Chapter 45: Nurturing My Human, Part 3: Putting Away the Scissors
It is time once again to Stew on this! Life is hard enough without making it harder by being brutal with myself...Indeed, life can be a lot like running with scissors.
With our oars secured in our own boat, rowing persistently through both calm stretches and rapids, we continue our journey to self-love, guided by the song, Row Row Row Your Boat.
This chapter is about remembering to go gently down the stream.
There were lots of ways I could have gone with this idea, so first I thought about the opposite of going gently down the stream. Obviously going up the stream would be part of that. For the other part I looked up antonyms for gentle. The word that jumped out at me immediately was brutal.
An image of going brutally up the stream came to my mind immediately - the Kokanee salmon going upstream to spawn. Every October here in Tahoe, we sit and are compelled to watch as the salmon leap headlong into rocks and struggle through roaring cascades, just so they can propagate the species and then die. It seems odd to root them on, but we do.
I cannot argue with the wisdom of their brutal run up the stream. It has worked pretty well for the species now for 50 to 100 million years.
It does not work quite as well in my life, however.
The word brutal originally meant bestial (like an animal). It soon came to mean fierce, savage, cruel, inhuman, and unfeeling.
None of those words conjure up a gentle row down the stream for me, how about you? They also do not seem like the best words to apply toward “taking care of my human.”
Life is hard enough without making it harder by being brutal with myself. As the Buddha reportedly said, “Pain is mandatory, suffering is optional.” Indeed, life can be a lot like running with scissors. And when I think about the ways I still sometimes go brutally up the stream in my life, I realize they always cause suffering as I upgrade from running with scissors to jabbing myself with them as I run.
Here are just some of the ways I still sometimes imitate salmon: I struggle against what is, I “should” on myself and others, I strive to do and have more thinking that is how I can become more and feel good about myself, I beat myself up and hold things on myself rather than giving myself compassion, I compare myself to others (and whether I come out ahead or behind, it still ultimately feels like crashing into the rocks), and I operate under a false sense of urgency or responsibility concerning things over which I have absolutely no control.
I do far less of all these than I used to, but there is always some work to do!
As you may have noticed, my brutal excursions up the stream are all self-inflicted, and it may sound as though I am beating myself up once again. But this is not about blaming myself. It’s about realizing what I am doing and opening to the possibility that through that awareness, I can stop jabbing myself as I run. Or at least jab less. Starting right now!
My human thrives on everything that is the opposite of brutal: gentleness, kindness, safety, ease, love and compassion. And so do I. I learn, grow and evolve more easily under those conditions. I feel more joy, more fulfillment and more energy. And when I give myself these gifts of gentleness - when I go more gently down the stream - I find that I am also stronger and more resilient to serve my mission.
It is a tremendous challenge to walk gently through this violent and crazy world. So, I intend to make it easier by approaching myself and my journey more gently.
That is why the first part of the song is so important. Before I head gently downstream, I want to be sure I am in the correct waterway! There are streams in my head that seem easy and gentle to follow, until I either crash into rocks or arrive someplace that I did not choose to visit. Those streams seem easy and gentle because I have gone down them so many times, but they are based on old patterns and mechanisms that no longer serve either me or my human.
Rather, I choose to consciously and intentionally row down the stream that flows toward a greater awareness of my wholeness, my authenticity, and my more than enough-ness.
I am talking about going gently down the love-stream.
As I “keep on keepin’ on,” with my oars firmly in hand, I can access the strength to be gentle, kind and loving and still hold to my values and principles – first and foremost with myself. Then I can hold them with, and for, others.
Yes, it takes tremendous strength to go gently down the stream.
But it is possible, because gentleness and strength are NOT mutually exclusive. In the 16th century, French cleric Saint Francis de Sales said, “Nothing is so strong as gentleness, and nothing is so gentle as real strength.” I believe this is perhaps even more true and meaningful today.
In our culture, strength is often equated with force, dominance, aggression, and asserting control over others. However, the quote reminds me that gentleness embodies compassion, empathy, patience, understanding – qualities that change the world for the better and that require strength of character to embody consistently.
Martin Luther King, Jr., whose birthday we celebrated here in the US last week, knew this very well. In fact, he wrote a book entitled “Strength to Love.” Gandhi also talked frequently about how it took more strength and courage to be nonviolent than to be violent.
This knowledge helps me tremendously to keep on rowing. I know that heading gently down the stream is always a win-win. When you and I do so, not only do we experience more peace, love and joy, but we also take other people and the whole world along with us. We inspire others to put the scissors away and walk more gently through their own life.
Who knows? If enough of us walk more gently, we might even see more gentleness in the world.
Stew on that, and I will see you next time.
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