September 2018 – Blog Abandoned, It Weeps

I can’t allow her to have space in my head. But in my heart, I give her space because the memory of her pain from the past is an imprint she can’t reshape or move past. She is caught between the soul journey’s right here on earth. More than a rock and a hard place. She moves a step or two forward, the fear settles in, returns and snaps her back to the wound and she lashes out or covers herself in armor in an attempt to heal and she only deepens it.

“the wound is the place where the light enters you.” ~Rumi

For her the light burns, it irritates and is a constant reminder of what she can’t let go. When she knows that is what will allow her to move forward.

It’s because of this that my heart weeps for her and allows that space for comfort, clarity, and safety. Even if indirectly.

It’s most likely that she is unaware. It’s likely that she is self-protecting so much that she can’t imagine that space, imagine it is for her and the space she takes is a shallow replica of what she thinks is her place of peace and harmony.

How would any of us have navigated?

How would any of us survive it? Have we?

How could we not at some level trust him to move through it in his way and to honor that for his sake? To trust him, his heart to move through as he did?

How could we be so selfish to doubt and create or participate in the wake, the wave of emotion that has us where we are today? To project our pain and fear onto another.

We all lost something, but who lost the most should not have been a determent or deterrent to a life of love moving through. Moving forward, not on but simply forward.

I know we did the best we could in the circumstances. If we all had been supportive and inclusive with open arms and true open hearts, would that support have been the fertile soil, the solid foundation to create a space of peace, contentment and unconditional love and a new joy?

We have a great division. A space to find, a separation, loss again and two young souls who lost their blood and two who have lost an example of how a man could and should be in a relationship. One that through all the challenges, brought wholehearted unconditional love to space.

In reality, it’s not or won’t be a huge split or division. But for the two youngest the impact is yet fully revealed from the first loss and now this one. How do we support that? How do we apologize for this one? Or even help explain it?

How do we own our contribution to the result of today? How will we answer these questions?

I don’t know the answer. I don’t have the answers. I have skin in the game as well. You don’t have to agree with me on any of this, but this is where I am and have been. It’s not been easy, but it is where I am and where I need to be.

Pain – we didn’t allow for collective grief. We tip-toed around some and not around others. For the most part, some of us kept it to ourselves or used it as a way to hide and lash out. We thought no one feels as I do. And that may have been true, but together couldn’t we have worked through it with love, understanding, and compassion together?

Of course, anger is part of grief. But I feel that in some instances was misplaced and placed where it had no business being placed. On innocent bystanders just trying to move through it as well. I truly believe that it would, has not made any of us feel better.

She is lost like many of us are. Maybe her wounds are deep maybe not. But we can’t expect her to deal with them in any other way than how she does. She does not understand this for herself or for others, yet. She will be harder on herself in some instances and her reaction to others will be in defense and with intensity because it’s all she’s known.

She is a young soul, so is either a child or probably a rebellious teenager. She doesn’t have the confidence to seek out teachers who will feed her completely. Here she is cautious and sells herself short. Even the ones she has, or I think she has are kept to a certain distance, mentally and physically. And limits or shy’s away from the true teachers right before her. This allows her to manage and not overwhelm herself with lessons and challenges she believes she is not ready for or has already learned. Lessons are never really learned, they evolve. And sometimes it is not your lesson that is being presented it is the lesson of another. But the ego steps in and we think it is about us. She thinks it is about her. She can’t see through the pain of the wound. It is all about her. She can’t settle into, this isn’t about me, it’s about the other and how they get through on their journey coming through it with them with love and compassion.

Her fear in true growth mirrors the youth of her soul. My heart opens for this. It opens wide, maybe too wide. It weeps for her because I think I have seen the potential, the openness that she shelters. But it is short-lived and fleeting.

I can’t allow space for her in my head because that emotion is too harsh and unforgiving and not who I want to be. I can’t let it run there and complicate my process, my space.

I honor her presence, the lessons she delivers and hope that her journey through from here forward strengthens and brings her the potential that is within her with an open heart that will allow her to peacefully embrace the goodness along with the bad with gratitude and acceptance.

State of Grace? Is it Grace? I’m not sure actually but that word is in my head.

What my teachings have taught me and what I know for sure is that we all have within us and hold basic goodness.

I can’t know her truth. I can only know and try to understand my own. My truth about her could be diametrically opposed,180° in the opposite direction. But I feel I must overlook the discomfort that I might feel and open my heart to hers. I do feel it to be different and more adverse than my pain.

That said I feel she is searching and she doesn’t yet quite have the tools or the understanding for the confidence to take the tools before her and use them for growth and openness.

I can’t imagine that it would easy to be vulnerable and open-hearted in a situation wherein the past you felt that people were taking advantage of you, where your vulnerability felt to be your weakness instead of your strength.

I’m not saying she gets a pass, I’m not saying that any of us get a pass for her pain and our grief but when any of us project that onto another and we don’t remain responsible and accountable to it and how it affects those around us we can’t really expect anyone else to get through it unscathed.

Within each of us is a goodness that some of us have not even yet realized yet it is there. Her included. Like all of us, I believe she sees glimpses of it and yet maybe it scars her? Maybe her fear, her wound is still too raw to take comfort in what it holds for her. As long as she lets that be in the forefront, she will continue to project. That projection will fall on others who will not know how to understand that and put up their walls, their defenses. The cycle circles and circles and circles and we all miss out on the joy and love that is ours to behold.

It’s interesting what comes into view as you work through something new or a new version of something old.

“if you never heal from what hurt you, you will bleed on people who didn’t cut you”

“stop letting people who do so little for you control so much of your mind, feelings and emotions”
~ Donna Pisani

“when you proactively share your desire to heal, the Universe picks up your desire and guides you every step of the way”
~ Gabby Bernstein

Even more, what a week!

“In the Bible, Thomas says he will not believe what Jesus has survived unless he can stick his hand into the wounds. But this is not a reasonable thing to ask of someone who is not God, to stick your hand into their wound. I am tired of watching people become wounds. Half the Internet is a wound. Have you stuck your hand in it enough? Do you believe yet? The #MeToo movement lurches forward over a path of scars. The change is so slow and the sacrifice it demands so great.” ~Alexandra Petri, Washington Post

Facebook memories;
One year ago – “Compassion is not a relationship between the healer and the wounded. It is a relationship between equals. Only when you know your own darkness well can you be present with the darkness of others. Compassion becomes real when we recognize our shared humanity” ~Pema Chödrön

“If you have rage and righteously act it out and blame it all on others, it’s really you who suffers. The other people and the environment suffer also, but you suffer more because you’re being eaten up inside with rage, causing you to hate yourself more and more. ~Pema Chödrön

Six years ago – “The only reason we don’t open our hearts and minds to other people is that they trigger confusion in us that we don’t feel brave enough or sane enough to deal with. To the degree that we look clearly and compassionately at ourselves, we feel confident and fearless about looking into someone else’s eyes. ” ― Pema Chödrön

September 30th, what is it about this day? Interesting what the universe brings when it brings.

I’ve been thinking about resistance. I’m thinking about the things or causes that I believe in and would and do fight for. Or do my best to support.

Today added to my thinking are tolerance or intolerance and their relationship to hypocrisy. Full on sibling or half-sibling? Hmm…?

I’m thinking or wondering how does one speak their opinion of a cause without retribution, name-calling or fear.

I am not very often direct. Fully admitting to the passive-aggressive approach. That is probably a mistake. Some may disagree with that. But in the grand scheme, I am more silent than I probably should be as is evident by the many, many “drafts” in Notes, email, etc. Seriously, you should see the number count in comparison to when I have actually said something.

I was more or less direct a few weeks back and stated the reasons on a FB page why I did not support the Kavanaugh nomination. The reply from a woman in AZ who doesn’t know me any more than I could know her replied, idiot.

Anyway…I know I’m not an idiot. But I also have enough self-awareness that I can’t know enough to be so sure and bold as to put it out there the way some of you do.

Intolerance – unwillingness to accept views, beliefs, or behavior that differ from one’s own.

Tolerance – the ability or willingness to tolerate something, in particular, the existence of opinions or behavior that one does not necessarily agree with.

In my opinion, I often read people in a hypocritical argument talking tolerance while being intolerant. Slippery slope. How does one navigate that?

Why is our choice of the damnation of another where we go with our differences?

We live in a country that allows us to freely have these opinions I thought without retribution unless it breaks the law.

And does anyone think that by blasting their opinion over and over and over again will change the opinion or conversation of very large and hot point topics?

I’m not saying stop voicing your opinion but maybe it’s the delivery. Maybe it’s how you present it when it sounds like you haven’t given any consideration to the other side. And when the other side is for the most part POC and those most often disenfranchised. What are the rest of is to think about your strong opinion when there is no hint of tolerance in your opposition? Or the opinion slides into an opinion that is far-reaching and dangerous for those who are already in some cases just trying to live.

We can’t have it both ways. We can’t think we are tolerant and expect everyone to tolerate our opinion if we frame it with the vitriol and baseless foundation that much seems to be formed on.

In the documentary, RGB Justice Ginsberg says about her time at Harvard, if you were called on in class and you didn’t perform well you were failing not just for your self but for all women. Take that out of its context and consider everything that you believe to be right or just. Think about the person you are vehemently disagreeing with and where their opinion is coming from. Why are they fighting an injustice? And why are you perceiving it not to be an injustice?

Understanding takes time, commitment and I think an extraordinary effort to set aside yourself listen and feel the pain and discomfort of others. Feel it as much as you can. Remove you from the scenario. If only we could walk in another’s shoes so as to not be so short sighted of others plight.

Actually most often, you can’t actually know or understand the scenario. Often, honestly, I see the argument against a person of color or a class that is being disenfranchised by an establishment as most maddening to the person who is opposing the cause rather than the person or persons it actually affects.

Ok, so I’ll get specific. The Flag. Honestly, I don’t think of the “flag” that often because it is an object. And I feel that we have taken a singular one-track idea of what that object represents. My family has always had one. How many didn’t have one until after 9/11?

The Flag. I was going to give you the link I found in my search, then decided, you’re on the internet go Google it yourself and see what you come up with.

The flag does not mean one thing. Stripes represent colonies stars states. “The colors of the flag are symbolic as well; red symbolizes hardiness and valor, white symbolizes purity and innocence, and blue represents vigilance, perseverance, and justice.”

Here’s another; “Very often, the colors used in a flag represent the values of that country (or other entity). Black often represents determination, ethnic heritage, and/or defeating one’s enemies. Blue often represents freedom, vigilance, perseverance, justice, prosperity, peace, and/or patriotism.”

I’ll repeat part of that; Black often represents determination, ethnic heritage, and/or defeating one’s enemies. Determination comes in all forms. The determination to create a space where people like yourself truly have the freedom and equality that all have, not just a certain few.

I find it rather curious that while arguing about the flag, it’s rarely mentioned that prior to 2009 NFL players didn’t come out onto the field until after the anthem. Then the military paid for that to change. Paid patriotism. What do you do with that? So a very large organization or company pays for that thing you have an opposing opinion of and lack of unanimous approval or acceptance is seen as, well…just do it. We can’t have it both ways. Paid patriotism? Why is that acceptable?

Please disagree, don’t like this or that. But don’t tell others they can’t. Or how they should feel about something. Especially if what is happening really has no physical or economic effect on you. That’s what, if anything the flag means to me.

Maybe do something constructive to change it. But sharing a divisive article and posting your outrage on FB, honestly says more about you than what you have posted. Especially to those who see the injustice, for POC, women, the poor and disenfranchised. And just perpetuates the division.

How does one respect something or someone who will take every opportunity to disrespect anyone, anything without hesitation?

We take objects or amendments, or ideas, or ideology and add or mix their meaning as we move through and navigate the world and we forget where things came from and the history that it represents. Just like the bible and taking it ALL literally or just what fits our current argument against something we disagree with.

Another short quote from RGB, “or striving for a more perfect union.” I’ll not say more to that because I believe if you know me or pay attention to what I do say from time to time you will know what that means to me.

I don’t understand a lot of things. But I try really hard to listen and read all I can. Sometimes that reading is uncomfortable. But I feel I must read it.

I read the book Radical Dharma by, Rev. angel Kyodo williams, Lama Rod Owens and Dr. Jasmine Syedullah There were parts that were very uncomfortable. But I believe it was an uncomfortable I had to feel, I needed to feel to even try to get to a place of understanding.

Now I’m reading Mindful of Race: Transforming Racism From The Inside Out, by Ruth King who invites us to: Tend first to our suffering and confusion, listen to what it is trying to teach us, and direct its energies most effectively for change.

She writes about and lists what whites typically say(guilty) and what POC commonly say. I haven’t finished it yet, but so far there is a lot of good in the book. For example;

“Why is white group identity important to acknowledge and investigate? The answer is simple—relatively speaking, it exists. To avoid this examination is white privilege. Most people growing in racial consciousness would consider it major progress for the human race if white people were to not only recognize themselves as a racial group, with a collective history of dominance and privilege but also to become attentively curious and diligent about how, as a race, they have become dis-membered as a group body as a result of that privilege. This inquiry would be a wholesome and healing use of privilege that supports bridging separation within white communities and between whites and humanity at large.”

“Common to all of us is the fact that we don’t see the world as it is but how we have been conditioned to see it. The delusion we carry is that everyone sees—or should see—the world as we do.”

“But when I look at you, I don’t see race.” As an African American woman, this well-meaning comment from the lens of the white individual renders my experience as a racial group member invisible, my history whitewashed, and my people at continued risk. It’s an innocence I can’t afford to have. When whites don’t see race when they look at me, they see me as an individual, just as they see themselves. In doing so, they deny my racial identity and group history—a history that their racial group is a part of subordinating. Given that my racial group identity has been historically denied respectful visibility and equality, such a statement, and many like them, is more an insult than a compliment.”

Guilty. Guilty.

So let’s be careful and not get ahead of our understanding. Or think that we have read enough to have an understanding. Let’s not question others way of dealing with the harm they feel from words, looks or even history that can’t seem to right itself to equality.

There are over seven billion people in the world. So at least seven billion opinions. How in the world will you make yours different or worthy of a true, honest respectful conversation? A. Conversation. Don’t make me define that for you.

Peace

-Jinpa Datso

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