On Responsible Wishing

What are you wishing for your life? What would you invite to come?

We always wish for something more in our life, especially around the beginning of a new year. We may be satisfied and thankful with the “place” we are right now, but we definitely wish for something new or something more; a loving partner, a fulfilling job, a beautiful family, a healthier body, a safe home, a liberating change, a deeper meaning, a moment of silence…

I am not referring to the mindless consumption here. I am talking about the true self-actualization desires. These are completely legitimate things. Our never-ending thirst for growth is what helped us evolve over time, create the arts and sciences.

However, many times, we fall in the trap of grumbling about the things we long for. Perhaps unconsciously we choose to stay in the comfort of complaining or whining. It sounds odd but it is more comfortable to complain and whine about things than actually take the responsibility for pursuing them.

But there’s a trick here. The process of complaining and whining, wishing but avoiding, takes in the end far more time and effort, than taking the responsibility of acting upon them. The process of grumbling unconsciously makes us think that we are small and unable to reach them. Eventually it does not bring us closer to the things we wish for, but further.

So let’s rethink of that. Let’s tune into our responsible part and act upon the things we long for. Maybe it’s time for us to roll up our sleeves and start walking towards them. Sometimes this journey begins and ends only by setting an intention, or voicing our wish in a responsible and committed manner.

Would you be up for tuning into responsible wishing?

Staying Safe Might Not Be Enough

Living in the corona virus pandemic, it seems that the motto of the days is no other than “stay home - stay safe”. I do understand, agree and follow all the proposed measures of staying safe (staying home, avoiding physical contact, washing hands, etc). It is just that the phrase “stay safe” is not enough in my poor understanding. It depicts the minimum of what needs to be done to survive the present moment. Survival is essential, I am not arguing with that. But survival is not real health or wellness. Survival does not equal a full life. Survival does not engender thriving-ness, growth, expansion, or flourishment of human and Earth.

If our lives are so important (and oh yes they are!) we need to go beyond safety and beyond survival. If our lives are so important, we need to forget about staying seated for 16 hours per day, watching continuously a screen, living in fear, consuming stress, feeding unhealthily, procrastinating the important, avoiding ourselves. Because our lives are so important, we need to roll up our sleeves and craft some real work.

The culture in which we have lived so far, mostly identifies human life with physical health. If we look at things solely from this perspective, I bet you wouldn’t guess what dangers are hiding inside our homes, right under our nose! WHO, the World Health Organization has a special name for these dangers. They call them Noncommunicable diseases (NCDs). (!!!) The NCDs include heart disease, stroke, cancer, diabetes and chronic lung disease. The rise of NCDs has been driven by primarily four major risk factors: tobacco use, physical inactivity, the harmful use of alcohol and unhealthy diets. NCDs kill 41 million people each year, equivalent to 71% of all deaths globally. (This information is about 2017 and is retrieved from https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/noncommunicable-diseases) So, coming back to what I was saying about safety, protecting ourselves and surviving the corona virus right now, does not mean necessarily that we are surviving the NCDs. Because our lives are important, we need to do more than staying indoors.

The culture in which our ancestors lived involved a completely different understanding of human life, an understanding which endorsed a multiple dimensional of the human nature, including the physical, emotional, mental and spiritual dimension, all equally important and vital. This concept, although attributed mostly to the Native Americans, is imprinted in worldwide indigenous cultures and ancient philosophies, and traces of it are found even nowadays. In this perspective, because our lives are important we need to ask ourselves:    

• How am I empowering my physical dimension?    

• How can I listen more to my body? How am I following these invitations?    

• How do I bring tranquility, clarity and creativity in my mind?      

• How do I enhance my learning and above all self-learning, self-awareness?      

• How do I invite love and self-love to nest in my heart?      

• How can I fully embrace all of my emotions and what lesson is each one of them teaching me about me?

• How am I strengthening my connection with the spirit? How do I follow my soul?      

• What am I born to offer to this world through this life and how do I manifest it?

Because our lives are so important and because the world needs us, (our children need us, our grandchildren need us, our parents need us, our grandparents need us, the whole Earth needs us) let’s not just stay safe. Instead, let’s take the vastness of time we are unexpectedly given right now, to answer - not in words, but through our actions and presence- this one question that Mary Oliver is asking us in the poem below.

The Summer Day (by Mary Oliver)

Who made the world?

Who made the swan, and the black bear?

Who made the grasshopper?

This grasshopper, I mean-

the one who has flung herself out of the grass,

the one who is eating sugar out of my hand,

who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down-

who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes.

Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face.

Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away.

I don't know exactly what a prayer is.

I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down

into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass,

how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields,

which is what I have been doing all day.

Tell me, what else should I have done?

Doesn't everything die at last, and too soon?

Tell me, what is it you plan to do

with your one wild and precious life?

Eleni Michail

On Fear And Liberation

For a long time I have felt strong discomfort posting photos showing my face on internet, especially when it comes to my professional work. I have believed that my work is what I do and how I do it, the soul and art I put it in, not what I look like. And it is true. I still feel like this and I will always do. What I came to discover with a lot of pain under this discomfort though, are strong mind restrictions, limiting self-believes, rotten thinking patterns and principles rooted in fear I have had inside of me for many years.

Bill Plotkin in his book “Wild Mind” calls these thoughts “loyal soldiers”. Loyal soldiers are self-protection mechanisms whose mission is to loyally protect us from any kind of hurt (physical, psychological, social, and/or economical hurt) but in return, they keep us small and far behind our full, integral growth as human. My loyal solders for example, have been keeping me small by opposing the idea of showing photos of me publicly. In this way, they made me reject an essential part of who I am, which is how I look like.

We all have these limiting thoughts in ourselves. Perhaps for you is singing out loud, dancing in a crowd, sharing the poems who secretly wrote at night, hugging the ones you love with humbleness, crying, saying confidently your opinion, doing the one thing you have always wanted but have been postponing and postponing. Yet I assure you that by allowing yourself to be the way you should be, is so liberating and so deeply healing.

I am quoting here a poem by Marianne Williamson, a poem that touches my soul and explains why liberating from our fears is so healing.

Our Deepest Fear By Marianne Williamson

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.

Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.

It is our light, not our darkness

That most frightens us.

We ask ourselves

Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?

Actually, who are you not to be?

You are a child of God.

Your playing small

Does not serve the world.

There's nothing enlightened about shrinking

So that other people won't feel insecure around you.

We are all meant to shine,

As children do.

We were born to make manifest

The glory of God that is within us.

It's not just in some of us;

It's in everyone.

And as we let our own light shine,

We unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.

As we're liberated from our own fear,

Our presence automatically liberates others.

So, today I am sharing an intimate photo of me, a version of me that only few have seen. This photo is captured by my youngest sister with an analog camera, black and white film, during one of our mushroom foraging walks last winter. I am sharing it with the wish that my liberation from my limiting thoughts regarding sharing photos of me publicly, will serve as an opportunity for liberating you. How are you taking this opportunity?

Eleni Michail