Jane and Momo

(Note! Major frustrations today with the spacing on blogspot...nothing is working to fix it, so please ignore the inconsistencies as best you can!)

Today has been a "cycle of life" day.

First, this morning, a dear friend's 88-year-old mother, Jane, passed gently away in her sleep up in Connecticut, less than an hour before Susie arrived at the hospital. Just a few weeks ago Jane was doing fine, only complaining a little of not feeling well. Her decline was rapid and relatively pain-free, thankfully. Susie is bereft, but grateful that Jane is free.

And, this afternoon, an email arrived announcing the joyous birth of another dear friend's daughter, Momo, in Tokyo. Neo is ebullient, beside himself with joy and gratitude at his baby girl's arrival, astounded at the powerful emotions present as he witnessed Momo's entrance into the world. His ecstatic email effused, "She is beautiful. Yoko and Momo are both fine! I stayed with Yoko for delivery. I was moved the moment that the new life came into the world. This is our baby! All lives are our babies!"

Comings and goings. Jane and Momo. The cycle of life. Quite a day.

What is it live fully from the place of childlike energy and wonder?

How would life today be different if you embraced the fact that your days are, indeed, numbered?

At this point, in between your own coming and going, what do you know of yourself that is true and right and points to your very own "North" on your very own compass?

Wake. Listen. Hold fast to what you know to be true.

Live fully on this day!

It's a RADICAL thing...

Did you know that choosing to live the most fully alive, joy-filled, values-based, noshitnoregretsnocompromises life is a RADICAL act?

Our good friends at www.websters.com tell us that "radical" (an adjective, btw), means "of or going to the root or origin; fundamental." So what's that got to do with the above? Plenty.

More and more, I see the work I do as that of helping clients peel away the layers of "shoulds" and "ought tos" and "They" and "Everybody," finally exposing who they are at their core, their root. They remember who were at their origin...that soul/spirit grounded being that came into this world to self-express in only the way that it possibly can...who they are fundamentally, outside of what everyone else thinks or wants.

Life hurts when this radical, fundamental part of us gets buried along the way. We get sad, depressed, and angry. We muddle through mediocre lives that are in service of everyone and everything else, instead of first tending our own souls so that we can then be of service in the world in ways that actually fill us up instead of drain us dry.

And we know. We know who we are at our root. We remember what brought us joy when we were a kid. The things we'd do and the people we'd be if neither time nor money were concerns. In our vanilla adult lives, we reach back in our memories, and into our heart of hearts, and we know that what's really there is cherrybomb chocolate caramel splash!

So what is it for you? Who are you, radically? What's under your layers that's aching to see the light of day?

"In due time..."

A friend and colleague, Michael Kahn, told me about a movie short called "Our Time Is Up" (available for just $1.99 on iTunes). It's a 14-minute film in which we meet Dr. Stern, a therapist who's like one of the walking dead with the added benefit of a chip on his shoulder. His clients present stereotypical problems...O.C.D., afraid of the dark, closet homosexual, eating disorder, etc...and he treats them, as all of life, as a banal, boring, slightly-beneath-him exercise of endurance. His trademark response to most questions is, "In due time..."

And then he finds out that he has six weeks to live.

As you might guess, that news shocks the hell out of him and the truth into him. He wakes up to life, and in the meantime, starts telling his clients what he really thinks, no holds barred! I'll leave the rest for you to see, but here are some of the quintessential questions around such a topic:

Why does it take something tragic for us to wake up to life?

Why do we wander around as if we knew we had all the time in the world?

How would life look and feel differently if you only had six weeks to live? Who would you love? Who would you leave?

And here's a good one: If the awakened, no-bullshit Dr. Stern was sitting across from you, what would he say? What would he call you on? Challenge you to?

What are you waiting for?

You're NOT Finished!

"Here is a test to find whether your mission on earth is finished: if you're still alive, it isn't."

That quote is from a book called "Illusions" by Richard Bach, same guy who wrote the small, simple, and amazing "Jonathan Livingston Seagull."

I was having coffee with a friend earlier (okay, technically steamed soy milk with half a shot of sugar-free raspberry syrup--try it! yum!), and we got onto the topic of mediocrity, and how easy it is to slip into a life stupor, accepting mediocrity as something to feel lucky for. E.g., "Well, I've got a great house and an okay job and someone to come home to at night, and my job has great benefits, so yeah, I should feel lucky. Most people in the world don't even have half of all that..."

Okay, so in part I agree. We should all be conscious about what we have in life, and be grateful. AND, I WHOLEHEARTEDLY DO NOT AGREE WITH ACCEPTING MEDIOCRITY AS A TERMINAL LIFE PATH. So many of us have been raised with this guilt thing hanging over our heads, and with a scarcity mentality. ("I'd better 'get mine' in life before someone else does!" or "This is really all I deserve.") But guess what? That is SO not the way it has to be! You, being fully expressed in the world, eeking out every last drop of who you are, is what the world craves from you!

I, and the world, much, much prefer an abundance mentality. Abundance thinking says, "Yes, that's possible, AND...!" instead of, "Well, that would be nice, but..." Julia Cameron does a great job of busting open self-limiting beliefs about scarcity vs. abundance in her book "The Artist's Way." In it, she basically says, "Why would God [meaning "good orderly direction" for anyone not into the big "G"] want you to have anything less than abundance in your life? Why would God make up rules that say work can't be fun and creative and fulfilling? Who says the two have to be mutually exclusive?"

But at some point, so many of us find our way into a spot where we may feel overwhelmed by obligation, either to family or friends or even a company we've been with a while. We get caught up in a wave we happened to catch at one point, and over the years, we start saying "yes" to what everyone else thinks we should do and be, and we loose track of the things that fill us with so much joy it feels like we almost can't stand it. Do you remember that feeling? That feeling of joy? Lightness? Almost-bursting happiness?

It must be quote night tonight because I'm going to round out this entry with Marianne Williamson's famous quote, used by Nelson Mandela in his inaugural speech:

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 is 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 are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.

C'mon. According to Richard Bach, you're still alive, so your mission's not finished. It's time to shift into abundance mode...after all, everything is waiting!

Being Here Now

How are you? Right now, this very, very minute?

Stop. Take just a moment.

Take in a deep breath.

What's here now?

What do you do with what you notice? Do you "vote" about what comes up? (e.g., happy = good! angry = baaad)

Part of my job as a life coach is to help people gain more conscious access to their whole selves. From a very young age, like, right out of the chute, many of us were taught that some emotions are good, and some aren't so good. When we're sad, people who care about us try to make us happy. When we're mad as kids, sometimes we're scolded for it, or even punished. And some of that is instinctual parenting stuff!

But as we grow into adulthood, we haven't been taught to recalibrate. To know that we can have access to our full range of emotions and just experience them, without attaching stories or meaning to them. Just simply feel them, let them be, and then do with them what we will. Usually they sort of just morph into the next thing, and then the next thing, and the next thing.

Instead, we're taught to always look forward. Set goals! Achieve them! Want more! More! More!

So does some of this sound abstract? Well, just give it a go.

Stop. Take just a moment.

Take in a deep breath.

What's here now?

And now?

And now?

And what's underneath that first thing?

What else is here?

Let it all in. See what happens!

Earn your M.S.U.!

Betcha didn't know that you were reading the blog of a bonafide Master of M.S.U., didja? Well, you might want to slow down and savor each...and...every...word...because it's true! I, Laura C. Neff, have been officially confered the esteemed degree of "Master of Making Stuff Up."

What? Why the funny face?! Oh, you'd like an explanation...

I spent the bulk of last week in a redwood forest north of San Francisco with a phenomenal and growing company called "The Next Level" (www.tnextlevel.org) learning how to facilitate experiential learning scenarios, whether they're 35 feet up in the air on a high ropes course, just a few feet in the air on a low ropes element, or on the good old terra firma itself. So where does the "M.S.U." part come in? Ah, grasshoppah, good question. Read on.

Experiential learning is, as its name so aptly suggests, a way to take in something new using the wisdom of your whole being. Typically, we (and I include myself here) go into a "training" with our bodies basically functioning as transportation for our brains. We sit and listen, often for hours at a time, counting on our brains to do 99.9% of the job of hearing, processing, corellating, synthesizing, and later, remembering.

How many of you have had such training, gotten all excited about it, and just a few weeks later, forgotten most of it? Or been frustrated that it "didn't stick," or that it all just seemed to fade away? (I'm envisioning lots of raised hands here!)

And now envision this: you spend that same amount of time in a setting that a) teachs you new skills, b) mirrors back to you the ways in which your habitual, often unconscious behaviors might be helping or hurting what you really want, c) helps you really envision what you truly, deeply want. And it all happens through exercises in which you're moving and in which you can't possibly succeed without the full and conscious cooperation of your brain and your body.

Here's the beautiful part about that last bit: what your brain doesn't know, your body does.

I'll say it again: what your brain doesn't know, your body does.

A personal example: So I'm bee-bopping through my day at The Next Level's high ropes course, sure that the elements will be as easy as pie for this former child-tree-climbing-star. I hop up when they need someone to go first, smugly feeling sorry for my counterparts who are all clearly terrified. I get my safety harness double checked, jiggle my helmet to make sure it's secure, and get confirmation that my belay team (the folks holding the other end of the rope I'm attached to) is ready. And up I go! Up, up, up! Scampering up the tree, happy, happy. I clambor onto the platform that's holding the eight-foot plank I need to walk and leap off of, quite pleased with my rapid ascent up the redwood.

And then I freeze.

And then I can't breathe.

And I can't, for the life of me, let go of, much less step away from, the tree I'm clinging to.

Words of encouragement start being hurled up at me from down below. Lots of voices, lots of words, and all I know is that I can't move or breathe. Somehow, though, a few words filter through the roaring going on between my ears.

"Laura, what do you really want?"
"I want to walk to the end of this plank and leap off!"

"What do you need?"
"An elevator!"

"You have about a minute left."
"Okay, but I can't figure out how to get out to the end."

"Just take one step. See what happens."
"What if that doesn't do it?"

"Then just make something else up!"

So I did. I took a step, even though my knees were knocking. I started saying a little mantra to myself, and then I took another step. Before I knew it, I was at the end, and although I hardly leapt with grace, I did it!

The point here is, there was no way that my brain alone was going to give me what I needed in order to be successful. And there was no way, ahead of time, that my brain could plan what would happen when I got up there. And there was no way the huge awakening I had in those moments would have been so deeply ingrained if I had read about the whole experience. (That learning, btw, was, "Woah! All my life I've seen fear as a bad thing, and if my legs were shaking, it was surely a sign to go another direction. Now I see that if I'm really pushing myself, fear will be along for the ride, and that I can tremble and take a step anyway!")

And how is it for you?

What's something you're wrestling with? A problem that your brain can't resolve no matter how it tries?

Get up.

GET UP.

Get your sneakers on and start moving. Let go of everything you know about what you're trying to figure out, and start moving. And then listen. And if that doesn't work, just make something up. The point is, move. Get an access point into the wisdom of your brain/body combination. See what comes. I can almost 100% guarantee that something will. And you'll be on your way to earning an M.S.U., too!

The Strength of Your Own Vulnerability

It's 6:30 a.m. here in Bodega Bay, California. The sun's just starting its daily job of illuminating the world as this big round tilt-a-whirl turns us toward warmth and light once again. Hooray for the sun! It's cold at night here (low 30s), and the mid-day heat is very welcome.

Today's the third day of a four-day training, held in a redwood forest, on how to effectively facilitate experiential learning (hands-on) games/exercises/elements, including low- and high-ropes courses. I expected to spend hours trying to understand the safety mechanics of pulleys and knots and belay devices, which we will get to, but we're mostly learning the heart of this work, about creating the space for real learning and exploration and risk taking to emerge. To help individuals and groups synthesize what they experience and transfer that learning into "real life" situations back at work/home/etc. There are 16 of us here. Many are from California, but we're also from North Carolina, Minnesota, Iowa, and even France! Tom Courry, owner of The Next Level, is hoping to expand his business internationally in the next year, and we're all hoping to find ways to help him do that.

One thing that someone said on the first day has really struck and stuck with me, and it's the idea of discovering "the strength in your own vulnerability." At first, it's a brain-bender. The perspective that a lot of us carry around goes something like this, "Hang on, the strength in my own vulnerability? But being vulnerable means I'm weak and open to being hurt and like I'm prey just waiting for something or someone to pounce! Yuck! No way!" And it's an understandable perspective, especially if I've been hurt before. And, holding that perspective keeps me closed off, not in true relationship, not trusting, needing to control my environment, and in an exhausting state of constant vigilance. Mostly, I'm not in relationship with myself because I'm always "out there," on the lookout for what might be coming that could hurt. It can be a pretty tiring and lonely state, actually.

I could write chapters on this topic, but instead, I'll leave you with a few questions, and feel free to comment on this posting with your thoughts or email me at laura@moreinyou.com. Here they are:

What might it mean to let yourself fall into the strength of your vulnerability?
What would need to happen to make room for that?
What might the gifts of it be?
How might it manifest?

Have fun!