Hello Everyone,
Well I am still flourishing towards the finish, even
though it had been a rough couple of weeks.
Never give up and never say die.
That is the mantra that I have been chanting this week. My house has sold. I am merging two households. I started in an intensive group that meets four
days a week for four hours and still I find I have time to stop and pause for
my favorite relaxation exercise, which is the Subtle Mind (Dacher, 2006). It seems to work really well for me and I can
stop and refresh myself when I get overwhelmed.
So on I go into another week and this week I was
asked to meet Aesclepius. Let me tell
you how that went for me. As always, I positioned myself in the “ready” position
of comfort that will allow me to be comfortable and accept guidance from the
relaxation coach. I had trouble with the
visualization of the person I loved and trusted, I could not get a fixed
reference for a person so I tried the second suggestion with was to fabricate
the person. This visualization took on an
interesting turn. Every time I would try
to form a person with arms, legs and a head, the form would dissolve back into
a formless shape of a floating blue mist. I decided not to fight this
visualization and let the light blue mist float in front of me. When I stopped fighting, the mist solidified
into a round orb of blue light that seemed to float in front of me. The more I relaxed, The more substantial the orb became. It seemed to pulse with the emotions of love
and kindness. It seemed to speak to me,
telling me to let go and not fight the exercise.
This shape, my Aesclepius, was love and kindness; “it”
was not a person to be transmuted into a form.
My Aesclepius was love and kindness in every way. It participated in the exercise with me. The light would shine from my orb and at
times when the light was to be shining in my heart, I realized that the entire
orb had moved into my heart and was becoming part of me and I, part of it. When the exercise was over, I was left with a
profound sense of joy that stayed with me.
It was amazing!
Now, I know the most judgmental of you will think I
am crazy, and that’s OK. I just know
that my Aesclepius was not from around here.
He was not human, but he was what makes up the best of the human spirit
and I am glad I finally got to meet him.
And…. When I think about the phrase "One cannot lead another where
one has not gone himself" (Schlitz, Amorok &
Micozzi, 2005 p.477), I
understand it as, I cannot teach an individual to flourish, or even how to have
Loving Kindness until I can do it myself.
I guess, I can point them in the direction of the text and the tools,
but I can never be their mentor unless I have attained these state of well-being
myself. As a nurse I have an obligation
to my clients to help them be the healthiest person they are willing to
be. It would be such a wonderful asset
to be able to flourish psychologically, physically, and spiritually and to help
them learn to flourish as well. Their
flourishing would certainly make my job a lot easier.
This class
has been the starting point to my journey of flourishing. At this seventh week, I do not look at the “finish”
of my “Flourishing to the Finish” to be week ten. I will be finished when I am finally the “blue
ball” of Loving Kindness that goes on to join the cosmos. But then again, that may be a whole new
beginning.
Thanks to
you that read this lengthy Blog. I
appreciate each one of you.
Rufus J.
References
Dacher, E.S., (2006). Integral
health: the path to human flourishing. Laguna Beach, CA. Basic Health
Publications, Inc.
Schlitz, M., Amorok, T., & Micozzi, M. S. (2005). Consciousness and healing. St Louis, MO:
Churchill Livingstone.
Hello Rufus,
ReplyDeleteIt sounds like we have all had a rough week. Like you, I had a problem visualizing a person in the exercise. I couldn't keep the image of a person focused and I think a lot of it again for me was the voice of the instructor that bothered me too much to concentrate. And this really was not the week for me to try this exercise. I did much better simply sticking with my meditation and breathing exercises. Maybe I'll try what you did the next time I give this exercise a shot and see what happens.
I think that when it comes to the saying for the week, for me at least, I've always believed that if you want to have true understanding of a subject, you have to be willing to learn everything about it. This includes the good, the bad, and the ugly as well. Once we accept that way of learning, we'll be able to give advice and help clients with confidence and know that we are helping them in the best way we know how.
Just keep on flourishing. I know you'll achieve full human flourishing.
Hi Rufus!
ReplyDeleteYour titles always pull me in and I cannot get around always posting to your blog, looks like I am the cyber-stalker now!
I am proud of you for getting through this week, and taking the time you need for YOU; it can only make things better!
I, too, had a very difficult time "seeing" a person before me, as there have been many different influential people in my life, so it was more of a "thing" than a human. Although my form did not take on any shape, there was focus. What do you think the "blue mist" represented? It makes me curious.
To me, the understanding through experience could not be more true. I mentor and instruct warfare tactics as part of my job, and I have a very difficult time just reading something and teaching it back; I actually have to have been involved in a scenario. It makes me think about Western medicine, and the "one-size-fits-all" scientific approach, and it goes against everything we have been learning in class so far.
Hope you have a great week!
Warm Regards,
Jenn