What’s it like being you today? I wonder if it feels different these days than, say, a year ago today. Here in the States, tomorrow is a big holiday, one in which many people often travel long ways to be with family, whether family by birth, by circumstance, or by choice. And this year, whatever their family situation usually may be, many people are –by circumstance– staying put.

So here we are at home. Our very own now-home whatever and wherever that may be. This year you may not be traveling to be at the home you grew up in. You may not be sitting at a table with the people you consider to be family. Or friends. In fact, you may be sitting at a table just with yourself. Or with the person you’ve been sharing space with, pretty much exclusively, for months and months now.

Are you okay? 

Hear me again as I write it out more slowly: Are you okay? 

If you aren’t sure how to answer that, try this: What happens when you pause for a moment, take a deep breath, and then hear those words somewhere in your middle—think chest, heart and belly area: Am I okay?

For a long time, years and years actually, I didn’t feel okay. The question of “am I okay” always somehow, brought me to the matter of home. And since I didn’t feel at home inside myself, no matter who I was with, no matter where in the world I was, I didn’t really feel comfortable or like I belonged much of anywhere. 

I’ve come a long way and there’s a reason these questions –what’s it like being you? OR are you okay?– mean the world to me.

Around big holidays, my long-time companion “Homesick” often makes himself known inside me. It used to be I kicked him out (or rather, tried to). It used to be I thought that his presence was very bad news. It used to be that I thought that one day, when everything was better and I was with the perfect person and living in the perfect place that then I’d be rid of Homesick once and for all.

But it hasn’t turned out that way. Many things are much better than they used to be. And I am lucky enough to most of the time adore the person I’m quarantining with. But Homesick has not gone away. And, long story short(er), these days I set a place at the table of me for him (even when he feels like a herd of elephants!). Funny thing, the more I welcome Homesick, the more at home inside myself I feel. And the more at home inside myself I feel, the more I belong.

So what’s it like being you? Are you friends with you? Are you frenemies who have called a truce? What’s it like being you once all the ways you show up in the “outside” world aren’t necessary? Because at the end of the day, no matter who is or isn’t with you, no matter whether you share a bed with another creature (whether of the human or of the 4-legged variety) or not, you are the one and only person you are guaranteed to fall asleep and wake up with. 

What would today be like to set a place at the table of you for Homesick or your version of Homesick? I wonder what it’d be like to practice friendliness with you, all of you, however you are feeling today.

That is all, my dear. I wish you a beautiful day. I wish you a welcoming table. And I’d love to hear what it’s like being you.

Warmly,

Heidi

Special Invitations for Pandemic-times Self-Care:

Come practice, with guidance and quiet company, being friendly with yourself at The Pause: Body-Oriented Meditation. Use coupon code CupofCalm to try a class out on me (i.e., free!). Class will not meet on Thursday, 26 November, but we will be back at noon (Eastern time) on Friday! Come!

Missing therapeutic touch? On Wednesday, Dec. 2 I am offering a Therapeutic Self-Massage class that will focus on shoulder/neck tension. Use coupon code FBfriend to get 33% off the cost of the class. (Coupon expires on Friday, 27 Nov.)

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“Is this all there is?” and “What’s the point?”

Ever since they arrived, I’ve had a queasy knot in my belly and my chest is all a-rumble. When I stop distracting myself with things to put in my mouth, links to click, sites to check, worries to fondle, I feel scared. I’m afraid they’re right.

Now you might be saying that I should just throw them out. And I appreciate your idea. Except that it doesn’t really work. Not really.

I know how trying to ignore or get rid of things I don’t like inside myself goes. I did it for many years and it just makes things change clothes and come back in another form. I can totally see these T-shirt guys coming back in drag. Or taking hold of my body and becoming a pain in my neck. Or butt. Things I try to ignore or banish can totally put my back out. Ow! And let’s not forget how they can make me anxious, and how anxious can grind everything to a halt. Including sleep.

Um, no thanks.

It’s just that I need help. I can’t do it alone. So, I was wondering… um, how to say…

Hi!

You: “You talking to me?” [turning around to see if someone’s behind you.]

Yes, you! You’re my smart and courageous reader. Please?

You: “I want you to be OK. It’s just, I don’t know what to do, really… “

OK. Here’s the thing. I don’t want to be alone. I’m scared. But with you? Different story. Then I’m not alone. You and me is two, and there might be others. Plus, I’ve seen your dance moves and your air guitar… You could totally entertain them, I just know. All you have to do is keep them occupied while I remember who I am. And I’ll totally return the favor. One day I’ll do my best moves for you when you need me.

You: “OK. I’ll try. I want you to be OK.”

Oh wow! Thanks man. Now excuse me while I find my curiosity superpowers… I know I left them here somewhere… Oh, it’s been too long… Ah, there! Good.

—–

Donning my curiosity cape, I re-enter the scene. I can move around freely and see everything. Including you! Oh my, you have totally been practicing your shimmies, haven’t you. My friend, you are amazing. If I didn’t have things to do, I’d totally join you. Maybe later. But now, I’m investigating.

Since they haven’t talked to me, I’ll start with what’s on their shirts. The words look like questions. Except they’re not. Because they contain no curiosity. A true question is curious, open minded and willing to listen, to hear. A true question is wonder-y.

My thought-guys’ questions are very thinly veiled conclusions about me and my life. And the implications of their non-questions really scare me when I believe them. Which I am. I’m TOTALLY believing them. Which can only mean:

I’ve Gone. Into. TRANCE!

No wonder! OK. I’ve noticed. Whew! Noticing is crucial. It’s at least, oh, 99%.

Once I notice I’m in trance, then I can send the part of me that noticed, the part NOT in trance (even if it’s just the eensiest bit of me right now) to pull out my sheet of trance procedures trance magics. That’s the other 99%! (Yep.)

ONE. Call yourself only by the sweetest, kindest of names. Sweetheart is good. My love works wonders. Darling drumstick makes you smile. Sweet pea reminds you of people you love.

TWO. Under no circumstances believe any thought crossing your mind while in trance. Don’t try to stop the thoughts. Don’t fight them. But also, don’t believe them. Trust me. Don’t.

Things to do instead of believing thoughts while in trance: You can notice them, you can play Byron Katie with them, you can Veronica Mars them, you can put them in a jar, you can make daisy chains out of them, you can chew on them and blow thought bubbles with them, you can juggle them, you can make soup with them, you can build a tower out of them and lean against it while you eat lunch. But whatever you do: Do NOT Believe Them.

OK, good. Onward:

THREE. Write. Write. Write.

“But I suck. And I have nothing to write about,” says a tranced out voice.

To which I must refer you back to thing ONE and TWO. Also, I’d like to point out that “You Suck” is not a name you like.

FOUR. Get fresh air. Get movement. Find water. Take a shower. Take a bath. Take a lake. Dance. Watch the kids run through the sprinkler at the park. Take pictures of trees. Eat meals. Drink water. Mind your body. Remember animal-you. Remember Mary Oliver: “Let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.” Which reminds me, you love poetry, so… Read it.

FIVE. Visit The Pause. (Dude! The Pause just opened a page a bar on Facebook. Go! Hang out!)

SIX. Do not, under any circumstance, try to make decisions while in trance.

SEVEN. Call a meeting of your Inner Council.

EIGHT. Listen to a Tara Brach podcast.

NINE. With your Inner Council or with Presence at The Pause, consider this: If you weren’t believing those 2 thought-doozies, what would you be feeling? And then do THREE. Or FOUR. Or EIGHT. In any order.

Rinse and repeat. Until the trance lifts.

———–

Oh my. Thank you so much! You saved my butt. Yes, you! I’m going to be pondering the question in NINE… maybe I’ll write about it here, maybe not. But thank you!

Hey, will you teach me that move? The one that had my beefy thought-guys laughing so hard they were crying?

Until next time, maybe I’ll see you at The Pause. In case you forgot, it’s on the corner of Now and Notice, where that old dive Reaction used to be. Presence tends bar. Shots of compassion on me today.

The post Entertaining today’s guests: Disappointed and Despondent appeared first on Heidi's Table.

“H?” you ask.

Yes H. H of the Love is Not a Victory March post. I didn’t mention him by initial before, but yes, H. He’s away for 12 days and I’m cottage- and dog-sitting.

The great thing is that I get to be by the lake. (Water! My favorite place to be in all the world.) And I get to care for and eat from the garden that we’d planted before things ended. (Yes! The baby basils are all grown up.) And if I wake up early and can’t sleep I get to hop in a kayak and watch the vapor rise off the water as the sun comes up. (Magical!) And there’s Jennie who gets me out into the woods for runs and walks and throwing sticks. (Woods! Sticks! Jennie!) Being here is a retreat for me. A get-away! (And yes, I’m returning to Boston for my beloved clients on massage days).

And it’s been hard. I am reminded of all the things I’ve loved and lost. Maybe not lost completely since here I am still enjoying the lake and the garden and Jennie and sometimes in some ways even H, but lost in the sense of hopes and dreams and plans for a future together… The loss of all that has felt so big I’ve been trying to numb and trying not to numb it in various ways for weeks—oh, who’m I kidding: pretty much the entire month of June.

When I stop watching Veronica Mars all the trying and turn toward what’s inside of me I am met with a big empty well and I’m afraid it doesn’t have a bottom. I’d like to understand the well, but I can’t seem to get close enough. Not on my own. Because, hello! Scared!

So I’ve gone all Veronica Mars on the well. You could say I’ve hired her, if by “hire” we mean that I am channeling her. When it comes to understanding and helping myself, I will stop at nothing. Understanding myself helps me love myself. And when I love myself, I can much better love the world. Also? Channeling heroes? Most exciting thing ever. Not sure why it’s not caught on out there!

~ * ~

I’ve parked my Adirondack chair car within view of the well. My journal fancy shmancy camera with ultra zoom lens is at the ready. I’m gathering evidence. I am Veronica Mars. I have a record to uphold: no case unsolved.

It’s dark. My lights are out. Nothing appears to be happening, but I am not fooled. It is not unusual on a stake out to have to wait many hours for action. You, dear reader, may not appreciate this, given the fact that most likely you’ve only ever watched stake outs on TV where the boring parts get cut.

That said, this is boring! Eff it. I’m going in.

I have donned my invisibility cloak (Veronica Mars and Harry Potter are friends. Of course.) and I am now approaching the well’s edge. I peer over. Rather anti-climactic, I’m afraid. I can’t see a thing.

I walk around the well a few times looking for signs, clues, anything…

Clearly it is time to tune in on a subtler level… The feel of the well is sad. A veh———ry heah——–vy sadness. (You must say those words all drawn out like that to get a visceral sense of the sad heaviness of which I speak).

Conventional investigators might not do this, but I am Veronica Mars and so the next thing I do is call into the well: “Um, hi—!”

I’m met with an echo. “Hel-oh-oh-oh.”

I can now deduce at least two things. Thing 1: the well is very deep—the sound of hello bounced many times—but not bottomless. Bottomless does not bounce. Thing 2: there IS something in there. It’s not nothing. Nothing would not have echoed ‘hello,’ when I’d said ‘hi.’ Duh. Easy peasy.

I sit down at the edge of the well and get comfortable. I feel no sense of danger. Clearly IT, whatever it is, wants me to know it is there but it couldn’t, for whatever reason, come right out and answer me directly. As I sit there I feel sadder. It is all I can do not to fold up into a heap and weep the night away. But I am Veronica Mars. I am not the well. I am here on my client’s case: I want to understand the well. It would not help for me to become it.

“Hello, Sad.”

I hear nothing back but the feeling gets even stronger. I continue: “You must be very sad.”

“I’m not Sad.” I hear this bit in my head, not out loud. Actually, I hear it more in my throat, which feels all chocked up. As a mood detective I know that emotions are often felt in the throat, chest and belly areas.

The voice from the well goes on: “Sad and I are related but I’m much older. I’m what Sad gets when it’s big and grown up.”

“Like grief?”

“Yes.”

“Hello, LikeGrief.”

“Say, who are you? And why can’t I see you?”

“Oh sorry. I’m Veronica. Veronica Mars of Mars Investigations and Mood Detective Services.” I pull off my invisibility cloak as I say this. It’s only polite to let myself be seen. Plus, I sense no danger.

“Hello, Veronica. Why are you here?”

“I’m here to investigate a case for my client, Heidi.”

“Ah, Heidi…” his voice trails off.

“You know her?”

Right then LikeGrief actually chuckles a bit. “Of course. I’m hers.”

“You’re hers?”

“Yes.”

“Hey, do you mind if I dangle my legs over your side here while we talk?”

“I don’t mind but you may not want—“

“EW!”

“I was just saying—”

“EW! What IS that!”

“I was about to tell you. Those are the protectors of Heidi’s fear. They dress up all gnarly and nasty because they want to keep her from seeing through her fears and feeling me. Don’t worry, they’re all show, really… “

“Show and slime!”

“Yes. But harmless. They’ve been sending decoys and keeping Heidi in a general state of distraction watching a certain detective show and eating popcorn… That’s why I’m talking to you with your inside your head voice rather than out loud. I saw you up there and wasn’t sure how I was going to contact you without waking them up. I’m glad you picked up on the echo thing. ”

“Piece of cake,” I shrug.

We sit in silence for a long spell. Some of the clouds have cleared and I see a sprinkling of stars and a waning moon above.

“Say! Aren’t you Veronica Mars from the show that Heidi has been losing herself in for weeks?“

“Exactly. She was smart to hire me, our Heidi.”

“So then… wait! Heidi does want to know what’s happening?”

“Yes. She just needs some help. And not just any help, mind you, only the best. Say, can you tell me who those nasties on the edge of your well are decoys for?”

“A powerful belief.”

“A belief?”

“Yes, a belief Heidi’s been nursing. You know how people have thoughts?”

“Yes.”

“Nothing harmful about thoughts, they happen all the time… they scroll across people’s minds constantly… But sometimes people hang onto a thought and won’t just let it scroll by… they get all ‘attached’, you could say… And when someone gets really attached to a thought, it becomes a belief. Nothing wrong with beliefs either, of course, except they make it hard to keep one’s mind open and to stay curious. Even harmless beliefs tend to obscure full vision. It’s always good to be aware of one’s beliefs.”

“Beliefs can hurt?”

“Well, what people do and don’t do based on what they believe can hurt—“

“What belief of Heidi’s are we talking about here, do you know?”

“Yes.”

“Are you going to tell me? Or did I come here and get my feet slimed up for nothing?”

He chuckles and then is quiet for awhile before answering. “I wouldn’t usually do this, but seeing that Heidi hired you and really wants help with this, I will. But I’m not going to say it. And I’m not even going to write it out loud. I’m going to write it for you across the screen of your mind’s eye. You’ll see it there. And then you and Heidi can decide what to do.”

“Thank you so much. I appreciate it.”

I close my eyes and then LikeGrief writes Heidi’s belief across my mind’s eye. It is like watching a movie. Something like the writing on the wall—mene mene tekel… I can see the slimy fear-guards in the margins of my mind and for a moment I feel the intensity of how hard things have felt for Heidi and I shudder.

“OhGod, can I open my eyes? Are you done? Oof! That’s a big one. I will talk to her about it. Hey, thank you so much for your help. Do you need anything from me?”

“Oh, I’d just love for you to get Heidi to come see me. I can help her. And, the thing she is forgetting (because, I know she knows this!) is that once she’s with me, allowing the feeling of me in her body, the whole thing will change. I can’t predict how, but it will. She knows that, but she’s forgotten. You might remind her, yes?”

“I’ll do my best. Thank you so much. Do you have any hints for getting this slime off my legs?”

“Matter o’ fact I do. One of Heidi’s potions will do great.”

“Oh! Which one?”

“Night Queen. She ain’t afraid o’ no ghosts.”

And with that I wave and I’m off. Heidi and I have much to talk about.

The post Entertaining today’s guests: Break-up and grief (feat. Veronica Mars!) appeared first on Heidi's Table.

I can really trip myself up and get stuck when I think I need to know and orchestrate what happens next. It’s like this: you’re walking along la-de-da totally enjoying the amazement of the moment, or the oddness of the conversation you can’t help eavesdropping on at the next table, or the good feeling of a friendship, until you think: What now?! Or, I better keep this going! And just like that, boom!

Gone is the pleasant la-de-da of the moment and you’re off and planning or worrying. A kind of self-consciousness descends upon what had been a sense of wonder, play, and flow, and, even if what was going on wasn’t entirely pleasant (and maybe it was even hard), it felt somehow necessary or life-affirming in and there was a sense of rightness about it.

All of last week I was struggling about writing. I wanted to write about things going on, but I didn’t want it to be blahblah sadfest this happened then that happened boo hoo… When I write like that it puts me to sleep. Or makes me roll my eyes.

I’d signed up for trial periods of AntiSocial and Freedom (highly recommended!) and woke up several mornings without internet connection and ready to write. And then…

Hello blank page… (nothing came). Or, hello crowded page… (blah and blah). It was more than a bit frustrating. But I kept showing up, even if all I did in my internet-disconnected time was to straighten my living room. (I know some people would not call that showing up, but for me it counted since I was not frittering energy away down that endless online rabbit hole and I was, even if just the eensiest bit, closer to the writing.)

I hear of writers who know or at least have a good sense of the whole story plot before they ever begin to write. I’m not one of them and I thought I had to be in order to write stories, and so for the longest of times I stuck to writing letters and personal reflection pieces. (Possibly you’ve read some of them).

Don’t get me wrong, I love writing letters. And reflection? Yes. It’s just that there have been stories floating around me for some time now, wanting me to give them voice.

On Sunday when I sat down to write, at first it was more of the blahs and then Doubt and Regret knocked on the door and off it went… It wasn’t mine anymore. It became its own. Yay! It was moving along swimmingly and most of the piece was finished when, boom! The dreaded “Oh noes! What now?!”

Enter self-consciousness. Enter trying to make something happen. Enter contrived. UGH!

But I also became curious. I saw that there were things I knew: Like that Presence was key, even though I had no idea in what form he, she or it would show up in the story.

Would I go to The Pause and have Presence, the bartender, serve me a drink? Nah.

Would Presence call me? Nah. (He so doesn’t make phone calls. Plus, I’d been realizing, Presence isn’t always a guy. Or a bartender. Ha!).

So I slept on it and walked on it and washed dishes on it. I wasn’t trying to noodle the plot, but there it was in the back of my mind.

On Tuesday I read my draft to my friend Barbara and she listened as I sensed into the whole “next” thing… And then I told her that there was something I saw next but I didn’t like it. Aha! I didn’t think it was, er, how to say, proper for my story: the picture that kept coming to me was of Presence, an old woman, sitting on my porch, smoking.

I was all, smoking?! But I don’t believe in smoking! It’ll seem like I’m endorsing smoking! And what about my friends who are trying to quit?

But whenever I went back to the story, there she was, still smoking. She just would not leave.

Finally I cried “Uncle!” and said, OK. I’ll go with it, even for just a few minutes.

I’ve got to tell you, that old woman came through in a surprising way. I just had to show up and let what was happening next, happen. Without trying to pretty it up. Without trying to make it different than it was. Without bossing it around. And without, in this case, making Ylang stop smoking.

Things and people show me where they want to go, what they need, what they want, and situations, no matter how stuck they seem, have implied within them the next and best thing. Funny how when I know something, I just know. If there’s a doing involved, I just do it. There’s no hemming and hawing blah blah. In fact, I don’t even stop to think “I know.” Things are just swimming along.

What if not knowing could be just as swimming? What if instead of “Oh no! I don’t know!” I said, “Oh my! I wonder what gets to happen next?!” It seems that not knowing is where it gets exciting.

Am I speaking of writing or am I speaking of life?

Yes.

What a relief not to have to boss myself around. I don’t have to play the puppet master of my characters or of my life. I get to show up, get myself out of the way and then see what happens. Plus, that potion that Presence smokes? Best thing ever. (And, ahem, turns out it contains no tobacco after all. Ha! My story just winked at me.)  Spare a light?

——

(If you missed the story I’m referring to, here: Meet Ylang! And, I dare you not to share a smoke with her.)

The post Facing the blank page (in writing and in life) appeared first on Heidi's Table.

It was probably the last day of sun before a string of rain days descended upon us, but on this day Spring was decked out in her softest and sunniest white, pink and purple ruffles and her youthful joy just made me all the sadder.

Oh, my love, it is best for us to part. It breaks my heart and yet it must be said.

That was the gist of the letter I’d just read again before sending. It had been on my mind for days, no, weeks, and in some way maybe even months. This was not a surprise of a letter to anyone, which didn’t take away from my sadness.

When I awoke the next morning, Regret and his brother Doubt were standing at my door, anxiously shifting their weight from leg to leg, weary from their travels through the night. Barely the door was open, they hurried into my living room.

“You spoke too soon,” said Regret.

“You don’t really want to lose him, do you?” added Doubt. “You sure do love him. Look at your puffy eyes, would you? Oh honey…”

His voice trailed off and a heavy silence descended upon the house of me. They are right, I thought.

“What a good guy,” said Regret, looking wistfully out the window.

“You certainly could do worse, you know. What a find he is. I mean, was—” Doubt piped in. “He spoke your dad’s language. Remember how you practiced German with him on the dock that day last spring, sitting on the piano bench in the fog with a blanket pulled around you?”

Regret, still looking out the window, added: “You were planting a garden. How could you leave when you were planting a garden! The baby basils were just becoming toddlers—“

I nodded. A set of furrows was settling itself into my brow and a huge lump had lodged itself in my throat.

“And now you’ve gone and lost him. Just you tell me where you will find another chap like he.” Doubt spoke with such old-fashioned grammar.

Minutes later, another knock on the door. I peeked from behind the curtain to find a youngish woman who looked like an over-caffeinated step aerobics teacher from the 90’s with her hair pulled back into the tightest of ponytails. Her shirt said, “Ain’t nothin’ can’t be fixed!” and her shirt sleeves, rolled up to her armpits, gave brand new meaning to “rolling up one’s sleeves.” I do not know how her tight ponytail allowed for even a hint of movement in her face, but she managed to raise an eyebrow while glancing at her watch, then knocking again.

When I opened the door, Ms. Fixit’s knuckles almost rapped me on the forehead, and then she marched right past me, brushing Regret and Doubt aside.

She unzipped her backpack in the middle of my living room and tools of every size and shape spilled out and a hundred bolts of advice went rolling across the floor. There was, “You need to see him. Like now!” And, “You need to stop wanting so much.” And, “You should take the train up there now and fix this. Here’s a schedule.” And, “You should try couples therapy.” And, “You shouldn’t be so bossy–”

That’s when I found my voice. “Excuse me very much, I shouldn’t be so bossy?! Pot ‘n’ kettle, hel-loh!”

She just rolled her eyes, flashed me a “whatever!,” and picked up a tool that, sweartogod, looked like a machete and a hammer and a chainsaw all in one.

Around then was when the movies started: a year’s worth of pictures, snippets of conversations, voiceovers and commentaries on various fight scenes, love scenes, hope and dream scenes, all began scrolling across my mind’s eye, ending, finally, with last Friday’s skype-call with the coach lady, the call that had mainly succeeded in reminding me of just how hard our hard stuff was. Afterwards he had texted me: “I’m going out for a run,” and I had texted back, “A run sounds good. Me too.” And then, without further ado, I did. Go running, that is…

All the way to Whole Foods. All the way to the chocolate-covered almonds that sugar-free-me justified by pointing out that they were made with fruit-sweetened chocolate after all.

The movies left me feeling like my heart had plunged down an elevator shaft into my belly. Someone coughed and that’s when I noticed Rumination running the projector from a chair over in the corner.

Rumination had the longest, most ancient looking of faces you have ever in your life seen. Seriously, his eyebrows had grown so long that I’m quite sure his eyes had only a vague, ancestral memory of sunlight. Also, earhairs? Put it this way: there were no ears to be found.

Blame and Shame did not want to be left out of the sadfest and, sure enough, by midday these two rolly-polly ladies with waggy fingers and not quite securely anchored false teeth had arrived carrying casseroles. (What else!)

“Dahlin’, you’ve gone and lost the best thing ever. You’ll never find better,” muttered Blame as she waddled into my kitchen. “You are a piece of work and you know it,” she went on, taking a red Jello mold out of Shame’s hands and proceeding to cut it as if it were cake.

Back in the living room Shame started in on a long list of thisses and thats, all preceeded by the words, “You are too…” while Blame kept muttering, not enough under her breath, that “no man would want that in a woman…”

My cheeks got redder and redder and it was all I could do not to cry.

“We should know, shouldn’t we!” exclaimed Blame, looking over at her sister. Shame, the quieter of the two, nodded.

“We’ve held onto our men for, oh, what is it now—eleventy hundred years?” Blame went on, proudly. “Oh how time flies when you’re bound in holy wedlock.”

It was the word “lock” that brought me back and I glanced around at the motley crew in my living room. And just when I thought it could not get any more crowded one more guest arrived.

Panic was out of breath when I opened the door. And also? Terrified. The end of the world was upon us, after all. His vocabulary was very limited and pretty much all he managed to say was “On no, oh no, oh no,” which he chanted like a mantra gone awry, all the while pacing about my living room wringing his hands and then smoothing back his hair with a sweaty palm. He knew my deepest fears and managed somehow, in spite of not being able to stand still for so much as a second, to lay a slew of pictures out on the table before me:

There was a snapshot of me hungry and alone… another of the Aardvark leaving me and going back to Africa… another of Heidi’s Table failing disastrously, my appointment book completely empty… another one of never another kiss, ever… culminating in the predictable—Urgency School of Redundancy trained as he is—clincher: a framed 8 x 10 of me dying a godforsaken and lonely death, alone, with nary a soul around.

What a state the house of me was in. And, whatever was I to do with these guests! I did not like them and yet there they were, all doing their best to, from their point of view, help me.

With my heart still in my belly and that lump still in my throat, I walked over to the window. That’s when I noticed her. She was sitting in the big white Adirondack chair on my porch, smoking.

Wait, what?!

I know, right? Smoking! On my porch. The nerve!

I was about to go out and yell at her but something kept my feet glued to the floor, watching.

I was still perturbed when I noticed that the smell wafting in through my window was not of any cigarette I’d ever smelled. In fact, I wasn’t even sure it was a cigarette. What was it, Sandalwood? Cedar? Definitely some Clove. Yes. And something a bit citrus, a bit floral…

I sank into my senses and inhaled deeply—Bergamot! Of course. And something else I hadn’t yet managed to place when she took her last drag and, letting out a loooooong exhale, slowly began turning her head—

I could have ducked but it wouldn’t have mattered. She knew I was there, I could tell, which was confirmed by the fact that she did not even so much as almost blink when her eyes rested on me.

I could not look away. Her face was forever wrinkled in a way that made me look forward to one day being that old. And her eyes were the most curious blend of calm and attention. I could tell that this woman never missed a beat and that nothing ever ruffled her. I wondered if she’d always been that way or if it had something to do with the wrinkles.

She looked at me with kindness, without even a hint of pity, and in that moment I saw myself and the motley crew in my living room through her eyes.

When I turned my attention back into the house of me, my guests were different. No one had left, and yet they had changed.

Regret had found some watercolors and was painting what looked to be an herb garden.

Doubt was talking philosophy over a glass of port with Shame, and in the kitchen I could hear Ms. Fixit and Blame tidying up. Ms. Fixit was saying that there was nothing better than waking up to a shiny sink, and Blame said, “oh, our Heidi could certainly use a little shine these days.”

Panic and Rumination, thick as thieves, were plotting techniques for making a new movie from the footage and photos they had. Rumination wanted some kind of a film noir, and Panic wanted some sort of a mystery-drama.

They were all fine.

I looked back out and the old woman nodded and motioned toward the empty chair next to her. I went out to join her and we shared a smoke. And then I cried and cried. She didn’t mind.

~ * ~

Love is not a victory march, it’s a cold and it’s a broken hallelujah

Leonard Cohen

Postcript:

Thanks to my guests, clearly I’m all set on the advices! But if you care to share a cry or a potion-smoke or a story with me here in the comments, I’d love that. I’m still hangin’ out on the porch with this curious old woman. Turns out her name is Ylang and she’s related to Presence, the hot bartender at The Pause. *ahem!*

Also, gossip alert!  I just learned that Presence is their family name. When I asked Ylang about Presence, the bartender’s, first name, she told me she had been sworn to secrecy. Whatever the name, I am so taken by them all that the Aardvark and I have named a potion for them. Go ahead and guess what it smells like! (And, yep, you can get it over here).

The post Entertaining today’s guests (break up edition): Regret, Doubt, Rumination… (feat. Rumi & Leonard Cohen) appeared first on Heidi's Table.

Sometimes they say: “I want to feel calm like you.”

The first time I heard this I’m quite sure I laughed. I thought: “If you only knew!”

These days I don’t laugh. First off, they are serious. Second, it’s not about me. I know this because I too have people that are to me just what I am to my clients and it is a gift for me to recognize calm when I see it. Calm (or any quality) is in the eye of the beholder. For sure. Third, if I look honestly I see that I am calm and present for my clients. It is, after all, no mistake that I do what I do. Learning calm is probably my biggest life learning.

The last few days have been hard for me. I have not felt calm. At all.

If you read my blog, you probably know that I’m a big fan of “channeling” people.

“Channeling?” you might ask, thinking it’s some special or weird quirky thing I can do.

I can assure you, anyone can do this. (Although for sure, I’m quirky).

What I do is keep a mental list of people I admire for certain qualities. During hard times, or even just when I’ve exhausted options of how to deal with something, I bring them to mind. Some of these people, like, oh, Clint Eastwood to name just one, are on My Inner Council, and that simply means that when things get reeeeally hard, I call an inner meeting to which only the smartest, kindest, and yes, sometimes bad-assest, people are invited and we have us a pow-wow.

A pow-wow?

Yep. Although we’ve never passed around a pipe and now I’m wondering why the heck not… But pretty much My Inner Council pow-wows consist of me saying straight up how it is and them listening and every so often asking me the best, get-to-the-heart-of-the-matter question ever, during all of which I am pretty much writing everything down. Because, hello! If the Dalai Lama says something to me, you bet your ass I’m writing it down.

Anyway…

Sometimes I have dialogs with these people I channel. Of course, most of them I’ve never actually met. But, no matter. In fact, even better. Because what these people really help me do is see myself and what’s around me, in a new way. They help me recognize and develop existent, yet dormant, qualities within myself. Takes one to know one, and all that.

(And if I ever do meet Cesar Milan, Clint Eastwood, Mary Oliver, the Dalai Lama, Isadora Duncan, Johnny Depp, Hiro Boga, J.K. Rowling, Maya Angelou, or Leonard Cohen, maybe I will thank them. Probably, I will just be dumb-founded. Or drooling.)

This morning, in a moment that “Losing It” was made for, I began to write, wondering whom to channel. And just like that I knew: I need to channel me. Specifically, how I am with my clients:

Calm.
Listening.
Balanced.
Smart.
Kind.
Sense of humor.
Sensitive.
Strong.
Confident.
Open-hearted.

—————

Me: Hi, Heidi. Come in, come in… How are you doing today?

Heidi: [about to burst into tears] Oh, there’s so much. It’s too much. I look at so-and-so and so-and-so and how well they’re doing, and how together their life is and how happy they are… and when things feel like today, my life just looks shitty… There must be something wrong with me.

Me: [nodding] There’s so much happening right now and it’s all seeming like too much–

Heidi: Mostly, it feels way too crowded.

Me: Crowded?

Heidi: My thinking! It’s crowded! Exclamation points! Flashing billboards on the highway kind of crowded in my head. It’s driving me crazy.

Me: Oh yes, I understand. Sounds overwhelming. Tell me… how would you love to feel when you leave your session today? What quality, feeling or state of mind do you need?

Heidi: I’d like a sense that no matter what is going on, no matter what is coming at me, no matter what, I am OK.

Me: Ahh yes, that is a very wise thing to want. Rather than wanting your circumstances to change, you want to feel that you are OK no matter what.

Heidi: Yes. Whether or not the relationship works out, I am OK. Whether or not my loved ones are healthy, I am OK. Whether or not I get all the clients I need this month before the holidays, I am OK. Whether or not I get all the Aardvark Essentials new things I want to put up on my website up or not, I am OK. Whether or not someone I love ever wants to see me again, I am OK. Whether or not I make my rent, I am OK.

Me: Ah yes.

Heidi: You know what that would be like?

Me: Tell me–

Heidi: That would be like the highways in Vermont, where they don’t have any advertisements or billboards or flashy lights, only directional signs indicating what the exit number is, or the town name, or how many miles to the next rest stop…

Me: Ahh yes. So, things right now feel more like the highway in New York or New Jersey, rather than Vermont?

Heidi: Exactly so.

Me: I wonder if you could tell me how you would know you are OK… I mean, OK could come knocking on your door and how would you know that’s who it is… In other words: how would it feel in your body? How would it be in your mind? In your heart?

Heidi: Well, take I-91 in Vermont. My eyes are free to move about slowly or quickly but without getting assaulted or interrupted by lights and noise and information, which is what it feels like inside of me when I’m overwhelmed… it’s like my attention keeps getting assaulted.

Me: Oof! That is hard.

Heidi: It makes everything be on edge.

Me: I can see that. Tell me more about how would you know that you are OK no matter what?

Heidi: [takes big, gentle breath and slows down to ponder… already there is an observable change]… I would walk confidently, knowing the ground holds me. [laughs] I’m not too heavy for the ground. And I would allow gravity to help me move as I need to.

Me: What do you mean?

Heidi: Well, I’d let gravity bring my shoulders down so they’re not hunched up to my ears. Also, my breathing would be longer and calmer. My heart would feel open and soft. I might cry and that’d be OK. Lately I’ve been too stoppered up and uptight and scared and feeling hard and protected to even cry.

Me: Hmmmm… Heidi, I can see that you know exactly how to feel OK no matter what. Even as you were telling me these things I saw them happen.

Heidi: But why do I feel overwhelmed so often?! There must be something wrong with me.

Me: Sweetpea, I want to tell you a secret that’s not really a secret. Most people feel overwhelmed sometimes. And a good many people feel overwhelmed a lot of the time. They might mask it, but they do. And overwhelm can feed on itself and then that makes it stronger… People do things to keep their overwhelm at bay but those things are temporary distractions, at best. Keeping something at bay doesn’t really make it go away. What do you think all that endless checking and texting and refreshing of screens is all about? Most folks don’t even sit down to sip on a hot cup of something without reading or refreshing some screen or another… Do you really think they are enjoying those things when they do them like that? Just look around, love… start noticing… we aren’t bad for doing those things, but I’m telling you this to invite you to notice, and hopefully feel less unique about the overwhelm…

Heidi: [quiet]

Me: I can tell you really care about taking care of yourself and living with an open heart, Heidi. Could I invite you to consider something?

Heidi: Yes–

Me: When you are feeling overwhelmed, like everything is crowded and noisy and too much… is believing “There is something wrong with me” a kind and helpful thing to think?

Heidi: Not really. It actually makes me spin faster, and then, in addition to feeling the crowdedness in my head, I then start trying to figure out how to fix myself, all because I’m panicked that there’s something wrong.

Me: Exactly.

Heidi: But I can’t help it. I just think it. All of a sudden, there is that thought: There’s something wrong with me.

Me: Right. You don’t make the thought happen. It’s not your fault. It’s actually not anyone’s fault. But you can notice it. And once you notice, amazing things can happen.

Heidi: Amazing things? Like feeling calm?

Me: Possibly. We think we have to change things. To fix them. To make them better. But simply noticing and paying attention is the #1 ingredient of kind, non-violent change. And kind, non-violent change is the kind of change that sticks. Change that’s been forced, always tends to backfire.

Heidi: OK, so I notice the thought, and then what?

Me: Well, you could then do many things. One of my favorite is to say hello.

Heidi: Come again?

Me: “Hello there Thought that there is something wrong with me. Funny you should come by today. Things are rather busy, in case you couldn’t tell. Feel free to sit and make yourself comfy in that chair over there, or you can even hang out with me, but you should know that I can’t entertain you. I have a life I’m dying to live and also, I’m learning to stay calm.”

Heidi: Hunh! That’s interesting. So you aren’t trying to kick the thought out?

Me: Nah. Never works. It’ll come back to bite you in the ass, and probably at some ungodly hour when you’re trying to sleep. But you can say hello. You can laugh with it. And you can treat it kindly. Or you can drop it off at your friend’s house for them to keep an eye on while you do your stuff… But, once you notice the thought, you are onto it, baby, and you don’t have to believe it. So, Heidi, how’d it be if the thought “there’s something wrong with me” popped up but you were totally onto it?

Heidi: Hmm…. I think I’d be able to notice my panic and the crowded billboards in my mind more calmly. Hmm… I’d notice panic calmly. Hunh! Is that even possible?

Me: You just saw it in your mind’s eye, didn’t you?

Heidi: Hmmm… Kind of like the medical people and EMTs who come to the scene of an accident… How unhelpful would it be if they arrived and were all: “Oh noes! You’ve broken your arm! Oh noes. What the hell is wrong with you!”

Me: Exactly.

Heidi: Ahhhhh… Thanks, Heidi. I want to be calm like you.

Me: You’re on your way, Sweetpea, you’re on your way. Now, how about that massage?

Heidi: Oh yes. My favorite!

The post Entertaining today’s guest: “Too Much” appeared first on Heidi's Table.

Why do you stay in prison when the door is so wide open?
Move outside the tangle of fear-thinking. Live in silence.
Slow down and down in always widening rings of being.

No to-do list is going to get me there.

There?

There. Where worry ends.
There. Where it feels safe.
There. Where I’m home.

A monster shouts: “You must figure out your mailing list thing!”

And another: “You must get that new page up.”

And another: “Quit being so anxious or everything you do will come from fear.”

And yet another: “What’s the use. You may have good ideas, but you are paralyzed. What’s the use. You will always be a loser, maybe smart, but a loser nonetheless.”

Ah yes. Thanks for sharing. Onward!

Except for the fact that fear has, in effect, grounded all planes.

<Cue sad trombone>

There is nothing to do now but sit and notice. Oddly, just that brings a hint of relief:

There is nothing to do now but sit and notice.

It’s been weeks now, the 4AM-waking-up thing. (Except for Sunday, when the clocks changed and I woke up at—wait for it!—3, which is to say, thankyouverymuch, 4).

<Again with the sad trombone>

At dark:thirty it’s hard to ignore what’s wanting your attention. I mean, you can try, but there’s not much by way of distraction. And you can struggle to sleep, but sleep and struggle were never good bed fellows. (heh!)

Of course you could pretend it’s 7 and get up and get busy. But you’re onto that thought. Plus, you’re a mood detective! And so this morning you sit up in bed, wrap a blanket curiosity cape around you, and try to channel the Buddha. (Some people call this meditation).

You notice how hard you feel: things feel hard and you feel hard. A wall around your heart kind of hard. Numb and brittle-hard. Fragile-hard. Hard all around.

You understand about defending against what you’re scared of. You understand about being afraid of what’s dark. You understand about homeland security. You understand about terror. You know war. It’s an inside job.

You could call in the light brigades. You could bomb the bastards. You could smoke them out of their caves. But we know how that goes. All wars are civil wars.

So you sit. There you are, on a wall. Hello, frustration. Hello, fear. And oh! Hello! If it isn’t…

Humpty Dumpty!

“Hi!”

[He doesn’t answer. He’s shivering. Let’s try again. Maybe let’s try un-exclamating and un-bolding the font this time.]

Humpty?

[Still no answer.]

“Are you cold?”

What can I say. When I’m nervous I sometimes state the obvious.

He’s chattering so hard I’m afraid he’s going to go and crack up right on top of the wall here, before ever there being an actual event to report, like a fall. And then, not only would there be a mess on top of the wall, but we, by which I mean I, would be responsible for ruining the age-old nursery rhyme, to boot.

I’m going to be here for a while, I can tell. Plus, I remind myself, I am channeling the Buddha.

I notice I want to save him, to keep him from falling. I want to tell him that the story doesn’t end well if he goes ahead and falls. The experts won’t be able to mend things. The people running the world are, in fact, more f*cked up than he is, and really, it’d just be a horrible mess.

But I bite my tongue. For about a minute.

“Do you need anything?”

[no answer]

Apparently, he doesn’t like questions. They put him on the spot and, I’m cluing in, he’s already on the spot. That, plus, he’s onto me. He knows my questions are much more about me trying to alleviate my own discomfort than about what he might really need.

So I keep sitting. I’m nearby, but not too close. And certainly not in his face. The last thing you want to do is startle an egg on the ledge. I’ve learned a thing or two from police shows.

His eyes dart around. His shoulders are up to the ears he would have if he weren’t an egg, and his head is way forward. (Work with me). His brow is furrowed and his egg-chest is sunken in. His legs are twitching. Classic signs of tension. I notice these things and, am proud to say, say nothing.

It is now a quarter till dawn. We’ve been sitting on the ledge, he and I, for what feels like ever. Egg time moves verrrrry slowly. Especially in the dark.

At some point I stop pretending he’s not right here inside of me, a part of me. I get more curious. That’s about when he starts calming down. His body is still shaking but he seems less agitated.

But he sure does still look cold. I get a soft woolen blanket and very quietly, set it nearby. If he wants it, he’ll get it. I notice that he doesn’t flinch or pull away, and when I am back at a safe distance and seemingly not noticing, he reaches for the blanket and wraps it around him.

I sit and notice the urge to say something smart, to blame something—his upbringing, his estranged family, the Easter Bunny—and I bite my tongue.

Then I notice the urge to leave, to get up, to get busy, to turn on some screen or another. If I can’t fix things inside with my inner Humpty Dumpty and make this fear go away and never come back, then at least I can distract myself, no?

But I stay.

The Buddha, who apparently I’m no longer channeling because he has just come and joined us on the wall and now he looks just like the freaking Dalai Lama, says something to me in Tibetan. Or maybe it’s Pali. Not sure. But either way, I don’t understand.

I raise my eyebrow, as if to say, “Come again in a language I know?”

Notice I say, “as if,” because I don’t actually say that. At least not out loud. I’m catching on to this silence thing and how most things I say when I’m scared are really just blah-blah-blah and, quite frankly, I’m bored. Given the choice of scared and bored, or just scared, I’ll pick just scared. Just. As if! Still. You get my point.

So now it’s me. And Humpty Dumpty. And the Dalai Lama, who, I might add, looks to be smiling.

Smiling? you ask.

I know, right?

To be sure, it’s not like he’s laughing at us or anything. It’s more a smile like he’s onto something I don’t quite get. Yet. The “yet” is definitely implied. Whew! And also? It’s a warm smile. Very warm. As if to say: “all is really truly OK, including you.” As if—get this—he has confidence in me.

I want to say, “But Your Holiness Mr. Lama, I’m very scared. And I don’t know shit. And I’m just one girl. And look! Humpty! Who will put him together again if he goes and jumps?”

But I don’t. Because I’m practicing silence. And sitting. And noticing, by way of writing, which is my way.

Thank goodness for pens, curiosity capes and listening caps. Best secret powers, ever.

The post Entertaining today’s guest: Insomnia, again! (feat. Humpty Dumpty) appeared first on Heidi's Table.

Hard to ignore. Certainly hard to sleep through. When I finally “cried Uncle” and got up, I was tapped ever so lovingly on the shoulder by this line:

tending as all things do, toward silence…

Ahhh. And then I remembered (with a little help from above Google) the poem by Mary Oliver from whence my love-line came:

When death comes
like the hungry bear in autumn;
when death comes and takes all the bright coins from his purse

to buy me, and snaps the purse shut;
when death comes
like the measle-pox;

when death comes
like an iceberg between the shoulder blades;

I want to step through the door full of curiosity, wondering:
what is it going to be like, that cottage of darkness?

And therefore I look upon everything
as a brotherhood and a sisterhood,
I look on time as no more than an idea,
and I consider eternity as another possibility,

and I think of each life as a flower, as common
as a field daisy, and as singular,

and each name a comfortable music in the mouth
tending as all music does, toward silence.

and each body a lion of courage, and something
precious to the earth.

When it’s over I want to say: all my life
I was a bride married to amazement.
I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms.

When it is over, I don’t want to wonder
if I have made of my life something particular, and real.
I don’t want to find myself sighing and frightened,
or full of argument.

I don’t want to end up simply having visited this world.

~ * ~

Oh my dear body, I have been full of argument. And oh but I have been feeling frightened. Something to do with time and how it keeps passing at warp speed measured in days, even hours, when it used to be years. (Um, what year are we again?)

Something about how I’m doing too much of the wrong thing, and not enough of the love thing. And how the two are all tangled up and I can’t tease them apart. And in all this I need to support myself.

That last thought is so heavy it could crush rocks.

Playing Mood Detective

Sweet pea, shall we play? Want to invite your old pal and superhero Curiosity to play Mood Detective with you?

Yesss!

OK. What happens when you believe this thought? How do you live your life when you believe: “I need to support myself” ?

I worry. And then what I do is motivated by fear.
I feel alone. And I jump into the future and worry about dying alone.

Yikes!

And I wake up early and can’t sleep.
And I spin. Not like in a Sufi dance of joy, no. More like a piece that has sprung loose from a powerful moving machine… it’s still spinning like mad but on its own.

Oof! So hard!

And how does it feel in your body when you’re thinking that thought?

I feel the weight of the world on my shoulders.
It feels like there’s static on the screen of my mind.
Nothing is clear.
Sometimes my neck hurts.
And sometimes I feel it in my butt.

Ow! OK. Could something else be as true or truer than this pain-in-the-butt thought “I need to support myself”?

What do you mean?

Well, as I see it you are an adult and you are running a business and you need to pay bills and keep things moving. But when you are crushed with this thought you are usually only looking at things from one perspective, and, not to put too fine a point on it, that would be the perspective of doom.

Oh yes.

The thought “I need to support myself” really doesn’t seem to be serving you, does it?

Nah.

Because I know for a fact that you’d still work and do the things you love, even without that thought.

Yes, probably you’re right.

Can you tell me about those?

Those?

Those things that you love to do?

Read and write poems and essays and stories.
Connect with people… people I’ve met and people I’ve never met and people I’ve not yet met.
Sing and dance. Pretend I am Leonard Cohen’s female backup.
Be a Massage Therapist.
Play Mood Detective. Teach my clients to be mood detectives so their bodies don’t have to express their stress as pain.

Wow. That’s a lot of things to love! So, what else could be as true or truer than your original pain-in-the-ass thought: “I need to support myself” ?

I need to allow myself to be supported.

Can you tell me about that?

Well, truth is, I am not alone. Not really. I often think I am, but I’m not. Yesterday morning I called my friend at 6:30 a.m., crying. I woke him up and he listened and was there. It was 5:30 for him!

Oh yes. That is support. Not to mention love.

And I have other dears that love me. All over the world.

Yes, you do.

And I have clients whom I adore and by all accounts, they seem pretty much to like me too. They pay me and I get to help them.

Wow, yes.

You know, come to think, how I help them is all about this.

How so?

Sometimes I will hold parts of my clients’ bodies. Like their head, for example. I make a fulcrum with my fingers and place my finger pads and tips right where their head meets their neck, atlas on axis, at the crux of so much of the pressure in their neck and jaw… And I wait. And listen. And hold. All the while their head is resting in my hands.

I can tell how much their neck tension is easing by how fully they let me hold their head. Sometimes, for whatever reason, a client will keep holding the weight of their head. Mostly it’s not conscious at all. Maybe they are trying to help me. They simply can’t, for whatever reason, in that moment allow the full weight of her head to rest in my hands.

Often, just showing up and bringing awareness to how it all is is enough to change it. I can tell when a client rests because I feel the weight of their head–ironically heavier and lighter at once–in my hands. Often their jaw and face softens at the same time. It moves me in a way I can’t explain, to get to be there when that happens.

Oh my, Heidi! Do you have any openings today? I want you to hold my head! OK. Where were we?

We were playing with the thought “I need to support myself.” And I was noticing that when I believe that thought I am not allowing Life–by way of the ground, the bed, the pillow, the figurative or actual hands under my head–to support me.

Gravity comes to mind, too. That fantastic force of this our earth, not letting me up and float away into the la-la-land. When I am worrying, I have usually forgotten about the loving force of gravity pulling me ever back to the ground, back toward darkness, “tending as all music does, toward silence.”

~ * ~

Dear Mary Oliver, dear poetry, dear life, dear Byron Katie, dear ground, dear gravity, and oh dear client-of-mine,

Thank you.

Love,

Your Heidi

The post Entertaining today’s guest: Insomnia (feat. Mary Oliver) appeared first on Heidi's Table.

Greetings!

When I arrived in Boston yesterday morning I heard Heidi saying that if only Someone with a big S, or someone with a little s, or anyone, really, were with her, then her life would be better. It’s a lonesome thought that one (if only, then…), likely to bring its share of sad and tears. So I decided to pay her a visit.

I nearly scared her to death when I appeared at her window, truth be told. She was all, “heard of a door, lady?” But she let me in. Kind of her, really, perched as I was on quite the narrow ledge on the second floor thankyouverymuch of her building. I might be the weather, but a brick ledge is a precarious perch no matter who you are.

“Helllllohhh,” I exclaimed, in my best sultry voice. “I’m Hot & Steamy Monday Momma. Lovely to see you, Heidi.”

Her eyes got all squinty. “And who are you?”

“I just told you, I’m Hot & Steamy Monday Momma.” I tried not to grin.

“Right,” she raised her left eyebrow skeptically. To be fair though, while I know her quite well, this was the first time I’d appeared at her window wanting in.

“And how exactly do you know who I am?”

Oh my, but that just made me laugh– to think that it’s not obvious that the weather would know everything there is to know… But I pulled it together and tried to look serious, for her sake: “yes, love, you’re Heidi. We weather girls know.”

She stood there, pretty much just staring, her mouth agape.

“What? You’ve never seen a Hot & Steamy Monday Momma before?”

She shook her head.

“You gonna offer me a cup of coffee or something?

“Oh, sure,” she said, “sorry. I didn’t know the weather needed caffeine.”

Cheeky, ain’t she?

“I take it you want it iced.”

“Oh no, dahlin’, hot and steamy is my way.”

While she was in the kitchen I had a look-feel around. There was definitely a heavy sense in the air and it wasn’t me, I swear. This was some kind of heavy lonesome.

“Creme and sugar?” she called out.

“Does it rain in the rain forest?” I called back.

We sat and sipped our drinks, not saying much. Finally she asked, “why are you here?”

“You asked for help. I came.”

“Oh, that.” I knew she was remembering her words into her pillow as she’d fallen asleep the night before.

We sat there for another spell, quietly sipping, cradling our mugs.

“Monday–uh–Momma?” she asked.

“Yes, Sweetpea, tell me–“

“Not to state the obvious, but it’s impossible to get hugged if you are alone. And, well, I’m trying to be brave and strong and all, but I’m just afraid about the alone thing.”

I knew that our girl Heidi is my old friend Curiosity’s #1 fan so I invited her to consider possibilities, potential fallacies in her conclusions.

“I hear you about the alone thing. I do. I know where your mind goes when you think of alone and the future, and those are scary places to go. Let’s get real basic, OK? How about those hugs: what is it about being hugged that you want?” I asked.

“To feel enveloped. Held. Taken care of. Supported. Not alone. Connected. Loved.”

“Ah, yes, lovely. What if you knew that those things and qualities, and indeed, even hugs, are available to you no matter your relationship status?

She raised that wayward eyebrow of hers again, but I could see her mind chewing on my question.

“Take Mother Nature. She’s a single woman, and a single mother, at that. At least these days. Lord have mercy!” I stopped to wipe my brow, feeling a rumble of thunder in my chest, which I quelled. “Not that she hasn’t had her lovers, mind you. Not that she hasn’t had the wunderbar liaisons and long and loving relationships… I mean, you and I would not be here if it weren’t for those. But really! You’ve got to give it to her. That woman keeps going and going and giving and giving and taking and taking… she’s a sight to behold–

Heidi interrupted: “um, a point?”

Good thing I adore her. I sized her up and realized how impatient she was for a hug. “Where was I when you interrupted my story?”

“Mother Nature and her lovers–” she said, rolling her eyes a bit.

“Yes, well then… Heidi, you don’t need to be with someone to be hugged. And you can be with someone and be hugged and still feel lonely and unhugged.”

“I know! What’s with that?!”

“What’s with that is that it really doesn’t have much to do with the hugs themselves then, does it?”

“Come again?”

“Well, if you can be happy or not with a hug, and happy or not without a hug, what’s it got to do with the hugs themselves? But still, Sweetheart, that’s for another time. About the hugs–“

“Won’t you just tell me already?”

“Tell you what?”

“Tell me where these regardless-of-relationship-status hugs are available?”

“I can’t just tell you! You know very well that telling someone things doesn’t really work. People need to find their own things. Plus it can be a game, and I know you and Curiosity like to play those.”

“Lady! You crawled through my window to tell me this? That I have to find my own examples and answers on how I don’t need someone in order to be hugged?”

“Uh, pretty much.”

At that her eyes looked so sad, it practically made me start raining in her living room.

“Tell you what. Weren’t you going to go out for a run?”

I asked in order to remind her that she always feels better after getting fresh air and movement, and that something about the repetition of motion gives her mind lots of “bings!” and invariably opens up a sense of new possibilities.

“Yes.”

“I’ll come along, and we’ll see what we find. OK?”

She studied me in my colorful scarves and dangling, weathered beach glass earrings. “Weather girls jog?”

I did not stoop to answer that.

Off we went to the park where we did Heidi’s alternatey run-walk thing. On the runs we were quiet. On the walking laps, we talked.

“What kind of hug would you want today, Heidi?” I asked.

“A big bear kind of hug. “

“Ah yes, like a momma bear or poppa bear in the stories?”

“Something like that.”

“Just thinking of it, can’t you just feel it already?”

“Yeah, sort of. But— I want the real thing. Not the airy fairy pretend thing.”

I smiled, not about to argue. Plus I’m confident in her ability to keep opening her mind. I didn’t tell her what we weather girls and Curiosity have always known but which human scientists have recently just discovered: there are these neurons (they call them “mirror neurons“) which fire not only when a person is actually doing a thing, but also when she or he is watching, or even seeing in their minds’ eye, someone else perform that same thing. Wonderful thing, that, isn’t it?

Her voice interrupted my thoughts. “I suppose there’s mossy soft forest floor hugs, too, like in Mary Oliver’s poem, “Sleeping in the Forest.”

See? She already gets the mirror neuron thing. Smart girl! I will have to commend Curiosity.

“Oh yes, sweetheart, that’s a lovely find. That Mary Oliver, we adore her, don’t we?”

“Mmmm, yes. What’s your favorite of hers?”

“I could never pick just one. Oh so many… Peonies. The Journey. When Death Comes… I know you have a number of them on your blog.”

We ran for another lap, me enjoying the steaminess of my Monday thankyouthankyou, and by our next walking lap, she’d found more.

“Oh! There’s being buoyed by water and feeling enveloped and held up at once, every last ounce of me, with whatever heavyness or lightness I might have in my heart, totally and fully supported.” She fairly shouted this, probably on account of being out of breath, but also excited.

“Do you get to go swimming, I mean, being the weather?” she asked.

“Oh Heidi, I get to do everything. And yes, water is a fantastic lover, I mean hugger.” I coughed, suddenly feeling steamier than I recalled having set the day to be.

It was getting to be the end of our time at the park, so I offered a suggestion of my own. “You know, if it reeeally is the flesh and blood person kind of hug you want, you could always stop a person on the street and ask them for a hug.”

I got a look from her for that, but continued unperturbed. “Sure, one might look at you weirdly, but the next person might be delighted. And who knows! You might make his or her day, sweetheart! Just sayin’. You can get creative about the actual in-the-flesh hugs. And I know you have virtual hugs at the ever-ready with all your lovelies around the world.”

She nodded, not having much breath to talk anymore. Which apparently I still did.

“And of course there’s the Hot & Steamy Momma Monday hugs, which is what I’m all about. You can always go out into the day of me, maybe for an early morning run at the park, or a 2 in the afternoon ambling stroll to the corner store, and I’ll be right there, as close as the sweat trickling down the side of your face. Tell me, who else’s hug has ever done that for you?!

“You’re weird, you know that?”

“There you go, my sweet! Happy Monday! Consider yourself hugged!”

And off I went, to my next stop. Maybe you. If so, I hope you live on the ground floor.

The post Unexpected help (feat. Hot ‘n’ Steamy Monday Mama) appeared first on Heidi's Table.

I wish I could come by to thank you in person but this being 2009 and you having lived back in the 1200s it’s a wee bit complicated. But still: thank you! Your poetry has helped me live life with more kindness and understanding and humor toward myself and my brother and sister humans. And that, Mr. Rumi, is huge.

I think you’d be surprised and not surprised by the state of our world today. We still fight. And we still delight. We still make love and we still make war. Do we ever. What has changed is our capacity to manifest these things on a much larger scale, and that, necessarily, makes the stakes for both joy and suffering seem higher. Though maybe that—stakes being higher—is an illusion since Life does tend to inexorably move forward, come what may, in spite of our human shenanigans.

I want you to know that your poetry, beloved for centuries in your native lands (today called Iran, Turkey, Afghanistan…), has crossed all the oceans. Yes, your Persian words have been translated into many languages and just a couple years ago, matter of fact, you were named the most popular poet in America! This, probably in large part due to the work of a lovely man, a poet in his own right, Coleman Barks, who has and continues to translate thousands of your poems into English. And this in spite of our country having waged war upon not one but two of your people’s countries. (Much sadness about that).

I should know better than to name any one poem a favorite as I tend to have many favorites of many things and many poets but still: your poem The Guest House has been a favorite of mine for going on ten years, which I hope counts for something coming from such a fickle, multi-favoriting girl.

When I first heart The Guest House it felt like warm oil in kind hands on a sore and tired body. Your words, they smelled like rain on cracking, parched ground. The sentiment of your poem felt like an open-armed invitation for me to come home to myself.

This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.

A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.

Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.

The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.

Be grateful for whoever comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.

You mean I don’t need to make that mean thought go away? (As if I could!)

You mean there’s nothing wrong with me if depression has come to pay a visit?

You mean this thing of having difficult inner states is a human thing, not a Heidi-thing?

You mean I can be kind even to the most difficult of guests?

You mean this incredibly difficult guest that keeps visiting me in spite of my best efforts to remodel and transform my guesthouse might be clearing me out for something new?

What a notion! What a relief!

Mr. Rumi, my note today is prompted by an immediate, personal matter pertaining to my guest house, and one guest in particular:

Anxiety. Not a new guest. At all. In fact, for many years Anxiety had pretty much taken up residence inside me. Oh those were some scary times. I did not, then, know Anxiety was simply a guest passing through. I thought it WAS me. It was in charge! I was living at its mercy, cowering in a closet or running away.

Thankfully, much has changed, in large part on account of gentle remodeling of my house more along the lines of your Guest House, wherein I’ve cultivated Kindness as the Presence that runs the place.

But still, of all the guests that visit the house of me, Anxiety is my most difficult. And here it is, AGAAAAAAIN! It’s enough to make me want to put up a “No Vacancy” sign.

(Whispering: I don’t like it. See this here bald spot on my head? Oh yeah. Anxiety made me pull those hairs out. M-hm, I don’t like it one bit.)

This guest brings with it a feeling at once far away and removed (as if a lamb’s coat of wool had been felted between my ears) and hyper sensitivity (as if I suddenly grew a million more motion detecting hairs on my arms). When Anxiety visits, it feels like a thick blanket of unease settles on the house of me: Heart rate, revved. Patience, threadbare. Tears, about to spill. Thoughts, multiplying like incestuous fruit flies. Mind, crowded. Future, doomed. Present— hunh? Wha—? Presence?

So I’ve been pulling out all the stops to take care of it and all the other guests in the house of me these days. I’ve written. I’ve been doing my best to be an impartial host to all. I’ve fed everyone well. They’ve been to the park. They’ve run. They’ve gotten fresh air. They’ve sat on the porch with lemonade. We’ve heard children laughing, running through sprinklers. I’ve written in my thought-book. I’ve worked. I’ve shown up. They’ve watched a couple episodes of my heroine-of-the-day, Buffy, on hulu. They’ve connected with friends. I’ve scheduled a massage for me …

By all accounts Anxiety should have checked out during the night, right?

But no. This morning, there it was coming down the steps to breakfast in those god-awful hole-y slippers it has. (Could it at least get with the times and update its wardrobe a bit? Or go barefoot for a change? Lighten up? It is, after all, the height of summertime.)

Mr. Rumi, as you can see, I’ve been doing my darndest to entertain this guest with magnanimity and kindness, but I’m having a hard time. Do you have any thoughts for me? Can you point me to another poem of yours?

I’d be most grateful.

Yours truly,

Heidi

The post Dear Mr. Rumi, thank you & could you help me with a guest. Love, Heidi appeared first on Heidi's Table.