this is an artifact of messy chatting with Chat-GPT – in creating the HOME month – some fun pictures in here, so I thought I would share – maybe useful to meditate though – some of it is surely crap, but maybe some diamonds in the rough 🙂
What Becomes Possible When It Doesn’t Take SO Much Just to Be & Do Us?
What if Life didn’t require quite so much pushing?
Not less living.
Not less creating.
Not less courage.
Not less work.
Not less movement.
Not less showing up.
Maybe MORE.
More running.
More dancing.
More building.
More loving.
More creating.
More leading.
More changing.
More becoming.
More actually getting the damn thing DONE.
But…
less pushing within.
Less forcing ourselves through our own Life.
Less gripping the steering wheel at the red light as though squeezing it hard enough might make the car fly.
Less energy spent fighting ourselves.
Less trying to personally manufacture enough force to make reality move.
What becomes possible when it doesn’t take so much of us…
just to be and do us?
This is some of what I mean by:
EASE.
A Small Word Can Hold a Whole Cathedral
One of the challenges in talking about this work is that the words can sound so simple.
Safety.
Comfort.
Ease.
Inside → OUT.
Body-Soul.
Flow.
Oneness.
For me, each of these words opens into a whole lived architecture.
A cathedral.
But if you haven’t been swimming in these practices already, the same word may open…
a coat closet.
😂
So when I say Ease, I don’t simply mean:
Take it easy.
Relax.
Do less.
Avoid difficulty.
Make Life comfortable.
I mean something much more fundamental about how we use our power, how we choose, how we move, and how we participate with Life itself.
That’s what we’re opening here.
HOME: From Safety to Comfort to Ease
Our theme this month in Soul GYM is:
HOME
Living as Allies with Our Body-Soul
We’ve been cultivating three closely related light-yellow energies:
Safety.
Comfort.
Ease.
Not as perfect states we must achieve.
Not as another self-improvement assignment.
As Blessings and Practices.
As conditions we cultivate from deep within.
Safety helps more of us come HOME.
Comfort helps us learn to live well together once we’re here.
And Ease?
Ease helps us MOVE from HOME.
Not running away from ourselves.
Not dragging ourselves behind us.
Not fighting ourselves every step of the way.
Increasingly able to move with ourselves…
and with Life.
Ease Is NOT the Opposite of Work
Let’s get this out of the way immediately.
When I talk about Ease, I am not saying:
Don’t work.
Don’t exert yourself.
Don’t sweat.
Don’t stretch.
Don’t run.
Don’t dig.
Don’t build.
Don’t climb the mountain.
Don’t catch the ball.
Don’t stay up late finishing something you love.
Don’t dance until your legs hurt.
Effort in the physical world can be magnificent.
If I want to move a pile of dirt from here to there, that requires physical effort.
Sometimes catching the ball requires an extraordinary burst of exertion.
Sometimes we’re tired and still choose to finish the job.
Wonderful.
That’s not the Effort I’m talking about.
I’m talking about the extra effort within that doesn’t actually help.
Soul Effort.
The additional human trying.
The pushing.
Forcing.
Straining.
Gripping.
Fighting.
Spinning.
Controlling.
The energy we burn without contributing to the movement we actually want.
The Monastery
There is an old Eastern spiritual story I love.
A man goes to a monastery and says to the teacher:
I’m completely committed to this. How long will it take me to become a master?
The teacher says:
Ten years.
The student objects:
No, no, you don’t understand.
I’m ALL IN.
I’ll work harder than everyone else.
How long if I give it everything I’ve got?
The teacher considers this.
Fifteen years.
The student is horrified.
No!
I mean I will work DAY AND NIGHT.
No one has ever seen the kind of effort I am willing to put into this.
Surely then I can get there faster?
The teacher replies:
Twenty years.
😂
There it is.
The more desperately the student tries to force mastery…
the farther away mastery becomes.
Not because discipline is bad.
Not because devotion is bad.
Not because practice is unnecessary.
Because the very thing he’s trying to accomplish requires learning a way of being that cannot be forced into existence by more internal pushing.
That is Ease.
You Can Be Still and Full of Effort
Imagine you’re late for an important meeting.
You’re driving.
Everybody else has apparently chosen TODAY to take a leisurely Sunday drive.
Someone is jaywalking.
Someone doesn’t notice the green light.
The person ahead of you seems committed to never exceeding twenty-seven miles per hour.
Then:
RED LIGHT.
You’re stopped.
What is happening outside?
Your car is sitting at a red light.
Appropriately.
What is happening inside the car?
You’re panting.
Cursing.
Clenching your jaw.
Squeezing the steering wheel as though perhaps you can launch the car through telekinesis.
GO!
MOVE!
COME ON!
What is happening within?
Enormous Effort.
Pressure.
Striving.
Hatred.
Fear.
Trying.
Energy spinning with nowhere useful to go.
And how much faster does this get you to the meeting?
Approximately…
not at all.
😂
You can be physically motionless…
and internally exhausting yourself.
Worse, all that internal effort can actually make things less safe.
Your perception narrows.
You don’t notice the bicycle.
You snap at your partner.
You arrive dysregulated and furious.
The pressure has to go somewhere.
And often…
it goes into us.
Body.
Soul.
Relationship.
Life.
Soul Effort Doesn’t Help
This is the distinction I was trained in:
Effort within, by definition, does not help.
We often think we’re helping.
We’re trying SO HARD.
But the trying itself may be getting in the way.
Like pushing through water instead of learning how to plane.
Like trying to personally shove the river downstream.
Like using an electric chainsaw…
without plugging it in.
😂
You could work incredibly hard with that chainsaw.
Sweat pouring off you.
Muscles straining.
Jaw clenched.
Look how committed you are!
Look at your work ethic!
Look at the heroic EFFORT!
And you’ll probably make less progress than somebody using an ordinary hand saw.
Meanwhile…
there’s an outlet.
Plug. It. In.
That’s Ease.
Not:
Don’t cut the wood.
Not:
Sit there and manifest cut firewood.
😂
Plug into the power that can actually help you cut it.
Then…
CUT.
Some of Us Are Identified with Effort
This can be tricky.
Because some of us don’t primarily identify with results.
We identify with trying.
I’m working.
I’m busy.
I’m overwhelmed.
I’m giving everything.
I’m never stopping.
Go go go go go.
Therefore:
I am okay.
I am worthy.
Responsible.
Necessary.
Productive.
Good.
Look how much I’m carrying.
Look how hard I’m trying.
The effort itself becomes evidence of identity.
So Ease can feel strangely threatening.
If I’m not pushing…
am I lazy?
Selfish?
Irresponsible?
Am I doing enough?
Do I matter?
Who am I if I’m not exhausted?
And sometimes…
we discover that enormous effort has been producing remarkably little movement.
An energy-burning machine.
Very impressive engine noise.
Not much distance traveled.
The WAY of Spirit Is FLOW
In my experience and training, the WAY of Spirit is Flow.
Life moves.
Energy moves.
Change moves.
Spirit moves.
We can learn to perceive and participate in that movement.
We can swim with the river.
Or against it.
Swimming against it doesn’t necessarily keep us from the ocean.
But holy hell…
it can wear us out.
😂
Ease isn’t refusing to swim.
It’s discovering:
Where is the current?
Where is Life already moving?
What happens if I participate?
What if we learn to Move the Sail – Non’t Manufacture the Wind
Imagine sailing.
The sailor isn’t passive.
They pay attention.
They perceive.
They choose a destination.
They adjust.
Raise sails.
Lower sails.
Turn.
Tack.
Respond to weather.
Correct course.
Work around obstacles.
Sometimes they work their ass off.
But the sailor does not stand on deck shouting:
I MUST PERSONALLY CREATE WIND.
😂
The wind is already blowing.
The art is relationship.
Where is it moving?
Where am I going?
What adjustment allows me to use the power already available?
That’s Ease.
Move the sail. Don’t manufacture the wind.
There May Already Be a Path Through the Forest
Imagine standing before dense forest.
You could decide:
I must personally cut a straight road through every tree between here and my destination.
Chainsaw!
Effort!
Force!
OR…
wait.
What’s that?
A deer trail.
A wildlife path.
Something has already found a viable way through.
Maybe it doesn’t take you directly where you’re going.
Maybe you’ll still need to clear some brush.
Maybe you’ll eventually leave the trail.
But perhaps Life has already provided leverage.
Ease asks us to notice.
Can You Let the Mud Settle?
Sometimes Ease looks like movement.
Sometimes Ease looks like:
wait.
Can you become still like a pond?
Let the mud settle.
Stop stirring everything because you’re terrified that not acting means you’re failing.
Wait until you can perceive.
And then…
perhaps the right action becomes apparent.
Maybe movement begins almost by itself.
Not because we’ve abdicated choice.
Because we’ve stopped producing so much internal turbulence that we can finally perceive what’s actually happening.
Then:
MOVE.
Call.
Run.
Build.
Leave.
Speak.
Rest.
Say yes.
Say no.
Work all day.
Ease within. Action without.
We Need Power
This is not a teaching about becoming powerless.
Quite the opposite.
We need power.
Energy.
Capacity.
Resources.
Will.
Authority.
Choice.
We need enough to BE ourselves.
Do what we’re here to do.
Care for ourselves.
Care for our people.
Build.
Create.
Contribute.
Participate.
Make our difference.
But here’s the problem:
Our personal human force isn’t enough.
Even the strongest of us…
the smartest…
most capable…
most disciplined…
most resourced…
at the absolute peak of our human capacity…
cannot personally force everything required to make Life conform to all the pictures we’re carrying.
And yet we try.
Of course we do.
Most of us weren’t taught another way.
Human Force Has Many Costumes
Sometimes we force overtly.
Push.
Fight.
Dominate.
Demand.
Compel.
Control.
MAKE IT HAPPEN.
Sometimes we force covertly.
Maneuver.
Manipulate.
Please.
Rescue.
Seduce.
End-run.
Sneak.
Manage everyone’s reactions.
Arrange circumstances so people will do what we want without our having to ask directly.
Different costumes.
Same underlying predicament:
I’m trying to personally generate the force required to make reality move.
But there may be another way.
The wind is already blowing.
The river is already moving.
There may already be a path through the forest.
Sacred Power Rather Than Personal Force
I use the language of Sacred Power.
Not because we become omnipotent.
Not because Life suddenly does whatever we want.
Not because we surrender our responsibility.
But because the power available to participate in Life is larger than our personal pushing.
We can learn to notice it.
Invite it.
Receive it.
Relate with it.
Participate with it.
Adjust ourselves relative to it.
Let it move us.
Move with it.
And from there…
act.
This is the difference between trying to muscle an unplugged chainsaw through a tree…
and plugging the damn thing in.
How Much of Your Power Is Being Spent Pushing Against Yourself?
There is another enormous drain on our available power.
Us.
😂
One part says:
GO.
Another says:
DON’T.
One says:
I WANT THIS.
Another:
WHAT WILL PEOPLE THINK?
One says:
REST.
Another:
YOU’RE LAZY.
One says:
LEAVE.
Another:
GOOD PEOPLE DON’T ABANDON ANYONE.
One says:
CREATE.
Another:
WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE?
One says:
YES.
Another says:
MOM WILL BE UPSET.
One says:
THIS IS MY LIFE.
Another:
BUT THIS ISN’T WHAT PEOPLE LIKE US DO.
And then we wonder why we’re tired.
This is what I sometimes think of as isometrics.
We’re pushing against ourselves.
Muscles firing in opposite directions.
Enormous energy expenditure.
Very little movement.
How much of your power is being spent pushing against yourself?
Welcome to King Arthur’s Round Table
Here’s another way I picture mastery within.
King Arthur’s Round Table.
All the parts of me are invited.
Each is monarch of its own realm.
Body.
Emotion.
Desire.
Sexuality.
Analyzer.
Fear.
Practicality.
Creativity.
Tenderness.
Ambition.
Soul perception.
Each has intelligence.
Information.
Gifts.
They don’t all have to agree.
But they need to be heard.
Respected.
Allowed to become increasingly free to be their magnificent selves and bring their gifts.
And…
someone needs responsibility for the whole kingdom.
It helps if the King of Kings is healthy, supportive and making wise choices.
😂
Who Is Voting Who Doesn’t Get a Present-Time Vote?
This becomes a fascinating question at the Round Table.
Because sitting there may also be:
Mom’s opinion.
Dad’s fear.
Grandma’s rule.
Third-grade humiliation.
An agreement made when we were twelve.
A former partner’s preference.
An inherited religious rule.
An old survival strategy.
A cultural expectation.
Programming.
An identity we outgrew.
A lie that still seems true.
A promise nobody remembers making.
A carrot.
A stick.
Some deserve acknowledgment.
Some contain useful information.
Some once helped us survive.
But…
do they get a present-time vote?
Without discernment, we may have hundreds of voices from every era of our existence simultaneously attempting to govern our Life.
No wonder the kingdom sometimes resembles a circus.
😂
We Were Shaped
This is where free will gets interesting.
We are shaped.
By family.
Culture.
Reward.
Punishment.
Belonging.
Exclusion.
Praise.
Silence.
Fear.
Love.
Expectation.
Modeling.
What was possible around us.
What nobody around us could imagine.
A prevailing wind doesn’t need to punch a tree.
It blows.
Again.
Again.
Again.
And the tree grows in relationship to it.
Water doesn’t attack rock.
Drop.
Drop.
Drop.
Drop.
Eventually the landscape changes.
Human shaping can be like this.
A look.
A laugh.
Approval.
Disapproval.
What’s praised.
What’s mocked.
What’s expected.
What’s forbidden.
What’s considered respectable.
What’s considered ridiculous.
Again.
Again.
Again.
Until eventually:
The shaping disappears from perception and the resulting shape gets called “ME.”
Programming: The Acorns in Our Cheeks
Some shaping becomes identity.
This is who I am.
Some isn’t quite swallowed that completely.
But we haven’t spit it out either.
I sometimes picture programming like a squirrel with acorns stuffed in its cheeks.
😂
The acorns aren’t exactly the squirrel.
But they sure affect how the squirrel is moving around.
Programming can operate like that.
Not fully experienced as:
ME.
But still shaping how Life occurs.
Add agreements.
Old experiences.
Fear.
Shame.
Other people’s expectations.
Images.
Habits.
Lies that seem true.
Hopes.
Dreams.
Survival strategies.
And we begin to see why purposeful change can be difficult.
Choice Is Simple. Becoming Free Enough to Choose Can Be Complex.
We love to say:
Choose differently.
Wonderful.
And sometimes that’s exactly what we can do.
But sometimes we’re trying to choose a different throw pillow…
and sometimes we’re moving a load-bearing wall.
Our earliest shaping can become like concrete.
And then we build houses on that concrete.
Walls.
Rooms.
Wiring.
Plumbing.
Roof.
Maybe a lovely imported marble fireplace.
😂
There’s a LOT holding the structure in place.
Even the concrete can change.
But deeper structures generally take more time.
More leverage.
More practice.
More provision.
So yes:
We can choose again.
But saying that doesn’t mean choosing again is always easy.
We Are Not Trees
We bent to the wind.
Often because bending was wiser than breaking.
We adapted.
Learned.
Belonged.
Survived.
And those adaptations shaped us.
But:
We are not trees.
We can participate consciously in our own reshaping.
Not perfectly.
Not instantly.
Not entirely.
But genuinely.
We can begin to perceive what has been choosing through us.
And then ask:
What do WE choose?
Free Will Isn’t Only “Nobody Tells Me What to Do”
Reclaiming free will is much deeper than rebellion.
It isn’t:
Nobody controls me!
I’ll do whatever I want!
It’s developing increasing capacity to participate consciously in what organizes our choices.
What is choosing here?
Fear?
Belonging?
Identity?
Programming?
Body wisdom?
Desire?
An old agreement?
Someone else’s expectation?
Present-time discernment?
Soul?
What realm?
And within that realm…
where?
Continent?
Country?
State?
City?
Street?
House?
Room?
Where is the actual leverage point?
Because enormous gnarly problems can sometimes become workable when we find a human-sized bite.
Something we can actually chew.
We Can Get Leverage
This is why tools matter.
Practice matters.
Distinctions matter.
Provision matters.
Community matters.
Working below everyday consciousness matters.
We don’t have to command ourselves from the surface:
CHANGE!
We can work where some of the shaping actually lives.
Sometimes change happens outside → IN.
We change a habit repeatedly and deeper organization begins changing with it.
That can work.
And sometimes we work inside → OUT.
Something in identity…
story…
agreement…
energy…
relationship…
organization…
begins shifting.
And behavior can become increasingly natural from there.
Because we tend to act in accordance with who we experience ourselves to be.
So instead of eternally asking:
How do I force myself to repeatedly behave unlike myself?
We can also ask:
Who am I becoming — and what becomes increasingly natural from there?
Freedom Needs to Become Inhabitable
Identity is enormous.
I sometimes think of identity as:
the stories we live in.
And those stories can be as large as Wikipedia.
😂
Trying to rip identity apart isn’t necessarily healing.
Changing too much, too quickly can be profoundly destabilizing.
So sometimes transformation is much gentler.
Imagine a tent.
We move the stakes outward a few inches.
A little more room.
A little more breath.
Maybe we can move some furniture.
Maybe something can leave.
Maybe something new can enter.
A little more spaciousness.
Then a little more.
Eventually perhaps the lamp goes out…
and a lion comes in.
😂
Our own royalty.
Captainship.
Soul leadership.
But we don’t have to shove the lion through the tent flap on Day One.
Freedom needs to become inhabitable.
Community Can Make Choice More Possible
Changing around the people who helped install all the buttons, walls, ceilings and roofs can be particularly difficult.
Sometimes it helps enormously to spend time with people who are comfortable with us choosing.
People who model choice.
People who aren’t terrified when we change.
People who aren’t invested in returning us to our assigned chair.
People who are perfectly delighted if we decide not to build another house on the old concrete…
but instead live outside.
Or build something completely different.
Or buy an RV.
😂
We learn through relationship.
Modeling matters.
Resonance matters.
Practice alongside others matters.
Community isn’t merely “support.”
It can help create a field in which choice itself becomes increasingly normal.
Not:
Choose what Wendy chooses.
But:
You get to choose.
And Reclaiming Free Will Can Feel Like SHIT
Let’s be honest.
😂
We sometimes talk about liberation as though we suddenly recognize our conditioning, choose differently, throw our arms toward heaven and shout:
I’M FREE!
Maybe.
Sometimes.
But changing can also feel absolutely terrible.
Because systems resist change.
Inside us.
Around us.
We change…
and something says:
CHANGE BACK.
Pushback
When one part of a relational system changes, the rest of the system often responds.
I call it pushback.
We change ourselves…
and relationships change.
Expectations change.
Patterns change.
Other people may become uncomfortable.
And inside us?
Identity pushes.
Programming pushes.
Fear pushes.
Old agreements push.
Habit pushes.
Belonging pushes.
Our familiar reality says:
Come back.
This is one reason change can feel so difficult even when we desperately want it.
The system has organized around what already exists.
Resistance Is NOT a Compass
Moving toward what matters can provoke enormous resistance.
Moving toward greater mastery, visibility, leadership, purpose and becoming can produce tremendous pushback.
AND…
this distinction matters enormously:
Resistance is not a compass.
Resistance does not prove you’re on the right path.
Resistance does not prove you’re on the wrong path.
You can encounter resistance while becoming more fully yourself.
And you can encounter resistance while driving directly into a barn.
😂
Both can hurt.
Both can produce breakdowns.
Both can scare you.
Both can involve pushback.
So mastery requires more than courageously overpowering resistance.
It requires:
discernment.
What is actually happening?
Is this my path?
Am I off-course?
Is this old programming protesting?
Is my body giving me important information?
Is this fear?
Wisdom?
Pushback?
A closed road?
A difficult but appropriate climb?
We listen.
We discern.
We adjust.
We choose.
Change Becomes the New Normal — Until We Change Again
Here’s another irritating feature of transformation.
😂
We make the change.
It’s uncomfortable.
We hold it.
Practice.
Acclimate.
Eventually…
this becomes normal.
Wonderful!
Then Life says:
Time to change again.
NOOOOOO.
😂
Now the thing we worked so hard to create has become what we don’t want to leave.
I experience this even with ordinary transitions.
I don’t want to get in the shower.
Then I don’t want to get OUT of the shower.
I don’t want to get into the pool.
Then I don’t want to leave the pool.
I don’t want to get into bed.
Then I absolutely do not want to get out.
Apparently I chose a career in transformation despite having a personal constitutional objection to changing states.
😂
So mastery isn’t reaching a place where change never rubs.
It’s developing increasing capacity to move through change.
Reclaiming Free Will Can Bring Us Face-to-Face with Everything
Fear.
Pain.
Shame.
Darkness.
Old wounds.
Demons.
The parts of ourselves we’ve hidden.
And sometimes perhaps most terrifyingly…
our Light.
Our size.
Our power.
Our magnificence.
What we’re actually capable of.
Who we might become if we stop organizing our Life around staying small enough to remain familiar.
No wonder people resist.
No wonder WE resist.
Reclaiming free will isn’t always a pleasant spa treatment.
😂
But…
there is another side.
What Does Greater Freedom Feel Like?
For me?
Space.
I can breathe.
I can move.
I can stop hiding.
I can show up.
I can choose not to show up.
I can take better care of myself.
I can stop pushing.
I can play.
I can dance.
I grew up extraordinarily shy.
Contracted.
Afraid.
Unable to simply show up.
And over years of practice, I’ve watched that change.
Not perfectly.
Not everywhere.
But profoundly.
Someone who has known me for years recently noticed that I could simply walk into a place and talk with people…
like it was the most normal thing in the world.
No enormous internal mobilization.
No giant production.
No fuss.
No muss.
Just…
be there.
I’ve always loved people.
Now, increasingly:
I can just be with them.
And I can also choose not to.
That’s freedom too.
What Becomes Possible When It Doesn’t Take So Much of You Just to Be & Do You?
This may be one of the deepest questions of Ease.
How much energy has it taken simply to:
enter the room?
speak?
rest?
say no?
ask?
be seen?
create?
lead?
receive?
stop?
begin?
be ourselves?
Imagine reclaiming some of that energy.
Not to become superhuman.
Not necessarily to accomplish twelve times more.
Maybe simply to:
live.
Less frozen.
Less hiding.
Less dragging ourselves.
Less pushing ourselves through our own Life.
More available.
More responsive.
More playful.
More alive.
Knowing Assertiveness Isn’t the Same as BEing Assertive
Years ago, I was sent to trainings on assertiveness and communication.
I knew the material.
Honestly, I probably could have taught some of it.
😂
It didn’t help.
Why?
Because I knew about assertiveness.
But I couldn’t yet BE assertive.
The scripts weren’t the missing piece.
Something underneath wasn’t sufficiently available.
Power.
Will.
Energy.
Authority.
Choice.
Captainship.
Soul leadership.
Years later, after cultivating these capacities, something very different can happen.
A boundary may simply arise.
I need this.
I don’t need that.
I like this.
I don’t like that.
I want this.
I don’t want that.
I’m done with this.
No 3×5 card.
No coaching session immediately beforehand.
No seven-step assertiveness formula running through my head.
The system can increasingly generate the behavior naturally.
Assertiveness becomes fruit.
A Healthy Cell Has a Membrane
This gives us another way to understand boundaries.
A healthy cell doesn’t attend an assertiveness workshop in order to develop a membrane.
😂
Its boundary is part of its living organization.
The membrane doesn’t prevent relationship.
The membrane makes relationship possible.
Through its living edge, the cell:
receives.
releases.
exchanges.
responds.
protects.
communicates.
relates.
The boundary isn’t merely a wall keeping Life out.
It’s the living edge through which Life happens.
Natural Boundaries
Perhaps this is why ownership supports natural boundaries.
When there is increasingly a ME here…
I don’t have to manufacture an edge every time somebody approaches.
The system has one.
I can perceive:
Mine.
Yours.
Yes.
No.
Enough.
More.
Come closer.
Back up.
Not now.
Let’s go.
I can receive without being invaded.
Give without disappearing.
Love without surrendering responsibility for my own Life.
Care about your emotions without becoming responsible for having them for you.
See you without ceasing to see me.
I can be wholly ME and wholly WITH YOU.
Differentiate in Order to Relate
This is one of the great paradoxes.
We sometimes imagine Oneness means eliminating difference.
Becoming merged.
Boundaryless.
One giant spiritual soup.
😂
But:
Differentiate in order to relate.
I need enough ME to meet YOU.
Otherwise there isn’t relationship.
There’s fusion.
People-pleasing.
Enmeshment.
Control.
Disappearance.
Projection.
Taking responsibility for everybody.
Or erecting such enormous defenses that nobody can reach us.
Healthy differentiation creates another possibility:
I/Thou.
Oneness is the spiritual reality.
Duality is the game we’re playing.
I/Thou is the practice.
Individuation.
Heart and Power
This brings us to another piece of Ease.
In the chakra picture I work with, each chakra supports those above it.
Root supports Sacral.
Sacral supports Solar Plexus.
Solar Plexus supports Heart.
Imagine a tiered serving stand.
Earth beneath.
Heavens above.
Each level influencing the others.
And I have long pictured the Solar Plexus almost like the setting of an engagement ring.
Strong.
Sure.
Holding the diamond:
the Heart.
The Diamond Doesn’t Need to Hold Itself in the Ring
This matters personally to me.
I came in with a big Heart.
Love.
Connection.
Relationship.
These capacities were strong.
And for a long time I was deeply identified with them.
But I was less permitted — by nature, nurture and everything that shaped me — to own some of my active energy.
Power.
Authority.
Will.
Leadership.
So Heart ended up doing jobs that weren’t Heart’s job.
I accessed belonging through relationship.
Resources through relationship.
Power through relationship.
I was often the power behind the throne.
Making somebody else successful.
Helping another person’s voice emerge.
Moving and shaking behind the person who appeared to be in charge.
The power was there.
But I wasn’t fully owning it.
And here’s an important realization:
Unowned power doesn’t necessarily disappear. It finds another way to operate.
Love Doesn’t Need to Do Everybody Else’s Job
If Heart has to:
love,
connect,
secure resources,
create belonging,
protect itself,
get our needs met,
exercise power sideways,
manage everybody,
keep everyone happy,
AND experience Oneness…
that’s a ridiculous job description.
😂
No wonder the flower closes.
Perhaps Heart can be relieved of some responsibilities.
Let Root do Root.
Let Sacral do Sacral.
Let Solar Plexus do Solar Plexus.
And then…
let Heart be Heart.
The setting holds the diamond.
The diamond gets to shine.
Power and Love as Equals
One of my teachers emphasized having Heart and Solar Plexus balanced — Power and Love as equals in how we live our way.
I don’t emphasize chakra sizing much now.
But the underlying picture remains meaningful.
Not:
Love conquers Power.
Not:
Power protects us from needing Love.
Not:
Become all Heart and transcend the messy lower stuff.
Power AND Love.
Power:
I am.
I choose.
I will.
I act.
I hold.
Heart:
I love.
I receive.
I recognize.
I experience Oneness.
Together:
I can be wholly ME and experience myself as wholly WITH YOU.
The Heart Doesn’t Need to Be Its Own Bodyguard
When Solar Plexus increasingly owns:
power,
will,
energy,
authority,
choice,
appropriate protection,
Heart doesn’t have to negotiate every experience around the possibility of injury.
OPEN!
NO, CLOSE!
LOVE!
DON’T GET HURT!
CONNECT!
PROTECT YOURSELF!
Another isometric madhouse.
😂
But perhaps Solar Plexus can say:
Sweetheart, you do your job. I’ve got the perimeter.
The flower doesn’t have to become the fence.
The flower can open because something else is tending the garden.
My NO Can Protect My Capacity to Remain Open-Hearted
This changes boundaries too.
I don’t necessarily have to stop loving you in order to say:
No.
I don’t have to make you bad.
I don’t have to close my Heart.
I don’t have to prove you wrong.
I don’t have to disappear.
I don’t have to surrender.
Solar Plexus can simply perceive and respond:
No.
Enough.
Not here.
Not now.
This is mine.
That is yours.
And perhaps:
My NO can protect my capacity to remain open-hearted.
Power doesn’t have to compete with Love.
Power can serve Love.
Heart as Mother — Mater, Manger
Within this emerging picture, I experience Heart as Mother.
Mater.
Manger.
And what is born, held and embodied there?
**Sacred Love.
Light.
Oneness.**
The holy child.
The Heart can mother that Light.
Hold it.
Reflect it.
Enjoy it.
Allow it to be enjoyed.
And the Solar Plexus can provide enough structure that Heart doesn’t need to become its own defender.
The ring holds.
The diamond shines.
The manger receives.
Sacred Love becomes embodied.
Oneness Becomes Easier
And then something almost funny happens.
After all this work…
Safety.
Comfort.
Differentiation.
Power.
Will.
Choice.
Boundaries.
Practice.
Discernment.
All this enormous excavation…
what happens at Heart?
Oneness becomes easy.
😂
Love.
Connection.
Sometimes bliss.
Available.
Because perhaps Oneness isn’t something we have to manufacture.
Oneness already IS.
We Don’t Create Oneness
In my spiritual picture, everything we can imagine — and everything beyond our imagination — exists within the ONE.
God.
Spirit.
All-that-is.
Earth.
Her children.
Humanity.
Solar systems.
Galaxies.
Universes.
Multiverses.
Whatever is beyond our current capacity to perceive.
As the ancient phrase says:
In God we live and move and have our being.
Heart’s intelligence can directly experience something of this reality.
Affinity.
Oneness within ourselves.
With another.
Family.
Community.
Humanity.
Earth.
Life.
Cosmos.
ONE.
We don’t create it.
We become increasingly available to experience it.
As We Mature, “Our People” Can Become Very Large
Our circle of identification can expand.
Me.
Mine.
Family.
Tribe.
Neighborhood.
Community.
Nation.
Humanity.
Earth and all her children.
Solar system.
Galaxy.
Universe.
Multiverses…
Eventually “our people” becomes rather enormous.
😂
But expansion doesn’t require erasing ourselves.
Quite the opposite.
I Don’t Have to Disappear into Oneness
Fusion is not Oneness.
People-pleasing is not Oneness.
Having no boundaries is not Oneness.
Taking responsibility for everyone’s feelings is not Oneness.
Making somebody else the throne through which I exercise my power is not Oneness.
Erasing myself so we can remain connected is not Oneness.
Those things can look remarkably loving.
Especially when Heart is doing everybody else’s job.
But perhaps something cleaner becomes possible:
I can be wholly ME and experience myself as wholly WITH YOU.
Differentiate in order to relate.
Oneness is the spiritual reality.
Duality is the game.
I/Thou is the practice.
Maybe This Is What Ease Is Ultimately For
Safety isn’t ultimately about spending our whole Life getting safer.
Safety is a condition we cultivate so we can LIVE.
Comfort isn’t ultimately about making every experience comfortable.
Comfort helps us become increasingly able to inhabit ourselves and Life.
And Ease?
Maybe Ease isn’t ultimately about having an easy Life.
Perhaps Ease helps free enough:
power,
will,
energy,
choice,
presence,
discernment,
agency,
alignment…
that we can participate in Life without spending so much of ourselves fighting Life or fighting ourselves.
Then that reclaimed Life can move.
Create.
Choose.
Relate.
Serve.
Play.
Become.
Love.
From Guard Duty to Relationship to FLOW
Look at the progression.
SAFETY
How much of me is assigned to protection?
Perhaps I don’t need quite so much of myself on guard duty anymore.
More of me can be HERE.
COMFORT
Can all these parts of me learn to live together?
Can body-soul become ally rather than adversary?
We can live well together HERE.
EASE
How much of my power is being spent pushing against myself?
Can I reclaim will, energy and choice?
Can I participate with the movement of Life rather than personally forcing everything?
We can MOVE together from HERE.
And then…
HEART
The setting holds.
The Mother receives.
The flower opens.
Sacred Love, Light and Oneness can be embodied.
HOME Is Alive
Maybe HOME was never meant to be a bunker.
Maybe HOME isn’t where we finally arrange everything perfectly and never move again.
HOME is alive.
People come and go.
Weather changes.
Children grow.
Furniture moves.
Things break.
Things get repaired.
We cook.
Sleep.
Make love.
Cry.
Fight.
Celebrate.
Rest.
Leave.
Return.
HOME isn’t the absence of movement.
It’s somewhere from which movement can happen without losing ourselves.
Safety helps us come HOME.
Comfort helps us inhabit HOME.
Ease helps HOME become mobile.
We can go out into Life without abandoning ourselves behind.
We can carry HOME within.
You Don’t Have to Push Yourself Through Your Own Life
Perhaps this is the invitation of Ease:
You don’t have to stop working.
You don’t have to stop changing.
You don’t have to stop wanting.
You don’t have to stop leading.
You don’t have to stop making things happen in the physical world.
You don’t have to become passive.
You don’t have to sit beside the river forever.
But perhaps…
you don’t have to push yourself through your own Life.
You can learn to notice the current.
Plug in the chainsaw.
Move the sail.
Follow the wildlife path.
Let the mud settle.
Call the Round Table.
Find out who is actually voting.
Retrieve some of your power from the isometric madhouse.
Let old agreements complete.
Move the tent stakes.
Practice choice.
Receive help.
Let community provision you.
Learn where your edges actually are.
Say yes.
Say no.
Let Power do Power.
Let Heart do Heart.
And then…
run when it’s time to run.
Rest when it’s time to rest.
Build when it’s time to build.
Speak when it’s time to speak.
Wait when it’s time to wait.
Dance when Life moves you.
Ease within.
Life in motion.
What Becomes Possible When It Doesn’t Take So Much of You Just to Be & Do You?
Imagine having more of your own energy available.
Not guarding.
Not gripping.
Not hiding.
Not pleasing.
Not manipulating.
Not rescuing.
Not maintaining obsolete identities.
Not endlessly negotiating with old programming.
Not forcing your body.
Not fighting yourself.
Not trying to manufacture the wind.
Available.
For what?
For your Life.
To perceive.
Choose.
Act.
Respond.
Create.
Participate.
Connect.
Play.
Become.
Love.
Maybe even experience a little bliss.
Not because Life became effortless.
Because we’re learning to stop adding so much effort that doesn’t help.
The River Is Already Moving
We can swim with it.
We can swim against it.
We can stop for a while at the bank.
We can play in an eddy.
We can choose how we participate.
But Life keeps moving.
And perhaps mastery isn’t finally getting the river under control.
Perhaps it is becoming increasingly able to:
perceive the movement,
choose our relationship with it,
participate with the power available,
and steer toward what matters.
Ride the waves of Change.
Choose a direction.
Correct course.
Restart.
Jury-rig.
Learn.
Become.
Arrive.
Leave again.
Because Change keeps coming.
And so does Life.
The WAY is FLOW.
We don’t need to manufacture the river.
We don’t need to personally push it to the ocean.
Perhaps we can learn to let Life carry some of the weight.
And use our precious human power for what is actually ours to do.
Come PLAY.
Yep. Post the beast. 😂
The monastery story really helps because it delivers the entire Soul-Effort distinction in about thirty seconds, and the cathedral/coat-closet section helps a newcomer understand why you’re taking the time to unpack a seemingly simple word like Ease in the first place. 💛
PS
More Perception Does Not Mean More Responsibility
There is another dimension of ownership that matters deeply to me.
As our perception expands, we may become aware of much more than what is happening inside our own personal space.
Other people.
Communities.
History.
Land.
Collective experience.
Pain that began long before we arrived.
Patterns that are much larger than one person.
I experienced this vividly after moving to the American South.
Walking in undeveloped places, I sometimes experienced the land as still carrying enormous unresolved pain — including the suffering of enslaved people and of the original peoples who had lived there.
I had encountered particular places elsewhere that I experienced similarly — places associated, in my perception, with old battle, violence, rape or dark ritual.
Usually I could relate with the place, participate in some healing as I experienced it, and move on.
But the scale of what I experienced in the South was completely different.
It was overwhelming.
And eventually I had to discern something extremely important:
Just because I can perceive something does not mean it is mine to heal.
Whoa.
That is power.
That is boundary.
That is Ease.
I could acknowledge what I experienced.
I could care.
I could respond appropriately within my own space.
And I could recognize:
This is not my Big Project.
I had to learn how to clear where I was…
care for my own body-soul…
remain present…
and continue living.
Not deny what I perceived.
Not become responsible for all of it.
That distinction changed everything.
Because sensitivity without ownership can easily become another form of bondage.
If everything I perceive becomes mine to fix…
how could I ever rest?
How could I ever have enough power?
How could I live my own Life?
Perception does not automatically create responsibility.
We still discern.
What is mine?
What is yours?
What is ours?
What belongs to a larger collective?
Where am I actually called to participate?
What is NOT mine to carry?
Sometimes Ease means allowing ourselves to care deeply without turning every pain we perceive into our personal assignment.
A Living Boundary Gives Us Choice About Availability
This also changes how I understand boundaries.
Sometimes the boundary we have developed is not a living membrane.
It’s plexiglass.
A fortress.
A shield.
Perhaps for very good reasons.
We may have learned:
If I shine, I will be attacked.
If I am seen, something bad will happen.
If I become available to other people, I will be overwhelmed.
If they can perceive me, I am not safe.
So we hide.
Dim ourselves.
Become unavailable.
Build protection.
Again:
the protection may have been brilliant.
But eventually we may want something more than protection.
Choice.
Choice about whether I am seen.
Choice about whether I shine beyond my personal edge.
Choice about whether I perceive someone else.
Choice about whether I make myself available to them.
Choice about relationship.
A living boundary doesn’t require us to be permanently open.
And it doesn’t require us to remain permanently closed.
It allows responsiveness.
Open.
Close.
More.
Less.
Yes.
No.
Now.
Not now.
The point isn’t maximum openness. The point is increasing freedom to choose our availability.
That is another expression of natural boundary.
There is enough ME here that the edge doesn’t need to be either absent or armored in plexiglass.
It can become alive.
Responsive.
Permeable when appropriate.
Protective when appropriate.
Relational.
Once again:
The membrane doesn’t prevent relationship. It makes relationship possible.
Oneness Can Change the Experience of Relationship
I learned something surprising about Oneness after moving to North Carolina.
I am naturally relational.
Relationship with the natural world has always brought me tremendous delight.
Communing with a tree, for example.
Tree and Wendy.
I.
Thou.
Relationship.
And then something changed.
Over time, I realized that in my lived inner experience — not merely as a spiritual belief or philosophy —
the tree and I were ONE.
And strangely enough…
at first this made the relationship feel less juicy.
😂
The tree felt almost like my arm.
A very lovely arm!
But no longer quite as distinctly “other” in the way I had previously experienced it.
The direct experience of Oneness had expanded…
and my familiar form of relationship had to reorganize around it.
Eventually I acclimated.
The experience normalized.
But it taught me something important.
As Oneness becomes lived rather than conceptual, our experience of self and world can actually change.
Not:
“I believe everything is connected.”
But something closer to:
The boundary of what I experience as myself has expanded.
And that can itself require integration.
Oneness Does Not Eliminate I/Thou
This brings us back to an essential paradox.
Oneness is the spiritual reality.
Duality is the game we’re living.
I/Thou is the practice.
Even as our experience of Oneness expands, differentiation still matters.
The tree and I can be ONE…
and the tree can still be Tree.
You and I can be ONE…
and you are still YOU.
I am still ME.
Perhaps spiritual maturation isn’t ultimately choosing between:
separateness
and
Oneness.
Perhaps we’re developing the capacity to hold both:
I can experience us as ONE without erasing the reality of our distinction.
This is individuation.
Not greater separation.
Greater capacity to be fully ourselves within relationship.
Being ME.
Loving YOU.
And perhaps eventually:
Being wholly ME…
while recognizing that the ME and the YOU exist within a reality that is already ONE.
Expansion Can Require Acclimation Too
This is another reason Ease does not mean transformation always feels easy.
Sometimes the new experience we have been seeking actually arrives…
and then we have to learn how to live there.
Greater freedom can require acclimation.
Greater power can require acclimation.
Greater visibility can require acclimation.
Greater choice can require acclimation.
Even greater Oneness can require acclimation.
The old organization was familiar.
The new one may initially feel strange simply because it is new.
So transformation may have a rhythm:
shift
→ disruption
→ practice
→ acclimation
→ new normal
And then, eventually…
Life moves again.
😂
This is why we don’t merely seek extraordinary experiences.
We develop the capacity to inhabit what we become.
Freedom needs to become inhabitable.
Power needs to become inhabitable.
Oneness needs to become inhabitable.
The new HOME needs enough time for us to actually move in.
Ease Is Not Carrying Everything We Can Perceive
So another expression of Ease might be:
I can perceive without automatically absorbing.
Care without automatically carrying.
Love without automatically rescuing.
Recognize suffering without making all suffering my assignment.
Experience Oneness without losing differentiation.
Be available without being endlessly available.
Shine without requiring everyone to see me.
Hide when hiding is genuinely mine to choose — rather than because an old system has removed the choice.
I can increasingly ask:
What is mine to do?
And then use my precious human energy there.
This is not indifference.
It is stewardship.
Power returned to its rightful place.
Will available for present-time choice.
Energy available for actual participation.
A living boundary through which relationship can happen.
And Heart increasingly free to do what Heart does:
**Love.
Light.
Oneness — embodied.**
Perhaps this too is Ease:
not having to carry the whole world in order to belong to it.
Not having to heal everything in order to love everything.
Not having to disappear in order to experience Oneness.
**Wholly ME.
Wholly WITH YOU.
Already within the ONE.**
That completes the Ease quarry beautifully for me.
Especially the distinction:
Just because I can perceive something does not mean it is mine to heal.