A healing touch

Over the last few days I’ve gone into a fairly regular kind of energy slump where even listening or thinking becomes painfully exhausting. It’s as though my body is so tired that even moving my mental muscles to form a thought makes me ache.

Yesterday, as I was lying in bed I caught myself trying to do a metta (compassion) practice when I was too tired to think straight. I was trying to form kind and caring thoughts about being in pain, but this mental ‘trying’ just increased my pain.  Hmph!  I was stuck. 

Then a section of Toni Bernhard’s book ‘How to be Sick’ (oh, how I love that title!) came to mind. Toni writes about cultivating compassion towards herself in the face of chronic illness by using phrases of care and understanding such as 'My poor body, working so hard to feel better'.  She then writes:  'Whatever words I choose, I often stroke one arm with the hand of the other. This has brought me to tears many times, but tears of compassion are healing tears.'

Following Toni’s suggestion, I stopped trying to think compassionate thoughts and just started stroking the top of my hand with my other hand.  This kind, compassionate touch went beyond all thought, straight into the heart of the matter; ‘Oh, I’m sick.  How sad.’ 

I was transported back in time to when I was very young – 5 and 6 years old – and spent months in hospital with asthma. I was not only isolated from the world, but also cut-off from my immediate surroundings by a thick plastic tent covering my bed.  Asthma medication was pumped into the tent, so I could breathe it in and out. The intention was to heal, and it probably saved my life many times over, but the experience was confusing and so very lonely. 

The simple act of touching my own hand brought me back to this sad time; a time where all I really wanted was kindness and a sense of connection – to hope, life, and the outside world.  It felt as though offering myself this care, even 30 years on, was a kind of healing. This beautiful and simple practice gave me a sense of mothering and caring for myself. 

Thankyou Toni! 

Beautiful Gili Air - Lombok - Indonesia

Self-Compassion Phrases

Hello lovely readers! 

It's been a while since I've posted, mostly because I've been busy crying. (I am confident that at the end of this financial year I will get a thank you letter from Kleenex and hopefully a free mega pack of man-sized tissues to see me through another afternoon of weeping). 

When I last posted I wrote about doing an exercise where I recorded how I was feeling and then responded with phrases of self-compassion.  This little exercise opened the flood-gates and 15 years of 'coping' has been washed away in my tears, as I allow myself to feel all grief-stricken, pissed-off and crappy at losing so much of my life to this illness.

I've been practicing saying little phrases of self-compassion to myself as I lie in bed feeling whatever feeling is present in the moment.  To help myself do this, I've been collecting and writing down phrases of compassion and kindness.  During the day, I have the list of phrases open on my laptop and while I'm resting I just open my eyes every so often and pick a phrase to repeat to myself.   

I thought I'd share this list in the hope that some readers may find it useful.  I'd love to know what your favorite self-compassion phrase is! 

Bumper list of self-compassion phrases

Yes, I’m sick – it’s difficult. 

What’s going on here?  How are you feeling?

It’s not my fault, there’s nothing I have to change.  

I never get to choose a feeling – I just get to choose how I will meet the feeling.

I’m sad that I’m sick.

I’m sad that I feel this feeling difficult.

This feeling is meant to be here, and I care about it.

How are you? I’m seeking to understand, not to change.

I’m doing the best I possibly can in this situation, a really good job.

I’m doing a great job of resting and taking care of myself.

I feel agitated, I want to ‘do stuff’ – well, that’s totally fine. It’s totally normal to feel like you want to do things when you’re sick.  I’m sure we’ll find time for you to do that later.

Even though x is happening and I feel x I choose to trust the place I am in.

I know I’m a good person because good people feel x and I feel x. Therefore I’m a good person.

It’s not my fault – it’s just happening.

I love you every way that you are, exactly as you are – and I’ll help you to be any way you want to be.

I’m here to make life better; I’m here to help.

This matters.  Whatever it is, it matters. 

(My latest portrait - I thought it suited the mood of this post!)

Like An Egg

Artwork by Milé Murtanovski

A few years ago I made a long and tiring journey across Australia to be with a close friend who comes from Africa. At the time, he was a refugee in a detention centre on the other side of Australia and couldn't come to visit me. 

After I’d arrived he told me, ‘Your sister rang to say you’d be really tired when you got here. I think she wanted to make sure I would look after you, so I told her not to worry, that I would treat you like an egg.’

‘An egg?’ I said, surprised. 

‘Yes, of course. I will treat you carefully, as though I was holding an egg.’

My friend was born in the Congo, and the idea of treating someone ‘like an egg’ was one that came from his culture. It’s a beautiful image. Imagine cradling a vulnerable egg in your hands, neither squeezing too tightly nor holding too loosely.

The image came to mind today as I was watching feelings rise and dissipate during meditation.  I found that it helped to imagine my hands holding my feelings with the careful attention I would bring to holding an egg. I saw the ‘egg’ being placed into my hands – anger, sadness, peacefulness – and felt my hands around them, not strangling them with a desire to change or cling to them, but not letting them go in aversion or disgust either.  

When the feelings started fading, I would carefully place the egg down, letting it go. Then, the next egg would be placed into my hands, with every egg wanting the same thing – attentive, gentle, care.

A Sweet Feeling

After a month where I felt some stability with my health, my adrenals have spiked and I’m on a roller-coaster ride of exhaustion and adrenalin. So, today I'm not feeling well.

Saying ‘yes’ to the despair, the anger, and the physical pain isn’t cutting through. I still feel totally wedded to the suffering. Lying in bed, just practicing awareness of what's happening, I start repeating a more complicated form of ‘yes’ –

‘I don’t ask of myself that I feel anything different to what I feel in this moment.’
 
It's  working for me because as I say it I realise that the subtext of every moment I experience is – ‘I ask of myself that I feel this differently.’ I'm  aware that I'm constantly wrestling with the moment, trying to force it to be different than it is. 

So, during the day I repeat my mantra:

Sadness

‘I don’t ask of myself that I feel anything different to what I feel in this moment.’

A sense of helpless running through my bones.

‘I don’t ask of myself that I sense anything different to what I sense in this moment.’

‘I hate this pain!’

‘I don’t ask of myself that I think anything different to what I think in this moment.’

 

Just moment after moment, thought after thought, sensation after sensation. And my response is, ‘I don’t demand of myself that I change it.’

Finally, in the evening, I am standing at the bathroom sink brushing my teeth. I’m being mindful of the way the brush feels against my teeth and I become aware of a feeling.  What is it?  It’s tiredness and heaviness.

‘I don’t ask of myself that I sense anything different to what I sense in this moment.’

Suddenly, amazingly, I feel a sense of warmth and relaxation. Tears well up in my eyes and a voice rises up in my mind – ‘this is what I’ve been waiting to hear all my life’.

I realise in a flash that all my striving, my studying, my piano practice, my trying to be a good meditator, good daughter, good person...all of this was done with the aim of feeling what I feel in this moment. I feel acceptance. It is what I have been striving for my whole life. And I have just given it to myself. 

It's a sweet feeling. 

Where's the war?

During my meditation over the last few days I've started a little practice where I gently ask myself, 'where's the war?' and I'm finding it very enlightening. 
 

I've found that, almost always, there will be a war.  There will be somewhere where inside myself where I'm struggling, disagreeing, criticizing, or talking my way out of thoughts or feelings I am having.  Sometimes the 'war' appears as words and sometimes as a crunching feeling in my stomach, or a clenching feeling throughout my body. 
 

For example, I might notice that I have a pain in my back.  'Is there any war here?' I ask myself.  Then I notice a cramping feeling around the pain. It's a feeling that I don't want this pain but also feel like it's my fault that it's there. The text of the 'war' goes: 'If I was a better meditator I wouldn't have this pain. What am I doing wrong in my meditation?  Why can't I just get it?'
 

'Oh, OK,' I note to myself.  'There's the war.  I have this pain - I don't want it, and I blame myself for having it.'
 

Then, I try to bring some loving kindness to this war.  Not to make the war go away, but just to extend some compassion towards myself for having it.  'Wow...it sure is hard having this war going on.  I don't think this is my fault.  It's just hard - to see it, to feel it, to notice it.'
 

And I keep going like this - gently asking myself where the war is, and when I see it, bringing some loving kindness to it.
 

Bringing the loving kindness often attracts its own little war.  This little battle goes: 'You idiot!  You shouldn't be showing yourself kindness for having all these terrible, warring, criticizing feelings! You soft fool...you need to FIX this...'
 

If I notice this war, I just bring attention to it in the same way, 'Oh...a little war saying I shouldn't be feeling kindness towards myself.  Wow...it can be tough having these wars.  I'm sure this isn't my fault...'
 

And on it goes...I just follow the trail of thoughts and feelings.  Noticing the war...feeling lovingkindness...noticing the battle...bringing compassion. 

Dealing with Difficult People

I don't know whether I've mentioned before, but my parents separated a few months ago. It's a strange thing to suddenly find myself from a broken family at the age of 38.

One of my sisters, known for being a mild drama queen, reacted to the news by bursting into hysterical tears for 5 minutes and then saying, 'I feel like I'm in Kramer vs Kramer!'

'Have you even read that book?' I asked. (I was the one breaking the news to her). 

'No,' she admitted. 'But I've seen the DVD cover and I feel like, well...I feel like I'm in it.'  

I think she was hoping my parents would end up in the Australian High Court in a landmark court case - sueing each other for custody of their 36 year old daughter. (I have 4 siblings, but  in my sister's 'Kramer vs Kramer' fantasy I'm sure my parents were only concerned with custody of her...)

I'm sad to say that when I was told about the separation all I felt was relief.  I thought I might feel something else, like sadness or loss. But, all I felt was relief and a bit of happiness that I'd never have to be in the same room as my parents again.

I won't go into the ins and outs of their relationship, becuase that's not really my business.  But, since the separation I've spent 4 months living with my mother in the family home.  (My father moved out). And, here's where I get to the main point of this post - dealing with difficult people. 

At the best of times I experience my mother as a difficult person, and this has certainly not been the best of times.  We have some similar traits; we can both be bossy and controlling and perfectionistic, so living together isn't easy. My mother also has some kind of  anxiety and hyperactivity disorder, which has never been treated.

Over the past months I've been very judgemental towards her. And then, because I'm into meditation and have this idea that if you are a good meditator you will always be peaceful and kind and compassionate towards other people, I then judge myself for being so judgemental towards her. 

Here's how the inner conversation goes after something happens between us.  I'll give you a little example...I put some rice to cook on the stove, and come into the kitchen 5 minutes later to find my mother has moved it to the microwave, becuase that's how she thinks it should be cooked. This is what I might say inside my head:

"Oh my GOD.  I feel like I am going to %^&* KILL her!...Can't I even put on a %^& saucepan of rice without her trying to control me...What am I?  Five years old?  I'm so angry...Oh no, I shouldn't be angry, she's really just a suffering person. She's just causing me pain and being controlling because she's in so much pain...I really should just be feeling compassion for her...resentment, resentment...I actually don't feel any compassion for her...she's a pain in the arse...but I should feel compassion..."

So, you get the general idea.  I feel angry, and then I try to 'should' myself into feeling compassion, when I actually don't feel any.  All I feel is that I want this person out of my life, and would not bat an eyelid if I never saw her again. (Which may or may not be true.)

So, this week I've really been focussing on allowing whatever feelings I have to rise up in me, and just to be aware of when I'm 'shoulding' myself into feeling something different.  I've noticed that when I 'should' myself I have this accompanying body sensation that feels like a kind of crunch in my stomach - it's like a block of concrete is sitting there.

I've been practicing noting the 'shoulds': "oh...I'm feeling like I should be feeling compassionate towards my mother, and I don't...oh...now I feel blame...now I feel a tightness in my stomach." I try to do this noting in a kind, understanding voice, just allowing the swirl of sensations and thoughts as I feel my anger and frustration.

I find that it helps me a lot.  I still don't feel much compassion towards my mother, but I feel a bit more compassion towards myself, and I think that might be an important first step. I feel like it's a good thing to just lower the expectations I have towards myself.  I'm no Mother Theresa or Kwan Yin, and expecting that I will feel incredibly caring and compassionate towards my mother is probably just expecting way too much of myself at the moment. 

So, it's been an interesting journey over the past few months and I feel like I'm learning a lot about being kind and understanding towards myself. Seeing the amount of self-judgement I have towards myself has made me reflect on who is the most difficult person in my life at the moment - my mother, or myself?

Poor little headless Buddha.  Taken in Luang Prabang, Laos.