I wish to choose less.

Not make fewer choices, but allow less into my life. Less of that which is not me.

Sounds like the opposite of allowing abundance in, but it’s actually a recognition of the abundance that already surrounds and suffuses me.

I wish to let go and get rid of that which is not me so I can choose to be and act on that which is me.

Here’s how I’m getting to what is me: I’m listing some experiences in which I remember living effortlessly, with joy. Then I’ll figure out what was effortless, what was me at that time.

1. Reading _Follow the Brook_ with my great aunt and pretending to be that raccoon family. We used the davenport as our den.

2. Walking carefully across the trestle bridge over the river carrying a case of beer to the dinosaur park. Opening a bottle while riding Stegosaurus.

3. Swimming across the lake in the almost dark.

4. Windsurfing.

5. Hiking through the Lauterbrunn valley in Switzerland. Eating cheese, sausage, jam and bread. Cooling our feet in the stream.

6. Exploring the stacks in unfamiliar libraries. Reading old copies of Advertising Age. Feeling the weight of all those ideas as I turned the handwheel to open the shelf on the other side.

7. Hanging out outdoors on any college campus. Watching people using public spaces.

8. Figuring out how to put something together, how to get something to work. Installing my parents’ dishwasher.

9. Traveling with the train though central Europe, standing in the corridor with the window down, watching the landscape, towns, people.

10. Packing the car and taking off EARLY in the morning for parts unknown.

Okay. So it looks like my abundance includes imagination, adventure, a bit of risk, the outdoors, concentration, quiet time, ideas, discovery, independence, motion. These are what are wish to choose.

What a wonderful prompt! I wanted to write about a book I have just read for the second time called _The Passion Dream Book_ by Whitney Otto. You may be familiar with an earlier work of hers, _How to Make an American Quilt_ which was made into a movie with a wonderful cast including Winona Ryder, Anne Bancroft, Ellen Burstyn, Alfre Woodard, Jean Simmons and Maya Angelou, among others.

Anyway, this book is an equally rich tapestry of stories about artists dealing with inspiration, distraction and connection. About how dreams reveal passions and passions drive people to seek what they dream, even if they don’t know exactly what that is. Artists from the Italian Renaissance to the Harlem Renaissance to the group of American expatriates in Paris appear along with stories about pursuing and denying passions and dreams. And for those working with the Artist’s Way, it’s a great companion piece.

“How funny … to say what I will be, not what I will do, as if [I] will someday be transformed.”

Well, I sent out the application for my husband’s U.S. visa today, so I guess that emigrating is the door that’s finally starting to creak open after months and years of planning. Just getting the door to move even a little has taken a great deal of effort, but now it’s open enough to get a foot in and soon we’ll see what’s around the corner.

That’s easy! I finally got started on my Artist’s Way path this morning and I wish to nourish my creativity, my ability to write and my determination to stick with it. The food that will support me is this community, my husband’s kindness and generosity and my elders’ own creative work. My great aunt painted and quilted, my grandma tatted, crocheted and wove rugs, another great aunt sewed, my aunt knitted and told stories, my father made furniture and who know what all the other relatives have done?

The word “nourish” also always reminds me of a song we sang in church when I was little. It’s an English translation of a Swedish song. Here are the first two verses:

Children of the heavenly Father
Safely in His bosom gather.
Nestling bird nor star in Heaven
Such a refuge e’er was given.

God, His own doth tend and nourish.
In His holy courts they flourish.
From all evil things He spares them.
In His mighty arms He bears them.

Here’s the Swedish:

Tryggare kan ingen vara

Än Guds lilla barnaskara

Stjärnan ej på himlafästet,

Fågeln ej i kända nästet.

 

Herren sina trogna vårdar,

Uti Sions helga gårdar,

Över dem Han sig förbarmar,

Bär dem uppå fadersarmar.

 

When I think of this song I feel safe and happy, like a nourished child. May you all be nourished this week.

I want to sincerely try following all that values defining, goal setting and pursuing advice that I used to be afraid of, i.e. always said didn’t apply to me because it’s all hokey (or is that hocus pocus?). In any case, having used more intuitive methods, such as laying tarot cards, for discovering what I need by looking in through the back door to surprise myself (I like to hide), I think a more direct (honest?) approach might be in order. Let’s get to the lists!

Yesterday in commenting on the always interesting Joy Junket blog (visit at http://www.joyjunket.com/everything-is-possible-2/) I discovered a new idea that many folks probably already know about, but for me it finally makes sense: to manifest something in your life, first you have to know what it is (desire), then honestly intend to have it (intention) and then behave as though you have it (manifestation). The steps are as easy as shifting language use, but the work is still the work.

Here’s what I mean:

Desire: I WANT to be the woman who does yoga and radiates health.

Intention: I WILL BECOME the woman who does yoga and radiates health.

Manifestation: I AM the woman who does yoga and radiates health.

These steps move you from wanting to becoming to being. Arriving at “I AM” seems tricky, though. There is always fluctuation between becoming and being; we never really “arrive” anywhere because we are always moving and changing.

Still, instead of just waiting for the final step to occur, it helps me to say that I AM that woman even before I really think I am or if I used to be that woman and now I’m not.

I think that this process is something that children often do easily without too much deliberation. Somehow, sadly, we lose the magic of manifestation somewhere along the way and many of us spend years looking for it again. But the concept is easy, even if the work associated with the steps isn’t. Desire, intend, manifest.

Let’s see what happens.

Wow, that’s a tough one. I wonder why? Maybe because I already have so many delights in my life: making summer drinks with my husband’s daughter with homemade rhubarb, mint and sweet woodruff syrups, watching my husband carefully brush each louse from his first crop of tomatoes, blowing bubbles on the porch and watching the cats’ surprise when they pop…

Or maybe I don’t really know what delights me – well, of course I do: visiting museums, lying in a hammock and enjoying the breeze and the smell of whatever is blooming while reading a great book, swimming, canoeing, summer vacation!

And we’re on our way starting Sunday. Delights are waiting for me already.

I wish everyone the delights they wish for themselves.

Today I read that the purpose of zazen is to sit to learn how to live, or that how we sit is how we live. When I sit in meditation I fidget, I think about all kinds of things that are not related to my breathing or where I am right now and I slump in my posture. And actually, that is kind of how I live.  I move somewhat aimlessly from one project to another, I am easily distracted (i.e. I follow distracting influences easily) and I don’t always put my best foot forward, I take what I think is the easy way out.

So today I want to starting sitting in the way that I want to live. And then sometime I will start living in the way that I sit. Can it really be that easy?

Yes! I really did dream of flying last night (well, sort of). A tremendously huge tree grew at the center of our lawn (wherever we were living in the dream). I reached up and took hold of a small twig on a small branch and pulled it down to look at the small, new green leaves. Slowly the branch pulled me up and off of the ground and I sailed up into the tree’s crown, swaying in the breeze, like a slow dance, until the branch slowly let me down again. I swear the tree bowed to me then. Lovely.

I thought it would be fun to think about what I would like to dream, as in when I sleep. I haven’t had a flying dream for quite some time now. Sometimes I would dream I was skiing then I would gently lift away from the ground and fly over the snow. I have dreamed recently of being with relatives who have left this life, otherwise I would wish for one of those dreams.

It’s funny – mostly when I think about my dreams it’s the ones I want to avoid that come up: where I lose my teeth, drive off a high bridge or find out something I had believed in was an absolute lie. I think I will focus on flying, on gently leaving the ground and moving forward to some safe, inviting place.