​stitched into the fabric of life
some of us towards the center
while others are at the periphery
does placement even matter

intricate patterns woven
from colorful threads
with large swaths of
dull gray in between
​
i am cold without this quilt
without all beings
believing they belong
regardless of perception
 
Stitched into the fabric of life, I believe I am at the center when a lecture, talk, or class goes well. When I’m healthy and can breathe, talk, sing for long periods of time. When I can do all the poses in yoga class. When my hair is newly cut and colored. When I’m dressed a certain way. When I have the perfect answer for patients and friends struggling. When my daughter is open to affection and animated in conversation. When my partner understands and applauds my spiritual practice and professional life. When I feel closely connected to Mummy and less irritated. When I write a meaningful poem and blog post. And so much more.

Anything short of this is failure, unpleasant, unacceptable, a problem that triggers banishment from the center to the periphery. Does placement even matter?

Sometimes I see myself in intricate patterns woven from colorful threads. Sometimes I’m surrounded by large swaths of dull gray, an island far away from any vibrancy. Comparing mind also stiches others into fixed positions on this quilt.

As hard as these last few weeks have felt with unwelcome physical symptoms, fear of permanence is worse. A self who will not channel talks with any compassionate healing or creativity. A self who will not survive and enjoy a women’s retreat on the ecstasy of sound and silence.  A self who will not sing and sound a certain way again. A self who will not enjoy and embody yoga. I feel a gentle warmth blanketing body and breath with mettā (lovingkindness), karuṇā (compassion), khanti (patience), paññā (wisdom), and saddhā (faith).

i am cold without this quilt, without all beings believing they belong regardless of perception.

Meditative, Qigong Healing
 
Sitting upright, supported by Earth
Warm breath of compassion
Forgiveness, wisdom
Releasing holding patterns of dis-ease
Permanence, a self in control
Clear recognition only gentleness heals


Then standing, feeling the exchange
Of energy between this body
And its surroundings
Invisibly connected to all life
The possibility of universal benevolence
Always a choice despite chaotic patterns
 
The last week and a half were challenging. From viral gastroenteritis to a cough and cold, from asthma like symptoms to worsening muscle strains, from irritation, impatience, disappointment, and exhaustion, it felt like illness was taking up permanent residence in the body. There was so much self-identification with dis-ease states and the mental formations they invoked. There was also a frantic rush to swat the emergence of each new symptom with a medication as if it were an annoying fly that would never go away. Killing it was the only choice.

​Or was it?

As I start to regain some mental clarity and physical strength, it feels important to reflect on what created more suffering, and what eased the suffering. (The word choice of suffering is very personal. If it rubs you the wrong way because you may have a heavier, incurable illness or stress that feels more significant than what I am sharing, feel free to substitute suffering with another word.) Identifying with any symptom, dis-ease or mind state was painful. Trying to overcome it with wholesome mind states like kindness, compassion, even joy was also deceptive, because I wasn’t allowing true feelings like irritation, impatience, and disappointment to throw big tantrums. I wasn’t allowing the fear to be felt, the dark cloud of doubt to be seen and known. The choice to reach for certain medications for relief was wholesome, but there was a subtle aggression against the body for misbehaving and falling apart. The belief in permanence of it all was so strong, that the urge to control the situation felt paramount.

When I chose to feel the cough and compromised breathing with gentle compassion, surrendered to supine meditation posture and gravity, released a known timeline for healing, and reached out to others for loving, healing energy, something changed. There was less identification with an invincible or dysfunctional, in control or chaotic, mindful or mindless, compassionate or critical being. Most days there was a certain percentage of each one.

We live as if everything is black and white, a dualistic mentality that does not allow for shades of gray or degrees of uncertainty. We are healthy or sick, balanced or crazy, paying attention or clueless, kind or vengeful. Is it possible most of us might just live in between the two extremes, always trying to build a reliable house on one side so as not to fall into the abyss between two cliffs of ego?

The need to know, to have things planned and figured out is strong in me. It’s a survival mechanism based on causes and conditions. Now there is recognition, compassion, forgiveness, wisdom to cushion each fall into the abyss of becoming.

The karma of now always offers two choices, suffering and the end of suffering. Robert Frost wrote that two roads diverged in a yellow wood. If you are anything like me, you might see trails in the wood well-trodden in the past from deeply ingrained patterns. There aren’t just two roads, but many paths.
​
Through meditation, Qigong, wise friends, writing, or whatever your support systems might be, may you feel connected to all life, the possibility of universal benevolence always a choice despite chaotic patterns.

The sound of driving
Images through the windshield 
The mind wanders
But awareness knows
The way back to freedom
Pausing 
Between the seen, the heard
Before a response is rendered 
It’s ok sweetheart
Welcome home again 
Imagine greeting others this way
What the world would be like
If we could all return to this moment
From wherever we are
 
Everything that enters through the sense doors of sight, sound, taste, smell, touch, even a thought, is based on causes, conditions, influences, and beliefs. Yet we believe everything we see, everything we hear as if it were the ultimate truth:  a Facebook story with stunning pictures and the promise of bliss, circulating gossip at work and social gatherings, our loved ones’ outbursts, among other things.

Will we experience the same bliss if we dress similarly and visit the same places as our Facebook friends? Is the circulating gossip confirmed by our clarification first hand with those involved in the story? Do our loved ones really mean what they are saying in the heat of anger and irritation?

As I was driving to work one day, sounds of tires rolling, wind blowing, sights of other cars on the road and views of the bay were all perceived through the sense doors. For a few brief moments, bare attention was sustained on these sights and sounds. Soon the mind wandered, but awareness knew the way back to freedom.

Truth and safety can only be found in this moment, when we ask ourselves, “What is actually happening right now? Am I seeing clearly, or is my perception affected by tinted glasses?” When I pause between the seen, the heard, before I react and say or do something I’ll later regret based on misperceptions, there is a space. In that space lies the choice to sew seeds of greed, hatred and delusion, or generosity, kindness, and wisdom.

Before a response is rendered, we can give overwhelming thoughts, feelings, and sensations space to play themselves out in the body. Rilke said, “Let everything happen to you: beauty and terror. Just keep going. No feeling is final.” Maybe ‘just keep breathing’ would be more helpful in this context. It doesn’t matter how many times we have left this moment. It is there to greet all prodigal daughters and sons with open arms.

It’s ok sweetheart
Welcome home again    

In that welcome, we can be thoroughly nourished and resourced, returning again and again for the promise of true freedom.

*****

What started as a practice in stress reduction over twelve years ago has now taken on a relational quality and meaning for me. The more I return to present moment awareness and question what enters the sense doors, the more I understand about karmic potential. For me, mindfulness isn’t just about sitting on the cushion for temporary peace. It’s learning to greet others with the same Namaste that each moment greets me.

Imagine what the world would be like if we could all return to this moment from wherever we are.​

​Sandbridge, Virginia Beach, United States by Jae Bano

The lipid (cholesterol) and Hbaic (3 month blood sugar average) results are released online by my primary care physician. After a few months of changing the exercise routine due to a chronic piriformis injury, and celebrating Diwali, Thanksgiving, and Christmas with so much food, I know the numbers won’t be good.

Taking a few deep breathes, I click on the lab links. The numbers confirm my apprehension. Shoulders slump, the heart sinks in disappointment.

Judgmental thoughts abound. How could you possibly think hiking and walking would be enough? Can’t you control your food choices and intake? Isn’t it a bit hypocritical to offer advice to patients you can’t even follow yourself? The thoughts threaten to submerge the heart even more in the brewing anger, fear, and sadness conjured by them.

Mindfully aware of the thoughts, feelings, and effects they have on the body, I recognize an old pattern based on past causes and conditions. The lab values feel like health grades, a kind of report card defining my wellbeing. If the numbers are outside of a certain range, then I have failed.

Ouch! This hurts. It’s unpleasant. Does it have to be, or am I adding on extra arrows of suffering that don’t need to prick so sharply?

I don’t like the numbers, but like final semester grades, they don’t define what I’ve learned about physical, emotional, and spiritual wellbeing. I wonder what a wise teacher, loved one, or good friend might say to me in this moment to help me remember kindness.

Sweetheart, this is an invitation to the biggest wellbeing party of your life! How does your body want to move, to dance? What do you want to eat at this party that is not only sweet or savory when swallowed, but will last to support deep loving connections with self and others?

Radiant, the heart emerges with more care, communicating with a curious mind to expand a narrowly focused lens on experience. With a panoramic view, I think of my colleagues and other physicians who balance the wellbeing of patients with their own wellbeing every day, sometimes to their own detriment. Ahh, others experience this, too.

Though I work part-time, have so much support at home, and cannot attribute a change in health status to work alone, I know other physicians suffer from exquisite burnout. Burdened by the overwhelming weight of patient care, demanding electronic medical records that threaten the physician-patient relationship, and never-ending administrative duties that seem to proliferate at an alarming rate, mindlessness can feel like the only easy way out.

According to Diana Winston, Director of Mindful Education at the UCLA Mindful Awareness Research Center (MARC), mindfulness is “paying attention to your present moment experience with openness, curiosity, and a willingness to be with what is.” For years, I worked with definitions like this in meditation, movement practices, silent retreats, and meetings with a mentor. The “paying attention to present moment experience with openness and curiosity” piece was starting to make sense. The mind got it, but the heart still wasn’t convinced.

When I learned about Kristen Neff and Chris Germer’s research and teachings on self-compassion, and began to integrate them into mindful practices, the heart began to trust the combined capacity of heart-mind to communicate with the body, to be in tune with each other and sense when there was an imbalance of thoughts, feelings, and sensations leading to dis-ease. The capacity to stay with these experiences led to internal freedom and joy independent of external circumstances.

To this day, mindful self-compassion gives me the strength to stay with difficult patients and circumstances, to touch intimacy and vulnerability without overwhelm, to celebrate healing with patients in a larger context than ones limited by disease states and problem lists.
 
Clearing
by Martha Postlewaite

Do not try to save
the whole world
or do anything grandiose.
Instead, create
a clearing
in the dense forest
of your life
and wait there
patiently,
until the song
that is your life
falls into your own cupped hands
and you recognize and greet it.
Only then will you know
how to give yourself
to this world
so worth of rescue.
 
May we all create a clearing in the dense forest of our lives. May mindful self-compassion bring back the meaning in medicine.

The email subject line announces the release of this quarter’s publication. It’s finally here! After one and a half months of anticipation, I wonder how the article on diversity and inclusivity in healthcare will land on colleagues.

Will they comment on the compassion, insightfulness, or skill of writing? Will they see me in a different light, beyond the part time family physician who doesn’t ‘work as hard’ as others? Will they appreciate the need for diversity and inclusivity awareness? Will they feel inspired to learn and implement some of the suggestions?

Holding my breath, I close the email. There are patients to see, an electronic medical record inbox to attend to. The thoughts almost lift me off the chair, out of the body and to another place far from here.

Earth to Kaveri. Feel your feet on the ground, sits bones on the chair, breath moving through you. You have work to do. The email can wait.
 
*****
 
After the dinner dishes have been rinsed, the dishwasher loaded, the family immersed in their evening rituals, I click on the email that links to the newsletter. Scrolling the contents, the heart sinks when I find my article towards the end of the publication, confined to one page, a majority of the original content missing.

What the hell! is my first reaction. I feel like someone has just taken away a prize I never won and stripped me of all false pretensions. Feeling angry, hurt, and exposed, who am I right now? The beautiful writer whose article didn’t make the front cover?  The kind, mindful physician who is really an imposter?

There is a strong urge to email the editor with these woes. Excuse me. There’s been a terrible mistake. But something inside encourages connection to the earth for grounding, awareness of breath to notice the subtle transition between stillness and movement, a warmth in the heart to encourage gentleness, and remembrance of the body as 60% water. Water takes on the shape of any container it fills. Can I take on the shape of this moment?
 
*****
 
Like inflated balloons being twisted and shaped by a clown at a children’s party, I wonder how many selves were created between writing the article, waiting for its release, and watching for impact. Judgments begin to arise. Hasn’t DPP6 taught you anything by now? There are only 4 months left in the program. Better figure it out soon! The midback tightens where the stone of shame is carried on the shadow side of the heart.

In meditation, compassion and humor are also present, gently popping the inflated balloon selves with pinpoint precision. Awww, Sweetie. Of course these balloons were present. Past karma, causes and conditions. The balloons are pretty frickin’ hilarious, aren’t they? Feel free to cry, laugh, or do both. It’s all welcome here. Metta fire from the heart holds the shadow side in loving awareness.
 
*****
 
An email is composed to the editor, thanking them for inclusion of the article in this quarter’s publication. An inquiry is made about changes to the article from its original content. The email ends with metta blessings for the holidays. Another email is received from the CEO of our organization expressing appreciation for the article.

Regardless of the number of painful ‘ego I’ deaths occurring with this experience, the emergence of ‘elemental i’ is totally worth it.

Grounded in Earth.
Breath sensing the subtle transition between stillness and movement.
Metta fire to encourage gentleness.
Body as 60% water, taking on the shape of this moment.

Not self, infinite space holding all of life’s dramas. An open heart learning to love what is real.

*****

(Come explore ego I and elemental i through meditation and reflective journaling. For information click here.)

Born into this moment,
each breath is a wave
erasing past selves carved in sand.
Still, I try to build
a grand sandcastle of ego
further inland for protection,
till the sea swallows it whole
into a belly of no becoming.
Birthed again from the womb
of wholesome intentions,
returning as a song that leaves its shell
to join the collective chorus for peace.
 
Each moment I am born into a new molecular configuration, erasing past selves carved in sand. This is a blessing and a curse. A blessing in that the slate of deficiencies can easily be erased. A curse in that even a grand sandcastle of ego built further inland for protection is defenseless against the sea.

Who am I trying to be? An acclaimed poet/writer? A popular family physician with good reviews? A mindful, compassionate mother? A wise meditator? A sacred feminine conduit with direct access to the Great Mother? An expert on diversity and inclusivity?

Who am I trying to run away from? The ideal housewife and daughter? The productive physician? The body that can be in better shape as evidence by certain chronic conditions? The anxious one? The mother who failed? The callous one?

Just typing all these selves makes my head spin. It’s like strolling through an open bazaar with a new outfit in mind. The vendors come at me from all directions displaying their colorful wares. “This is an exclusive dress. Hand stitched. Best price in town. You won’t find it anywhere else.”

​Who ever said I was for sale??

I’m tired of trying to be someone. Trying to impress. Trying to build a sandcastle of ego that will last.

Let the sea swallow me whole into a belly of no becoming. Birthed again from the womb of wholesome intentions, may i connect, create, have compassion for a larger sphere than this small sense of self.

May i return as a song that leaves its shell to join the collective chorus for peace. This eternal song of generosity, wisdom, kindness, patience, determination, joy, compassion, mindfulness, and faith has no name. It doesn’t belong to anyone.
​
And it can still be shared.

This is a verbal garbage dump without
a forethought of what will harm the heart-
speeches, judgements all aimed at
protecting one’s own view while
the unreal other is suffering, too.
 
This could be a love letter, a truce
one brave act of forgiveness,
the walls of division crumbling
because one side is tired of living
inside a limited potential for peace.
 
Shedding tears of individual and collective harm this morning in meditation. So mentally and physically tired by this country’s political climate. Reflecting on dependent origination, karma, and not-self, I realize how important my spoken and written words are.  Do I want to contribute to what this is, or what this could be?