i wish a happy birthday to my beloved oldest son chip in san diego, ca...i love you! read more about chip here...
this evening is the beginning of my estate sale...the last few weeks have been a blur of emotions and chaos...my sister, pat, came to my rescue thankfully...as i had become unable to make even a simple decision...here she is on the beach...
she helped me sort through 25 years of stuff...make some tough decisions and get some clarity about taking one step at a time...the first step is getting through this sale while maintaining some poprtion of sanity...
she insisted that i leave during the sale...so she brought me to her daughter darcy's (see above) beautiful home in wilmington, nc...we have been here since last friday...
the first few days i remained in the robotic, paralytic state i have been in for months...then something remarkable happened...late sunday/early monday (about 12:21 am) i was reading "a new earth" by eckhart tolle...on page 225-226 the darkness that has surrounded my being for seven months finally began to open up...and i found true peace, the peace of God...
it is not easy to put into words...i have been wrapped under layer after layer after layer of grief, sorrow, heart ache, pain, dread, and fear...these emotions engulfed me, overwhelmed me, surrounding me like a heavy burdensome shroud of darkness...i could not move, i could not think, i could not even breathe...this once strong woman was reduced to a shivering, paralyzed child, cowering in a corner rolled into the smallest possible fetal position...afraid to open my eyes......
i was only functioning on an instinctual level...unaware, unable to function on a rational level when major life decisions needed to be made...friends nor family could dig me out of this mire...i clung to God, but could not even hear his voice....
then it happened...suddenly, while meditating on the words "this, too, shall pass"...i had a breakthrough moment...obviously these black and gray layers of emotions had begun to shrink imperceptibly...to a point when they started to separate and tiny crevices of light and color opened up...in those inner spaces between the emotions i felt at peace....
this peace has no words to describe it...no painting to capture it...it is a place of pure love and freedom that i can only voice as the peace of God!...a stillness so complete and fulfilling that i never want to leave it...truly the highest happiness and completeness...complete serenity...pure, all-encompassing, primordial awareness...one with God and the universe....
it may be Gnosis, Nirvana, enlightenment, higher consciousness, Dzogchen...whatever it is, i stand forever changed for having experienced it...
the Buddha described nirvana as the perfect peace of the mind that is free from craving, anger and other afflictive states. This peace, which is in reality the fundamental nature of the mind, is revealed when the root causes of the afflictive states are dissolved.
this fiery life lesson may have been the path of purification for me...i have not been in this awareness long enough to give it a name...i just know that i am changed...and i see the world around me through a new paradigm...i am no longer attached to the things that i valued before...by choice and by circumstance...yet there is a perceived emancipation...a new sweetness to everything...i now have the foundations of mindfulness....
my impermanent and suffering-prone worldly self (my giant ego) is beginning to diminish...and with it comes my place of peace at last...for this i am most blessed and gratful....
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