Letter to my children: Life is Both And

Dearest Beloveds,

According to Oak Meadow, the Hopi Creation story involves a Spider Woman who sings the Song of Creation to bring forth all life. She also puts a soft spot on the top of people’s heads so that they might be able to listen to the Creator. Eventually, people forget the Creator anyway and a great flood is sent to punish the wicked and start over. The few people who are saved in reed boats (thanks to Spider Woman) are brought back to a world where “there are now hardships so people will never forget their dependence on the Divine.”

For the two of you, that is the story of the week. A story we recalled as you two bounced around the room. A story to imagine as we painted onto dripping paper in yellows and blues and reds. A story the Bean summarized into her Main Lesson Book in her cursive. For your mother, that story pierced my soul.

Hardships as a way to remember their devotion to and dependence on the Divine is so appropriate for me right now.*

I think back on my relationship to my body and its cancer hardships. Through the lens of cancer my body has betrayed me. I have a body I cannot trust. My body is seen always as broken by doctors.

I am faced with those feeling at the same time as I love this body. I pull weeds in the sun and my muscles burn, the wind ruffles my hair, my shoulders are warm in the sun. I feel parched and sip cold water - it burbles down my hot throat filling my toes with light. I can feel the soft cave of my belly and sharp hunger in my shoulders and fingertips. Food suffuses into my system and suddenly my vision is wider, my smile is softer, my feet more firmly planted. I feel the delicious languor of fatigue which leads me to the glory of a clean body crawling between crisp sheets and the stretching of my toes into the cool softness. Then a rested awakening where I meet the day excited for Sadhana to set me up for whatever homeschooling adventure awaits. This body holds you in my arms, tickles you, dances with you, sings with you. This body drives you to activities and cheers for you in soccer.

I have been very adamant to not let my cancer hardship body run the show of either my internal monologue or how I see myself in the world. But some days it is more difficult than others. As I dutifully do my follow up appointments for the bone marrow transplant I enter a building where everyone sees my body as broken, as sick, as in need of monitoring, as in imminent danger from unknown (or known) potentialities.

I have gotten pretty good at using my Fear Muscle and not buying into this view of my body. But as Eckhart Tolle says, the pain body gets hungry and likes to trick you. Or as Mary Magdalene tells us - these seven powers of wrath are part of being human. We are supposed to forget again and again that we are Divine so that we can practice remembering. Again and again.

Each time I experience a hardship as a body it is my opportunity to forget and then remember that I am Divine. That is what is meant by hardships being the road to the Divine.

My beloveds, life will send you hardships - hardships where you curse and rail against fate. Hardships where you scream and rant and bellow into pillows. Hardships where your stomach clenches and your body constricts with terror. Hardships where it feels as though your belly has grabbed you by the throat and pulled all tendons into the floor. Hardships where you cannot eat, cannot sleep, cannot see properly.

Please yell.

Please scream.

Please cry and rant and reach out to those who love you to hold you as you wail.

Then, when you are ready, remember.

Remember.

Remember this hardship comes to focus your attention on the Divine. This hardship is an opportunity to strengthen your resolve to meditate/pray/take three breaths. This hardship is an opportunity to come back to yourself because you know what a calm body feels like. A body at peace is the opposite of a body experiencing hardship - and it is only from a body at peace that we are able to move forward into the world with love for ourselves and others.

It is only from a body at peace that we are able to listen to the Voice of love inside of us and act from that Voice. It is only from a body experiencing hardship that we are able to know the contrast of what that doesn’t feel like.

Be grateful for your body that can hold so much and teach you what peace feels like in your bones. Be grateful for your body that is willing to experience physical pain so that you can anchor yourself into the Divine. Be grateful for your body that you can experience LIFE.

BOTH the hardships.

AND the Love.

BOTH AND.

* Huge shoutout also to the Hopi for having this be the framework of existence.