climb

In spiritual circles one often hears, “what you resists persists”.  We resist a lot.  A lot more that we are likely even aware of …  It’s also referred to as face everything avoid nothing. It can happen for some of us at the very start of the day upon the sound of the alarm, that we set, for ourselves, the night before.  “I don’t want to get up”, we say. “I don’t’ want to go to work”, we continue.  Or, in my case I experience resistance on the onset of hearing my toddler whining from his room, demanding something from me before I have fully entered the waking state of being. That has been and continues to be a steep encumbered mountain for me to climb.  I am making progress, and the peak is within sight.  However, the weather of my ever-changing emotions brings repeated unexpected delays. Of course it’s great on one hand because my son has actually slept through the night, which is huge, considering this was something he didn’t begin doing until he was nearly three. Yes, you read that right.  I am grateful and a heck of a lot more functional, sane and kind as a result.  Though now I am finding myself resisting his grumpy morning moods upon waking, which I have no control over…or do I?   Most mornings I breathe in and out and work for calm thoughts. I work to extend this calmness into the room I am occupying, and throughout the house and with any great fortune to him.  I am willing to commit to raising my vibration while resisting any temptations (and there are many) to join him in his drama.  It require a lot of shifting my focus so I can greet him and his grumpiness with a friendly smile and energy, inquire about what he may like for breakfast and ask him about his dreams.  There are days that my resistance is so strong and my will is so hard to recognize that I want to cry, attempt to control or shut down, stay in bed, and hide deep under the covers and a pile of pillows.  Basically, I want to act like a three year old.  I do. I really really do.  Every fiber of my being can easily access this state, and I can actually experience myself slipping away from the grasp of my adult and falling into the vast comfort and familiarity of toddler tantrum mode.   This is how I know I have been making strides and climbing this mountain, because at the start, it happened, without my even noticing until I would be deep in it, arguing with my three -year –old as my three -year -old self.  We’d compete for power all the while a slow steady leak would ensue of any remains of my power in a ridiculous attempt to win this battle.  There are no winners in this battle, and my need to be right and heard and respected and honored and… and…and….soon I find myself rolling down, down, down, down, the mountain, tumbling over the very terrain I had worked so hard to navigate, further and further away from my calm, my center, my goals, and most devastatingly, my love, the love that I am, the love that I share with my beautiful son, the love that is greater than my need to be right.  And in a flash I remember what I really want and it happens in an instant, like a flash of light, a satori.  And, I am back, and I am open, compassionate and happy that I am here, full of appreciation.  My son sees me, and recognizes my love and he embraces me, right here joining me, facing me, loving me.  I am able to invite him in to this space, rejecting his invitation inviting me into his grumpy morning mood.   We all have this ability to respond within us.  It is response ability to love and to share this love.  We must make a few moments for our self to connect to it. With practice this climb we navigate up this mountain of mothering will create the strength and endurance and guide us back to love more easily and more gently and more quickly.