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My friend Donna recently shared a Hasidic story with me. A disciple asked the rabbi why it said in the Torah that God placed the teachings on the heart of man; why did he not place it IN the heart since God had the power to do anything. The rabbi responded that God knew that only when the heart breaks, can the teaching truly enter.

Life breaks us open repeatedly. Sometimes it is from a simple kindness, sometimes it is from a loss. Whether we are broken down by what is happening or broken open is a choice. I just talked to a dear friend whose beloved dog passed away.  A month out, I still hear the sadness in her voice. She described to me the altar that she created honoring a life well lived. I was touched by her willingness to simply be present with her heartbreak and all the resulting feelings. Grief is a natural response for losing what we value.

To allow our hearts to break open is a radical act. It requires turning a deaf ear to the voices that beckon you back to the surface where things make sense. Often it is the very act of moving out of ‘sense’ that leads one to an expansion of receiving the light. When we refuse to let go into what the present moment is offering up, we end up recreating the past. We come to see that when loss, heartbreak, or any form of anguish knocks on our door there is a blessing on the other side. It is always a choice to open the door and invite in fully the opportunity that resides within and beyond pain. Each knock hearkens us to move closer to our essential self, to God, to the vitality that moves through all of creation.

Winter is such a wonderful time of introspection. I am always moved by the deep quiet that a blanket of snow seems to create.  On a crisp clear night, the moon and stars draw my attention upward; how miniscule I feel, how insignificant. Yet at the same time it is the ineffable presence within me that is able to experience the presence around me. I feel a connectedness and peace as I slow down to commune with this still, cold season.

We live in a culture that is heavy on intellect, activity, and intolerant of emotions. To be present with our emotions requires us to slow down and go within. We do what we can to avoid those broken hearts choosing instead to numb ourselves with unconscious choices. It isn’t easy or comfortable to sit in the deeper darker places of the soul without looking for the nearest exit. It takes a commitment to accepting ourselves and all our experiences as perfect in the imperfection.

Sometimes I hear clients or students in a hurry to get rid of something that is causing pain. There is beauty in every state – even in our suffering. Dare I say that when you take presence to the hardest of times, each moment can be a rich experience.  It becomes just another state of being, to explore and eventually to awaken you. “Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves” says Rilke.

It can be painstakingly slow to sift through the parts of ourselves that lead us away from living with an open heart. But the rewards are greater depth and an intimate communion with one self and life. To make friends with a life that is in a constant state of flux we first have to make friends with ourselves. You have to start where you are. Because wherever you are – whatever painful emotion or challenging life experience you encounter – there is a diamond there waiting to be unearthed and brought to the light. That diamond is the very essence of God manifest in you.

~Rev Juli Somers

Change is not always an easy thing to embrace.  Though we may really want to improve certain aspects of our lives or ourselves, often we resist the process that change sometimes demands of us.  The grooves of past habits can seem too deep to overcome.  And in order to fill in those grooves with new, more conscious choices we are asked to leave our comfort zones.  We glance back at the familiar with a longing for the sense of safety that it once gave us and look ahead to the unknown with fear and distrust.  What if a caterpillar refused to come out its cocoon? We would be short a lot of beautiful butterflies in the world.

Discomfort mistakenly becomes our measuring stick of whether something is working or not.  Yet discomfort is often part of the process of realizing that we have outgrown a certain belief or behavior.  The cocoon can be a tough skin to shed before the butterfly frees itself into a new life.  Once while meeting with his students, spiritual teacher Krishnamurti paused and asked the audience, “Do you want to know what my secret is?” While everyone eagerly waited to be let in on some great secret to enlightenment, he proceeded with, “You see, I don’t mind what happens”.
Not minding what happens is a state of complete equanimity with life and a state of non-resistance to what is. From this perspective our discomfort or suffering comes from our resistance to the present moment just as it is. The one undeniable thing about the present moment is that it is how it is. Wanting the present moment to be different than it is constitutes crazy thinking – but how often do we do just that?

I recently caught myself resisting what was presented before me.  When I am resisting I am usually pretty obvious with it – to me and everyone around me – but this time it was subtle and harder to catch myself at it. I thought I had a clear agreement with someone around some work they were doing for me.  When it was time for them to fulfill their end of the agreement, the person expressed dissatisfaction at what they had agreed to and a desire to change it. I responded in a fairly neutral way but found myself mulling it over in my mind for hours. There I was in resistance.

When I am resisting what is happening, the possibility of a win/win solution doesn’t appear to exist.  I felt like a politician! Once I realized my resistance I wondered how this opportunity was asking me to grow.  In this particular situation, I decided to let go of the story that my mind kept recreating to see what was being triggered on a deeper level. I felt disappointed and powerless in the situation. When I could just have my feelings without making either one of us wrong, I started to feel better and my resistance evaporated.

I suddenly had a lot of space around what was happening and I knew in my heart that what was most important was for both of us to feel good about what we agreed to. There was nothing I had to do to fix it, just take care of my own consciousness. If it doesn’t feel good to me then it is shining a light on something I need to heal inside – not fix outside. Reach for the higher ground and allow myself to evolve! It is said that we are either operating out of love or out of fear. I so clearly experienced how fear constricted my energy. When I was able to return to the love inside of me, there was no problem.

We are all encountering opportunities to become enlightened at a faster pace these days. If I want to change, and I do, then I can only be grateful to be seeing myself more clearly despite any discomfort in that process.  When I am in that place of not minding what is happening, not resisting what is, I am at peace.  All is eternally well.

~Juli Somers, Executive Director