• Back to the Drawing Board

    • February 28, 2011 4:52 am

    Dearest Readers,

    It’s 3:48 a.m. and I’m in absolute despair. The cat I live with pounced on me at 3 a.m. and woke me up and it has refueled an absolute ton of murderous rage.

    You may remember my first post ever. It was September 2009. The cat woke me up and I was so upset, so angry that my only recourse was to pray. The answer I received was, “Blog.”

    I’ve been lying in bed praying for help. How is it that a year and a half have gone by since that first awakening and nothing has changed? I’ve done so much work on this relationship (yes, it sounds funny — it’s a cat — but it’s a cat with an anxiety disorder and believe-you-me this little guy has required me to work) in the name of surrender, compassion and unconditional love and still I end up back here? Swearing into the dark with visions of snapping his neck at the forefront of my mind? Horrible. Horrible!

    Again, my only recourse is to pray. So I breathe. Inhale Love, exhale Peace. Inhale Faith, exhale fear. I begin to drift off to sleep. Pounce! He’s back. I pet him, scratch his fur. God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference. He leaves. I can hear him crunching his food in the kitchen. I’m fading. Sleep is close. Pounce!

    That’s when the rage comes. My prayer turns to vehemence. What the f$#%? What the F&$%ING F#$% AM I SUPPOSED TO DO? Show me. Help me. Please. Please. Because I am completely and utterly at a loss as to how I am supposed to deal with this.

    And then the answer. “Blog.” No. Come on. You’re kidding right?

    Perhaps I should explain where the rage is coming from and why it is so pronounced on this particular morning. After all, this is practically a nightly ritual. Most nights it hardly wakes me. I’ve become so used to it that I can now sleep through the cat’s nocturnal exercises. But this night? I happen to be working on a grant.

    Yup, a grant. And it’s a big one. The application is due on Tuesday. It’s going to take every ounce of energy I have to get it in on time. I went to bed at 10 p.m. last night so I could get 8 hours of sleep and wake up at 6 a.m. This would give me an early enough start to do a full morning practice (prayer, meditation, yoga) and a full day of work on the grant. Good plan, Celia!

    And then the cat ruins my plans. So things have not gone the way I wanted them to go. Bingo. Trigger the control issues. Trigger the rage. And I’ve been on the healing path long enough to know that rage = fear.

    So what is the fear? I’m going to be tired. What happens when I’m tired? I get overwhelmed. What happens when I get overwhelmed? I numb out, give up, check out. I recoil from life.

    One of the thoughts I had when I was praying after the first “pounce” was this: Celia, if you are this upset when something this small doesn’t go your way how in the world are you going to handle it when something BIG doesn’t go your way? The grant application is for funding for a feature film. It’s BIG. Maybe this little thing is preparation. Maybe I’m being shown how to handle setbacks.

    What was that very first Inspiring Message of the Day? What did I learn all those months ago? When something happens to me that I do not like, that feels like cruel and unusual punishment, I will see it as an opportunity for growth. I will use it to change the world, be of service, help others. I will thank the person/place/thing that gave me the lesson, for he/she/it is my greatest teacher.

    So now I have to live out this credo. Now. Eighteen months later. I must accept the lesson anew.

    Alright. Let’s do it. Something has happened to me that I do not like. It feels like cruel and unusual punishment. But is that what it really is? No, it isn’t. Seriously, I’ve just been woken up by a cat. He’s asking for love and attention. But it’s 3 o’clock in the morning. So what? I’m going to be tired. So take a nap. I don’t have time. I have to finish the grant. Ah, the grant.

    The grant represents the film. The film represents something much, much more than anxiety over sleep loss. The film represents a lifelong dream. What if I don’t get the grant and I can’t make the film? Better yet, what if I do get the money? Then what? The film might fail. I might fail. These are the deeper fears. They are the fuel behind the fire of rage. This is why I’m being woken up. To confront my deepest fear of failure.

    Sigh.

    Okay. Walk the talk. Be of service. Blog and share. Thank the teacher. Thank you, cat.

    Now can I please go back to bed? You’re up now. You may as well get a head start on the grant. You’ve got a movie to make, don’t you?

    Inspiring Message of the Day: My anger is a defense mechanism for my fear and I am willing to look at my deepest fears today. I am willing to be changed by this awareness of my shortcomings. I am willing to “wake up”.

    Sticks and Stones

    • February 14, 2011 8:43 am

    Dearest Readers,

    A couple of years ago I posted a video on YouTube of a speech I did at a Toastmasters Conference. The speech won first prize. Recently I received notice in the ol’ inbox that a new comment had been posted on the video’s page. I’d like to share this comment with you now.

    Here it is:

    “You do realise it’s EXACTLY the very people claiming to have relationships with supernatural beings who are materialists and killing people over it !?? Depravity in the name of spirituality, that’s all it is, that turkey day is not celebrated by a majority free thinkers, that convicted criminals in jails are disproportionately followers of “higher powers”. Stop lying will you. Just say openly you’re a blind god follower, blind to the harms religion and “higher callings” cause humanity!”

    Naturally, I was shocked. I’m not used to getting comments like this. Immediately I began to think about how I might reply, defend my position, stand up for myself. This turned into a mild obsession and so I decided to let it go until I had more clarity. It’s now been a week since I got the email and still I’ve not responded.

    What strikes me most about this person’s message (who, by the way, calls herself tallard666) is that it is so angry. Though I didn’t respond to the comment on the YouTube page I did share a post on Facebook that day saying, “Some people are very angry. I understand. I know what it means to be angry.”

    And I do. I’m dealing with the release of some old anger issues right now, as a matter of fact. And I, too, get rageful at the idea of people killing in the name of God. Whenever I hear someone like George W. Bush mention the war in Iraq and God in the same sentence I feel steam start to blow out of my ears. Or if I read something about terrorists blowing people up for God’s glory I experience great despair.

    In this sense I suppose I agree with tallard666. People who do violence and simultaneously claim to do be doing God’s will scare me. The God (or Universe or Higher Power or Creator or Spirit of Unity Back of All Things) I believe in is one of Love, of Peace and of Justice. And by Justice I mean Equality, not vengeance.

    I’m not sure where tallard666 has gotten her statistic about convicted criminals. I’ve done volunteer work in prisons and jails on and off for the last almost 12 years. My experience is that convicted criminals are most often deeply wounded people who have been terribly abused by poverty, addiction and mental illness. Some, but not all, have found healing through some kind of a Higher Power and have changed their lives for the better as a result.

    Let us all be allowed to believe what we would like to believe. Let us not hate other people for believing something that we do not. Let us learn to express our anger in useful and just ways. Let us accept one another without judgment. This is Higher Power at work: Love and Tolerance.

    As for being “blind to the harms religion and “higher callings” cause humanity,” I can only say that the opposite is true. Religious abuse makes me feel sick. But Religion is not God. It is a way to worship God and so religion is neither good nor bad. It is a path. Some religious people are wounded and so they wound others. Other religious people have helped to make the world a better place. Mother Teresa. Martin Luther King Jr. Saint Francis of Assisi.

    Am I a “blind god follower”? Au contraire. I once was blind. But now I see.

    Inspiring Message of the Day: Today I will continue to do the work of Love. I will respond with compassion to those who have little or feel none.

    Take me Higher

    • February 2, 2011 9:24 am

    Dearest Readers,

    Presently I am in Vancouver attending the PuSh Assembly on behalf of Sour Brides Theatre. Last night was the opening of the Assembly and the keynote was an artistic “manifesto” delivered by a performance artist named Julie Andrée T.

    This young woman walked on stage with a bottle of wine and a glass and said, “I’m super scared,” and told us she was using the wine to help her deal with her fear. The bottle had been half drunk already.

    Over the course of an hour she spoke to us occasionally, read to us from her laptop, played back recordings of manifestos by other artists she admires and made mournful sounds on a viola that rested on her lap. Slides of her naked and manipulated body in various compromising positions were projected behind her.

    I am an artist and I have learned how to appreciate the work of other artists even if I do not “get” the work. Every artist is expressing his/her creative Self the only way he/she knows how. Some of us are stranger than others. Performance art is not easy to “get”. It doesn’t make sense to most of us the way a painting or a narrative play does. It challenges everything we know about our relationship to art and to one another. It takes us out of our comfort zones.

    Probably a good thing, right? I suppose. Yes. In fact, emphatic yes. On the other hand, I’ve reached a point in my life where I am in need of art that inspires, uplifts, and transcends the darkness. I desperately need Light. I really do. I didn’t use to. All of my earliest plays are dark and full of despair.

    Julie Andrée T. said, “I like the dark side. It inspires me.” Fair enough. I was the same. I still write about the pain and the grief. But now I offer healing and hope because I am healing and I have gained hope. So this is my process.

    And this is why not only do I offer it to the audience but I seek it as well. I look for healing and hope in films. I look for it in leaders and mentors and other artists. I need to have my experience validated and I need to continue believing in transformation. It is what helps me to keep going, to give back, to feel joy and thankfulness in a challenging world.

    I have a ticket to Rouge tomorrow night, Julie Andrée T.’s performance piece here at the festival. I’ve decided not to go. I do respect this woman. But I think I’ve seen enough.

    Inspiring Message of the Day: Today I will seek the kinds of experiences which uplift me and validate my healing work. I will continue to choose things that bring me to the Light.