Keeping the Dream

One of the most amazing videos and personal testimonies I have ever seen.

(First posted at my healing voices forum)

Presenting Frederika Yumei Kocoronis, named after both grandmothers according to Greek tradition. I had a choice of my first name or Chinese surname, by my daughter, changing the tradition a bit. I chose my Chinese surname, as my mother carried it, both her daughters carried it as a middle name, and both my daughters carry it as a middle name. Now the name is passing to yet another generation.

She arrived Saturday morning close to 11:00 (mother and baby doing very well!) but I have been so busy caring for my grandson that I have not had a chance to post much sooner!

At the hospital, I held Ricca (for short) in one arm…what a treat that was for me! My lightest baby was 8 1/2 pounds and my last was 9 1/2 pounds! She was like holding a little doll to me!

I am in love.

It’s almost 4:00 in the morning. Just moments ago, my oldest daughter left for the hospital with her husband. She is in labor.

Earlier I was rubbing her back, her shoulders, breathing with her as the contractions came and went, closing my eyes and feeling generations of women before me and the power of this connection that will continue to reach out after me.

I sit here now and savor those moments and think about how much we have become disconnected to this great flow of life with the very technology that is supposed to increase the odds of that life. And how ironic that our technological advances can connect a world and yet disconnect us from our roots and the wisdom of our ancestors.

But in those moments, before the wires and gadgets and sterile rooms, it was as if time stopped, and within that stillness, I felt a sense of primal connection. It was rich and deep and if it had a smell, it would be of dark, fertile soil.

And I wonder, if somehow we have not created a cage of safety for ourselves like birds that have all the food they want to eat and no worries about predators, but no room to fly and no sky to reach.

But now, in these early predawn hours, my thoughts turn to my daughter and the baby who will soon be here. I see an endless horizon of possibilities and wonder. And I see a bond that spans through the generations. I know that the connection is still there and always will be.

We need only accept its eternal invitation to be aware.

Woke up early this morning. This is not unusual, but I did something I haven’t done in a long time. I started my day with prayer.

My spirituality is so important to me, and yet, somehow I find that I have let my conscious practice of it slip away. I would get up, do some quick “clearing of the mind” morning pages, and then maybe be silent for a minute of two, before rushing off to meet the day.

And though I’d stop to think every now and then about my connection with Spirit throughout the day, it was always on the fly.

So this morning I landed. I took the time to just stop and give myself the space to really go within, to let myself stop and enter the silence and feel the presence of God.

I need that. The pressure and stress has really seemed to be rising, and I feel very hard pressed to meet all my obligations or to be there for the people who seem to need me.

But I am learning. I’m learning to carve space out for me. I’m learning to let go. I’m learning to trust in the process to a much deeper degree.

It’s funny, but in the midst of a very stressful last week, I received an email out of the blue from someone from the other side of this country, who spoke words of encouragement to me and just happened to be someone who has made it her life’s work to advocate in the very area I was struggling with. A total stranger, a gift of insight and support.

This morning slowed me down enough to ponder the wonder of this synchronicity and allowed me to relish this feeling of being loved.

Quiet moments can do that. But you have to let yourself have them. They are not forced upon you, for even if you are bedridden, you can still race miles away from where you are.

Quiet moments are a state of mind. When your environment matches up with your quiet state of mind, so much the better. That’s why I like early morning hours, but you can carry that state around with you.

That’s the challenge, I think. Even more than what’s on your plate, the challenge is what’s in your head. Thoughts of peace, feelings of trust or chaos?

This morning, I choose peace.

That’s what an enabler does. She robs another person of the right to be accountable. She thinks she’s protecting the person she loves, but what’s she’s doing is a kind of abuse. It’s not just an aiding and abetting of a crime or an addiction. It’s a theft of another person’s actualization into adulthood.

Enabling can be a very controlling thing. On the one hand we can tell ourselves we’re helping someone, but what we are doing is keeping them dependent upon us as we enable them to continue in whatever hurtful behavior they are engaging in, by continuously cleaning up after them.

I am guilty of this. It seems to be a big part of my identity. I call it being an “advocate”, and I am…but I don’t know when to stop, and then advocating for someone becomes something else.

Advocacy that usurps accountability is not advocacy. It’s enabling. It’s a cover up. And sometimes it’s an effort to keep someone weak.

Parents have to watch out for this. And people involved with others who have addictions, whether drug, alcohol, obsessive spending or whatever forms the compulsion to avoid the real self takes, need to take a good look at not only their intentions but the deeper and actual impact of “helping”.

“Accountability theft” is a serious thing. It not only robs the person of the chance to take control of their own lives, it drains the life out of yours.