48: Thoughts, beliefs, & maybe-shrines

July 25, 2016 Helen McLaughlin

PAPER LEGS | oklahoma city, ok — PAPER LEGS | *oklahoma city, ok*

This week, I'm musing about shrines.

I'd venture a guess that most of us are building one, in some capacity, every single day. The word shrine comes from the Latin scrinium, meaning "case or chest for books or papers" and the Old French escrin, meaning "box or case." If a brain is a container for what's revered and obsessed over, read and dogeared, boxed-up and stored, thought and felt, loved and hated, experienced and processed, esteemed and damned—if a brain is all that, it could be considered a kind of shrine, couldn't it? If a shrine is a shrine because of an energetic commitment, a full-on recognition of and devotion to something, then our brains—yours and mine, too—are absolutely our portable shrines.

T H E I N S P I R A T I O N
The energy experiments in Pam Grout's book, E-Cubed, have me thinking about things a little differently. Specifically, her third experiment, The Simon Cowell Corollary (Or Why You're Not Capable of Judging Anything), in which I found this gem:

Of course, you must deal with problems if they arise. But it's unnecessary to let them become your whole identity. No matter how it may look, you are still whole and complete and intact. To focus on the problem is to subconsciously cling to it, never allowing for the possibility of release. There is a difference between dealing with what you have to deal with and building a shrine to it.

T H E Q U E S T I O N
Do we know what we're worshipping...or even that we're worshipping something?

T H E M E T H O D
Let's measure the number and quality of offerings we make at the altar of our most prominent and predominant thoughts. How? While there are many excellent resources for tracking minutes spent on various tasks and websites online (8aWeek, MeeTimer, Rescue Time, etc.), I'd like to disturb the shrine more dramatically than that. First, by identifying those thoughts that, depending on our energetic commitment to them, might veer into worshipping territory:

Maybe Shrine #1
"I can't stand the idea of [fill in the blank] becoming president of the United States."

Maybe Shrine #2
"This illness/dis-ease is my reality. I am a sick/unwell person."

Maybe Shrine #3
"I am dreadfully unhappy because [fill in the blank]."

Okay, now, let's crash around the temple and throw things, flip a table or two, desecrate the crap out of the place. What does this look like? Finding the inverse of your maybe-shrine and saying it out loud:

Disruption #1
"I can stand the idea of [fill in the blank] becoming president of the United States."

Disruption #2
"This illness/dis-ease is not my reality. I am not a sick/unwell person."

Disruption #3
"I am not dreadfully unhappy because [fill in the blank]."

T H E C O N C L U S I O N
This isn't about positive thinking. It isn't even about manifesting, really. It's more about testing some of our thoughts (and those things we claim as our realities) for signs that they've become our beliefs. If voicing a disruption causes you discomfort, you might want to consider what (or whom) it is you're inadvertently venerating...because, make no mistake, you're building a shrine to something when you're committing copious energy to thoughts, good or bad, about it (and I for one refuse to build a shrine to Donald Trump).

Hit 'reply' and share with me one of your trickiest maybe-shrines. Let's bust it up, together. (I love flipping tables. Proverbially, of course.)

'Til soon,
Helen

Notes from the week of July 17

EXPERIENCED

+ Sooner Mall in Norman, OK

COLLECTED

+ surfing tips, though I'm going to learn to skateboard first

BEFRIENDED

+ many shoe salespeople (one told us we should do a standup act as a couple)

47: Navigating race, privilege, & current events (& what curiosity has to do with it)

July 18, 2016 Helen McLaughlin

BIZARRE CLOUD FORMATION | oklahoma city, ok — BIZARRE CLOUD FORMATION | *oklahoma city, ok*

It's really hard to stay curious in situations that are scary, overwhelmingly upsetting, tragic, and deeply (deeply) unfair.

Last week's newsletter was a weary white flag: I'm so upset and full of rage and I'm not sleeping and I don't know how to talk about this and I'm not sure I even have anything to add to the conversation because, right now, I'm just feeling it all.

Feeling the awfulness on a level that isn't productive or proactive...that isn't a salve for anyone who's living the injustice.

Swimming in hopelessness.

Completely unnerved by how unsafe so many American citizens are...in the very situations which my country, my culture, has told me that I'm most safe: in the presence of police, the people in our society whose express job is to protect and to serve.

And then, completely unnerved by acts of retaliation against the police.

Violence begets violence begets violence begets violence.

So, I talked about clothes. I opted for levity. I gave myself more time to process without any expectation.

I'm still feeling it, still wondering how and where to join the conversation, stuck between not wanting to be a white person who's preoccupied with "doing something" and not wanting to remain ignorant to all the ways I benefit from my white privilege. And I feel a bit like an outlier because I'm trying to maintain my curiosity in a world that's constantly poking and encouraging me to react, in a society that would gladly egg me on in following the wishes of my ego.

But maybe this is a fruitful state to be in, and to acknowledge publicly. Maybe you're someplace similar right now.

The truth is, I don't want to talk about current events here. There are plenty of news outlets (and op-eds) devoted to just that, and I'm sure you know where to find them and/or how impossible it is to avoid them on your various feeds. However, if you're anything like me (and I suspect you are, since you read this thing every week), you might be wondering how curiosity figures in when everything seems to be going to hell.

I'd like to share two thoughts I've had this past week about curiosity, as it pertains to current events:

We must not let our fear override our curiosity.

Pain and sadness might cloud our curiosity for a time (and that's okay), but we have to be willing to investigate the sky the moment the clouds clear—to see what else is there, what's left, what we have to work with and work on.

We cannot be too afraid to ask questions.

What's it like to be a person of color in America?

What invisible systems do I benefit from, perhaps without condoning or even realizing it?

How does your experience of the police differ from mine?

Whom do you feel you can turn to when you need help, when you need protection?

In what ways can I lessen my unearned race advantage and conferred dominance?

In what ways can I contribute to the improvement of your quality of life?

Am I willing to sit with the discomfort that comes with having an honest conversation about this?

Our job as curious people BEGINS with the asking of these questions, and questions like them.

But we cannot want to ask the questions more than we want to hear and learn and internalize the answers. And I mean really listen to the answers.

The asking is a gesture, sure—but it's the care-full listening and the subsequent action taken that actually hold the possibility of change.

We must not let our curiosity override our self-care.

Take the time to process what devastates you. Feel hopeless if you feel hopeless. You do not owe anyone a public reaction or a pithy essay that details your response to the horror. You are not uncaring if there are viral videos you cannot watch, because if you do, sadness will overtake you.

Curiosity is no good if it dead-ends with you mindlessly consuming information that makes you feel guilty.

Know your limits. Learn when enough is enough and you need to stay away from the news, from social media, from that coworker who won't stop saying "All lives matter" (because, yes, of course they do, but holy shit if that isn't missing the point entirely).

Curiosity is a tool—and a good one, if you ask me—that should fuel action, not reaction. Instead of focusing on current events, take a trip through history and learn a bit more about what we've done wrong in the past, what we're still trying to correct, and how much has actually improved (despite everyone's occasional feelings of hopelessness).

Remind your spirit that everything is changing, all the time.

Hit 'reply' and share with me how you're feeling today. A little check-in to ease us into a new week.

'Til soon,
Helen

Notes from the week of July 10

DISCOVERED

+ SURJ

ADMIRED

+ "Please do not change the conversation by talking about how your life matters, too. It does, but we need less watered down unity and a more active solidarities with us, Black people, unwaveringly, in defense of our humanity. Our collective futures depend on it"

BOOKMARKED

+ The New Jim Crow

READ & NODDED MY HEAD

+ "This is an extraordinary time full of vital, transformative movements that could not be foreseen. It is also a nightmarish time. Full engagement requires the ability to perceive both"

46: It's okay to snoop

July 11, 2016 Helen McLaughlin

THE MULE | oklahoma city, ok — THE MULE | *oklahoma city, ok*

I don't know about you, but I need today to be lighthearted. So, let's talk about my traveling closet.

When Dana and I decided to sell the RV in Spokane, drive our stuff to my sweet in-laws', and ride the rails for a few weeks, the first thing I fretted over was what to pack.

I knew that, ultimately, I was packing for an Oklahoma summer, but besides that, I had no idea what our situation called for. How do you pack for everyday living without a home...and fit it all in a backpack? Our time in the RV had taught me that I never used one hundred percent of whatever I brought—so, better to stick with bare-bones basics and pine after what doesn't make the cut (red clogs!) than carry the extra, and unnecessary, weight of the items that will get worn maybe once, if at all. For me, the thing to keep at the front of my mind is this: Comfort and contentedness while traveling comes not from having all the options I'd like, but from liking all the options I have.

Besides, my clogs and I will be reunited later this year.

Last week, I received in the mail a new travel backpack that I suspect really might be the Holy Grail of All Luggage, Ever. It's to replace the camping backpack that just wasn't working—one that required an exasperated rejiggering of its contents every time an item was removed. This new fellow isn't so ornery.

I'm a bit nosy when it comes to how and what others pack for short- and long-term travel, so I figure you might be, too. It's just such a curious thing, isn't it? How travelers manage not to look like they're living out of a suitcase when, in fact, they are.

Well, I think I cracked the code. Cracked my code, anyway.

Pick only your favorites; take two fewer shirts than you think you need (two of those pictured haven't been worn a single time in the past three months); make sure the shoes are practical for walking (no offense, red clogs) and make you smile.

Add to that pajamas, undies, gym clothes, and running sneakers, and you have yourself a vagabond who's at home in her skin and suitcase.

'Til soon,
Helen

Notes from the week of July 3

DISCOVERED

+ llamas have sit-ins, too

ADMIRED

+ "Escape from Oblivion"

ATE, DRANK

+ falafel sandwich
+ bread pudding