Manifesting Closure

This post is related to the first post of the year in my blog “What Will You Leave Behind?”. Closure in a way, is truly leaving behind something that you don’t want to experience any more.

Have you ever had someone who just dropped out of your life and you wonder what happened? Perhaps, you were the person who dropped out of someone’s life and they are wondering what happened? Ever regret not saying the proper thank you or goodbye? These types of situations are what we in coaching terms call “incompletes”. "Incompletes" are the secret little bugs that alone don’t cause much damage, but when you get a few of them over time, they can eat away some big holes in your life and feeling of well being.

Closures are about coming to terms with endings so you can move forward. Often times, people are regretful and have feelings of guilt when a parent or a friend dies and they never got to tell them, “I love you”, “thank you for being in my life”, “I am sorry”, etc. Closures can happen in person, by mail, or even soul to soul after one party has passed on. The point is not to have the receiver say, “yeah, thanks, that was just what I wanted to hear”. It is about the giver acknowledging the ending and honoring the relationship to say what they have to say to complete the cycle. It is similar to forgiveness in nature, it is not for the sake of the other person that we ask for forgiveness but for ourselves. Without closure we go through life carrying heavy loads on our backs or chained to our ankles, not recognizing why we are tired and drained.

Grief and allowing yourself to grieve not just the loss of a person, but a job or a marriage, is all part of closure. Often people don’t think that they need to grieve the loss of a marriage, especially if it was a bad one. However, whenever a phase or a relationship ends, it is also an ending of an identity or a past-time. In addition to missing the person(s) involved, you are also missing you and how you participated in that relationship. It is not about good or bad, it is just an ending that needs to somehow be acknowledged. I strongly recommend people create rituals for their closures. Perhaps you can honor your ending by treating yourself to a vacation, taking a workshop, going out with your friends, staying home in your pajamas all day and writing in your journal, etc. It could be anything, just do something so you can mark this event and then move on.

I have witnessed and personally experienced many "incompletes" that have gotten in the way of progress in life. So in the spirit of living a more fulfilling life in 2009, let’s bring closure to those pesky "incompletes". And if you are still not convinced, here are ten things that closures allow you to have or experience.

Top Ten Things Closures Allow:

• Moving on without feeling guilty, burdened, or empty
• Acceptance
• A break in the cycle of repeating similar scenarios
• Forgiveness
• Attracting new, more fulfilling relationships
• Being more present
• Seeing the good and the bad (being more objective) about the relationship
• Completion
• Letting go of an old way of being or an old identity
• The opportunity to start fresh with the same person (if you both wish and understand that it is different now)

What I Learned From Yoga

In the middle of my yoga class I realized how even my practice of yoga has evolved in the same direction as the way I live my life. In the beginning, I just did the poses trying to do it right, not fall over or embarrass myself. As it progressed, I pushed myself with every class, trying to improve, do what I couldn’t do in the beginning. Later on, in an attempt to stay in the moment, I held on to every word my teacher said. “Move your sacrum towards the ceiling while keeping your tail bone towards the ground”, I would go into my body and imagine those instructions from the inside. I tried so hard to be the good student but also to be in the moment. As I practiced this and realized that I wasn’t getting any better or more flexible, I started the harsh dialogue with myself. I would push myself and insisted on doing the advanced poses, no modifications were necessary.

After I hurt myself and thought that maybe yoga isn’t it for me, I tried another way of showing up to my classes. I went with my teacher’s words to the same places they took me, in my shoulder blades, into my abdomen, feeling every muscle and bone and the desire to move or not to move, as the instructions demanded. This time however, I did not evaluate myself. This time I was the observer in my body. I noticed what I could do and what I couldn’t. I observed my own frustrations and amazingly enough, as soon as I became the observer, the frustrations melted away. It was as if I had a friend, or a gentle witness embedded in my own body and aware of every breath and every strain and every movement and every stillness. Then the poses didn’t last like an eternity, even my least favorite ones. I had a friend with me, one who knew exactly how I felt and allowed me to get comfortable or uncomfortable in that feeling. I was not alone anymore…

This didn’t last too long. Once I gave in to wherever it was I was at with my practice, I started noticing that my teacher was becoming frustrated with my lack of progress. In addition, I noticed that I relied too much on her instructions. Both these factors were feeding into each other. This disturbed me as I thought that she was more enlightened than me. I found myself trying to please her once again. I stopped trusting myself and being ok with where I was at. I was just following the instructions.

So I had to leave. I write this with great sadness, sadness for losing a loyal friend, one whom I relied on for a long time. But I use this opportunity as an example to let go of all that does not serve me anymore. There comes a time in every relationship where you outgrow each other. Perhaps that is when your connection does not allow for any more new growth or expansion. And for those who think that yoga is a kind of stretching exercise routine, they are right. It stretches you inside and out.

What Will You Leave Behind?

One day being lazy and trying to multi-task, I had many packages to carry, so I moved the ones in my hands to under my arms and elbows, squeezing them to my body as I picked up a few more with my newly freed hands. I did this over and over, until some of the packages dropped. I used some bad language, blamed the packages and continued picking up the ones I had dropped and moving the ones in my hands to the position close to my body. Finally, I succeeded to pick everything up and move them to a table in my kitchen, body: distorted and tense, mood: somewhat angry. This could have easily ended up differently, I could have dropped something so many times, that I would give up and make two trips to the table like any sane person would have. This is the image that comes to me as I try to write about what I want for the New Year. I can be like the version of me with the packages, with lots of goals and ambitions, holding on to some real tight and dropping others in the process. Are New Year’s resolutions or goals like that for you? Do you find yourself cramming new goals and finding yourself sometime in April thinking you dropped the ball on something else?

Sometimes, we need to let go of something to make room for something better or more relevant to our current situation. What is something that you are willing to let go of? It could be an old goal, an old belief, an old way of being, an outdated relationship,… We can’t change if we aren’t willing to let go of what doesn’t work anymore. That is a simple statement, but a difficult one to practice. We tend to hang on to what doesn’t work for many reasons: comfort, we don’t know any better, it is easy, fear of what will come next, what will happen to my loved ones, no one to blame, etc. Hanging on just delays our evolution and robs us of experiencing a new life.

In the spirit of transparency and sharing, I will share with you what I am letting go of this year. I am letting go of all suffering. I know this sounds sick, but I love to suffer. If it isn’t about me, I’ll make it be about me. It could be a political conflict thousands of miles, away, I’ll suffer with all the people in the area and make it be about me. I’ll suffer for my children and any unjust act or word against them. I can go on and on, I won’t. I choose to let go of suffering, the big package I have held on to most of my life. I do this letting go, without anger or hostility. I let go gracefully and lovingly. I walk away from all suffering peacefully and joyfully without looking back. Now, I invite you to leave something behind as you enter 2009 so you can experience a new version of yourself…

Happy Holidays and Remember to Reconnect!

What I consider miracles that occur as a result or during the process of coaching include a deep sense of reconnection with ourselves. It still catches my breath, when I hear a client tell me how everything in her/his life is working out so beautifully and how they can correlate this flow to their coaching experience. It’s one of those things that I didn’t know about coaching and certainly, I didn’t really focus on during my training to become a coach. Ironically, it is all I focus on these days! When the client is reconnected to their true, authentic SELF, is when the miracles start rolling out.

So in this season of busyness, families and parties, I wish you all a deep sense of connection with your true SELF, so you can feel fulfilled, complete, and rejuvenated. Be well and happy holidays!

Manifesting Personal Power

So often I meet people who are completely identified with what they do, their accomplishments, their family roles, or their stories that they do not comprehend that there is anything beyond that. At this time in our history when our financial institutions are collapsing and our economy is troubled, many are panicked and fearful of losing their jobs, their livelihoods and their material security. More than that though, it is the loss of identity as a person who works at company X, a person who has a place to go to every day, a person who can buy what he/she wants or needs, etc. What’s happening is not just a financial earthquake, but an internal earthquake that is disorganizing and ripping apart many of our beliefs. People who have lost or are losing themselves are great clients to work with! It’s like building from scratch instead of knocking down walls and rearranging the furniture. I’ve never been interested in furniture placement. I’ve always been interested in what the foundation is built upon. Ironically, that is where most people are starting to realize. Without the proper foundation, any building can come tumbling down.

Last night, I had the privilege of listening to a talk by Laura Berman-Fortgang, a very successful coach, author and business woman and she so wisely put it: there is no such thing as a career crisis, the only crisis there ever is, is when you’ve lost yourself and sense of connection with who you are. So many people who have been doing jobs they don’t particularly like in organizations they don’t particularly care for are angry at what is happening in the world. They believed that at least, they were making money and had a job. With that security gone, they are left with little, or little that they can identify with.

So, if you have lost everything or are in the process of losing things, this is the perfect time to take a look at what it is you are identifying with. Personal power does not come with money, or anything that money can buy, and what better way to learn that than watching money disappear in front of our eyes! Personal power comes from connecting with our core selves. This brings us back to the question of who we are. Once we understand who we are then it truly doesn’t matter what we do. Haven’t you ever come across people who have “small” jobs, maybe a mail carrier or a janitor with a strong sense of self and living his or her values every day. That person has more personal power than someone who has a salary 100 times greater but who lost the sense of who they are in the process of getting there. What’s amazing is that the person with true personal power is not ever affected by what happens on the outside. The question we should be asking ourselves today is “who am I?” And if somehow we’ve forgotten or are not sure, it is our job to find out. Because without knowing who we are, we have no personal power to lift ourselves out of what is happening around us.

Expectation

We live every day expecting certain outcomes or events. We wake up and expect to be able to get out of bed, dress ourselves, go to work, etc. Under those mundane activities is the expectation of being treated a certain way: “I smile at the person I see and say hello, and they return an equivalent greeting”. It gets deeper: “I am loved the same way that I love” or my favorite: “I am cared for the same way that I care for others”. All of these beliefs are based on the fundamentals of “expectation”. We expect the world, people and events to be a certain way whether we are consciously aware of it or not. We expect to be healthy and when we are not, we expect to get better. We expect to die only when we are ready at a very old age. We expect our children to be geniuses in school and well-liked and successful. We expect our parents to be proud of our accomplishments, and on and on these go. What happens when our expectations don’t turn out? Unhappiness, anger, disappointment, sadness, etc. are all results of our expectations not turning out.

When I heard the news of Jackie passing away last week, I was surprised by my own reaction. It was very similar to when I learned of the passing of my father. In both cases, their deaths were expected and not a surprise. In fact, secretly, I was relieved that they both had passed. The relief however, was a mental one. I was glad that they did not have to suffer anymore. Then, why was I sad? No, it wasn’t that I missed them, at least not in the immediate days or weeks following their passing. It was the knowledge that neither of them would be a part of life (in this world) anymore. My sadness was based on the fact that my expectation that things will be this way for ever was no longer true. Even though, in my mind I knew that both would die sooner than later, somewhere in my heart, I was holding on to status quo. We are creatures made up of belief systems that go beyond our minds. We like predictability; we like to know that for every action there is an expected reaction. But when that reaction isn’t quite what we had expected, we are disappointed.

Recently, I attended a gathering that I was very excited about, because I expected to learn new things and make some new and meaningful connections. It ended up being quite boring and I didn’t make the connections I had hoped for. In fact, I was getting angry at having to spend my time in this manner. In the midst of my experience I realized that my anger was just due to my expectation of it being a certain way and it not being that way. So I stopped myself and took a few deep breaths. I decided to stay and allow it to unfold. It was very hard, as I am not a patient person and am rather selfish with my time. However, I decided to allow the occasion to teach me whatever “it” wanted. I know this sounds crazy, there is no “it” to be wanting anything. Bear with me, what I mean is that I took myself out of the picture. This act, opened me up to receive whatever showed up without my agenda. And I found myself interested and engaged. No, it wasn’t what I had hoped for, but by not hoping (at least half way through the day) I allowed myself to receive the moment as it showed up. So many times, we insist on getting what we want that we forget that maybe if we loosened up a bit, we might get something even better!

In the Eastern traditions, they call it detachment. Detach in order to experience peace. Our expectations keep us attached. What we don’t realize is how many we have. It is part of our consciousness. It is why we are unhappy and confused. Ok, so now that we know why we can be unhappy, how do we detach, how do we stop expecting? That’s the tricky part. It all starts with awareness. Once you are aware of your expectations as you go through your day, you can release them. What’s amazing in this process is that when you notice that you are expecting, you already are in a place of choice. If you choose not to expect, just to experience, your state of expansion and bliss begins. Once you stop expecting, you are no longer in prison. You are free from mass consciousness and now you can choose who/how to be. In that moment, there is complete peace and contentment. Life feels bigger than you and you feel a part of it all. So, with the holidays coming up, it might be a good opportunity to practice awareness of when our expectations creep up on us and the choice to release them. Happy Thanksgiving!

Memorial To A Friend

This is not a typical blog post. My friend whom I visited regularly in a rehab hospital passed away yesterday morning and I had to honor her in some way. I have nothing of Jackie’s except her memories. Three years ago when I left my “real” job in search of significance, I decided to volunteer to visit an elderly person and to be a companion. The agency hooked me up with Jackie, an 84 year old French lady who had just moved in with her daughter after losing her husband and not being able to live on her own. That’s how the story of Jackie and I began. In these three years I witnessed her physical deterioration as well as her mental deterioration, especially in the last 3 months. She was a constant in my life as I changed direction and focus many times. Jackie told me to write her story and that was the impetus for my writing. I am working on a book and her story is in it woven into other stories.

I will miss her wit, courage, sense of humor and will to live. She was the most determined person I have ever met. She was rough and tough, but we always said, “I love you” when we said our goodbyes. I did say my final and real goodbye to Jackie during the last visit where she was still coherent and sharp. In fact, she told me “goodbye” and she said, “This is our goodbye”. She insisted that she wanted it to be that way. That was in August, and that was truly our goodbye even though we saw each other several times since that time.

I am grateful for having her witness my transition as I witnessed hers. I don’t know if she knew that Obama had won the election, she did like him a lot! “So, here’s to our guy Jackie, he did win! Thank you for being in my life and au revoir, until we meet again”.