Thankful for the Leftovers

      Years ago I heard or read somewhere that the average American family eats Thanksgiving leftovers for 6 days. I haven’t been able to confirm that, but it’s a staggering thought, especially when you figure that quite a few people only have them for 2 or 3 days, meaning some families are annually pushing the limits of safe refrigerator hygiene. More to the point, regardless of how many turkey sandwiches I might endure, my intention this year has been for the thanksgiving in my heart to last at least as long as the leftovers. 

      Without a doubt, of all the spiritual and life-enhancing practices I’ve engaged in, cultivating a practice of thanksgiving has been the most valuable in terms of my day-to-day happiness level. Indeed, to this point anyway, according to the scientists who actually study happiness (I wonder if they’re happy studying it?) the only practice that has been objectively measured to increase prolonged happiness is doing a daily gratitude list. Wow, and such a simple thing, too. Gratitude opens my heart, brings me right smack dab into the present moment, has me focusing on what I want (rather than what I don’t want), and instantly raises my consciousness; all the things most of us are looking for in a daily spiritual practice. Your grandmother and mine knew what they were talking about when they told us to count our blessings! This is probably why every faith tradition contains prayers and rituals that represent gratitude and appreciation for the Divine, for life, and/or for all creation.

       Eric Butterworth, a famous Unity Minister and author, wrote, “Thanksgiving is not just a reactionary emotion; it is a causative energy.” Gratitude isn’t just something I feel only when I get what I want; it’s a state of consciousness that allows me to create my experience of life based on my core values and intentions. It’s an attitude of mind I can develop that allows me to see the good in myself and in life. It’s a causative energy that has contributed greatly to the realization of many of my dreams.

      When I first started developing a thanksgiving practice, I began with the “small” stuff—those everyday blessings and gifts that I was taking for granted. Immediately I discovered, to paraphrase A Course in Miracles, that there’s no order of magnitude among blessings when I notice and acknowledge them. It was hard at first to list what I was grateful for, but forcing myself to do it seemed to grease the whole mechanism to the point where I could soon take a 15-minute walk in the morning and rattle off things I was grateful for the whole time.

        

        The next step was developing gratitude in the face of things it was harder to be grateful for. In the Bible, Paul writes, “Give thanks in all things.”  No small feat. Thankfully, he doesn’t say, “Give thanks FOR all things.” The Buddha put it this way: “Let us rise up and be thankful, for if we didn't learn a lot today, at least we learned a little, and if we didn't learn a little, at least we didn't get sick, and if we got sick, at least we didn't die; so, let us all be thankful.” For me both Paul and the Buddha are suggesting something possible and extremely powerful, namely, when the schmootz (Yiddish for “dirt”) hits the fan, I don’t necessarily have to be grateful FOR it, but IN the situation, I can still keep at least one toe firmly ensconced in gratitude, because I can choose to remember all the countless things that aren’t schmootzy and be grateful. This allows me to stay grounded, present, hopeful and connected to my inner resources—those things that will help me through the schmootz and possibly even see a blessing in it.

This brings me back to leftovers. I’m working on being thankful for my leftovers, which in this case I’ll define as those issues I’ve worked on/with, ad nauseum, for eons. You know; the negative labels I’ve stitched deeply into the collar of my self-image? The ones that still, after all these years, show up and spoil the fun like red ants at a picnic? Do you have any of those? Can I really be thankful for those leftovers when they emerge from the fridge and show up in my awareness?

In many ways I believe that until I do develop gratitude for those leftovers, they continue to return like relatives I don’t like. In Jewish scripture, after Jacob wrestles all night with an angel who finally asks Jacob to let him go, Jacob responds, “I will not let you go until you bless me.” What a beautiful metaphor for those issues I’ve wrestled with for years. In the past I tried denying them, hating them, resisting them, feeling victimized by them, cajoling them, inquiring into them and generally focusing on them so hard and so long in an attempt to get rid of them that I was able to expound on them backwards and forwards in several different languages. When I started to simply be OK with them, to notice them and accept them, they started to let go of me a bit. They lost some power over me because I stopped giving them so much power. When I actually started blessing them, they let go of me even more. 

There’ve been other gifts in giving thanks for my leftovers. I’ve noticed that in some way my leftovers have served me and still serve me, and I’ve been able to identify the needs they serve and work on meeting those needs in healthier ways. I’ve also noticed that I’ve been able to reframe some of my negative labels into things that empower me. For instance, instead of calling myself lazy, I now enjoy and understand the value of rest and recharging. Instead of thinking of myself as a “good little boy” or “people pleaser”, I’ve become a compassionate being who touches people with my kindness and love. And instead of stressing over my tendency to obsess over things that never happened and never will happen, I now have one-pointed focus and attention on my deepest intentions. Is that cool or what?

I’m turning my issues into allies. Just like Gandhi did with his alleged greediness, I can use my leftovers as compost for growing what I really want for myself and for the world. I’ll need them as allies in my journey. When Jesus was tempted by Satan, his last “test” before taking on his ministry, he repeated several times, “Get thee behind me, Satan.” Perhaps Jesus was being tempted by the leftovers in his own consciousness and not necessarily banishing them, but telling them to get behind him, to support him, to get on his team. He undoubtedly knew he’d need every aspect of his wholeness to do what he needed to do in this world, and I can do the same. I’m thankful for my leftovers, and I’m thankful the Thanksgiving leftovers are gone!

Author: Stew Bittman, ISIS Class of 2013

With his wife Hillary, Stew is the Spiritual Leader at Unity at The Lake in South Lake Tahoe, CA. Their blog and full bios can be found here: http://bittmanbliss.com/wordpress/

Integrating the Shadow

Author: Joan Kistler, ISIS Class of 2013

In our Essence, we are whole, perfect beings. When we incarnate into this world as Spirit in human form, we are unlimited in the authentic expression of our Essence – but not for long. We are soon drafted into the limiting roles of our cultures, religions, and families. To fit in and feel safe, we begin to hide many aspects of ourselves. The parts of our light that we block are called Shadow.

When I was in my early twenties, I was suffering from intense anxiety, depression, and social isolation. At that time, I asked my mother what I was like when I was very young. She told me that I was very funny, easy-going, and friendly. I then realized that I was not by nature so serious, fearful, and reclusive. Since then, my inner work has been to return to my natural state of being by identifying, understanding, and integrating my Shadow.

How did my Shadow come into being? When I was five, my mother began to experience mental health issues. For about six years, my home environment was very unstable and emotionally toxic. As an empathic child, I readily absorbed the feelings of intense fear and despair that defined the emotional climate in my home. During this extremely stressful time, my parents also couldn’t handle my typical childhood wants and needs. As a result, I naturally felt that I was nothing more than a huge nuisance to them. If I didn’t stop being such a bother, what would they do?

To protect myself from rejection and abandonment, I unconsciously split-off and hid the parts of myself that my parents couldn’t tolerate by attacking those parts and driving them into the Shadow. As a result, I created a false self. This false self became a “mask” that I wore around my parents that looked like what they seemed to want: a child who wants and needs only to be who they want and need her to be.

This false self overshadowed many aspects of my authentic self. However, the false self could not completely silence my authentic self, which frequently fought for expression. Anxiety and depression resulted from this constant war raging within me. After playing this role for so long, I became stuck in it. This created problems for me later in life, especially in my relationships with others. Because I was never bringing my authentic self into those relationships, they were phony and doomed from the start.

On a collective level, humanity suffers from a similar problem. Many of us were indoctrinated into that ages-old lie of our religious institutions: that our very nature is sinful and therefore unacceptable to our Source. To protect ourselves from eternal abandonment and rejection (a.k.a. “Hell”), we turn our power over to a false self, the Ego, which promises to protect us from this intolerant, jealous, and wrathful god. We allow the Ego to drive our Light into Shadow. As a result, the Ego overshadows many aspects of the True Self – the whole, perfect Spirit that resides within humanity. The Ego teaches us to cower in fear of this angry god who cannot tolerate us – to see ourselves as subordinate and separate.

Shadow is all the parts of ourselves that we refuse to accept and therefore drive underground. Then it is free to take on a will of its own because we refuse to “see” it – like the wayward child that the parent refuses to take responsibility for (“Oh, no – not my Johnny!”). The guilt trips laid on humanity by its religious institutions have caused much confusion. On the one hand, we must reject our perfect Spirit because God resents competition. On the other hand, we must also reject our humanity as “corrupt” because God demands perfection. So – we have to be perfect, but God resents competition. What a conundrum! It’s the perfect catch-22 to keep our will in shackles. What if we fully accept both our Spirit and our humanity? Then we take responsibility for the whole aspect of our Being in this physical existence, and nothing is driven underground where it can operate without our conscious awareness.

In reality, we are to be the receptacles of the power of Source in this world – as equal and One with Source. Our limited sense perceptions and child-like level of consciousness have caused us many misconceptions about our relationship to Source, Mother Earth, and each other. As a result, we suffer from tremendous fear and all of the subsequent emotions – anger, guilt, fear, shame, and despair. Some of us become sanctimonious and – like sibling rivals – attempt to prove ourselves worthy by condemning others. Some of us are so overcome by shame that we don’t even attempt to draw near to God. We figure that there is no way that we can ever be good enough. In either case, what we don’t realize is that we are not loved because we are good; we are good because we are loved – by our Source eternally.

How can I reintegrate those lost parts of myself? As a part of my energy, I can’t fight my false self without driving it underground. Then it will become Shadow, creating mayhem like a little gremlin in my life. As an adult, it no longer functions in a way that is beneficial to me. It helped me to survive a difficult childhood, but now it is time for me to assign it a new role: one that is more useful to my personal evolution and the evolution of this planet and all its inhabitants. There certainly are times when I need something to restrict my words and actions to avoid hurting myself or others, but not to put a stopper on who I am. The day that I can boldly stand before my mother and father without any pretense is the day that I am fully healed.

I believe that the Ego has also had a role to play in this great drama of Consciousness Evolution. Without the experience of separation, perhaps we would never become autonomous enough in our consciousness to experience ourselves as co-creators – just as children have to leave behind their symbiotic relationship with their mother in order to become independent. Once they separate out, they go through a period of ego-centeredness, which they must also eventually give up in order to co-exist peacefully with others. Otherwise, they can expect much pain and misery in life.

In order to become Universal Humans, we must also move beyond our ego-centered consciousness into Cosmic Consciousness. To integrate the Ego, we must not attack it because it is part of us. If we deny that, then it will retreat into Shadow and operate underground right under our very noses because we refuse to “see” it. We need to observe it carefully (really “see” it), appreciate it as part of our energy, but make our choices from our Heart Center – our True Self. Thus, we accept the wholeness of our Being, reclaim our will, “Shift” it back to where it belongs, and stand boldly before our Source as One.

Next blog by Joan Kistler - the Integration of the Anima/Animus

Peace Through Complete Surrender

Photo credit: Christian Michael, christianmichael.org

Yogis have their own version of The Ten Commandments: the yamas and the niyamas are the “do’s” and “don’ts” of the yogic path.  Yama means “abstinence” and niyama means “observance.”  From the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, as translated and presented by Sri Swami Satchidananda, Sutra 2.30 reads: “Yama consists of non-violence, truthfulness, non-stealing, continence, and non-greed.” Sutra 2.32: “Niyama consists of purity, contentment, accepting but not causing pain, study of spiritual books and worship of God, or self-surrender.”

Right now in my practice I am very focused on Isvara pranidhana, the fifth and final niyama, considered by many to be the ultimate realization of the yogic path.  It is a surrendering of the self and all actions to God; this idea of surrender to God seems very religious, and that is because the Sanskrit word Isvara does actually mean God, or in some translations, “Lord” or “Supreme Being.”  The word points to a recognition of a life force or power that is greater than us in the scope of our individual existence, some greater force that encompasses us and includes our being within a larger whole.  If we are not religious, we may prefer to think of this niyama simply as self-surrender.  Even if our interest in religious faith is merely intellectual, it is interesting to draw the parallel between this niyama and all of the well-known faiths of the world: for example, the very word Islam means “surrender to God,” and in Judaism, the central prayer, called the Shema, contains these words: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength,” words which Christians also revere since Jesus declared them to be the greatest commandment.  So then Yoga, along with these Abrahamic faiths, tells us that surrender is the path to the highest spiritual development.  

Expanding upon Isvara pranidhanam, Sutra 45 in Book Two of the Yoga Sutras reads, “By total surrender to God, Samadhi is attained.”  In the commentary we read that the easiest and quickest way to Samadhi or enlightened consciousness is to dedicate ourselves wholly to God, converting all of the energy we expend, all our thoughts and actions, to God’s service.  The teaching says that when we do this, we will be at peace because we will no longer be worried about the outcomes of our efforts, clinging to our possessions, anxiously hoarding rewards for ourselves.  Perhaps even more importantly for our peace, we'll no longer be resisting what is, or striving to swim upstream, against the flow of that greater whole which surrounds us. "Surrender is the simple but profound wisdom of yielding to rather than opposing the flow of life," writes Eckhart Tolle in Practicing The Power of Now.  We keep moving, but when we surrender we align our movement with God's movement.  In The Bhagavad Gita, Lord Krishna says, “Do everything in My Name. Then you will get peace and joy.” This is also what Jesus was getting at when he said, “None of you can be my disciple unless he gives up everything he has” (Luke 14:33).  With that renunciation comes perfect peace, bliss, or Samadhi. 

We read that Isvara pranidhanam is an easy path, which also reminds me of what Jesus taught, because he said, “My yoke is easy and my burden is light” (Matthew 11:30).  However, we recognize that the simplest truths so often cause us to trip right over them, falling over ourselves.  It is damned hard for most of us to let go of our efforts, our cherished labors and the fruits thereof.  A powerful recent example of this is what happened with the New York Marathon in the aftermath of Superstorm Sandy.  The marathon was cancelled and tens of thousands of people had to let go of the anticipated cherished outcome of all of that training effort.  But-- in total surrender to God, there are no wasted efforts. God takes in everything that we do. We can adopt the attitude of surrendering every effort to something greater than ourselves, knowing that outcomes are not for us to control or hang onto.  This is in fact spiritual truth which is constantly proven out in our everyday lives; with our senses we discover how everything around us is impermanent: our possessions, our homes, and even our bodies.  It all passes away.  We should not take this to mean that nothing matters or counts; it’s just that we cannot cling to anything.  The marathoners can be at peace knowing that their efforts were not wasted, but the outcome of those efforts ultimately had to be surrendered, just like everything else in this life.  There is comfort in knowing just how meaningful that surrender can be. 

It is the same for us yogis on our yoga mats.  We expend a great deal of effort in our yoga practice, day after day, month after month, year after year.  We work hard to master our asana, to deepen our meditation, to reach greater awareness—and, as we repeatedly discover, we can’t control the outcomes.  Sometimes we fall out of our postures, we get sick, we don’t meditate as long or as often as we would like—but in surrender we find peace.  When we take child’s pose or savasana, we let go of the effort, and it becomes a gift rather than a struggle.  In that moment of surrender, grace pervades us.  In that moment, we begin to see how Isvara pranidhana truly is the easiest way to peace.  

Let’s see if the next time we practice, we can experience a glimmer of that peace and bliss when we simply let go, turning our efforts over to God or the Universe.  Below are two beautiful pieces of music I like to use in my practice, to remind me of Isvara pranidhana. In the beautiful words of Snatam Kaur, “May you never forget God, not even for a moment, worshipping forever, the Lord of the Universe.” 

Author: Michelle Garrison Hough, ISIS Class of 2013

Michelle Garrison Hough is currently completing her yoga teacher training with Living Yoga in Cold Spring, NY, in addition to working through the second year of interfaith ministry training with ISIS.  She worked as a teacher and a lawyer prior to moving to the Hudson Valley with her husband and two sons.