Take charge. Stay calm.
1. Come into the present moment. When you panic, your thoughts break time barriers. You imagine, “This will go on forever.” Or, “Nothing will ever change.” Take as much time as is needed to move your awareness around your body, noting where you are in time and space at this very moment. Breathe slowly into the moment. I know it sounds silly. That’s good. Silly is better than panic. “Breathing slowly as I stand in the airport…I calm my body.” Or, “Breathing in through the soles of my feet, I feel more grounded.” You will actually feel some of that anxiety leave you and a greater sense of control and calm return. I promise.
2. Ask yourself: “What’s needed right now?” Or, “What would help right now?” When your primitive mind says, “Nothing”, persist. Keep asking: “What memory, what plan, what breathing, what comfort would help right now?” In very bad moments, write down the question and your answer. Keep writing until you have some clarity and less confusion and helplessness. It will also help just to remember that, “This too will pass.” At times when you can’t write, say your helpful phrase over and over like a mantra. This literally soothes. When stuck, imagine what you would say to the person you love best. Say that to your own self.
read moreWriting (and reading) your life
There’ve been lots of questions in the twitter and Facebook spheres in recent weeks about why writers write. My own shortest answer would be: to know more. For me, there’s no better way to understand humankind as well as ideas in greater depth – and to use the gifts of mind and spirit that are our species’ greatest blessing. I read for joy, distraction, insight, pleasure, knowledge. I read because I am an idealist. Because I am incurably (I hope) curious. In fact, because I am increasingly curious as I age. Because books have been my most faithful companions since I was a tiny child. Because they speak to me, as Rainer Maria Rilke would say, of the “deepest things”. Reading creates meaning for me. And, in the presence of words, I sometimes laugh out loud. Or cry over lives that otherwise would never be part of mine. An introvert, I am never “alone” when I have something to read. Never bored. Rarely restless. And I write for similar reasons.
Writing takes me much deeper than reading alone can. It’s harder, tougher, not always fun. It can be intensely sobering. Blank pages can be like blank walls. Horrible to hit and hard to scale. Yet writing’s rewards – when they come – are greater than reading’s. It’s the move from reception to action.
read moreA universal message of love?
Is it true, asks Sufi poet Hafiz, that it is our destiny to turn into light itself? In this talk, filmed at Pitt Street Uniting Church on 18 December 2011, Dr Stephanie Dowrick talks at depth about the “unconditional welcome of love”so tragically often missed or forgotten in conventional religious thinking. Supporting this, she offers – as an interfaith teacher and minister – a quite radical view on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth.
Stephanie says, “From the sources we have, including the Gospels loved by Christians, we see that Jesus’s mission was not about setting up a new religion: it was about opening us to the power of love that is our unconditional inheritance. This is the thinking of a revolutionary. And the message it inherently offers helps us turn around our usual divisive, judgemental ways of thinking that tell us we are right to keep some people safe but not others. Or that some people are special but most are not. Or that some lives are worth living but others can be squandered. It is also a message that defies our usual feelings of insufficiency: that we will get around to living more lovingly…but not quite yet! That others might be up to this…but not me!”
In the 2nd of these two videos (which completes the talk), Stephanie warns against easy self-righteousness or contempt for those holding traditionally divisive views. “It is very easy, in preparing a talk like this in 2011, with a 21-st century consciousness and especially with the love and gratitude I have for other faith traditions, to bemoan the terrible chasm between the inclusive welcome of love offered by Jesus of Nazareth and the horrors of exclusivism that have characterised so much of the history of Christianity. I do bemoan this.”
read moreRetreats with Stephanie Dowrick 2012
Australia? New Zealand? Japan? You can join us from anywhere in the world! Early in the New Year, I will post a more complete list of retreats and workshops that I will be leading in 2012. Meanwhile you could choose to give yourself – or someone else – the priceless gift of peace of mind and inner renewal and purpose that comes with a spiritual retreat. Or the excitement of creativity and freshness of “view” and experience that comes with a writing retreat. Please book with the organisers as soon as possible. All have strictly limited accommodation and numbers.
Peace & Purpose Interfaith Retreat, NSW, Australia 10-12 February 2012
read moreFeatured book
Everyday Kindness
Publication December 2011
Stephanie Dowrick’s new book, Everyday Kindness: Short cuts to a happier and more confident life, offers short, wise and often entertaining chapters on parenting, food, moods, self-confidence, personal power, relationships and work. Add kindness to the mix – or greater care, appreciation, good humour, respect – and life itself takes a welcome turn for the better.
twitter
facebook