Yoga, Zinnias, harder stuff

The essay below was written by the teenage neice of someone from RantWoman's Meeting. RantWoman has never thought about the spiritual aspects of yoga before. The essay showed up in the same Facebook feed with zinnias from someone else's garden.

http://cardinalyogaok.com/newsletter-july-2015/

Being the change: reflections on my brother’s suicide

My intention in telling you the story of my brother Max’s suicide is to help start a conversation—a conversation, I believe, that affects us all, as suicide is something that has likely touched all of our lives, directly or indirectly. It was too late to save my brother. I tried– even long before I found him dying. This is my story and how I believe my brother’s suicide is giving greater clarity to my life’s purpose.

I see my purpose as being a reaction to paradigms that aren’t working. I’m a self-proclaimed radical, and I see my path as needing to confront the social and cultural paradigms that cause the loss of so many individuals to self and community-inflicted violence. This paradigm can leave an individual feeling alienated from other people and from himself. Our population numbers are so large, it’s easy to become lost.

We find ourselves in a crushing pace of life with distractions like entertainment, media, and technology that desensitize us to our own needs and the needs of others. For example, we might be tired, but also feeling anxious. Instead of going to bed and processing the day, we watch another TV show. We further alienate by abandoning friendships because it’s easier to escape than do the inner work that it takes to maintain deep friendships. For men especially, the cultural pressures to hide weakness and suppress emotions, to “man up” and “be a man” disallows men to be sensitive and have their own emotional needs met. Men have differing reactions to this paradigm– some choose suicide. Our social and personal alienation has lead so many to make this choice.

This is why yoga is so vital. Yoga creates space for self- reflection by increasing the awareness of our body, and thus increasing our total awareness. The goal is to realize that we are not on an island. To be human is to be social. Any thought that is self-reflective is inextricably linked to our interactions with others. For example, if we are working on our road rage, it is our fellow humans that we need to willingly share space with. Through yoga, we examine the postural habits and physical and emotional pains that we suffer to gain awareness of our body’s subconscious messages. In order to share with others we must take care to meet our own needs so that we can be present for those around us.

To stop and make the time to move and make shapes with your body with other people is a profound way to take the risk to love yourself and others. You take the risk to love others and to be loved back. This is the intention behind Cardinal Yoga. We intend to create a community in which we can facilitate people healing themselves where someone might discover his or her own answers. People want love. They need love. And there is NOTHING wrong with that. It is NOT a character flaw to need and want love. In our space we want you to feel like it’s your space, where it is safe for you to be intimate and vulnerable, and to also be weird and different, and mostly loved.

Being true to myself has often meant going against the grain of expectations. I wish my brother had been better supported by ALL of us to go against the grain too.

My intention in starting this conversation is just that. It’s a start. It will likely take a generation or more to build a new mindset before we see meaningful change. This conversation will hopefully lead to a safety net of people that will become a catalyst group within the community. This is a social revolution. It’s a revolution of people who choose love over fear.

So, how can we be there for each other? I think we first show bravery and reflect on the ways in which we ourselves are desensitized, so that we can grow our empathy and be in communion with one another.

Think about the opportunities that you missed where you wish you would have said something. When you even knew in that moment you should be saying something, like when relatives make racist, homophobic, or misogynist statements, and you could have simply said “I feel differently about that.” You hold tremendous power to change the world just by simply standing up for people who so desperately need our solidarity. Or maybe it’s making eye contact or saying “hi” to a stranger. If we had the courage to listen to our inner voice and were brave enough to connect with another person rather than being indifferent, that choice of love over fear would not only empower us but could facilitate profound change in lives individually and communities globally.

Be the change.
Natalia

Jello ... or not?

Dear Bill C, yeah, you with the Jello ads, (Trademark symbol needed throughout)

Hells Bells Dude. RantWoman does not LIKE needing to put a trigger warning for discussion of sexual assault on this blog post, but guess what, here it is. RantWoman does not want to hear any excuses or equivocation or exclamations about things being off the record or your acute embarrassment.

RantWoman does not want to hear you lecturing Young Black Men about much of ANYTHING. RantWoman wants to hear "What happened was WRONG and I am DEEPLY SORRY."Then MAYBE you would have some cred to say"Pull your pants up and get an education and DO NOT do it the way I have!"

Dude, RantWoman does not want to speak on behalf of the women you wronged. Rantwoman is hoping that they have busy full lives and, if you admitted what is wrong, would be willing to embrace the new you, but RantWoman cannot be the one to force that.

Dude, you have a wife who clearly loves you.

You have a public, a lot of whom are just sick about the story, but who in many cases like RantWoman  would be glad to think forgiveness,

RantWoman is not a giant consumer of Jello Pudding. RantWoman these days is not even a giant consumer of commercials, but the old ones on Youtube still make her smile, except when...NEver Mind. Watch the commercial.




Okay, now the commercial is over. A clip from The View in November 2014.
Rosie O'Donell and others talk Cos on the View.

Now, here's a pretty judgmental clip of a couple people willing to call a spade a spade.




and if ya need an example or a pathway, read up on the Friend with the Remarkablestory, oh and put restorative justice into the search engine of your choice. Oh, and maybe find yourself a faith community and Get Right with God!

Thank you for reading.

Peace love and clarity,
RantWoman.

Blog as...?

RantWoman probably should post the current draft of the Appendix the committee on the Discipline has come up with about Quakers and electronic commuinication or at least the particular snipppets inflaming RantWoman's passions and inspiring individual blog entries. In this case, RantWoman's soul has been inflamed by two concepts "quakerly" and blogging as ministry, together in teh latter case with the suggestion that one needs editting and elders and ... and...

RantWoman's first problem: actual Quakers say and do all kinds of things that RantWoman does not automatically accept as Quakerly. RantWoman wishes we all did not so badly need forebearance, the grace of God/dess and spiritual kicks in the butt from time to time. RantWoman in total realism sees no reason that the electronic world is going to be any different from "meat space" in that respect and there is no way that RantWoman is going to try to hide that reality under the fig leaf that is the word "quakerly."

RantWoman's second problem: no one for instance told George Fox he should write his journal any other way than he wrote it and if they had, modern readers would miss out on all sorts of opportunities to mix up mysticism, editorial maladjustment and evidence that maybe he was just suffering from bipolar disorder, not to mention the sense of spiritual accompaniment that comes of sharing his experience in his own words.

RantWoman actually might articulate some focused thoughts about blogs meant for particular purposes. Well okay, one model, blog as Called Meeting for Worship clerked by oneself, really does not work for RantWoman. RantWoman needs here to speak for herself. RantWoman's models of blogging include blog as Quaker journal, blog as filing cabinet, and today blog as scrapbook or collector of spiritual pocket lint. RantWoman needs the last concepts in order to accommodate the following spin, which does not in fact accurately reflect RantWoman's use of her Smartphone but does reflect closely enough RantWoman swimming in the electronic interwebs that RantWoman humbly warbs her readers....

Nametag. Un-Nametag. Pinking Shears. Prayer.

Recently RantWoman, aka the Clerk of the Still Didn't Get the Memo on Email Immoderation was led to...offer to lurk on the email discussion list for the NPYM IT committee. RantWoman is now led to comment on one issue at a time among all that has swum into RantWoman's awareness as a result of this lurking.

For example, RantWoman thinks PERHAPS Committee on the Discipline now revising our Faith and Practice, the IT committee, and possible M&O and Finance and Legal might benefit from some focused simplifying conversations.  RantWoman thinks for what she has in mind it should MOSTLY be possible to post at least initial thoughts on her blog with links sent via email. This is to give the people who agreed to let Friends deluge them with emails the option of choosing to click or not click if it is not psychically or temporally convenient to read further at a given moment. But here to get started is just one example even if the simplifying is a matter of interpretation.

Query: Do we honor the Light and connections among the diversity of our communities--even when this means the technological picture includes human hands as clearly as specific other technology?

Query: do we take care that our technological tools remain tools held in care for service to the community?

Query: when something to do with technology goes awry, do we tend to the human aspect of the problem with the right mix of human concern and technical know-how?

Query: recognizing that we tend to many manifestations of the same Spirit, are we open to continually evolving Light about how the Holy Spirit flourishes in electronic media?

The nametag matter. RantWoman came upon the nametag matter mid-conversation.The IT committee discussion included a need RantWoman had not previously thought to meditate about, the possible need sometimes to render names on nametags if not in a database in Cyrillic.

Yeah, sure. RantWoman believes in something called Unicode, a topic likely of little interest except to people who tend the contents of databases. And RantWoman herself might sometimes be called to render her name in Cyrillic if for example there were visitors from Russia with Quaker connections. RantWoman honestly thinks Cyrillic nametags can be handled on a case by case basis, but in a fit of nerd selves being let out to play, RantWoman opined that well, it would also be wonderful if wecould do nametags in the hot happening new Unified English Braille, a topic probably of NO interest to anyone else in NPYM except RantWoman but tough bananas!

In terms of actual nametag practice, RantWoman offers in the image above:

(No image from an NPYM Annual Session nametag because RantWoman dutifully returns the reusable hand-written one created by a Friend whose presence is deeply appreciated even though the person who creates nametags  seldom at present appears in person. RantWoman at this point has done to hers what she tends to do to all nametags with the possibility to do so: written on the back “Please Tell Me your Name.”  Take RantWoman’s word for it.)

A nametag prepared with fabric, pinking shears, and prayer for each person to be given a nametag at the Pacific Northwest Quaker Women’s theology Conference. RantWoman would so not think to make nametags this way and thus is so touched that someone else was so led.

RantWoman’s standard reusable Nametag / Un-Nametag for purposes when RantWoman needs a nametag and either there is no temporary option available or RantWoman for some reason feels a need to remind people that she really cannot read nametags unless she is indecently close. The nametag is made from 1 colored index card, a sheet of the plastic RantWoman uses with braille to label some things, and several lengths of whichever yarn was available when RantWoman was assembling this nametag. Probably it would look more elegant and professional to make a braied lanyard or use onf of the numerous lanyards RantWoman accumulates over a year.

Nametags generated after RantWoman registered by computer for something called Accessibility Camp and something called a Digital Inclusion Summit. Both of them mention a role at RantWoman’s life focu, affectionately referred to as the Friendly Neighborhood Center for Extreme Computing. RantWoman is wondering whether the word “Manager” appears on one of the nametags because RantWoman was just picking the least inadequate option from some predescribed list.

The back of an event nametag disguising the most interesting part of the nametag, the ribbon at the bottom that says Planning Expo.

RantWoman's basic point: NPYM IT committee has PLENTY to do; perhaps it is good to understand diverse threads of the Nametag matter and NOT to overspecify may parts of the process. God and these our Friends can handle...

Discipline! Electronically?

North Pacific Yearly Meeting is revising our Faith and Practice. The Committee attempting to herd NPYM Quaker cats together into unity about the content is called the Committee on the Discipline. The Discipline. Not the Committee on Discipline, alas!

The Committee on the Discipline is attempting to find language that speaks to both faith and practice in the realm of electronic communications. RantWoman is called first to digress and noodle about and meditate about the word discipline.

RantWoman is aware that the concept of shared commitment and spiritual grounding are supposed to be topical. RantWoman means to meander about that topic further but not now.

RantWoman remembers when she first moved to Seattle and read of the annual Gay Pride march. RantWoman THINKS it was the security volunteers for the march who were  issued T-shirts that said "Obey Me!" O Baby! Discipline!

RantWoman can herd people around and direct people to bathrooms and filter out SOME psycho behavior simply from the souls who are simply lost. RantWoman can do this, single standard of Truth, in all sorts of costumes:

--a white Symphonette dress (Really!  Besides RantWOman Symphonettes from RantWoman's year include: a fashion designer, a kickboxing teacher, an AIDS doctor, and a couple other not exactly debutante titles.

--assorted T-shirts and / or armbands issued by various rally coalitions and women's music festivals.

--the numbered jackets RantWoman and team were issued for a brief get-paid to go to rock concerts security gig.

RantWoman is also an oldest child, with rampant Oldest  Child Complex. Somewhere in RantWoman's brain there is an insistent voice yammering away about how RantWoman is supposed to be Responsible for Everything! So RantWoman could get REALLY carried away about this "Obey me" thing.

May we all, though, please settle for some thoughtful discussion across multiple media, blogs, in person, hopefully in committee meetings?

In the Light

RantWoman

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