Tiny, Quiet Revolution

So here I am...5 days in to a new place of being. Exploring something I am completely shocked to find myself exploring. Uncharted parts of me. Shocked and delighted to find myself here.

10 days ago I agreed to do a cleanse for a friend of mine who is launching a new business. I am so fond of her and wanted to support this leap of faith she is taking. Sure, I can do a cleanse for 3 days. To support Neelam.

No big deal.

But the result for me has been monumental. Three days drinking juice has shifted something in me at my very core. Not only was I not hungry, I had no cravings. So different from my past experiences with weight, feeling deprived, wanting to eat everything in sight, using food to slather on my broken heart, my fractured nerves, my unmet needs. Needing it to nurture and protect me. Looking for all the answers at the bottom of my hot fudge sundae. And living with the hatred of the extra 30, then 40, then 50, then 60 pounds. Carrying it around as punishment, as an outward expression of all that I truly believed about myself.

Feeling so lost and desolate in my weight loss journey because I had been to hell and back, done it all, seen it all, heard it all, tried it all and just ending up somewhere broken and wretched and lost. Not knowing if I could or even wanted to find my way back.

And trying to live in acceptance.

Trying so hard.

But it's hard to hear what my body really wants when it was muffled and stifled by all those chocolate chip cookies.

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I met with Neelam months and months and months ago. She's a nutritionist who helps women release weight through proper nutrition and custom meal plans.

It was too much for me. The journey she was proposing I embark on was too much for me. I couldn't face it. I couldn't face starting from scratch and doing it all over again. I couldn't punish, torture and hate myself thin again for all the Blizzards in Dairy Queen. Couldn't do it. Couldn't even think about doing it. Nope, nope, nope. I needed to find my way back. I needed to find the start line and then decide if I even wanted to get there. And mostly I didn't.

Until this 3-day cleanse came along.

Can I face all the mechanics and work involved in losing 30 or 40 or 50 pounds? No. Can I drink fresh-made, all natural juices delivered to my door every day.

Ya, I can do that.

So I started this totally harmless thing and it turned into this REALLY BIG THING! Because, that's it, that's it, that's it. That's my START! I started! No over-analyzing, no overwhelm, no mechanics, no fucking 'weight loss plan', just a start, an opportunity, a new chance at feeling better.

A start. That's all I needed, Neelam. A start. A chance. A new beginning to a desperately and deeply unsettling problem. And isn't that what it's all about?? Isn't this the crux of humanity? Isn't the core of any good friendship, relationship - or business for that matter - about having someone stand at the mouth of a whatever dark cave you're stuck in waving their flashlight, calling your name and showing you the way out.

Quote of the Day

I have had this post sitting in my inbox since SUNDAY NIGHT and I have not posted it because it SCARES me. It scares me because it's from the Bible and the preachy, religious undertone makes me uncomfortable. But here it is, tapping its foot and saying 'Are you gonna go ahead and post me already or what?'

So I decided to look it up and what do you know? It's not from the Bible at all. It's from Hindu scripture, with which I have no problem.

Maybe the root of why it scares me resides in the fact that I feel like a fraud for not living up to this quote, which is all the more reason to put it out there.

And it's so powerful:

So gah! Here goes:

“Out of abundance, he took abundance and still abundance remained.”
-The Upanishads

This one goes straight for the jugular and hits me where I need it to. There is more than enough for everyone. I need to remember this right now.

For This New Year

A note from my spiritual guru:

"Emerson wrote an essay on Circles, which is considered one of his most important statements on the experience of a personal lifetime. Everything is part of a circuit that begins with us and returns to us. What we are projecting comes back to us instantly, as a mirror-like reflection. That which we give with ease and joy returns to us multiplied and enhanced. Those habitual worries and fears gather momentum and bring their friends home to us in the middle of the night.


Like an electrical current running through any system, our personal way of being is not only conducting energy, it is circulating it in the immediate field of our body. Good health is a sign that the system is running smoothly. Money has a way of multiplying itself as we circulate it in our world with the clear awareness that we are part of a vast circuitry of ever renewing substance.

A personal vision for how we choose to live contains ideas which germinate and grow, giving us even more inspiration.

We are an activity of self expression and if we are closed off and withholding, our lives tend to shift down into a very low grade existence. The principle is simple: Our world does not contain that which we are not giving into it. We are like seed sowers, who expect a crop because they have been out there working the fields and planting the possibility.

Let’s make this a year of heightened awareness of our part in creating our own Good."

Carol Carnes

Hallelujah, Amen. I am Hooked

So, I hauled my sore and tired ass out of my comfy and blissful bed this morning to take a second crack at the ole’ church whip. And you know what? It totally rocked. Man, it totally. rocked.

Now before you go all freaking out on my ass, let me just say that the Centre for Positive Living is not like any church I’ve ever been to. It is very New Age, and the term ‘church’ is used for lack of a better word. The ‘reverend’ is a more of a motivational speaker and the sermon is really more of a conversation. The ‘congregation’ is her audience and the gospels are rock songs. And instead of saying “Lord, hear my prayer", the audience says “and so it is.”

And though I realize that it's all just semantics, it is the environment and the message that I feel comfortable in, so call it what you want, in the end, that's what matters most.

Other things that rocked:

It is a community where all faiths, cultures, and lifestyles are accepted. Yes, even the gays. In fact, I even think there was a transvestite in the audience today.

It is touted as an alternate to traditional worship. (yay!)

They sing kick ass songs, such as ‘Let the Sunshine In’ and ‘Somewhere Over the Rainbow’ (albeit not the Tori Amos version) and the Beatles ‘Let it Be.’

During the sermon, the speaker read a Ralph Waldo Emerson poem.

The speaker is realistic, down-to-Earth and HILARIOUS. She cracked two sex jokes today. Any place where they sing the Beatles and crack jokes about sex and read beautiful poems is the place for me. The only thing that would have made it better would have been if she'd thrown a few swears in there for good measure.

All that aside, the message itself was so inspiring. It was simple and unfettered by dogma or jargon. God gets nary a mention and the Bible is nowhere to be found. We DO NOT need to save ourselves, or give our lives over to the Lord. Nope, all we have to do is love. Love ourselves, love one another. Period.

She spent a lot of time talking about finding out what turns us on and lights us up and then activating and following that bliss. She spoke of choosing happiness. If we are happy, the world is happy. Happy people don’t start wars or propagate hate.

We were also prompted to ask ourselves the question: Are you really working on yourself, or is this the best we can expect from you?

Even better, she spoke of listening to our inner voice, the voice of higher potential. She talked about meditation and Global Thinking. She talked about thinking beyond our limitations (yes!) and accepting our whole and perfect selves. This is a tough one for me. I have spent my whole life in a cycle of self-hatred and loathing, being critical and needy and hating of myself and others. I have lived in scarcity and hung on so tightly to what little I have had, that I have ended up with less and less. So opening up and trusting and coming from love and abundance has awakened in me so much safety and relief and astonishment that I feel grateful and astonished. Overwhelmed and dazed that it really is that simple. Accept my whole self. Warts and all. Accept that I am perfect, even in my imperfection. That’s a gigantic horse pill to swallow for me. Loving myself is a FULL-TIME JOB. Accepting myself is time-and-a-half. So to go to a place where they say, “Hey, man. Love yourself and the rest will follow” is core shaking.

And so it is.

Other great things she said, which made me bawl the whole way through the sermon: “The true nature of you and me is BLISS. That’s our starting point and when we don’t feel it, we are unhappy.”

The journey is not “out there,” it is within us all.

The aim of spirituality is self-expression and self-acceptance.

And my ABSOLUTE FAVOURITE, the one thing she said that absolutely hooked me:
“The goal of the spiritual self is not to know God, it is to know ourselves.”

Now You’re Talking.

CHURCH

So, I went to church on Sunday. Why, you ask? Because I could. Because I haven’t been for twenty years and because it is so far out of the realm of my comfort that I absolutely had to try it.

I was endeavoring to go with an open mind and I really don’t know what I was expecting. I think part of me was half-expecting to be completely shocked with how progressive and open-minded the Christian church had become. Part of me was fearful that I would actually *enjoy* it. Part of me was wondering and yes, maybe even hoping?... that I had been wrong all these years, and was so wrapped up in my own righteousness that I had been completely missing out on a warm, positive energy, and a sense of belonging and community.

Um. Yeah, no.

First of all the church was GIGANTIC. And did I say church? It was more like a theatre. It sat 2000 people and was one of three Sunday services. It was like a prayer mill. I am reluctant to be invited into someone else’s world and then completely trash it, but that is exactly what I am going to do. I would say this particular church borders on the evangelical. The sermon is TELEVISED and so elaborate and slick that I instantaneously mistrusted it. There were several different chapels---one for parents with screaming kids and another for worshippers with special needs. There was also a restaurant, right in the church, a 30-foot waterfall for baptisms, and movies during the sermon. I mean, I felt like I was at the mall. After the sermon, I could swing by the Banana Republic and pick up that sweater I’ve had my eye on, buy a falafel and then head to the IKEA for some affordable shelving. It was just all so surreal.

I picked this church, by the way, because my friend L goes there. And you know how you walk into a place and you either just feel like you belong or you don’t? I felt like I was on a spaceship.

It was all just too much for me. I mean, were we at the Jubilee Auditorium? Was the cast of “Rent” going to come out after and put on a performance? Comfortable seats, though.

And the sermon? *Sigh* A little too old school for me. The pastor is doing a 9-part series on the Old Testament! The Old Testament?! Really?! Why is that even still around? He was up to Part 6. And he talked about Polygamy(?!) Oh, I’m sorry—did I wake up in Salt Lake City? Is this a Mormon church? Polygamy?! Like is this really a present-day issue which needs to be addressed? Talk about forgiveness, I’m listening; Adultery, trust, compassion, kindness, love: oh, you so have my attention. But polygamy?! So he’s telling the story of Hannah and Peninnah, who were both married to Elkanah. And every time he said her name, I thought: “Oooh, I could sure go for some ham and melted cheese in crusty bread. Panini.”

Is it considered gauche to text in church?

Hannah was upset because they had no children. She therefore prayed earnestly for a male child whom she promised to dedicate to the Lord. And guess what? She got a child. Which just goes to show you the importance of prayer. Just pray. Pray, pray, pray. If your prayers aren’t answered right away, keep praying. And then at the end of the sermon, the pastor lead the entire congregation in a group prayer. It was too much for me.

The sermon was also very geared towards family and specifically, men: how to be a good father/husband/leader. So, not much for a single gal to hang onto. I couldn't relate. But I’m sure if he was to address the single ladies out there, he would instruct us to pray. Pray for a man. If your prayers aren’t answered, pray some more.

It's all just so damned manipulative. And I can't escape that feeling that my uncle is touching me inappropriately.

Personally, I am looking for a sense of community: good, positive energy and a feeling of connection with humanity. But what I realized is that I DON'T need to be saved, and I don't feel the need to hand my life over to God. And really, I don't need the Bible to be the moral compass in my life by which I make all my decisions. I don't happen to think of myself as a sinner, and if or when I do, it's a badge I proudly wear with honour. Yep, I'd even go so far as to say that I enjoy sinning.

I also don't like their view on gays, their position is that they are facing 'same-gender attraction issues'. Cmon. I guess I just didn't find them as progressive as I was hoping. And the community that I want to belong to will include ALL TYPES of people. Yes, even the homosexuals.

I relate easier to believing that the Universe is a large energy force that wants good things for me. I understand that I can substitute 'God' for 'the Universe' in that last sentence and it's all just a question of semantics, but the truth is, I don't think organized religion is for me. I may not need church to feel a sense of community. All the same, next week, I am going to try the Centre for Positive Living, and see if that is more my style. The week after next: maybe Buddhism?

It was interesting and fascinating and totally not for me. And I don’t know if I am feeling more relieved or disappointed about that.

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