There is a scene in Beth Henley's tragicomedy 'Crimes of the Heart' in which one of the characters talks about the suicide of her mother. In her sweet Mississippi accent, with heart rending empathy, Babe says of her mother, "She just had a bad day. A real bad day." The line is delivered in such a way that the audience wants to laugh and cry at the same time. 

We've all had those bad days, when everything seems to fall apart, break down, or otherwise fly into irreparable pieces. When all of our usual coping strategies lead us to 'hit the wall', and overwhelm sets in. Despite our best attempts to make sense of what is going on we just can't. We may find ourselves in a void, a place of fear and confusion, and try to fill it with our old familiar thoughts and emotional memories. Perhaps not helpful, but it is certainly human to feel abandoned, to wonder why this is happening to me.... to try to make the pieces of the present puzzle fit together based on past history. But if we build our present solely upon the past, we only get more of the same.

Carolyn Myss, author and teacher, suggests that the practice of what she calls 'illumination' can serve as an alternative approach that allows for a new outcome. She writes about quieting the reasonable mind that wants answers, and seeking another experience of perception.  In Entering the Castle, she wrote, " Pause and observe with appreciation all the so-called small things of the world around you. Put all of your perceptual senses in slow motion.... say 'I am exactly where I am supposed to be. All is as it should be. The divine is active in every detail. Therefore every detail is serving a divine purpose and influencing my life in this moment.'" And then open your intuitive mind, and breathe, and listen in the silence. 

The root word in 'emergency' is 'emergence', the process of coming into being. The Japanese symbol for 'crisis' is the same used to represent the concept of 'opportunity'. What opportunity might emerge if we take off the constraints of our past overlays of thought and emotion and simply open ourselves, simply surrender to what is with an open heart and mind. We might find deeper connections, and we might not have to be so afraid of the unknown. We might receive divine guidance, we might see things a new way based on mindfulness, appreciation, and grace. 
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Feeling bad about feeling bad usually leads to more feeling bad. These are two separate issues that are often jumbled into one. Feeling bad in response to a physical or emotional wound is a normal response and appropriate for a period of time.  Part of having all of our emotions includes permission to feel bad. We need to acknowledge suffering and we need to allow it to be finite, to be able to differentiate feeling and wallowing. It is not an easy task to determine that fine line, especially for those of us who tend towards "all or nothing" thinking. Pain can easily become all consuming. It can become our identity: I am a person who suffers. And if that is how I see myself, suffering is then something I do well and frequently.

Sometimes people live a huge part of their lives in bad feelings about their pain, and the regret, bitterness, or self pity can become bigger than the original injury. They may identify with the role of victim or martyr or sick person and the self judgement perpetuates the pattern of the experience. When you are in it, it can get confusing and sometimes it is necessary to find someone to help you separate the two. Confusion, by the way, is usually a good thing. It means you are thinking rather than just repeating in your mind what you already think you know. And be aware that "bucking up" or "sucking it in" does not work very well. Trying to just turn off the pain often means that it will go underground and show up in other ways, some of which may be totally unconscious. New body pains, cranky attitudes, accidents, punishment to self or others may result. 

One of my teachers used to say that pain is like ringing telephone, something to get our attention. It is part of our inner guidance system and learning to use our GPS helps us make choices that lead to different outcomes. Often to avoid uncomfortable feelings we blame others, self medicate, or insist that reality should be different from what it is. Sometimes pain indicates that there are things we need to change about what we do in order to change a situation. Diet and exercise in order to improve a health condition is an example of this. Other times we are powerless to directly change a situation other than changing our thoughts about it. "The one thing you can't take away from me is the way I choose to respond to what you do to me. The last of one's freedoms is to choose one's attitude in any given circumstance," wrote Viktor Frankl, an Austrian neurologist, psychiatrist and Holocaust survivor.

Whether it is physical pain or emotional pain, you can choose to put your attention on something that you feel better about in order to differentiate 'who you are' from 'the pain that happens to be with you right now'. This does not mean that we deny or minimize the pain, but rather acknowledge that we are more than just the pain and recognize when it is time to move our thoughts in a different direction. If we look at the parts that function well we can put the pain into perspective that allows us to see that there is 'other than pain', that pain is not all of who you are. Being grateful for the parts that work, the parts that don't hurt, creates a good vibration and this better emotional state allows us to move forward. There may be a time when it feels like the pain is all there is and it is challenging to open to an opportunity to be more than our pain. One of my clients in California was a women whose young daughter had been killed. She told me that for the first few weeks there was no part of her that did not hurt, that did not resist and struggle, and that she eventually came to a place where she realized that she needed to surrender to the reality of her loss. That she need to let go of her resistance and simply accept what was. Then the next step became clear to her, and she began to rebuild her life. 

Pain serves a purpose: it invites news ways to look at things and new behaviors, and it confronts our fear of change, our fear of letting go. It can motivate us to be creative or it can invite resignation and despair, and we make that choice whether we do it consciously or unconsciously. The Japanese symbol for crisis is the same as the symbol for opportunity, and painful situations are usually rife with opportunities to learn and grow. Make it paramount to raise your emotional vibration, to seek new perspectives. Practice gratitude for what you can and choose where to shine the light of your attention to minimize the degree of your suffering. You shape your life by your thoughts and your choices; make it more beautiful. 

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I have come to believe that everything unfolds in perfect divine order, that everything that happens is a lesson here in Earth School, and that what actually happens to us is not as important as how we deal with it. This is quite a different philosophy than the one I used to live by, and it was severely challenged five years ago when my house was infested with ticks. 

Brown dog ticks are the only ticks that have been known to  take over a human habitat. Being a researcher, I learned more about BDTs than I wanted to know. Given the reproductive rate, it is fair to assume that I had between 2,000 and 8,000 ticks in my home. Living in my rugs, furniture, clothes, walls, and of course on my dog, they took over my consciousness and my life.  I wore only white clothes because I could hold them up to the light and see if they were already occupied.  I pulled more than 50 ticks off my dog every day. I could only sleep with the lights on, and then fitfully at best. I could not relax in my house. I realized I was in trouble when one walked over my foot while I was talking on the phone and I started to hyper-ventilate. Being petro-sensitive, I could not even consider pesticides, since all professionally used pesticides at that time were petroleum based. I  diagnosed myself with Acute Anxiety Disorder and felt hopeless, like I was being held hostage with no way out other than to abandon my home.

Obviously, I did find a solution. But that is not important to this story (unless of course, you have ticks, in which case, please contact me!)What I learned from this experience was  not to give up hope, to have faith that I would be led to a solution. And  I learned that I was brave and resourceful, that I could call out my Warrior self. In this experience, I reclaimed parts of me that I had lost. There was a time I used to call my friend Bonnie to come and take ticks off my dog because I couldn't bring myself to do it; today there are very few situations that intimidate me (and none of them involve removing creepy crawlies).  I learned that I did not have to solve all my problems by myself and it really was OK to ask for help. I learned that if you talk to enough people, someone can give you a direction and that research pays off. I learned that I could get a grip on myself even when I was stressed to the max.  I learned that my biggest problem was not my situation, but my fear. And that if I could face my fear, if I could turn to love and faith and open my mind to seeing something new, I could find my way home again. And I learned to be grateful for the challenging things that happen because they bring powerful lessons. I learned to practice gratitude no matter what: every day that I was not bitten by a tick, I was grateful for that. I lived with thousands of blood sucking parasites in a relatively small house and not once was I bitten. What a blessing that was!

In Japanese writing, the symbol for crisis is the same symbol that is used for opportunity. I've known that little tidbit for a long time, but I didn't really "get it" until the ticks taught me. Everything is an opportunity to learn about ourselves and to call back parts of ourselves that we have lost. It's all good, it's all part of the lesson plan. 

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I have one little ceramic and iron table in my house that I keep empty. I use it most every day to hold a cup of tea or to rest a book. I make sure that nothing comes to stay on this table for more than a brief period because it symbolizes open space and receptivity; it represents having room for something new in my life.

The tendency to stay overly busy, or to fill the surface of every table and counter leaves little room to receive new input. And it often reflects a repetitive "conversation for no change" thought pattern that maintains the status quo by blocking out new ideas and perceptions. Participation in disciplines such as meditation and yoga and T.A.T. open us to powerful life changes because they create quiet internal rooms of alternative experience.

The other day a friend told me that in the best restaurants an open table is kept "reserved" even when there are people waiting to be seated...... just in case someone of great importance shows up without a reservation. I like to think that my little empty table helps remind me to be mentally and emotionally available  for opportunities that come my way.

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