Tiny Buddha

Tag: light

  • Release the Fear of Not Measuring Up and Share Your Light

    Release the Fear of Not Measuring Up and Share Your Light

    cartwheel

    “You’re imperfect, and you’re wired for struggle, but you are worthy of love and belonging.” ~Brené Brown

    I believe that it is part of the human condition to want love and connection with others. For some of us this comes much more naturally and abundantly than it does for others.

    The universal thing we all share is that at some point along our life journey, there will come a time when our self-worth is on the table for questioning.

    I can clearly recall the first time my self-confidence was rocked. I was seven years old and full of energy, life, and good old-fashioned cheer.

    I spent endless summer hours skipping rope, riding bikes, playing tag with the neighborhood kids, and had recently discovered the art of performing cartwheels on the back lawn—what a rush!

    At the time we lived in a duplex. My mom was a single mom. My dad passed away when I was only six months old, leaving my older brother Eric and I behind.

    Of course I didn’t realize it at the time, but while my mom was the most amazing mom around, I didn’t have a male role model in my life and must have really felt that loss.

    My mom and I still share a giggle over a story from when I was two years old. I very eagerly staggered out into the street during a holiday parade to profess my love or “wuv” for the policemen and firemen as they passed by.

    It just so happened we had a police officer living next door to us. It was a warm summer evening and he had guests out on his deck enjoying a barbeque. I also just so happened to be outside once again, perfecting my cartwheel.

    I remember gearing up to showcase them my newly honed skill. I composed myself and very deliberately set off down our bumpy, sloped lawn toward their deck.

    I gave them one impeccable cartwheel after the other, without any break in between, until I reached the end of the lawn and the start of the blackberry bush.

    I turned to face them with a victory smile and a silent “ta-da!” but instead of receiving anticipated applause and approval, I was met with roars of laughter and a snicker: “Wow, what a showoff this one is!”

    I was instantly deflated and utterly crushed.

    I clearly remember feeling the heavy pit in my stomach, and the accompanying sting of tears and hurt I fought back as the heat rose from my belly to my cheeks. At seven years old I stood there with my heart wide open, looking for approval only to feel squashed and ashamed.

    Fast-forward another twenty-eight years and it all sounds a bit silly to me now, yet somehow the hurt is still quick for me to recall.

    This was, of course, not the experience that taught me the great life lesson of expressing and honoring my worth as a human being.

    That came much later with far more extensive bruises, bumps, and lessons, but this memory is one that stands out to me because it was the first time I ever thought to myself “Maybe I am not good enough, and maybe I never will be.”

    I don’t believe there is a human out there that doesn’t have this inner child in them that yearns for the reassurance that they are okay. Most of us have had at least one experience somewhere along the line that has left the lingering question of whether or not we are good enough.

    I think we all carry these wounds around with us. Some of us face unthinkable things and suffer from much deeper wounds and fears than others.

    I guess the point is, at any given time we are surrounded by others that have felt insecure and unloved, that worry about being worthy of belonging and can relate to what may be one of our biggest fears.

    I just can’t help but think if we all gave ourselves permission to not be so hard on ourselves, or to each other, the ride could be a little gentler. When we come back to that place in life where our hearts are open, we are less likely to be so critical of others and of ourselves.

    The simple act of sharing a heartfelt smile with a stranger on the street, or praising a young child for being completely amazing by just being who they are, is empowering and contagious.

    When we loosen our grip on our fear of looking foolish or not measuring up, and instead share our light and love with others, the magic of life seems to naturally unfold.

    The best part is, we help give others the courage to do the same, to find their way back to remembering how totally awesome and worthy they are right now as they are.

    I should add that while I never did become a gifted gymnast, I will on occasion bust out my best cartwheel moves on the back lawn with my kids, or on the beach just because. Now I always follow it up with a “ta-da” and a pat on the back I deserve for purely being human.

    Photo by Louise Palanker

  • Dealing with Loss: 3 Uplifting Truths About Death and Grief

    Dealing with Loss: 3 Uplifting Truths About Death and Grief

    Enlightenment

    “Don’t be afraid of death; be afraid of an unlived life. You don’t have to live forever; you just have to live.” ~Natalie Babbitt

    I stared at my reflection in the mirror as my face contorted into a painful grimace, tears streaming down my cheeks. My throat constricted to keep the sobbing at bay. My grandmother was dying, and this is how I coped with death: by falling apart.

    I was lucky; this is the way death is “supposed” to go. Grammy was 96 and had lived out her old age in comfort.

    While I knew I would miss her kisses and the way she generously dished out advice, it would be selfish to insist on keeping her here, as if that were an option. Grammy said that she was ready and that this plane held little thrill for her anymore. The inevitable end was here, and yet I was still a giant mess.

    I’d recently been through a wonderful and dizzying period of self-discovery and growth. I’d dug my self-confidence up from the basement and lifted her to the heavens. I had gotten a handle on all my self-sabotaging behaviors, like drinking wine to escape. I even wrote a popular course to help others break bad habits, gain a sense of purpose, and start living big.

    I finally felt like my real life had begun, like I knew who I was, and my need for validation from others had finally dropped away.

    Yet my present breakdown was glaring evidence that we’re never done growing. We’re always evolving to higher and higher ground. We will never “arrive” and there is no final destination in this life, except for death.

    In the coming days as I wrestled with my grief, I was presented with the following three uplifting truths about death.

    1. Death is the ultimate deadline.

    I’m a True Blood fan, but from watching the show and seeing how vampires handle the understanding that they’ve been granted everlasting mortality, it occurs to me that none of them really accomplish all that much.

    Take the case of Eric Northman, who was a Viking when he was turned into a vampire. He’s been roaming the planet for 1,000 years, give or take a few hundred. You’d think that with all that time to dream, plan, and accomplish he could be a motivational speaker, prolific author or artist, or a talk show host with success that rivals Oprah’s. So what is he? He’s a bar owner.

    Death provides humans with the ultimate deadline. Behaviors that hasten this deadline, health-destroying habits like sloth and overeating, are a means of living suicide, of acting dead, and distracting us from fully living.

    When we’re presented with evidence of our own mortality, so many of us wake up and decide that we’re going to cast aside these old habits, figure out what would make us feel happy and fulfilled, and then go do that.

    2. We can’t enjoy life in the absence of darkness.

    Imagine the most glorious spring day of your life. You’re walking around outside, enjoying the perfect temperature that supports your physical comfort. The sunshine makes you feel perky and happy, the trees are blooming, and you feel hopeful and alive.

    Now what if the only weather you’d ever known was like this spring day? Most of us would immediately say, “Yes, that would be great! That’s the only weather I’d ever need to know.”

    There are people who live in climates like this year round and they appreciate it, but the reason they can appreciate it is because they know there are places like London where it rains a lot, or places that are cold and windy and dark for much of the year.

    If all we were ever shown was perfection and we never witnessed a contrast to that perfection, we wouldn’t have a frame of reference for knowing how perfect it is.

    We can’t enjoy life in the absence of darkness. We need a contrast—of sickness to truly enjoy and appreciate our health, and to endure rainy days to fully appreciate the sunshine. We need to know that death exists in order to truly appreciate life and to fully live it.

    3. Grief is fleeting.

    As I stood in front of that mirror, my throat feeling closed off as I tried to keep back the sobs, it occurred to me to physically open up into my grief, to relax into it and to receive it into my body rather than continuing to resist it.

    I knew that physically resisting my grief was painful in my chest and throat. I became curious to know what it would feel like if I allowed the grief to come to me.

    I leaned into it. When I stopped resisting it and I breathed my grief into my lungs and tried to let it fill me, a most curious thing happened: my grief escaped me.

    When you let it in, grief comes and goes. When you resist grief, and when you close your body physically to the experience, then grief hovers around you in an attempt to gain entry. When you invite grief in, it will come and set a spell, and then it wanders off while other emotions visit with you.

    When you lose a loved one, grief will come back to visit with you, again and again. But if each time grief comes knocking you allow it come in, over time, grief will come back less and less frequently and for shorter and shorter periods of time.

    Eventually, when you think of your loved one, rather than thinking of loss, you’ll honor their memory with a smile.

    Photo by Hartwig HKD

  • Love, Light, and Other Lessons That Crisis Reveals to Us

    Love, Light, and Other Lessons That Crisis Reveals to Us

    Inner Light

    “Life always waits for some crisis to occur before revealing itself at its most brilliant.” ~Paul Coelho

    There have been more shocking and devastating world events in recent memory than I can keep up with. Hurricane Sandy. Sandy Hook Shooting. Shooting at Portland Mall. Australian wildfires. Club Fire in Brazil. Hurricane Nemo. Earthquake in China. Bangladesh Factory Collapse. Boston Bombing. Texas Plant Explosion. Floods in Midwest. Tornadoes in Oklahoma.

    So much loss. Devastation. Pain. Piled one on top of the other with little time to regain our footing in between.

    I can hear that fearful place inside me questioning, “Is this how it’s going to happen? Is this the beginning of the end? Is nature finally gonna take us out for what we’ve done, or are we just gonna take each other out?”

    And I fall into that spiral of anger, frustration, and endless questioning, feeling my energy getting dragged down and down. 

    I want to crawl into my hermit-y, safe shell and hide, and resolve in the fact that people are screwed up, and nature is ultimately in control, and there’s nothing I can do about it except wallow and whine about how no one’s doing anything about it.

    And I can hear that fearful place inside me wondering, “Why? Why there? Why those people? Why kids? What’s going to happen? Should I be scared? Prepared? Worrying? Ramshackling together a bunker in my garage? What am I supposed to do?”

    So I do all I can do. Clutching my loved ones a little tighter to my chest, I keep going.

    My fear usually continues until the day after comes. Until we know it’s over. And then the fear and anxiety releases in a flood of relief as love comes in to fill its place.

    On the day after, there is hope. Incredible tales of resilience, courage, and survival. Amazing stories of heroism, selflessness, and grace.

    Suddenly, we feel spared, lucky. Yes, look at all we’ve lost, but look at all there is left to be grateful for.

    Suddenly, we are reminded that life is only about the people around us and that it’s all, and always, about love.

    Neighbors, strangers, communities coming together. Nations rapt in attention, holding their breath. In those moments, we experience our oneness. In those moments, we shift from a modality of competition into one of cooperation. In those moments, we can actually feel the truth that we’re all in this together. It’s palpable. 

    Could that be why these horrific events keep happening? Their rate seeming to steadily increase since 2013 dawned and we were ushered into a new era.

    It seems we need a collective shift in consciousness; our entire energy needs to be raised.

    And unfortunately, it often takes shock to knock us out of our hypnotic day-to-day enough that we wake up, rise up, and come together. It takes a shock for us to start questioning why we’re here and what it’s all about.

    It feels like the something greater out there has two gigantic defibrillator paddles on the Earth’s heart and is trying to shock us back to life. Clear. Hurricane! Shooting! Tornado! Bombing! Come on. Wake up. Come back to us.

    And in those moments when we do wake up and act out of courage, act out of conviction, act out of love, we feel it: lucky just to be alive. Grateful for this moment, this one, right here. We can’t believe how blessed we must be to be alive right now, having this experience.

    We feel connected. On purpose. Like we’re here for a reason. Like it all matters. And that’s how we’re meant to feel everyday. Not just through trauma and pain, but in our good ole, average ordinary.

    Miracles are not extraordinary events; they are happening all around us, all the time. It just often takes extraordinary events for us to see them and realize they’ve been here all the while.

    I think that if we can take one message from the sadness that’s surrounded our world lately, one possible why, is that only by witnessing the dark can we know what the light is.

    That light exists within all of us, and once we know where the switch is, we can turn it on every single day—not just in our darkest moments.

    It is wholly within our power and responsibility to feel lucky, and grateful, and amazed just to be alive. Just to be a part of it all.

    It’s wholly within our power and responsibility to shine our individual lights as brightly as possible so that when we come together, the darkness will have no fighting chance. We’ll obliterate it.

    From my perspective, our response to all these inner-light-switching events as of late just confirm to me, more now than ever, that our future looks positively bright.

    Photo by Hartwig HKD

  • Don’t Let Anyone or Anything Dim Your Inner Light

    Don’t Let Anyone or Anything Dim Your Inner Light

    Find Your Inner Light

    “The more light you allow within you, the brighter the world you live in will be.” ~Shakti Gawain

    I was born with it. I know I was. There was a light within me that showed in my smile, my dancing around the house, my love for life, for friends, for family, and my bright future.

    I don’t remember the exact day it happened, I don’t remember the last event that did it, but my inner light went out. I was no longer the happy-go-lucky girl I once was; I became lost in an abyss of darkness and sadness. Happiness and joy were thing of the past.

    Was it heartbreak over the guy I was supposed to marry who broke my heart? Was it the fact that my parents got divorced and I was suddenly in the middle of it? Was it because I never stuck up for myself or spoke my truth? Did I do anything so horrible that my “karma” was kicking in?

    I couldn’t figure it out. I was suddenly paralyzed in fear and my world became a place where I no longer wanted to be; I wanted out.

    I was diagnosed with stage three melanoma at the age of twenty-one. The doctor who performed the biopsy called the house to let me know the results and left a message. I deleted the message.

    About an hour later my parents asked me if the doctor had called. I told them yes and that I had deleted the message. They immediately called the doctor’s office in the other room.

    A few minutes later they came into my room crying and told me I had stage three melanoma and needed to have it removed immediately. I wasn’t scared. In fact, I was relieved in a sense that there may be something that removed me from this world of pain I now lived in. I was numb.

    I no longer had the ability to form friendships; I lost that knack which used to come so easily to me. I didn’t allow anyone to get close to me. My walls came up so high and I swore no one would ever get in.

    The shame, the guilt, the embarrassment of the girl I had become began to eat me up alive. Why was I even here anymore? What was the point?

    From the tender age of eighteen I suffered daily with pain and fear, and constantly had to tell myself out loud, “I can do this, I can do this,” whether it was showing up for work or any other area in my life.

    In order to deal with all this emptiness and fear, I felt the only way out was to drink, do drugs, and self-destruct in any way I could.

    I drank to the point where I would black out because that is where I found peace, a total escape from my reality. It didn’t matter to me if I was putting myself in harm’s way or ruining the relationships with those close to me, I had to do it. I didn’t care anymore.

    The last straw was on New Year’s Eve 2001 when I went out and went into my usual blacked out state. I ended up telling my friend I wanted to kill myself. The next morning, my mom, who I had a strained relationship with because of her inability to watch me self-destruct, called me and was in tears.

    She told me my friend called her and told her I said I wanted to take my life. My mom pleaded with me to get help as soon as possible.

    I thought about it for a minute and pondered what she said. Live this miserable life of self-hatred and addiction, or get help. The decision I made was to get help because I had reached my bottom emotionally, physically, and spiritually and had a tiny grain of hope that I had a chance.

    Attending my first rehab at the age of twenty-seven was the beginning of my road to recovery and freedom. I wish I could say I got it my first time around, but that’s not my story. Two rehabs, countless relapses and lost relationships, and continuous fear and anxiety consumed me until the age of thirty-eight, when I finally surrendered and saw that I could not do this life thing on my own.

    Fear ruled my life. It was the gripping anxiety I felt on a daily basis in my stomach and in my heart. I have heard the acronym for fear, which is “Future Events Already Ruined.” I expected the worst to happen in any situation of my life.

    It wasn’t until I realized I wasn’t in charge and my self-will had taken me to these dark places that I felt a load off of my jaded soul.

    I began to see spirituality as a solace to my pain. I had hope (“hang on, pain ends”) that there was a light beyond my darkness.

    I heard you gain strength through trials and emotional bottoms. The fact that I saw others who had suffered and found a way out made me feel like I could do it too. I wasn’t the only one who wasn’t able to cope with life.

    I started to see meditation as a way to find the answers to life’s challenges and struggles. This came as such a relief, because I used to think I had to come up with the answers in my head, which was a dangerous place to be since it had led me to this place where I no longer wanted to live.

    I began attending twelve-step meetings specific to my struggles, which helped me learn skills on how to live my life in a healthy way. I related to people and their pain, and was able to share mine.

    Finally my pain was paying off. It allowed me to help others so that maybe they would not have to suffer as long as I did. I was no longer a victim of my life. I had appreciation and gratitude for my dark past.

    I began to pray to a higher power. I learned for the first time in my life to let go. Let go of the outcomes, the fear, reactions or actions of other people, my career, my job, and my relationships—all of it.

    Am I practicing letting go on a daily basis? No, but the key thing is that I have a willingness to try. Just knowing I have the option to try to let go gives me a peace of mind that I have not had for a very long time.

    I had allowed people and situations that hurt me to burn out my inner light. No one turned off my light; I did. Knowing this gave me the freedom to find it again.

    Everyone is born with an inner light. Some of us can hold on to it and others lose it and have to work extremely hard to get it back. My road back to my light has been painful, scary, exciting, and fulfilling. I would not change any of it. I am a stronger woman because of it and for that I am eternally grateful.

    Photo by Stacy Kathryn Holst

  • Coming Home to Our Light by Embracing the Dark

    Coming Home to Our Light by Embracing the Dark

    “Turn you face toward the sun and the shadows will fall behind you.” ~Māori Proverb

    I am looking out of the window of the airplane. We are above the clouds; the evening sun is just setting. There is a glow all around me. I am lost in this moment. I feel like I’ve never been closer to the heavens. I can stay here in these clouds forever. I am at peace.

    I am returning from my first trip to Jamaica.

    I went to this island paradise on what was supposed to be a fun, party trip. Yes I had fun and I partied a lot. But I also discovered my heart and the truth of my soul.

    I have been running for a long time. Not physically, but emotionally and mentally. I was running from the grief and sadness I feel about my mother’s death. I was running from the fact that I was eating ice cream everyday to deal with this loss.

    I was running from feeling pain. I recently ended a “relationship” with someone who was emotionally unavailable to me. I was running from the truth about that situation. I was running from the boredom I feel at work. I hate corporate life. Sleep wasn’t forthcoming. My mind was too busy running from itself.

    I was running from this person who felt trapped all the time. I felt like if I stopped and faced this hurt, pain, frustration, sadness, and disappointment, I would shatter into a million pieces and I wouldn’t know how to put myself back together. I didn’t like who I had become.

    And then I got to Jamaica, and I had space between me and all the crap I was running from. I was so damn tired too. I finally felt like I could stop running. I felt like I could just be, like I could breathe. I felt like I left all the crap that was my life back in Trinidad and I was free.

    Free to just be. This freedom brought clarity. I realized that, in my running, I was running away from the light, and so the shadows had swallowed me up. (more…)

  • The Secret to Lighting up a Room: Find Your Inner Glow

    The Secret to Lighting up a Room: Find Your Inner Glow

    “As we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.” ~Marianne Williamson

    We’ve all met that person at a party or a business function who seems to “light up a room.” People are drawn to them like moths to a flame.

    Maybe it’s the way she carries herself, or the easy way he laughs, or her eyes that seem totally focused and engaged in the moment. I’ve always noticed that they have sort of a “knowing” smile—a secret that maybe, just maybe, they might tell you.

    I have always wanted to know that secret.

    A confession: Up until a couple of years ago, I was a total happiness-faker. Yep. Even had myself fooled there for a while.

    It took a couple jobs lost, one relationship ended, and a few life crises thrown in for good measure before I woke up one morning and realized that I no longer saw “me” staring back. It was that moment of clarity where I finally saw things exactly as they were—and knew that they had to change.

    I was never more afraid in my entire life. But then again, the best things that happen to us in life are usually the most terrifying, no?

    As I’ve evolved in this journey, I’ve slowly inched closer towards the radiant person I want to be. For me, that means finding simplicity and a sense of flow in all aspects of my life—which has been surprisingly more difficult than I ever thought it would be.

    Simplifying our lives can be hard because it forces us to own our values and shape our lives around them. To take responsibility for our lives and cut away what we’ve outgrown. To do something, anything, every day to move us one step closer. 

    Most of the time, this process requires us to step outside of the norm—perhaps our “normal” persona; our “normal” relationship habits; our “normal” place in society. It’s challenging, uncomfortable (albeit extremely rewarding) work.

    Navigating the process can be even harder. How can we know what’s right when we’re stepping away from what we’ve always been told is just that?

    There are six actions I actively take in my life that have made all the difference. Each time I practice, I feel my inner glow burning just the tiniest bit brighter.

    (more…)

  • See the Love Around You and You’ll Feel More Love Within You

    See the Love Around You and You’ll Feel More Love Within You

    “The most important thing in this world is to learn to give out love, and let it come in.” ~Morrie Schwartz

    There is a Native American tale that tells of a young boy speaking with his grandmother. She tells the boy that she has the spirit of two wolves living and battling inside of her; one is vengeful and unkind, as he sees all the world as a threat, and the other is loving, secure, and nurturing.

    The little boy asks his grandmother, “Which one will end up winning?” and the grandmother replies, “Which ever one I feed.”

    We all have this pull inside of us: We can either nurture our fears and insecurities, or we can nurture our trust in love, kindness, and acceptance. This is not a new concept.

    There is an endless amount of information out there about connecting with your inner self and finding happiness from within.

    However, all that information can feel overwhelming and even discouraging. If you’re anything like me, you may find yourself still aching from a broken heart, or beating yourself up for the chocolate-chip cookie you just ate shortly after reading about finding forgiveness, gratitude, and self-love.

    What I realized was missing for me in my quest for self-improvement—and what kept pulling me back to my old, familiar negative thinking, feeding the insecure wolf—was faith.

    In order to make the meaningful changes that allow us to release the grasp of our fears and limiting thoughts and beliefs, we have to be willing to believe in the positivity—believe that we deserve to stop beating ourselves up and looking for an external solution to “fix” us.

    It’s not enough to just think it. We have to believe it.

    The limiting beliefs of our fears are deep-rooted, and so we need to meet them from our gut level. We need to really believe that it’s okay to step out of our darkness and connect with our light instead.

    Okay. So, how do we do that? (more…)

  • Why We Need to Embrace the Middle Place

    Why We Need to Embrace the Middle Place

    “The light at the end of the tunnel is not an illusion. The tunnel is.” ~Unknown

    A dream: I am in a woman’s prison. The cells and halls are dark and dirty. The prison looks like a damp dungeon. Inside the cells are women dressed in rags along with their children.

    I am not in a cell, but walking around, observing the faces of desperate, imprisoned women. I need to get out, and find myself in an empty corridor, long and wide.

    At the end, I see a glimpse of light: freedom through the corridor. After a long walk, I arrive at the place of light, an oasis, an ocean retreat filled with sunshine, laughter, and happy people wearing white.

    But before I enter the long tunnel, I see a girl crying, and I ask her why. She tells me she has a feeling something bad is going to happen to me.

    This dream has become the metaphor of my life. The quote above resonates with my dream and the journey I have walked, but what has inspired me to write this post, is this: the tunnel is the illusion.

    It would seem that since the “new age” movement, we have heard a lot about illusion—about what is real and what is not. What we should focus our minds on and what we should not.

    How we have a choice that we need to make every day, perhaps every moment, between fear and love. Between prison and freedom. It makes us think we might have some power in a world that often does not make sense or brings us to places we would never want to be.

    Here is another quote by Carl Jung.

    “There is no coming to consciousness without pain. People will do anything, no matter how absurd, in order to avoid facing their own Soul. One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious.” 

    It is not that I don’t agree that the tunnel is an illusion, but it concerns me that this word, illusion, gives us permission to not care about the tunnel—to not care about the process, which brings us from where we are to where we are going. (more…)