les portes de Portugal

I've been drawn to the doors that separate me from the inner places here in this country.

Sometimes I wonder if any two doors are the same. Sometimes I wonder who or what moves within. I feel inclined, at times, to knock.

Other times, I'm content to wonder, to wander,

to let the hidden places hold their mystery,

to let the door speak, to listen.

Psychotherapy holds the same dynamic for me.

Inside are doors, endless doors, unique thresholds to the Mystery. Time and again I find myself wanting to throw open the passageways - reveal, see, identify, assess, understand, know.

Absurd. Sad.

Science (including Psychology) is the 4 year old constantly asking "why?" Unlike the child, Science has lost touch with its origins in innocence and magic. These qualities have been pressed to the outside, to the fray, to the margins. Science has become a machine, maybe unstoppable in its drive to.... to what? Reveal? Control? Harness? Manipulate?

This week we worked with some techniques in Polarity Therapy (http://www.polaritytherapy.org/). As students, we also participated in a day of Breathwork - a practice as old as time in using the basic element of breathing to deepen experience and invite the Mystery within to move. Not sure how much of my own mystery I want to reveal in this medium but 'moving' captures my experience beautifully. I made contact with other times in this human life and with a primal energy that connects all life forms. I connected into a force of sound and feeling that felt as ancient as the sky.

I move all the time to try and understand myself and others better. It's a practical endeavor as a therapist, a very human habit. All the same, the more I open and see, the clearer it is to me that while patterns exist, Mystery reigns. I'm loosely aware of the devastation that has taken place in Japan in the past few days, prior to that in New Zealand (and countless other places, I'm sure). Certainly there are those who will be grappling with Science to trace the etiology of the Earth's movements. Others who will migrate more towards Religion in hopes of feeling some ground on which to stand in the wake of the death and destruction. It's what we do. We feel moved and we want something to hold onto. We see a door and we want to open it.

The trick is that what I see is coloured by my perspective; the inner sanctum seen through the filter of my inner space. And when I close the door, what lies behind it continues to move, with patterns, with mystery - already altered by the very act of being 'seen.'

And so I've answered my own wondering. No two doors in Portugal are alike.

me, happy

Figured it might be good to add a picture of myself just to let mama (and dad) know that all is well and good. This is from the very delightful weekend in Tivara. 10 miles of beach, 3 people. No wonder I'm happy.

Hello family. Hello all.
love, Mart in Portugal

... and the bowl ran away with the spoon

This week I left a bowl and a spoon, both still dirty, in the sink. And then I took a breath, exhaled, and walked away. This might sound like a moment of mediocrity but, for me, it was a mighty and monumental step towards emancipation.

I grew up with some very clear and somewhat uncompromising preferences around tidyness and the management of personal space. I grew up with a sense of timeliness,

being responsible, holding myself in the world with a reverence for right and wrong. My parents instilled in me how important it was to be considerate of others, their needs, their expectations and also to try to offer something positive to the world. I wouldn't change a thing about the way I grew up. And I'm not going to stop growing.

Living with 4 other people I'm learning that the line between right and wrong is an illusion. I'm learning that there are preferences, habits, attitudes, and values. I'm learning that there are outcomes and consequences for every choice but that there is no governing body of righteous action and that the most powerful policing force lives within me.

The most powerful peace-making force also lives within me.

Watching dishes accrue each day. Watching debris build up on the kitchen floor. Watching mold grow on the ceiling and walls. Watching dirty and clean (but damp) laundry collect on the furniture. Coming home from class at 8pm to find that the sliders onto the patio have been left ajar all day. Emerging from my room at 6am to see that the main door to the house has been left open all night. Noticing that the shower no longer drains because of sand building up in the pipes. This is my classroom. This is my current training ground into becoming more fully human. Mom and Dad prepared the soil but no amount of cement, staking, fencing, or externally imposed laws will hold back the upheaval from below. My housemates will not be tamed or trained. They insist in being themselves! I can kill myself (or them?) or I can pay attention to the gifts of this grand gesture from the Universe.

What is REALLY wrong with dirty dishes and disarray? What is REALLY wrong with having a stranger enter our house and take our personal belongings? What is REALLY wrong with the plumbing overflowing? Nothing.

I tried for awhile to stay on top of the mess in my own way - 5am would find me not-so-quietly doing dishes and wiping counters while water boiled for my tea (this, of course, brought me up against my upbringing in a very binding way - how could I be quiet and considerate of another's wish to sleep while simultaneously bringing 'order' to the land?). Then I noticed that my attempt to model 'right' behavior was falling on blind eyes. No one even recognized my service to the greater good. They just kept making dishes and leaving mess in their wake.

The choice... hold tightly onto my own values of right and wrong and suffer. Or let go of this 'battle' so that I might be happy.

I tell a tale of being a teenager and moving into a new home. I remember clearly that my parents gave me a choice in how I wanted my room to be painted: "What colour of white do you want?" At the time, it seemed like a very practical way to decorate. Now when I move into a new home I see it as an opportunity to reveal the depths of my

complexity - my passion for colour, my attraction to both subtlety and intensity.

I'm not sure whom or what I would meet if I migrated a little away from "should" and ventured into possibility - no right, no wrong. It could be chaos. It might be crippling to my life management and success (though, at this point, maybe not so noticeable!)

It might be an adventure. And every adventure begins with one step. My step was a dirty bowl and a dirty spoon.

people...

There's a story that goes with these images. Between my apartment in the ghetto and my local haunt (Lazuli Bar) where I regularly utilize internet services while enjoying morning coffee (served by Sebastian) and after-class beer (served by Miguel), there's a corner of the beach which is territory for the creative power of the human spirit.

There's a man, his name is maybe either Lupi or Lukey (he gave up trying to get me to understand him after repeating himself 4 times - it was a rough morning for him). He spends each day inviting art to this part of the beach, this corner of the planet. He builds sand sculptures, very pleasing to my eyes because they are both playful and skillful, allowing me to remember what it was like to be a child and feel awe for the whimsical and magical, the world as it was before I grew into seriousness. Dragons, gnomes, castles, alligators, and other creatures rise up from the world they inhabit below. They come to the surface to see what's real here, what we humans believe in.

This morning I enjoyed a beautiful run along the high cliffs. I came down to the beach and watched the surfers begin to gather in the growing surf. Something has shifted here in Praia da Luz. The weather has turned ever so slightly. The British retirees who live here much of the year have been joined by young men, travelling in vans and beat up Land Rovers, coming in search of waves. A nice shift, I gotta admit.

As I was walking from the sand to the stone 'boardwalk' I passed by the sand artist standing, staring at his corner of creation. His sculptures had been toppled sometime during the night. My breath caught in my throat. I hadn't spoken with him yet other than to say "bon dia" - a morning greeting. I looked at his eyes, his crestfallen shoulders. I said, "What happened?" I wasn't going for intelligence in my question, I was going for contact with this man - arriving back to his life to see that it had been altered, dramatically, sadly.

We exchanged a few words with our limited shared vocabulary. He knew the word "stupidity" and I knew the words "I'm so sorry." I asked him if I could take his photo. He agreed. Fortunately for me, earlier in the week, I took a couple of pictures of this corner of creation as the sun rising in the east, caressing the shoulders of the magical beings while the world was waking up.

Side jump... without getting into the confusing and gnarly details, I've managed to trigger (annoy, anger, frustrate, piss off) one of my housemates in the last couple of days. I'm not at all clear what to do about the situation because I've approached her a few times with an olive branch and she seems uninterested in making peace or getting to the heart of the issue together. This has made life in class and at home a little tense for me. She and my other female housemate are very tight and so I'm feeling a little ex-communicated (I'm actually feeling a flashback to middle school but that's another story!). I've been doing much soul searching and feeling into my own heart. A sense of helplessness rises up because I don't like living in tension; I very much like the experience of stepping into the proverbial 'fire' with someone and coming out the other side together, more deeply seen and known.

It is/was very tempting to make an 'other' out of my classmate - make her an adversary because of the discomfort and helplessness that I am feeling. Lord knows, sometimes there's nothing I want more in the world than an 'enemy' so that I can reinvigorate my sense of being a separate self who needs to be constantly vigilant and ready to rumble to protect my personal territory (aka "ego"). But meeting the sand artist this morning helped me to look at this with a broader vision.

I have a little spot of sand. Every day is fresh. Every day is new. What happens on this territory is not determined by the wind, the high tide line, or the drunken or bored or angry visitors who come during the night. What happens on this creative territory is a reflection of the openness of my heart and my willingness to accept all that passes my way, greet it with curiosity and compassion rather than make it personal - it's not personal, it's Life.

Today, Lupi/Lukey has a long day in the sun and breeze re-creating life as he feels it in his hands. I, myself, have a late start and will head to a massage practice session this afternoon. This will give me, too, an opportunity to create a part of the world by using my hands - inviting the magic and mystery out from below the surface.

I'm learning that feeling into life from fullness requires that my mind and heart be open and that my hands are ready to build and receive rather than heavy with weaponry.

pictures of Portugal

Getting closer to sorting out the technology to bridge my visual experience of Luz, Portugal with the internet world. Above are images of Laressa, the local colours, the splendour of the rock cliffs, the immensity of the ocean, and the
breathtaking way that light and colour melt into life in this part of the planet - fluid, constantly shifting, defying words, defying capture of any kind. My love and gratitude to Jesse, a classmate and housemate who astounds me daily with his generosity and kindness of soul and allows me to stay connected to the world via his MacBook.

sinking in

I see that my exploration and education into the world of bodywork is ripe for metaphors. As this third week of training comes to a close, I realize that I've sunk in and I'm landing.

Earlier in the week we learned about fascia, the fibres which enfold the muscles, assist in movement. As you rest light hands on the surface of skin above a muscle, let gravity do its thing and breathe, you might feel your fingers sink below the layers of skin and rest on the thin layer of fascia that covers a muscle. If you quiet yourself, continue to breathe, let go of your preconceptions, your knowledge of anatomy, you will be invited into the body, you will embark on an exploration, a dance between your touch and the world below.

I have been surprised by the level of inner dis-ease with which I have reconnected over the first few weeks of this program. Being out of my comfort zone I have rallied my old familiar ways - pushing back, resisting, and struggle. I have vacillated between doubting, fearing, withdrawing and enduring, efforting, breathing into low-level letting go. I appreciate those of you who have encouraged me to relax, lighten up, enjoy the experience. Sadly, when I imagine or experience an external 'threat' not a lot of my historical survival instincts have revolved around relaxation and surrender. And so this quality of release seemed elusive if not impossible (I can actually engage the absurdity of efforting to relax).

A mainstay of my challenge of working with massage is that my hands em-body my efforting and rather than being soft and receptive, they are strong and hard, muscling my way through a massage in hopes of getting it 'right.' Again, the feedback from fellow participants and trainers has been to relax my hands, soften my touch and bring my strength up from the ground and through my legs, hips, pelvis, and torso. The training is touching fascia was a doorway into softening. It's amazing that as I touch without attachment, agenda, effort, and the noise of my so-called knowledge, as I allow gravity and quiet to reign, my hands travel the terrain of muscle, get invited into an exploration. No weapon-wielding soldiers are permitted access. Only an energy that embodies curiosity, quiet, playfulness, and openness is invited in to dance, to move and be moved.

Side travel -- This week I dreamed that a black bear attacked me as I was running through the woods with Ben (who was a small puppy). He charged out from the bushes to my right and took me by surprise, picking little Ben up with his mouth and running away. I realized I had two textbooks in my right hand and I threw them at him, hitting him in his rump and causing him to drop Ben who ran back to me. In another instant, the bear returned and, feeling overwhelmed by the pain and fear of the predicament, I 'woke myself up' deeply affected.

The next night as I fell into the dreamful sleep, low and behold, the bear re-emerged from hiding and charged me again. This time his fur had changed from black to brown but his ferocity remained. This time I was in an old, white Chevy pickup truck and I managed to evade injury and attack. I don't recall what happened after that but I knew that something was coming, that my psyche was stirring.

Yesterday was a practice day in the training program. This means we have a partner and we exchange massages, the full body sequence taking about an hour and a half each. Laressa was my partner and into her fascia, into her skin, exploring the terrain of her body's energy, her muscles, her joints, and bones I fell. I fell through playfulness and I fell through pleasure and curiosity and a quality of innocence grounded in not knowing but being willing to learn. And I landed. The experience of giving this massage was better than most of the massages I have received thus far in my life.

By the closing sequence of the massage my body was 'humming.' I realized I had finally arrived here in Portugal, in this training program, in the dance of communal living. My body is waking up in a profound way through the process of being receptive. 'Feeling into the fascia' is a gentle doorway not only into my client but into myself as a partner in the massage - a metaphor I can perhaps carry into other ways of sinking into life and landing.

the foreign and the familiar

Where do I start today?

It's a little after 9am on Sunday morning. I just 'hoovered' my first cup of coffee (espresso with milk) in 2 weeks, one of the most delicious experiences I've had for awhile. It was a necessary step to sitting at this cafe and working away at a computer; good to purchase something when accessing otherwise free internet services. The sea is to my right. I sit by the window of the cafe so that I can plug my housemate's MacBook into the wall. I can hear the occasional seagull, the low rhythm of the waves, behind the staccato of the locals around me waking up with their own liquid caffeine (and nicotine). I wonder how many espressos I can afford (physiologically and financially) as I enjoy a light breeze through the window and the space to type something genuine, something true.

Breathe. I drop into myself, bring some awareness to my ever changing system of thoughts, feelings, impulses, and sensations. My morning writings (pen and paper) have been a torrent of words, encompassing angst, struggle, peace, quiet, and lightness. This morning I wrestled with the juxtaposition between life as both familiar and foreign. Perhaps at any given moment during a human experience there is a tango, a pull towards keeping things familiar and a simultaneous inclination to exploring the unknown. I feel this tension, this dance in my body.

When I put my body down in bed at the end of each day, there remains a low hum of vigilance, a part of me is unwilling to sleep because it remains attuned to the environment around me. Only through waking meditation do I consciously invite myself to sink in, to rest, to feel into the space below the surface. As I sink deeper, I find the location in the universe that is unchanging, unchangeable. Regardless of place, regardless of events, activities, surroundings, language, physical being, emotions, or thoughts, this place is constant. And yet, even in its constancy it's constantly moving - not the quality of moving each of us knows living on the surface of life but moving that is pulsing with colour and life, pure breath.

Unfortunately, I don't choose to anchor myself this way very often. I am highly susceptible to slipping into the more surface currents of the water and getting tossed around like debris. I get to a place of exhaustion and complete disorientation and then I react with a need to control - a kind of false grounding built on the illusion of individual will. And then I become more disconnected from my body, more depleted, until I collapse. At the end of my rope, there's nothing left to do but drop. With grace through exhaustion, I find myself with nothing left to do but, once again, find solace through surrender, through finding the quality of peace which is not dependent on circumstances but which finds its source in the ground of being.

And so it goes. Over the last two weeks, I've repeated this cycle many times. Sadly, most mornings I find myself trying to 'redo.' I forget how futile it is to muscle my way into the world through better management of the surface waves (schedule, expectations, physical space, circumstances, individual energy level) and I return to my familiar habits - the way most of us get through. After two weeks of this cycling, my mind recognizes the futility but my body still knows the dance so well, so mindlessly. Funny how 'familiar' then reveals itself as a cage, a system of movements I can't seem to easily alter and 'foreign' emerges as the quality of my human existence that has always been with me and has never wavered in its invitation to 'return.'

So, how am I? I'm tired. Exhausted really. Not the type of exhaustion which comes from too much activity or exercise. Different. There is a fairytale called "The Red Shoes." In it, a young girl is given a pair of beautiful red shoes and she is so enraptured with their shinyness and shimmer and she puts them on her feet. She begins to dance, and dance, and dance, and she can't stop dancing. Her feet are moving on their own power and she can neither stop nor get them off her feet. Ultimately, she meets a woodsmen who uses his axe to chop off her feet. The story goes on with continued insights and wisdoms. The meanings are woven into the archetypes. I am the girl, the shoes, the woodsmen, and the axe.

I know that the dancing I am doing right now is a necessary and vital part of my growth. I know that in this dancing I am meeting new ways that I move, I feel more than see how this way of moving in the world has always been in me. The difference is that due to my current circumstances, the dancing is gruelling and my patterning is louder, revealing my habits as unsustainable. I can't find more energy to fuel the dance. I must find my own way to chop off the shiny red shoes.

My salvation, I think, lies in finding a way to sink to the bottom of the sea, finding a way to the timeless and spaceless space, the spot on the ocean floor which is directionless and eternal.

Ironic that I have finished my second cup of coffee and am considering a third. Funny how we have created rituals in our busy lives to help us maintain a good 'on', other rituals which assist us to turn 'off.'

I'm not sure I would have been so aware of this patterning had I not spent the last year or so of my life living a life of great solitude in a moldy, cold cottage in the woods of northern New England. And so, as I sit here in this beautiful land, beside the constant rhythm of the ocean, and under the rays of the unchangeable sun, I am deeply grateful for the ways that life is guiding me and teaching me always, inviting me to wake up and drop in.

My gratitude goes out also to those of you who have reached out to me in various ways in the last two weeks - your words and presence in my life have been tethers, connecting me to another (maybe the same) abiding source of unconditional energy, Love.

That's it for now. A third cup of espresso would definitely disconnect me from any kind of authentic ground.