Thursday, January 28, 2010

Today is the first day......And today....And today...




I beg you, to have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Don't search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer.
Rainer Maria Rilke, 1903; in Letters to a Young Poet

My friend K sent me something lovely yesterday, my horoscope. It said:
Leo July 21–August 22
You become more and more aware that you’re working with powerful forces this week. They’re not only cosmic forces but people around you will be acting them out. This is an extraordinary piece of information … to know that people in our environments act out planetary motion. Observe all work realities this especially this week. Remember also that from loss comes profound new life.

People in my personal cipher have been going in, up and through it lately. There is no denying that now is a time for serious personal growth for so many - those who are ready and willing (and some not so willing!) to do the hard painful work. Those of us who barely made it out of 2009 are being confronted with our quest - get it together baby. What?! Where is my lottery win, my all expense paid vacation, my date with Will Smith? Don't I get something for making it through last year fairly sane? Yes, you get the great joy of continuing in your evolution. I feel ripped off.

A friend and I used to say that "ignorance is bliss" but the fact that we know that makes us too aware to ever be blissful. Yea, dealing in philosophical syllogisms was our version of fun in high school. But there is some truth to that statement but also a huge gift in it too. Because we experience pain we can really know joy. Someone told me that living in joy was as simple as changing your mind. Really? That seemed awfully naive to me - just change your mind? Then why isn't everyone living in joy? Because it is a lot of work. A lot of work. And requires constant vigilance. And it takes a long time - you don't see the results as quickly as you do working out. Being on the low end of the patience spectrum I always wanted things to happen as soon as possible if not before. I lose interest in routine, constant prepartion and what I perceived to be the drudgery of every day life. And mastering those things felt like a huge waste of time. But they are foundation choices that give me somewhere to go. And I have been struggling with this same issue my entire life. This is my Galileo moment - my "get it right this lifetime" lesson.

I've started re-reading old journals so I can see that I have gotten better in this one aspect of my personal growth. I have made major strides. And there is still a long road to go. I have been really hard on myself most of my life - as I am sure a great many women are. And now I think that the best way to keep moving through my evolution is to be more gentle with myself. To accept those things I don't love about myself and those things I cannot change immediately. To live them openly and fully and not push them out of my mind. And with time I, we will all live our way into the answers.

Thursday, January 7, 2010

And if I'm crying while I write these words

is it absurd of is it just me? - Tears for Fears

Yesterday I found an old friend on Facebook. First I found him on classmates.com and then something said check out facebook. He has an incredibly common name so searching for him previously had yielded no responses. But now he is friends with a common friend and has a picture posted. It is definitely him. And it doesn't look as though he visits his site too often so it may be awhile before I get a response. Or I might not get a response at all.

After the last 20 years of my life I feel almost like I need to be in a twelve-step program for my transgressions of youth and stupidity. The people I didn't understand and value. The situations where I put my interests above those of others. The times when I took more than I even considered giving much less gave. I feel the need to make amends. But what I have realized is that most people don't remember the things that you remember. Your bone of contention with someone is usually not their bone of contention with you, if in fact they even have one. So I am loathe to bring up past sad moments when I reconnect with an old friend. If I would like to rekindle my friendship with them I ask them if they have anything they are still upset with me about, or any questions from our collective past that they would like cleared up. If they have a past pain then we can work through that and I can apologize. I don't know if it does anyone any good to bring up things they are no longer angry about - why so you can feel better and they can get angry all over again? I find making amends to be more about the person you are asking forgiveness from than making yourself feel better. That still feels awfully selfish. It's about you feeling better not healing a rift. So, I clear up my hurts away from the person.

Recently I contacted a person I was friends with in High School. I called this person to get them to come to our reunion. They were less than enthusiastic when speaking to me. My initial thought was - "Don't you have caller i.d. If you didn't want to speak with me why did you answer the phone?" But then I realized that maybe that's what they wanted. Was to speak to me and act uninterested or even cold. And that's okay. I am really learning and accepting the fact that I cannot take the actions of other people personally. And I have always wanted to be one of those people who kept friends from elementary school through each and every job I've ever held. But I am not that girl. Maintaining the few close relationships I have now is a lot of work and I am not doing the best at those. It is even that much more daunting to think about maintaining relationships with people even more dispersed. And that is my process. That is my choice. So I do my best to treat everyone with respect and attention when I am with them or they are in my virtual cipher. Just taking it all one day at a time.

We are blessed may we recognize the blessing

in peace

Keisha

Friday, January 1, 2010

My Obligatory New Year's Post


Good Morning Loves!
I think I was "supposed" to spend the entire week cleaning my house and cooking scrumptious meals and getting ready to enter the new year with all the things I want to manifest in my life - done. That's not happening. The house is a wreck, there are dishes to be washed and I think we had Panera for dinner last night. But what is in intact and markedly different is my children. They are happy. They are not fighting with each other and they have spent a significant amount of time with me and Ilya this week. Being pampered, cared for and paid attention to. That more than tops the list - that is the list. Have a wonderful year, dear hearts. Know that it starts with a wonderful day, hour, second.

What follows is something I read on twitter this morning. It is from Esthero (Oh, how I love her) and was written by a friend of hers called Jimi Dava. I know him - in my bones. This story is my story. And I realize all of our stories.

Respect
Nanda Mama aka Keisha


Dava in Hollywood: Episode XIII : “The Phoenix”
on this last night of 2009 we find our hero typing away on his laptop….
and this is what he writes….

a distance great i have traveled to deliver this message to you, to present you with this little gift of me.
take it for what its worth. its one size fits all.

its very difficult for me to ask for help, even harder for me to accept it.

i cant remember the precise where, or when i was taught this lesson, but to me, asking for help meant that I wasn’t good enough, that i was weak and lacking, it meant that alone i was not sufficient, to me it meant that i was in need.
and that to me, was, unacceptable.

asking for help always raised the volume of the voices inside of me that have tried to defeat me, and so to quiet the screaming i sentenced myself into the cage of silence, where no one, not even i
could hear me cry out for some help.

So i learned how to keep things in, how to hide and hold that which pained me most, i learned how to put on appearances for the sake of others and for the the light under which i chose to bathe.
fueled by the weakness i saw in my father, i became what i wanted him to always be. STRENGTH.

but, looking back now, i wonder how well it has served me. in some ways, in ways that will always remain upright and steadfast, it has kept me alive, and in other ways, i see today that it’s killing me.

I was conditioned at a very young age to be a “man” looking back now, i think i was conditioned to be “the man”
but what does it mean to be the man?

perhaps it means just to be, a man, to be able to suffer the consequence of your ignorance, to be able to stand up when you have been knocked down, and not feel the shame of the fall but rather the pride of the rise. perhaps its the understanding that we you and I are not perfect, and within the search for our innate and intimate perfection we must accept the fact that though we are godlike, god we are not. perhaps being a man, the man, any man, is to be able to look around you and trust that you are surrounded by the same. The same greatness that we seek within must be appreciated and allowed to thrive in others. And perhaps to be able to trust the fact that you too, like I, am capable of greatness is
the true mark of a man, THE MAN.

For inside of this misunderstood and poorly translated man, lives a soul that wants nothing but to love you, and wants nothing but your love. and that scares the living shit out of me to admit, because that would mean that i have to trust you, and perhaps even more frightening, that i have to trust myself. it means that i need you, and your help. and that again, is very hard for me accept.

I have been so afraid to reveal my weakness and my faults, my vulnerability and my pain, because i thought you wouldn’t like me anymore. i thought you would judge me, i thought you’d find out that i wasnt worth fighting for.
I tried to be what i thought you wanted, rather needed me to be. because i think all i ever wanted was your acceptance, even if i rejected my innermost self in the process.

Growing up i was always ashamed of where i came from, being different, being Georgian in a world brand new, being called a “communist” by the children of democracy, being a Jew in a secular world, being the son of drug addicted gangster, having fucked up teeth, being skinny…. for the ideas of our self perfection seemed to exist within me before i was ever taught the definition of the word.

Today, i realize that the greatness in me, you and us, lies in the fact that we have withstood and overcome many of the preconceived notions that we have carried for way too long, i realize that strength comes from facing your weakness and not blinking away. I realize that being different is the greatest attribute we are blessed with. and so today i celebrate the strange peculiar me that has come this far down a road more or less traveled and i say to you i am ready, ready to ask for your help, and i might just accept it his time around.

So today, on this last day of a year i wish i could forget, and yet this will be a year i will always remember, i shed the cloth of my insecurity and ignite the flame of my rebirth, and stand before to see who the fuck i am and perhaps may i reflect you too.

so i am asking you…..

I am asking you kindly dearly and sincerely to help me, help me live a better life.

I am asking for deeper connections, i am asking for the contact of our eyes, i am asking for the shedding of our collective fears to touch each other and to be touched back.

I am asking you to rise with me from the ashes of this fire.

I am asking you to wake up with me, i am asking you to walk shoulder to shoulder with me, i am asking you for your hand and i’m offering you mine.

I am asking you to dream, your dream, and to help me achieve mine.

I am asking you to let go of our regrets, to release our egos and to allow us to penetrate deeper into ourselves so ultimately we can know each other.

I am asking you to help me share my knowledge and ask you to teach me yours.

I am asking you to help me be more present, i am asking you to help me speak more truth.

I am asking you to rise and live your life the way you have always wanted to, i am asking you to be my heroes, i am asking you to lead me with your examples.

I am asking you to help me forgive myself, and i am asking you to allow yourselves and I the ability to ask for help.

I am asking you for your help to help me love you more.

I am asking you for inspiration.

I am asking you to teach me how to be a man…

thank you for letting me speak to you.

I see you. all of you.

2010….. here we come.

Happy New Year…

love dava.

photo: Christina Cohn