beanalreasa

September 8, 2016

A Thursday Throwback: Sometimes.

Here’s a Thursday Throwback – from 21 February 2013 – that I am sharing at the request of a dear friend.

Enjoy!

~~~~

“Sometimes, He is not pretty.
Disheveled, stinking of piss and filth.
A frightening homeless man
Shouting at me from the other side of the train station:
The face that you often see is nothing but a glamour crafted to be pleasing to you.
But, sometimes, I am tired of that
face, and you will see Me as I am
An ancient being, whose face bears the ravages of time, and what appalling marks
Grief, pain and madness have inevitably made upon Me.

While it may be easy to approach Me in a finer guise,
Silk cravats and topcoats, leather and flash, I am
Also this, at My core. This is also Me.
I am bloated with rage, and careless
grime settled in the creases, compulsively licking
The blood and the spittle that collects at the corners of My ragged lips.
My yellowed, broken teeth have gnawed and ground down upon the offal and
bones of My very long memory.

I call to you
but you must approach Me.

Would you kiss My mouth?
~~~
And I see Him across the room, and His voice is interwoven with the cacophony of noise that is noon at South Station, Boston.

I cannot will my feet to go forward, but I see His eyes, the intense clear blue of Icelandic water, His disheveled hair an awkward penumbra of red and gold, His face unshaven and streaked with the filth born of having slept in the elements upon concrete. He raises a hand, and makes a beckoning gesture. Oh I see you, little one, He drawls. I notice that His fingernails are dark with grime, and He smiles, a grin of wolfen teeth, and He licks His cracked lips, waiting.

For all that He looks, His voice is not unpleasant.

But I am afraid.

I am cold, I realize, and I hug myself tighter, as if my own arms could possibly warm me enough, and yet I know that I am holding myself in. This is me putting up all my walls and fronts.

You have so much shame, He shouts, You have learned nothing….

The rumble of the trains pulling into South Station obscures His voice, His tirade, for several minutes.

There are too many trains, I shout, I cannot hear!

He begins to laugh, shaking His head. He tilts His head, almost menacingly, working out a crick in His neck, as He continues, Oh no, my dear. It is as it is always, with you. You are too cold. You cannot hear. You have a headache. You are afraid….

He glares at me.

He pulls a cigarette from the pocket of His shabby, unseasonably thin coat. Oh, spare Me the details of all of your excuses, He snarks at me, loudly, angrily.

He reminds me of Heath Ledger’s Joker, as He wipes His sore and tattered mouth with the back of His grubby hand, before placing the cigarette deftly on the edge of His lower lip, and lights it.

A lone ribbon of smoke curls and spirals ever upward over His head, strangely unbroken and unbuffeted by the crowd and activity that surges about Him, between us.

Come. Kiss Me. I might believe you.

But I cannot will my feet to go forward. I will have to push myself through this crowd, I am thinking.

The air feels thick and heavy, my head rings with high-pitched buzzing anxiety, and my skin prickles with heat.

Poor little girl, is His singsong sigh, half a sarcasm, half a reprimand, to me, as He shuffles His feet, waiting.

Come to me, He whispers, more within my head than without, and His words seem to reverberate like a humming inward chant, in my head.

Come to Me.
Come to Me.
Come to Me.”

(link here)

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August 31, 2016

On needs, noise…and silence.

From 8 August 2014:

I am surrounded by so much goddamned noise.

I get distracted by everything.

Sometimes, I just want silence.

I have always lived in a home wherein others have wanted noise around them to feel comfortable. Whether it’s the constant drone of the television, or talking, or even music, sometimes I feel that I cannot focus on anything for all the effing noise.

(Though I will admit that music is the least annoying of these, as I’ve always felt that there is so much comfort and connection that can be found in music.)

But sometimes, I just need silence…

and so, through some meditative visualization, I built a cabin in the woods, at the base of a mountain, surrounded by trees.

(thoreau.away)

Whenever I go there in meditation, there aren’t so many distractions to focus upon – and that blessed silence brings me peace.

(And even if Loki is ‘there’ – as He sometimes is – there is very little conversation between us, thankfully.)

This might seem odd to others — as I am usually such a chatterbox — but I guarantee that silence is necessary.

~~~

It’s odd to think that I wasn’t always this way.

The sound of the television, the radio, the endless chatter and near-constant buzz of activity that surrounded me as a child (being a member of a family of seven) — all of that noise and activity used to be a source of comfort for me.

And today, it suddenly occurred to me as to the reason why I no longer find comfort in being surrounded in a cocoon of background noise.

It’s strange to admit this now, but I think that I was always an empath well before I knew what that word meant.

As my long-term readers may recall, as a child I was accused of being overly sensitive and easily spooked by damned near everything around me.

To give you an example, my childhood home was in a rather rural area, and I can remember feeling startled and uncomfortable – and sometimes even crying – whenever large trucks would pass by on the road, or planes would fly overhead while I played in the yard. And yet, surprisingly…I could not sleep without some sort of background noise. Whether it be the buzz of a fan, the hum of cars passing on the road, or later, my baby sister’s music box playing in her crib, I could not sleep in a silent room.

Rhythmic, ambient sounds made me irritable by day, but I was anxious and wakeful by the lack of sound at night?

This definitely struck everyone as being a rather strange dichotomy.

But I know the reason why now.

And yes it is related to this (which in turn, is related to this.)

Sound can mask energetic activity, and as an empath, the strongest levels of energetic activity (including but not limited to spiritual activity) often occurred at night.

But this is not to say that I didn’t experience strange things in the daytime, it just that the strength and frequency of occurrences increased exponentially at night.

So.

That is my epiphany for the day: it is quite possible that when I stopped trying to ignore Them, I didn’t need to mask my perceptions of Their presence.

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August 24, 2016

Gold.

“At some point in time, I was a new thing. I was a thing that had not been hurt, had not been beaten, had not been cast out, had not been rejected. Maybe it was only for a day or two (or maybe more) but I dare to think that, once upon a time, I was even loved wholly and completely, if even for a moment.

We all start this way: new. We all start with our hearts in tact, our spirits strong, our connection to soul and self: solid. We start with our ten fingers and ten toes and we hold that newness for as long as we can. Or for as long as life lets us….” – from Meadow DeVor’s latest post.

The above quote is taken from today’s incredibly powerful post from Meadow Devor concerning the Japanese artisan practice of kintsugi (otherwise known Kintsukuroi :(金繕い) [Japanese: golden repair] – the artistic method of repairing broken ceramic vessels with lacquers imbued with gold, silver or platinum…

And how kintsukuroi can be seen as a metaphor for spiritual self-repair and moving beyond trauma toward healing and wholeness.

August 7, 2016

3 Thoughts for Empaths Who Are Feeling Drained

“…When you’re feeling overwhelmed, like you have given all your energy out to others and need to recharge yourself, always remember:

1.) You deserve happiness; take time for yourself
2.) Your feelings are no less important than anyone else’s
3.) We are all connected – when you hurt yourself you are hurting others”

(Taken from this article by Hilary Gerstler)

4 Comments

July 29, 2016

Trust me, you’ve heard this all before.

I have been wanting to write and I promised to write – it was the reason for this month’s writing project (which was not so playfully named ‘Keeping it 100’*) – but as you might notice, I haven’t been keeping up with it this particular July/Month for Loki.

There are reasons, and I am trying to decide if I really want to get into all of them, because Heaven knows, I had plenty that I’d planned to write about, plenty that I’d promised to write about.

It’s more serious than usual in that not only had I promised myself that I’d carry the project through the whole month, I promised Him that I’d write about these topics and that I would carry it through by writing in this blog every day for a month.

We struck a deal of sorts, and I reneged in the sense that I did not follow through on my part.

I had promised to tell a story that I have not told.

It’s not that I had a shortage of posts, or that I never intended to tell the story. As a matter of fact, I have enough posts sitting in draft as well as several other posts written that only require that I cut and past them from the file folder on my laptop where I’ve stored them. They are in order, as I had planned.

You see, it is not that I stopped writing. It is that I did write but I refused to post, and that was what I promised Him that I wouldn’t do. I promised Him that I would share as much of the story as I could, no matter how uncomfortable things got, no matter how controversial the topics were….and yet…

I have not.

So what happened?

I got sick around the 15th of the month, as I may have mentioned in several of my latest posts.

A few of my friends pointed out that if I hadn’t been keeping up with my writing, of course that was understandable.

If I was ill – and I still am recovering from that double ear infection and sinus infection – that it stood to reason that I should rest and recuperate.

Several opined that I was being too hard on myself to think that He wouldn’t understand, that He would insist that I write anyway.

But I wrote every day. The writing is not the hardest part. It has never been the hardest part. He knew (just like anyone else who knows me well) that the purpose of the project had nothing to do with a writer’s block or an inability to express myself.

In essence, what He asked for was that I stop censoring myself; that I stop hiding – privatizing posts, or posting my thoughts in my less-frequented blog. He was asking for me to make my writing entirely public and highly accessible, to post ‘where it counts’ meaning where people could see and respond to my thoughts if they so chose.

He wanted me out of my comfort zone. It was an exercise to force me out of my social anxiety.

And so, He wanted me to stop keeping secrets, to be authentic and unashamed of who I am and what I am and what I do — for one month.

Just for one month, and then I could go back to ‘hiding’ if I so chose.

He didn’t care (because, if you know me, you know that I argued with Him) if ten thousand other people had written about such things ten thousand times before I wrote about them, before I would write about them.

He wants His people to express themselves fully, and He doesn’t care if you’ve all heard the stories before; He places great value on self-expression.

Perhaps it’s more than that: It’s about self-knowledge. It’s about fearlessness.

He wants us all to tell our stories….or at the very least, be fearless and unashamed about telling our stories.

~~~

*Believe me, you have heard this story before:

And yet, you’d better believe He never gets tired of hearing that story.

~~~

So, as you might imagine, I haven’t any VALID excuses.

5 Comments

July 25, 2016

Month for Loki, Day 20: Another lesson.

“You can accept or reject the way you are treated by other people, but until you heal the wounds of your past, you will continue to bleed.

You can bandage the bleeding with food, with alcohol, with drugs, with work, with cigarettes, with sex, but eventually, it will all ooze through and stain your life.

You must find the strength to open the wounds, stick your hands inside, pull out the core of the pain that is holding you in your past, the memories, and make peace with them”

― Iyanla Vanzant, Yesterday, I Cried

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July 22, 2016

On a related note…

To this entry.

This song will not seem to get out of my head.

I have heard this song at least a dozen times today, through various channels and means, so I thought that I’d post it….

Y’know, just to acknowledge to the Universe that I’m hearing it.

If anything, it seems to imply that I have some ways to go in dealing with my anger issues.

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July 21, 2016

Month for Loki, Day 19: in the deep

What struck me the most about this quote is that is unattributed except for

written by him

The Universe is funny.

When I saw this on my media feed this evening, it had all the earmarks of a message as if it was written by Him.

For it is true, you know:

If you seek Him, you will find Him

in the depths between

All these places you’ve come to know

And all those places you’ve yet to go.

July 21, 2016

Month for Loki, Day 18: Lost…and found.

Since I am still struggling with several overlapping illnesses at this time – ear infection, sinus infection, and general malaise – you may that I haven’t had much of the wherewithal to write these past few days.

Hence the reason that I’ve gotten so behind in keeping up with my daily posts this July in the Month for Loki.

But I have been reading a lot – and this powerful post came across my WordPress feed today, concerning Loki as a God Who is rather popular with folks who have struggled with various forms of abuse, difficulty, and dysfunction in their lives. I agree with her especially in this:

One of the biggest groups of people who tend to find themselves interacting with Loki are those who have been abused in some way. The ones who have lost themselves and need to be guided back – who need to learn who they are again. Loki teaches us that it’s okay to not be okay. He teaches us that it’s okay to be wounded and feel the wound so that it can heal properly.

While my experiences were not exactly the same as those of Ms. Kyaza, I can relate to a lot of her experiences, especially in regards to dysfunctional family relationships.

I can definitely identify with the ambivalent feelings that arise out of having suffered physical and emotional abuse at the hands of those whom I trusted most to love and respect me.

In fact, there were several occasions wherein I found myself dangerously close to tears while reading her post, as her description of her thoughts and feelings about her mother and their relationship so closely resonated with my own experiences so powerfully.

Reading her post made me feel a strange mixture of feelings.

I felt both a sense of exposure and a sense of triumphant relief in reading this post.

I felt an incredible sense of exposure and shame – as in reading her words, I was so acutely reminded of the immensity of my own desire to please my mother (and in turn, my siblings) who often rejected my efforts by responding with anger, ridicule or outright dismissal. And yet, I remember that guilt, that shame. I had grown up feeling that somehow, if I could just do better, work harder, love more – then finally, I would receive love; I would deserve love.

And yet, while reading, I also felt an undercurrent of strange relief – here was someone who writes so eloquently of navigating emotional landmines that I understand.

I felt understood. I felt heard.

I am not alone in this pain.

I am not the only one.

You see, I have both loved and hated my mother and my siblings – and as a result, in turn, as a woman and as a mother, I have both loved and hated myself. I struggled – and still struggle – with the emotional scars of my upbringing. I crave to feel understood, to feel safe, to feel loved, and yet I have been skeptical of the existence of a relationship wherein I can feel understood, safe and loved. Sometimes, I find myself skeptical of those who have tried to nurture me, so deeply ingrained was my belief that I did not deserve even my mother’s love, the love of my brothers and sisters.

It took me years to decipher that it was not my inadequacy or failing, but the lack of self-love and incapacity to receive love that my mother (and perhaps of those even further back) suffered with that continues this horrible chain.

It affects all of my relationships. I have tried valiantly to be the mother that my own wasn’t, and yet, I still find myself wondering if I’ve fallen short, if I’ve done a disservice to my children. As a person, I have endeavored to be emotionally reliable, compassionate, and kind, and yet, sometimes, I am a victim of my own perfectionism and pessimism, and my own distorted habits and worldviews.

I am estranged from my family, even today.

But the truth is, I am no longer estranged from myself. I am no longer lost.

I had to learn to break the cycle of the past. It is daily work to remain mindful of my emotional responses and reactions whenever I interact with others. (Is it kind? Is it necessary? Am I responding from a place of love and understanding rather than from fear or anger, for example.)

I have learned to be acutely aware of my own negative self-talk and self-limiting behaviors and beliefs. I am learning to accept myself and recognize my strengths and weaknesses, as well as accepting and recognizing that everyone else also has their own struggles with similar issues, with similar emotions, behaviors and beliefs about themselves – and none of us are perfect. Perfection is stagnation.

I am learning to allow myself …to feel vulnerable. To feel angry. To be open to my own emotions and not fear the emotions, reactions, or responses of others. I am learning to be accountable. I am learning to let go of what doesn’t work and focus on what does. I am learning to let go and trust the process. Trust Him and trust myself.

Loki taught me a lot of these things. He has taught me to embrace imperfection, to confront fear of loss or change, to let go of the need to control outcomes, to work with what I’ve been given, and most of all, to allow myself, to open myself to love.

Love the process of living, love the process of learning.

Just…LOVE.

~~~

Hail Loki, God of the lost and…found.

Thank You for finding me.

❤

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July 17, 2016

Month for Loki, Day 17: Distraction.

So. I am still sick with the flu that I’d caught from V the week before last.

And I was talking to a friend – who is spirit-touched and a Reiki practitioner – about my symptoms the other day.

You see, I have been suffering a great deal of sinus congestion, a headache, and most concerning of all, I have had a near-constant nosebleed for the past week.

My friend was pointing out that the combination of sinus congestion followed by nosebleeds could indicate the opening of my third eye.

And I was surprised to hear that, as I have always felt that I am almost completely headblind, but since my return from Arizona (following the ritual that occurred there), I have felt more ‘open,’ and as a result, I have had several rather vivid experiences.

Though I hadn’t thought to connect the increase in my experiences with the frequency of my nosebleeds.

~~~

(8:30 AM)

I have been stressing about what I should be writing again.

I woke up about 30 minutes ago.

I hadn’t intended on getting out of bed. I was still in that hypnogagic state, when I rolled toward the edge of the bed, and ‘sensed’ Loki there. He was standing there by the bed, and I distinctly remember muttering, ‘Let’s go.’

I had just awakened from a vivid dream concerning a small body of water, because I could recall seeing Him standing in the water, naked to the waist, waiting for me to join Him. And how, upon wading in, I received a clear visual of a short poem.

It looked like an Internet meme tile.

It was a poem about an experience – a magical experience – written by someone named Walter.

Unlike other times when I have dreamt of written words, the visual image of these words appeared surprisingly clear and easy to read, in black ink on a yellow lined paper.**

I think that I had been reading this paper.

But something had distracted me.

(Oddly enough, I could still hear the TV in the bedroom in the background — and it was distracting me. I could distinctly hear some news channel commentary concerning Donald Trump and Hilary Clinton, and all of that.)

I recall that I had been reading this poem to myself, as if I had been trying to memorize it, as I may have been intending to make a post of it today.

But then, I’d begun to wake up.

I am trying to think of what this poem had made me think and feel – as I’d felt that I’d almost had it memorized – but then I’d let the TV distract me.

All I can remember was the first line:

Let us go to the well, and you will chart your first experience here…

I recall that the poem had a lilting sort of subtle rhythm as I whispered the words to myself – possibly an ABBA or even an ABCD-ABCD rhyme scheme. I was amazed that I’d been able to see the words so clearly as I’d spoken them aloud, and I remember thinking that I wasn’t that deeply asleep and yet, so deep and so clear were the words that I was speaking. I repeated them to myself several times – but somehow – how? why? – had I allowed the TV to intrude, rather than to ignore it and focus on what I had been saying?

Maybe this is not about my memory of the poem at all.

Perhaps this is the lesson:

The words, the experiences would all be clear to me if I allowed them to be.

And yet I jump away from away from these experiences and cast about for a distraction to take my focus away from them, from the possibility of recalling them.

(Perhaps this is what He means when He insists that I am still running; I am still afraid.)

We are standing at the Well of Memory and I am fussing over poetry?

Relax.

Relax. Let yourself be like water. The words were flowing over you, were they not?

You asked for a session. This was your session.

You heard [the television], yes, but you still had access to your vision of Me, and what We were doing…

These things can and do co-exist.

These ‘realities’ are nothing more than undercurrents of each other and you can tap into these multiple streams at any time that you wish.

(Am I so skilled as all that…or is it simply that easy?)

Yes…and no. It is that simple, but, as you might guess, it is not EASY.

Do you see the way you struggle with relaxing, with remembering? Let go of your need to describe every detail and just allow the flow.

That is the lesson. Stop putting these rules and all these parameters on it. Stop trying to document the experience as you are experiencing it and just let yourself see, let yourself feel, and you will remember it.

Stop thinking of these experiences as something unusual that is only given to you in pieces with all those attendant fears that suddenly you will forget.

Let yourself remember. Let yourself relax.

The fear drives it away from you, pushes it away from your understanding.

You will forget if you are always afraid to forget.

~~~

When I realized that I’d fully awakened, I blew my nose. There was blood coming out of my left nostril again.

(Clear out this logic…trust this process rang in my head.)

Perhaps this is what was meant when another Lokean friend and I were discussing this project at the beginning of the month.

I’d asked Him for a clue, a means to begin the project, and He’d said (through her, through some automatic writing):

Be fluid. Be more fluid.

~~~

And related to these hypnagogic conversations, here’s bit of pandoramancy:

~~~

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