This has been a season of puddles, and as the sun begins to show up I don’t want to forget what I’ve learned from exploring my inner puddling. It all began with a small injury, to which I added lots of insults. I mostly rained on what could have been a perfectly nice parade by thinking that I should be more evolved and enlightened than to feel disappointment or frustration.
I’m reminded of a time when my three-year-old daughter wet her “big girl pants” on a cloudless summer day, then claimed they were wet because she “sat in a puddle. A very big puddle.”
I had been sitting in a very big puddle of feelings and beliefs while I stayed dry in my mind, in my image of myself as someone who had evolved past lowly messes.
So I took a good hard look at where I was getting stuck and asked myself some hard questions about where I’m still arguing with reality. I took a close-up tour of what’s going on behind the façade of enlightened perfection that I sometimes wear. I took classes in inquiry. I led a small group as we got serious about living into our answers.
At the bottom of that puddle of disappointment I found a great gift. There’s a peace and clarity in discovering what’s behind thoughts like: This situation is a problem. I need to take care of it now. There’s not time. It’s somebody else’s fault that the world isn’t perfect (from my point of view).
As I poke around in the yuk of lies I sometimes believe about myself or the world, I keep finding how much easier and kinder it would be to just take a giant step to the side and discover how good my essential self really is, away from all the mental chatter.
Here’s the big surprise: When I strip away the façade of enlightenment, what I find is enlightenment.
A big part of this process has come from actually seeing and allowing some hidden feelings that I had not felt seemly in someone of my stage of evolution. Now that’s a relief. The relief that comes from being on the same page as reality, which contains all things natural. Like feelings. Puddles of tears come, sometimes. And then the sun shines.
When I allow for all that messiness, I find myself in a big puddle of relief….and joy.
Where do you puddle up? What might you allow yourself to do or if you weren’t trying to be wise or enlightened? A big subject. Touch in and poke around gently. Hold what shows up in kind curiosity. What do you notice?
Actually, one of the best things about Portland is sloshing through all of the puddles. The silver lining in the weather here is the gift of being a child again for a few seconds.