After traveling and Easter and spring break, I was back in my classroom this week. \u00a0Our story was the \u201cLife Cycle of the Human Being\u201d. \u00a0We looked at pictures of people in different stages of life and thought about how we weren\u2019t two any more. \u00a0All of us are much older than that now! \u00a0We talked about all the many things we can do now that we couldn\u2019t do when we were two. \u00a0It\u2019s a lot of things, even for those of us who are only three.<\/p>\n
After our story we took time as we always do, to wonder together. \u00a0We always ask, \u201cIf you were something or someone in this story, who or what would you be?\u201d \u00a0One of my children answered that she would be the person being fed. \u00a0I had to clarify because part of the life cycle lesson is a baby being fed and completing the cycle by showing an elderly person being fed. \u00a0\u201cWhich person being fed are you? \u00a0The old person or the baby?\u201d \u00a0\u201cBoth\u201d, she said.<\/p>\n
This answer struck me. \u00a0Probably it caught my attention because I tend to be the person feeding and not the person being fed. \u00a0That was even part of the focus of the lesson. \u00a0We can do so much as we grow. \u00a0We can keep learning and our hearts can keep growing even when our bodies reach their full height and start shrinking again. \u00a0We can do. \u00a0We can grow. \u00a0I like being a do-er of many things. \u00a0I like being the leader. \u00a0I like imagining and sharing a new way. \u00a0I like growing in my thoughts and growing in compassion as I age.<\/p>\n
So, even though I firmly believe in the value of simply being, of simply breathing, I have to admit that it\u2019s very difficult for me to be graceful about being fed. \u00a0I am ok at exchange. \u00a0I am ok with mutuality. \u00a0I can open to receiving most of the time if I know there will be an opportunity to give back or if I have already given something first. \u00a0The pictures we witnessed together were of being fed. \u00a0Not just someone else setting dinner in front of me which they have prepared with their love and effort, but a human with a spoon in their mouth that they weren\u2019t holding themselves. \u00a0I do not desire to be the person being fed.<\/p>\n
It makes me a little uncomfortable to think of myself in a position where I cannot manage to get a spoon to my own mouth. \u00a0It makes me uncomfortable to think about someone sitting in front of me, loving or indifferent, feeding me. \u00a0And this discomfort is not just about the idea of physically being fed, although receiving that with grace must be a challenging practice for those who experience it. \u00a0This way of being for me is also spiritual. \u00a0It\u2019s difficult for me to be vulnerable and admit that kind of need. \u00a0I like leading the group and asking the questions. \u00a0I like opening the space, observing and going inward. \u00a0And there are spaces in my life where I share deeply and those are a refuge. \u00a0However, I don\u2019t often experience the kind of spiritual need that would require the equivalent of someone lifting a spoon to my soul.<\/p>\n
I am going through significant transition in my life right now and it has highlighted to me the ways in which I struggle to stay steady, to be confident, to be unafraid and to show that face to my own self and others. \u00a0It\u2019s hard to allow feelings of fear and doubt and anxiety to surface. \u00a0They sometimes do. \u00a0They come when someone asks a compassionate question about how I\u2019m doing. \u00a0They come when all that emotion gets so stuck in my body that I\u2019m in physical pain. \u00a0But I\u2019m having a hard time welcoming my own feelings of helplessness and despair and brokenness. \u00a0When I was two, I could just cry and release every difficult feeling and the adults who loved me would hold and comfort me. \u00a0When I was two I could ask for help for everything. \u00a0These things seem to be much more difficult as an adult. \u00a0So I find that I need to keep doing my work. \u00a0I need to continue letting my children teach me what it means to surrender. \u00a0I need to remember the love inherent in the Universe that makes it ok to know when despair needs expression and company. \u00a0And I need to open, not just to giving kindness to others when they are in need, but to receiving it when I have nothing to give or am overwhelmed by the feelings that seem much bigger than me.<\/p>\n
Who or what are you in this story? \u00a0Are you the one being fed?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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