STOP Look Both Ways

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Wednesday January 20th, Joe Biden took office as the 46th President of the United States of America. In the days leading up to his inauguration, the National Guard was ramping up security in several state capitols to combat any protests or riots that might take place. After the events a week or so before where protestors took over the Capitol building, it seemed like a pretty good idea to prepare for the worst.

I was thinking about this on one of my runs and I felt called to do something that I don’t regularly feel called to do. I thought that I could host an online guided meditation that morning to help my community ground down and get their feet underneath them in case we had another negatively newsworthy day. My main goal of the meditation was to inspire love and understanding.

I think recently in this country, we’ve had an issue with listening.

And when I say that, I mean everyone. The current state of America is what happens when everybody gets a voice, but nobody feels heard. It’s identifying with one group and shouting loudly at the other. It’s taking moral high ground above those who disagree with you and defaming their ideas, beliefs and way of life.

I’m not asking anyone to see the side of white supremacists. White supremacy should be denounced from coast to coast. There is no room for that way of thinking in this world. I do, however, know good people who vote Republican. I don’t perceive them to be racists. Their reasons seem logical from the perspective that they give. The people I know don’t have their torches and pitchforks ready to run anybody out of town. They just think differently on some other issues.

Those are the people that you want to encourage discussion with. Those are the people that you don’t want to block out and unfriend, because those are the people that can help to bring about change with the serious social issues that our country faces. If policies can be adjusted in a way that serves both parties and all people that have good in their heart, well then we are well on our way to a more perfect union.

So with that in mind I planned this meditation as a means to promote love and understanding. I wanted those that might lean a little left to want to bring the people on the right with them, not cut them out. I wanted those that might lean a little right to understand where the people on the left were coming from and understand why this was such a big moment for them. I wanted to bring us all closer to the middle.

And to do that I thought I would open up the heart chakra.

The heart chakra is located at the middle of your chest. Being the middle chakra, it serves as the balance point between the more tangible and manifestation-based chakras below, and the more ideological and liberation-based chakras above. This chakra also serves as quite the conundrum for the human race. Most animals protect the chest. It’s where all the good stuff that keeps you ticking is, so they ambulate on all fours or hunch over to protect this area. The erect posture of a human is pretty rare in the animal kingdom when you think about it. Our survival instincts tell us to close this part off. As we learn how the world works, we erect barriers around our heart to keep people from hurting us. Certain people are not let into this area. The ones who gain access, are special indeed.

But in order to have a full human experience we do have to open up this chakra. We do have to let love in knowing full well that it’s the easiest way to get hurt. I mean, heartbreak only exists as a loss of deep and affectionate love. Without that initial feeling, there is nothing to take away. So it’s a bit of a gamble to open up and really allow yourself to feel.

It’s not easy to do, but we don’t do it because it’s easy.

After a few grounding and presence visualizations we arrived at the heart and I instructed my class to take padma mudra. This mudra consists of bringing your palms together at the heart, keeping your pinky fingers and thumbs together as you open up the three middle fingers away from each other. It creates a bit of a lotus flower at the heart. It is said to assist circulation to the chest, heart and lungs along with creating gratitude and empathy.

Once there, I called upon my class to picture someone who they disagree with. Someone who made them angry. Someone they would go as far as to say that they hated. We all have someone. As those feelings started to well up in the body I cued them not to push them away. It’s important to really feel your feelings, and not just the good ones. Lean into hate, anger and jealousy the same way that you would with love or happiness. That doesn’t mean that you have to go out and do something about it, but it does give you the chance to experience what comes up for you rather than just bury it down below and assume yourself to be the next Gandhi. 

After sitting with those feelings for a bit of time and letting them run their course, I asked them to see if they could forgive that person. Could they, after allowing the initial emotions to surge through them, find a space in their heart to let love in for another human being? Again I reminded them that this wasn’t easy, but we don’t do it because it’s easy.

The meditation wrapped up a bit later to thunderous applause and a declaration that we as a human race would no longer see hate, but from now on only love…

Ok so it wasn’t that good, but I did get some positive feedback.

People seemed to like what we did and my phone didn’t seem to be inundated with one thousand updates of impending civil war throughout the country. So maybe a couple people sitting down to choose love tipped the needle in the right direction.

Fast forward later in the day. I’ve just wrapped up all of my clients and I drove over to my local sandwich shop to pick up a sub. I’m in fairly good spirits having completed the day and ready to go home, eat lunch and get a workout in. I roll up to a stop sign barely paying attention at all as I try to adjust my volume and temperature control all at once, when I look up and almost freeze.

On the street perpendicular to me at a four way stop sign is a former partner of mine. And you know how we all have former partners but there’s that one that still kinda twists you up inside to think about? Well, this is the one. We’ve got history, quite a lot at this point. The feeling that I experience as I see her isn’t hate, but it’s not far from it. Let’s split the difference and admit that it’s not a positive feeling.

Luckily the moment passes and we both drive out separate ways. I’m just left with a quick little reminder of some scars I hadn’t noticed in a while. I messaged one of my good friends to tell him what had happened and he put it into some perspective for me.

“Wow, you thought you’d be needing that meditation for the inauguration, but I guess the universe had other plans.”

And ain’t that just it. We make all these plans for how we want to live our life and how we want to approach the world and in doing so, sometimes miss the signs that are right in front of us. This chance encounter was my opportunity to practice what I had preached only hours earlier.

I didn’t want to do it. I tried to workout instead, but couldn’t focus.

I tried to take a nap to calm my nervous system, but couldn’t sit still. So I drove down to the beach, a place where I’m most comfortable in sitting with my feelings. I let all those ‘bad’ thoughts and feelings I was experiencing come in and fill up my chest. It sucked. I mean really sucked. This is stuff from a long time ago that part of me feels like should not come up anymore. But it does come up. It comes up so that I can continue to evolve in the way that I approach the world. It comes up as an opportunity to practice what I preach.

So I’ve got to hand it to the universe once again. She’s constantly turning the tables on me when I think I’m the teacher, so that I can become the student. She flips the script when I’ve figured something out, to show me that I’m just a beginner. It’s all very curious to me, but I truly do feel connected to it. It all seems to be unfolding as it should, even if it’s not the way that I wanted it to.

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