I've had such a busy weekend that I haven't had time to write this blog. I was assisting at an event for the entire weekend. The hours were long from 7am - 11.15pm but we did have breaks. I woke up early on Saturday morning and did my 20 minutes of TM and felt great. I was staying close to where the event was so didn't have far to go. I couldn't believe it when I woke up on Saturday morning and peered out of my high window to see a blanket of white on the ground. 'Not snow again' I inwardly moaned. I donned my coat, hat and scarf and set off for the event. The morning was so crisp and fresh and the moon still high in the sky. I felt such contentment as I saundered along without a care in the world. I got to the event at around the same time as everyone else and there was great atmosphere between everyone. 10 minutes before everything was to begin I was asked if I would take on a supervisory role due to the supervisor not turning up. The moment this request was made of me I felt a sickening feeling in my stomach and everything in me screamed 'say no'. Instead I pushed this feeling down and covered it with the reason that I couldn't let people down and so I said 'yes, I would do it'.
Well it was a complete disaster. I have made no secret in this blog of the fact that I am challenged by things like organisation, structure etc and this was organisation, structure, being thorough taken to its ultimate degree. Suddenly people were looking to me to find handouts, put together packets, make sure everyone was taken care of and ensure that everything ran smoothly. I was so challenged and I resisted everything that anyone tried to say to me. I had all kinds of rants going on with myself and what was most frustrating was that I didn't seem to do anything right. How I missed out a whole row when I had to collate handouts was just a mystery to me. At 8pm on Saturday night I was feeling so tired and had my usual irritability. Then I remembered that I hadn't done my 20 mins of TM in the early evening. I requested an additional break which was agreed to and I went off to find an empty room to do my meditation. I did my 20 mins and 5 mins after the usual drowsiness of meditation I was wide awake and came back into the room much more alive and awake and ready to make things happen. But while I was more alive and awake my enthusiasm for putting together packs and arranging chairs was still zero.
Sunday was worse and I spent the say in confusion and bewilderment wondering why I find things like organisation and structure so challenging. At end of the evening everyone who had worked to make the event possible was thanked. To my horror when we were all on the stage the leader singled me out and acknowledged me for stepping in and taking on a role at the last minute. I wished the ground would open up and swallow me I was just mortified. At least I was awake which was thanks to the TM which I had done earlier in the evening. This morning I woke up and I was in such a black space. I knew that me not being thorough in the work I did over the weekend was down to the destructive part of me that sabotages everything when I feel I have been pushed in to it. But I wasn't pushed, I had a choice. I took on the role when I didn't want and then made it mean that I was pushed and then I set out to sabotage. I was reminded of when I was young and my mother made me dry the dishes. Mysteriously two plates just fell out of my hand! My mother was so angry and said 'you did that on purpose' and sent me off. At the time I remember wondering how I could have dropped the two plates but I saw the exact same thing happening this weekend. It's like my way of getting out of things that I but don't want to do but lack the courage to say 'no'.
What I have realized about this is that I sabotage because I haven't been straight. Agreeing to do something because I don't want to let someone down has no integrity and therefore will never work out. I see that now and from now on I will choose powerfully yes or no because I now realize that if I choose and want to then whatever I take on will work. In the past the only reason I had for saying yes when I wanted to say no, was 'to say no might upset the other person'. This is really spineless on my part and I am stating in this blog that from now on I say yes or no depending on how I really feel because now it is a question of integrity. The only reason I wasn't thorough this weekend was because I hadn't chosen freely to take on the role. I sabotaged it because I felt pushed into it and this what my mechanism does everytime. Now that I have been able to see it, I know that it won't have the same hold over me.
The TM meditation is absolutely amazing. I did my 20 mins at 6pm this evening and it is now almost midnight and I feel like I could write for hours. But over the weekend I got hit by an insight that may have nothing to do with the meditation. It suddenly hit me that because up to November 2009 I was still emotionally aged five, that staying up late at night was never going to be possible because five year olds are not up working late at night! But five year old children love to get up early in the morning. These days I keep getting flashes of insights like this. With each one that comes I feel a sense of relief because I am released from giving myself a hard time about not working late at night in the way that I used to. There may be no substance to this claim but when I got this insight it seemed so loud and powerful that it rang true for me.
This evening I met the lady that I lived with when I first moved here and I was aware of how well I could listen and really understand what she was saying and the things she is dealing with. I have created a new way of being for myself which is powerful, exciting and playful. What being powerful means to me is being straight and taking what I get and when there is no fear or nothing to protect or defend I can take and be with everything that is said to me. In the past it wasn't possible for people to be straight with me because I got upset and drammatical now when I share my new way of being it is an invitation for all my friends to feel that they can be free to say what they want to me without fearing my reaction or upsetting me. I have to accept that as a leader I am going to upset people and I have to be OK with that. The only way that I can be OK with that is that it is in line with my Boddhissatva vow and I am accountable for my actions inside of that vow......
So now...even though I am not in the slightest bit tired....I'm going to end this blog for today.
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