Crossing the unknown sea

Posted on May 2, 2012 by musingsontheway

Bog #6. May 2nd

I am aboard a super ferry, the Stenaline, crossing the Irish Sea from Belfast, Ireland to Cairnryan, Scotland. This morning, I drove into Dublin and turned in my rental car. I was happily surprised that the insurance paid for the two tires that I blew out on the first day driving. I caught a shuttle to the airport, a taxi to the Port of Dublin to pick up my rail-sail ticket, then taxi to Connally train station, and train to Belfast. I found myself without British pounds and buses and taxis would not accept euros or dollars. There was no currency exchange in either of the train stations. Buses would not take credit cards. The taxi that took me to the port of Belfast had considerable difficulty with credit or debit cards. Finally, the driver agreed to accept euros with unknown exchange rate, rounded off.

The cost of 1 liter bottled water was $5.85 when exchanged for British pounds sterling, and the water aboard this ship is undrinkable. It is happy hour somewhere anyway, a beer will have to do.

As I reach Cairnryan, Scotland, I will still be in Celtic lands with history of speaking a slightly different dialect of Gaelic. A bus and a train will take me to Glasgow for the night. Tomorrow, I take a train, a ferry, a bus, and another ferry to the Isle of Iona for a 1 week silent retreat. Focusing on the inner journey more than the outer one feels more daunting, withdrawal from email and Internet. It is time for a new stage of this pilgrimage to unfold; it is tempting to continue to remain more focused on the beauty and the novelty of the wondrous outer world around me, as I travel. But, this sabbatical is about something else as well, something that involves inner listening, tuning the eyes and ears of my heart to an inner landscape from which to receive direction. Iona, a sacred island, with it’s wild windswept coastline seems like a good place to deepen and pay attention to the inner search. Who knows what is within us? In the modern world of 24/7 responsibility and stimulation, I have found it difficult to stay attuned to the soul and spirit’s voice. I am grateful for the privilege. I pray I use it well.

I acknowledge David Whyte’s book title in the title of this blog.

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Beware of what you ask for

Posted on May 2, 2012 by musingsontheway

Blog #2, 4-17-12. Acknowledgement: the name of my blog, “everything belongs”
Is taken from a beloved book by Richard Rohr of the same name.

Beware of what you ask for. I have been saying to myself, rather boldly that I know that I need to release my grip, my ego attachments to security and illusion of control in order to hear the call of my soul, the divine invitation. As I prepared to depart, I realized that I would need to close my practice and release the committed professional relationships to many of my patients whom I care about, yes love. I wanted to find the very best psychiatrist and/or psychotherapist for each person under my care. As I contacted many colleagues, I came to realize that I could not guarantee who my successor would be. The best mental health providers are busy and may not be able to accept new patients or only a few. I had to trust in the resources of my patients to find the doctor they needed and trust the “universe”, beyond my control. This proved more difficult and painful than I had expected.

As I began to prepare for my trip, I developed a painful knee injury, which turned out to be a new tear in my right medial meniscus. Slowed down, needing to walk deliberately, I realized that this would not be a vigorous adventure as I idealized it from my younger years of travel. In physical therapy, I learned that I needed to learn a new gait, a new way to walk, awkward and with a new center of gravity. I would have to release my ideal of physical vigor and endurance, my dreams of youthful pace, not easy losses to accept.

I recognized how many medications and vitamins I would need to carry in order to be away for 5-6 months. Travel light? Pharmacy and insurance allow 6 months refills?

I set up bank transfers and auto pays to manage money and ensure its availability during my time away. 2 days before I left, I learned the arrangements that I had made for bank transfers were blocked by new bank requirements.

I wanted to write a blog but found repeated confusing obstacles. Both printers in the house were without ink or replacement cartridges on the day before my departure, so I could not make copies of directions or web sites for my journey.

I would be away from my wife, best friend, advisor, traveling partner. I would need to release my control over bills, family and office business. I would have no income, no position, job, status, official or professional security.

How would my long departure affect my relationships, family, social, professional, personal, health care?

My personal and professional relationships, my physical health, mobility, endurance, fitness, illusion of power control, money, illusion of youthful strength and independence, feeling of value to others, and other personal issues are all being shaken, tested, challenged. My illusion of control, security, safety, durability, power, and being needed are dissolving. As I surrender control over my plans, outcomes, and my sense of certainty about everything, I enter into a new world, way of being, that reveals my hubris and pride, false self. What do I trust in?

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Where the ocean meets the continent

Posted on May 1, 2012 by musingsontheway

Blog #5 May 1, Beltane

Something about the west of Ireland draws me. There is a content feeling, a warm fullness in my belly connected to the earth, water, and stones. Even the air is alive, with trickster wind teasing and gusting. It is such an ancient landscape littered with Neolithic giant stone dolmens, stone circles, court tombs, cairns on every hilltop, megalithic standing stones engraved with spirals and solar and lunar symbols. These 5000 year remains we’re created by a mostly unknown people with no written language. Their history is lost in the mists of time, but traces reman in oral history and rich and extensive mythology that inhabits the earth. It is everywhere, especially in the west. There are sacred rivers and holy wells throughout.

There is a multitude of early monastic constructions from the 5th to 10 th century, with more nearly historical legends and lore, strangely carved standing stone crosses 1500 years old. Soaring huge stone abbeys from the middle ages tower in every town, by the rivers or the sea. These were torn down, burned, and rebuilt and destroyed again and again by the various invaders. A mulitude of huge stone castles from the time of the Norman invasion, in the 1200s and later the British castles built to intimidate and control the Irish population, occupy the heights every 8 miles. And it is all preserved in stone, a resource that Ireland is rich in….. And the land still supports the tribes of the past. The O’Rourkes, the Rosses, the O’Donellys, Conlans ( my mother’s maiden name), and they still live and love close to their kin and the land of their ancestral clam for millennia, telling the stories of the living landscape, from which they are born and to which they return. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust is only part of it. The grass grows from the dirt of the land, feeds the sheep and cows, which the descendants eat and live on. Their molecules and spirits recycled in each new generation. Do you have your great great grandfather’s eyes? Maybe so, in more than appearance.

And where the wild north Atlantic Ocean crashes into the granite cliffs, and golden beaches, the wind and the rain and the sun combine into something so vividly elemental that it is easy to feel the carbon earth of my body, the 70% water, the breathe, and the fire of my heart’s beat, and my cell’s metabolism in communion, part of it all.

Yes, I know this deep sense of connection, kinship, belonging, being part of it all, not an objective being separate, is the basis of my spiritual passion. Can you imagine the lapping of waves on a sandy beach, an ever changing interface of the feminine elemental aspects of matter? Or the roaring foaming crash of the waves on the ragged eroded rocks, roots of a continent? The dynamic interconnection of opposites perpetually dancing together, while the wind howls and the sun enlivens and burns.

For 3-4 days I explored County Sligo, Yeats country and rich in archeological sites, lakes, and waterfalls. Then, I travelled north to the edge of the world outside a tiny village called Glenncolombkille, in Donegal. I followed the coast north as far as Bunbeg and Bloody Foreland, before turning back to the south, passing by Mount Akiscal, and vast boglands.

Today, I left that magical countryside behind and drove east toward Dublin, as I prepare to make my pilgrimage to Iona, Scotland, across the Irish Sea, in the Inner Hebrides.

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The unpleasant things also belong

Posted on April 29, 2012 by musingsontheway

Blog 4. April 29th

After completing the week with the Jungian program on liminality and creativity, I picked up my car from the airport. They only had one car with plugin for IPod. So, I have been listening to lilting meditative music by Aine Minogue, Celtic meditations and Celtic Lamentations, as synchronous background for seeing the country and visiting ancient sites.

Sunday, on the day I picked up the car, I felt euphoric, liberated, I could go anywhere. I drove to Hill of Tara; that place is magnetic for me. It was the sacred place of coronation of the High Kings of Ireland, who ritually married the land of Ireland, making love to Queen Maeve or her representative. It is wide area marked by barrows and cairns, the highest of which is topped by a phallic standing stone. I contemplated and hung around there for a few hours, soaking up the energy, through several pouring rainstorms that would loom to the east and rapidly blow through, rain and hail, then lessen and veer off, heading west. There is a wild unfettered ancient energy there. One had better be a powerful and wise sovereign candidate supported by the other world if one seeks a marriage to this land ruled by the intimidating queen Maeve of the Sidhe. If you are not the destined one for the high kingship, making love to the land at Tara may devour, destroy, or drive you mad. This sovereign position and commitment was not for the faint of heart or one with any weakness.

I was in altered state as I drove away from Tara and got back on the N-3 to find my B&B in nearby Trim. After a few minutes on the motorway, I realized that I was going the wrong way. I found a turnoff at Kells,. in order to head back east toward Trim. As I drove through Kells, I came to a fork in the road, unsure which way to go, I decided to pull over. As I pulled over to the left side of the road, my front and rear tires hit the projecting edge of the curb and blew out front and rear tires….. The rest of the story about local people helping me access the National highway roadside assistance tow trucks etc. Three hours later, I rode in the tow truck with a very taciturn Irishman as he towed my car to garage in Trim. He dropped me off there, so I then walked about a mile in the dark to BB and checked in near 10:00 pm. The next day, my B&B proprietors gave me a ride over to the garage twice, once to give the garage man the keys, and once to pick up the car with two new tires on it. Ouch, cost of 2 tires from my first day on the road. But I was mobile again.

Well, everything belongs…..

On the third day, I hit the road with confidence in my left side of the road driving diminished. Hugging the white center line, :~}>, I chanced to notice that I was driving near Ouisneach, the navel of Ireland. It is the central place where the ancient celts celebrated Bealtana, May 1st with all nite Bonfires and bachanalia, fertility rituals all over the countryside, on every hill and high place.

The legend goes that Queen Eiru, the light filled fairy queen and her people of the Dana (original gods and goddesses ) were defeated by the warlike Milesians men. The chief of the Milesians was supposed to slay Eiru, but he fell in love with her instead. He was stricken with passion for her and made love instead of killing her. Instead, he banished her into the landscape of Ireland. She became the rocks, bogs, forest, and hollow hills, the land itself. And the country came to be named Eire, or Erin, for Ireland, for her living in the landscape. Thus the landscape is alive and Feminine, much beloved by the people of the scattered farms and thatch homes. Everwhere was enchanted with the light filled faery queen.

The legend goes on to describe how Queen Maeve took her place, a much more formidable warlike queen, that represented the faery world to the high Kings of Ireland. Therein lie many more tales, some quite daunting, from the mythological cycle of Celtic writings.

The energy from my pilgrimage to Ouisneach stayed with me as I drove into the west to Sligo.ace

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The fool

Posted on April 26, 2012 by musingsontheway

Blog #3 4-26-2012

I formally began my sabbatical on April 1st, April Fools Day, a nod to the “fool” archetype and my intention to step off the cliff and practice the wisdom of “beginners mind”, not knowing, and to have fun, play along the way. The archetype of the fool travels light, releases a lot of his “baggage”, and relies on his instincts as opposed to plans. He balances polarities and lives by contradictions. He is not ruled by the inner king or the outer collective, though his attitude can serve the sovereign within, balancing and providing novel, creative approaches to life’s problems. He does not take himself or anything too seriously.

The irony was that for the 11 days between 4-1-2012 and 4-12-12, when I flew to Ireland, I was intensely task focused and oriented, even more than usual. This paradox of seeking to release control while increasing my focused effort seems familiar.

The weather has been good for springtime in Ireland. Dramatic, dark, threatening cloud banks and gusty cold wind alternate with sunlight and raindrops at the same time. It makes for beautiful and serendipitous rainbows.

The Jungian program was excellent, and isolated at a spa in the Wicklow Mts. The speakers presented meditative and dream like images, with opportunities for drawing, coloring, active imagination, and story telling, with a good sprinkling of great rabbi jokes throughout. The images and stories of the Sidhe, the living Irish landscape, and the history, myth, legend, and archaeology made for dream-like altered space. Of the 35 or so people there, multigenerational, all were folks who had lived life’s adventure and experienced their share of suffering along the way. There were few pretensions. The underworld journey was a familiar place for many. I enjoyed the socializing at meals and on the bus. Michael Gibbon, a very Irish archaeologist took us for a day’s meandering to ancient Dolmen, stone circles, and Glendalough Abbey with its huge round tower and lake trails.

Yet it was, by necessity, on a schedule, well, but carefully planned, including meal times.

On Sunday, the 22nd, I took a shuttle to pick up my rental car, near the Dublin airport. Others were heading into Dublin or preparing to catch their flight home. As the shuttle let some people off at the airport, I suddenly had a sense of a need to get off there as well.

I had previously been trying repeatedly to reserve a flight from Dublin to Glasgow on Aer Lingus at the end of my time in Ireland. I tried for hours on my IPad, losing the connection, going in circles again and again. Finally, I entered my credit card and it seemed finished (2 or more hours, until after midnight, grimly determined…..)

At the airport, I suddenly had the impulse to jump out and go talk to an Aer Lingus person. When I found them, they told me I was not reserved, no sign of my payment, which was a good thing, since the tickets are non-refundable and I had more weight in luggage than they allow (maximum 30 kg for both bags. Carry on bags could be no more than 10 kg. Aer Lingus, like Ryan Air are commuter airlines, for people with a brief case and day bag. They charge astronomical fees for luggage, even though my bags can both be carried on to a normal airline. It was grace that I was not able to complete the purchase of a non-refundable ticket that I could not use. At the airport, also I was able to speak to a travel info person who told me about a train-ferry-train combo from Dublin to Belfast to Cairnryan to Aleys, to Glasgow. It also turned out that the airport was where I needed to go to pick up my rental car.

Grateful for heeding my sudden impulse, the fool is awake in there somewhere. Grace abounds.

In my next blog, in the spirit of “everything belongs”, I will recount an unfortunate event that occurred soon afterward.

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