The Art of Integral Education

Igniting the Spark of Lifelong Learning

Remember that feeling when you played tag as a kid and got caught? “You’re it!” And there was no more running away, no swerving or turning back.

The only way onward was to be it, to go for it, to play and run. Do you recall the mixture of yikes and excitement that would arise just seconds before you got tagged?

It’s that blend of “yikes” and “excitement” and what possibilities emerge when we’re “it” that I’d like to explore today. Which, really, is every moment. Life is tagging us each moment; we’ve just become so good at hiding out, we don’t always notice the tap on the shoulder.

However, whilst I may ignore that tap many a time, there are activities in my life that consistently bring me right to that place where hiding out is impossible, or at least, in which hiding out backfires fairly fast, the feedback is direct and “in my face,” and the only real way forward is to fully become and be “it.”

As hard as I may try, as much as I may use strategies to control and manage the situations and myself, these activities themselves are made up of the “You’re it!” material to such a degree that I’m forced and invited to respond from a different place, a more authentic place within myself. Anything less falls short of what is necessary.

That is what makes them such a challenge (the yikes factor) and such an opportunity (the excitement factor). They propel me to grow up and wake up like none other. They demand radical honesty of me. They show me who I am, not who I think I am or would like to be. They bring me to my knees and, ultimately, they also raise me up to the stars.

Basically, they give me no other option than to show up and be “it” more fully. In this way, they are activities that invite me to dig deeper, to practice more, and they inspire me to translate what I learn to the rest of my life.

Two examples of such activities in my life are: singing and parenting.

When I sing I am often struck by just how “naked” singing is. Which I think is one of the reasons so many people are drawn toward singing and also why so many are terrified of it.

Image: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:33535white06.jpg

When you sing, there’s nothing to hide behind, no other instrument than you. No piano, no cello or clarinet… just you. You’re it. You’re the instrument. You’re the resonance body. You’re the air stream and support. You’re every note, intonation, pitch, and timbre. You’re also every hesitation, tremble, tightness, squeak and roar.

The feedback is immediate, ruthless and wonderful. No hiding whatsoever. The smallest, most subtle ego habits show up in your voice. The tiniest ways of holding and “making happen,” of forcing and controlling, are all reflected in your song, compromising what it could be. I never cease from being humbled and amazed by this experience.

Approaching singing in this way — as a direct reflection of who I am and how I am navigating this very moment — offers all kinds of insights and practice moments to get out of the way, to, in many ways do less, and in other ways do more. More support. Less control. More precision, less strategic positioning. More trust, less hesitation. More focus, less habit. More centeredness, less trying. More self, less me.

Parenting offers the same “nakedness,” and more. You’re it. There’s nothing and no one to hide behind. Only here, the stakes are much higher because it’s about another person: your child.

My daughter doesn’t care how many parenting books I’ve read, how many wonderful ideas and intentions I may have on how to parent. Whether I’ve had enough time to do my shadow work and work through my own childhood experiences.

The only thing that really makes a difference to her is how I show up day in, day out. With how much presence and love, care, reliability and understanding I meet, greet, and accompany her. How much I’ve actually translated knowledge and insight into actual practice, presence and action.

She watches closely. She learns primarily through imitation. And I as mother am her model, her guide and orientation, especially during her early years. I, and whoever else is close to my child, we are it. Whatever issues or ego patterns or traumas we have not yet worked through and integrated will leak through. That’s quite a “yikes” situation, isn’t it?!

We can use many parenting and teaching methods and techniques, but at the base of these is the reality that we parent who we are. According to research, children’s learning happens primarily through imitation and practice!

“Don’t worry that children never listen to you. Worry that they are always watching you.” – Robert Fulghum

On the other hand, what an opportunity also! To be poised in such a critical role, to know that everything I say and do she may copy, and that everything I say and do provides her with an imprint on how to be in this world.

Stepping consciously into the blend of “yikes” and “excitement” that comes with being our children’s first model, and being “it” to such an extent, parenting becomes a powerfully transformative, consciousness-raising experience: an incredible practice in awareness.

I’m placed right in the middle of this choice: Do I show up as fully as I can, do I willingly engage in growing up and waking up so that I can help my child do the same? Can I be honest with myself, and see my growing edges, acknowledge my limitations with compassion and clarity? Will I learn from my mistakes, get back up and keep going?

What activities, situations, and roles consistently bring you to that “naked” place, where you’re it, and there’s no one else and nothing else to turn to? The ones where there’s no hiding away?

Long-term relationships will often do that. Or giving a presentation without a powerpoint or notes, just you. Or hanging out with horses; they seem to have a remarkably sensitive antenna for picking up on a person’s energy, sensing how someone is truly feeling, and not being fooled by how we’d like to feel or come across.

I’d love to hear from you what your most challenging and potent “you’re it” experiences — moments, activities and roles — are.

As I consider the two I just mentioned — singing and parenting — I notice how the lessons, the keys and insights that show me the way forward are the same… of course! They’re life lessons. When we acknowledge that we’re it, we have to dig deeper, and source ways of showing up that go beyond habit and hiding out.

Insights and keys such as:

•Being centered. In singing I call that “singing from home,” not projecting forward or backward, or any which way with my voice. But staying connected with my center, and singing from there, trusting that this is the place of greatest strength and sound. In parenting I call that “relating from my authentic self with my child,” not reacting from egoic habit patterns, but making it a priority to drop into my deeper, essential self and find what response arises from there in any given situation.

• Discernment. In order to be centered, I need to know the difference within myself between being centered and being off center. In both singing and parenting this requires paying close attention: noticing contractions, tightness, habits of control, resistance, fear, hiding and protection, as well as moments when I rest in a more expanded, loving, relaxed and alert sense of self. Each of us is an incredibly sensitive barometer. Learn to read it! Become adept at self-witnessing — physically, emotionally, mentally, spiritually.

• Support. In singing each note needs to be held and supported with my breath and energy, pelvic support for each single note and phrase. As a mother, the need for support means making sure I take care of myself so that I can take care of my child… sleeping enough, eating well, offering kindness to myself, allowing the great love to pierce and penetrate all the layers I have built around my heart, so that the question is no longer, “Am I loved, seen, heard, and taken care of?” Rather, it transforms to “I am love, loving and loved, in and through and with the One Great Love in service to the Whole.” And for parenting and singing, support means taking deep breaths all day long.

• Presence. Being fully present in the moment, simultaneously relaxed and alert, trying less, controlling less, committing more, listening deeper… when I sing, as I parent, in all of life!

• Connection. With self and other (child, audience). Connection before anything else. Each parenting moment, each song, resting on the relationship between self and other.

• Vulnerability. This comes with the territory of being tagged, of being “it.” As said, it’s a naked experience. Nothing to hide behind. How you show up matters. Am I willing to be seen and heard? As a parent, to say sorry when I make a mistake, when I’m short and impatient with my child? When I sing, to take a risk, to allow my voice to tremble or squeak when I stretch to new heights or depths in my vocal range? Am I willing to be an instrument, even if I’m not perfect and never will be?

• Practice! Showing up for who we truly are and undoing our entrenched ego habits takes practice. It’s not that it’s so complicated; in fact, I find that the moments I fully drop into authentic presence, an incredible ease and delight arise. It’s just that what I need to do to show up more fully as a singer, as a parent and person requires of me shifts and choices that are often wildly unfamiliar. It takes a lot of focus, awareness and practice to shift ego habits… If I don’t pay attention, I’ll fall into the same old habit of slightly tightening my jaw just as I’m about to sing. If I don’t take a moment of awareness between my daughter’s very slow dilly-dallying to bed and my impatient reaction for a new choice to emerge, perhaps of deeper listening and a co-creative solution, I’ll cut her off in an unnecessarily snappy voice. I’ll add to practice, the need for patience, compassion and perseverance.

These are some of the keys I have discovered to showing up more fully and authentically, to engaging my “self” as an instrument of service and love in this world. They’re the kind of things I think we need to figure out anyway.

Activities and roles such as singing and parenting simply highlight for me the need for us to step more fully into “being it,” to learn and practice what really makes a difference so that our song resonates, delights and rings, so that our parenting serves our child’s growth and flourishing, so that our relationships and work are aligned with who we truly are and why we’re actually here.

I invite you to engage in more and more of the “you’re it” ways of living, small and big.

I encourage us all to engage with this notion of “self as instrument.” An instrument that needs ongoing care, tuning, nurturing, and practice, if we are to facilitate and encourage our children realizing their potential, if we are to sing our unique song, if we are to not just get older, but also to keep growing up, and bring our gifts to this world.

May you step ever more into being “it,” becoming you, welcoming the blend of “yikes” and “excitement,” of challenge and opportunity, to show up as fully as you can, to get out of the way, and to make a blessed difference. This world really needs us all to go for it.
If you’re a parent or caregiver and curious about approaching parenting in this way, I invite you to join my in an upcoming eight-week online course I am offering on “Parenting as a Spiritual Practice,” starting in the spring, 2013. www.integralparenting.com

This course is designed to bring to life the full potential of parenthood: a transformative vessel for evolving yourself, your child, and the future.

It is not entirely surprising that individual evolution might lead human development at a pace well ahead of concomitant growth in the collective realm. As individuals begin to recognize more of their whole potential as living, breathing beings, there is a natural movement towards engaging practices that catalyze further growth and development.

Physical practices, spiritual practices, intellectual and creative practices stretch the individual and open up levels of depth and capacity. We are actively seeking a kind of health and well-being that goes way beyond simple self-satisfaction.

But what of our mutuality ? We are perhaps as a planet far less skilled in understanding how to come together and support the growth of more meaningful and sustainable collectives. As we deepen our practice, we have come to understand ourselves more fully in our individual nature, but we still seek a place where a similar unfolding can begin to take form in community, in relationship to the collective.

We might think of collective consciousness or collective intelligence as the place where we begin to catch up in our wider social and interpersonal relationships to the territories that we have opened up on our own. In this realm, we enter the delicate and still emerging discernment of giving shared voice to that which arises both within us and between us, that which enters into the space of our being fully with all that transcends us and binds us simultaneously.

The space of integral community is a rich and dynamic territory, and one that can experience its own evolving sequence of increasing complexity, nuance and depth. It is perhaps one of the most exciting and one of the most important edges in our growth and unfolding as a human family. If we are creators writing the cosmic music of this infinite composition, this might be the newest movement in a symphony that will continue to play for eons. We are called to take part in the great collaboration that grows out of this particular moment in our shared history.

The Integral Community Seminar offers an opportunity to both explore and experience the potential of collective evolution. Through practice, dialogue, exercises and shared creative spaces, the week will open up a new set of possibilities through our direct experience of the ground we can share in a space of trust and depth.

A community learning experience facilitated by Miriam Mason Martineau.

Experience the full potential of parenthood: a transformative vessel for evolving yourself, your child, and the future.

Join us for this transformative, 8-week online course! Together we will explore this new frontier in the parenting adventure.  From meta-perspectives to daily practices, we’ll discover just how powerful this integral-evolutionary context can be in creating the fullest, richest, most loving parenting practice.  Raise the bar for how you show up as a parent, and provide your child with the very best foundation for being a loving, creative, conscious being — while discovering an unshakeable ease amidst the inevitable ups, downs, and doubts of parenting.

This past week, I have been living life with tears just behind the layer of daily functioning, joys and busyness. The troubles of this world, the craziness of our humanity and the suffering we inflict and experience have felt so close, also the contortions, confusion and tangled webs we weave… It has felt as if my soul were getting cracked open a bit more.

Such times — when my skin feels thinner, and the darkness beckons more intensely — happen every once in a while. It is tempting to turn away. To distract myself. To give up and get cynical. Or angry, even allow a moment of “f*** it all.” Despair calling from just behind my ear, reaching with deliberate grasp, pulling on my coat sleeve, and yanking down.

What to do? As we grow up (as in “waking up”), our awareness increases. We become more and more conscious. We see more, and we feel more. Not just the good, beautiful and true, but also the deepest grief, suffering and ugliness. The illusions are stripped down. What’s on the other side is not always pretty.

Ken Wilber aptly points out that awakening does not mean reaching a state of constant bliss (as is often put forward as a “promise” of enlightenment). Waking up means feeling more of… everything.

However — and this is a key distinction Wilber makes — waking up also means that our capacity to bear the content of our increased awareness, to hold space for It all, also grows. As I become aware of more, as I see and feel more, the container that I am also grows, and I can be present to “It All” with courage, clarity and compassion. That’s fair. A saving grace, really.

The first time I heard that and put it together with my own experience, it made so much sense. And then I started noticing that the two — the “feeling/seeing more” and the “bearing more” — didn’t always show up at exactly the same time.

In fact, I noticed a distinct pattern: The awareness would first grow, my circle of care and seeing would widen and deepen and my capacity to steadily hold space for this increased awareness would take a while to follow, sometimes limping behind by a few months.

That “gap” time was and is uncomfortable every time it shows up. I’m feeling more, yet I’m not quite ready to handle it. I can easily get thrown off and despair at the state of self, other and the world.

Do you ever feel like that? Plunged into a heightened vulnerability and sensitivity, and tempted to cover it up or push it away quickly?

But what if you don’t? What if you stay present with the “gap” until, over time, the capacity to solidly bear catches up, and with it, you grow — you, the container for “all that is,” expanded. What if you stay present during this “gap,” this “interim time,” until you become a strong and healthy container for the increased awareness?

I have come to greatly appreciate the gesture and work of presence in the face of this uncomfortable interim time. It’s not a fancy thing. By no means glamorous. It is not about simply putting up with something uncomfortable. It has a quietly committed, even fierce energy to it.

Such presence neither indulges not represses. It has attributes of a dear, dignified and patient friend. It enables me to be with, to be in touch, to turn toward and breath, to allow both the light and the dark to nudge and tear at my soul. It brings me to the stillness in the eye of the storm. It points to the possibility of “learning to dance in the rain, rather than waiting for the storm to pass.”

I learn to trust that, much like the growth that takes place beneath the earth before a new shoot appears, movement and evolution may rumble below the surface before making an obvious appearance. Simultaneously, I learn to pay attention for the beckoning of a sudden shift: It doesn’t have to take forever. (“Forever” can easily become a trap into passivity; anything can become the ego’s next identity, even the seemingly virtuous quality of “being present in the interim time.”)

I stay patient with the real time the journey takes, and I welcome the eternal possibility that it could all happen in a second, container vastly expanded, present to witness ever-deeper and wider content in the blink of eye.

Thus, staying present in the interim time also enables and ennobles me to discern when to do something, when to move into action for change from a place of presence and choice, rather than out of resistance or fear.

While we are feeling more, and perhaps not yet equally able to bear it, we can do a number of things to bridge our selves and one another across the chasm. Here some invitations:

• May we remember that we don’t have to journey alone. This passage from Matthew 11:28-29, well-known through Handel’s “Messiah,” speaks beautifully to the possibility of being held as we learn to hold: “Come unto Him, all ye that labour, come unto Him that are heavy laden, and He will give you rest. Take His yoke upon you, and learn of Him, for He is meek and lowly of heart, and ye shall find rest unto your souls.”
• May we gratefully receive and be held in the positive, the laughter, delight and humor showing up in others around us and across the planet. This also helps keep things in perspective.
• May we sleep enough, eat well, exercise and do good unto ourselves and others.
• May we pay attention to when our fellow humans are in a period of growth and stretching, and extend a hand, saying, “I am here to hold space for the validity and meaningfulness of this interim time. I am here with you.”
• May we know that there is a greater purpose to the unease: It is through waking up, feeling more and learning to bear more that we become a living prayer, present to that which is hollow, desperate, fearful, and offering it a breathing body to pass through.

In this way we can keep stretching to become healthy, courageous containers, and a powerful presence for all of life. Allowing it to flow through us like a river, neither damming the “water” nor rushing it forward artificially. Offering a gesture of solidarity by not turning away, neither from the greatest joy, nor the most sorrowful moments life brings. And so we grow up for the sake of the whole.

“What is being transfigured here is your mind,
And it is difficult and slow to become new.
The more faithfully you can endure here,
The more refined your heart will become
For your arrival in the new dawn.”

~ John O. Donohue

It was an incredibly rich week. I look back and am so heartened by what happened. To tell you the truth, I was both excited and a bit nervous leading up to the seminar. This seminar was about discovering and exploring a new field together, pushing the edge of what we knew together! Territory that is so much more emergent than established. There was a definite sense of diving into the unknown.

I have never said this of one of our seminars or of other events I have attended, but this time it was such a palpable experience: the presence of the Holy during these days on Whidbey.

So, what happened? Many things. I’ll share some of the highlights from my perspective.

One thing that struck me right away was how ready this group was for depth and authenticity. As soon as a deeper chord was struck in any of the presentations, or experiential offerings – and this was the case right from the very beginning – the group was right there to meet that depth and take it further. And so we very quickly went deeper within ourselves, meeting ourselves more fully… simple honesty held in compassion, with a sincere willingness to grow, to discern, to heal, to shed and to be present. We also went deeper between each other. We listened to each other, not just the words, but below the surface, learning to be present with our whole self to another whole self.  Learning that there is no limit to inquiry and presence.

Moving from our focus and our discernment practices in relation to self and other on to the “We” that resides amongst all of us, we dove into a regular exploration of this “We”. This collective presence or We-being that emerges when we gather together to listen, to be present to and express that which is greater than the sum total of all gathered, was delicate at first, and fleeting. As we kept on practicing, it quickly became more tangible, palpable. We practiced in various group sizes, configurations and with a number of formats… sometimes bumpy, sometimes tender or tentative or awkward, sometimes blown wide open and holy. Practice helped. By the end of the week it often took just a few seconds… gather in a circle, sit up straight, show up fully, listen deeply, give it a voice. Above all, listen to what it offers; it speaks from the Future. Upwellings of gratitude, honoring, blessedness, healing and challenge poured forth. Seemed like we were getting better at it in silence, speaking from that place was still very much a growing edge for the whole group.

I was also very touched and amazed by what an authentic relational container can do for healing, for renewal, replenishment, and hope. What could take years of therapy or inner work as an individual, could be met, felt, and released within moments, hours, a few days. A river running through and on – with no damming or flooding, simply enabled to pierce the self, and flow through and on. Lauren Worsh, one of the seminar participants, expresses this so beautifully:

“As I return from the exquisitely wonderful experience of sharing a week in the embrace of a consciously evolutionary collective (the Integral Community Seminar), I am struck by the recognition that, as a group, we embodied a balance of listening and expressing, and of yin and yang, unlike anything I have ever experienced. And what was possible because we began to enact this balance together was an unfolding of immense depth and dimensionality, held in a healthy, breathing, responsive container capable itself of growing and flexing to meet the needs of the moment. The experience of participating in an aware and consciously emergent collective was nourishing beyond compare. Unimagined dimensions and capacities were awakened and quickened in me, evoked in and through the alchemy of our We. I have begun to glimpse the power of what we can heal and what we can create when we genuinely surrender into our true nature, as Love, as a unique holographic microcosmic Self concurrently arising also as a larger whole-of-humanity Self (which is itself a part of ever larger collectives) — our power as conscious Love as a collective is unimaginably immense. What overwhelms and frightens us from the vantage point of the somewhat aware individual human, can be effortlessly resolved at the levels of consciousness accessible to and enacted by the aware collective.”

I also delighted in the sense of connection with the greater We, spread afar geographically, but more tangible with the help of technology… skyping Thomas Huebl in from Tel Aviv and feeling the immediacy with which he was present with everyone. Having Trevor Malkinson from Beams & Struts blog on a daily basis live from the seminar, and receiving people’s comments and connection in response.  Witnessing the fb threads of conversation and inspiration creating ripples.

Also a highlight, and great help for me as a co-organizer, was the smooth functionality of the outer realities of running such an event – from the newly added kids’ program to the amazing help from volunteers with setting up the spaces, the incredibly nourishing food, and the beautiful natural setting offered by Whidbey Institute. Thank you to all those elements! They make our job so much easier and fun and yummy!

Another insight gained through the experience is how we really need to keep practicing and experimenting this new way of coming together. It’s not just gonna “fall on our heads”. Coming together beyond the Ego takes real-time practice, which includes the individual practice of ever-increasingly dis-identifying from one’s Ego. Evolution of the “We” requires evolution of the “I”, and the evolution of the “I” can be quickened and supported by the evolution of the “We”. Given the current state of the world I can think of nothing more pressing or effective in bringing us closer to sane, healthy, sustainable and ethical choices. I hope we can increase our communication and connection with other initiatives around the globe working at evolving this next stage in consciousness evolution, that of the “We”.

So let’s keep on practicing – preparing the ground within ourselves by working the inner “muscles” of our own discernment between ego and authentic, as well as getting together with others who share an openness and readiness to dive into the exploration of emerging the “WE” in our midst.

At Next Step Integral we are looking forward to taking our next step along these lines… we are presently looking at two possible streams forward:

1)  Another Integral Community seminar in 2012, that offers a deepening of the practice and experience

2)  An “Evolving the We” festival, expanding the size of the event, spreading the experience to many more people

Let us know what you think, where you’d like to see us take this. We are listening. There is always more to learn, ways to improve and evolve our offerings.

And so, over a month after our seminar, I am remain heartened, I feel more hopeful, I truly feel we are evolving. And I thank each of you for You, for the work you do to bring more honesty, more kindness, deeper listening and Big Heart to yourself and all your relations.

To our mutual evolution!

Miriam

“Lying under a starry night last week while camping and looking up for shooting stars with my 8-year old daughter, our conversation turned to gravity, what it is and how it keeps us from spinning off the face of the earth. We both lay there, letting the significance of gravity sink in, noticing our minds grappling with the immensity of it, and then turning our attention back to the Great Dipper and the Milky Way. The next day, as we shared grace before lunch and spontaneously expressed gratitude for a variety of things, my daughter spoke: “And thank you for gravity, even if I don’t understand it.”

I pondered her “thank you” over the next few days, especially noting gratitude’s freedom from cognitive understanding: We don’t have to fully understand something in order to acknowledge and see it as a gift. We don’t have to make sense of it to say “thank you.” Just a glimpse of what it means to us can suffice, and perhaps not even that glimpse is necessary. We do, though, generally use “benefit to self” as a criteria for expressing gratitude. Gravity — yes! Teething, even though it may hurt? Yes, from the parents’ viewpoint. But what about from the perspective of the 6-month-old, who is only aware of an aching gum? And what about us adults, when things happen that, even as they may eventually contribute to our growth, hurt deeply?

What’s your experience? Do you find yourself mainly grateful for what you understand? For what brings you greater joy and ease in your life? Have you ever extended gratitude beyond what makes sense to you or brings you pleasure? Is that even a good idea?

Saying “thank you” is something we are taught early in life, and often it is one of the first things we learn in our journey of becoming socialized. Remember the many occasions you would hear something like: “Don’t forget to send a thank you card to Aunt Mary for the lovely present she sent you!”

And so we learn to say thank you in all kinds of ways — sometimes as a quick social platitude, other times with deep sincerity. Sometimes it spills out of our hearts, and we feel how limited words can be to fully express our gratitude. We expand our thank yous as our awareness and our circle of care and appreciation deepens and widens… to the further reaches of humanity, to plants and animals, the universe, God, to any and all that offer us gifts and blessings. How far could we take our gratitude? And might extending it even beyond what we think is a blessing and a gift open up new worlds of appreciation, presence and possibility?

“If the only prayer you said in your whole life was, ‘thank you,’ that would suffice.”
–Meister Eckhart

I had no idea how far I could take a gesture of gratitude until a couple of years ago, when I faced one of the greatest spiritual challenges I had ever encountered. A wise friend told me resistance would make the journey harder, that surrendering to what was happening would show me the way through. As I journeyed through this experience, I tried all the tricks and tools I could think of to reach a place of non-resistance while maintaining awareness and discernment in the face of difficult content. I sat up straighter. I focused on being centered. I looked at what was arising and said, “I am stronger than that,” and later on, “Not I.” I prayed. I blessed. I meditated. I breathed.

And then, when nothing else worked, when all my usual ways of “trying,” “controlling” or “being strong” or “spiritual” didn’t work, I finally remembered softness and gratitude. Or, really, they remembered me. Release and a completely different level of surrender opened up through being grateful for everything I was experiencing at the time, and not just for what I perceived and experienced as beautiful, good or true. In so doing, I experienced a wholly new opening into love, light and understanding. The only way out was through.

What I also learned from this experience was that the only way through can feel like hell, can look like everything you would ever want to run from, and that would seem impossible to be grateful for. And yet, by resisting gratitude for all of it, I upheld a stubborn veil of separation between myself and life — and thereby unknowingly, sabotaged and prevented a deeper response to the situation at hand.

Now I will tell you that I did not willingly get to that realization — I was pretty much dragged there on my knees, because nothing else worked. I have also had all kinds of thoughts as to why such a level of gratitude could be dangerous. If you are grateful for the bad things that happen, does that make them right? And might you then become passive and stop working for change, for greater justice, sustainability and health for all? Or might being grateful simply go completely against healthy survival, and in many instances, only come much later, when integration and healing have happened?

Eckhart Tolle shares a helpful reflection on surrender and presence in his teachings on the “Power of Now,” in which he speaks frequently of meeting life’s ups and downs without resistance. Paraphrased he says, “Imagine you are stuck in the mud. If you resist immediately, you will likely panic, try to get out quickly and as a result, probably get more stuck in the mud. If, on the other hand, you take a moment to simply note and face what is going on, to really take it in that you are indeed stuck in the mud, well, then you are also more likely going to figure out how best to get unstuck: ‘Hmm, I’m stuck, wow, really stuck… okay, let’s see, the ground is a bit higher and drier over there. I’ll place my right foot over there. Then my left foot here.’ And gradually you make your way out and on, in huge part because you are not resisting, not panicking, but simply seeing what is, and then choosing on the best course of action from that point forth.”

Understood in this way, non-resistance is not a passive stance. In fact, it becomes a prerequisite for effective action, enabling clearer choices. Without that moment of surrender, we layer a reaction on top of our resistance, muddling our way out or digging ourselves deeper, instead of fine-tuning our next step from a place of honesty and completely facing what is.

In this context, I find it important to make a distinction between surrender and agreement. They are not the same. Surrender involves bringing our full presence to a situation or experience, regardless of whether we agree with or like it. It goes farther than “being OK” with something. Surrendering demands much more intimacy and proximity to it, whatever “it” may be. But it does not mean submission and acquiescence.

And perhaps, in some circumstances (as in the one I briefly describe above), extending gratitude may draw us into an even deeper experience of non-resistance and surrender, taking us well beyond what our small minds can grasp, understand and make sense of. It can be a gesture of “thank you” anyway, a gesture of “yes” to all of life, not necessarily suggesting agreement, but a “yes” for what is arising so that I can be fully present to it, and discover through it what the next step on and upward may be.

I’d love to hear your thoughts on where and how you stretch your gratitude to include more of yourself and life.

Sunday afternoon, with an hour to spare, I wander to the garden to thin some baby carrots – those wee beginnings of carrots, just tufts of green really – so as to create more space for the few I leave to fully grow and flourish. The sun is warm on my back as I get busy with this task that takes focused attention: one pull too many and a whole potential carrot is gone!

As I make my way down the rows slowly and carefully, I notice the challenge I face every time I perform this gardening task: To enable a few to thrive I need to pull out a lot of others and the thicker I originally sowed, the more I have to yank out. I don’t like yanking out baby carrots, even if my logical mind tells me they’re just tiny carrots and my gardening experience knows that if I don’t do this, none of them will do well. As I go about the task, I wish I hadn’t planted quite as thickly to begin with. I also try to figure out which ones look strong and healthy (those ones I leave) and I pay attention to spacing them evenly, so that each one left has enough soil and light to grow in.

During my carrot-thinning hour this Sunday, as I curiously follow my inner resistance to the task at hand, I have to chuckle… what a perfect reflection of my struggle with letting go of any of the “too many projects on the go!” I feel such gratitude for the delicious fullness of life, the many varied and richly textured projects I get to initiate, co-create and be involved in … and sometimes it just feels like “too much”, like I’m juggling ten balls at once and any of them could drop at any moment. Or worse still, I actually forget one of them for a bit and slack on my integrity with others (projects or people). Do you ever feel that way? Excited and engaged in many meaningful, fun and interesting projects that encourage you to grow, stretch, be challenged and offer your gifts, yet with a nagging underlying sense that you may be compromising depth for too much width in your life?

That you might serve more if you focused on less? Overwhelm doesn’t reap the best results.

Back to the garden … the more I sow the more I eventually have to thin. The more I am unsure how many seeds will germinate, the more likely I am to over-sow to make sure that at least some will make it. And the feedback loop is clear: If I don’t thin, I end up with crooked, wonky, small carrots.

So what is your sweet spot, where you seed just the right amount, saying yes to what you can manage well and thrive rather than survive? That place of not too much and not too little? And is there anything in your life you need to thin? Anything that is taking too much time and focus away from what you are really here to do? The more capable and multi-passionate you are, the more urgent this question becomes, for you could do so much. Question is: What truly makes your heart sing? What fills the cells of your being with inspiration? What are you responsible for? When do you feel most alive and in service to life itself?

The answers to these questions may change over time. As you continue to grow and evolve, the ways in which you serve and show up will likely take on different forms. This is an invitation for ongoing discernment, for a daily practice of touching in with what moves you, what you are committed to, clearing the clutter and engaging in a regular practice of spring-cleaning. What perspectives and beliefs are serving you and which ones are holding you back? Are you giving enough time and attention to the things that ultimately matter most to you and those entrusted to you? Are you in touch with your authentic purpose, or do you first need to get rid of some clutter to feel into this question? What motivates you — is it fear, love, shadow, egoic drive or an authentic impulse to serve?

And once we get clear on what to keep and what to let go of, we still don’t need to make it all happen ourselves. Same as the garden requires ample sun, water, minerals and further weeding to grow strong and healthy, we too can complement our initial discernment on how much to sow (what we say “yes” to) and our ongoing discernment on what to thin (what to let go of and what to stick with):

We can ask for support and help.

We can delegate, collaborate and syngerize with others.

We can communicate when we need to make adjustments to what we have committed ourselves to.

We can be attentive to timing — perhaps “not now, but later”, or find a rhythm that allows for more balance, extending the time frames in which projects get completed.

And in all these and other ways of dealing with the thinning, lies the core spiritual practice of discernment: To grow in awareness of who we truly are and to make choices that align us with our essential authentic self. In this way, we can grow our true gifts and offerings like strong healthy carrots. We can make good use of this precious life we are given, contributing with depth and sincerity to the great unfolding Whole, without burning out, being overwhelmed and compromising integrity.

Blessings to you as you clear the clutter, follow your true joy and come together with others to bring all of you into ever-greater alignment with your authentic nature and service – with enough space, time and energy to breath deeply and live healthily!

I invite and welcome your thoughts and comments and am interested in hearing your experiences of engaging in this and other practices of discernment. Thanks for reading!