Transformation

On Rebirth

October 1, 2012

Wow. This is the last of my blog posts before birthing my third baby and taking maternity leave!

What an adventure this pregnancy has been. And how totally wonderful and scary that I am in this blessed place, on this life-changing precipice, yet again!

Each pregnancy is different. For me this one in particular has been about unweaving and sweeping out some of the most nagging and difficult thought patterns and threads of my early life. It has taken a great deal of staring my not-so-lovely habits based on bogus, self-demeaning beliefs in the face.

What has happened after all these weeks and months of hard work is that this baby has asked me to make some serious and heartfelt room not only for his emergence but for, drum roll please, my own exalted one.

Yes, any way you slice it, giving birth is a spiritual and transformative process and it starts even before conception. Whether we take advantage of this special time, however, is another story, and with my first pregnancy eight years ago, I didn’t appreciate my opportunity for metamorphosis in the slightest. I simply checked out.

With my second, two and a half years ago, I was more inclined to go deep but ended up on bed rest and was too afraid to do much inward work. Hence, the steady roll-up-my sleeves kind of journaling, meditating, yoga practicing, breathing, intuiting, and connecting that has occurred this go round is pretty much unparalleled. With less than 3 weeks to go, I feel like I haven’t seen anything yet.

Ironically, here’s what has also dawned on me: To unseat and dismantle the binding thoughts and obstacles to joy that we have had since our own conceptions does not at all require being physically pregnant with a baby.

It requires being pregnant with ourselves.

An OB-GYN once said to me that when women in their late 30’s crave babies, they are likely craving their own rebirths, their own self-creation, unhindered by the turbulent murky swells that threaten our unique, ecstatic development into fully actualized beings. I’d like to extend this notion of longing for rebirth far beyond the 30-something woman, and offer it to every one of you.

We can, male or female, young or old, gay or straight, uproot the tough errant stuff we’ve been programmed to live stream to ourselves our entire lives. We can all un-birth the grossness and negativity of the past and claim fulfillment and bliss as our birthrights.

Right now, this very instant is indeed ripe with the possibility of rebirthing you, on your own delicious terms. But you have to be willing to do the work. Are you?

Through Zen sitting practice, I have been taught to experience every breath, every moment as a both dying and being-born one, a simultaneous falling away and profound rising up. In the dying away, we shed and discard all our cruddy baggage. In the rising up, we reveal our naturally elated selves, and we have this chance every single bleeping minute! How much more fantastic does it get?

Please, as my final bid for the next three months, I urge you from my deepest, most alive, and thumping heart, to resurrect yourself. Go ahead and take that longed-for leap. Find the bravery and the guts to un-birth all that old crap, then RISE, RISE, RISE!

I can’t be there to physically catch you, as midwives do when catching babies as they first arrive into this gleaming world, fresh from their mothers’ wombs. But I will be there in spirit, cheering you along, as you catch your own newborn, reborn self and cry out with delight in all that shimmery wonder at the wholly, holy rebirthed YOU.

I’ll of course be doing the very same.

Will write to you again in January!

In sweet rebirth,

Maggie

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Navigating Change

September 10, 2012

Change is in the air. Not only is the weather subtly shifting with the turn of the season soon upon us, but deeply, on an inside basis, change is just, well everywhere.

That I am going to give birth to my third child in less than 6 weeks is of course a biggie in this department. Life as me, my husband, and our two kids know it will be blown to smithereens for a while. My body will too, of course, change in kind from that of soon-to be-hatching hen to major milking mama.

The other major change on the horizon is that I am, as of October 8, taking a 3-month hiatus from my writing obligations, private clients, and all else that swims in my working-world wake. This is BIG for me. This is SCARY. Yet it is also totally necessary and profoundly exciting at once. More on my leave in the coming weeks, but for now suffice it to say that yes, change is all over the place, and when I try to fight or ignore it, nothing ever feels right. I am humbly shown over and over again that I just can’t escape it.

You know what? None of us can. Even if it feels like your life is crawling along, forever the same, with very little stuff on the outside to show for any flashy-type metamorphosis, you are always quite beautifully, and often alarmingly, in flux. Trust in this.

Seriously, how do you deal with and feel about change? There are those change junkies out there who can’t stop seeking the newest, most thrilling, most different thing around the bend. Then there are their opposites. Where do you fall along this spectrum?

It is highly important to know yourself in this regard, to feel out and notice how you behave in the face of subtle (or radical) change. It has everything to do with your sense of wellness and of security in being able to ride out any storm or curve ball of interest that life offers.

I remember a lyric from the old film Love in the Afternoon, where in the beginning along with shots of lovers kissing all over Paris, the line goes, “…Even the birds and the bees do it.” Here the reference is to falling in love. But let’s extend it to change. Every single one of us does it, right? So why balk? Why quake? Why fight? I am actually relieved to be reminded that all of you out there are changing too.

Hence, here is my plain and simple mantra of the moment, FLOW WITH IT. I think I’ll be blowing this up and putting it all over my house in the coming weeks. Best message a woman in my condition can get, and probably not so shabby for you either…

In sweet change,

Maggie

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Losing Control, On Purpose!

September 3, 2012

Control, or lack thereof, is one of the greatest sources of suffering around.

For someone like me, whom I affectionately call a control freak in recovery, and with a chaotic walking-on-eggshells childhood, it is obvious why I became (in my teens) so obsessed with having maniacal control over all aspects of my environment. At age 16, the most obvious place to start was with my body.

If you haven’t read or heard by now, I became a major anorexic at this time. This brutally domineering mindset lasted on and off in bouts well into my twenties. I’d be lying to say its creepy little ways didn’t present in more feeble moments (and when I got severely ill) in my early thirties.

Anorexia is, of course, all about control and it has, in various moments, thoroughly taken over my life by leeching out into arenas far beyond what went into my mouth. There have literally been times when I couldn’t stomach any kind of mess. If something didn’t fit into my intense vision of perfection, it got tossed, and fast.

Well, guess what? Life is inherently messy; and so my struggle to clamp down, rein in, dominate, and dictate has bred incredible suffering over the years. It has also, luckily, given me rich material to work with in my spiritual practices.

With many hours of meditation, yoga, breathing, studying, reading, and healing under my belt, I understand ever more deeply our need for control as sheer human folly, one that manifests in a variety of ways depending on our individual wiring.

How, do tell, does grasping for control appear in and occupy your life?

More than getting into the nuances of control itself, I am much more interested in encouraging you to commit to giving it up, on purpose. Yes, what I’m talking about is seeing, just seeing, what happens when you loosen your grip, throw your hands up into the air, and allow for things, for life, for everything to just happen and flow as it does, without stepping in. In other words, SURRENDER.

What’s amazing is that when we consciously release our misery inducing, controlling ways, we feel better! By this I mean, freer, more at ease, relaxed, and reassured in a manner that can only come from profoundly letting go. It’s like sending a message directly to the universe that announces that we are finally ready to trust in its infinite divinity, and in grace. How cool is that?

Willing to give it a shot? Let me know how it goes! I’ll be here waiting, letting life beautifully and organically arise, just as it is.

In sweet surrender,

Maggie

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Safety: A Blog Post & Worksheet Rolled Into One!

August 13, 2012

It is often precisely what we miss in our young lives that we come to intensely value and emphasize as adults. For me, this quality is SAFETY.

What is it for you?

I’m not talking about physical safety per se, but about the sense of genuine emotional and psychic safety that we require so profoundly as infants, toddlers, kids, and then teenagers coming into our own in this world. Especially now, as a parent in my own right, do I appreciate how pivotal providing safety for our children is.

Why safety? Because let’s face it, the world is totally de-stabilizing. Do you agree?

I am convinced that one of the hardest and most key lessons is that we are constantly, all of us, being up-rooted and thrown off our centers. Life just seems to happen this way. Some of our deepest work in order to thrive is in finding and re-finding our balance, in staying upright despite life’s constant swells.

How do you keep yourself stable and feeling safe amidst these disruptions?

Due to the volatility of the house I grew up in, I honestly never experienced any sure, solid, and reliable ground. Wow has this become the hub of my life’s project! Fast-forward some 30 odd years, and I am still at it, fastidiously manifesting the safety I never had.

What is your life’s project?

Ironic too that I am writing this post in the middle of the night out at the beach where, truth be told, I feel more vulnerable than I do when we are in the fortress of our apartment building in the city. I’ve forgotten what it’s like to live in a house with all its rickety sounds and the night winds lashing the windows, and given how utterly pregnant I am, this feeling of vulnerability is even more pronounced.

The night, of course, has a way of disarming us, don’t you think?

It certainly did when I was a child woken night after night by the screaming in my parents’ room, or when pregnant with our first child some 8 years ago I had the first panic attack of my life, rooted totally in not feeling safe.

How about you? Does safety, or lack thereof, play a significant role in your life?

The last affirmation of the Healthy Pregnancy CD that I’ve been listening to over the past 30 weeks is that my baby and me are perfectly, utterly safe. I can finally confirm this deep inside my bones: I am—plus my two sweet kids down the hall and the baby in my belly—really and truly safe. This very plain, very simple phrase has indeed become my signature mantra.

What’s yours?

(I so hope this post was enlightening for you! Would love your feedback!)

In sweet safety,

Maggie

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When The Heart Cracks Open

August 6, 2012

About a month ago my husband and I went to see Once, the wonderful Broadway musical that recently swept the Tony awards. It really was delightful. But what happened over the course of the performance, and long after it ended, still astonishes me.

The best way I can describe it is that something during the show catalyzed my heart cracking open, and I mean BIG time. For the last two songs, tears started innocently brimming and I simply felt warm all over. I was 25 weeks pregnant at the time and a walking swirl of hormones, so at first I just chalked it up to that. But soon it became clear that the feelings I was having were much more momentous than even my pregnancy could account for.

Here’s why: Only after we’d left the theatre did my tears really begin to pour out, and I mean pour. I couldn’t stop them and I could barely catch my breath. The poignancy of the bittersweet love story we’d just seen had burst my heart open so vociferously, so surprisingly, that I literally couldn’t contain all the feeling. I was awash and utterly overcome by the depth of LOVE in all its glory.

Never more have Adyashanti’s words from Falling Into Grace resonated: “The more deeply I love, the more I taste the bitterness with the sweet. It’s not a negative bitterness; it’s a bitterness that makes the sweetness even more sweet.”

Truth be told, the experience of such huge and powerful love was down right daunting. Not only did I cry for many hours, but also I was so jazzed that I couldn’t fall asleep. A dam in my heart had majorly given way, and it took basically the entire night to ride the strong emotion coursing through me. I was up until 4 AM.

My Zen teacher Norman Fischer wrote to me a few days later, after I’d told him all about it, “To go to the musical and to feel a lot and continue to feel a lot of tenderness and sorrow for days afterword seems nice to me, not a bad thing.” Perhaps if I were more enlightened, I would have rejoiced at the largesse of the whole thing right in the moment, without any fear or overwhelm.

Thanks to Norman and the steadying wisdom of two others, I have since come to see my heart cracking as it did as a gift and profound blessing. The heart cracking open is, after all, what so many of us aspire to in this miraculous life, isn’t it?

Now it is my turn to ask you: What has cracked your heart open recently? How did you respond? Are you still that open?

I most humbly and sincerely want to know.

In sweetness and LOVE,

Maggie

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Declaring Your Independence

July 2, 2012

When I turned 21 on July 6, 1996 it was an especially meaningful year for me. Given that my birthday is so close to the Fourth of July, there is always a sense of celebration and independence in the air when my day arrives two days later. However, this particular year was markedly significant, and not at all because of my obvious age and suddenly being a legal drinker or deemed an official adult. It was significant because it was when my beloved grandmother Sylvia and I formally and ceremoniously declared my independence from the agony of my childhood and teenage years.

I was still living in Northern California at the time, still too close to where I had grown up, and with a lot of psychic, emotional, and college work yet to do. But I remember flying out to see her in Boston for that first week in July, and how deliberately we had planned my trip. We celebrated the Fourth on the garage roof of the Museum of Science, and nodded to each other in complicity as the fireworks burst out, knowing just how spectacular a declaration we were about to make together when the 6^th arrived.

Yes, that birthday kicked off my entry into the conscious, necessary, and healing transformation that occurs when any one of us becomes ready to excavate and ultimately release the pain and garbage from our past. My personal declaration of independence was indeed a momentous event. Especially now, when I look back the 16 years from when it all began, I see that what Sylvia and I did was a REALLY great thing.

This 2012, in honor of the Fourth, I entreat you to go inside, ask yourself honestly, and receive openly what you have yet to release from your history. I implore you to find out just what it is that still holds you back.

What do you seriously and intimately need to declare your independence from?

It doesn’t necessarily have to be anything so huge or explosive. It may just be about severing the last threads of some deep strand of your story that you’ve been working on seceding from for years. Only you know the answer, and only you have the power and the raw grit to go in there, and not only declare, but equally and actively awaken your independence.

Truth be told, I am still working on the independence project that I began so many years ago, though my understanding of ultimate freedom and independence has certainly evolved just as I have. The main thing is, especially if this is your first declaration, to commit fully to and live in alignment with your intention for a freer existence.

After all, the present—not the past—is really all we’ve got. In light of this, there’s no time like now, this very Fourth of July, to go out there and fire off your own declarative display!

The joy of profound independence is so totally right here. I can feel it. Can’t you?

In sweet freedom,

Maggie

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The Boon of Retreat

April 15, 2012

Every April, I go on private retreat. It has become something of a ritual and something by which my internal clock is deeply, critically regulated. The feeling that begins to creep up right about now is that I’ve spent the entire year, from one April to the next, intensely committed to navigating and celebrating life on the outside, and am ready, I mean really ready, to blessedly turn up yet again on the other coast, my childhood coast, for 7 blissful days where my job will be to simply turn inwards and in essence return to myself.

I spend most of my time on a meditation cushion, though this is certainly not what everyone else does. I also laugh and share with dear friends, seriously commune with nature, harvest organic vegetables for my delicious meals, get some strong massage, journal, and do loads of restorative yoga. Still, it’s not so much about the activities we do, but about the quality of what happens when we give ourselves over so fully to self-care, which in my case happens to translate as a whole lot of introspection.

Luckily for all, there are myriads of retreats from which to choose, spanning from silent and serious ones, to nature or yoga or cooking or creativity-oriented ones. The main thing about retreat, versus a splashy or culturally steeped vacation, is that the culture being investigated is not some fabulous city or ecosystem, but rather YOU.

The boon of retreat comes from embarking on one that is aligned with what makes you tick and that is equally capable of setting the stage for you to receive what you profoundly need. Sometimes you won’t know if this is the case until you’ve actually come back to the “real” world, and experienced the shifts in you.

Some solid questions to ask yourself after the fact might be:

Do I feel rested, refreshed, and rejuvenated?
Do I have more energy to face and steadily handle whatever life throws my way?
Am I clearer about who I am, what I am doing, and how I might contribute?
Are there changes I now know I need to make in my life?
Am I ready to make those changes?

These are the ones that immediately come to mind, though there are many others that will surely arise for you.

I am of course writing this on the eve of my journey—not yet there, but close—and tune up here I come! Doesn’t it make perfect sense for us all to dive into this kind of regular maintenance? I obviously think so. What about you?

For now, let’s just say, I’m falling off the grid.

Next post coming in May, folks!

In sweetness and peace,

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The Rite of Spring Cleaning

April 8, 2012

The magic of the new season, daffodils, cherry branches, and all, has definitely hit. I am again marveling at how like clockwork it is for us all to go into major makeover mode this time of year!

It’s like there is something so beautifully rich and rooted in the nature of spring, that all us earthbound creatures impulsively want to shed clothes, toss clutter, empty closets, detox our bodies, and dust the cobwebs off our seemingly unpolished lives.

This go-round, though I am still intensely supportive and all in favor of clearing away debris, I am also thinking differently about the rite of spring cleaning. I am thinking beyond it, or rather, emphasizing the accomplice to what it is really all about.

In other words, I am profoundly considering what this innate desire to free ourselves from dirt—both inside and out—is essentially for. In my mind, it is to welcome abundance, transformation, inspiration, and thrill into our lives. Sounds simple and obvious, yes, but can be awfully hard to remember, don’t you think?

We get so bogged down by the work of diligently casting off our garbage, that we lose sight of the jewels in the proverbial rough that are always right here, pulsing and gleaming, and ready to be revealed.

These jewels are essentially our very own vibrant and already whole selves.

Just as poet e.e. cummings in his beloved ‘in Just-spring’ reminds us of the play and delight so reflexive of the season, I am also here to remind and cheer you in celebrating while you work the freshness and wonder of the more and more beautifully peeled back YOU.

From my truest and deepest heart, here’s to Spring Cleaning!

In sweetness,

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Living and Loving Your Life!

April 1, 2012

How often do you feel exuberant and intensely loving of your life? Is this way of being the norm or is it a sensation you merely touch upon in particularly happy moments?

I am a huge supporter of, and have in fact devoted my life’s work to inspiring others and myself to love being alive, and to be equally grateful for these specific lives each of us has so graciously been given.

This personally hasn’t come easy, and ironically has arisen from feeling for the bulk of my 36 years decidedly less than in the life-I’ve-been-given department. Yet, quite miraculously, and since a profoundly catalytic spiritual experience at age 33 while on holiday in Cabo San Lucas, I have pledged whole-heartedly to LIVE.

What I mean here is not just to exist by keeping my head above water, but to fully embrace and seriously love all the experiences—up, down, and upside down—of being alive. Or, as Zen great Suzuki Roshi puts it much more succinctly, “The only way is to enjoy your life.”

Believe me, it hasn’t all been a cakewalk. Still, my internal acceptance of and awe at what has and continues to happen as I step authentically along my path has made it pretty wonder-full.

How so? I was urged in my Cabo experience to deepen my understanding of what it means to be alive. Since then, I have prioritized fostering an ever-evolving rich interior life, namely through meditation, affirmation, and visualization practices, and too, very quiet yoga. Secondly, and almost more convincingly, I have worked hard at cultivating a more intuitive, fulfilling connection to the things in the outside world that bring me joy, and too, have changed and sometimes even muted my relationship to the things that create undo stress.

Now I won’t pretend to sit here and know exactly how you should go about seizing the day and loving your sparkling precious life. Only you know what thrills and depresses you, and so much of this comes from tapping the seriously wise voice inside.

I do however hope that my words spark you enough to open up and allow for that spirited inner light to beam and guide you into discovering and manifesting your own unique and celebratory way of being.

Here’s to LIVING and LOVING your life!

In sweetness,

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Making Room for Spiritual Practice

January 15, 2012

What is spiritual practice? Furthermore, do you have one?

Simply put, I define spiritual practice as something you do every single day that draws you deeper into who you really are, by connecting you with your divine self.

Please don’t be put off by the word spiritual here! Spiritual doesn’t have to entail–though it often does–meditation cushions, prayer beads, chant books, yoga mats, or any other such paraphernalia. A spiritual practice might be baking, gardening, running, knitting, playing piano, painting, hiking, meditating, golfing, doing yoga, tai chi, or calligraphy. It is not so much about the form but about the profound and connective quality of the time spent within it.

The practice part means just that: you do it daily, over and over, not in a gross way, but rather in a this-is-what-makes-me-who-I-am way. Without the aim of ever stopping with it, you practice as contribution to your ever-unfolding life on this earth. It can feel beautiful and compelling, harrowing and agonizing, annoying, vexing, boring as hell, or as ordinary and routine as brushing your teeth. Above all it is your rock, the ultimate placating pillar, steady and reliable as they come.

There have been times when, driven by such desperation, my yoga, pranayama, meditation, and journaling practices served as literal life preservers, day by grueling day. In these pockets, practice translates directly as necessity. In the coasting phases of our lives however, or during the highly celebratory ones, spiritual practice feels as joyous as the spread of a bright authentic smile, or as easy to fall into as a hammock under the stars, in the perfect climate, and between the two most exquisite trees.

This is all great you say, but how do I actually do it? First you have to admit that practice is essential, and something you must do. Next, you must designate, carve out, and stick to the time for it, often letting go of something else in order to keep it alive. Many people find it easiest to maintain practice first thing in the morning. But what does that mean you give up? Sleep? Or is it the extra hour on the computer before bed the night before so that you don’t lose the time in bed? There are choices here. It is up to you.

In short, and for you to take as inspiration or affirmation, here are my top ten benefits of spiritual practice:

It provides clarity in the midst of our overflowing and demanding days.
It cultivates the attention required to complete our tasks.
It lifts our mood.
It creates a sense of steadiness and grounding in change.
It keeps us afloat and even-keeled in even the most riotous emotional storms.
It helps us see our lives on a macro level.
It helps us understand our lives on a micro level.
It draws us into the simplicity of the moment.
It touches us so deeply that without it we would feel lost or downright not right.
It connects us to and reveals true spirit.

Ultimately, we must summon the courage to make room for spiritual practice, and the experiment that it is, as instigator at any given time of peace, elation, chill out, aha, tears, or evocative reflection. We must be willing to face whatever arises within this uncanny vehicle and to touch the sacred in ourselves every precious day.

How do you feel about that?

In sweet practice,

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