There is a discipline to using every heart tremor or emotional
trigger for a purpose, for a way to learn more about ourselves. Each
tremor is a gateway to possible growth; it means that we are faster
on the road to maturity. Every time we blame someone else, accuse
and verbally abuse, then we take steps backwards into the immature
shadows of our personality. Moving forward means accepting the
hearts challenges and saying yes to what they teach us. This is a way
to true growth but is not such an easy discipline to set ourselves up
with. The heart is connected to our primal energy and is yet again
related to the pineal gland that was originally reptilian. It keeps us
in touch with basic animal instincts. When we speak or act from the
heart we are tapping into this behaviour.
A little impulse of a story hits my heart and moves a muscle in
a particular way. I feel it begin as those words put pressure on a
nerve that responds down into the depths of belly. My breath wants
to restrict the feeling so it shortens and becomes less. Knowing in
my mind I must breathe deeper and longer to assist the movement
and the heart tremors. But the journey is to feel. Without that feeling
there is no growth, no matter and no energy for future life. Sink into
the depths I must, else my life becomes a constant re-action of past
stories, accumulating en-mass repetitive wounds that build on top of
one another, unless I dance each one of them free and explore their
meaning, they stay stuck and twisted like vines growing amidst stone
walls with decaying cement, that will age far too quickly as they
dry and crack, being sucked by roots with a lack of forgiveness and
understanding. Freeing each root and loosening their grip I tread
softly amidst the earth’s mosses and heathers and draw comfort
from the ability to connect to the sensuality and tenderness that the
earth and my heart dance together with. In that sweet connection I
know that I am free, free to feel unashamedly, free to move without
restriction and free to unleash my dance from the burden of past
history.

Sometimes I have wanted to make my pain about someone else
and what they are doing to me. Sometimes it can be the truth, I/we
are being hurt and we have to stand up to any abuse. But even then
there is still something for us to learn from the experience.
The discipline is that as we feel heart tremors or emotion, we
need to be still with it, no matter what is happening, to still ourselves
internally and listen to what we are feeling, whatever we are doing.
Within reason most activities can be continued but it is our internal
being that needs to be addressed. All the better if we can sit or lie
down or dance softly, always listening, standing or walking quietly.
Connecting to the breath and the emotion.
No matter what is arising be careful not to blame or make it about
anyone else, be really honest with yourself. It is your emotion, your
heart, so take it personally and allow it to be your teacher, welcome it
in and see the beauty of possibility within it. Sometimes it becomes
even more painful when we do not vent it onto another, it can feel
like it is all building up inside us and it would be such a relief to put
it out of our body and pin it onto someone else. That would ease the
pain and allow us to feel far more comfortable. However it would
not be a more ‘grown up’ experience that we could learn from.
We have all made decisions in our lives and need to pay
attention to the consequences of those decisions and choices. We
are not victim to any of them. It is far more helpful for us to take
responsibility for our part in the process and that enables us to be
open and compassionate towards ourselves.
I remember well making one of those decisions for myself. I
recognised that I, myself, had chosen the very challenging situation
that I was in. When I meditated on it and found peacefulness within
it and an acceptance of it, I experienced a huge relief. This was the
absolute truth of the matter; I could not blame anyone else and took
one hundred percent responsibility for it in my life. I walked on with
a smile on my face and a deep sense of rest and relief within me.

A beautiful feather, freshly fallen from a passing bird in flight
draws my attention and I stoop to pick it up. It is perfectly formed
and soft to touch. Thick stems of lightness and strands that extend
longer and thinner strands on the outside. I notice its perfection and
purity, allowing that to touch me. A little beyond I notice another
feather, it is dirty and scruffy, worn out and trodden into the earth.
I dismiss it deciding it is not perfect enough to be bothered for that
moment of bending down and dirtying my hands in order to pull it
from the muddy grasses in which it lays. But going back then for
another look I wonder why!
Is it, in its imperfection not worthy of a longer moment of my
presence? Bending down I pick up the feather and allow it to join
my more perfect example of purity. I notice its shabbiness next to
the white and I feel sad at what has been lost. In the beginning they
both looked the same, riding high on the wings of time, across the
heavens, glistening in sunlight and being pruned by their owners
beak on rooftops high above the ground. Falling from grace onto the
same earth, passed by many times by the same human feet, they take
on a very different journey.
Am I too ready to seek out perfection or can I stop a little
longer each time to look deeper at what I might consider to be a
darkened and forgotten element that was once more important than
I could imagine. Too quick to dismiss a feeling that could lead my
imagination through many gardens of fantasy and illumination.
My eyes see and my heart responds, I cannot choose not to feel
it, it happens anyway but I can choose whether it be perfect or not
in that moment, even what appears to be imperfectly formed might
be the perfect emotion and the perfect element for that particular
moment. And as the thorn bush pulls at my ankle reminding me that
nature too has its demons and claws, I am reminded that my own
darkness has a memory of past illusions that wants recognition
that wants to be ‘picked up’ as well and put side by side with my
perfections.

from ‘Reclaimed Innocence’  MyVoice Publishing 2012