If abundance were measured in mangos we’d all be rich here in the Virgin Islands. Like a value laden stock portfolio I check the state of my grafted mango tree each morning to see if the thrushies have found the fruit ripe enough too peck at so I can pick it before they treat it like a sampler box of chocolates, taking a out of bite of each piece and then putting it back in the box.
If the red and yellow flamboyants dotting our island home are any indication of the passionate, colorful lives we lead we’d have to take turns being featured on the life-styles of the rich and famous or the celebrity channel and let’s not forget about super moon bonuses paid out in shimmering silver like Oprah handing out cars or tickets to Australia; sunrises and sunsets so dazzling that they command audiences larger than the biggest summertime block buster and a winter time that I’ve come to call rainbow season where we each have our day basking in the pot of gold at the end of the spectrum.
We behold more stars on any given night than anyone in NYC sees in a lifetime except at the Hayden Planetarium and we don’t just sing about the fish jumping but get to witness the drama of life and death on the high seas on a daily basis.
The Law of Attraction suggests that whatever we focus on expands whether it’s a dwindling bank account or random money found in last season’s jacket pocket. Since we are vibrational beings – pure energy – we attract people, places, situations and things that have a similar vibrational frequency to our own. If we’re vibrating at the lower end of the scale feeling powerless and depressed we tend to draw people, places, things and situations with similar vibrations into our lives – as in misery loves company and when we’re scowling, the whole world seems to be scowling too and the bad news is what’s hot off the press. When we’re smiling the whole world smiles back at us and it’s a bright sun-shiney day or at least a rainy day full of clouds with silver linings.
The only reason we ever want anything – whether it’s a Porsch, true love, a day off or a raise – is because we think it will make us happy – and the best way to be a vibrational match for happy is to feel happy now. It doesn’t matter what we’re happy about or if we’re in that delicious state of joy of happy for no reason – irrespective of the state of our bank account, relationship status, career trajectory, number of bedrooms or pool or no pool. A focus on abundance can only result in an expansion of abundance in our lives – it’s the law.
Sustaining that focus can be a serious challenge if we are used to coming from a place of lack, of not enough, of I’ll feel good when….. my ship comes in, I get the job, the guy, the house, the car (fill in the blank).
An underlying theme for many of us when we scrape the surface is that we are not good enough. We didn’t get good enough grades, weren’t good enough to fulfill the expectations of our parents or teachers or our culture’s mandates, don’t have ideal bodies or an ‘acceptable’ sexual orientation or mainstream political views. We are brought up to think that the pie is limited and that like a piñata at kids birthday party, if we don’t rush in to gather the candy that drops to the ground, it will be gone or like a game of musical chairs, if we don’t rush, and push someone out of the way we may be the one left standing.
It’s a lot of programming to overcome – all this negative pr about ourselves, about the state of the economy, the environment and the world at large. What if we have been sold a bill of goods and not knowing any better have bought it. What if there is more than enough to go around – enough food, enough money, enough love for everyone. What if we don’t really have to scramble, compete, steal, hoard, stockpile and live in fear. What if we turned that formula on it’s head and relaxed, collaborated, shared, trusted, distributed and understood that giving and receiving are part of the same loop – whether it’s money or love or our attention that we’re giving.
There’s no better time to tune into this message than mango season and I like nothing better than to stop and pick up bags of fallen mango and delight in the impromptu fruit stands that have popped up everywhere with their neat little piles of yellow goodness arranged carefully on roadside tables making me think that Fort Knox is leaking golden ingots and reminding me that paradise is merely a thought away and that it’s our home.
I started playing the violin about 6 years ago and have taken lessons on and off ever since. improvement is always in direct proportion to how much I practice as well as to the guidance of the several wonderful teachers.
The violin program at the Montessori school was preparing for it’s final violin recital last week and I was hemming and hawing about whether I’d participate. The dress rehearsal went badly and I have to thank a parent I saw at Picassa’s the next morning for her encouragement. When I shared my reluctance to play, she said “Ridiculous. Go ahead.”
I left the dress rehearsal, went home, practiced like crazy and showed up for the show along with the other students – ages 3-16, one other adult and me. The audience was padded with fans – mostly parents, grands and a few friends. The show began with Julie Beistline, our teacher, wowing us with a Paganini piece and proceeded to showcase Julie’s students. My rendition of Fritz Kreisler’s Liebslied was a big improvement over the dress rehearsal version and, having no parents present (on this plane anyway) I was proud of myself for pulling it off, sounding OK and simply for having the courage to stand up and perform.
Sitting in the audience before and after playing, my focus was drawn to Julie. The pride and joy that radiated from her as she watched each and every student perform was a delight to behold. Her pure pleasure in the progress and performance of her ‘kids’ was palpable and warmed my heart. Whenever I looked her way she was nodding, listening closely and smiling – as my friend Zora said – like an angel. Her total focus on helping the tiny students position their feet and their instruments and prepare to play was the same as I’d always felt in my lessons – total focus on helping and supporting me to do my best.
The whole experience was wonderfully uplifting and got me thinking about the tremendous power of teachers in our lives and, that whatever we do professionally, we are all teachers and we are all given many opportunities everyday, not only share our expertise, but to encourage and support one another.
My daughter took piano lessons many years ago and her teacher Richard Sabonis was another version of Julie – in a much older, Santa Claus like persona. He was endlessly encouraging, endlessly positive and had her playing pieces that I would have deemed too advanced for a beginner. I would sit, cringing at her cacophonous efforts, marveling when he said, “Good try. Now lets go back to the beginning and see if we can do it like this.” When we moved away I looked for another teacher so she could continue her studies and, at a first lesson with a prospective teacher, she was asked to play something and proudly played Fur Elise. She turned expectantly to hear him say– “ Well, that could use some work.” Her 10-year old body deflated and on the way out she said “I don’t like him. I don’t want to go back.” I understood.
When we focus on another person fully with the intention of supporting them in any endeavor – as a teacher, coach, parent, friend, sibling, colleague or random person on line at the post office – focusing on their strengths and helping them shore up and transform their weaknesses we are using our magic wands of affirmation and encouragement.
We relegate magic wands to the world of fairy tales and forget that we all possess one. Imagine what yours looks like and what incantation you might mumble in the tradition of abracadra and the bibitty bobbity boo of the fairy godmothers in Cinderella who sang “you can do magic believe it or not and ‘just a wave of my stick and I’ll finish the trick”.
Go ahead pull it out, dust it off, try it, give it a whirl. We all have within us the words and wands that have the power to transform: help others shed rags for gowns, stand taller, do what they wouldn’t have thought possible, see their Buddha natures, divine selves and empower others to move out into the world sharing their unique gifts, being their best, most joyful selves and showing up at the recital, playing their hearts out and taking a bow to well deserved applause.
I was in a rush. I’d agreed to pick up my elderly friend Jim and take him to the hospital to see his best friend. I’d said I’d pick him up at 1 and it wasn’t until I was on my way that I remembered I’d made a lunch date with some friends for 1:30. Figuring I’d be a little late, I hurried Jim along which, given his age and limitations, proved to be an oxymoron – i.e there was no hurrying Jim. I called my lunch date to say go ahead and order, I’d be late and thought ahead to pave the way – wheel chair up to 4th floor, get him settled and take off.
Pulling my jeep in front of the hospital, I went to the passenger side, opened the door and was about to help Jim to a bench while I went and got a wheel chair, when a woman approached us and asked if we needed any help. I looked up. She look serious so I said, “Sure. We need a wheel chair.” She looked puzzled until I explained that my passenger was a visitor, not a patient and was on his way to visit a friend on the 4th floor. She said, “I can take him for you.” Now it was my turn to be puzzled, “ You really mean you’ll take him all the way up to the 4th floor to see his friend? “ She said “Yes” and returned a couple of minutes later with a wheel chair and took off, Jim in tow.
I was beaming and over the top appreciative, thank you thank you – no longer late for lunch. I called, “I’ll be back in a couple of hours Jim. Thank you angel lady.”
About to climb into my car I caught the eye of the driver in a car parked behind me. I smiled and said, “God is Good. “ She answered. “Always.”
She didn’t say, “sometimes,” or “just for today” or “if you’re good – or lucky”. She said ALWAYS and that ALWAYS has been echoing in the caverns of my insides ever since.
I could have said “Well what about how much it sucks that I’m even here, that Tom is deathly ill, that Jim is so old, that things fall apart” but I just nodded and let the always permeate my being and lead me deep to a very peaceful place where the impulse to rant and rave, complain, bemoan and dive into the drama was faint hearted and short lived.
Long ago I adopted Byron Katie’s phrases: The world is a friendly place and Everything always happens for my benefit. Barring moments of depression, imbalance and disconnection from source, I have found that owning these affirmations makes them so – witness the angel appearing to shepherd Jim upstairs allowing me to keep my lunch date – both friendly and beneficial you’d have to agree and only one small example from the plethora of miracles both big and small that populate my days.
What if you saw everything that happened to you as a gift basket – 
– custom made miracles so to speak even if initially you don’t get it, or don’t like it or wish you’d gotten another basket
What if you stopped looking a gift horse in the face and like a child, got excited and curious, started poking around and discovering no end of hidden treasures– some with your very own name on them and when you look around you see signs saying The silver lining, this magic moment and Let it Be.
I am grateful for the gift of seeing through eyes that recognize that all moments are magic and are as plentiful as stars, and, that, like the woman coming up and whisking Jim away, the universe answers our requests. I am getting better too at breathing in the always of acceptance, feeling the blessing of each opportunity and the lesson of every magic moment, even if, or especially when, the way things go down isn’t what I had in mind or pains my heart.
My friend in the hospital passed away one week ago today – rest in peace Tom St. Vincent di Coio – and his best friend Jim has gone to live with his niece and nephew in the States – an intense transition for all leaving his friends in shock and meditating on final endings, memories and the meaning of it all and here I am still tuned into the echo of “Always.”
Driving across the island enjoying the after glow of one of the best smoothies I’d ever made, I reviewed, in my mind, the tasty, healthful ingredients that had gone into its creation. There was the papaya I had just picked, a lime and a star fruit from my trees, cocoanut water from Clement the Magen’s Bay Coconut man, hemp powder for a major dose of protein and fig bananas and kale from the rasta farmer at the Bordeaux market.
When I thought of the kale I was reminded of my desire to plant my own crop and how I get stymied by my need for enough soil to fill up the 9’x4’ plot I’ve surrounded with cinder blocks. Even though I drive around with two buckets and a shovel in the back of my car and have been told where there are piles for the taking, I’m not always dressed for the task or in the mood to stop and shovel and, the one time I did, I felt discouraged at how two buckets of soil didn’t go very far.
When I realized that I could divide the plot into a smaller chunk, a light bulb went off in my brain. Combined with the potting soil I have on hand and the results of my new compost pile – I’d be ready for seedlings in no time and could look forward to adding my own kale to my smoothies – a thought that made me smile. I felt liberated and wondered why it had I taken me so long to figure out that a chunk would get me going and had languished in the land of overwhelm and not enough instead? I knew too that this is familiar territory extends beyond the boundaries of my nascent garden into other areas of my life in the land of unfinished business, works in progress and drippings from the good stuff of life that is waiting to be turned into gravy or something equally delicious.
I have dreams and lots of them. Many have come true thanks to my efforts, lots of help from my friends and family and the amazing ways the universe has of conspiring on my behalf. But there are lots that are waiting in the wings – some just needing a coat of paint while others have so many steps involved in their conception and birth process that when I think of all that is involved in getting from here to there my brain fogs over and I put them on the back burner or the endless to do list where they sit and clog up the works and, like plaque, prevent the free flow of unimpeded energy.
The Place mat process of Abraham is great for dealing with overwhelm. It involves taking a few top priority items from your endless to do list and putting them in a column under your name while putting the rest of the list in a column labeled The Universe. It’s a way of cutting what’s on your plate into manageable bites and a vote of confidence that the universe, God, source, the powers that be, are also taking care of business.
Time management experts suggest breaking tasks into small increments and production lines include descriptions of every extension and exertion involved in a particular task. I’ve been working with a coaching program whose challenge is to break things down into their smallest components, to be specific and set clear deadlines. It’s not good enough to say “make healthy soups twice a week”. I’m asked to specify whether I have the necessary recipes and ingredients and if not when so life is easy and I don’t get sidelined with no recipe and no potatoes for the vichychoisse for example.
If you are going to start an exercise program that involves running or swimming – do you have sneakers or goggles and if not when are you going to get them? If you want to earn 5,000 this month from your sales job – how much do you have to bring in today, how many sales calls to have as many conversations as you need to get your target number of buyers. Nothing vague or fuzzy here.
My plot of Kale is pure poetry and a metaphor for the rest of my life where focusing on a smaller more manageable chunk of my garden plot means I can fill it up sooner than later and add my home grown kale to my home grown smoothie – a testimony to the benefit of, what I’m calling, “Chunky Living” where we stay present, bite off what we can chew and reap the benefits of being here now.
Lately, on my morning beach walks, I’ve been playing with shifting my gaze. – Throwing it way out like a yoyo to take in the big picture, all the way to the end of the creseent that is Magen’s Bay, and then slowly reeling it in and enjoying the scenery along the way, until I’m finally looking straight down at my feet.
There’s a spot where my gaze is most comfortable. It’s where my eyes, neck and head are in their ‘rest’ position and it’s approximately 12 feet ahead.
When I look to the end of the beach I can see the big picture and people and objects in the distance are small and indistinct. As I bring my gaze in closer everything becomes bigger and clearer until, up close and personal, things are super-sized and fill up my field of vision like my giant big toe.
12 feet ahead provides the perfect little world in which to walk. It includes the footsteps of those who’ve gone before, the sand, any obstacles, jelly fish, sea gulls, sand crabs, a peripheral view of the sea, approaching people and a peaceful, private inner place.
The word Drishti came to mind when I was walking. It’s a Sanskrit word that refers to where to place your gaze in each yoga posture so, when I got home I got down David Swenson’s Ashtanga Yoga Practice Manuel and sure enough, what I’d been doing was experimenting with my drishti – looking for the perfect balance between my inner and outer worlds – my beach walking Drishti.
Each asana (yoga posture) has a Drishti associated with it – a suggested place to focus your gaze that enhances the benefits of each posture – like increasing your stretch by leading it with your gaze or deepening a bend by gazing at your big toe. In Yoga the Drishti also refers to an internal gaze and inner awareness that like a microscope reveals what we may not see externally.
As there is a Drishti associated with each yoga posture, for our outer and inner benefit, I’m seeing that there’s a Drishti associated with all our movements whether we are walking on the beach, washing dishes, having a conversation, sitting at our desks, doing pirouettes, reading a book, driving a car etc.… an ideal positioning of the body, head and gaze that is comfortable, ergonomic, expends the least effort and helps us to be present and focused on what is immediately before us and immediately within us.
I used this notion of Drishti (conscious focus) with great results when walking on the Camino de Santiago in France several years ago. My companion forged ahead on the steeper hills, leaving me, slow and steady, in the dust. When the going was steep and long, I found that if I l kept looking ahead, I got discouraged but if I looked up at the beginning to take stock and then kept my gaze (Drishti) about 12 feet ahead of me, staying in the present in my mind and with my gaze, I enjoyed the journey and celebrated summits. It worked downhill too with me in the lead leaping ahead like a goat.
I learned that it’s good to have a destination and then not to get too far ahead of yourself en route.
The same thing holds true for paddle boarding. If I’m la di dahing around out there scanning the horizon looking for turtles and dreaming of dolphins my gaze ranges far and wide but when I’m determined into the wind and mustering strength to move the board through the water, I focus on the water just in front of the board (probably about 12 feet ahead), gauge my speed and cultivate momentum.
In Buddhist meditation, you are encouraged to mediate with your eyes half open and your gaze cast downward and in front of you – a Drishti to enhance the purpose of the practice – being fully present.
The message I’m getting is that once we know where we are going, we’d do best to return to a manageable chunk of the present. Keeping our focus on what’s in the here and now will enhance whatever we are doing inside and out.
Like all yogic practices, Drishti uses the gifts of a human body and mind as a starting place for connecting to our full potential.. When we clear our vision of the veil
of habits, opinions, ideas, and their projections about what is real and what is false, we gaze beyond outer differences toward the absolute Truth.
May we all cultivate the ideal drishti – or perfect gaze for whatever we are up to today and always.