Passing the Judgement

Posted on September 17, 2015 by mcallister

by Alan McAllister, CCHt PhD-phys

judegments

Rush hour going in town in the afternoon. Across a busy intersection the traffic is stopped, backed up from a red light a little ahead. I pause so as not to get caught in the intersection, then move forward as cars move up, just enough for a single car. Behind me someone else is coming through the intersection with no place to go.
I find myself getting angry in a self-righteous way, that this person would block the cross traffic, would potentially endanger themselves and others. My judgement is getting all revved up; a pet peeve going into high gear. I start to say something out load, but my beloved flags me down and invites me to reign in. She’s not wanting to have me go there while driving with her.
So I turn inside myself. I hear a voice in my head that says, “you’re spoiling all the fun”. Whoah. Its always so interesting when I can be in my witness to internal psychological processes. Then I can become neutral, disengage, and decide if I find the process useful or not. Does it currently serve me? if so when. Once I have some awareness I can begin to make changes.

Taking time to feel into this energy and the part of me wants to whack someone else, to tee off on someone I don’t know. It thinks it will feel better. That by making someone else wrong I can make myself right. Why can’t I just be right all by myself?

Back up to earlier in the afternoon, when I was having a somewhat challenging conversation with people about responsibility for something involving money. I’m asking them to take some responsibility and help me pay for something. There is an expectation of resistance to this request, and a sense of limited power on my side. I’m asking them to do something that seems reasonable to me, but if they say no there is little I can do.
It left me in a place of feeling uncertain and weak, that I should have done more, somehow. My guidance tells me that I did what I could, to let it go, but somehow its hard. Some level of my psyche still wants to boost itself. Too many doubts about my toughness as a man in the world. Perhaps it serves me better to add energy to that possible positive outcome, rather than rehashing me “defeat”.

I’ve been judging myself for the last hour and now I want to release that at someone else. Isn’t this the way it so often happens? When I was young I used to come home from school and pass along things that had upset me to my younger brother. Not proud of that either. So perhaps its time to change this old pattern; to ask Spirit to show me how to let go of my fears and self judgements and to notice when I’m about to pass something along to someone else. I can then own them, sit with them, let them go. A new practice.

Waiting for the light up ahead to change I go through all this. My beloved checks in and I say I’ll be with you in a minute. As it comes clearer summarize for her. She laughs at how complex a web the mind can weave in a few minutes. She is happy that I was able to stop and sort through things.

Thanks to my beloved who saw this and said no thank-you in a way that was kind enough that I could observe my process rather than reacting to a reaction and getting further distracted by tangling with her. Gratitude to my guidance for helping me notice what was useful to notice and stay out of reaction.

I have begun a dance with my inner fear, the not-enoughness, not as an idea, but as living energy that I have invited into a conversation, allowing myself to feel and sit with it, rather than pushing it away, or easily distracting myself with the other drivers. I can see how its useful to this protective part of me to have a stock pile of pet peeves for uses at times like this. Things that its pretty easy to call up as experiences that feel real and justified. Perhaps I can let them all go. I choose to stop judging myself and/or then passing it along to others.

Now I can continue in town with my beloved. Leaving the other driver behind. Leaving the earlier people behind more completely. I think I’ll be happier that way.

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Inner Trust

Posted on September 4, 2015 by mcallister

by Alan McAllister, CCHt PhD-phys

trust and calm

Have you ever received a massage and found it challenging to release control of parts of your body to the person working on you? I’m often subconsciously trying to anticipate and move things for them. Particularly my hands which I use a lot in my work, and find hard to pull my awareness out of them enough to let someone else move them. Though I prefer to think of it in other terms, it includes an unconscious lack of trust on some level.

There are certainly life situations when I am conscious of wondering who and what to place my trust in. It is easy to project fears outward and say I have to be careful because there are people who I really shouldn’t place my trust in. Receiving a massage from someone I have worked with often doesn’t seem to be a place where this serves me, but it shows up even there.

This week I had the chance to practice trusting people around me at a much deeper level. I was in surgery, having something unhealthy removed from my face. Local anesthetic alleviates the sharp pain, but not the sensations of pushing or pulling, the ability to see if I open my eyes, or the ability to hear the doctor’s commentary as he instructs the resident he is working with. It also becomes clear that my body knows what is happening even without direct any sensory/mental information.

Lying there with my eyes closed I focus on my grounding, calming the fear arising in my third chakra and slowly am able to let go of the mental tracking of all the things going on so close to my sense of self. Having moved through the fears of possible pain, I was still up against my ability to trust my surgeon and Spirit, that it would all come out ok. I could feel how hard it is for me to feel supported and held by Spirit under extraordinary circumstances, to release my well-being to another. So while the medical team did their thing I worked on the inside to ground and stay present.

Later, having finished and gone home, after such large pieces of trusting, I found myself resisting my beloved in much smaller things. She was coming from a loving, concerned, space, but I unconsciously pushed her away, resisting what she was offering with my attitude if not my words. I was pained to have done this with the person I most want to be open and receive from. At the end of a long day, however, I had reached a quota of some sort for trusting the world around me to be benevolent and competent. It had little to do with her, it was just one more time I had to open and trust, and part of me balked.

I’ve been thinking about why that would be. What does it mean that I have trouble trusting the world or others to the extent that I do sometimes? I’ve come across old pictures from previous operations when I was a child, more when I was an infant. I’ve felt the imprint of my mother’s mistrust during my birth. There are likely some past life experiences in play as well.

It is easy to go through all this and say, well of course it makes sense. But there is always an inner component, isn’t there? Having done the archeology I come back to myself and ask what don’t I trust in myself, or in Spirit. What part of me expects that negative things might happen *this time*? Where am I not feeling held enough by the universe to trust that those I draw to me are competent and benevolent? What deep part of me at times mistrusts even those I love most?

I have to move beyond the story of how I got here, the logical history that justifies my fear. Beyond the guilt about having put myself there to begin with, having created the lesion, and called in the doctors etc. All of it. I was there on the table practicing being present, trusting them to do their job well. And they did.

When I fearfully mistrust others I’m most deeply not trusting myself as a spiritual being to be ok. Mistrusting that my being can recognize who to work with and who to walk away from, that Spirit will not to put me in situations that aren’t right for me, even if they are uncomfortable. Although this was a fairly extreme situation it was a powerful place to practice feeling held and supported by the world; to let go of the fear which cuts me off and puts me in isolation. When I roll up inside perhaps I feel safer, yet I also loose connection to Life and any sense of support and being held.

At home, moving through another healing process, I am cultivating trust in my body to heal itself. The old fears come in waves and my body will freak out if I let it. I ground and run my energy, staying present with myself until a sense of trust and solidity arises. Once I relax it is easier to open to my beloved and receive her loving attention and support. It’s also easier for my beloved to support me when I’ve opened to myself again.

(© 9/2015)

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Emotional Weather

Posted on August 19, 2015 by mcallister
weather moving through

The other day I was driving to the super market and when a wave of emotional anxiety came up. My thoughts and being began to organize to “deal” with the anxiety, until I noticed that it didn’t have anything to do with my present experience. This bit of grace allowed me to step back out of problem-solving-alert mode and simply experience what was happening.

We feel in each moment what is alive in that moment in our emotional body. Emotions are originally a response to what we experience in the world around us. They are meant to come into being, motivate us to act, and then fade away. Its this last part that often fails to happen. Then they are left as imprints in the emotional body, tied to thoughts and memories in the mental body.

Our present experiences can trigger these emotional memories. Then we are feeling something created in the past, which may be different from what is being called up by the present. Alternately, we are thinking about something from yesterday, or last year, or how we will feel tomorrow, or next month, and these thoughts stir up associated emotions; either memories, or reactions in expectation. Then we are feeling things from other times and places, which also may have little or nothing to do with what is happening in the present moment.

This was happening to me on the way to the supermarket. It has happen countless times before, only this time my attention was called back before I was caught up. I was able to check in and know that I was experiencing things out of time, and that I didn’t need to respond to them. They were part of some old patterns that have been percolating up and releasing out of my being recently.

When you are committed to spiritual process, personal growth, or emotional healing work, the old imprints will begin to surface. Simply witnessed they will move through and complete without much need for you to do anything, except be present and give them space. They will, however, cause emotional weather that is not directly connected with the present flow of life, adding a background color to present emotional experience.

Realizing that what I was feeling was something old moving through gave me space to allow it to be present; to perhaps be a bit curious and just experience the emotions in part of my being, while most of me went on to the market and with the rest of my day. I didn’t need to give them all my awareness, or become them, act them out, or try to solve them. I could choose to let the weather move through and keep my present-time emotional space.

Is today a hard day because there are hard things today, or are things hard today because old hardness is flowing through? There is a lot of freedom in being able to let things move through without having to do anything, or by reacting let them create ripples and effects in your current life. This is part of the answer to how you get off the wheel of action and reaction, how you let old patterns clear without creating new ones.

Some days will be colored by old emotions, weather moving through, but this is a different level than present moment emotions, and with practiced awareness we can let them move through in the background, while living our chosen life in the foreground.

(© 8/2015)

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Human Resonances

Posted on August 2, 2015 by mcallister
bell resonance

Sing a note. This is perhaps the most basic of human resonances. Pick a sound and a pitch. Play with them freely and there will be a specific place in the vocal system that feels natural and easy voicing that note. Try moving it up and down in pitch, or changing the sound, and the easy place will shift to a different place in the body, throat or head.

Resonance is the foundation of perception and communication, both human and throughout the physical world. The ears vibrate with sound frequencies. The eyes are tuned to certain optical frequencies. The body feels various vibrations in bones and muscles. In order to be able to perceive something there has to be a resonant perceiving organ of some sort. A radio or television is tuned to receive the frequency of a specific station, otherwise the signal passes on by. Different animals see frequencies that we can not because their eyes are tuned differently. Some feel pressure or electric currents.

Physical objects have inherent resonances based on their shape and material. These are frequencies that they effortlessly vibrate, or energize at. The strings on a guitar or violin, have a specific weight, while their length is defined by where we place our fingers. Bells ring specific notes based on size, shape and material. Wind instruments have holes that define the length of the resonant cavity.

Resonances determine which frequencies are emitted when energy goes into a system, but also determine which frequencies are most easily received, or perceived, by that system. At resonant frequencies energy is very easily transferred, sent or received. When people are toning together, they can feel when they are at the same note, because there is an effortlessness to it. You can hear, or almost feel, it lock in, and know that energy can be sent back and forth easily. There is a fascinating sense of almost physical touch and communication there.

Human beings have physical senses, various parts, and internal spaces, which all have their own resonances and abilities to send or receive vibrations. We also have emotional, mental and spiritual aspects which also have resonances. These levels can also send and receive, feel in-tune and harmonious, or discordant and conflicted.

We see a color because our eye has the capacity to tune to that vibration. We can feel another person’s emotion because our emotional body can tune there. If we can’t or won’t feel something ourself, we can’t perceive it around us either. Where we place our attention in our mind or emotional body, is like where we place our fingers on a guitar. This may be a conscious choice, or the result of habit or trauma, where the attention has been fixed somewhere until it is released. Where our attention is in our being, there we are tuned and resonant.

Holding patterns of energy in our being, we vibrate there, potentially or actively, both sending and becoming more sensitive to similar frequencies of thought or emotion in other people. Freeing the attention by clearing these fixed patterns, especially those that don’t serves us, allows greater freedom of expression and more freedom to choose what we perceive; give our attention to outside us. Like relaxing stuck places in your throat when singing.

Bodies are like the broadcast antennae for the music of the Soul. Clearing things that are not our true nature, we can tune body to Being, and the expression becomes effortless, like resonant notes when toning. Clarifying perception and communication, we become internally harmonious and resonant; living from the song of the Soul.

(© 8/2015)

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Stillness and Flow

Posted on July 18, 2015 by mcallister
flowing water

Sitting, recently, on a low wall along the edge of a small bridge, trees surround us, hanging out over the stream in front of us. Water flows out from under our dangling feet, rushing off, swirling white, through the green branches.

My beloved is helping me explore the uncomfortable feeling that I often have with a bit of height, that I might fall, or fly out into the empty space in front of me. The trees are filling much of that space, but the rush of the water is almost physically tugging on me and my eyes keep moving away in it.

I ground myself into the earth, but my grounding cord also seems to get swept along, before snapping back, over and over. This produces a quite ungrounded, floating, feeling. I focus my grounding, while intending that the water moves freely through it, and come back down again.

I explore how to sit solidly in place, grounded in the earth below and let the water energy flow freely through me. The dolphin in me wants to play in the stream, so I give it permission, but stay present on the bridge. The deep tension between sitting still and moving forward into the world comes to physical awareness. There is a lot of change around me right now, family getting ready to move, and myself making space for changes. This new moon has been a time of releasing old things to make room for new.

I ask my Being to show me how to hold both parts of this duality. I feel into each fear that comes in the crucible of this tension and breath it out, releasing the attachment or resistance that sweeps me along, coming back to my seat on the concrete. My body relaxes and allows the requested integration to happen.

The next day, sitting on my porch eating breakfast with my beloved, I notice that part of me is itching to be doing things. We often sit and enjoy the sky, the birds, being present with each other before starting our day. Today this is harder for me. I reach inside for yesterday learning about integrating sitting still and being present, allowing the busy part to flow by, but not giving it my attention yet.

The feeling is very similar to yesterday’s feeling of letting the water flow around me without getting caught up in it. I find my core while breathing into any fears that demand I engage before I choose to. Without resisting the rushing, I allow the world to be outside of me, until I choose to dive into it and start that dance again.

Wanting to have more ease with the feeling of being caught up in a world that is rushing away with you, perhaps you can find a place to sit above, or next, to rushing water. Notice where you feel that pull in your being and breath in relaxation and spaciousness. Make friends with the uncomfortable edge of the tension, and come back to the core of Self that is unaffected, without having to resist.

Spirit brings interesting lessons in simple ways, teaching us deeper things. The stream and my beloved have shown me very clearly how either resistance or attachment will unground me, perhaps at the same time, allowing me to be caught up in the rush of the world. Experiencing the felt sense, it is easier to recognize the pull of life’s flow now, so I can release the my fears, and engage it only when and as I choose.

(© 7/2015)

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