Tag Archives: Spring

The Waiting is the Hardest Part- and Perhaps, the Most Important

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Spring

I live in the Northeast and it will come as no surprise to anyone who has heard about our record breaking winter that I am pretty tired of the snow. It feels unbelievable now that I actually welcomed the first blizzard of our season. Now as I look out on the towering snow banks and the menacing icicles hanging from my neighbors’ roofs, it easy to forget that a month ago I thought snow was beautiful. These days I dream of spring and wonder if I will ever see my lawn again. Given the sheer quantity of snow, it appears I am going to have to wait.

And waiting is hard. In our fast paced society we almost never have to wait and when we do, we measure the time in seconds or minutes. An hour wait is unacceptable to most of us. We have places to go and things to do. We have no time for waiting. We certainly have no time for winter.

We are uncomfortable with the rhythms of our ancestors who had to submit to the cycle of seasons. Indeed, merely several hundred years ago, people had to submit to the will of dark nights whose completeness was only punctured by the light of moon and stars and the flickering glow of candles and lanterns. We are now masters of the clock even as we become servants to our technology.

What we have lost is the value of rest and even hibernation. Perhaps you have experienced periods in your life where you have “gone underground” for a bit- when the demands of life seemed a little too much and too overwhelming and you responded by doing and communicating less. We are often made to feel bad about those times- as if our dropping out was cowardice or perhaps a sign of depression (and for some it may be). But for many it is actually a sign of self-care. Sometimes what is happening is that our bodies and our psyches are telling us that it is time to slow down. It may even be time for a nap…or two.

Quiet “unproductive” time is actually really important. Underneath the snow, plants and seeds are getting ready. They are gearing up for an explosion of color and life. They are gaining energy to grow and blossom. They are not dead (although perhaps just a little buried).

They are waiting.

The rest that nature takes culminates in growth and life. Similarly, the rest we take facilitates creativity and health. Sometimes we need to hibernate. We need to shut ourselves off from the rest of the world and quietly grow things within ourselves. When we are ready to shovel out and step into the sun, we will be capable of more than we knew was possible.

So as I look out the window and see the sun gently warming the snow, I must content myself with waiting and the knowledge that beautiful things are happening beneath the surface.

Just Begin Again

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Meditation can be hard. Sitting still, focusing on your breathing… in and out, in and out. It’s easy for your mind to wander. Indeed, the practice of meditation is not really about having a blank mind, but about controlling the wandering of your mind when it inevitably strays. There are some mornings when my meditation practice (and there is a reason they call it practice) does not seem to be going well- when my mind is so crowded with lists and worries, and my allotted meditation time feels like an eternity that  I contemplate getting up and just getting on with my day.

At these moments, the voice of my teacher comes to me. “Just begin again” she tells me. No judgment, no recrimination, just begin again. And I return to my breathing. In and out. In and out.

Just begin again. Her words are powerful and grounding. And truly, they are important outside of the confines of meditation. Life is about trying and failing and trying again. When we fail, and we all do, we must begin again.

Psychologists refer to this ability as resilience. Some people are naturally resilient while others must work at it. Some people are able to rise over and over again and claim victory from defeat. But for others, through learned helplessness and difficult life circumstances, they get stuck.

We attach so much shame to failing that sometimes the process of beginning again feels like an admission of defeat and not a sign of resilience and triumph over circumstances. At these moments, it is important to find the strength to begin again. Just begin again- because that is what life is about. In my teacher’s suggestion is kindness and gentleness. Her voice in my mind urges self-forgiveness and quiet urging to continue.  We can train ourselves to become resilient, by getting up, and beginning again.

Just begin again. It is simple and difficult at the same time. We must begin again because there truthfully is little alternative.

Just begin again. When love withers, when a career falters, when health fails, just begin again. The rhythms of life tell us this is possible, from the sun rising every morning to the changes of seasons to the ebb and flow of the tides and the moon. Just begin again.

Just begin again, knowing that you will do so many times in your life. Meditation is the art of calming a busy mind- of starting over again and again. One of the reasons that meditation has such powerful effects on our lives is because if we practice the art of beginning again in meditation, it makes it easier (not easy) to begin again when life is tough.

So, just begin again. Without judgment. Without recrimination. With gentleness and kindness. With love. Just begin again.

Avoiding the Empty Calories of Chocolate Easter Eggs

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When I was a child, a neighbor who was a devout Christian came over to our house and sat distraught, talking to my mother. She had just returned from the grocery store and found it filled with chocolate bunnies and cream eggs for Easter. She said to my mother, “we, as Christians, have already lost Christmas to commercialism, if we lose Easter too, our religion is in serious trouble.”

What my neighbor was decrying was the substitution of commercialism for content- of surface for substance. When advertisers come in to our lives and try and sell back to us our own experiences, they diminish them. Without question Easter eggs and chocolates are part of many families’ memories of the holiday. But they are not, and never have been, the sum total. The holiday has deep religious significance. Not everyone has religious connections to the holiday, but for them, Easter may also be about time with family and perhaps, the joy of Spring- things similarly not captured by commercials.

The problem is that when advertisers enter the dialogue, they are seeking to place their products at the center of our experience. Sadly, in our world of constant media bombardment, it is easy to lose what is authentic in our own lives. It is easy to let the televised version of events take the place of our own memories- swapping symbolism and commercialism for real connection.

Whether advertisers are painting a picture of the holidays, or love, or fun, or happiness, their aim is always the same- to make us buy things. Their goal is to turn our desire for authentic connection into purchasing. They want to sell us the facsimile and we are all too often willing to buy. But of course, one cannot really buy love or happiness and true religious experiences cannot be purchased at a store.

Our culture is all about convincing us that we do not have enough and that the next purchase will somehow make us whole. We are told that “retail therapy” is the way to cure our ills- when really such therapy results in greater credit card debt, more clutter in our homes and the feeling of emptiness that follows the realization that this purchase has not actually changed our situations in any meaningful way.

For, like the chocolate bunnies and creams eggs, the purchases are devoid of nutritional value. They offer us nothing that can nurture our souls and our lives. This year, resist the Easter Bunny and instead embrace what is real and meaningful in your lives. Find your spiritual center, embrace a loved one, take a walk in nature. Celebrate what is authentic and true in your lives and you will find it is a better therapy than what advertisers would have you purchase.

Exodus from the Narrows

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At this time of year the Jewish people celebrate the holiday of Passover in which we tell the story of the Exodus from Egypt, when the Jewish people escaped from slavery and became free.

Although some read the text literally, there are many others who read the story metaphorically. The Hebrew word for Egypt is “Mitzrayim” translated literally as “the narrows.”

What does it mean to be in the narrows? And what does it mean to leave the narrows to become free?

There are many types of Mitzrayim; of “the narrows”. Sometimes the narrows are a physical location in which we find ourselves trapped. Sometimes the narrows are about the relationships in our lives and the constraints they put upon us. But sometimes our Mitzrayims are internal- a narrowness of heart and mind that squeezes and confines us. Leaving such narrowness is indeed a struggle of epic proportions- an Exodus that each one of us may at some point need to embark upon.

Every year Jews are commanded to retell the story of the Exodus, to recall the confinement of Mitzrayim and expansiveness of freedom. It is a holiday that every year invites its participants to feel as though they themselves left Mitzrayim.

I would suggest that the invitation is not merely to remember the Exodus, but to embark upon it. Leaving behind the narrowness in your life can be quite difficult. It can feel like a long and arduous journey. But the rewards of the journey are worth it.

Imagine what it would feel like to escape the narrows of your life; to live in a way that is expansive and open. Imagine what it would feel like to live in a way that honors your values and makes you feel truly free.

In each one of us is the potential for such an Exodus. Our Mitrzayims and our freedoms may be different, but each one of us holds the potential for a meaningful Exodus story, one in which we go from the narrows to more open vistas.

The Duality of Spring

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I live in New England and this year, in particular, I feel the hope of the season. There is something life affirming about the arrival of spring- of those first buds on the trees and the shoots of crocuses pushing through the earth- stretching their leaves with the assurance of color and sunny days.

As the dirty snow banks melt away, people’s moods lift. Inherent in spring is the contradiction of dependability and change. Even in the depths of our collective seasonal affect disorder, in the dark days of February (and this year the stormy days of March,) we know that spring will come. We know, just as we know that the sun sets and rises, that spring will arrive. We know that if we can hold on long enough, new life will sprout and color will again populate our landscape. That’s the dependable part.

The second thing that spring offers is the promise of change. As the sun warms the earth with its gentle rays, we begin our spring cleaning. We open the windows to air out our homes and clear away the clutter we have somehow managed to collect since last April. With new life, comes the possibility of new routines and behaviors. With the joy of spring comes the belief that anything is possible. Although many people make new years’ resolutions for change, it is perhaps in April and May that one has the greatest chance of following through on those resolutions (although as I have argued here, we should be making commitments instead).

The season puts a spring in our steps and a smile on our faces. This positivity leads to a spiral of positivity wherein our happier outlook creates the potential for happier outcomes.

So this year as you clean out your cupboards and your closets, do a personal inventory as well. Decide which habits and patterns of thinking no longer fit you. Look at your life and identify the things that are clutter. Open the windows of your soul and let fresh air and new life enter.

Let spring be the season in which you welcome change. Every year we can count on its arrival. Every year we can seize on its promise of change. What will you change this year?