June 9

HUMILITY MONTH: DAY 9: “You must know nothing before you can learn something, and be empty before you can be filled. Is not the emptiness of the bowl what makes it useful?” ― Lloyd Alexander

Being empty can feel uncomfortable for most of us. Ego wants to be full and knowing all there is and doing all there is and busy, busy, busy.

When I empty my mind, I can empty my belly and chest with deep yogic breathing. This is different than the breathing we do regularly. At birth, we are able to breathe well. We forget how to breathe at some point in time during childhood; usually at the time we begin to individuate and identify with ego, as separate from others. We begin to breathe into our chest, which is more like panting and produces high levels of cortisol into our bodies.

This “alerts” our bodies and minds for danger. There is no danger! When we are small, if we are in scary circumstances, we learn to breathe like this. As adults of 30, 40, 50 or more, we need to learn to breathe well again, so we don’t blow up our hearts and central nervous systems with cortisol. This is killing more Americans than any other health issue we have.

Why? This is the “fight or flight” hormone that creates a sense of stress in our bodies and minds. The ego is now in charge! And cortisol; and its partner adrenaline, are the leading causal or co-occurring factors in heart disease, cancers, and diabetes, the 3 leading killers in our culture. OH!

When we practice breathing deeply through our nose and into our belly, we are not producing stress hormones. Okay. So just shifting our breathing is a huge key to emptiness. You can sit in meditation all day; but if you are not breathing well while doing it (i.e.; after a cup of coffee or sugar!), you will not be successful at emptying the mind.

I want to be an empty vessel every moment of every day. Why? Because then I can be filled with the beauty, wonder and grace of life AS IT TAKES PLACE! Most people miss the boat on this. They are so busy in the head they cannot hear or see what is happening right in front of them.

I am sure we have all had the experience of driving somewhere, for me it is usually on a long drive; and not remembering the biggest part of the trip. Driving can become automatic and somewhat hypnotic. And then! Something happens that startles us out of our hypnosis! Yikes! Shock! Heart beating fast and gasping for breath. That is because we have learned to “check out” of our lives and we therefore miss a great deal.

I have checked-out of entire relationships with drugs and alcohol. I love the song “I Never Want to Miss a Thing” that came out in the late 1990s. It was the song I sang to my husband when we first got together. It was also the song I sang to him as he was dying and our moments were so very, very precious.

Truth is, it applies to ALL of life. I get caught in ego, just like the rest, and miss hours of my day behind some kind of drama shit. It used to be days that left my awareness. Now it seldom happens for more than 15-20 minutes before I breathe back into my belly. But when it does, it SUCKS! What used to be the perfectly comfortable norm for me is now entirely unacceptable. That is what I call recovery!