The Sweat Lodge, Love and Connection

We had a sweat lodge for the young, early recovery guys from Back2Basics, some of whom I have as clients.  For most of them, it was their first sweat experience.  It s a bit hard to explain, but if a person transcends the physical discomfort of the lodge, it is possible to feel strongly the sense of connection, love and compassion that I have described elsewhere.  If you are in a dark confined space with several others focusing on the same thing, it can be a truly awesome and magical experience.  I know of no other way to achieve that feeling, regularly, for most people.  I achieve it daily through meditation and it can also be achieved in very intimate groups, when a sacred space is established.  At any rate, they all seemed to get there and were very moved by the experience.

Waking Up the Demon

While working with a client, he stated that he had blown up in anger at another person and that it did not feel good.  I commented that it did not feel good to “wake up the demon”, which is exactly what it feels like to me.  I also suggested that he approach the person he blew up at, apologize, express caring and compassion and provide some minimal explanation of his behavior.  Techniques I have used to put the “demon” back to sleep.

Earlier in the day a friend was talking to me about having observed someone else call his x-wife, “you f - ing bi –“.  No one deserves to be talked to like that.  Yet I have said similar things, and still have the capability inside me, if enough hurt and fear is applied.  The demon used to be very close to the surface and I would express it frequently.  Now I generally conduct myself with love, compassion and understanding and the demon is deep inside and never acted on.  As far as I can tell, we all have the capability of either and our behavior depends on which part we choose to “feed”.  People do not hurt other people unless they have been hurt, themselves.

The Fear of Change

Today, I am scared.  My work schedule has changed.  I am doing more.  I feel like more is being asked of me, by God and I have not been able to access that strong feeling washing over me and saying “everything is going to be O.K., I am with you”.  I know that I am the one preventing that feeling, because of my own fear.  The feeling of things being all right is not there and the fear is.  I also know that this will pass, but the feeling of fear persists.  Writing about it and simply being with the fear helps, a lot.  I begin to get glimpses of that feeling of everything being in divine order, being just a tool and not in control of much of anything.

The Honor of Being Treated Like a Puppy

We had a sweat lodge last evening and I left after three of the four rounds due to some exhaustion and beginning cramping.  Long experience has taught me that I would feel quite a bit worse as soon as I left the lodge.  I did.  One of the participants had brought their dog, a large female mastiff. When I left the lodge and began to lay down, she nudged and nosed me to check if I was alright, which she has done many times in the past.  On this occasion, she persisted in her nudging and then gently (for a large dog!) tried to get me to play.  She was treating me like one of her puppies - quite an honor!  It is quite an experience to connect with another animal the way I do with other people.  I finally covered myself with a blanket to stop her and she laid down next to me, pushing her body against mine and we both just laid there.

We Are Not in Control

It is certainly not unusual but I work with a person who seems to like to think he is in charge of maintaining order in his own personal life and with respect to events in his work life.  He seems most comfortable when things are going according to his plans and gets noticeably agitated when they do not.  I can certainly identify with his approach since I used to be that way.  Before recovery I was quite a bit more extreme in my desire to have events fit my plans.  During recovery I have experienced increasing faith and trust along with a decreasing desire for events to fit my plans.  At this point, I choose to believe that we are not in charge of much of anything.  That way I can live in the moment, without the stress of trying to control things and with maximal acceptance coupled with minimal expectations.  Desire to control still comes up periodically, which I find to be a somewhat amusing indication of my humanity.

Symbolic Resolution of my Alligator Dream

Without having made a conscious choice on my part, beyond getting in better shape, my spiritual alligators are now swimming around and I am feeding them and caring for them, without knowing what that means.  Faith??  Understanding is not required.

I was a bit surprised by the strength and intensity of the feeling of love and affection that I felt for the alligators/crocodiles as I cared for them during the meditation.  The feeling just washed over me and reminded me of the same feeling I get often during the day when interacting with someone, being hugged by a tree, embraced by sacred herbs or a variety of other things.  A magical feeling that I did not know about until my close connection with what I call God.  I have only felt that feeling before due to my interactions with God.

Symbolic, Spiritual Alligators

Last night I had another dream about my grandfather’s pond, a dream symbol for my spiritual condition.  In the dream the water was very clear and the pond was large and deep, suggesting that I am being very open and clear as a channel for the God power.  Unfortunately, there were also five alligators (I keep saying/thinking alligator, but they were slender, like crocodiles).  They were all suspended above the pond where the stone wall and big tree used to be, near the dam.  At any rate, I threw dirt wads at one of them in order to wake him up and he did.  He dropped into the pond, swam near me as I laid on the path on the house side of the dam and then I woke up.  There was a definite feeling of forbidding like with the snake vision. Between the rattlesnake and the alligator, I suspect I am doing something not healthy for my spirituality.  Perhaps becoming too comfortable and complacent.

Maria suggested that I actually needed to wake up all five alligators, that there is a lot of power there.  She is right, though I know little beyond that.  I am fearful of waking them up.  I have misused power in the past and I am wary of doing so again.  All I know at this point is that I need to be less passive and be more aggressive about getting in better shape, physically, which will have an impact spiritually/emotionally.  Also I need to look into the possibility of a reciprocal therapy license in MD.  Each is proactive and goes along with the possibility of relocating, instead of taking a purely passive role.  This puts me in a strange situation, since I am totally happy with my situation here!

The Importance of Sorting Time

A quiet day, no clients, I began by doing exercises, cleaning bathrooms, doing paperwork, in preparation for tomorrow and set up the splitter for the next lodge.  I “split wood and carried water” (Zen saying), a good, solid, grounding day.  As I generally do, I also spent a fair amount of time in quiet contemplation of my own process and the process of those lives I touch, what I call  sorting time , I find that a substantial portion of each day needs to be spent in the quiet solitude of sorting time.

Animal Visions

Last night I got up a bit before two AM, my regular time, and did some spiritual writing until just before four and then soaked/communed for a while in the hot-tube.  I then reclined in front of the stereo to listen to monotonous music with earphones and do some deep meditation and relaxation for about two more hours.  Sometime around five (some light was beginning) my meditation was interrupted by a rattling rattle snake right by my right ear.  It had to be an auditory vision, since there was no snake there.  I was quite startled and looked all over for it!  There was a definite feeling of forbidding and a need to pay attention.  I continued to look for the snake during the day and the next.  It reminds me of having “seen” a California Condor a couple of years ago, which was also not there, physically.  I looked for it for days and kept checking the paper, thinking that people would report a bird with a nine foot wingspan that does not live here. No one did.  I have come to realize that the Condor is a protector spirit of mine.

Men's Group, Love and Connection

We had our men's group tonight, seven of us.  We are a tight little group and we all care deeply about each other.  It amazes me how much individual and group strength can develop from the love and support of a close knit group like that.  As I pointed out tonight, the world could use more of this sort of thing.  The strength/power there costs nothing and includes no materialism, bells or whistles, but it leads to a sense of fulfillment one can find no other way.  It also makes distractions, drama and addictions unnecessary.  As the saints say, it is not possible to find that level of fulfillment through anything in the created order but I sure have tried!