Janis Dehler

Darkness Into Light

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.
Martin Luther King Jr

The darkness declares the glory of light.
T.S. Elliot

December is a busy month of celebrations with many focused on the arrival of light. It is not by accident that these holy events take place in the darkest days of the year. Hanukkah is known as the Festival of Lights. Bodhi Day celebrates the day Siddhartha Gautama achieved enlightenment. Solstice or Yule is a pagan celebration on the shortest day of the year celebrating the return of the sun and is a festival of rebirth. Christmas is a day of honoring the birth of Jesus the Christ. In John 8:12, we read that Jesus referred to himself in these words, “I am the light of the world.”

We all know what we would consider a dark time, individually or collectively. Times when we have lost our way, said goodbye to a loved one through death or betrayal, lived through battle in war, devastating illness, and any condition when we feel separated from our inner life. We have learned to fear the dark as a place where we can get hijacked by disturbing thoughts, lack of hope, painful memories, or a feeling of emptiness. As children we grew fearful when the lights were turned off. Not trusting the dark, we saw monsters in the corner; what was once our favorite yellow toy truck now is an animal waiting to pounce. When we cannot see, we do not know how to orient ourselves. Our imagination grows wild. In our fear we don’t think to wonder what it is we are really seeing. We want light. We want what we perceive as truth, reality.

Life cannot survive without light and the smallest of seeds cannot germinate deep in the soil without the rich moist darkness surrounding it. We will not die from lack of sunlight, but prolonged lack of light will bring us to illness which will then take our life. These are references to light from an external source, the sun, or a light bulb but what this season is really reminding us of is the light within each of us. A light that has gotten clouded over, diminished, or forgotten. It is what Jesus spoke of in proclaiming himself ‘the light of the world’. Here he is speaking of the internal light that so radiates from him he becomes a guiding principle available to all, a source of spiritual light. Buddha also found that light source as have the rare few who continue to guide us and help us find our way.

As adults we can still fear the dark for many reasons. Trauma, despairing thoughts, layers of insecurity and doubt, and all the conditioning we have learned that keeps us from our true self. All the mental junk mail that arrives daily and that we have not filtered out, over time creating a perception of self and of the world that does not serve us well.

If we cannot live without external sunlight, how do we survive in our soul’s journey without awakening to the light within? Meditation and contemplative prayer are avenues to that light. When first learning to sit in meditation or contemplative prayer with eyes closed, we can feel anxious about what we might find. What is supposed to happen? In the inner dark and quiet we experience the jumbled thoughts of our mind, the lack of direction, the desire to be done now, the impatience for light and the opening of our eyes. We are outer referenced and want the light to be on.

The more we practice the more we learn to trust the inner darkness, the quiet, and the workings of the mind. If we bring curiosity, we see the shadow self, all the personality aspects of self we don’t want to admit to or don’t recognize in consciousness, but in themselves are keys to our healing soul, and in recognition and patience open an avenue to the light. This is a common truth for all no matter our political or religious or social beliefs. The billionaire as well as the one living on the street. Our hate and discrimination will not light our way. Light is found in our hearts of love, our compassion, care, and kindness.

In the early 80’s, I was asked to preach during advent, the waiting time before Christmas. It was three years after a dark time in my life, the death of my infant daughter and my continuing struggle with health issues. I was asked to share how I found light in the darkness, what brought me forward, gave me hope in this advent of my life. Simply put, it was light. I consciously chose light, hope, love, and compassion. It has taken me years to understand those words more fully as I continue to live into that choice; I continue to learn and to understand. Like the seed deep within the moist dark humus, we can only grow into our fullness or languish and die. There are not a lot of options.

In that darkness, I learned more about who I am. I looked closely at what was needed to help me to grow— the dung that we place on the garden for the natural nutrients. This is not clean, tidy work; it is digging, weeding, nurturing, pruning with honesty and courage. Choice is not made on one day and then see what happens; choice for light and love is made daily, becomes a discipline, a practice. An embodiment of courage. But in that moment of choice, it also felt natural, an ‘of course’ moment that I had to trust and see where it led me. In doing so we begin to recognize, even briefly, this light in each other. The inner light becoming as important as the outer.

During this season of light, we are reminded. We celebrate. We take stock of where we have come in life. Feel gratitude for life’s blessings and the connection to spirit, the All. To whatever being we have chosen as our guide, our guru, our reflection of what can be, we celebrate the birth of the light of the world, in our hearts, in our very being. We celebrate the return of light in our days. We honor and bow to those who have achieved this rare human occurrence.

May the darkness of these days increase our awareness of all the light there is to see.

Holiday blessings to all.

A Journey of a Forgiving Heart

The mind selects, enhances, and betrays; happenings fade from memory; people forget one another and, in the end, all that remains is the journey of the soul, those rare moments of spiritual revelation.
Isabel Allende from Paula

To understand the judging mind, we need to touch it with a forgiving heart.
Jack Kornfield

Warning to those who have witnessed a violent act and have been subsequently traumatized.

The idea of “happenings fading from memory” and “forgetting one another” at first glance might scare us as we all watch the continually rising rate of dementia as we age, however, looking at these statements from a day to day living viewpoint, I believe we can also consider the propensity for forgetfulness in our thinking selves a boon of our ever-changing brain.

We are all bombarded daily with rampant and random thoughts, those that are judging others, painful memories, resentments, judgement toward ourselves, fears, angers; the mind can be exhausting. With a holiday season and for many of us in all manner of beliefs and traditions, these thoughts might be more burdensome, including the loss of loved ones, depression, anxiety, and lost dreams.

Pestered by the smallest incident of who did not clean out the dryer filter last to a painful experience in childhood that has not been resolved and won’t leave us in peace, our mind selects today’s winner of the mental lottery and runs with it in a circle of exhaustion, upheaval, and self-criticism. The more we fight our thinking the more persistent it becomes. The body and mind are one, hence the body is also aroused in our mental circles with our nervous system responding in increasing heart rate, breathing, and muscular tension. What a blessing it would be to live in this day without dwelling in the past in old hurts that drain our energy or to not lose ourselves in worry for a future that is not yet written but leaves us stuck in inaction.

Many times, we feel helpless with the running of our thoughts; I know I have. One moment stands out for me as a time when I could pull together all the years of meditating and education in mindfulness and other techniques for calming the mind/body that I had learned and tried to practice. It was a cold January morning when a call came letting me know that my colleague, Sarah, had been murdered during the night by her husband. There were enough details gleaned leaving me feeling sickened, shocked, and unmoored—this did not fit my known sense of reality. The event was traumatizing in its gory details with much left to my imagination.

Hanging up the phone, I felt stunned and off balance. Where a moment ago, I knew exactly what I was doing, I now felt like I needed direction. My sister was visiting, and we had a full day planned regarding care for our youngest sister. While a part of me needed time to process this information, I also knew that I did not want it to take over my mental state and consume me as we had a long drive with a long day ahead of us and had to be leaving soon.

I took a few moments to sit quietly and review the information from the call. Saying a blessing prayer for my colleague and her husband and young son, I then visualized all those in my department who would also be hearing this story. I allowed myself to feel the pain and the shock and asked that I and all be held in love as we journeyed through our important duties in this day. I acknowledged to myself that there was nothing more I could do and whatever was happening now for her, and her family, was in the care of other hands. Then, rising from my chair, with my sister in tow, we entered the tasks at hand.

As we drove, I began to watch my mind. An image would come of my colleague, then the murder, and her little boy. Then, I would try to shut it off. No. I do not want to see this. But that never works. The more we say no, the more persistent a memory or a thought becomes. The next time the thought of her arose, I watched it and saw that it began to take me down a road, one that was always seen in my mind to be at my right, and one that I had been following, but not now. When I caught myself beginning on this path, I acknowledged the thought with non-judgement, saying, “Okay, I see you, and now I am thinking of Sarah at work.” I pictured her doing or saying something that brought a smile to my heart and face and then I proceeded to bring myself back to the moment with my breath or in looking around at the world around me.

This is and was hard work. I kept at it throughout the day and into the night and the next day as the thoughts of the trauma continued to rise. The energy for working with this came from knowing that I knew enough of the story and dwelling on it did not offer me any new insight. I was not shutting off my care for her or the reality of this tragedy but working to open my heart to the whole of her life, all the while caring for myself. I was giving my body the time and the trust it needed to calm and to settle as the mind worked to claim its center once again, thus allowing the autonomic nervous system the time it needed to understand it was not needed for fright or flight and I could now breathe, rest, and feel peace.

My experience showed me a way to be compassionate and kind to myself and my thoughts. This story was tragic, shocking, and challenging to work with, and there were many more days and events that followed when I needed to use my will to care for myself. Over time, the mental images I struggled with receded to a fading memory replaced with a recollection of a beautiful woman’s life as I knew her.

As Jack Kornfield states, judging comes in many ways. There are stories and images created in our minds around any event. The ones we tend to cling to come when someone slights us, or when we feel we have not done enough for another, or we have felt misunderstood, or we witness an event, or experience trauma, and on and on. Some are quickly let go of, others linger, coming forward when we are not focused, or we get triggered by something we see or do or hear. It happens equally in our grief stories and our love stories. We replay and recreate and every time we do, we develop a new version of the narrative.

I chose to free this narrative with my heart. Being mindful of the suffering mind of the spouse who acted out his own troubled thoughts. Allowing my heart to open to the young boy left without a mother and father, to the broader hurting families and coworkers. I chose to care for myself as well knowing that I have a challenging time clearing visual images. Choice is essential in working with our mind. We all have the power to choose and we either forget or do not believe this as a viable option.

When we get to the end of life, the detail stories and the list of grievances will not be important, fading from memory, forgotten in the truth of the moment, enveloped in the lifelong task of letting go. The path we trekked, those we met along the way, the kindnesses shown, the compassion developed, the care for each other, from birth to death, is the journey of the soul. That is what we will be taking with us. This is what we are preparing for in the cleaning, the clearing, and the polishing of the heart, all that happens in the rare moments of spiritual revelation.

Where The Heart Calls Home

Out on the road are millennials, couples, women, and men who are each solo traveling, families who are home schooling. There are many seniors…living full time on the road.

I believe wherever dreams dwell, the heart calls home.
Dodinsky

Before you tell your life what you intend to do with it, listen for what it intends to do with you.
Parker Palmer

Recently there was a program on our local public radio station about guilty pleasures, defined as something one enjoys regardless of it being seen as unusual or weird. Being attracted to unusual and weird, I had to think what I would offer as my guilty pleasure. Then it came to me, Nomads. #Van life. #Social Science Project. That is what it is for me, a study in human nature, in peoples’ ways of living, of creating home. Not the sticks and bricks type home but the home on wheels.

In many ways it is a natural for me as I feel captivated by homes in all styles and locations. I find it fascinating to see how people make home, what is important for them to include to feel safe, grounded, and in beauty. Having lived in 17 homes, I understand the resilience it requires, the creativity, and the trust that one places in these walls that might have seen generations before me.

I also love travel and, owning a travel trailer, I have some experience making a small space feel comfortable and stable. What I don’t know is what it feels like to live in my car, a small van, or an RV (Recreational Vehicle) full time and in many cases, alone. This I find intriguing. Not that I desire this lifestyle for myself, but I enjoy the captivating and inspiring questions of who chooses this type of home, what brings a person to this choice, what encourages a person in this living arrangement, what is a person giving up and what are they gaining, in what way is the aspect of the spiritual engaged in this person’s life, where is community, who do they count on.

So where does a person go to research and study this interesting topic? YouTube. Of course. Where I can get lost in time and preoccupation. Many of us have seen the movie Nomadland but If I want to add to my growing list of who is doing what, where, and how, I go to CheapRvLivin, or Glorious Life on Wheels. Both Bob Wells and Carol offer short interviews with people they meet on the road. Each one interviewed is unique and sometimes their situation is eye popping, concerning, or simply well done.

Then there are individual channels like, Lady Bugout, Ad-van-tures Over 50, The Dawn of Van Life, Life Simplified by Mai, and Carolyn’s RV Life, to name a few. These vlogs give personal experiences on a day-to-day basis of the life the individual is living and what changes they have made to their setups. The challenges as well as the joys of living on the road.

Out on the road are millennials, couples, women, and men who are each solo traveling, families who are home schooling. There are many seniors, ones who are out for adventure and those who are trying to stay afloat on Social Security. Some who are ill. Some who have been evicted from home. It was estimated a couple of years ago that there are over a million people living full time on the road. In that estimation, they were counting all types of RV’s not cars and vans, so the number has grown.

I see women and men older than my 71 years with declining health and finances, losing most of their money to a health issue, or rising rent and facing eviction, and who are now facing the daunting question of how and where to live. Many are found on the street while others prepare and head for their vehicle.

What I have learned:

I hear a firm statement from each person that they do not consider themselves homeless; even the ones living in a compact car. Each one has created a different home, one where they can feel secure, afford, and feel a sense of freedom. I see pride in their interviews as they show what they have created either from a build or a no build, using materials from their former home to create a space to sleep, store food and water, prepare food, and ways to keep clean.

Overall, there is a repeated statement of feeling more connected with other people now while living on the road, different than in their sticks and bricks home that they left. Whether a senior or a young person starts the journey because they find they are just sitting within walls and still have dreams to pursue, or because they are forced out, there is an across the board feeling that they now know so many more people, and have a community that helps them learn, repair, and find resources. For some, living a life of travel with their own accommodations brings them closer to family who live throughout the country, and whom they can now visit.

Beauty is being found in nature. When asked if they would ever go back to a sticks and bricks home, the answer is a clear, “No. Just look around here. How could I give all this up to go back and live within walls? I was lonely there. Out here I have only found kindness.” Many state that while they are alone, they do not feel lonely.

Living like this is hard work. There is always something to repair. There can be dangers and the learning curve can be big. When I hear the young one’s state this, I wonder how the elders are making it. Resilience, determination, and being able to ask for help, play a big role here. Those who make it long term state the importance of asking for help.

We take ourselves with us wherever we go and by this, I mean our joys and our sorrows, our regrets, and our successes. Geography does not offer a cure, but it might offer the space and change needed to heal.

People can make and keep their own home on wheels with just their Social Security income.

After a period of living on the road, some try to buy remote land giving them a place to anchor. The general rule is one needs to move every two weeks, even on free BLM land (Bureau of Land Management). Some make it in this fashion for 10 years and more, others find the constant moving too much.

Most often I hear, “I had a vision of doing this.” I always wanted to travel and now I can every day.” “This is where I want to be.”

Recently, I watched a video of those we would consider truly homeless in Oakland, California. These are very different images, all manner of vans, cars, motorhomes, trailers, tents, and cardboard structures creating a home, all surrounded by garbage strewn about. The interview of one gentleman who has lived here for about 15 years revealed that while a few are addicted to some form of drug, most of those living here are lawyers, tradesmen, doctors, businesspeople, homemakers, those who survive a life changing circumstance, with many moving here with a good paying job but unable to afford the first and last rent down payment which is required to rent an apartment. Some that cannot afford the current going rate of $3,000.00 per month for an efficiency apartment, meaning you need $6,000 for the down payment. These are the folks too young to receive a social security check. Those who are working cannot make enough to afford rent. There are those who are not working as their life is too unstable to get hired.

Here the need for focus and determination is paramount to moving on. It took the gentleman interviewed 15 years of persistence to finally procure an apartment for himself with assistance to keep him living there. At one time he and his wife were serving meals to homeless, now he was the one needing support. In the video, what looked like a shambles of pain and hopelessness to the viewer was community for this man, a place where people were helping each other out and helping each other to get out.

This was not the sense of freedom I experienced in the voices of those fleeing the cities for the desert, those who have the bare means to buy gas and move on, or those who find jobs along the way, or those who have the skills to work remotely while living in their van. These were very different images with each one tugging at my heart in different ways. Some of these folks will not move on. Some will struggle beyond my sense of what it is to be human. Some will lose hope and many more will find a way to move forward. While there are stories of those lacking a sticks and bricks home that are shocking and disturbing, there are also stories of those creating a new idea of home that are uplifting and inspiring.

For all of us, the future is found in this moment. It all starts with the heart/mind, the vision, the dream, the possibility of something more. The woman facing eviction after losing her job begins to search within herself for what she can do to live with less than $1,000 a month. It is more than survival; it is being able to open to a future where one can breathe with ease. Something settles into her heart, it is nurtured, and it grows, creativity is freed, and then the will is activated allowing her to move forward. She studies carefully what others have done and thinks, “I can do this.” She creates home in her minivan carefully thinking of how she will sleep and eat. She feels pride, contentment, and fear as she moves into the unknown. Then the fear resides as she becomes more confident, meets others, creates community. For now, she has home, is home. Created from within. Creating a new future.

Having known challenging and adverse situations in my life, I feel fortunate in not having to face the choice of how to physically survive and having a stable home with the joys of travel when I choose. Whether one has chosen the nomad life out of adventure or was pushed to create an alternative home, I find much to admire and learn from their experiences.

I don’t know where this trend is headed but beyond what it is saying about our US economy, it seems to be telling us something about our intrinsic connection to nature, living small, living day to day, living with resilience, a feeling of possibility, and the need for our own space within the work of creating community, relying on community, and supporting community in whatever way it appears for us. It is not only survival training in body, mind, and spirit it is a model for resilience and adaptability through the creative spirit.

Gratitude

Greetings all,

Today, in the United States, many of us celebrate Thanksgiving. For our family, it is not about celebrating the traditional story told of coming to America, conquering the land and its people, then sitting down for a shared meal.

For us, it is a day to come together with family and friends, express gratitude, eat not only turkey and the favorite childhood dishes but also lentil balls, vegan gravy and mashed potatoes, and of course pie. Always, pie.

Some years it might be more challenging to open our hearts to gratitude as we experience our losses and challenges in life, but there are invariably people and things that we find we can lift up. Today, I acknowledge and thank you, the reader. Thank you for taking the time to read, comment, and like, however it is you interact with me, throughout the year and years that I have been offering my thoughts and reflections. It truly becomes a shared journey between us.

Good wishes to you in this day, wherever you are, whatever you find in your gratitude list, whomever you find in your day who offers you kindness and compassion.

I offer you a poem, a bit of my expressed gratitude. As I have been absorbed in the writing of my El Camino journey with my sister, a little poem floated in one day while I was waiting for my client to appear on Zoom. I hurriedly wrote it out and laughed out loud when I came to the last line.

One Marvelous Big Toe


Little self learns to walk following
her sister’s lead. Up on two legs,
one foot, one foot, plop.

It looks so easy, now up, fall,
up, fall. Then, one day, she
pulls herself up with strength
and determination. 

She does it! with pride, a smile,
looking around for approval,
seeing clapping hands, laughter,
and happy delight. 

What a fun trick. She can do this
and make others happy—until,
one day she will recognize 
making herself happy with:
run, skip, walk, bike, and kick.

Sometimes a kick in anger.
Sometimes a dance with joy.
Sometimes a run with fear.
And sometimes, a bike ride with abandon.

There is so much to express
with legs and feet making her
own vehicle of transportation.

For now, little self plops down on the floor
rocking onto her back, feet flying in the air, with
her foot coming to her mouth.

She finds comfort and peace
in a sloppy, happy kiss to her 
one marvelous big toe.

@Janis Dehler

On Empty Feeling Full

Words are the most powerful thing in the universe… Words are containers. They contain faith, or fear, and they produce after their kind.”
—Charles Capps

I sit and stare at a blank screen trying to conjure up words, craft a sentence, develop a theme. I find nothing new arises, except the awareness that I have used so very many words in my writing over these past days.

Early in the week, my words wove into a tribute to my mother on the 100th anniversary of her birth, followed by my El Camino memories crafting into a broader memoir, then continuing the arduous task of writing my life and complicated ancestry into a more developed timeline in story form for my kids and grandkids.

I realize that within this feeling of empty there resides a deep satisfaction in the artistry of words, flowing like a rhythmic dance, whether they mean anything to anyone else does not intrude. It is the feeling when I am lost in painting and it all connects, when the spices are just right in the dish crafted for dinner, or the tree, the sun, and the shadow align in perfect symmetry for the photo I snap.

Then, there is a moment of empty, a day of rest, or possibly the eternity hidden within the pause between each breath—a long moment to take it in, deep within, and ready myself for the next flash of inspiration. We can’t consume so fully every day. We need rest, contemplation, review, as a time to pull it all together and see the whole.

The truth of this comes to me as it has been a span of four years since I walked El Camino and the full review of my blogs, journal, and post trip review, reveal to me what I could not see then. They point to where I am today. They beg me to go deeper into an event revealing something in me or other that I could not see before. The pause has deepened my experience. The space of time has opened my heart.

Today, empty is a feeling of full.

Where There is Despair, Hope.

All Hallows Eve is upon us. The veil between the physical realm and the spirit realm is thin, as I experienced it upon my mother’s death. A sacred and holy time when we feel the presence of all that is beyond our finite sense of reality. It is the eve before the day of the saints; those who have now become the ancestors; those who we look to for their inspiration and guidance; those who we will become as we in turn decay into food for the soil in a mutual exchange from walking this earth feasting on its abundance. The children dress as goblins and ghouls as they stand up to the dread and anxiety held for this final transformation. We bring laughter to this day as we allow the child within to face her fear.

In this covid time, dying feels closer as we witness the illness, the deaths, the fires burning across the world. Where do we find hope? Where do we find peace for our tender hearts? What do we bring to the alchemy we conjure in turning fear and divisiveness into kindness and caring?

Like the seed that sprouts in the crevasse of rock, the green of will and desire rises and flows, weaving and connecting, bringing the persistence of the living to this momentous time. Let us not shy away from remembering, acknowledging, and honoring all that dies while deciding carefully what we wish to carry forward. It is choice at its finest. Not through the idle movement of habit but through conscious awareness of all that we are and wish to become. Not against something but with, not away from but towards. Knowing that each moment of life is a moment of death as everything changes, cells die off, and memories fade. Forgiveness transforms resentment, love envelopes hate, kindness covers cynicism. Growth and beauty strive forward from the depth of darkness to the brilliance of a new dawn.

And so it is.

The Colors of Autumn

“Is not this a true autumn day? Just the still melancholy that I love—that makes life and nature harmonize.”
George Elliot

On Tuesday the sun shone brightly, the shadows creating a sharp contrast to the bright yellows, reds, and oranges of the maples I passed along my walk. I stopped to photograph a tree and thought of a painting this might inspire. The smile arising on my face was delight and on I went to the next beauty.

On Wednesday, the sky was gray and overcast the entire day moving into rain in the afternoon. On my return from an errand, I turned down Central Avenue and noticed the stately red maple to my left as it stood out in size and color among many. The size of the tree spoke of longevity while the depth of color drew me into my heart. As I looked further down the hill the deep rusts, golds, and reds almost into purple did not thrill me as on a sunny day but brought me to a moment of peace. I began to notice that in this light on this day the colors took on more depth as if I could enter them and rest in them, be held in them for this moment. These colors did not tantalize but beckoned, did not scream but whispered.

As the day moved on in my chores my eyes would alight on the mums in display at my front door that on a sunny day would draw my attention with their stunning color. Today, I experienced the color in my body as warm, solid, and enduring.

At the end of the day along towards sunset, I gazed out our windows to the river. I chuckled to see the wild turkeys running through the yard after stopping to graze on the seeds dropped from the bird feeder. As I sat at the dinner table my vision moved along the rust colored table cloth to the greens, golds, oranges and reds of the mums in the centerpiece, out the sliding doors to the red/purples of the Amur Maple toward the river. The sky was soft and darkening and I felt the desire to pause, to weep, to enter a place that draws us into the soul.

In the season of autumn we are moved into our natural rhythm, from spirited sun dappled joy to the soul depth color of being, allowing the need to open to as we move from bright lights to inner darkness. In quiet, deep, listening and inquiry, we draw life from the stillness. In this place, grief is attended to, sorrow is transformed, compassion soothes our pain. We become one with rather than the one stepping out of the moment to photograph.

We do not stay long in these depths. It is a journey we flow in and out of in a moment, an hour, or a day. Today the sun shines brightly again and I long to walk amongst the color.

“Notice that autumn is more the season of the soul than of nature.”
Friedrich Nietzsche

Tears From The Heart

The cure for anything is salt water: sweat, tears, or the sea. Karen Blixen

A friend recently asked if it is okay not to cry as others do. I have encountered this question in the past from clients and at times from myself. Tears are curious things. They can come unexpectedly, unwanted, in torrents, or gently and softly, and not at all. And then we wonder, why?

Tears might come as a simple moistening in the eyes, or gently fall while experiencing another’s pain. They might come quite suddenly in a joyful moment, and we feel our heart burst open. We can feel cleansed after a deep cry. Our body relaxes, softens, and as we breathe and quiet, we might become aware of a larger space within. There are tears after a profound loss that can feel as if we will drown. There are also the tears after humiliation, betrayal, standing up for yourself when all you want is to be angry and confront, and then out pour the tears. Then that feels humiliating. Sometimes tears come after prolonged laugher, the kissin’ cousin of tears, with at times moving into the weeping of deep pain that had been buried or ignored. It can feel as if we have no control, and we don’t. Not really. We can make ourselves cry but that takes some practice and may be a surface experience only. We can at times hold our tears back, bite them back, but then everything else gets all scrunched up and we tighten around the tears or the loss. We can feel like we have not cried at the appropriate time, like at a funeral. Then, a few weeks later, we are watching a Hallmark commercial or a movie or listening to a song and the tears flow, sometimes gently and at times into a sob. We may not find tears at all in a loss experience as our primary feeling might be gratitude or relief.

The tears after profound loss don’t necessarily flow freely. Not for me anyway. After I learned that my baby had birth defects and would not live, I was in shock and numb. I was brought to her in the NICU and on the way there had a panic attack. I could not breathe. Then I saw her in all the wires and machines, and she was beautiful. It was only later, back in my room, away from it all, during our priest’s prayer and blessing, as he placed his hand on my head, that the tears arrived. Even then they were painful but gentle. This loss contained a well of tears that took many tear sessions over a length of time to get to the depth of the well.

After my dad’s death, I went into action. There was funeral planning, a eulogy to write, family arrangements, making sure mom was attended to. It took a few weeks, and seeing I was starting to snap at my husband, for me to realize and own that the pain was being held in too long and I needed to take the time to go to the well. It was the same after my mom’s death except the first tears came in torrents soon after her critical stroke when I knew to my core where this was headed with the difficult decisions needing to be made.

Not having tears does not have to mean one is numb. It does not necessarily mean the heart is closed. The mantra from my childhood goes, “If you are going to cry, go to your room.” It has been hard for me to fully cry in another’s presence. I have had to learn to trust that experience as it does not come naturally. My daughter is my teacher. I marveled since she was young how tears could flow naturally and freely in pain or joy. I treasured her free open expression and realized how the witnessing of her tears opened my heart. Some cultures encourage and live out a very natural robust expression. For others it is stoic. We are a melting pot of an array of expressions, and we cannot judge one against the other. And certainly, we cannot judge ourselves in our experience. At best we bring compassion and curiosity.

My response to my friend’s question? It is all okay. Tears are not required. Rather than, why am I not crying, I might ask; Is there something I am not expressing? What do I wish to express? In what way now do I want to express myself? Create? Build? Write? Sing? Laugh? In what way do I best express myself? Then, after the question, return to the heart and listen.

Tears are healing because they flow from the heart and there is a myriad of ways to express from the heart. When we do allow expression, we feel not only a deeper connection to self but to the greening world around us, to the collective whole, to sacred Oneness. In our honest open expression, we come to an inner silence, the doorway to the Divine.

The Moment of Uncertainty

In the teen years, life calls her forward, 
Stepping out from home, family, childhood.

Not that she won’t someday return
but that she needs to scratch the itch of curiosity.

As many before, she walks out, alone among many, 
challenging habits, ways of thinking, learned perceptions.

She asks: who sees me? Who acknowledges me? 
What is here for me?

One day in the seeking future,
She sits in quiet, she listens to her heart,
In that moment of uncertainty, a voice is heard,
I see you. I know you. I believe in you.

Then the knowing arises,
I am seen as I see.
I am known as I know.
I am loved as I love.

I am home.

@Janis Dehler

On This Late Summer Morn

A new work of art and a poem. Blessings on your day.

On This Late Summer Morn

On this late summer morn,
She sits where mind rests, prayers flow.
Wonder at the world of blame
Brings her head to bow.

On this late summer morn,
The sky dark from falling ash,
Our lungs fill, the sun remains
Hidden. Even he fears the heat.

On this late summer morn,
Thousands fleeing a war-torn country, 
Our hearts fill, the moon remains 
Hidden. Even she cries with the knowledge.

On this late summer morn,
Delta dead are piled into trucks,
Our minds fill, the stars remain
Hidden. Even they wonder at the folly of it all.

On this late summer morn,
She recognizes all that is sacred, 
Sees the beauty in all creatures, all life,
Her heart opens with the embracing of it all.

@Janis Dehler