Heeding inner promptings is like accessing a real-time manual for life inside yourself – if, if, if and when you can remember to turn to it. ‘Worry’, on the other hand, is a great stymie machine and is highly effective at blocking our remembrance of the inner promptings.
I am happy to say the Inner Anchor visualisation is continuing to make me feel more solid, weighted, strong, assertive, anchored in this world. I love it! It has helped me a lot in these last few days when I have been undertaking the toughest casework of my life so far. To go in to a room of disputing, distressed and litigious solicitors, barristers, clinicians, patients and advocates – and be the only one in the room confident we can find settlement requires inner anchoredness – and outright prayers to be a channel for that Mercy, and for Peace, Unity, Love and Light to be ‘PULLed’ in. And, praise be to all that is out there supporting the wellbeing of souls, the case yesterday did settle.
I am ever astonished, humbled and awed by the efficacy of mediation as a tool and a process in seemingly intractable disputes. Thank you, Divine Source of my Being, for the opportunities to be a part of this peace-giving work. I am so grateful and appreciative to have found this path. I am nourished and nurtured by all I learn in this profession.
Heavens! I have a profession! High-five, Team Spirit!
High five, indeed! High ten, twenty, one hundred! We watched, in awe.
Really? Is that just me bigging-up me??
We watched in awe at the focus you applied.
I was focussed.
You held, firmly and with conviction, a vision of resolution. That was your gift to the parties yesterday. It was an immovable focus which created space for people to manoeuvre out of their positions. You were like the traffic lights holding the traffic back while two enormous trucks reversed gingerly out of a tiny cul-de-sac. Well done.
Thank you. I appreciate that. I know, thanks to my blessed autism, I have the ability to hyperfocus. It’s not always easy to direct my hyperfocus. I am really glad I’ve found an excellent good use for this capacity. May I grow in skill, in impartiality, in compassion for all, in tenderness, in gravitas, in confidence, in courage, in ability to self-care while working hard, in emotional range.
Let’s read today’s chapter.
-28- Develop the strength of a man, but live as gently as a woman. Become a brook and receive all things under heaven. If you are such a brook then Virtue will constantly flow into you and you will become a simple child again. Know the pure but live the life of the sullied. Become a fountain to all things under heaven. If you become such a fountain then you will have abundant Virtue and you will return to the state of the Uncarved Block. When the Uncarved Block is cut up into pieces, it is turned into specialised instruments. But the True Person makes use of it whole and becomes the master of the instruments. Hence, it is said, “The finest carver cuts little.” (Tao Te Ching chap 28)
I’m going to pick out words related to a repeated concept of Lao Tzu’s, that of the ‘uncarved block’: ‘you will return to the state of the Uncarved Block‘. I’m reading that for myself as:
- super simple
- fancy-free
- unadorned
You know what, as I get more developed in my profession, I can see a path towards reducing my fancy-pants jazz-handery, and becoming ever more simplified. Really, the less I did in the case yesterday, the better. It was about tiny, really well-placed and carefully-judged nudges – largely in the form of questions that gently challenged entrenched thinking and stimulated new ideas of framing the troubled circumstances.
What does a person need to do this work? Nothing really. A computer and phone. Then the energy to put in the preparation, and be there, in an internally anchored state.
To be Present and Internally Anchored, I do well to sustain my MEDSAN routine. That really is a key part of my ability to do the Work well. It’s not a ‘nice-to-have’. It’s essential. I can not pitch up to do this work in a fizz. It’s not fair on the people involved. My role is to turn up as a heavy anchor, as an uncarved block which does not opine, but holds back the traffic… Mixing my metaphors now. Your advice today?
You love alliteration, and so do we. Super Simple sums it up. This is a game: How Super Simple can you make each decision, action, space?
What is Super Simple to you?
I guess Super Simple, in the style of the Uncarved Block, is non-fancy, unadorned, true. Like an arrow’s flight might be true (accurate or un-erring). Let me meditate on Super Simple. So help me, my Super Simple Soul. #TeamSpirit!
***15min Med***
Arising: a) tears of grief b) ‘boundaried’
Super Simple: unadorned, fancy-free, true = easier for a person who is Well Boundaried.
The Uncarved Block has held her boundaries well, that’s for sure. The carpenter’s knife has not come near her.
So, play the Super Simple game thus:
- Develop the Inner Anchor (gold) and let it’s glow permeate out around you to create a good, healthy boundary.
- Go through your day and actions holding the #Focus of looking for snapshots of Super Simple satisfaction. The Super Simple is very satisfying – it speaks to the heart, you see. Eg. the ‘mown lawn’ creates a powerful Snapshot of Super Simple Satisfaction for the mower, because it is pleasing to the heart.
In the work of #ReachPeaceTeachPeace, this is prime #ReachPeace, isn’t it?
Indeed. Which of course also makes it prime #TeachPeace.
Yes! Ok, so today, this Uncarved Block is going to count her Snapshots of Super Simple Satisfaction by playing the Super Simple game.
Send photos!
Ok. Then I will.
I am playing the Super Simple game
*****
Later
Here are some snapshots:
