Finding Your Voice & Mental Wellbeing
The following poem on finding your voice and mental wellbeing came to me recently.
I have shared living space these past few years with my young adult, and very precious, son. He is recovering from being cramped and lost in the clutter of his mind and the clinical diagnosis is schizophrenia.
He realized he was crumbling under the weight of life’s gunk and clutter. He was at a loss for words even as he was in the experience.
We have traveled a few roads together in search of recovery and been blessed with wise teachers, and his own brilliance and determination, to find his way out of this isolating and debilitating disease.
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I come from possibility! There is never missed opportunity!
Have you ever fallen into the deep inner recesses of your mind?
If you did, you would discover how cavernous, spacious and open it really is.
If you are aware, as you fall into the inner recesses of your mind,
You would not only know how spacious it is…you would also see the clutter.
You may already have fallen into the recesses of your mind and never found the spaciousness;
You may just be lost in the clutter—clutter banging up against clutter—feeling panic and not knowing why.
Have you ever wanted freedom and not known how to find it? Or, peace and had no clue where to look?
Do you sometimes run around in circles? Feel your heart squeezed? Not feel your heart at all?
In that junk and clutter you are bumping up against,
You are not free to feel the freedom that lives within the spaciousness.
You are trapped and you may not know it, like an animal in clamps,
And your body begins to panic as the fear begins to rise,
And you look outside yourself hoping someone can pull you from the clutter.
You don’t know that you are the only one that has the key,
To finding that spaciousness and freedom that lives inside of you and lives inside of me.
The culture that defends itself and tells you right from wrong,
It has no sense of the role it plays in the clutter that we all carry in our mind.
That culture that you reach out to for solutions; it’s response is typically—“Fall in Line!”
Your eyes may show a pleading that you don’t even know you hold,
Your cultures response is—“You will feel better if you just get in line and do what you are told.”
And you know that is not the answer, because this line you are in feels cramped.
And you know that is not the answer, and you know that you are not allowed to say;
“That there is no freedom here to find your particular, unique and brilliant consciousness.”
That can only be discovered in the freedom to explore the inner workings of your mind.
We are taught to march for freedom;
We are taught that freedom is what keeps us alive.
Even so, when we are pleading for our freedom from the trapped-ness and the clutter
The culture’s only answer is to ‘fall in line.’
We fall in line again into our trapped-ness.
Hoping beyond hope that this time the line will provide the answer.
All the while blind, that answer lies in facing the very fear we are taught to silently hide!
And, so, the saga continues.
The hope does lie within each of us; and the answers is really clear.
We need to turn to the one behind us and together face our fear.
And in locking eyes and sharing in the mutual embrace,
There is access to the freedom and a SHARED willingness to face.
And, then, the hope arises and allows a capacity to see,
The spaciousness in you as you see the spaciousness in me.
This can break this bondage that we don’t always know we feel.
The answer is so simple, too easy to reveal.
And, yet, to look into another and be open to be seen,
Can take all your willingness and courage for fear of what will be.
If you have the courage to turn and break the line,
And come for just a moment into this heart of mine;
There is a love that shows itself that melts away the shame.
It is hiding in the clutter where you may be too trapped in fear to claim.
But, if for a moment you have courage to look into the eyes you see,
You can free yourselves from bondage and break the line of trapped-ness that lives inside of you and me.
To stand in line, to only look forward, into the back of the head of someone you cannot see,
This keeps you trapped in shame and fear and unavailable for any curiosity!
To turn around and look into the eyes of that someone that you find,
To stand tall within your being, no longer willing to be blind;
This clips the bindings that squeeze your heart in a way you cannot see
Except for the dramatic way that it piques your curiosity!
In this practice of seeing and being seen, and sharing the spaciousness we all share,
It opens up the courage and the willingness to bare the pain.
That allow the tears to cry to melt away the fear.
This grants the freedom that abides and is waiting to be known,
And opens up the way to see your own particularity in this vast unknown.
Relief at last and freedom to explore unlimited possibility!
Through humility and truth there is a new way to reveal,
A reality that is hiding in plain sight while you are standing in the line,
Wanting someone else to help you with your fear.
While all the while the answer and the key can be found by simply turning,
And looking into another’s eyes and share curiously, this new opportunity,
To see beyond the gunk and clutter!
To truly see the spaciousness that exists,
That is embedded with a love that is waiting and persists
This is the 2nd coming!!!
Finding love and freedom from within,
That can only be found in the sharing.
So, please, break the line of bondage by facing one another in a curious embrace
And be willing to see and be seen with an open face!
Go forth, and find your freedom, your particular voice, your Beloved Self!
