Generosity, Baby!

 

Babies are big blobs of give.  I once watched a mother snuggling and kissing her four-month-old son for many minutes, and was astonished when the baby attempted to kiss her back! Infants are born bundles of Love, and only release it gradually, as the world ruptures their sense of security.

The other day I was in my favorite local consignment store, more for respite from the searing late summer heat than for shopping, and a 16-month-old girl was toddling around the racks of clothes, shoes and knickknacks having the time of her life. One customer commented wryly, "If only she were happier!"

At one point I tried on a shoe that was too small, and as I put it back on a shelf exactly at the toddler's height, she grasped it and offered it to me. The generosity and joy of that baby uplifted everyone in the store.

I was musing, here on the far side of a half-century, that we tend to "age up": that is, many older people are open to association with those younger than them, though it doesn't necessarily work in reverse. I am invisible to most teens and early 20-somethings; I'm simply too far from their age and worldview to be acknowledgeable, and I understand this. However, given the nature of who I am, the fact that I never had children of my own, and that I will talk with almost anyone, any time, I do have a lot of contact with people in all decades of life. This is enriching. I also learn a great deal.

The other evening I told a new deli worker at a local food co-op that he looked like actor Ray Liotta — thirty years ago. I asked if people said he looked like anyone famous and he mentioned Leonardo DiCaprio, whom I still think of as 23 but who is actually closing in on 40. The deli worker told me he's 27. From there our conversation evolved to the years he spent in Hollywood (though not to become an actor!), to what it's like to spend time in New York City, to his recent relocation to my area. It developed he's also an avid reader and budding writer, and we ranged far afield about genres and what we learn from books. I shared how a pivotal message during my awakening journey came from a novel: the protagonist is a young man itching to quit his magazine job and write full-time, which, he tells his best friend, he'll do "once he's saved up more security" — meaning, of course, money. His buddy wisely responds, "Security isn't something you save up. It's what you find when you take risks." I still get goosebumps relating this.

Then my very cool new pal and I connected over the awareness that the days of the week are named for the five visible planets, plus the sun and moon. You can "hear" this much better in the Romance languages than in English, and since he's bilingual in English and Spanish, and I speak some French and rudimentary Spanish, we went back and forth, delightedly naming each day in three languages. Other customers occasionally joined our meandering conversation.

When I left the store my energy was elevated, probably akin to how the 16-month-old darling I'd met earlier feels most of the time. It's radically wonderful to live this way, and becoming easier all the time as we awaken en masse at Light speed.

Reach out in the most unlikely places, to the most unusual faces. Once you scratch the surface, you'll discover commonalities you never dreamed were there. At heart, we're all One, pure Love awaiting expression. Pass it on, baby.

Reimagining Death: The Elephant in the Room

Woody Allen famously said that he didn't want to achieve immortality through his work; he wanted to achieve it through not dying. While we celebrate birth, its corollary, exiting the Earth plane, is feared only slightly less than public speaking — at least, in the Western mind.

As someone with a gerontology (study of aging) background and an abiding love of elders, I've been exploring positive aging and death-related subject matter for years. I'm currently reading two complementary books with mirrored titled: From Age-ing to Sage-ing by Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, and Sage-ing While Age-ing by Shirley MacLaine. MacLaine's book has been eye opening, not least because she articulates much that I've discovered/remembered on my own awakening journey, but also because she ratchets up my knowledge to the next level. In Chapter 11 (number of Aquarius), she focuses on soul development and references the work of regression therapist Michael Newton, PhD.

Suddenly I read, "All regressed souls speak of how much easier death is than birth. With death there is a release into the light. With birth there is an entrance into density." Of course! It's easier to expand than to contract.

And this awareness dovetails beautifully with another stunning book I read last year, Deathing: An Intelligent Alternative for the Final Moments of Life by Anya Foos-Graber.

Deathing is the real deal on conscious departure. We're not meant to die alone and afraid, maintains Foos-Graber. This definitive guide — the first of its kind I've seen, and it was published in 1989 — spells out clearly how each person can prepare for an informed death. Since most of us avoid any discussion of the subject, the very concept of a 'how-to' manual may sound frightening. Yet like MacLaine, Foos-Graber maintains that death can be a light-filled, spiritual experience.

We have a lot of help entering the world: we emerge from the body of our mother with attendants such as doctors, nurses, midwives, spouses and friends at the ready to welcome us and tend to the birthing mother. But there is no corresponding death ritual to support us in exiting the body we've inhabited as we return to the Great Mother of All.

Through two teaching stories, Foos-Graber shows us what both a typical, unconscious dying and a planned 'deathing' experience look like. The second half of the book provides step-by-step instructions and simple exercises such as breathing, visualization and remembering the Love that you are, to assist you in releasing the body and making a conscious, even joyful, departure from this life — and to support others in doing so.

Plus, we can rehearse while alive! Foos-Graber writes, "By practicing ahead of time with an eye toward this spiritual life insurance, you can increasingly live in an atmosphere free from fear and ignorance. A correct grasp of how to die necessarily produces an expanded philosophy of how to live more abundantly, however long or short your time of physical life."

As I was reading this book, a friend of mine's husband surrendered to cancer. Here's how she described his conscious death: "He squeezed my hand and left his breath here to begin to inhale the ethers of elsewhere. A gentle wave of joyful contentment spread out in ripples of sparkling delight. He was free again and slowly twirling in the softly glowing wonder of it all. This ethereal mist of farewell whispered through our home for an hour or so and then was gone."

So let us bow to that elephant and embrace its wisdom, rather than indulge in what MacLaine refers to as "amphysteria" ~ a condition of forgotten fear, usually of a place. We have no reason to fear expansion into the Light of All. And the elephant-headed Hindu deity Ganesh is revered as the "Remover of Obstacles". We can ride the elephant of awareness right on into the next adventure.

Crow-Magnon Woman: On Being a Birdbrain

"Birdbrain" is not a compliment. Yet cross-culturally, indigenous peoples have depicted bird-headed people to signify a connection with the spirit realm. I have a particular affinity for crows, which became my familiar the summer I had pneumonia. I was living in a highly altered state of consciousness, and when I heard them cawing on the telephone wire outside my apartment, I began to count the caws to divine what the number might mean in my life at that time. Birds are augurs. I also began responding to the cawing crow, and we conversed. Enraptured, I penned the poem/chant that appears at the end of this post.

Crows and I forged this connection 20 years ago. Just a few weeks ago, I was captivated by the novel Eternal on the Water by Joseph Monninger. His central character is a college professor whose expertise is corvids (crows) — and she harbors a secret about her health and impending early demise. For someone who's long been fascinated by positive aging and reimagining how we perceive death, this was an irresistible combination. I recommend the book highly for its impeccable storyline and the author's courage to illumine a difficult subject with fresh eyes.

And then, synchronistically, I spied The Gift of the Crows: How Perception, Emotion, and Thought Allow Smart Birds to Behave Like Humans in my local bookstore, in which real-life college professor John Marzluff deems crows incredibly intelligent as well as playful, describing how one crow would entice neighborhood dogs away from their owners and hold "class" with the canines on the campus lawn!

So I am delighted to be a "Crow-Magnon" Woman. May my poem speak to you, and to your own special relationship with the winged familiars in your life.

Talking to Crows

© Amara Rose 7/30/93

Black-winged wisdom on a wire

Cawing collect,

Caws and effect

A coded conversation

In guttural cries

Opens my eyes

And lifts me higher.

If You've Ever Shopped At A Factory Outlet, Read This

Six degrees of separation long ago shrank to three; these days, the connections are so profound it isn't difficult to see how everyone's related, if only by common interest:

A few weeks ago, I decided to take my last pair of Dexter hiking boots to a local consignment store where I shop frequently.  I wore "Dexxies" faithfully as my primary shoes for years; when I purchased this last pair around 2003, I bought several at once, since the Dexter outlet was closing — and even the main store in Dexter, Maine was going out of business. As a consequence, I never wore them; they just accumulated dust on a closet floor, as my shoe tastes evolved. I live "lightly" in terms of possessions, and finally it was time to pass these still-new beloved boots along for someone else to love. So I consigned them.

Today, while reading The Mature Mind: The Positive Power of the Aging Brain by Gene Cohen, MD, PhD (one of myriad books on positive aging I peruse both for client projects and personal interest) I was astonished to discover, in a section on late-life philanthropy, that the founder of the Dexter Shoe Company, Henry Alfond, was the author's wife's great-uncle! Alfond is also credited with creating the first factory outlet store. Originally intended to sell "factory seconds," or slightly damaged goods that could not be sold at retail, Alfond soon expanded the outlet concept to include first quality merchandise from previous seasons. Other retailers began mimicking his model, and soon factory outlet stores sprang up across the country. From there, it was a small leap to factory outlet malls.

Unfortunately, in 1993, a year shy of his 80^th birthday, Alfond sold the company to one of its many suitors, Berkshire Hathaway; eight years later, Warren Buffet folded Dexter and its affiliates into another business. Hence, the demise of my favorite shoe company and outlet store. (Buffet later admitted this was "the worst deal I've made.")

Coda: when I learned my consigned Dexters had not sold as of this morning, I opted to keep them and enjoy one final romp in Dexxies, for however long they may last. These boots were made for walkin', and that's just what they'll do…

So keep your mind and heart open to unexpected connections in unimagined places; when they find you, it engenders a cozy feeling of all-one — which of course we are.

Are You Chronologically Gifted?

If you're a card-carrying member of the 50 and better set (or just looking forward eagerly!), please enjoy my article, Life In the Middle Ages, just published on Silver Planet (only took me 2.5 years to discover this amazing resource ~ via Twitter!)

Still grappling with youthful issues? Then read 42 Forever: The Ultimate Anti-Aging Tonic, which applies regardless of whether you're long past 42, or years from reaching it chronologically.

Age is just a number, so let's have fun with it! Here's my tribute to my dear friend Ellie, now nearly 96, written when she was a mere 93: The Love You Make.

Blessings!