Yin and Yang

Feb. 2, 2015

Last Monday night Husby was sick, so I went to Tai Chi class alone. But I had company once I got there – two women and a man. After six months of progression, to go back to a Square-One class filled me with what I learned tonight is called Yin (to the extreme): disappointment; bitterness and frustration that God would give me such a gift and then yank it away – because if new people join, Sifu has to teach to the lowest common denominator, leaving nothing in-between for Husby and me; and hopelessness – again.

But the Yin only lasted 18 hours before turning to Yang (Yin and Yang discussion to follow!) At class the next day, Husby and I were the only ones to show up, so we got one-on-one time with Sifu, one more time. It was a marvelous class full of the personalized nuances I have come to crave, and so what I needed after the Plot Twist left me fearing Tai Chi would end just as I was on the verge of realizing its healing effects. And at the end of class Sifu told us he’s working with the Rec center to add a Forms class, which is the next progression of Tai Chi study after a person learns the 45 Postures. I am utterly on-my-knees grateful for that. I knew every Monday night that if someone new came, that class would have to go back to the very beginning, and I was grateful every week that it didn’t. I knew the day would inevitably come, but when it did, I wasn’t prepared for the emotions that accompanied the realization that my progress had come to a screeching halt. A simple Plot Twist can change everything in an instant; another Plot Twist can turn everything again just as quickly.

I must insert here that the two women who “tried out” the class last week didn’t return tonight, as I figured they wouldn’t; they clearly were not feeling the Chi. The man has attended Sifu’s classes at other locations, so although he doesn’t know the Postures well, he knows what they are and has done them before. So Sifu did a new Qi Gong with the three of us and took us through the Postures with a focus on Yin and Yang.

I can’t claim to speak with any authority about Yin and Yang after one class, but I do grasp that in simple terms, Yin and Yang are two opposing yet complementary aspects of everything in the universe. Yin examples are dark, negative, night, cold and wet; Yang, then, is light, positive, day, warm and dry. 

The Tai Chi symbol

The constant interchange of Yin and Yang represents balance, as depicted in a diagram called the Tai Chi symbol. We see Yin and Yang in the crests and troughs of ocean waves, in night turning to day and winter to summer. This isn’t a new concept to me; I have been taught in my faith that we can’t appreciate good without evil, health without sickness, joy without grief. While I have appreciated the principle as truth and found some comfort in recognizing the value of trials, I have never seen it as a way of achieving balance.

In Tai Chi practice, we first learned basic postures by trying to imitate the moves Sifu made. After learning the choreography of each move, we began to learn that a Posture is actually a complex sequence of weight shifts – Yin and Yang. If we try to move before the weight has shifted, we lose balance and sometimes topple over. Chinese thought holds that Tai Chi creates balance within our body through Yin and Yang movements. The Postures felt different – and resonated more, if that makes sense – with this new perspective in mind. It’s these intricate layers that make Tai Chi increasingly satisfying – and we’ve only begun to scratch the surface!  

I’m grateful for the first Plot Twist, without which I might not fully appreciate the second one, which is, in essence, God’s assertion that He knows this class is a gift to me and His mercy in not taking it away (while reminding me that He can!) It's like they were an object lesson of Yin and Yang that prefaced the class on Yin and Yang. Both of these Twists also made me appreciate even more that Sifu is a gift from God – he was healed by practicing Tai Chi and teaches with the selfless goal of helping each of his students achieve balance and healing; if that means adding a class so two students can continue to progress and heal, he'll commit some more of his time to do that.

Writing this journal helps me find and appreciate the good, or Yang, sometimes by recognizing that things could be or have been worse, the Yin. I can see God’s hand in leading me first to lunch with a friend who inspired me to look for daily blessings, then quickly to someone who told me about the Tai Chi class; recognizing blessings plays right into the Tai Chi practice of moving Yin and Yang to create balance.

According to Chinese philosophy, anxiety, frustration, anger and fatigue I feel can be balanced by bringing in more Yang. It seems so obvious, right? What’s the quickest way to end a child’s tantrum or sulking? Tickle him! But why do I not instinctively tickle myself? Sifu says it’s the Monkey Mind that so dislikes change that it stubbornly resists.

I am grateful that Tai Chi gives me a daily practice designed to slowly loosen the Monkey Mind’s grip, unblock energy flow and restore balance. And grateful that my classes will continue for a while!

Keep Writing!

Jan. 26, 2015

Quite often my journal entries end up being much longer than I thought they would be when I sat down to write. The thing about writing is that you have to think to do it. As I write about something for which I’m grateful, a certain thought process unfolds, wherein I realize the blessing is not one thing in isolation, rather it’s a component of a conversation God is trying to have with me, a revelation of His hand in my life. The blessings wouldn’t be visible if I didn’t sit down and take stock; the conversation would be inaudible if I didn’t notice one little blessing. Today’s blessing is one such example.

I talked on the phone this afternoon with a writing buddy who moved away a couple of years ago. We haven’t visited in several months, and our catching up always includes some musings about writing. She told me she’s writing her memoir, and I told her about my gratitude journal and gave her the link, with instructions to start at the first post in order to understand the reasons for my ramblings. She texted later in the day, “Dropped everything – so swept up in your blog. Keep writing!”

Our conversation came on the heels of a months-long string of Mama-said days. I got beat down during the stress of the holidays and didn’t write, in part because I didn’t have the time, and in part because when I’m using my limited energy to keep my head above churning waves, it’s hard to see things to be grateful for. After Friend’s comment today, I went back and read my first – and subsequent – posts to read through her eyes and see what might have swept her up. I’m not sure what that might have been, but for me, reading my own words threw cold water on my pity party.

My gratitude today is three-fold:

1. For the uplift of connecting with a friend
2. For the subsequent nudge to go back and read my own journal, the purpose of which I myself stated is a daily exercise of recognizing blessings and to help me remember during the times when the clouds obscure my vision that I am blessed.
3. For God’s roundabout way of giving me a hand up and out of the winter-blues-bad-mood-funk I’m in

Renewed Hope

Oct. 29, 2014

Back to Fibro doc today after four months. At my previous appointment, he seemed to be throwing up his hands - beyond testing and possible treatment for Lyme Disease and heavy metal testing/chelation, he had little else to offer me. I truly don't believe I have Lyme Disease, and I'm not willing to do antibiotic treatment even if I had Lyme; besides, Doc doesn't know of anyone in the area who treats Lyme anyway, so I see no point in testing. I'm not really on board for heavy metal testing and chelation the way Doc does it, either - I've read too much that says chelating agents don't have a strong enough bond to the metals to hold onto them all the way out of the system. The metals get pulled out of tissue, but when the bond breaks, a lot of metal ends up getting redistributed throughout the body, often in places it wasn't in before. Dentist says it's counterproductive to do chelation before all the mercury is out of my mouth, and since I don't feel good about doing chelation at this point anyway, I believe it's actually been a blessing that I haven't been able to chew without pain on the teeth that have had amalgams removed and/or crowns placed. Dentist says it can take up to a year for those teeth to calm down, which buys me some time before Doc begins pushing the chelation. I'm hoping that Tai Chi, diet and supplements together will improve my immune system enough that after the amalgams are completely gone it can handle any remaining metals without chelation therapy.

Doc began the appointment by asking me to tell him what's going on; he had a list of questions but wanted to hear from me first. I told him about starting Tai Chi in August and that it's been amazing; at the same time I began writing this gratitude journal, and hand-in-hand they have given me a new outlook. I told him why I started writing this - because of the epiphany that Freddie doesn't define me along with a personal need to write again - and related to him the positive effect: looking for blessings every day makes me aware that there really is much more to my life than Fibromyalgia, and that overall my life is very good. Not surprisingly, but still miraculous, I have felt better. He nodded knowingly. He told me at my last appointment, when I felt defeated and showed it, of a patient who just didn't respond to any treatments (one of those 10 percent, of which club I appeared to be a sad new member) and how she reported to him some time after he released her that she turned her life over to God. She accepted her condition and His will, and once she did that, she began to feel better. He urged me to do that, which I had tried many times to do. The gratitude journal - along with the meditative essence of Tai Chi - seemed to be the key to peace for me.

How grateful I am to have been led to a physician who recognizes that any medical intervention is only a complement to spirituality in promoting physical health. At every appointment, he has asked me, "Are you good with God?" or "How are you with God?" I am a spiritual person; my religion is my life. Yet somehow I could never find healing through prayer and faith alone; for whatever reason, I needed a physician to combine medical knowledge with spirituality, and perhaps now just happened to be the time for the two to come together. He told me today that he's not one to tell a patient he can fix this or that or to give false hope (yes, I saw that in my last two appointments!), but that he could tell me today he really believes I will get well. It won't be a revelation, "Hey! I'm healed!" but will be a gradual process. 

So, the technicalities of today's appointment: Doc says for me, the diagnosis "Fibromyalgia" really means mitochondrial dysfunction, as fatigue remains the primary, persistent issue. 

1. First, we need to address sleep, which was pretty good until our vacation approached and my mind raced with preparations. Then on vacation, sleeping in different beds with uncomfortable pillows, coupled with my propensity to overthink details of each day's adventures kept me half-awake every night. If I don't get back into better sleep in the next few weeks, he wants to consider a low-dose pharmacological combination to promote restorative sleep. A body cannot heal without restorative sleep!
2. He has learned even more about glutathione and methylation cycle since our last appointment, and he feels that I can triple my ALA dose to 600 mg twice a day. 
3. He ordered bloodwork to look at DHEA-S, Ferritin, and comprehensive metabolic panel to evaluate how the liver and kidney are functioning. He also wanted a specialized test for glutathione that had to be done in his office, so I did it while there today (three attempts by two nurses to find a vein ... aargh, the reason IV therapies are not a good option for me!) If glutathione is low, he will supplement, hopefully with liposomal cream, nasal spray or other non-intravenous carrier. 
4. Cortisol levels are OK - not great, but no longer at crashing level. I stopped taking cortisol about two months ago and went back on AdrenoChelate; I haven't noticed crashes, but Doc says the formula is weak and recommended Adrenal Stress-End by Integrative Therapeutics instead. 
5. No more Candida therapy! Even though Doc says this, I know too well how sugar and processed foods make me feel, so I will continue with a clean diet.
6. He gave me deep breathing exercises to do, which I did in the past, probably with Fibro Doc #1. Deep, abdominal breathing is inherent in Tai Chi, which I do at least once a day, but Doc's exercises are a good reminder. They're great because they can be done while driving (when I most need relaxation) or standing in line (the second-most common source of nervous stress) or at any time/place. I've actually had people in public places ask me if I'm OK when I start breathing deeply at the onset of stress. I'm sure I look like a head case about to pass out when I do that, but if people only knew how effective a few deep breaths is for centering and calming oneself!

And now it's time for bed, so I'll apply some progesterone cream and lavender oil, do my mind-calming Tai Chi memory exercises, and hope for pleasant dreams. I go to the retina specialist in the morning, though, so my mind will likely be anticipating that all night. For heaven's sake!

Starry, Starry Night

Oct. 15, 2014

Today I'm grateful for childhood memories of Yellowstone, homemade chili and stars. 

I remember my family's camping trips, many of them to Yellowstone, and some of my memories bubbled to the surface as we drove those roads again with Daughter, Son-In-Law and Grandson. Grandson is 5, and as five-year-olds do, he talks incessantly, usually nonsense. He pokes, squirms, laughs, then instantly turns to sulking when he doesn't get his way. That reminded me of three little girls squirming on the back seat of my dad's Oldsmobile as the miles stretched endlessly on, with my dad crossly threatening that he would pull off the road and spank me if I didn't stop giggling. He kept his word on more than one occasion, and I would cry, my bottom stinging, only to start giggling again as soon as the car was back in motion. My sisters have both independently recorded the same memory, so I'm pretty sure it really happened as I remember it. On this trip, the realization came to me that I must have been about 5 when my own annoying behavior caused some aggravation on family vacations. I never thought spankings would be a memory for which I'm grateful, but somehow, I am.

Daughter wanted a family portrait from this trip, so today, even though it was cloudy, we set up a portrait on the cabin deck and down on the river bank. Yesterday was sunny and would have been a perfect portrait day, but we had so much we wanted to see in the park that we got home too late to do a portrait.

Despite the clouds, the air was still today - until the moment we wrapped up, then the wind came up and blustered the rest of the day. I'm grateful that we got to take a family picture for Daughter. After my parents died, one of my sisters went through all of my dad's slides and made a digital selection of representative photos. I treasure more than words can express the ones of our trips to Yellowstone, many of them probably taken in the exact spots we have taken pictures the last few days. I know what this family photo will someday mean to Daughter and Grandson, and perhaps to others in the family tree who haven't yet been born. 

I also felt a sense of personal history when we drove the road around Quake Lake, as my family was in the great Yellowstone earthquake of Aug. 17, 1959. I was not quite 3 years old, and my family was in a camper when the quake hit at about 11:30 p.m.; the 7.5-magnitude quake triggered a landslide that sent 80 million tons of rock crashing down on sleeping campers at a Forest Service campsite just west of Yellowstone. About 28 people were killed, either crushed under the rock or drowned in the Madison River. I never realized until this trip how grateful I am that we were protected. The 50-year-old dead trees rising out of the depths of the six-mile-long lake are an eerie reminder of how blessed we were.

We put chili ingredients in the crock pot this morning before leaving on our day's adventure and came home to the most wonderful aroma. Even the next-door neighbor's dogs apparently knew something was cooking and were on the doorstep the minute our truck pulled up. I'm grateful for the blessing of food and for how delicious it tastes after a long day of exploring nature. After dinner we played games, and I'm grateful for the bonds that are formed when families play together.

The day ended with a gathering on the porch to look at the stars. This is the only night of our stay that the skies have been completely clear. It's been so long since I’ve seen stars like that, I was awe-struck. We saw the Milky Way stretch across the entire sky. Grandson saw for the first time the Big and Little Dipper, but the stars were so dense that Husby and S-I-L couldn’t find Orion. There we were with the expanse of endless stars like tiny holes punched in a perfectly clear blue-black sky letting heaven shine through; silhouettes of pines against that sky; the river shushing by, and night-birds calling … heaven on earth. I'm filled with gratitude for that breathtaking experience.

Surrounded by Majesty

Oct. 14, 2014

It’s pretty easy to find things for which to be grateful while on vacation – it’s vacation, after all! 

I’ve kept vacation journals before, but I’ve never recorded how I feel about what I see and experience. Doing it brings a new dimension to vacation, just as it has done to everyday life. 

I'm grateful for the wonders of nature I've seen the last few days. I've seen these same features many times, but it occurred to me, as I’m sure it does every time I visit (but I forget when I get back home), that I'm witnessing God’s majesty here. I don’t often see or feel that in man-made surroundings. 

As I looked out at the stunning vistas, with dramatic rocky cliffs towering to the sides, a clear rushing river cascading to a dramatic falls, and beyond that, miles and miles of green pine trees stretching to the blue mountains on the horizon, I felt so grateful for all this splendor! 

And today I’m grateful for 60-degree temps, which made visiting all these sights even more pleasurable than yesterday, when it was overcast a lot of the day, 38° and windy, so our hands, noses and ears stung with the cold. 

Walking through the mist from the hot pots made it even colder, and at one particular spot, the steam was so dense our hair was dripping and our eyelashes froze; our coats were covered with frost, and we looked like wet cats.  

 


We headed to Old Faithful at lunchtime and ate our little picnic on a bench near the geyser, shivering and walking around to stay warm. We were blessed with a tender mercy: the geyser went off about 15 minutes after we ate lunch, and the next eruption wasn’t for nearly two more hours! To be at the site I visited so many times as a child and to see it again now through the eyes of my grandson was ... kind of like Christmas. Things that are magical to a kid don't seem quite so magical when you grow up until you become a grandparent. I'm grateful to have felt the magic again!



We walked and hiked and got in and out of the car dozens of times, and we came home tired and happy. 

We built a fire in the fire pit on the riverbank and roasted hot dogs and completely saturated our clothes and hair with campfire smoke. I'm grateful for all the happy family-camping-vacation memories this activity conjured and to share it now with Grandson. 

 

I'm grateful to look out the window and see this for five glorious days in autumn!

I Have Been Purchased

Sunday, October 12, 2014

Sabbath in the mountains … we had no church to attend today, but if worship is communion with God, then at times, Nature is a fine chapel.

 He who created this chapel of trees, water and mountains (which received a snow-frosting last night) also walked the earth and felt all the pains I have or ever will feel. He himself surely experienced stomachaches, headaches, fevers, scrapes and bruises. We are told He knew sorrow and grief, for He too lost friends and loved ones to death and more tragically, to sin. He was reviled, tempted and betrayed. Whatever mortality has to offer in the way of trials and suffering He knew, either through His own experience or through mine, and everyone else whose soul He lived to redeem. 

He never faltered, He never lost sight of His purpose; even when He could have saved Himself from the agony that only He could endure, He continued. With His tears and His love, He purchased me. 

I often forget that and become frightened, disheartened, impatient and angry. I have become distracted by a job, a hobby or pursing a talent, all of which are gifts from God, but which have, ironically, at one time or another replaced proper worship of the Giver of those gifts.

But listening to a rebroadcast of last week’s LDS Church General Conference messages – here in this environment where my spirit feels most at home – I reflected and resolved to do better at utilizing His sacrifice for me.

I am supremely grateful for my Savior. I am grateful to be reminded today – and every Sabbath day as I take the sacrament of the Lord’s supper – of the love He has for me, for what He was willing to do for me, and that He alone knows how I really feel, and thus how to comfort me, because He felt it, too.

 Today’s smile (from yesterday): As Husby, Daughter & Family and I were saying a family prayer for safety in our travels before we embarked on our trip to the mountains together, I peeked at Grandson, who happened to be peeking at me. We both knew our eyes should be closed, and I’m afraid I wasn’t a very good example. But it made both of us giggle silently to see the other one peeking. Funny, too, he didn’t peek at anyone else, and neither did I. Kindred spirits.

Namaste

Aug. 11, 2014



YogaJournal.com has a definition of "Namaste" that I really like:

The gesture Namaste represents the belief that there is a Divine spark within each of us that is located in the heart chakra. The gesture is an acknowledgment of the soul in one by the soul in another. "Nama" means bow, "as" means I, and "te" means you. Therefore, namaste literally means "bow me you" or "I bow to you." To perform Namaste, we place the hands together at the heart chakra, close the eyes, and bow the head. It can also be done by placing the hands together in front of the third eye, bowing the head, and then bringing the hands down to the heart. We bring the hands together at the heart chakra to increase the flow of Divine love. Bowing the head and closing the eyes helps the mind surrender to the Divine in the heart. For a teacher and student, Namaste allows two individuals to come together energetically to a place of connection and timelessness, free from the bonds of ego-connection. If it is done with deep feeling in the heart and with the mind surrendered, a deep union of spirits can blossom.

~ Aadil Palkhivala

I love what Namaste means! The surrendering of ego to the Divine and connecting with another person in a practice such as yoga or Tai Chi must surely be healing.

Husby and I attended our third Tai Chi class tonight, the only two in the class. It was a superb opportunity for the Sifu to work with us individually, to do steps and postures that would benefit our specific needs - and to go over them again and again with imagery that helped us see and feel how they should be done. Having him show us how to do the horse stance and telling us how it should feel, for example, made such a difference. When I did it on my own this week, I didn't realize that it's meant to be a powerful quad strengthener that also tones the glutes, the hips, and if done regularly with other stances, it will improve the ability to walk, climb and move side-to-side.   

I had a particularly hard time getting the Brush Knee posture; my movements were spastic-looking, and if I did get it once, I couldn't repeat it. The idea is for the movement to flow in a relaxed, fluid manner but I can't even get the mechanics down to get beyond mechanical! We spent a lot of time talking about energy and how each stance, step and posture aligns the body so energy can flow properly. Sifu D explained that Tai Chi moves are very difficult for me because in fibromyalgia, the central nervous system is firing all over the place and the brain has a hard time making sense of all the stimuli. With regular Tai Chi practice, the brain will learn to take control and the manic firing will calm down - when it does, fibro symptoms will begin to disappear. 

We talked a lot about energy and how each step, stance and movement is done a certain way to achieve proper body alignment. Sifu did strength demonstrations that showed how simply moving a hand breaks alignment and makes it easy for him to push us back or over. This moving of energy is so powerful, he says, that at first we shouldn't do too much Tai Chi on a daily basis. He instructed us to do just one stance a day and not to carve out an hour a day, but to do about 20 minutes and incorporate steps, stances, acupressure points and stretches in daily activities throughout the day. 

Smile of the day:

Perhaps when we're mindful of blessings we are offered more opportunities to serve or we're in a better frame of mind to see opportunities and view them as blessings. Last Tuesday another friend asked me to help her, and today I got to help a friend whose 17-year-old daughter fell Saturday while practicing for an ice-skating competition and broke her hip. My friend was with her daughter through surgery and stayed with her all night and most of the next day. I've never known my friend to get frazzled or be less than positive and cheery, but when I called her yesterday, she started crying. She was perfectly exhausted, and I knew that figuring out what and how to feed eight people today was more than she needed to deal with and was something I could do. I'm grateful that Husby and I have the means to provide a meal for another family and that today I had the energy to do it. (The full moon is waning, thank goodness!)