Category Archives: transformation

That’s All Happiness Is…

Attachment, Awareness, Buddhism, Carl Jung, Ego, heart, Joy, Life, Love, Mind, Perception, Poetry, Reflection, Self Perception, self-help, transformation, , , , , , , , , , , ,

It’s just the heart being free.

About 4 years ago I saw the above music video made for Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche, also a spoken word artist, poet and marathon runner.  The video and poem blew me away and I knew I would never be able to get it out of my head.  Which is funny, because it is all about being in your head.  I love this video because it incorporates something very relatable to me.  Some of my attachment in this life has to do with electronic music, and combining music with imagery and profound words really gets my heart going.  I feel joy, joy, joy!  What can I say?

I love this poem by Rinpoche because it expresses the passion I have in my heart to explore perception also in a relatable way.  In the end of the video he says:

When you’re happy, I’m happy.
That’s the formula.
First you, then me.
That’s all happiness is…
It’s just the heart being free.

The ignorant mind’s primary sense of being comes from the idea that it’s just “me”.  It strives to prove every day that we are separate from one another through habitual thinking.  But when you decide to train your mind to think outside of itself, and see that everyone’s experience around us is our experience then happiness becomes abundant.  When we see happiness in others, it grows within us.  Envision a garden that thrives in the joy of others- that is our heart.

I remember coming home one night from a dinner stopping at an intersection with a homeless man holding a sign in need of assistance.  It was probably 30 degrees outside and 8:30 pm. I had nothing but a $20 bill, so I decided to just give it to him.  All I could do was cry with joy on my way home because he felt so happy.  Doing things for others changes our self-perception from being all about me, to being all about us.  This is the development of purposeful perception, and another opportunity to love from the heart.

Please share this video with others if you feel inspired by it too.

“Let’s Rock Big Love!”  Jessica

Weekly Writing Challenge: Carry Me to the Stars

Awareness, Buddhism, heart, Life, Life Coach, Love, Nature, Peace, Perception, Poetry, Self Perception, self-help, transformation, Uncategorized, , , , , , , ,

This is a poem and photo story displaying my heart’s connection with the perception expressed in the poem- connecting the words with pictures I have taken on my journey to a more purposeful perception daily in my life.  The journey is important, as it is part of reflecting where our perceptions have come from.  I urge you to reflect in your heart where your most limiting self perceptions play out in your life regularly and share in this blog.  Remember to scroll down and click through each page!

Remembering feelings sparked by a note
A sound, so sweet and subtle
Only your heart knows it is there
Giving rise to feelings light
You forget what is weighing you down

IMG_1082The ignorant mind trailing behind you like a predator
Wondering why you are not paying attention
In its small, small world
A perspective limited and stuck without motion

025 (2)Yet my heart- tugging me forward like a child
I shall follow, carry me into this knowing
Remind me of what it is to be
So light and airy- remind me of love’s truth

076A truth so full it explodes in the sky before me
Yet it continues to be, forever full.

WHERE’S YOUR HEAD AT?

Acceptance, Boundaries, Ego, Forgiveness, Heal, lessons, Life, Life Coach, oneness, Power, Self Perception, self-help, transformation, Uncategorized, , , , , , , , , , , ,
Does your mind ever feel like this? Picture by Katie Lee found on VisualizeUS at http://vi.sualize.us/by_katie_lee_photography_balloons_inspiration_beautiful_picture_5zqt.html
Does your mind ever feel like this? Picture by Katie Lee found on VisualizeUS

A long time ago during my partying days, a group of my friends and I loved to rock out to the electronica song “Where’s you’re head at?” by Basement Jaxx.  I remember dancing on the rooftop of my friends’ enormous shared house on California Street in Washington DC during the summer when the low air quality fog hung over the city as the sun would try to peak through making it more amplified-  and soon, you could always count on that song.  Why am I rambling about this song?  Because I realize how this song has revisited me in a new era of my life, where I am always reflecting on just that- where is my head at?

It is a perfect question at a perfect time where half of what I am reflecting on is perception and mind.  In breaking down perception, the basis for my upcoming book, reflecting on your state of mind and how you are about to react to something is a valuable tool for living a life that is authentic and uncompromising.  What I do realize is that most of the time we are completely unaware of where our head is at- tethered like a balloon full of helium just bobbing along and carried off by any slight wind.

Just recently I orchestrated a large event and made a mistake that really upset someone.  When the victim of my own confused and overwhelmed mind confronted me about it, she expressed with great emotion her unhappiness.  I felt terrible and could not get the moment out of my mind.  I had a running tape of it secured tightly, rolling over and over again.  I relived my own feelings of shame and guilt without end.

When I went to bed that night, I had to acknowledge a few things in order to let it go.

1- Forgiveness of Self- I made a mistake, but running a tape of the incident over and over again in my head was completely unproductive and would give me nothing but more negative “feelings.”

2- Acceptance & Boundaries- I said I was sorry, over and over again, but she chose to still be extremely upset.  It is her choice alone.  There is nothing I could do to change how she felt.  This is a good boundary- that everyone is responsible for their own choices, and that includes in how they react.  My only role would be acceptance, and staying in my integrity.

3- Release & Heal- In accepting and creating a good boundary, the one thing I did have the power to do was envision this other person engaged in feelings of love and happiness.  I bathed the situation in love, and let it go.  Even in our boundary setting, which is primarily a function of the ego-driven mind, I can also recognize that we are inherently connected in spirit, and sending love and envisioning the situation transformed, it will help heal no matter what my mind tells me.

I acknowledge I still feel a little shame.  And I shall need to work on that, continuing with the above process.  But most importantly, I also have the opportunity to practice the new perception in my life that is at the core of my past experiences with situations like this one-

I AM LOVABLE.

Even though I made a mistake as we all do, or else what is the purpose of this life, I am not unlovable, as I might have acted out in the past.  But due to awareness, and processing my old perception of self, I can now come out of situations like that empowered with the knowledge of exactly where my head is at.  Time to groove on!

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Daily Prompt: Ch-Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes > Life Without Change? A Life Unlived.

Change, Daily Prompt, Death, Ego, Karma, Life Coach, Nature, Perception, Psychology, Reflection, Self Perception, transformation, Uncategorized, , , , , , , ,

There is nothing permanent except change. Herodotus

Change. A scary, dramatic word for many. For nature, change is constant. For human beings, change is also constant. But for the mind- the experience of change is much like death, at least in the beginning. For the mind, a thought or a belief system generally emulates concrete. But then again, even concrete changes! It is the nature of the mind to hold onto belief systems like they are living, breathing beings that determine who we are and how the world “should” be

Change- It Never Ends.
Change- It Never Ends.

When I was in college studying historic preservation, I had to focus a lot of my time on the conservation of old structures. And to conserve, you had to know a building’s past, present and future. We actually had to create architecturally accurate drawings- only through a reverse process of intricately measuring every aspect of a building in its current state of life. One of the things I distinctly remember is the debate of glass being a solid or a slowly moving liquid. When you look at a glass window from the 1800s, it looks like old glass- wavy, hard to see through clearly- but still. It almost looked like it was not consistent in thickness from the top to the bottom. Apparently that has to do with the way the glass was actually made, and not necessarily with its molecular structure- but nonetheless, even though some say it is a myth, there are still scientists out there doing studies to prove if glass is a slow moving liquid or a solid.

Nonetheless- the fact that the argument is out there at all is just symptomatic of subtle change that exists on a molecular level every second around us. Change is constant, even though we can’t see it with our naked eye. The same goes for relationships, and our own mental perception of the world. In my world, our outer reality is reflective of our inner reality. How we perceive ourselves is projected around us like a film in each person we interact with in a multitude of ways.

Change never stops, one minute we are born and with every day thereafter, our body is different. The thing is, change naturally flows in a step by step process. A butterfly does not become a butterfly in one leap. It starts with the laying of an egg, then the birth of the caterpillar, then the pupa or chrysalis, and finally- the beautiful butterfly, which may life only 1-2 weeks. If we are going to make a major change in our life, and we have the opportunity to take it in steps, I feel that the mind generally copes better with change in a step by step process.

But let’s be real! Some change simply does not unfold like a gracious symphony. The death of a loved one, the loss of a job- that is the change we cannot control. But if we are choosing a major life change- choose the healthiest options for yourself and remember your motivation with each step. This will create an outcome that will always serve your highest good- trust in this outcome is integral or else, you may just lose your mind. But then again- would that be a bad thing?

I would love to know- how have you coped with a much needed, major life change- and was it easier to do it in one swoop, or vice versa?

IN AN INSTANT- LIFE REMEMBERED

Buddhism, Ego, heart, holidays, Joy, lessons, Life, Love, oneness, Peace, Pearl Harbor, Perception, Psychology, Reflection, transformation, Uncategorized, War, , , , , , , , , , , ,

Peace Doves

“Then, in the nightmare of Monday and Tuesday, there was the struggle to keep normal when planes zoomed overhead and guns cracked out at an unseen enemy. There was blackout and suspicion riding the back of wild rumors: Parachutists in the hills! Poison in your food! Starvation and death were all that was left in a tourist bureau paradise.”

Betty McIntosh, Hono­lulu after Pearl Harbor: A report published for the first time, 71 years later, Washington Post 12/7/12

This morning, the anniversary of Pearl Harbor, I opened up my Washington Post to an amazing experience.  An article written by a now 97 year old woman named Betty McIntosh who was a journalist in Hawaii the day Pearl Harbor took place.  The Washington Post published her article today after 71 years has passed, as the paper she wrote for in Hawaii deemed it too graphic and traumatic for its readers at the time.  The article was written 7 days after Pearl Harbor took place, a piece about the woman’s perspective of a war that began with great uncertainty and fear, during a time that many people view from their heart and safe place in the US- the holidays.

In reading the article, I felt emotional and wanted to relate her experiences to something deep inside of me that continues on its human course to heal.  This journey that we are all on ebbs and flows with our fear and our light’s inner knowing.  We oscillate between feelings of love and safety to feelings of uncertainty and sadness.  The pendulum between the ego-driven mind and our connection to the divine, our inherent truth.

“For seven ghastly, confused days, we have been at war. To the women of Hawaii, it has meant a total disruption of home life, a sudden acclimation to blackout nights, terrifying rumors, fear of the unknown as planes drone overhead and lorries shriek through the streets.”

Betty McIntosh points out how on the morning of Pearl Harbor it was a lazy Sunday with people coming out of church still in their reality that a war could not possibly be taking place on their island.  Her narrative takes us on a journey of coming to terms with the reality.  Yes, a war was taking place, and as she walked deeper and deeper into that reality she saw things that shattered the safe place that most knew to be home.  The forest of destruction became thicker with every movement.  There are people still experiencing this in our world, every day, coming to terms with the expansiveness of the human existence and how our reality can so easily be shaken because it is so tightly bound with our expectations and what we are “used” to.

In our experience as fragile human beings, I find it important to remember that each day we could still possibly experience this same thing including our own death.  We don’t know what plane will be ready to take off in our reality and we can’t count on our expectations because they are rooted in our desires rather than possibility.  The only thing we can count on is our ability to choose our reactions and how we will treat people, what we will do that affects other people.  If we can remember the humanness of our bodies that we experience this reality in every day, we can create a motivation to love.  This is our gift.  It is the greatest gift that we can experience within ourselves and in turn, our experiences with others.  Our oneness will not evaporate like emotion or the quenching of an ego-driven desire.  Our oneness will always be here to reflect on.

During this holiday season, I would like to extend my own kindness to all of you out there in the only way I can- in these words.  I want to say thank you with all of my heart for every moment that you choose to reflect and to love.  Every one of those moments is affecting me right now and my potential to also do good things.  You are my olive branch, you are my peace- and I honor you for all that you have experienced as a human.  Whether those experiences are rooted in trauma or joy, I have experienced the same, and I can relate.

As those during any war come to terms with the darkness in the human existence, I can only honor their experiences of suffering in my own and pray peace.  I pray peace during this holiday season and hope that all may experience it in their interaction with others, so we may all remember that we are simply one.  Pearl Harbor, along with all war, has a purpose now to teach us that life is a pendulum of swinging possibility and to embrace it with a motivation to live in our highest potential.  Let us choose our light and shine, illuminating the path for all to experiences of peace.

A MOTHER’S LOVE

Death, Life, Love, transformation, , , ,

Some people may look at life and death as a moment that is divinely inspired.  That we have no choice in when these transformative, game-changing moments will take place- whether it is our own life, or the life transition of another.  Things happen in our lives; people come and go with life and death much like the clouds in the sky yet with much greater impressions pressed upon our hearts.  When I read the weekly writing challenge prompt many things went through my head.  So many things have happened that could be considered “life changing.”  But in the end, I kept coming back to one moment that I have to say, changed everything for me.

When my mother was pregnant with me, she had recently suffered traumatic loss.  A year before she married my father, her own father passed away from a sudden heart attack.  Within the same year, only a month or so before her wedding, her mother who was also her best friend passed away from a debilitating illness that painfully drains away your spirit.   She was the silent witness of that sacred second when her mother took her last breath.  It was a final breath that would echo forever throughout her life.

One story that always has affected me was how my grandmother struggled to sew my mother’s bridesmaid dresses near the end of her life.  I try to imagine what that would be like.  To know that you are so close to death, to feel it deep down in places you didn’t even know existed, while tirelessly piecing together dresses for a wedding party- the wedding of your only daughter; and to know that you will most likely not be there for the celebration.  I imagine that piecing those dresses together would be an exercise in piecing together your own life in your heart, using it as an exercise of love and meditation.  I know these events had to have been powerful, game-changing experiences for my mother, and affected another turn of events that gifted my soul with a life trajectory.

Shortly after my parents’ wedding, my mother became pregnant with me.  At the time of my birth my father was away training for his new job as federal law enforcement in Georgia.  My mother was all alone, 9 months pregnant and staying at my grandparents’ house.  My grandfather was a man of few words, and did not come off as the warmest of souls.  My mother went into labor and was taken to the hospital by my grandfather knowing that she was in this all alone.  It was her opportunity to bring new life into this world after the loss of both of her parents.  It was her first time giving birth, not knowing what to expect in her heart.

After my delivery, she had an allergic reaction to the anesthesia.  My mother had a near death experience where she witnessed her soul leave her body.  She could see everything happening around her body from a distance- the nurse rush in, the resuscitation efforts.  I know for me, this was an event that changed my life forever.  In this moment, my mother had a choice- to leave her body behind and move on from this life, or to come back and live out her current life as my mother.  She chose to come back.  Because she did I have had a mother that has taught me many lessons that I could not have learned without her.

They were not all rosy moments, but they were not all tragic either.  I am who I am today because in that instant when she could have chosen to move on from this life, she did not.  My mother went on to tell me this story about her near death experience and here I am, writing it now and sharing it with many others. I share it with the intention that you too may think about how precious life is and how our ability to witness the suffering and joy of others is a profound gift offered to us as an experience of deep abiding love.   Our suffering is not isolated.  We have the opportunity to remember the importance of every instant we also share with others and how the simple act of sharing even a little story can change someone’s life, in an instant.