Tag Archives: self-awareness

May5

Non-Attachment: An Update

Posted on May 5, 2017 by Grass Oil by Molly Field

I have friends who know the intention I set for 2017: to practice non-attachment as “best” (ha!) I can.

They ask me from time to time, now that it’s May and we are more than 1/3 into the year, how it’s going.

I tell them, “it is what it is,” and laugh. Because that’s all there is and yet, there is so much more.

My beloved older brother and I were together in February on a 75˚ sunny day that made us feel like we were in Florida in February — when the angle of the sun is so distinctly “winter” that you know the experience is novel — when we weren’t. We were running an errand and I drove with the top down. I was thrilled to have him all to myself for that special hour. He’s a busy man, husband and father and we were all together as a family again to celebrate our “Second Christmas” because we are all in different places on actual Christmas.

We started talking about life in a way we hadn’t in years. It was just us. We got around to “new year’s resolutions” and I spoke of my new year intention. He is a really smart guy and he’s read a lot of amazing books and philosophers so he’s willing to go down the rabbit hole with me at times and I love those talks. I summarized up saying that “non-attachment” feels like a trap because I end up wondering if I’m “doing” it right. “Like, how do I know if I’m doing it the right way? If I try to stay in my own zone and let go of shit my kids or other people do, isn’t that like not caring about my own standards and personal space and boundaries? Do I stop caring about my family and dogs and just let them figure it out on their own? What if my not caring about something means that someone could get hurt or be negatively affected? Say, if I see a toddler walk into the street, of course I’d stop my car… when is non-attachment not good? Do I just keep driving and say, ‘well, he had it coming…’…”

I continued as rainclouds gathered above us on our way home and I wondered about whether I should close the top but decided to keep it open… it’s just rain… I can always pull over…

“Am I good at non-attachment??” We laughed.

Then I said, “Ah, fuck it.” We laughed louder and the rain began to gently fall around us amidst a sunny sky, and we were moving fast enough to stay dry.

The truth is that it’s hard. It’s hard to be soft when the world wants you to be broken instead. It’s hard to be aware when the world seeks to numb you. It’s hard to be open when you would rather clam up and turtle yourself in.

I have the true gift and blessing to host a “restorative / yin” yoga practice. This class centers and restores me in a way NO physical practice can. I have to be centered, or near-centered in order to give it fully. Sometimes that is easier said than done. I’ve been caught up in traffic or arriving on the heels of a disagreement with someone.

“Fake it ’til you make it.”

My therapist once mused about 10 years ago when I spoke of the crushing feelings I had about my mother and my father; about my childhood in spite of being a mother myself. A family event was on the horizon and I was a bit raw from the Work he and I had been doing in my head and heart. I didn’t want to attend but he said “fake it ’til you make it…”

I so dislike that phrase. I can’t fake it until I make it, because what if I never “make it”? And then, of course, what if I’m already there? What if the “what if?” is really “so what?” Because I dislike that phrase, teaching restorative classes means I can’t share what I don’t have, so I have to “rally” to let go. I realize it’s as much for me as it is for them.

I begin by inviting everyone to sit and to “soak” in their space. I propose a slow breath in. I suggest a flowing, peaceful breath out. I suggest an awareness of the heart rate and a connection with the energy in the room… after the first two minutes, I’m centered. I’m present. I’ve made it.

In those restorative classes, I talk about the poses and their effects on our bodies’ systems: circulatory, immunity, digestive, pulmonary, lymphatic and more… I read poetry, quotes and essays by Rumi, Chodron, Emerson, St. Francis of Assisi, Thoreau, Mother Theresa, Buddha, Lammott, Brach, Jesus… sometimes the stories are ancient and sometimes they are contemporary. Sometimes the readings are fresh to the class and sometimes they are repeats.

My sense of “non-attachment” means to me that it doesn’t matter if the quotes are the same, because every time I read them, it’s a new day for the listener and for me. It’s how our day shapes up which leads us to how we hear what is being read. For some people it might be the first time they’ve heard it and for others it could be the sixth. The point is, that life throws us experiences that shape HOW we hear those readings.

I remember going to Mass and being irritated by having to hear the story of Lazarus or Jesus Calming the waters, or of his curing a blind man by spitting in the mud that he rubbed in the man’s eyes, or of the woman at the well, or … or … or … until I realized: oh… this isn’t about repetition… it’s about lessons. For me, now in retrospect, it was about choosing to be irritated or choosing to NOT be irritated and listening.

Why am I harping on repetition? . . .Wait for it. . .

After a recent restorative practice, I was told that a new student loved it, but that the readings were the same as the week before. I got the impression that it felt stale to this person. It didn’t affect the same way as the first time.

NON-ATTACHMENT BREAKDOWN. BITCHY DEFENSIVE YOGA TEACHER BREAK-IN.

What is ironic is that I was also told by another student that what I read in that very same class was EXACTLY what was needed. People tell you things in these spaces. They feel safe in their vulnerability. A marriage was dissolving. Sobriety was new. Children were raw and wary from years of hurt and neglect. A rebirth was taking place right in that studio; right on that mat; right before us all in a private, silent, and beautiful way. This student found the readings both soothing and buffeting and it was all very needed.

As an adult child of alcoholics, I could identify with the children this practitioner had injured. I rested my hands on my heart and bowed to this yogi who is boldly stepping into the light, no matter if one reading is exactly the same as the week before. No matter if one pose is repeated.

justbeyoupillow

The whole point of a yin practice is to “get down” with who you are. To get close to the discomfort of being in your own skin and letting the feelings well up and breathe them out so we can let them go. The whole point or a restorative is to let stuff ride through you and try to practice non-attachment, to truly BE “it is what it is.”

So the conflict: Do I change what I do to please the one person who itched that night when I’ve been doing what I’ve been doing and people tell me this class is like their church? That they wait all day for it? That they count the minutes until class? That it’s a form of body prayer for them? That it’s their sanctuary from the world? That it lets them go soft when the world insists they stay hard? I’ve been teaching this type of class this way for three years and I’ve never heard a “it was great, but…” and maybe because that’s people are too nice? Mmmmmmmnnnnope. Not around here…

“It’s not me it’s them.” Isn’t that a fun line? The truth is, it’s all of us. The insight for me, however, is that I’m keenly aware of my own shit and that any reaction I have to anything is mine, including this person’s reaction to what I did. Carl Jung said basically that when we don’t like something or someone, to pay attention to it because it gives us insight into ourselves. I used to really dislike that concept because it was right. It means “work”; it means we look in the mirror and parse out what we are and grow up and stop being little babies.

Are we judgy? Are we reactive? Are we irritated –in a restorative yoga class?! REALLY?!– breathe, molly . . . by a repetitive reading SO MUCH that we are going to talk about it, or are we going to do some digging and wonder why we are so irritated…? So attached? What are the expectations of this person? Levitation?

NnnNgnnn. Breathing. . .

So ok.

I love feedback and I am all for mixing things up, and frankly, some of the readings have felt repetitive for me. That said, I feel strongly that I must be guided to read what I read; that if I “preselect” what I’m going to read, that it’s not authentic, it’s “planned” and when is life ever really that way? As a yoga instructor, there are times when you think you have the best idea ever and then you get to your place of practice and you “read the room,” and your initial idea vaporizes. The moods of the people or the events of the day or the week DO NOT mesh with what you had in mind at all. That happens more than I’d like. In that way, I have to be responsive.

I remember a power vinyasa class I was preparing to teach. I had a whole line up all set. And as the people streamed in, the mood was SO unlike what I’d prepared to experience. I had to think on my feet; I had to find a way to ease into the place I wanted to bring us because while the tone of the room might’ve been heavy, the truth is that people come to that class to revive and to work, so I had to steer the ship.

But I’m attached. I don’t like what I heard about that restorative class and the readings. Do I say “fuck it” and do what I’ve done? Not if you know who I am I won’t. I will roll up my sleeves, do some digging about my reaction and serve the class to the best of my abilities. I could decide to blend both my worlds: write my own essays for the class that I teach, and maybe that has traction. I could write essays based on a reading and that would blend it all together. It’s a consideration. It’s got legs, actually.

And so RIGHT NOW, as I previewed this post, I find myself bowing in gratitude to this person who spoke up. I find myself utterly awake: I can change this, I can write up thoughts. I can share myself in a way that will never be experienced again. Why buy or read other writers’ works when I’m a writer myself…? Why not share me? Weave me into the readings?

Holy cow.

My prescription for non-attachment: lean in to what chafes you. Roll in it. Get its stink all over you. Decide if it’s worth learning from or letting go. There is no right or wrong answer, and my experience has been that if I can’t let it go it’s because I’m supposed to grow from it.

Thank you.

Feb24

What I Will Gain by Quitting Facebook for Lent — 3: Resisting Urges, Feeling Left Out

Posted on February 24, 2013 by Grass Oil by Molly Field

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So today is Day 12, but I journaled on Friday about it.

The first thing I said in my entry that day was this: “Woke up in Status Update mode,” which really bummed me out. I closed that sentence with, “rats.”

The thing is, I didn’t wake up in SU mode today and I’m glad. I went to sleep last night after playing around on my iPad with a new app using my new stylus called “Ink Writer” and it’s a great extension of creative energy — it’s described as a replacement for paper and ink. You can doodle, trace an outline of a photo, all sorts of things for active minds like mine and it wore me out, in a good way. So today, I woke refreshed, not thinking about Facebook.

Here’s what I did last night on the app. I outlined a photo of myself with my 83# lap dog, Murphy:

Here are some things I’ve learned in the last 12 days of being almost entirely (save for the fiction group and the fundraising groups I launched) off Facebook:

When I went on FB Friday for the fiction group, the first thing to show up was my home page newsfeed, and what was the first thing I saw? A meme. But this one was about Pistorius not being a flight risk. Pistorius is that double-amputee Olympian who shot his girlfriend three times because she “surprised” him.

Reaction: this isn’t funny. It’s tasteless. Does the fact that this is showing up on my newsfeed show more about me and the online company I keep or does it show how depraved people can be? Answer: yes.

But below the meme, I saw my FB community: their beings digitized and reduced to 1″ avatars and I sensed a quickening in myself, not unlike the sensation I feel when an ambulance goes by. That sounds morbid, but I don’t mean it that way. What I mean by it is to suggest that I feel disconnected, that I am observing, not necessarily voyeuristically, because I also felt no interest. The avatars reminded me of “TV Mike” from “Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory” (the only good one, starring Gene Wilder) when he was broken up into millions of little bits and his mother freaked out that he was the size of a coffee cup when he landed in the TV on the other end of the transportation or “broadcast.”

Most of the content from this post is coming from the journal entry, that I wrote in hand, on the advice of a friend. My second post about this lenten hiatus was also generated from my journal entry. I am glad I’m doing it this way, on paper first.

I don’t deign to suggest that this experience will be of vast importance to anyone but me, but I am getting feedback from both of my readers that they are encouraged by these posts and the fact that I’m sharing how I’m doing.

When I went on Friday to correspond with the groups, I had 78 unread notifications. I also got a couple emails from Facebook telling me they missed me, and that they’d noticed I hadn’t updated my fan page “in a day” and suggested that I might want to update it then. A day. Well, that’s about right. That’s what I mean to Facebook I guess. For someone who was not a super-heavy user, I was mostly an uploader and content sharer (news posts, etc.), I mattered that much to them. By this point, 10 days later, they missed me as about I as much as I missed them.

But 78 notifications in 10 days. That red 78 over my little monochromatic blue globe made me feel important for a moment and it made me feel as though people wanted me to know they were thinking about me, so I did feel that rush, that draw to go see! but I didn’t look at the notifications — that’s obviously how they get you in. I reminded myself that I don’t care about what I’m missing, despite the fact that I woke that morning with the concept that people needed to hear what I thought first thing. This is a sick trap… for me.

But writing this all in pen on paper gives me a connection with my content; it makes my thoughts indelible, not part of the internet (even though they are now), despite my conflicts.

I wrote six pages that night. Don’t worry, it’s a 5″x7″ notebook. I feel like Gulliver when I use it.

My life has opened up considerably since logging off and having to stare at my own neediness for approval and my estimation of self import. I’ve gone to museums, I’ve met with eldercare consultants for my parents, I helped out my son’s class with their bread making and then took my son to a food bank the next day to donate the bread… I’ve participated in life, but I found myself not necessarily sated by those acts because something in me, a years-long conditioning is impelling me still — despite my consciousness, awareness and reluctance — to share it on FB, to earn the Likes and the so-called approval for posts that compete with cat memes and glib someecards.

Egad, that sounds really snobby. But it’s true and this is hard for me. I’m truly being candid and am risking sounding like a jerk because I’m processing. It’s a little-known fact FB peeps, that FB has some sort of (another) creepy algorithm to determine what of yours gets seen first by your connections, in your newsfeed. I do know this: images win out. I also say this at risk of sounding completely paranoid and conspiracy theorist-y, but I wonder if FB is intentionally contributing to attention deficit disorder to keep people online; it’s like gambling … I’ve written before about dopamine rushes and pleasure centers and Facebook.

I continued on that thought,

It wasn’t enough to just do it and to document it and share it in a blog post. Something truly bizarre and I thought foreign to me is that urge from deep within that wanted the affirmation yet I know it’s completely pointless as well as soon forgotten once consumed. Do I remember anyone else’s status updates? For 99.829% of status updates I see, the answer is no. What’s more, do I remember any of my own? Do I remember my last one? Well, yes, because that one is when I said I was taking my leave of Facebook, but it’s sort of assholic of me to think that anyone would remember it; it’s an ego thing for me to think that anyone really cares about my status updates; but then I must remember not to be uncool to myself because then that opens up another rabbit hole …

The thing that feeds this concept for me as being an important member of my own Facebook community is that I’m a writer. And the publishing paradigms are shifting: self-publishing abounds, eBooks are all the rage (even though I really want to publish on paper), and the all-but-skywritten pronouncements that traditional publishing is on a DNR.

I hear time and again the need for writers and other creatives to develop a “platform” which is based on the person’s accessibility and social media “persona” and well, my “persona” is me. So that means, as far as the social media platform standpoint is considered, that I keep up with the Joneses, or more likely, the Hausenhaufers and Nardletters and Fingleworths — other completely unknown writers and trust me … there are a lot of us. I lament (quite ironically, by the way) that if I were just a regular person (I KNOW!), then leaving FB would be so much easier… but like Joan Crawford, I have to consider my public, dahling.

Don’t worry — I get it.

I stated in some posts leading up to my eventual decision to abandon FB that I’d had some epiphanies about living life when I was sick with Norovirus. Exhaustion, dehydration and vomiting does wonders for existentialism by the way. Another reason I had was one I don’t talk about very often (great line from “A Few Good Men,” “Because in places you don’t like to talk about at cocktail parties …”) is that I felt left out. That’s hard to admit. It makes me vulnerable and yes, real blah blah blah… but it’s true.

For a long while, when I first joined FB in 2008, I don’t recall ever seeing anyone else’s status updates. I recall going to someone’s wall (and I was a total noob about FB at the time, and I’m grateful that I’m still an FB / social media noob) and seeing what they had to say. I would just post my update or share an article and be off. But then something changed and I saw my friends’ updates and they were often about … well, themselves. And some mutual friends (this is where it gets sticky) and what they did together, with photos, without me. So I felt small, and unimportant and I would become sad.

So, I even did it myself a few times, just to make other people feel small and unimportant, thinking that would make me feel big and amazingly important and you know, special. I’d tag a friend or two in a status update and share it. But then I felt like a dick. So I’d take it off. I learned later to share my thoughts more generically, “A regular night is always nicer with good friends and a dinner served by a hot waiter.” That is a status update that anyone, anywhere can agree with. And you can borrow that status update free of charge.

I have an actual friend who has a rule (which I admire): Anyone she sees on a near-daily basis or who lives within 30 miles of her is not allowed on her FB connections list. (I’m not going to use the word “friend” anymore.) Her connection group is less than 100 and her bullshit ratio is controlled.

So there were also times when I was convinced ~~(because I’m a deluded, self-entitled, paranoid conspiracy theorist)~~ that some of these socially exclusive images were posted as a giant (swear alert) “fuck you!” to me and despite my weirdness, I know I’m right.

Why? Remember how Facebook first began: as the vengeful scheming of and public slandering by a jilted small-minded emotionally arrested boy at Harvard. It all started with his system of rating women based on their looks. Some women liked it and others didn’t; but guess what: they all got talked about and so did the women who weren’t included in the original idea. Facebook was founded on exclusion and rejection. So then that begat the question: do you want to be included in this or not?

Granted, Facebook has evolved (as I’ve stated on a previous post about this topic) or that’s what the marketing would have you believe. No… I don’t know about that. Would the marketing have you believe that? I have to say this, I’ve never seen a television or heard a radio ad or even seen an internet ad for Facebook. Why? Because they don’t need it: in the digitized, Internet-based world, Facebook is ubiquitous. But that doesn’t mean it’s healthy or unhealthy; the more I process this, the more it comes back to my knowing myself and my limitations.

I have another human friend who recently shut down, completely deactivated her account as did her teenage son who will likely be followed by his teenage sister. Why? Because they decided that it’s a freakfest of self-promotion and for my friend at least, she found herself completely unimpressed by it all after a while. And she did it silently, no pronouncements, because she didn’t want to hear about it from anyone. She’s like that. I dig that about her.

And so, here’s me: feeling like after four years that maybe it’s time to graduate. Keep the yearbook, stay in touch an’ all, but you know… get a life. This break has been awesome for the most part, despite my feeling twitchy and needy at times about sharing my thoughts and experiences.

The drop in data and light in my face have helped me become more self-aware, more calm, my thoughts are cohesive and productive and I don’t feel bad about being “away.” Despite what happened Friday morning with the Status Update thought, I haven’t thought that way again and I don’t really feel like hearing about other people. That sounds selfish until I realize that Facebook doesn’t share status updates anymore the way it used to. Back in the stone age, when you had a status update, it stayed at the top of your wall and people would know you’d not been online in a while and that was cool. Now FB shares posters and pictures and ads and cat memes and someecards and other stuff that quite honestly: has done nothing for my life.

The problem for me: it can be fun to get a glimpse of what my friends and family choose to share. I really like to see how everyone seems to be doing. I am a social creature who loves banter and seeing friends and visiting and travel. That’s the social part of social media that I dig.

I remember that before Facebook, I didn’t not think about my friends, I just didn’t think about them not thinking about me. It never occurred to me that I figured that large in their lives. I think about the thought of completely deactivating and it doesn’t completely appeal to me. Still chewing on this; the key is to not be distracted by it.

Thank you.

ps – here is the next post about this: https://mollyfielddotcom.wordpress.com/2013/03/06/what-ive-gained-from-quitting-4-overcoming-habits-resurrecting-old-good-ones/

Feb19

Tuesday Morning Press 18 — Achievement Vs. Recognition

Posted on February 19, 2013 by Grass Oil by Molly Field

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One of my favorite moments in the film, “A Beautiful Mind” was when the Judd Hirsch character Dr. Helinger (who was the department chair at Princeton where Russell Crowe’s character, the protagonist John Nash), took an agitated and confused doctoral candidate Nash to the mathematics department tea room at the university.

In the hallway just at the entry to the tea room, Helinger and Nash discussed Nash’s lack of work, which resulted in threatening his PhD candidacy as well as his appointment to a coveted position at the prestigious Wheeler Institute at MIT after attaining said PhD.

Helinger interrupted Nash’s clucking and excuses and barters for more time and he tersely instructed him to look at a gentleman, presumably a senior mathematics professor of some countenance sitting alone at a table covered by a draping ecru linen tablecloth in this gorgeous room of soaring coffered ceilings, wrought iron glass windows, Norman moldings, and cherrywood walls.

What they were witnessing was “the ceremony of the pens” which I just learned this very second upon researching it that it was completely fictitious. Well… that sort of blows the moment, doesn’t it?

ANYWAY, in the now-discovered fictitious moment (despite its significance to me and this post — this revelation is totally killing my buzz on the movie, by the way), the ceremony was to make big noise deal to smart someone teacher long time who’d done has math real good at college the.

Shit, I don’t even feel like writing well anymore.

What the what?! Really? Resist urge to edit and start all over. This is not what I do… I write IN the moment.

Excuse me a moment. Please hit play:

ONWARD… there is a point to all this: Nash is frantic, begging for more time; Helinger essentially says shut up and watch the now entirely fictitious frigging ceremony of the #)(%@_! pens.

When the fictitious ceremony was over, Helinger immediately asked Nash what he saw. Nash ~~supposedly~~ blurted reflexively, “recognition.”

Helinger ~~supposedly~~ corrected him and firmly said, ~~supposedly~~ thrusting his ~~fake~~ right fist, “No. Achievement.”

Hell, I don’t know what to believe. Curse you, director Ron Howard! I do know that Hirsch did thrust his fist for emphasis at the Nash character in that building when the cameras were rolling to show a moment of truth whilst witnessing a completely made-up ceremony at an Ivy-League university.

On Mars.

The point is, as it doesn’t matter what I’ve researched since starting this post (honestly, I was just trying to get the name of the Hirsch character and to learn the real name for the fake ceremony of the pens), is that achievement is more important than recognition.

Because Judd Hirsch said so.

This brings me to my current moment of self-actualization (and the post would’ve been a lot shorter had the entire ceremony not been made up…I’m letting this go…NnnnnnNnN).

My point: yes. Achievement matters more than recognition. Recognition is a construct of the ego; it requires outside validation and external gratification and it will hardly ever be enough; it’s constant and never ending. Think Madonna. Think Schwarzenegger and Stallone at the Golden Globes:

Better yet… don’t. My apologies. Wow. That’s gonna stay in my mind for a while.

It’s all well and good to want to be recognized for our work; but that shouldn’t be the goal.

Achievement is an actual experience: it is quantified and reliable internally and measured by a sense of accomplishment and pride by creating something or doing something that matters to us. It is largely a private experience. Achievement and accomplishment can build upon themselves as well and that’s good. We want to feel good about what we do; it’s nice… but does lack of recognition invalidate our achievements? No. Who cares if no one notices. Really… think about it. Like this: because that pens ceremony was completely made up does its message take away its significance? ~~Maybe.~~ No.

So this leads me to another self-acutalization, not based on a fictitious ceremony (sorry, I’m still pretty steamed about that): in order to build more pride and more enthusiasm for what we do (I’m really talking to myself here, you’re just sticking around to see if I come up with anything of any real value): we need to feel good about what we have done. I’ve been noticing this:

When someone asks me what I do, I usually sigh-speak, “I am a SAHM, but…” and that’s wrong. I need to build value and esteem into what I do here as a mother of three boys, because guess what: this gig is tough. I vacillate on this, clearly, I’ve written about it before, but the point is this, and I’m feeling closer now than the last time I dipped in this pool: I’m doing a good job. My kids are healthy, smartasses, and clever. They have friends, they have outlets and they don’t return the tools they borrow or bring their laundry down. This is all normal behavior. RIGHT?!

Instead of kicking a rock every time I think about the entirely huge reality that my book won’t outsell the Bible (especially not if I never publish it a*hem, Molly…) I need to be OK with the fact that I wrote one because that’s a big deal. (But… it would be nice to put it to bed and see what happens… Nnnn. That’s semi-recognitionistic isn’t it?)

These are the ideas that are floating around my head since giving up Facebook for Lent. I’m pretty cool with that decision; I haven’t thought in status-update mode yet today.

So here we are. Feel good about what you Have Done so that you will feel good about what you Will Do. We all have to start somewhere. I’m not looking for a ~~pen~~ medal (that’s good, because now I feel better that John Nash doesn’t have all those pens because… that would be wrong). But Nash did win the Nobel Prize in 1994.

I’m looking for self-satisfaction. That’s tough these days what with everyone seeking their 15 minutes of fame. It’s hard to know the difference. Or it used to be… I think I’m getting a handle on it. Self-satisfaction with personal achievement means you’re good with what’s going on; that if you kicked the bucket, you’d be OK with how your life has turned out, based on your own assessment.

If you haven’t seen the film, you should. It’s largely true; Nash did have schizophrenia and he has overcome it, and he is still affected by hallucinations. Here’s a nice moment that ~~likely~~ never happened:

The take away is this: be happy and proud of what you’ve done. If nothing else: it keeps the flow of good energy going in the universe and that, my friends, is HUGE.

Thank you.