Field Experience

“Use your happy voice!”

“Do as I say, not as I do!”

Two things I want to write about while fresh in the garden of my mind. I drove to Alabama to attend the Nigerian Missionary reunion, as Mom was being “memorialized” and we knew she, and Dad, would want us to be there. I felt refreshed – the change of routine, driving in the countryside on beautiful days, listening to The Divine Idea (over and over), sharing time with my sister and family, meeting “old friends” who were part of another lifetime – all was a good experience which nurtured me in this time in my life. It felt good to remember Mom and Dad in that setting, too – as though the windows open on their life when they were our age, and before, as so many that they knew gathered in one place to honor their heritage, their history, and their lives together in a place they came to call “home.” 

An old friend we saw sent me an email saying how seeing us was probably the highlight of the weekend for her, and how it evoked many memories. She said she could still hear Dad saying in his gentle Southern accent, Margaret Ellen, use your happy voice! I love this story, this memory. It is so perfect for me to remember right now. I have been thinking a lot about sounds, about my voice, for the last few months as I am learning to modulate my own energy as a whole being. The hard-edged voice I had even as a child I remember sometimes like the sound of a scratchy record – disturbances in the field! It’s funny to think of this. The narrator in the book-on-tape (There are Gods in Alabama) that L. loaned me performs this level of “scratchiness” well, in the narrator’s character in the story. She is smart, defensive, and snarly at times. Her remembrance is as a young adult, telling the story of the ruining of her innocence as a mind, if she began with innocence. The tone cast by her boyfriend, a different and much more patient personality, beautifully shows the contrast in how they think, how they perceive themselves and the world. I think about how we create images of ourselves as we live day by day, beginning with our conception – having chosen our parents, our “destiny,” we plunge into “character” and begin the molding and shaping that energy beings must live as physical matter making their way in the world. 

I am learning to always use my happy voice, Dad! Thank you for the guidance you’ve given me, and continue to give me even in such messages as these from an old friend. Dad taught us, we are what we do and we are what we say.

After talking with a friend on Sunday, I have been thinking about the teaching/learning pattern of “do as I say, and not as I do.” She was telling me about her study program. They are taught some things because of the Boards, but taught to do things differently in the clinic. I remember Kathy’s talking about taking the real estate broker’s exam years ago after studying THE recommended reference book, with no experience “in the field.” This, compared to others’ extensive experience in the field, and perhaps also a fear of taking tests. Or being tested. The variety of experience, and potential of “unknown variables,” changes the way the information is applied – so those with more experience have more to “unlearn”? I keep thinking about the mentality of “will this be on the test”? “Do we need to know this?” I realize that Spiritual Philosophy, or philosophical thinking, is the foundation of learning. With this foundation of the Ethical Values as our Spiritual Design, and the design of our soul as dual (mind and emotions, male and female), we can apply all knowledge to its highest potential of being, and sense follows, appears, is made and enjoyed. 

This is because love, as the creative, healing energy, is always logical. Love as an emotion without true understanding of the mind and its place in the trinity of consciousness, is not safe in the world of strong-arm tactics and labile, immature minds. The senses cannot be fully appreciated when the mind is depressed and love is suppressed. The senses can be appreciated only to a limited degree – delightful though that degree may be. I think of the pleasures of swinging on vines, the total satisfaction and flavor of biting into sweet ripened fruit as its juice drips, the physical release as a cascade of “joy” runs through the body like electric currents of teasing pleasure. So much there is to appreciate and enjoy. Yet the mind is its own castle and ocean which opens into vistas beyond the cave that a physically focused mind relies on for shelter. Thinking is a gift which lifts us to the mountaintop, so we know the terrain for miles and miles – so we know the cloud patterns and what they bring, how they change. Watching the rescue of the Chilean miners has shown me this again beautifully. Though “suppressed” deep in the dark within the Earth, they thought through their situation, worked together, and “kept their spirits up” until other necessary parties enacted the plan to free them into the light of day. The emotions as they arrived from below, as their relatives greeted them, were irrepressible and absolutely a joy to watch and to share.

If we are taught well, we are taught to know the foundation of principles which illuminate the structure of the knowledge we are seeking, and every way the other details relate fall into place or by the wayside as we experience. Book learning as compared to “life learning.” Knowledge is easily applicable when we understand the structure of our creation as energy beings. I think that knowing the Ethical Values of us as an eternal being makes any learning easier, and any information more applicable, more relevant to our individual life experiences.

Trust Love

Today as we were talking about poetry, Kathy told me how excited she was as a very small child when she began to write very small poems. She would get so excited that she would take what she wrote and run to find her mother to tell her. Her mother also loved poetry. As Kathy describes it, her mother, who always wore dresses, hose, and heels, and an apron when she was at home, would stop what she was doing, sit in a chair to give her full attention, and fold her apron up so she could fold her hands over the clean part of the apron. Then she would ask Kathy to read the poem to her, as though she were reading it to her class. Kathy did, often acting out the few lines in full animation. She remembers this so fondly, and how her mother would clap, and then always encourage her to then “make it bigger,” “make it better.” My mother taught me to think, she said, “Now, make it better!”

I loved hearing this story, and it brought back memories in my mind about reading the World Books on our shelves at home when we were children; how our parents would encourage us to read, and many afternoons would find all of us in our various chairs fully engaged in our latest story (whether fiction or poetry or history). For some reason, I remember Mary Stewart’s Crystal Cave book, on my mother's shelf. I remember Go, Dog, Go (Dr. Seuss). I remember the excitement when we shared some tidbit from a book that made us laugh, or something sad that was new to our experience. 

I have not always been motivated to make things bigger and better.  At times in my early life I was caught up in the whirlwind of confusion in my mind, and I can clearly understand now how such a whirlwind of thoughts and feelings and reactions is only productive when a mind begins to understand the motion of the whirlwind, its causes and effects, and finds more than shelter from flying debris.  True encouragement to think is always a gift, even though it may take a mind a while to accept and appreciate that gift.  (Change!) I understand now that love always encourages, and encouragement always motivates when a mind is open. Excitement is contagious. Listening is a gift to a mind, from one person to another, and within ourselves and our many “voices” which echo so many memories which are there to cherish as we learn from them and expand them.

I love to think about poetry. When I read my brother’s poetry, for example, I am so taken with the images he creates, and I know his energy so well, that I feel we are holding hands or side by side as he is sharing these deepest of feelings and visions. The moments are timeless, as the words become visions. When I read Kathy’s poems, such as are in her book Sharing, I feel I’ve opened a window or door into a room where a conversation is in full swing, a song is being sung, sometimes with rain on the windowpanes, and always with the ocean of energy from which we come visible, absolute, and loving. Recently I read an early book of poems by Judy Hogan (Light Food). Her rhythmic expression in this book is tender, explorative, and expressive in a way which highlights a new-found level or images of love – with another, with and in Nature, and most of all, within herself. 

For my 18^th birthday, so long ago, my boyfriend gave me a “book” of poems he’d written. They were beautiful, and there was much wisdom in them which I continued to learn from and appreciate for many years after. In one of them he finished, “let me be of you my summing up.” I read and re-read that line, and what it gave me was an understanding of how, when we love, we want to reflect the best of ourselves as we love each other. This is one expression of love. When I “miss the note” of harmony (love) in a moment, I miss the poetry! Trust love – the Spirit of us loves it!

Before the Rain

Thank You

“Loving yourself is the supreme test of the internal struggle between the ego who wants to control and the Spirit self who wants to be free and loving.” 

Changing the image of self is an act of the Spirit in controlling the ego.       The Joy of Health by Kathy Oddenino

Our fear emotions function within a controlled subjectivity that suppresses the loving emotions and spirit senses.   (from Jan 2002 class handout)

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When I began to study Spiritual Philosophy, a light shone into my mind which asked me to openly explore my beliefs and perceptions about what it means to be human, living and learning together as we create human lives. Though I had been taught that we are created equal, I had not yet been taught to consider that our soul is our dual mind and emotions. I did not understand what our Intelligent design of life, the image of our Spirit, was and is. I had not yet begun to understand the reality of energy. When I went to classes and heard Kathy Oddenino say over and over again - the soul is dual in every aspect - I knew that I did not understand what that meant. I could understand and relate to this image in many ways, such as our body has its left and right sides,we are father and mother/male and female, reflections; the day turns to night; the sun gives way to moonlight; and each way I thought of this opened to more aspects to appreciate. Now, I understand better that our male consciousness is our intellect and our loving emotions, and our female consciousness is our mind of wisdom and our loving emotions. My spirit senses create my quality of life!

This duality is the basis of our internal competition as male and female energies. We compete with our past and present life patterns (habits and beliefs) – until we learn to love all that our senses guide us into, and we lessen and change the competition born from the “mutual hostility” (energy) created from our ancient beliefs as we have “made them real” in our physical lives. Monsters under the bed? Ogres under the bridge? Things that go bump in the night? I'm not making this up! We come to know ourselves as a trinity of consciousness, accepting the guidance of wisdom, appreciating the beauty of truth, and savoring the infinity of love. This is our slow spiritual awakening which changes everything.

I feel happy when I feel free to be myself! No jailer can change that, except a belief given the key.  

This is a test of my conscious acceptance of the truth that I “create my own reality,” that I am an eternal energy being, not a mind confined to “mental slavery” or “death” (fear of change). As I think with love, I feel the power of my own energy potential. The change is obvious and absolute and I feel it like a caress and a hug and a smile and the stirring of a voice as big as Pavarotti’s and the cellular joy like fireworks that come from the dance of love.

Last night I listened to a few arias sung by Pavarotti in different stages of his life and career. He and Dame Joan Sutherland dancing in song, their voices instruments controlled with the precision born of passion, practice, patience, and an exuberance of being alive. Maestros indeed, each with their power and precise beliefs about perfection.

Do I tell the truth always? If I did, would I feel a left over anger, the familiar energy field of an old angry man or a worn-out old woman? Or a young angry man with a cause which burns within him and is never fulfilled. Or a woman whose love remains far away, never to be fulfilled in the life she would love to have with her beloved. A soldier. The list goes on and on. The losses we live overshadow loves, until we truly appreciate the absolute love with which we are designed and through which we grow. We grow as a tree grows, toward the sun, or nestled in shade, bearing fruit and blossoms through seasons, seedlings, then dying, the detritus of our life dripping and falling and blowing from us, until the dirt is turned and we roll over and over into new ground and growth.

Now, bear with me as I come into my own. I am learning to love. As I take upon the mantel of my new life, born anew, with the purity of spirit and the wisdom gained through experience, I mature into this human being I came here to be. 

Love acknowledges the wisdom of energy first, always. This is an acknowledgment of the truth that I know myself, and that we are beautiful as a human spiritual design, growing into the perfection as an energy of Spirit consciousness constantly and consciously evolving. The sabotage of the ego is the game which tells us, as some athletes do, I hate losing more than I love winning! 

The kites which dip and dive in the blue expanse of sky with a background of beach remind me how our mind learns to enjoy its freedom to soar. The sparkles of sunlight on the waves dance.

The grains of sand accumulate into mounds, piles, curves, flat expanse, dotted with bits of shells sometimes still full of color, sometimes molded into new sculptures by time and water and the force of unending waves which eventually washed them to shore.

I love this freedom which reminds me how beautiful my mind is and can be, when not clouded by old memories of what I believed to be absolute and "beyond my control." The best memories show me how we learned, grew, how we grow now, the simple flow of love which is shared in words, smiles, a touch, a gesture, the lilt in a voice, the twinkle in an eye, the heat of sun in an afternoon. 

Challenges of “physical survival” tempt vestiges of these old beliefs out. I feel the flurry of images, as an old woman who works until dark, and in the dim light, slaving for the family and the man who has become her jailer.  I feel the depression of her energy fields. I feel the strength in the man as he wields the physical power he believes in, the way he talks, moves, and blusters through life. This gruff appetite for life is a very low level of enjoying being alive. The freedom of other times, images, lessons appear as the happy call of children who are squealing as they run and play, as the touch of a bearded cheek on mine as I sleep in the dark on a cool September night. Friends are appearing to me in their own happier images, using love to craft new lives. Last week a friend I hadn't seen in over a year came by and we had coffee on the patio late in the morning before going back to work. It was wonderful - to catch up, to soak up the sun and the breeze, to share the moments.

I have felt such wonderful impressions of love as my mind begins to love the purity of patience and exuberance of joy that my Spirit constantly tickles me with. The laughter lives! Love is eternal, and such knowledge is priceless.

Andromeda, another Excerpt

Just looking out the window sometimes she felt him. The leaves seemed to move, just a fraction, just a tease of a ripple, enough for her to notice, then she felt the heat of the sun, the caress of big clouds, the birdsong – suddenly then she was enveloped in green, and her body was consumed with its own desire to combust, to share the very nature of its creation, a mammoth tropical wave leading the curve of her sensitivity, the peak of her physical joy a rush that would never be forgotten – until the next time.  His hands guided her through the tangle of her everyday cares as she moved through this watery green and blue sensation full of sunlight which burst and sparkled and danced inside her as clearly as outside her boundaries of skin.

He smiled as he moved so smoothly, slowly, and she knew how once men felt they were gods. The power of such an altar at which to speak their desires, the cradle of mothers throughout time, and the warmth and fire of the woman whose life-giving gift consoled and frightened them.  She was inviting his ceremonial power, his greatest sense of creation to join hers, to commingle, tadpoles discovering new life, cosmic soup stirring with thought forms announcing their presence.

When he put his hand on her breast with such tenderness, she felt warm inside. When their lips met, she took in his words, his thoughts, his breath, and they shared a rhythm they only had when together.

Some mornings awakening was this wonderful.

Other mornings, she rolled over to face the window, and he moved behind her, his arm encircling her waist. They mumbled good mornings and stayed silent, she staring into the sky beyond the window and he taking it in.

Our saving energy - An Excerpt

When the woman that he thought he loved got married, he felt the wrenching within him. He dreamed obsessively of her in that white dress of tradition, the traditional smile and sweaty palms, the excitement barely contained within the confines of the bodies eager for their new lives. She was tan, with her long brown hair carefully coiffed for the occasion, and her favorite ginger and orange-colored lipstick was in and out of her bag. What did that mean to him, when she got married? She seemed happy, her new man seemed nice, solid. He did not want to acknowledge that holding on to her in his mind was a way of keeping himself a little boy, an adolescent who doesn’t want to give up or share his toys, of changing that image of her in his mind, from “his” to being her own beautiful self in full flight, smiling as she skimmed her own ocean of memories, making them more beautiful in her happiness.

What did this thinking make him, but a little boy who didn’t want to grow up? War had shaped his mind, now. He was trying to learn beyond this, to remember his love of some of the learning in school, the excitement he felt in science some days, when the experiments went just the way he thought they would and he found a new way to understand a relationship of chemical dynamics. Girls, women were the same. He was the same, but he was struggling to understand this. Little by little he was learning to guide his mind into accepting this chemical way of thinking of everything. His old girlfriends especially gave him a starting point, because they had been his salvation when he came back from the war, with the star bursts in his brain that flashed to reveal not the tenderness of faces so much as the heat and grit and blood and the smell of fear. He craved the flesh, the touch, the taste of skin he loved, bathed in the smell of rose soap, or the fresh cotton scent of soft sheets. These were not “love,” he knew, but his way of thinking of them was only slowly opening itself to the panorama of memories which went beyond his wartime, his adolescence as a boy bursting with the sexual hormones which dictated his life.

He was slowly beginning to see how the energy of war slows our mind down, creates a drag like a quicksand. When his body was on alert, active to that point of everything being focused into a white-hot point of survival or die, he felt fully alive – yet he knew that was a primal sense, not the sense of Michelangelo coming through that creation of David. Why make war? Smelling blood was primal, throwing up when seeing flesh torn and dried, bones broken like sticks, faces afraid, was a way of remembering what it is to be animals, vulnerable as humans.

We are on our own. Yet never alone.