...Dear friends
My apologies for disappearing for a while...I was called to go out to Oregon to support a dear teacher/friend with advanced cancer. It was a tremendously hard and yet world-opening visit. I am still integrating what I've learned. One of David's life-long teachings has been to turn toward all experience rather than away from it, and he is modeling this so profoundly as he turns toward his experience with cancer.
One of the practices David gave me to come home with was to bake bread daily for 30 days. This was given to me, since he said that I "move too fast." I told this to a couple of friends after I returned home, and they laughed. In the world of the Northeast, I am not such a fast mover. But I took on the project, knowing that I have something to learn in the realm of mindfulness.
It is all about turning toward experience. When I got the assignment, two friends who were also there to support our teacher, helped set up the kitchen. They got out a Laurel's Kitchen recipe book, turned it to the right page, they lit a candle, they cleaned up the dirty dishes in the sink. But somehow, even with all this care, I sat over the book for an hour, trying to deal with an alarming level of emotional resistance.
Once this wall crumbled into not a few tissues, I started measuring and mixing. Around midnight, a couple of beautiful loaves were born.
Since coming home, I've been observing how much I try to avoid suffering. Often, I don't sit down to meditate because I know I will just cry a big bucket of tears--and why would I want to spend my time doing that? Isn't reading so much more...fulfilling? And yet, being with someone who is suffering so much on the physical level makes it obvious that tears are really a blessing. If my suffering is only tears moving through my body and out--what is there to complain about? I have my health, relative physical comfort, a loving family, a peaceful neighborhood.
And I have my bread. As I was kneading dough for a baguette last night, I could see how the Divine kneads us like that. Pressing us with the gentle heel of the hand, turning us toward ourselves, tucking our heads under in humility, pressing us again. In this way, we become soft and ready to be formed into what it is we are here for.
...
With love & a little flour under my fingernails,
Cynthia
Intuitive Coaching and Sound Healing
Extraordinary Coaching Using Extraordinary Means
www.cynthiayoder.com
mail@cynthiayoder.com
Tel. 609-799-6071
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