Please stay "too Intense"

Max and I have moved out of his chamber.  Max's 3 glittery M A X letters came off the wall. I would feel like I am leaving something behind but by now I know that we always are. Sentimentality is a very slippery slope. Places are like people in the way that they carry a certain energy, but hold onto anything to tightly and you will squeeze the life force right out of it.  I am living in 300 square feet. I call it the "Bamboo Tube", not much wiggle room except for the narrow passageway to the light.  I like it this way. Intense containers with no place to run.

I suppose I too am an intense container or so I have been told.

People say the most incredible things to me. It is all well intended, or not... it actually doesn't matter.  Please don't waste your time trying to figure out if people are well intended.  I am more interested in how we walk and what actually comes out of our mouth. At this stage in the game it is all grist for the mill and yet I have learned something that I believe is worth sharing.

Very clear people have said to me, " Heather it has to get easier, nothing can be more difficult than loosing a child".  Although endearing, "getting easier" is not Max's teaching. Here is his basic teaching, "love is radical, love is our birthright, love is not an economic equation, love doesn't get you anything,  and yet the act of loving and ripping open is what we are here to do,  be both shameless and vulnerable, stay triumphantly heartbroken and accessorize it with red lipstick and heels." Of course there is the advanced course in playing planetary marbles but let's stick with the basics.

This practice of staying open and saying "yes" is not bias. Staying open is saying "yes" to life. But saying "yes" to death is also Max's teaching. Things will end. Love will kick your ass. You will loose it. Sometimes love is a moment, a month, a marriage, or a total miss, no matter we get a taste.  My teacher Max is all love and no bullshit because all that "love" means to my teacher is that you do it anyway. Trust me we are going to loose it in the form that it found us. So when it finds you, when it comes knocking on your door, make room, write your love haikus,  move the furniture because it has a tendency to flood, make friends with it's container but please remember that love is only a current a content of sorts that has no bias for it's container.  The best we can do is become a vessel and let it move through us.

Here is the new piece and one that has taken me a few weeks to understand,  an incredible part of loving is also knowing when it is not. Please listen. Vessels must have valves. They are vital.  Saying yes to life does not have to mean saying yes to everyone or everything. Discernment is the most powerful weapon a warrior can hone. Letting love out is as important as letting love in. Listen to your instinct.

Sharpen your skills.

And please do stay "too intense".

Full Gestation

I have, as of today physically been without Max as long as I have been with him. He left his body exactly nine months ago. I am in good company. I am in God company. Come to find out, they are no different.  Grace moves through us. I can recognize her as the people who hold me accountable to the highest truth of my heart and ask me to continue living from that place. Look around. These are your people. These are your teachers. These are your warriors. These are your heart song. 


Some of my good people/god people live in Tucson. So here I am today at an advanced yoga intensive at Yoga Oasis. I am fully back in my body and bending it backwards, radical syllabus style. This is the place in the yoga practice where you trust that you have put in all of the hours (sweating, crying, building strength, ripping open, refining your alignment, and figuring out the formula) needed to support you for what is next.  This is the place in the practice where my teacher Darren Rhodes shares "you have to allow your intuition and memory to move you beyond the formula". In other words... when things get radical, there is no formula. 


Here is the one constant: everything is uncertain, everything is groundless and still we practice to create the stability we need.  We do not practice to create more stable ground. We practice to create a more stable container. Practice is a reference point. It gives us a place to work from, but it is not the work itself.  Life will move through us.  We are it's vessel.


There is no formula. 
There is no formula.


When radical things happen all we have to rely on is the hours we have put in getting to know the depths of our heart so that we can, and we will rise up when we are called. 




The only real work is the opening of the heart. 


Not all heart opening needs to be radical. This is where time has become my ally. The perspective time has shown is this... be gentle with yourself. Rest when you can. Trust me. Your time for night watch will come.  Life will move through you.  Living a good life is not about getting through it, it's about getting it all over you.  But we too need seasons... so in the rest times, in the times in between the really big storms enjoy the ocean for what it is. Take really good care of yourself. Bask in the sun. Ask your heart questions. Be curious. Get to know its longing.  Make loving yourself the priority of your practice. Because at some point the formula will not cut it and this path (if we are lucky) will eventually reveal exactly what and how we have been practicing. 


Thank you for walking this path with me. 


as we let love in.


Heather 

accessorize your scars

I have a wall of teachers in my new room. I also have the letter M A X.   A friend questioned why I do not have a picture of Max up there with the other open-hearted heretics. My teachers do all share a certain quality of revolutionary .  And Max certainly rubs elbows with these masters.  I have, however very intentionally never printed a picture of him. Pictures of him decorate the desktops of my electronic devices and yet to frame him on a wall in his perfect form that he didn't stay long in seems futile.

He is changeless, yet changing forms all of the time.  A frame seems too little for his great bigness.   For the first few weeks after he left his little body the two of us once again shared skin suits. He came from my cells and I felt him return into me. He moved from my uterus to my heart-erus. The veil became so thin between birth, life, birth, death we wanted to stay very close to each other so not to just disappear. As soon as we figured out how to communicate he quickly found an additional form, and another form, and another form.... he is always recognizable and always beyond the scope of my imagination. He both evolves alongside of me and shows me the way on a path that demands all of me.

Sometimes he wears roller skates and feathers, while sometimes he wears war paint and armor. Sometimes he is as gentle as a chinook wind,  while sometimes as fierce as flooding water. Sometimes he has very furry large feet and a little clumsy while sometimes he has perfectly coordinated bird wings.   Sometimes he is an absolute planetary marble playing mastermind while sometimes he is two good friends having a salad.

He is omnipresent, omniscient,  ineffable, and loves girls singing Kirtan.

He is also happy to just be my son. 

We long for each other. 

This is the beauty of the beloved. The beloved is a perpetual state of longing for the other. When I talk about the awakening that Max shared with us, it is the awakening that essentially we are all in a state of longing that doesn't come from incompleteness. It comes from our heart's longing to be in our baseline state of absolute unconditional love. We loose it somewhere along the line. We forget. We let strange things block us from feeling it. Then we will find it.  Then we loose it again. This cycle continues.  Then one day we get lucky (when I say lucky I am talking about the lila kind of lucky, not the winning the lottery kind of lucky) and something radical happens.  And when radical strikes it is insane. But If we rise up and really meet it... inevitably we will be ripped open and the raw space of revelation gives us another taste of the sweet perpetual deep longing of the heart. This is beloved. 

Evoking a broken heart doesn't take much when we loose are children... and still the work is to stay both broken hearted and ripped wide open. We are actually designed to be in this state. Our cells know what to do. Our hearts know how to connect. 

 The choice between tragic and triumphant is a very thin sharp sharp razor.  Both edges will cut you open.  Our work is not so much to heal these kind of wounds as it is so much to accessorize our scars. I wrote a few blogs back that "our beauty is our broken". Dare to stay triumphantly broken hearted.   Dare to stay triumphantly broken hearted.  It will look amazingly good on you.

Let Love In

H. 

Rejection is liberation

My dear friend Elisha calls rejection "god's protection". I feel very clear about God not giving a rat's ass about a prayer list of our wants or needs but God and I are still working it out. Our relationship is a work in progress. But I put down my weapons the day I helped Max leave his body. Still... I am working on staying in fighting shape. Stepping onto the battlefield is not necessarily about straight up spiritual warfare. Stepping onto the battlefield is the place where we choose triumph over failure when we get rejected. We stay present regardless of the outcome. Staying in a heart broken open space is actually a very victorious place to be.

Loving is not about getting anything. Loving is not about getting anything. Loving is not about getting anything. Loving is not about getting anything. Loving is not about getting anything.

Before Max was born I used impermanence as a way to guard my heart. I found a practice of contentment by remaining unattached. I actually had a name for it "compassionate neutrality".  I assure you I didn't know any better so there is a kind of ignorant innocence here that I am sharing with you.  Then this path of mine presented a new landscape.   I can now tell you with absolute certainty, "compassionate neutrality" is bullshit. Nothing stays the same. Impermanence is the path we are all walking. There is nothing enlightened about staying neutral.

Max isn't teaching us how to stand on the side line and stay neutral. Get in there and get yourself dirty mom. We confuse a survival method of not getting attached with simply waking up to knowing that nothing stays the same.  Whether you attach or renounce is not going to change things changing.  This life is inviting us to explore the depth of our heart and to bind ourselves to what we love. Get radically attached. How fully, how madly will you love knowing the truth that no matter what, someday you are going to loose it. I listened to Douglas Brooks talk about love this way: "Love will bring you into conflict, disappointment and grieving. Love will fuck you up. But however it is we choose to love is what we will become".

Bind yourself to the act of loving and see what kind of heart opening happens. I assure you this path is much more challenging, much more risky, and much more authentic than being compassionately neutral.

and yes... You will get rejected. Do it anyway.
Rejection is liberation.

L O V E

Heather

Invite death to the dinner table

The work is self observation. Sounds simple. It is. But there is something about "simple" that we tend to resist. It may have something to do with our tendency to stay distracted. We can, if not checked find ourselves in a perpetual state of "busy" confusing our essenntial self with our outputs. When we stop and look at our essential goodness, our essential god-ness, our essential brightness what we find is it has very little to do with what we do and much more to do with how we show up to what we are doing.

One of the greatest gifts Max gave me was absolute stillness. My world stopped. The gift to get down and dirty with the present moment is what really matters. Max invited death to the dinner table to see what kind of conversations we would have with our people... and not just the ones we love, but also the ones we think are not worthy of our love. Death at the dinner table actually made me take a seat right between them so I was able to see the microscopic line between worthy and unworthy. Invite death out for a walk and watch how beautiful the sun sets. Invite death to go for a swim and taste the salty water. Invite death out for a jog and see how fast you can run. Invite death to the unveiling of your masterpiece and see if you care about what people think. Invite death to your self obeservation session and see if what rubs you the wrong way is just you neglecting your heart's longing. Invite death to your busy day and see what really needs to be done.

When I talk about the simplicity of self observation what I am really talking about is the pretty radical practice of returning to what is truly important. Keeping death on the horizon slices away at the bullshit to keep us perpetually in the ripped open place of our hearts. It is only in the senses of our hearts that we can truly savor the intensity, taste the uncomfortable, see the infinite chances to open, touch the intangible, and really hear our heart's deep longing. If I may, I encourage you to get "busy" with that kind of work.

Keep letting love in
Heather

Going off the deep end

I am aware of the abnormality of my grieving. Trust me, it's not normal to refer to your son that left his body after eight days as "your teacher, master of masters, guru of gurus"... who tells you to keep loving. Keep letting love in. Keep your heart open and broken regardless of the outcome. The boats have been burned and there is no going back.  Safe is an illusion.  Technicolor is the new mauve so color the walls of this life big and bright.  You are going to get hurt. You are going to fail so be as graceful as possible.

Trust me It isn't normal that I said "no" to a memorial because Max is very much alive in my heart. While it doesn't phase me, it does freak people out. I can say with quite a bit of certainty that I surround myself with very level-headed, grounded, rooted and located Masterminds who talk to me daily about what Max is doing, what Max is up to, what Max is teaching us, or how Max shows up in very unexpected places. I am grateful I have them. They hold me accountable to keep living in the abnormal. When I get worked by the ocean of this rawness they wrap me up in a warm towel, give me a snack, wax up my board and say "get back out there kid, keep living from that kind of conviction".

Normal says "Heather went off the deep end". People have told me they were worried about me until they saw me at the bank.

The bank? Really?

We get a sample of how radically uncertain all of this being human is but instead of really living from that place of no bullshit and all heart, it's just easier to go the bank. Of course we have to go to the bank. It's expected and necessary, but please do see it for what it is.

Another women shared that she can't believe how open I have been with loosing a baby. That it makes her uncomfortable that I have been public with Max. She shared that she knew a woman who lost her baby and nine months later had another one and that she's totally fine.

I can't argue with that. Fine is a fine place to be. Fine just isn't for me. I prefer the going off the deep end.

I am writing this because many of you have swam out to some pretty big waves with me, another way of saying "off the deep end". You have taken a stand to move deeper and deeper into the layers of your heart where the waves of love are intense and the risks are big. You have bravely shared what that surf continues to feel like for you. Thank you for being brave. But let us be clear, not everone is willing to paddle out into really big waves and it's ok. I am interested in living in the abnormal.  I am NOT interested in being righteous about it. It's enough just to live from that place. What I don't get to do is drag people out there with me. Or worse, come across that I am somehow more awake for choosing to stay open. I have made this mistake and almost drowned a very dear friend of mine. I tried to drag him out here with me when he has been the one supplying the rations for me to stay out in these big waves. Take it from me, don't do that.  It is not up to you who joins you in the line up.  I got tumbled and tossed around and may have done some damage.  It will need some attention and some nurturing before the trust is there again. Note taken.  I'd be in deeper shit if he didn't love me the way he does. I am thankful our friendship survived.


Max says "keep paddling Mom and recognize the incredible amount of support it takes from shore to make sure you stay alive out there". The opportunity for growth is in every fathom. Be grateful for the near drownings. Be grateful for the bank. Be grateful for the normal. Be grateful for going off the deep end and when needed just apologize.

Let Love In
Heather

"Yes" go shuffle a 5K

Max was born five months ago today. There is a palpable potency around these last eight days of every month. I have shared that I once feared time, scared that as it marched on it would be a promenade away from Max, away from these moments along the continuum that open us up, that rip our hearts well into the realm of god ache. Good thing God has rhythm. Time is just making me a better dancer. Even if I miss a beat Max doesn't seem to mind. He giggles at my messy moves and keeps drumming. Max just breaks it down on his hi-hat "I like your style Mom."

"Dress your grief up in Blue High Heels and get moving. We have work to do"

Max and I initially spent a good deal of time together in quiet spaces while he taught me how to listen to his voice. I took lots of notes. This note is specific to an evening at my sister's house a little over a month after Max left his body, "Hey mom, you can do anything. You have a body. Do everything". My response was, "Christ Max you are right. You could have taken me with you, and here I am. I get it. Skin suit wearing is embodiment. Embodiment is god wanting to feel, touch, love, cry, celebrate, endure, walk, run, go to Katmandu, surf and ski in the same day, make ceramic coffee cups, stay up way too late with people that I love because the company is that good, surf 40 countries, serve humans, write a book, sit at the feet of masters," the list continues. Max was giving me the practice of saying "Yes". Not yes to the bullshit ways we feel we need to please people by doing things that don't resonate in our hearts, it's not that kind of yes. It's saying yes to everything we have made up an excuse as to why not.


Just like Max has increased my sensitivity to the spectrum of the magical realms he is also offering a doorway into the obvious... You have a body. Love it. Utilize it. Rub up against all of your edges. Don't just do one thing that scares you, go out seeking things that scare the shit out of you and then dominate. Embodiment is Empowerment but we need to stretch way beyond our comfort zone for the spectrum of what is possible to reveal itself. Be harmlessly reckless. Be vulnerably bold. Be lovingly messy. And as our Christina Sell shares, please don't walk through life without getting it on you. Get out your list. Start checking things off. If you don't have one, make one. And please do make sure that you aren't good at it before you go for it.


I hate running. So I ran a 5K. I was so excited I sprinted the first 2 miles. I got a side ache. I stopped. Then an eight-year old dressed in all red kind of shuffled past me and I thought " I can shuffle ". I shuffled past the finish line. The only role I have ever wanted to play was a Doo-Wap girl for Little Shop of Horrors. I finished my shuffle, took my race number 661 off and replaced it with my audition number 26 for the Palace Theater.

shuffling

What I am saying is go find all of your 5ks even if it means you shuffle. Go find all of your dream roles, belt out some show tunes even if it means you sing off key. Own it, then take your trophies to go, and let love in on your way out the door.

Let Love In
Heather

The Cremation Ground is the New frickin' Tea Cup Ride

I am Back on Oahu on the 3rd floor at the NICU to return that breast pump that I stole. Master P joined me. I wanted to give our nervous systems a chance to integrate the intensity of the eight days we spent in the hospital. It took me a moment to realize after picking up Kim P at the airport that we didn't have to rush to the NICU. Max isn't there. Pulsating proof that my body and nervous system are still highly sensitive and in some ways on guard, at attention, ready to lift a truck to save my son. The strength of a mom is impenetrable. No need to rush. My body is also on an incredible journey. 


I also came here to simply hug the medical staff and to thank each of them for serving and loving Max. They are extraordinary. I was able to hold my baby as he passed. I was able to breathe him in. I was able to became a conduit for him to return to the source from where he came. They made that possible for me. They broke any rules that may have stood in my way to being able to experience being Max's Mom.  There began my pilgrimage.  But when a baby leaves, we all grieve. They had to go back to work. Other babies needed them. The world doesn't stop and yet all of the support I have been given suspended mine so that I can stay open and experience Max as my teacher. The amount of pure gratitude brings me to my knees. Time is not taking me farther away from Max. Time is spotlighting the very human workload it took for me to be so well taken care of.  Time is showing me that Max is the human spirit. He is not just mine.  The world is not falling apart my friends. The world has never been more awake. I can feel it in your eyes. Those long lashes of yours batting at the recognition that love is everywhere.  

Being back at the battlefield has a much different feel when your armor is off. Come to find out we brought the battlefield. It travels with us. It's here in my back pocket ready to be rolled out when any of us need it... and we will. We rallied warriors. We fought hard. And we will fight this battle of the heart again and again. Here, sitting in the plain mauve walls of the hospital on the bench that I sat four months ago waiting to be taken into hold Max as he left his body, not a single part of me feels defeated. Rather I am in a state of surrender. The entire electromagnetic spectrum is the new visible light. Technicolor is the new monochromatic. The cremation ground is the new frickin' tea cup ride. God doesn't give us what we want and still God is everywhere. Grace glides with her net as we walk along our edges. Whether we are asked to hang a toe off or jump with our eyes closed...Grace swoops in. Shaken awake Max, redeemer is right, all we have to do is pay attention. All plain mauve walls have magic written all over them. Max is sharing his new set of magic markers ready to illustrate this next chapter. Get scribbling. Get your doodle on and let's do this thing.