THE COIN

I held my hands out in front of me, one of the hands holding a coin, hidden by a closed fist.  I asked the eight-year-old girl to guess which hand held the coin. She scanned both hands, deciding which hand held the coin.   I stood still and silent. She wondered for another minute, then pointed to my right hand.  "Not there," she said, slightly disappointed. 

I moved my hands behind my back again to to hide which hand held the coin.  This time, with my hands still behind me, I told her “to not guess”-- to not try to figure it out----to not have to be right.  Instead, "Let your instinct, and your body point to the hand.  Allow yourself to be wrong, and trust your body to select the hand with the coin.  Let it not matter.  Just point instantly.

Most of us learned to try hard to be right. to pick the right one of anything,  Embarrassed if we are wrong.   I encouraged her to go beyond guessing, and let her body just point, without hesitation, as soon as I show my hands. 

She did it.  Without a second of hesitation, she instantly pointed to the hand with the coin.  Again and again, ten more times in a row, she transcended her mind's need to be right, and instead, instantly pointed to the hand with the coin.  We were both elated.  We were done. 

Later, with a hidden coin in one of her hands, she calmly instructed another young person to "let your body choose which hand I hold a coin." 

DREAM BEFORE BIRTH

Two months before his birth, our now twenty-year-old son came to me in a dream.  While still in the dream, slightly awake, I reached for the small tape recorder.  I was aware enough to know the dream needed to be recorded.   

It was only when I was fully awake and transcribing the words the next day---- words that filled two typewritten pages, single space, that my life, and understanding of children would be altered forever.  The information was explicit, direct, and universal.  Later, I was inspired to write: Free The Children, a book later published. 

 “I am coming here to help dissolve the artificial barriers between people,” he said in the dream.  “I wll have a name when you, my mother and I see each other equally,” he continued.  Four years passed before a name appeared.  I noticed, during those pre-name years, when I was seeing him as just a child.  I quickly changed my perception to see him fully as a whole person.  Until the name came, we called him little person, sweet face, or little one. Still do actually. 

Without ever sharing the dream with him, (he wasn't interested).  I continue to witness how his simple presence brings people together.  He quietly stands for everyone, and takes no sides.  I have learned to do the same.  When I am trapped by old learned beliefs and fears about education, money or "think of your future"thoughts, I silently soften, remembering the final words of the dream, "“I do not need you to be with me.  I need youto be with yourself.  When you are with yourself, you are with me."     

CHILDREN ARE US

Children are us.  They are not simply out there in little bodies, or teenage bodies.  They are us.  They didn't come here to disturb anyone, or inconvenience the adults around them.  Not the parents.  Not the teachers, Not anyone.  They did not get born, nor did we, to become consumers, trouible makers, cute beings to buy things for, or become recipients of rules chores and grades.  They just didn't.  Neither did we.

Who knew our lives would become based on grades, regulations, time schedules. accumulation of stuff, and ultimately expected to gather money as a gardner would gather seed.  At birth, most of us came into this particular world with a sense of wonder, and often even a smile.  We were just born into a world unknown, and into a family that wondered about who we were as much as we wondered about who they were. 

 Children are physically smaller than the impact they have on big people.  Children really are us.  When we were small, the original us, walking or not, we were gradually nudged towards absorbing layers of identities, becoming like those around us,  As we grew into bigger bodies, we were surrounded by beliefs and thoughts not our own. 

I think that little us is still totally present.  She and he show up in the form of tatoos, dance, sillyness, compassion, kindness, kisses, hugs, tears and those moments of uninhibited reaching out to strangers to say hi!

GOOD ENOUGH

I have to tell you the truth.  I am not a consumer.  I am not a recluse, nor introverted,  nor extroverted.  I am not too sensitive, too smart, nor too anything.  I am just right for who I am.  I can say this, yet our language tends to define, name, classify and pathologize behavior from birth on.  There is no one to blame. Oh well, maybe just a little bit.  But then, blame is another learned behavior    

What if I decide, which I have, to simply be with people, especially children, being present, noticing when I am about to classify, or label them.  Are children "fussy" or are they uncomfortable, needing something?  I feel lighter and freer when I delete all the naming of what appears wrong, missing or needs improvement with others, or self.

There is a system and habit of carrying voices inside of us that constantly find fault with ourselves, and a belief that whatever we do in life, is never quite good enough.  I could explain how all this self judgment, and judgment of others came to exist.  But doesn’t matter.  I know it separates us all.  I just want to hang out with people, care about them: children, women, men, gay, straight, neither.....that have a sense of humor, can speak of things you cannot prove, are not logical, not even part of what appears to be reality, (consensus reality).  Just hold space for everyone.

It is more fun to look for what is right about everything even when it seems so wrong, and learn to see myself in others. 

COMPASSION FROM HATRED

When I was five-years-old, our family lived in Utica, New York.  I was walking to my first day of school, swinging my lunch box as I skipped down the sidewalk, anticipating my unknown new adventure.  I was happy.

Across the street, I heard a creaky screen door slam shut.  I turned to see another boy about my age running towards me,his face red with anger.  From his sidewalk, he screamed, hatred in his voice,  "Get out of our neighborhood you dirty Jew.  We hate you." 

I didn't know what a Jew was, even though I later found out I was one.  My body could only begin to cry, turn around and run two blocks to our home.  I ran up the wooden stairs, into my room and threw myself on the bed, hiding my head under the pillow, sobbing. 

Weeks later, we moved to Los Angeles, where within a few years I found myself in high school, a school occupied by lots of students of color, white people, and a whole variety of religions and economicdiversity.   Utica was behind me until one day, I found myself standing up for a Latino student who was being harrssed.   It was an instinct on my part.

Later, as a new high school teacher, that same instinct inspired me to reveal racism by the administration.  I was soon terminated, but the institutional racism ended.   The angry anti-semitic boy in Utica, when I was five, was a gift.  I got to feel deeply and access my compassion….finding ways to bring people together…even today. 

WHO WE REALLY ARE

A resolution to love oneself.  What a good idea.  When people I know, or come to know,
no matter their age, step back from there public selves, the part that others easily see, often they silently reveal a need to love themselves, and are judgmental of who they think they are and what they have done.  No matter how much money they have, what they have done in life, whether famous or not, they carry a belief deep down that they are not good enough, no matter what. 

It's a cultural thing.  It's a religious thing.  It's a school thing, something we all learn: that no matter what we do, or who we are, we tend to believe we are never quite good enough.  Not true, but it is a common belief. 

As we come to remember who we are inside, the us that was born innocent and kind and connected to everyone, we exhale and remember the truth.  What happens when someone sees, really sees you, or I, inside, behind the personality and that public self we have learned to display, to be part of what some may refer to as consensus reality?
 
Instead of the term loving oneself, I suggest a different term, or words.  Instead of loving myself, I listen to myself.  I pay attention to familiar feelings and beliefs that separate me from others....feelings that only exist in the body, not the mind.  I can tune into that feeling sensation (for seconds or a minute) that remind me to show up now, be present, be aware of the familiar pattern that I have reacted to since a child. 

Loving myself is all about awareness.  Self awareness. Aware of all my body sensations, feelings and thoughts that accompany that feeling, then take a different action.   The actions include being silent instead of reacting.  Feeling a feeling without need to explain it or speak of it.

And, only speak when I can be heard.  Only then.  Notice when I am judging, making someone else wrong, blaming, and then simply and quietly let them be in my mind.   Maybe this is loving others, an action that I can take daily.  From this perspective, I don't need to love myself.  Not when I am loving others more often.  Loving them means letting them be in my thoughts.  Then I am not loving myself, I am simply being.  It's a practice.
A daily, hourly practice.  

COMING HOME

I think we all ought to come together: meaning becoming more inclusive, welcoming others into our homes and lives, especially our children no matter their age.  This individual, separate, find a career, move away from family or people you love being around, to do it on your own, be independent, earn lots of money, own a home, save for the future, take sides in conflicts and politics and decide who is right and who is wrong, simply goes in circles, leaving me or you constantly searching out something better or more than we have, holding a belief that whatever we do, is never quite good enough, wanting whatever it is we do not have, often unaware that what we have now is what we wanted before.

Just what if we believed that friends, people we know that are easy to be with, mothers, fathers,
grandparents, children, all thought it would be a good thing to live in one home, or close by in a neighborhood, knowing that there is a satisfying bigger community then just a city with people spread out all over, or even states away, staying connected only by phone or email, yet deeply heartfully
longing for daily connection, familiarity, love, and the beauty of being cared about, and caring for
those around us, frequently, daily, all the time, an awareness that as humans, or as most creatures on land and sea,  (money can fill banks), while people can touch one another, calm fears, open hearts and dissolve most symptoms of the body and mind......living amongst each other in close proximity, with others that have noticed the relative peacefulness of knowing we matter.  We simply matter.