing to listen, willing to be honest in the deepest sense of the word. It means approaching what others view as trials and struggle as the ultimate guru, a playful teaching moment. It means living without optional suffering to the best of our ability. It means learning to be comfortable with discomfort. I value and appreciate the friends and teachers in my life who understand and share this approach to living, and with whom I share this journey. While the universe seems to be taking a turn towards greater consciousness, I still find that for much of the time I feel alone as I try to incorporate living as a yogi with this very material, ego-gripped culture.

I don’t say this because I’m sad feeling alone, necessarily.  It’s just that sometimes I wonder if I’m sane. Add to my questionable sanity, the fact that I was raised Mormon and am linked to the religion in a tribal way forever-more, and things start to get interesting.

Mormonism is like this:

Mormons – for the most part, swim together. It’s like a school of fish that instinctively know which way they’re going, who’s on the inside, who’s on the outside and how to work together for the benefit of the group. There are so many wonderful things about moving in the group, especially when you really like the fish you’re swimming with.

As a Mormon, I used to struggle against the stream, so to speak. I did my best to stay in formation with the group but I often did so begrudgingly. As a yogi embracing the depths of honest living, I’ve had to make some changes in my relationship with the church. I don’t embrace anything begrudgingly anymore. I find myself off on my own more often than not. As challenging as it is, I think I’m becoming a stronger swimmer off on my own.

“Enlightenment is not a process of learning, it is a process of unlearning.”  — Dr. Kat Domingo

my long, lost friend. i love you.

i love the dripping off the elbows
in a stream of sweet release.

i love how i wipe you off and push you away
and you forgive me, staying with me anyway
as if your source were infinite.

i love that you aren’t afraid to go deep -
root out all of my shit and expel it
with the joy of a job well done.

i love how friendly you are with gravity.
earthy and clingy.
forming beautiful lakes, streams and pools
on my Manduka.

i love how you dissipate, evaporate and condensate.
making the air thick for the sound of aum,
clinging and sticking long after the flow has stopped.
like a reminder of all that is good.

drip on my friend. drip on.

It’s interesting to me how my real New Year’s resolutions only become clear to me well into January. Do not confuse my fake New Year’s resolutions with my real ones. Last year it became glaringly obvious that I needed to laugh more, so my resolution was to laugh out loud as much as possible. It was a great year! (Much thanks and acknowledgment to YogaDawg, Shamanic Cheerleaders, my children, George W Bush, SNL, 30 Rock, and my niece Amber who has the best sense of humor of anyone I know.)

This year, emerging as a theme is COURAGE. All around me are opportunities to get out of my comfort zone and do what needs to be done. So for this year, my resolution is to do something brave, something out of my comfort zone (almost) every day. I’m finding it extremely easy to find these opportunities of discomfort, and I’m planning to exercise those muscles of courage until they’re strong and reliable.

Today I’m going to try to move faster. I know that sounds lame, but it’s really big for me the big slowpoke. It makes me uncomfortable. I wonder what courageous/uncomfortable opportunities tomorrow will bring…