Self conscious

Monkey Gurl is the least self-conscious of the gang of cats and, perhaps, the most conscious of Self.

In a recent conversation with Sharon, Monkey reported that she, unlike Zorro, doesn't have many questions and doesn't have any answers. She says she doesn't think things over--that in her estimation, that gets in the way of enjoying the present moment.

From the beginning of my encounters with her, there has been something about her gaze into my eyes. She holds the look longer than the other cats. There is a presence and a lack of personal that I find grounding. It's soft and soothing.

She prefers to remain unpettable. She reported in a session with another animal communicator that she didn't see the value of petting because we touch each other on the inside so intimately. I doubt she gave it much more thought.

invitation

I've been giving satsang to not being invited. In the language of NVC, I see being invited to play, to work, to visit as a strategy to meet the need for inclusion. One strategy of hundreds, yet the sense of not being invited has been a source of pain for everyone I've talked with about this.

Not getting picked for the team. Not getting asked to the prom. Not being included in major family decisions, work decisions, school decisions. And the flip side of not inviting, which has an equal measure of pain in it.

Like blaming, looking for invitations puts our happiness outside of ourselves.

I used Katie's questions to inquire. Katie likes the use of the word "should", so I framed it like this: "My friend should actively invite me to play to show care for me. My friend should say, 'I miss you. Won't you come and visit for a while?'"

One of the turn arounds I found was, "I should invite me to play to show care for me." What a relief--it's not up to someone else to determine if I play or not or if I feel cared for or not.

A question that held my attention in this inquiry was, "What would it be like to meet this person for the first time without having this thought?" Ah. Fresh start. No baggage to bring along.

I know my friend cares for my well-being, my happiness, and our friendship. This wanting something different contributes to stress for both of us. I don't want to gloss over the grief I feel in response to having less contact than I would like or having most of the contact initiated by me. But I would like to grieve fully the should-belief and then see what freshness comes in.

Invitation is about wanting to attract something. What I want most is to attract liberation of these beliefs that still hold dense should-thinking.

Rest

Oh-Oh has the most energy of the Gang of Four. He's curious, sensitive, and playful. They each favor different toys; his is a small plastic circle with bumpy edges. He can toss, carry, and bat it about. Like the others, he likes to bat it under the fat chair and watch the human lift the chair to retrieve the collection of toys that have gotten wedged there.

He spends much of his time out of doors climbing trees, partying on the roof, and keeping tabs on the other cats. His unbounded enthusiasm for life is fully evident.

But when he comes to a stop, it's a full stop. It's as if he brings the same passion to resting as he does to everything else.

This seems to me to be a simple and priceless lesson for us all. When resting, fully rest.

In fact, I think that by being fully present, rest comes to naturally occur even as we move about or think or engage with others. There is a sweet economy of movement and a softening of shoulds. It seems much more restful to live in the present moment.

"...in all the great spiritual traditions, at their heart is tenderness - just to be kind inside, and then everything rights itself. Fear rests. Confusion rests. Everything that was perturbing the system rests. Because they know that when you are tender inside you no longer need their services, because you have returned to your true nature." Pamela Wilson

The one perfect tone

In the forward to "The Touch of Healing: Energizing Body, Mind, and Spirit with the Art of Jin Shin Jyutsu", Alice Burmeister recounts a story her parents told of Pythagoras. Two men were about to strike one another in an argument. Pythagoras pick up his lute and "plucked a single note"--the fight broke up. He found the "one perfect tone" to harmonize the situation.

When I was first introduced to NVC, I immediately saw how it could provide the support for discovering the one perfect tone in conflictual situations. I saw how beautifully and effortlessly Marshall Rosenberg, the founder and primary trainer at that time, could defuse tension in workshops without it being a power trip. I also saw that he chose not to "make nice".

Mary Burmeister writes of Jin Shin Jyutsu, "[it] is not application of technique; it is demonstration of art...." And so it is with NVC. It took me a number of years to understand this. I got caught in attempting to apply technique without having the profound experience of the essence of the art. That came later when I trained with Jorge.

I mark a pivotal point when, in a formal empathy session with Jorge, I spoke of something I despaired would ever be received by someone in a way that could actually shift the despair. For over a decade, I had been experiencing a "dark night of the soul". I had given up my Buddhist practice, had given up on god, had given up on the possibility of ever truly being happy or whole or alive.

Because I had tried to share this inner agony with teachers, therapists and friends with no appreciable change, I had resigned myself to being stuck in a gray hell for the rest of my days unless, by chance, grace appeared.

Grace did appear that day. I took courage and tried again. "I feel utterly and completely abandoned by God, betrayed by the Buddha, and terrified to talk about it once again."

All that Jorge did was be present with "lazy-bones empathy", as he describes it. He may or may not have had a similar experience. He didn't try to fix the situation. He simply, out of his own curiosity, kept making tender guesses of what I was feeling and wanting. Sometimes his guesses were precisely accurate, and sometimes not. I don't remember the particulars of the words. What I do remember with clarity is a sparkly spaciousness coming into the room we were in. In the deep empathetic lazy-bones listening, there was a chance for the one perfect tone to come to the foreground. And for a turn toward the healing I was so desperately wanting.

This way of being present can be accessed from many paths. NVC offers one path. In my opinion, the transformative power of NVC is rarely understood and even more rarely practiced. It requires a raw honesty that strips away beliefs and a sense of control or safety. It's not about "making nice" and it's not about avoiding cacophony. It's not about peace and harmony as a strategy to getting along.

The perfect tone is an art, not a technique.

Blame and the body

"When we blame someone we put our happiness in their hands." Isaac Shapiro

I would like to live in a place where there is little tendency to blame the body for its perceived imperfections and failings. I would like to soak up that ease and celebration of body-as-it-is.

I don't know if I know anyone who loves their body just the way it is functioning. No wonder I have spent most of my life blaming myself (i.e. body/mind) for preventing happiness.

Yesterday I had a conversation with Thyroid, who in this body named Joan has struggled to do its job for decades, perhaps even all of its life. I saw the blame I've thrown at it for not functioning the way I thought it ought to, and I saw too the burden that goes with placing my happiness in the hands of another. Thyroid naturally cares about my happiness, so probably has tried to work even harder to give what I apparently want. The harder it works, the less optimum the functioning.

This morning I looked into the notion, "I should be more disciplined with exercise, food, etc." I used Byron Katie's four questions for inquiry. When I came to asking what would it be like to be incapable of thinking this thought, I felt a surge of grief. For myself, for our culture, for the lack of exemplars who love their bodies just as they are.

When I cast my eye on the cats, I realize I do know many who accept body-as-is. Bonz, when she was dying, would wobble through the ferals and semi-ferals with curiosity and interest and no apparent fear. Once, the wind knocked her over, but she just got back up and continued her enjoyment of the outdoors. She cared not a whit about her body's appearance or ability.

I had the honor of accompanying Bonz when she was taking her last breaths. And to be with her body for another day. We laid flowers on her body and made prayers and sang her favorite songs and felt her spirit as it moved out of the body into vastness. It was clear to me then and for some time after that all these obsessions about how the body behaves and looks were of no value. The body really does die. But something much more precious continues, something we call by many names that is eternal.

When I finished my inquiry this morning, I re-read some of the text in Katie's book, "I Need Your Love--Is that True?": "Love won't deny a breath. It wouldn't deny a grain of sand or a speck of dust. It is totally in love with itself, and it delights in acknowledging itself through its own presence, in every way, without limit. It embraces it all, everything from the murderer and the rapist to the saint to the dog and cat. Love is so vast within itself that it will burn you up. It's so vast that there's nothing you can do with it. All you can do is be it."

May blame burn up.

Beauty

"Let the beauty you love be what you do.
There are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground." Rumi

Some friends and I are sitting with this poem. In the classical language of NVC, what strategies meet my needs for beauty? (I much prefer the language of the poem, but NVC does help me cut through judgments.)

The answers coming up are sometimes surprising. Not surprisingly, working with cloth, hanging with the O'Ferals de Onate, and connecting with my cadre of soul mates are strategies that serve very well indeed.

I thought my dream of creating a foundation to support the work of the NVC trainers I admire was something of beauty, but it turns out it's not. Nor, it seems, is continuing with the practice group I've been leading for a couple of years. The latter especially surprises me because it has become effortless. And I know from feedback how much many in this group value what we are doing together.

I was initially a reluctant leader, doing so only because Jorge was traveling a lot. But through the process of learning to be present and relaxed when we got into muddles, I have come home to my life in a way I have longed for but had come to feel hopeless would transpire.

Support simultaneously came from discovering Pamela's satsangs. At last, a satsang-giver who warmed my heart and helped welcome all that was coming. I instantly saw the connection with the notion in NVC that behind every expression was a beautiful need.

"Each one of these servants inside, from the most irritating of emotions, can reveal an incredible amount of wisdom when you interview it," Pamela has said.

So I am interviewing resistance these days, and seeing the paths that apparently want to be followed with more honesty. I am willing more and more to forgive the dream of what I think ought to be happening and just let myself sink in to see if what Hafiz says at the end of his poem is truer for me:

"Your wounds of love can only heal
When you can forgive
This dream."

"He hasn't been nvc-ed yet."

Disclaimer: I am not a Certified Trainer, nor am I on the Trainer track, nor am I exposed to many trainers currently. The views I present in this blog are my personal views and therefore are no reflection of the views the NVC organization.

NVC has a transformative power that, in my estimation, is little emphasized. And because of this, the model can easily be used mechanistically. I overheard a student say the above quote to another student as a way of explaining why someone didn't use the model "correctly".

When I first was learning NVC I got a lot of ideas of how it is suppose to be done and corrected others with vigor.

On reflection, there were some key elements that were missing. Here are some that I emphasize in my practice group:


Behind every action and every expression is a beautiful need. The strategy to try to get the need met may be tragic, but the need itself is beautiful.

Needs are not in conflict but strategies sometimes are. Hence the importance of learning to distinguish between strategies and needs.

The two aspects of the model, empathy and honesty, are equally important to clear communication. My friend and colleague Jorge Rubio-Vollert describes it as a kung fu dance. One moment you are in empathy, the next in honesty. If you give listening without it being the most enlivening thing for you, your listenee will know on some level that something is stinky.

NVC is simply a language of the heart. The form is useful as training wheels but it is not the goal.

Beware of single mindedness of purpose in getting needs met from a particular person and/or in a particular way. There are a myriad of ways of getting needs met.

Practice lazy-bones empathy--relaxed, open, curious, agendaless, with no desire to fix or change or advise. This latter I will write about more and how I see it can lead to a deep presence that is, in essence, without needs.

Catching cats

When my brother and I were growing up on a ranch, he learned to trap. I won't describe the kinds of traps he used--I'm sure he's had some nightmares about them and plenty of regrets. It was the way he was taught by the his father and the government trapper and probably some other skilled trappers.

When the trapper came to talk to our father, my dog Tami was both fascinated and scared. He smelled like dead animals. He always sat on the stairs rather than in a chair, and held his hat in his hand as he and my father talked about the ones they wanted to kill--coyotes.

In my father's world, there were good animals and bad animals, and Man was the one who knew best to determine who fell where. Coyotes were the worst of the bad because they killed good things, like sheep. The connections among seemingly unrelated changes weren't made: the use of DDT and other modern chemical warfare; the demise of the jackrabbit population; the increase in coyote population that occurrs when more are killed; the decline of the bird population (especially of my father's beloved quail) and so on.

I have tried to approach my involvement with feral cats with great respect for their wisdom and willingness to be caught and with a sensitivity to what it feels like to be caught and contained. When I got interested in TNR, I learned about drop traps and made one with a padded door. Instead of a trap made of plastic net propped on a stick, I chose to feed the cats inside the trap and use a drop door. On the days I want to trap, I set the door and stand inside the house with my hand ready to pull a string that yanks the nail out holding the door up.

The next moments tend to be the most stressful--rushing out to throw a sheet over the trap, grabbing a wire trap that has a lift door and is covered with cloth except for both ends so it looks like a tunnel, keeping my knee on the drop trap, lifting the two doors, and then trying to close the door on the small trap without a tail in it. I cover the carrying trap completely and haul my catch to the car.

This morning I meant to catch three--Rimpoche, Felicity, and Zorra, the last of Mamacita's kittens. Because they spend many nights and parts of days inside, I mistakenly thought they would let me grab them at their food bowls. One attempt and I knew it wasn't going to work.

By the time I brought the drop trap inside and set up the smaller carrying traps, only one would come forward quickly. I had chances with the other two, but blew it, so they get another day to think about their rite-of-passage surgery. I think Rimpoche is especially concerned about her freedom and autonomy. If she weren't in estrus, I would be inclined to let her out and try next week. But we are trying to avoid adding to the cat population so I feel more determined than usual to catch her and Felicity, who has also been out chasing the boys.

Like life, this may or may not go according to my plan. As my father used to say, "We''ll see."

Color

"It is astonishing to remember that what we regard as color is in fact a form of mirage," Carolyn L. E. Benesh writes in the most recent issue of Ornament Magazine. "Color is such a beguiling state due to its intrinsic phantasmic quality, as it does not really exist but is based on how light waves refract off our eyes."

Benesh is reviewing the Fashion in Color exhibit at the Smithsonian's Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum, in New York City. The subject is 300 years of Western fashion grouped by color--black, white, yellow, red, and multicolored, each grouping within the same-colored room. I'm guessing this presentation has a way of jolting the mind out of habitual seeing.

I imagine walking through a room of yellow with expressions of clothing as adornment in yellow from different times and I have a sense of yellowness. How the body responds, how the mind interprets. Yellow as royalty, yellow as sun, yellow as brazen.

Isaac reminds us that the perception of the world changes--the world we see now is different from the world that was seen a few hundred years ago.

I wonder what will be "seen" today....

"A Book has a lot of Words", Puff the Wise

Using words to point to the wordless realm of Awareness sometimes seems pointless. Yet, it's what we've got, along with movement and other senses.

Ramana said, "We are not the body." Isaac Shapiro and others remind us that the body is for sensing objects. An answer to this particular riddle is that without the body, we don't sense objects.

When I close my eyes, body dissolves. When I have my eyes open to write words or to read words, the body becomes more solid in my perception.

An on-going riddle for me is, How to teach Nonviolent Communication (which is trademarked, copyrighted, and owned by an organization in the word-world), a model of using words less violently in interactions, without stimulating more of a sense of separate identities? NVC is a needs-based language. Part of our work is sleuthing back to the universal need that is apparently being met or unmet. Feelings arise from needs. Judgments are the habit of thinking that is even further from our needs. If we can't identify the feeling, we start with the judgments. If we really let them fly--preferably with a non-judmental listening companion--we usually stir up the feeling. From there, we can go "home" to the need.

For example, at the post office this morning there was one clerk on duty and about eight people on line. One of the things I enjoy about downtown post office is that people still know each other. One thing I didn't enjoy this morning was that the clerk knew a guy who was behind me in line. I had stepped aside to fill out a form. I was ready to resume our transaction, but he said, "I've already called his number, so I'm going to take him first."

The judgment that came up in my mind went something like this: "You are only saying that to have an excuse to talk to your buddy. Numbers get called all the time here and then you all find someone else got skipped. If you knew me you would say to him, 'Wait while I complete this with her'. It's that old-boy network at play here." Okay, so I'm feeling irritated because my need for inclusion isn't being met. And I feel annoyed because I would like to trust that my needs are of equal value to yours and others.

I could have spoken up in this way and made a request, immediate and doable, such as "Would you be willing to complete my transaction before going to his?" but I actually found myself in the moment more interested in what led him to make the choice of taking his friend first. I'm guessing he feels bored and tired a lot from the monotony of doing the same tasks with hundreds of people each day and wanted a chance to exchange some witicisms with his friend as a way to have fun.

When I connected empathetically with my own needs and then with what I'm guessing his needs were, I relaxed. And what followed was I felt more patient and willing to wait while he had a conversation with a friend about what he did last night (party and gamble) and how he feels today (hungover).

As you see, there are a lot of words getting to this. And I don't feel certain the words I've used express clearly the power of NVC. Just for fun, let's say that you, Dear Reader, get a sense of how coming home to needs (universal) that are up can bring us more into connection with ourselves and, I dare say, with our Selves.

At the same time I see that the transmission of NVC and other systems I've had acquaintance with can also activate cause-and-effect thinking, or right-wrong thinking, or should-shouldn't thinking. Buddhism, the Enneagram, astrology, social activism, and psychology are all systems I have been intimate with and, in my experience, can both create more static thinking and help us see through the illusion of static thinking.

When Puff was young and indoor-only, I would sometimes tap on the window to bring her attention to an animal outside. She was interested in the finger on the window. It's the Zen story of pointing to the moon and people looking at the finger pointing.

Eventually my communication apparently got clearer and Puffer came to understand I was wanting to show her something outside the window and eventually her communication got clearer that she wanted me to open the door and let her go see for herself. This leaves me with some hope that even using words can help us dissolve the veil of duality.

not-separate

The essential delusion of humanity is to suppose that I am here and you are over there.
Kobuun Yasutani Roshi, Japanese Zen master who was willing to take Westerners as students

Isaac Shapiro--isaacshapiro.de--says this another way (paraphrased)--the only way I know you or other perceived objects is the experience of you in “my” experience. That is that the experience of you arises in the experience of me, which is the experience of the body sensing objects.

Ramana repeatedly pointed out we are not the body.

In other words, the universe we create is a dream. As if Consciousness “wants” this experience we name life.

To me it seems logical then that Love is enough. In fact there is nothing else.

These cats simply “do” love. In a sense, they have nothing else to offer. It’s my reward for hanging out with them, offering food and water and a place to sleep and a few other amenities.

When I let the edges soften a bit, the eyes relax some, and just let the catness in without so many preconceived notions, I get a taste of not-separate quality.

Love is Enough

"Love is enough." Pamela Wilson

Less than a year ago, some cats showed up on my patio. I already lived with two, Puffer Noodle and Bonsai aka Bonz. I wasn't looking for more.

I knew where they came from. Neighbors two doors south were clearly feeding cats. I saw a ladder propped up against their house that was part of their pathways.

It took me a while to understand they were coming into my life whether I was enthusiastically welcoming them or not. In the last 9 months I've gained 7 mostly indoor cats, 2 outdoor-only cats, bottle fed three (one died, the other two went to my neighbor to the north), and lost Bonz. An additional 2 to 8 show up at feeding time. My weaving/sewing studio has washable sheets and blankets over the furniture and various mats. There are cat carriers, a tall cat tree, a shorter cat house, and toys of various shapes and degree of hardness strewn about. I have two sets of 6 colored plastic bowls and a large water dish. I also have 4 bottles of flower essences from Anaflora Essences for Animals (which includes humans).

My neighbors (who feed an additional 20 or more) and I built a quiet "safety basket" with a drop door to catch the more feral ones for TNR (trap, neuter, release). I've stocked up on quiet traps and carriers, cat food, cat litter and bought a cat "playpen". And I've learned my way around the veterinary hospitals in town. To date, about 25 have gone through the rite-of-passage surgery. I continue in awe at their courage to let themselves be caught, contained, taken in a car, and handled by people.

Now it appears one of the Gang of Four, the original group to come in to my studio, will leave his form soon. We call Louie-Louie our sweet boy. Like his grandmother, Mamacita, he is white with gray-black splotches. He is mildly petable and has a purr that runs pretty much all the time. And his body is not well.

I wake in the night worried. Mostly, I worry about the cats and wonder at the worry.

"It's devotion under pressure," Pamela points out in a private satsang. "We think we have to do something when, really, Love is enough."

Sharon Callahan, who makes the essences and advises me through her communication with them, agrees. Of Louie-Louie, she says, "Louie says he is just fine..is enjoying life in the moment and is not afraid if he must leave his body and re-enter the subtle realm. He is grateful for each moment he has with you."

She tells me cats go back and forth with relative ease.

I think they are helping me forgive the dream.

Forgive the Dream

All your images of winter
I see against your sky.

I understand the wounds
That have not healed in you.

They exist
Because God and love
Have yet to become real enough

To allow you to forgive
The dream.

From "Forgive the Dream" in THE GIFT: POEMS BY HAFIZ, translated by Daniel Ladinsky