telling the truth,,, (life)

hello my friends. it is a good day to be alive.

if my journey so far could be described as peculiar, these last few weeks even more so.

unexpected twists in my road have invited me to a place where i have experienced more pain and more growth than i have in many years. i am not used to feeling such pain.

it has been an incredible teacher, gifting me with a healing i didn't know i needed. i have become less,,, in ways which enable me to be more.


just tell the truth. - words spoken in the movie the Great Debaters have stuck with me since i saw it.

simple words, but words that have been given new depth in these last days. kept like a rock in my pocket, they have become something of an anthem for me - a reminder of what true strength is.


my dear friends, there is a part of us that will do anything to avoid facing a painful truth, even if we must lie to others, and worse, to ourselves, in order to do so.

these small betrayals stack, one upon the other until years later, we live in a kind of warren of mind.

such patch jobs can never be too closely examined, or they will be found to be as faulty as they are. because of this, our mind goes out of its way to avoid those places, steering us in a crooked detour of determined ignorance.

we wouldn't pretend an infection on our hand wasn't there, putting layers of gloves over it so we don't have to look at it. but strange though it may sound, i have come to believe we do this very thing so often with our mental and self-image injuries that it becomes habitual, to the point we no longer realize we do it.

but there, beneath the mess, still untouched, is that affliction, still undealt with, still in need of healing.

though on a conscious level we may ignore the existence of these wounds, on a subconscious level, they cannot help but have a very real affect on our body and mind, often manifesting themselves in ways that would seem completely unrelated, such as physical and mental ailments.

they also reappear as subtle but commanding fears when we find ourselves encountering similar kinds of circumstances, further compounding the unhealthy cycle of avoidance.

in this way, and in others, they become chains to us, too often keeping the best parts of us from finding the freedom of expression they deserve.


my friends, my family, my loved ones,,, my self. we all deserve better.


events of these past days have put me face to face with some very old wounds in me, wounds that i had hidden from for so long, i didn't even recognize them.

layer after layer, i peeled away, only to find at the root of it all was perhaps the chiefest of all fears - that i am not good enough, that i am not worthy of love.

it is a lie, my friends, and a cruel one.

to turn away from true love is a suffocation of our natural life force. and why do we turn away? fear.

how ironic is it that our fear of losing love, of being without it, is often the very thing that makes that fear come true?


i was surprised to discover that for years i had been playing this same cruel game with myself.

getting to that root, digging it all up and bringing it into the light, has been liberating in a way deeper and more powerful than i can easily express.

it is no exaggeration to say i am a different person than i was three weeks ago. i feel that changed. in some ways it is as though i have let go of a heavy weight. one i had carried for so long, i had confused it for myself.


i dream of making an end to this vicious cycle.


first, in myself.

in some ways, i feel that my work has just begun. it won't always be easy, and will require a careful balance, but it is a work i am willing and ready to perform. i know its reward.

the love i feel burning in me is a living thing, a moving thing that is tired of the bounds i have placed on it for far too long.

love is a movement, a flow, as a dear friend once told me. at the point it is stopped, it is not love.

i have learned it is not possible to change anything but myself. as Mohandas Gandhi said, be the change you want to see in the world.

this is where i will start.

i have witnessed the miracle of love spreading many more times than i have earned. i have seen its fire express itself in many ways, and in many forms. but always, it starts with a decision to be true to self. always.


this is the decision i have made. each day, each moment - to tell the truth, as best i know it. i am done with pretending to be anything less or more than i am.

i am me, and that is enough.


this post isn't what i intended to write, when i sat down this morning to speak with you, but apparently this is what was most important.

it is the best i can do for the people i love - to tell them the truth. my truth, as i experience it. anything else, in all honesty, amounts to so much of nothing.


my deepest love for you all,,, may the day star of your heart burn brighter than you ever thought possible,,,

jesh *

things i learned today,,, (life)

i love,,,


to sing with my body.

to be warm and cold at the same time.

the smell of bark.

the sound moving water makes.

how it turns white, grey and green and blue, and is still clear.

listening to my heart tell me secrets (especially ones i've kept from myself).

watching trees dance in a wind.

following veins of leaves, the the sun behind them.

rolling down hills with grass, laughing afterwards.

jumping over creeks, foot to stone, stone to foot.

watching the sky with the earth at my back.

how autumn leaves tip toe down the road, moving somewhere they've never been.

how their shadows are from them, but not like them.

how the world bends in a way so big it's hard to see.

sunlight reflecting.


not knowing.


*

exploring love,,, (upward spiral)

wow.

these few days in catalina, arizona, spent sharing and learning among friends and family may have been one of the most catalystic weeks of my life.

when i try to reach for what it was i pulled from those days, it is the small things that i remember best.


Katie's bird nest. Rachel's handkerchief, and how she loves to salsa dance. the way Rassouli said the word love.

watching the sky move, sitting next to Porter, as he shared a beautiful story of two very different journeys to the same place.

Amy's hand on the piano keys, before she began to make music so beautiful it rocked me to my core. meeting her on the path, mid-morning.

Charlie's impish smile, how he ran toward Libya anyway.

Jodi, demonstrating tree pose during dinner. Pamela, how she shaped the colors.

Liz, the way she looked up at me and cried. Sherrie's left eye, so green, as she told me something true.

Emily, running through the forest. Sandy, as a teenager. Lisa, the way her eyes glow as she tells me about the tightrope.

Steve, feeling the sound that comes from a white bowl, the way he looks at Tamara.

Tamara, listening to the oldest story i know, laughing when everyone was supposed to be quiet.

Wendy, and open hearted belly laughs. Brent, and how it feels to meet an old friend for the first time.

Reiki. omg, Reiki.

me. the giant rock i carried, how i traded it for a grain of sand. the mirror my heart made. the medal i gave to Meagan and the sound of children laughing.

my fingers spreading the paint.

the next three days,,, some of the hardest and best of my life.


i feel beautifully empty. it is not what i received, but what i was able to let go of, that made the experience so powerful for me.

i am here. ready to experience whatever life may bring me next.

the upward spiral,,, begins.


blessings to you, my lovely friends,,,

jesh *

a birth, a death (life)

tonight, i die to the past.

i die to the past, and am born to this present moment -


this gift, this fresh rain-smell, this empty box, this early morning, this child's laugh, this midnight snow, this quiet stone, this single star, this shared look between friends, this warm promise.


it is not that i do not honor the dead, i do. i am thankful for the path i have walked to here, and every colored stone it was set with.

i may, now and again, fondly recount these steps - the conversations, the laughing, the hurting, the joy - embracing their memory like an old friend.

but i was born to be no grave-robber. i will not dig up what time has past and try to give its chalk line shape a place among my present dream.

and i will not play the puppeteer - working hard to carry both sides of a conversation no one is having.

my friends, my loves - these cannot be hidden from me. i will know them always when i see them.

the measuring stick? i threw it out. i burned it. it was made to calculate finite things, and so always gave an inaccurate reading when i tried to use it to measure life.

now, i keep an eraser, held loosely in my pocket. each morning before i speak, i erase the boxes my mind drew around everything lovely the day before.


i am newly in love with everything i love. this is me crying from seeing its beauty for the first time, again.

i am newly alive, with all the wonder and magic due those who have just come from a long darkness.

i am newly alive, unbound, unchained.

i am new.

i am.


*

commit,,, (life)

friends,,,

there is something surpassing beautiful about the way kids commit to what they're doing.

if they're running,,, they're running. if they're laughing, they're laughing. if they're upset,,, it will be hard to miss ; )


one of my son Prevail's favorite games to play with me is chase, and it has become something of a daily ritual.

each time before we start he tells me about the superpowerful, so so fast engine he now has, and how it will make him go too too faster than the world.

this morning, i couldn't help but become lost in stunned appreciation as i watched him rev up in preparation to launch from the starting line.


we've all made the car noise with our mouth,,, you know, brrrpprprppprm, brrrprprprrrmmmm. this guy wasn't just making the car noise, he was the car noise.

his legs crouched down in a primal, ready-to-pounce position, tiny fists raised in the air, somehow instinctively knowing the the exact position that would take full advantage of his diaphragm's brrrpprrrmmp-ing power,,,

and he set it free - - - *

four year old boy-spit flew in quantities i can only describe as astounding, and he shot off from the living room floor like i've seen lions do on the nature channel, when they're hunting gazelle.


needless to say, i was impressed on many levels.

it was so fast, so sure. he knew what he wanted to do and committed instantly, involving his whole body in what might seem to be an isolated act of his mouth.

but of course it isn't isolated at all, is it?

the mouth, is connected to the throat, which is connected to the diaphragm, which works with our lungs, which rely on blood supply, which depends upon the heart,,, we are an entire orchestra of living, whether we realize it or not.

at what point in growing up do we learn to do things so halfheartedly? when do we forget to move, breathe and live with our whole body? when do we start practicing saying things we don't mean? when did we settle for being so much less powerful than we really are,,, for using such a small percentage of our natural potential?

why? when? i'll tell you exactly when: when we start becoming conscious of the spit flying out of our mouth, and how it really is a ridiculous amount of spit, and o no, what will the people around me think of me now that they've seen all this spit, and will they take their love from me because of it???

the fear of rejection is so strong, so deeply ingrained in us, that we imprison the best parts of us in a misguided attempt to keep them from harm. the greatest gift in the universe, traded for fear.


really? so what if johnny thinks you have too much spit, you're alive!!! alive, and no one can take that from you, no one can lessen the glory of that in any way.

no one, but you.

that's what i want to tell that precious little man as i see him fly through the air, so free and unburdened.

that's what i want to tell the 52 year old boy i saw on the street last week, locked behind eyes that had seen years and years of too much of that same fear.

it's what i want to tell the 27 year old girl i saw at a restaurant two nights ago pretending to laugh at something said by the man she was trying so hard to impress - a man who looked at her, completely missing the wealth she truly is.

it is what i want to tell to everyone i've ever met who is pretending to be fine.

no, my friends, no. we are more than this, and it is too long buried, for reasons that could never be good enough.


watching my boy work the magic he was born with, so effortlessly, so thoughtlessly, i am reminded of the most powerful artists i've been blessed to witness perform, whose work i've been privileged to experience.

there is an undeniable similarity between the two - a complete surrender, a commitment to the act of expression which is at the same time riveting and deeply moving in a way older than spoken language.

and we are born with it. born with it.

is it possible that reconnecting with that gift is as close and as simple as practicing being fully alive, fully present, fully genuine, in what we choose to say and do?

i believe it is that simple.

if something is worth doing, it is worth doing with everything you have. if it's not, then why are your spending precious moments of your life doing it?


love, love and more love, my amazing friends,,,

jesh *