Blast O' Joy

Meditation

Recently I heard from a reader that she'd like more practical, hands-on ideas about moving your dream forward in The Joy Letter. I'm all for that ... so let's talk about meditating, which is one of the key tools for connecting with the work of your dreams. Or better yet, let's talk about finding that secret place where you feel God's presence in your life. For me, that's what meditation is all about, and there is no one way to achieve it.

My problem with standard seated meditation has always been that I wasn't sure I was doing it right. I'd heard you should inhale to the count of four and exhale to the count of six or eight. Which I did for a while, and it did seem to focus my mind. Yet, once I'd calmed down and gotten into some sort of alpha state, my mind was hardly empty. I was going through yesterday's grocery list by the time my meditation was officially over. I would open my eyes feeling vaguely guilty, and not really sure the meditation had "worked". Another option I tried was staring at a mandala, a design, or a candle flame, which was a complete failure. I didn't like the idea of staring at anything; it gave me a headache.

Through trial and error, I eventually came up with my own sort of mongrel meditation which I've found to be highly effective -- one it turns out that pray-ers have used for thousands of years. I simply close my eyes, take a few breaths to relax, and say hello to God. There is almost always a warm, secure, taken-care-of feeling that takes over, a sense that God is there, waiting, wanting to help. I thank God for various blessings in my life, and I ask for information and ideas, and help on challenges. Then I do my best to stay open to whatever divine thoughts or images may roll along. Above all, I let my intruding thoughts come and go, with the understanding that they will never leave altogether -- that I can simply include them, and move on.

It took some years to realize that a process this simple was indeed 'doing it right'. I was sure everyone else's technique was better than mine. And yet, when I finally gave up and trusted my method, I truly felt that nod from God. After all, God does want to speak to us ... He or She is always patiently waiting for us. The question is, can we muster up the courage to tune in?

Let me also add that guided meditations on tape can be a terrific solution, especially if you're new to meditation. You can just sit back, turn on the tape, relax and let someone else take care of you for a while. Tapes can be wonderfully specific, too, guiding you to work on specific issues. For many years, I happily climbed into Shakti Gawain's pink bubble on her "Creative Visualizations" tape whenever I wanted to help prod my goals along. I put together my own tape for going into your creative space, and asking for help on your dream.

The important thing, of course, is not how you meditate but that you do meditate. This is your pipeline to your dream, the work that will bring you further along your path. And the more often you do it, the more clear and fertile that channel will become. Just pick a regular time of day to meditate and stick to it -- first thing in the morning, right before you go to sleep, just after you get home from work, even behind closed doors on your lunch hour at the office.

Once you discover the lovely, honey-light of God's essence warming your soul, it will become too hard to resist, and you will find yourself waiting for the moment each day when you can connect.

Sit back, relax, close your eyes, and enjoy!

It's About Surrendering and Listening

Why is it that we must often go to a place of complete bleakness before we can really get what we want in life?

Lately I've been puzzling over the inevitable, incredible power of 'hitting bottom' -- a place it seems we all must travel to sooner or later in the pursuit of our dreams. For some of us, that bottom feels like a tepid place; everything's 'fine' but nothing's really happening. We're dying a slow, psychic death, but there isn't a lot of twisting and writhing going on. Others, like the man I interviewed below, must lose everything they have before traveling out into the calm seas of true spiritual connectedness. They must suffer extreme loss and be stripped clean of everyday reality as they know it. Either way, there inevitably comes a day when we all must reckon with who we are, what we've created, and whether or not we will surrender to the greater spirit the guides us.

I recently read Stephen King's amazing account of being hit by a car, and his subsequent recovery. In less than two seconds, for no good reason at all, he was stripped of everything comfortable and ordinary about his life. His body was so badly injured that it took virtually every ounce of courage and stamina he had just to sit in a wheelchair and begin writing again, months after his trauma. The essay left us with no neat conclusions about why this had happened, but it made it clear that he still had his writing, and though his output has slowed, he is grateful for it.

I'm not sure why one must suffer at all in this life, but I know this: crises lead us, ever so humbly, back to the rich stuff of who we are and what is dear to us. They can be the portal to God, spirit, intuition, or whatever you see that great body of wisdom to be. And when the dust has settled, the bottom can leave you marveling at the smallest things, happy just to be alive as you finally get the joke.

It isn't what you do, necessarily, that creates the success or failure of your journey -- it's how well you listen, and surrender, along the way.

When All Seems Lost...Just Ask!

Recently, I had a fantastic crisis. It was fantastic because not only did disaster NOT strike, but it reminded me of a truth as old as the hills: when all seems lost, just ask.

When I was in the throws of doing lots of radio interviews to promote the new Ballantine edition of my book, the worst thing that can possibly happen to an author (and a publicist) happened. I forgot an interview. It was just one of those mornings when I had a houseful of guests. In fact, I was busy serving blueberry pancakes when it struck me that something was wrong ... something was very wrong. Just like Miss Clavel in Madeline, I ran fast and faster, trying to figure out the disaster. When I reached my upstairs office, I fumbled through my file and saw that I'd been scheduled for an interview on a Colorado radio station at 9:05 AM, and it was not 10:05 AM! I could feel the bottom of my stomach drop out.

How was I going to face Joanne, my beloved, trusted publicist who had worked so hard to schedule the interview? And how was I going to face the folks at Ballantine who were counting on my to show up and do my part? I just stood there, doing my best to curse quietly so the children, and houseguests, wouldn't hear me.

For a good twenty minutes, I hung around my office avoiding calling Joanne. Blueberry pancakes and my houseguests were totally forgotten. Instead, my mind was full of excuses, which The Big G kept patiently answering. The conversation went like this:

ME: It was only 7AM on the West Coast. I can't call NOW.

THE BIG G: Joanne would be at work already, as she has to be on East Coast time often to do her job.

ME: I've already blown it, right? So why bother calling anyone?

THE BIG G: You never know, Suzanne.

ME: I just can't tell her... I can't. She'll kill me.

THE BIG G: Joanne will not kill you. She'll help you.

ME: But remember the other time -- when the station gave my publicist the wrong time? Remember how mad the DJ was when I got him on the phone? This guy will yell at me!

THE BIG G: Everyone's different, dear.

Finally, I called. Joanne was not mad and certainly did not try to leap through the phone and kill me. In fact, she was the essence of grace under pressure and said, quite sanely, "The host is a really nice guy. Call him up. He'll probably put you on."

So I girded my loins again, dialed, and explained to the man why I was an hour and twenty minutes late. "Can you hold on?" he asked, and two minutes later I was doing the interview, marveling at the fact that all I had to do was ask.

So often we assume we 'know' how it's all going to turn out. We're completely certain of future results, and base our information on previous circumstances that have little to do with the here and now. I'm here to say that we don't necessarily know a thing -- all we can do is ask and try, ask and try, no matter how scary it seems. Otherwise, the only certainty is that we've once again caved into our fear and stayed stuck, instead of moving forward.

Or, as the sign my friend Ellen Nalle used to have above her desk said, "Just Ask".

After my interview, I called Joanne back and told her how it all turned out. "This is so great!" I gushed, "I can write about it in the Joy Letter." "Fine," Joanne replied. "But don't miss anymore interviews, okay? Even for your newsletter."

Think Big!

I like people who think big. I'm always struck by those who take on major cultural issues as their own personal problems to solve, and refuse to quibble over whether it can or can't be done. They inherently understand that solving the problem isn't the issue ... it's chipping away at it that counts.

I have this theory that inspiration begets inspiration, so each person's effort stimulates another effort out there, then another, and then another, so ultimately sea change does happen. And only because one person bothered to chip away at impossibility.

Martha Swan, who was born a civil rights activist, has been looking for the right venue to channel that energy into since probably about age two. She has that infectious sort of passion that makes you think to yourself, this is somebody who is doing great things. And yet, just like the rest of us, Martha has fears -- huge fears.

The trick for her has been considering the consequences of not doing these large, scary things she was meant to do in this lifetime. The hollowness of one's justifications, the deadness of not moving ahead with purpose, that impatient, half-sick feeling you get when you know you're in avoid mode -- these are the really dark, scary places you must go when you don't follow our dreams. And every person reading this knows exactly what I mean. These feelings are like little gremlins who live in your soul and quietly chew things up. And they feel far worse over the long-term than some intense bouts of fear might feel on the short term.

So ask yourself this: how much damage are you willing to sustain in the name of changing the world? Can you put up with a little sleep deprivation, or the possibility of appearing foolish? Can you live with financial insecurity, or possibly a less fabulous car or vacation? Will you choose some immediate, short-term discomfort that will be rewarded on the other hand with huge satisfaction? Or, instead, are you going to go for the slow and torturous killing of your soul over a lifetime?

These are the little questions we have to ask ourselves every day, whether our dream is large or small, and whether we plan to change the world, or not.

Now stop asking ... and start doing.

The Power of Focus

I've been thinking a lot about focus, lately -- mostly because mine has been all over the place. So I made a point in this issue to interview a master bread baker with the kind of focus you have to have to achieve something truly great.

For me, focus as often been an issue. Just when the wheels are rolling, results are happening, and my juices are flowing buckets, I'm inclined to pull back and distract myself with some assorted piece of trivia. I suspect I've done this not out of necessity -- for who really needs to dawdle in junk when you're in the creative flow? It's done out of fear of standing up for myself, and truly extending my power in the world.

I once had a friend, Victor Phillips, who taught me all about the value of focus. Victor was an interior designer and psychic healer who also had tremendous talent as a painter. So it came as something of a shock when we both attended an acting seminar in New York City one weekend, and I watched Victor stand up and perform a monologue. Victor stood on the stage for several moments with his eyes closed in concentration. Then, when he opened his eyes and started to deliver his speech, he was a transformed person. He was his character, quite literally. People in the audience were crying at the end of his work -- and the most incredible part was that Victor had never acted in his life.

Naturally, on the next break I went straight to Victor and gushed about his talent. "But it wasn't talent," he said. "It was focus. I stood there for a moment centering myself. I pulled up every ounce of energy I had. And then I just did it."

"But you were incredible! You could be a great actor! Will you?" I asked

Victor looked non-plussed. "Probably not," he said. "I was just seeing where my focus could take me."

Victor died of AIDS several years ago, but I will never forget the amazing lesson he taught me that day. Because what I saw was not that Victor, alone, was this supremely talented man. Instead, I realized how powerful our focus can be when we train its laser beam on what we want to create. And that goes for ALL of us. So we can truly achieve greatness, if we're willing to use the tremendous tool of focusing, and be the powerful force we were given to be in this life.

Dreams Are Slow Growing Organisms

When it comes to living my dream, the biggest single stumbling block for me has been the 'Money Thing'. For eighteen years, while I dabbled in the arts, I made my living as a freelance copywriter, and almost the entire time I hated it. I can remember railing against my job, refusing to see it as what it was, my patron of the arts who afforded me flexibility, and financed my beloved music and writing.

Instead, I decided my 'bread gig' was the enemy -- that which kept me from doing what I truly loved. Furthermore, since thinking about money wasn't as much fun as creating, I decided it was irrelevant, even though money was the key to living my dream every day and sharing it with lots of people.

This is a fundamentally immature view that ignores an obvious fact of science: your dream is actually a business. I wanted to do mine full-time, and earn a living from it. Therefore my dream was something that needed building, nurturing, and quarterly reviews just like a new business. Obviously, this takes time. The first few years are rocky. You have to do things you don't want to do. You often have to keep an alternative income source going for a while to ease the transition. And if you want to make a living from your dream, you must organize your actions towards one, single-minded end -- running your new business so it turns a profit and stays viable.

Yet, I never quite did that. I wrote books, and hired agents, and submitted things here and there. But I never really looked at the bottom line in any practical way. Rather, my writing career was always this thing "I just had to do ... no matter what!" And I figured some day, magically, my ship would come in (and, of course, I'd be rich beyond my wildest dreams.) I figured it would all just "work out" one way or another.

I have since learned that dreams are slow-growing organisms that need a lot of care and feeding. And we need to nurture them just so, to help them thrive. I need to keep a business account, a spending plan, and maintain spreadsheets on my income and expenses. I need to develop 'new products' that diversify my income sources, and put energy into marketing. I need to let go of the need for fast, spectacular results, or huge clamoring crowds. And above all, I need to be patient and build the foundation.

Our dreams will show us exactly where to go, who to speak to and how to make them happen. What we bring to the table is not only faith, but the willingness to do what must be done ... and that includes handling the Money Thing.

Life's Surprises Are Best When You Stay Loose & Open

One of the things I love most about life is how surprising it is. Sometimes when we set out to fulfill our purposes, we think we know exactly where we're going. Then something happens -- an accident, a lucky bit of fate, a fortuitous meeting -- and the entire course of life shifts dramatically.

For a woman I've interviewed previously, this came in the form of a gift: a hat-making kit from her mother that she accepted grudgingly. Sally Faith Coombs thought she was going to be an academic, or a journalist, or a documentary film maker, possibly, with an important social message. Then she found herself getting inspired with a bit of boiled wool. Instead of the traditional venues for political statements, hatmaking became her platform. The expected course of events turned on its ear, and produced creative magic instead.

Sally's hats do, indeed, have a magical effect on people, as well as on her. When you talk to her you can hear the exuberance and joy in her voice. And you can still hear the surprise. For when we are truly connected to our divine purpose, no marketing plan or business plan can ever match the pure power of God's plan, and that's when things get surprising.

I can still remember how odd it seemed when I made the transition from being a singer to being a writer. It wasn't that writing seemed odd, for I'd always known in my heart that at some point I'd write. What seemed weird was that I became a novelist. This seemed like more creative fulfillment than any little shmuck like me deserved to have. Yeah, I could write, but shouldn't I be doing the boring stuff, like annuity packages and auto industry annual reports? Novel writing seemed the province of truly creative, gifted individuals, not someone like .... me.

Somehow I managed to go with the flow and accept the surprise. And I still accept it to this very day, ever marveling at the sheer curiosity of this cool thing I can do. The bottom line is that you can have fun in life and get paid for it -- well paid, even -- if you can stand to be surprised.

So stay loose, stay open and go for it. And may you be grandly surprised by what you receive in return.

Moonlighting

Lately, I've gotten interested in people who moonlight. The other day I met a film editor who is also Quebec's Regional Champion Snow Carver. By day he sits in an editing booth, working magic with tape and computers. By night, he tackles ten foot high blocks of hardened snow with carving knives and whittles them into incredible sculptures. I also learned that my accountant is a passionate hang glider, our minister does legal work on the side, and our electrician has designed an $8000 amp the electronics media calls the most sophisticated in the world. The electrician's assistant, meanwhile, is a two-time national champion in in-line skating.

Then there's my friend who is about to go to New York to design buildings for several months so she can accumulate enough cash to get her shaped glass concern up and running. And since her goal is to create architectural components made of glass, she'll be making contacts that will enhance her creative business as well. And then there's Alex Forbes, who designs our Blast O Joy newsletter and spent the last six months as a graphic designer so she can tour Europe's coffeehouses this month with her guitar, promoting her new CD.

The world is peopled with so many itinerant artists, inventors, and entrepreneurs it seems like moonlighters are taking over the economy. And with good reason. Few of us have the capital or the guts to make the leap towards our dream without a financial net in place. Which means a lot of us wind up "in transition", i.e. moonlighting, for significant periods of time.

I was an advertising copywriting for eighteen years -- ten of them freelance -- while I worked on building my writing career. And what I learned is that there's a right way, and a wrong way, to moonlight. A few fundamentals:

-- Never do a job you can't walk away from by 5:30PM. You won't sustain the energy to do your creative work at night

-- Look for jobs that feed your other interest, wherever possible. (My last job had me reading periodicals for much of the day, many of which have provided research for my books.)

-- Never work for a jerk (to paraphrase author Pat King.) It's not worth the paycheck at the end of the day. Abusive bosses or co-workers can always be replaced with better jobs and less stress.

-- If you find yourself literally running through the halls of your office, look for another job.

-- Don't get too entrenched in the office culture. Use your lunch hour not to hang with the gang, but to provide something you need to fulfill your other work, whether it's a workout for stamina, or a trip to the library for research.

-- Avoid jobs that require heavy manual labor. Waitressing or logging is great if you're in your twenties. For the rest of us, pick something quieter

-- Begin your marketing campaign at the office, when you need to attract a market or an audience. Co-workers can be amazingly loyal (and understanding)

-- If you find yourself hating the company you work for, think of it as a benevolent patron of the arts. Quit expecting it to feel good, because it won't. Instead, use your time effectively there and appreciate the steady paycheck

-- Manage your money wisely, maintain a budget and a savings/investment schedule. Never fritter money away if your goal is to leave the day gig

-- Avoid the casual beer or glass of wine at night. Alcohol tends to erode resolve. Think of yourself as 'in training'

I could go on and on. Bottom line: moonlighting is a brave and glorious course of work that also has a way of making you more efficient in your day job, and enhancing your inner force.

Finally, to all who toil by night so their souls can breath, I thank you for your great generosity. Go forth and conquer!