A Drop in a Vast Sea

Looking at my life, I feel, at times, inconsequential. If I wasn’t here tomorrow, if I disappeared without a trace, would anyone notice? Does my life, the life of anyone, really matter? Are we just one forgettable drop in a sea of forever? The conundrum — I can believe that I do not matter or I can recognize the many ways that my one drop impacts the other drops around me.

In our interactions with friends, coworkers, family, we are better able to recognize we impact others. It may occur as part of an evolving conversation or in our commitment to the relationship. It may be a simple word or action or something deeply profound and life changing. It is in each moment we connect in uplifting ways and when we reach out during discouraging times. Awareness is the key to our impact. 

But, our awareness washes away in the torrential downpours of life. We become inundated with people, events, and circumstances until we find our self swimming in a pool of despair. Carried away from the moment, we find our self trapped in past regrets or propelled into a worrisome potential future. We need not remain in the past or future. When we rest in our quiet mind and fully engage in the moment, we feel drops of hope and potential gently caressing us as we return to the moment.

These times of peaceful engagement seldom last for chaos seems almost a constant in these challenging time. Swept once again into the tumult, we are carried away on this mad dash. In our not so gentle landing, we might bounce once or twice before our speed slows and we are here now. Once back in the moment, our drop seeps into the parched land melting the barriers of suffering. Behind the lines of suffering, our drop, in large and small ways, effects change. We may even find our perspectives shifting. As we connect, we view our self less as inconsequential and more profound. 

One small drop in an infinite ocean of drops may seem unimportant and easily lost, but that drop may touch the earth in ways that open the floodgates for other drops to pour through. Or, maybe we are a drop falling somewhere in the middle that provides the ongoing energy to move through the current challenge. Or, perhaps, we are the last drop through the floodgate. We are the catalyst that changes everything. 

It matters not where we are, but that we are a drop in the vast sea of compassionate presence. And, our part in this community of compassion is anything but inconsequential.

Small drop, mighty impact through our connection with others.

Vanessa F. Hurst, ms, is a Mindful Coach, Compassion Consultant, Professional Speaker, and Author who interweaves her inner wisdom in all she touches. Contact Vanessa

Her books are A Constellation of Connections: Contemplative Relationships and Engaging Compassion Through Intent & Action.

More from Vanessa: www.intentandaction.com

Reconfigure Your Constellation of Connections

Last week’s blog most certainly raised the ire of one reader. Who knows what I triggered because I am most certainly not living in her reality. But, her reaction, as most reactions, became a reflection point for me. I asked myself: Why would I reconfigure a constellation of unity? And, when is reconfiguration necessary?

In my book, A Constellation Connections: Contemplative Relationships, the nature of mindful relationships is dynamic, flexible, and evolving. But, relationships are not static. We cannot expect that a relationship will remain the same over its lifespan. As each partner, together and apart, meets their challenges and learns life lessons, their core values and beliefs change.

We, like the relationship itself, are not the same as in the beginning of the connection’s formation. As we change, the boundaries of our connection stretch. Conflicts are a result of this stretching. Unless we resolve the conflicts, our evolution has the potential to create a schism in the relationship. At any time from initial fracture to schism, we have the choice to

• ignore the widening gap trusting that it resolves itself
• acknowledge the fissure and address, with compassion, what contributes to it

If we ignore the conflicts, there is a possibility that the relationship remains viable despite the fractures. Ignoring our differences creates minute cracks in an already tenuous relationship-scape. We may find our self unable to navigate the growing minefield until we or our partner steps on one of the mines triggering a relationship implosion.

When I was younger, a friend would correct my pronoun use in regard to the Sacred. I never verbalized my irritation and intentionally stopped using pronouns when referring to the Sacred around her. (I avoided conflict.) This was one small fissure, a symptom of issues that were causing in a widening relationship crack. The relationship ultimately became too fractured to continue. Maybe if one of us had acknowledged the gap and attempted to heal it, we would have a stronger, durable relationship today. Or, the severing of our relationship would have been less painful. 

Addressing the differences within the relationship with compassion — for yourself and the other — opens us to the evolution of the relationship. With compassion, we are better able to evaluate our role, our partner’s role, and the circumstances that bring the relationship to crisis. We move through the conflict using the 4non: non-attachment, non-judgment, non-defensiveness, and non-violence. Through reflection and introspection, we find a way through the crisis by allowing the relationship to shift. 

Using the 4nons, reflection, and introspection, the natural evolution of the relationship is compassion driven. One of two outcomes occur as a result of compassion: 

• the partners resolve conflicts and the relationship becomes stronger, more durable
• the partners honestly admit that their beliefs and core values are too different for the relationship to continue as is

The relationship with another is always a part of our constellation of connections although they might not have as prominent role in our constellation. Once in relationship, our connection with another continues through respect and compassion. Allowing relationships to evolve gives us the space to reconfigure our constellation. With this evolution we breathe compassion into the world. 

Vanessa

Vanessa F. Hurst, ms,  is a Mindful Coach, Compassion Consultant, Professional Speaker, and Author who interweaves her inner wisdom in all she touches. Contact Vanessa

Her books are A Constellation of Connections: Contemplative Relationships and Engaging Compassion Through Intent & Action.

More from Vanessa: www.intentandaction.com

An Ever Increasing Constellation Of Unity

I have always been an explorer when it comes  to relationships. My natural instinct is to ask questions and listen to answers in order to understand. I have always been fascinated why a person believes as they do and how those beliefs are lived in the moment. Instead of being confused and leaping from judgments to beliefs to assumptions and back, I try to the best of my ability to gain information to better understand why another believes as I do or views life in a very different way.

Last month when a program participant mentioned NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming), I flash backed to working at a retreat center where we offered programming that used this tool to improve communication skills. NLP assists in the better understanding of how personal views of realities are created. When we understand why a person believes as they do, we are given the key to connecting on increasingly deeper levels.

NLP is one of the many tools we can use to better understand our self, our conversation partner, and our interactions with one another. While I have not used NLP in years, I often assume the stance of the objective observer by practicing the 4nons (non-attachment, non-judgement, non-defensiveness, and non-violence). Through the use of the 4nons I better understand the roots of my own personal reality — judgments, assumptions, and beliefs while not superimposing them on the reality of another. I can also attend with my full body to gain clues as to the foundation of the other’s view of realty. Then, listening with intent, I gather information to respond with compassion.

The participant who was introduced to NLP was forever changed by the experience. Her relationship with her coworker improved. I had a similar experience with a coworker when I integrated what I had learned while in the objective observer stance. I stopped taking the coworker’s behavior so personally. Did she change? Does it matter? I did. And, I found that the technique we use to shift our communication style doesn’t matter as much as the intent to understand the view of another. 

What happens when we stop taking everything so personally? What happens when we recognize that the other has as much of a right as we do to live from their own reality? We live in ways that are not parallel existences but weave and twine and intersect with one another. We experience our challenges together and learn from each other. The world becomes a better place through respectful interaction. None of this means that we ever have to agree with the other or change our beliefs to accommodate theirs. It means that we consciously and intentionally listen to understand. 

We stop reacting out of anger. We don’t ignore the violence inherent in another’s reactions; we respond with compassion and nonviolence to a world that is increasingly out of sync. We use the energy of our anger to fuel our compassionate response in ways that protect the vulnerable and move us toward a world of inclusivity. And, we are compassionate witness to those who would divide. We build a tribe of compassion rebels who live in an ever increasing constellation of unity. 

There still may be threads of not understanding, but, over time, those can be resolved by listening with intent. Misunderstandings become rarer when we open our heart and listen with intent in order to respond with compassion. We remain confident in our beliefs. This confidence creates the space for another to live their reality. We create our constellation of relationships based upon our commonalities and strengthened by our willingness to respect differences. 

Vanessa

Vanessa F. Hurst is a Mindful Coach, Compassion Consultant, Professional Speaker, and Author who interweaves her inner wisdom in all she touches. Contact Vanessa

Her books are A Constellation of Connections: Contemplative Relationships and Engaging Compassion Through Intent & Action.

More from Vanessa: www.intentandaction.com

Sowers of Seeds, Sharers of Compassion

I used to believe that it was the role of every compassion filled word, every compassionate act, to trigger a resolution to suffering. That the pain the other was feeling would be greatly diminished and suffering would dissipate based upon my reaction to their suffering. That being a healer meant my words and actions would vanquish the wounds of another. I was wrong.

The deeper that I wade into the spring of compassion, the more I realize the fallacy of this belief. Instead of alleviating suffering, my actions potentially push suffering underground where it patiently waits to resurface. When least expected, the suffering bursts through the cracks of the present moment and taints the here and now. 

Unresolved suffering never leaves us.  It is a patient companion that silently walks with us until we look it in the eye, acknowledge it, befriend it. In order for suffering to be alleviated, we must bring it into the light of day and listen to its anguished voice. And, in response we gently blow compassionate awareness into its woundedness.

Compassion asks that we alleviate not enable — that we curb our inclination to offer suggestions and make quick fixes. We recognize that the first, and most important, act of compassion is to listen. Our only agenda is to hear the suffering present in the words, body language, and inflection of another. We listen to be compassion’s presence while not assuming that we know or can empathize with the other’s experience. We listen in order to understand how we can bear witness to the suffering of another.

Our compassionate essence assures us that we will not be unaffected by the plight of another. As we listen, we are mindful of how sharing experience of another impacts us. Perhaps we feel the suffering in our body or take on the emotions of another. As we listen, we discern what is the others and what emotions and thoughts are triggered in our self. We breath through those things that are not ours and release them.

Through intentional listening we find the most fertile soil in which to plant our seeds of compassion. Instead of burrowing our seeds deeply into this space, we toss them into the wind of suffering trusting that they land exactly where compassion is most needed. We are not the directors of compassion, we are assistant gardeners who share compassion with another. The master gardener who suffers tends the soil so that it bursts forth with the fruits of compassion.

Sowers of seeds, sharers of compassion we listen, form our questions, listen again, and respond in loving ways. This is how compassion calls me, calls you, calls us. And, in this listening to our self and others, we acknowledge the anguish that comes from our inability to fix. We breath through and release the arrogance that lies at the roots of our anguish.

We are mindfully aware that compassion begins as a seed in our own garden. Compassion turned inward fertilizes our garden. We use the seeds we harvest from our own garden to alleviate the suffering of another. Through self compassion, we grow into master of our own gardens who guides others in bringing forth the fruits of compassion in his/her garden.

Vanessa

Vanessa F. Hurst is a Mindful Coach, Compassion Consultant, Professional Speaker, and Author who interweaves her inner wisdom in all she touches. Contact Vanessa

Her books are A Constellation of Connections: Contemplative Relationships and Engaging Compassion Through Intent & Action.

More from Vanessa: www.intentandaction.com