Running Away

I've been running away from writing for a long, long time.

And I'm not talking a few years, I'm talking about all my life. At my ten year high school reunion most folks were surprised that I was not writing. (They wouldn't count computer systems design specifications.) And for the girl least likely to run a lap around the track, they were more shocked that no one held a gun to my head and I was willingly training for my first marathon - which turned out to be the first of many.)

December 24, 2004 (another snippet from last journal entry before long lost journal found again somewhere in vicinity of Phi Phi, Thailand):

The day you realize that all running is futile you come to a dead stop right where God is. The day you come to know that you have not gained anything by running, you do not run anymore. - Finger Pointing to the Moon, by Osho

I used to think there was a place my pen resisted going to. This mysterious place I was adamantly fighting against was a crucial spot to visit, if I was dabbling, and to fully commit to a creative endeavor, to dwell. When you stop running and you stop searching under the nooks and crannies, you might notice the spaceless, timeless infinite realm is so close in front of our eyes it's nearly behind us - that's why we don't see it's right here, right now.

...there is a language in the world that everyone understood, a language the boy had used throughout the time that he was trying to improve things at the shop. It was the language of enthusiasm, of things accomplished with love and purpose, and as part of a search for something believed in and desired. - The Alchemist, by Paulo Coelho

To craft in the universal language of the world - no translations needed - and tap into what Coelho refers to as the soul of the world is what every writer strives for. I know it comes from depths of the heart. Ah, which means of course keeping it open - no matter what the circumstances are surrounding me that beg: please, please fortify the fortress.

For a creative writer possession of the 'truth' is less important than emotional sincerity. - George Orwell

I realize I haven't been running away from writing per se - but I have been running away from opening my heart and keeping it open. (Which is to say I've run away from intense authentic writing that strikes a universal chord...but there are many many more ramifications to a closed heart.)

[H]ow to be open without taking on all the suffering of other people? Yet while protecting us from further hurt, this fear of being taken advantage of, ripped off or walked over is also sabotaging our entire sense of wellbeing and connectedness; it is because of this fear of being open that we have become so closed to each other, so locked into separation and isolation.

The Dalai Lama has often said that he does not practice religion as such, that his religion is simply loving kindness. - Unconditional Love: How to Live with an Open Heart in a Changing World, by Ed & Deb Shapiro

The book, Unconditional Love, challenges us to be heart warriors. "What the warrior renounces is anything in his experience that is a barrier between himself and others," Chogyam Trungpa writes.

We were amused once to see the Tibetan leader, the Dalai Lama, being asked by an eager young television reporter for CNN what was the first thing he thought of when he awoke in the morning. You would have thought that this most revered teacher would say something deeply profound or insightful, something along the lines of vowing to save the world from its own ignorance; instead he simply replied, Shaping motivation. He said that we all, including himself, have to be constantly vigilant, to pay attention so that our intentions and motivation are focused on the open heart and not the closed mind. Shaping motivation each day means making the open heart your constant focus, extending loving kindness and making compassion your innate response. - Unconditional Love, by Ed & Deb Shapiro

Last night speaking after class with my mindfulness course instructor, whom studied in a Buddhist monastery for eight years, I realized the post-tsunami period was the first time ever I allowed my heart to break open. He looked straight into my eyes: "Heart Break Open. There is a mantra named, Break Heart Open." Because of past trauma, my protective coping mechanism is to wall myself off. I haven't shared this completely before in the blog but in a two-week period I suffered an injury, witnessed loss and devastation on a global scale, went through a breakup, and learned that a dear friend - my ex-husband - suffered a serious head injury in an accident. This series of events could send anyone over the edge. I choose to stay with whatever came up. He continued, We are afraid that if we sit still with the emotions - the grief, the anguish, the pain, the sorrow, the emptiness - then we will be totally consumed by waves upon waves of emotion.

What we run from pursues us, what we welcome transforms us, he repeated from earlier in class.

The staying was more intense than the physical tsunami for me. I wasn't sure how far done the rabbit hole I could keep falling...and falling. Where and when would the unraveling end? He shared that what usually happens is that as we go deeper into "what is present" we eventually go through it to the other side. And this is exactly what happened. I know without a doubt that my heart can never shut down again. And I know I am now ready to be the writer I always imagined.

One word frees us from all the weight and pain of life: that word is love. - Sophocles

Comments

[Steve S]

Evelyn, when one door closes another opens. I am glad that you have found The Door. Those who find this blog and your writing will be able to share the goodness of the heart you have opened to the writer you will be. I look forward to following the word stream. It should be quite a journey!

[Evelyn Rodriguez]

Steve, thanks so much for your kind words. I'm really ok now - I could not have written this say three weeks ago though. I'm not saying the events were good things of themselves - but having a wide open heart is. And that's the place I am now - although things appeared dicey there last month. There's a lot of energy drained - not to mention love withheld - in erecting barriers. It's excrutiatingly hard to describe what a wide open heart feels like but it's like another plane of existence that's exquisite and precious and luminous.

[Jon Husband]

Thanks goodness .. for you .. that you've come to this place.

It reminds me of a wee story I'd like to share. About 2.5 years ago I attended a very interesting forum which was facilitated (sort-of) by Margaret Wheatley and a colleague of hers, Miha Pogacnik (a world-class classical violinist who uses his gift of musiccraft to intervene in world crisis spots). Margaret's facilitation of the forum waqs really only starting it off by asking "What if ... what if we didn't "know" ?

At any rate .. to keep this as short as I know how ... one of the moments in the two-day forum was a two hour-or-so segment where Miha took his violin and a single piece of flip chart paper and deconstructed for us a Beethoven passage, all the while relating how the music starts out slowly and builds some initial order, then begins to 'question itself', so to speak, and then begins to disintegrate, decompose, lose order. He emphasized that virtually all classical music follows this pattern !

Segment by segment he deconstructed the music .. showing us how the order began to decompose, and become disquiet, less harmonious, seeking itself again.

The most striking for me was when he demonstrated very clearly the moment when the music reached what he called "the holy zero point" .. it's most cacaphonous and disorderly. There he stopped for a bit and spoke, and engaged us on the issue that this type of dynamic arrives in all of our lives, in some way or other .. and that often we keep struggling against this, both consciously and unconsciously ... we don't want to lose control of ourselves, and let go. And he stressed, at this point, that we are not taught well (or at all) from childhood on in western society to "let go into the infinite".

He emphasized that it is crucial to realize and acknowledge "the holy zero point" ... as long as we struggle and deny, moving beyond it is difficult if not impossible.

What came next was ... letting go into what he called "productive resignation", which is where the new order begins to seek and form patterns and find meaning, ususally in new directions. Again, he demonstrated this clearly with the music, playing the next segment and showing us how it was beginning to reconstruct .. new melody line, new harmonies, almost always more complex and more integrated.

Here's what I wrote recently about productive resignation, for a blogging chum who's struggling with letting go into his own (very obvious to us/others) magic:

"productive resignation is NOT letting the spark die out ... it's sitting back and relaxing into watching and listening to the spark, and stilling all the wind currents that we keep bringing with us as we keep trying to figure out how to make the spark jump into flame ... and blowing at it all the time without knowing what kind of fuel to bring to it won't make it flame but will keep it sputtering and jumping ... acknowledging that it won't go out, sitting back and watching it lets us know what kinds of fuel it might like to use next."

Sounds to me like you are confronting and recognizing an important personal "holy zero point" and perhaps letting go into "productive resignation" ?

[Colleen]

Two things:

>>"What we run from pursues us, what we welcome transforms us" is a quote for the ages. Going into my quotations book right now. Thank you, once again.

>>"And I know I am now ready to be the writer I always imagined."

You were always ready; you just didn't know it yet. Now go explode into that supernova we already know you to be.

[Jerry]

Thank you Evelyn. Nothing but love should come to you for your courage in opening your heart.

[jennifer rice]

I went to a zen buddhist retreat last year... 8 days of utter silence, mostly staring at a wall. No talking, no eye contact. Just coming back to yourself, over and over again, when the mind wanders. Or runs, more like it, because our minds so rarely want to be right here in the present moment. Towards the end of the retreat I was able to experience 'heart wide open'... when I returned to the real world I kept it open for such a small period of time, and then life closed in. It's such a rare and precious gift, to see the world through eyes unveiled. Thanks for writing this; I'd forgotten what that world really looks like. This reminded me.

[John Abbe]

Thanks. I've been in a pretty closed space these days, and reading you helped. Also reminded me of this quote which i thought you might like:

"It is only through letting our heart break that we discover something unexpected: The heart cannot actually break, it can only break open ... To live with a broken-open heart is to experience life full strength ... When the heart breaks open, it marks the beginning of a real love affair with this world. It is a broken-hearted love affair, rather than the conventional kind based on hope and expectation. Only in this fearless love that can respond to life's pain as well as its beauty can we be of real help to ourselves or anyone else in this difficult age. The broken-hearted warrior is an essential archetype for our time."
--John Welwood, Love and Awakening

[Jennifer Schelter]

Hi!

Thanks. You are brilliant and I love you for opening.

I just got back from working with tortured Iraqis and I can tell you my heart has smashed open.

Like a dandilion, my heart has opened, and smashing all the ideas I had about love - I hope the pieces turn into seeds that grow a meadow of bouquets and love sprouts from each "broken" part of my heat like a new loving fragant something good.

Peace to you,

jennifer