For the past month I have been on hiatus from my teaching job for the winter holidays. Typically, I enter the month of December feeling like I’ve been flattened on the interstate by a Mac Truck! But this year it was worse. The end of 2008 proved to be especially dark for me. I had no energy, felt deeply discouraged and depressed, and simply wanted to go to bed for a month. Spiritually I was overwhelmed and exhausted. Since I wasn’t working, I never left my house. Intuitively, I knew this was not a good state of affairs. I needed help and I needed it fast. I contacted my dear friend, Mary, an energy healer and asked her for some help. As always, she was able to help me to see the root of things. Sorrow over a break-up two long years ago still haunted me. In the depths of my heart, I’d lost hope that my life could ever change. As a generally hopeful and inspired person, it demoralized me to find myself in such a deep well of grief and sadness. 

            So, what did I do?  After my session with Mary, I initiated some intensive internal work.  I dove for the “pearls” I knew were inside of me.  I began by slowly and carefully removing all my masks.  Asking myself, who are you and who do you want to be, I started my work.  I believe we all carry different archetypes inside of us, like the magical or wounded child, or perhaps, anger-girl (I know her well), studious-serious-chick, or doormat-woman who works like a dog. I contain all these and more! Last month, I started to delve into my inner life —the “shadow” side of my personality, as Carl Jung referred to it — and I was surprised by the amount of relief I felt.  You cannot imagine how relieved I was when I started to embrace all of myself, instead of just the parts that I deemed to be “good” or “right” according to society’s standards.  For years, I’ve tried to be perfect.  (We all know how that works out!)  In beginning this inner work, I developed some much needed compassion for myself, my choices, and the way that I have survived some pretty dicey and difficult stuff.  I have done my job, paid my bills, and taken care of my business even from the depths of despair. I realized the need to express gratitude to my body, my mind and my spirit. I read the books “calling out” from my bookshelves; listened to music; bought myself a guitar; and ate a lot of chocolate! I took long languid baths and was continually reminded of my need to care for my life completely—with the kindness and sensitivity that I would give to others. And as I did this, those exhausted parts of me, the parts of me that I had disowned or disavowed, stepped forward and thanked me.  I greeted the child inside, and remembered how she loved to draw, walk in sunlight, and eat red licorice. I found that if I truly listened to my life — really putting my ear to the ground of my being, I could clearly hear my intuitive voice.  The realization hit me that in truly embracing all of myself, I would find the answers needed to make the changes I wanted to make.  I found catharsis in the wholeness I discovered through this process.

            In December I watched every Lifetime movie I could get my hands on, especially the cheesy Christmas romances. My favorites were “A Very Merry Daughter of the Bride” and “Undercover Christmas.”  I laughed and I cried, watching “It’s a Wonderful Life” and “A Christmas Story.”  I slept and I read, finally stemming the long-term exhaustion I had been experiencing.  I decorated the house; played with my cats; and got in touch with the lovely simplicity of enjoying daily life.  Imagine that!

            I also had incredibly healing discussions with my closest friends and, of course, my mother. The reason I mention all of this, is that as women, we tend to put ourselves at the end of our “to do” lists. If (and that’s a big if) there’s time after everything else has been taken care of, then and only then, can we step up and take something for ourselves. I don’t know about you, but I can’t keep living like that.  I need more balance.  I want to feel a sense of serenity when I contemplate my life, not a sense of overwhelming doom!

            On New Year’s Eve, I sat at home, drinking champagne and coloring a spirit mandala, like the one above.  I thought long and hard about all the things I still want to accomplish and see flower in my life.  As a result, I came up with the following ideas. My goals for the coming year are four-fold:

1. Take care of what’s important to Shavawn, first. In other words, my passion & play (writing, music, and creativity) comes before work, no matter how urgently work is thrown in my direction;

2. Take care of my spirit and my body—including plenty of rest, good nutrition, exercise, and time for my spiritual practice;

3. Take care of the “important stuff” in life: responsibilities, family, bills, obligations, things I have agreed to with a resounding “Yes!” from my heart;

4. And, finally, let go of the need to meet the expectations of other people. I have to live my life for me.  I have to make my life mine, and only mine. What others think of me is none of my business. (This may horrify some of you, but, that’s OK!)

I am convinced that if I pursue these goals, I will be successful in all areas of my life.

Some of the reading that I did was truly transformational.  The most helpful books include

· Living Your Unlived Life by Robert A. Johnson & Jerry M. Ruhl, Ph. D.

· The Eden Project—In Search of the Magical Other by James Hollis

· Trust Your Vibes by Sonia Choquette, and

· The Water of Life by Michael J. Meade

If you are struggling to find balance in your life, I highly recommend them as a place to start.  As women I think we owe it to ourselves (and to those we love) to put ourselves on our “to-do lists.”  If we do, the resulting joy will translate to everyone we touch.

© 2009 Shavawn M. Berry

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At the end of a long, challenging year, I am feeling reflective.  Here are my last words, my advice for the coming year…or for the coming decade, perhaps!  (They are, mostly, self-directed, I think.)

Make sure to experience real, pulse-pounding, I-can’t-breathe love at least once.  Watch the sun rise on the north rim of the Grand Canyon.  Listen to the stones sing in Sedona.  Remind yourself to find the spiritual grounding you need by dragging a stick in the sand at the beach or by climbing a tree so you can see the stars better.  Nothing outside of you can define you.  You are the creator of your experience of life, the author of your story – make it one that you want to live, you want to tell.  Don’t think that money will fill you up; instead fill your life with messy sensory experiences: pastels, glue sticks, bits of paper, glitter….Give something back to the world—a poem; your child’s life; a loaf of wheat bread; a crisp dollar; a soft blanket; a kind word…Have reverence for the water, the moist earth, the dome of stars floating above you…Take a few uncalculated risks.  Pray.  Breathe.  Sigh. Sleep. Dream…Make mistakes.  Your life is a container of absolute divinity.  You possess wisdom and a reason for being. 

If you live full throttle, with your neck out, running along the edges of all that you want to savor and experience, you will—without a doubt—experience true joy and no regrets. 

© 2008 Shavawn M. Berry

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As November blows in, with a cavalcade of falling autumn leaves cueing us that winter will soon be here, I am reminded of my deep need to reflect on all the blessings in my life. Thanksgiving is just around the corner.  It’s sometimes easy to feel overwhelmed by the expectations attached to the holiday season.  It’s easy to complain or eat too much and rest too little.  It’s easy to wallow in self-pity and to look back instead of move forward.  It’s easy to rant about how our glass is half empty instead of half full.  And this year – this terrible year – while many of us watched our 401K accounts sink like the Titanic, as our jobs were threatened and the cost of all our bills rose, it has been as hard as ever to remain hopeful about our collective and individual future.  However, despite the definite “worst of times” feeling that I get from my daily dose of CNN, I am actively turning my prayers toward the grace that permeates my life and reminding myself of all that I have to be thankful for.  The list is long.

Because I am unmarried, for much of my adult life I have spent Thanksgiving in the presence of friends in New York City, Los Angeles, Fairfax, VA and Phoenix, Arizona.  Occasionally I have even cooked a whole bird and all the trimmings of a festive meal, and invited friends over to enjoy it at my house!  I have witnessed many traditions, dishes, and ways of celebrating the holiday.  One family eats paella. Another one serves sticky rice instead of mashed potatoes or gravy.   I’ve had turkey and ham, lasagna and red pepper soup, corn stuffing and peach pie.  Every single situation has been unique.  But one thing that has been relatively consistent is the camaraderie of the meal itself and the sharing of what each person feels most thankful for.  Hearing each person’s singular reasons for giving thanks is often humbling, to say the least.  I have heard thanks given for all manner of good fortune, including the ability to rise again after misfortune.

So, when I think of what I will list this year, I think of people, events, places and, yes, even a few precious possessions:  I am thankful for the beauty and wisdom of my mother’s life and her ability to help me find my way through life’s detritus again and again.  I am thankful that she’s in good health and still able to enjoy her life (at the age of 73).  I am thankful for cherry pie and the peaceful purring of my cats; for the sound of laughter and the transformative power of books.  I am grateful for my friendships – particularly with my women friends – who offer me so much solace every day.  I am thankful that I can write about my life.  I feel gratitude for the hope percolating up from the very soil of this nation; for our brave-hearted and eloquent president-elect; for his wife whose brains and beauty are a true pleasure to witness.  I am glad I have access to kisses, comfort food, flannel pajamas, pumpkin pie, hot coffee, and the occasional beer…I am thankful for my spiritual practice and the support system it provides.  My heart is gladdened by hearing music and tasting chocolate.  I am grateful for my job and my amazing students; for my ability to take care of my basic needs and still buy an ice cream now and then.  I am thankful for my body, my brain, and my health.  I am thankful for church bells, and true love, and heartache, even if I am alone right now as a result.  I am grateful for solitude and sadness and angels and ice bergs…for polar bears and rain showers, for the sound of Oak Creek and the roar of the ocean.  I am thankful for the stars poking through the cloud cover here in the desert.  I am thankful that I had my father in my life as long as I did — even though it was not long enough.  I am thankful for poems and language and paintings and prairie dogs.  I am thankful for the promise of my life and the things that Spirit has set at my table to accomplish.  I am grateful for prayer, for hardship, for the ways in which my life is changed and transformed in relationship to others.  I am thankful for the books I read and the conversations I count on.

As I edge toward the half-century mark, I am grateful for every single day, every lovely breath, every opportunity to dance.   The world is full of wonders.  This Thanksgiving, between the turkey and the sweet potato pie, turn to those sharing your table and express your love and joy and gratitude to them. You will be glad you did.  

© 2008 Shavawn M. Berry

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I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word.                                                                              Martin Luther King, Jr.

Regardless of which side of the political aisle you stand on, what happened on Tuesday at the moment that it became clear that Barack Obama was our president-elect was amazing.  In all of my adult life I have never seen anything like it.  None of us have.  It was a moment of such pure joy, relief, disbelief, and transformation, that I considered pinching myself to make sure I was awake.  I wasn’t sure I wasn’t dreaming.

But then, I knew I wasn’t dreaming.  I was on the phone with my best friend, Lisa, when I saw a shift in the demeanor of the crowds in front of the cameras.  I had the TV muted, but I stopped and picked up the remote.  It was 9:01 PM Mountain time.  The polls had closed a minute earlier in California, Oregon, and Washington State.

“Wait.  Something’s happening,” I said.

I hit the sound button.  I heard an incredible joyful roar as a banner scrolled across the screen: Barack Obama elected the 44^th President.

“I can’t believe it,” I said.

Lisa turned on the TV in New Mexico, and we watched together, for a while unable to speak.

“I can’t believe it,” I said again.  I told her I needed to make another phone call.

I called my mother; she was weeping.

 As I watched TV in complete disbelief, people from Kenya danced in the streets.  I couldn’t stop my tears.  In NYC’s Times Square thousands of people embraced, sang, dropped to their knees, and exchanged kisses.  A mosaic of humanity shimmied in Harlem and screamed in Seattle.  Flags pulsed in the air in Grant Park in Chicago.  CNN scanned the crowd there and found Jesse Jackson, his face wet with tears.  That said it all.  Whether you voted for Mr. Obama or not, we witnessed history on Tuesday night, and this country is forever changed as a result.

I will keep this country and her people in my prayers.  I will keep Mr. Obama and his beautiful family in my prayers as well.  The years ahead will be filled with challenges.  There is nothing particularly quick or easy about digging out of the financial mess we find ourselves in.  There is nothing easy about ending wars or working to defeat poverty.  There is nothing simple about dealing with job losses or global warming.  But I have faith in this country.  I have faith in our resolve and resilience.  We are an innovative and creative coalition of people.  We come from a history of people who have defeated tyranny and built our economy brick by brick.  We know how to work hard.  We are capable of caring deeply.  We are a diverse nation and nothing is impossible.  I believe in change.  I believe we took a leap into the future on November 4. 

I am profoundly grateful that I witnessed it. 

Yes, we can. 

Yes, we did. 

Yes, we will.

© 2008 Shavawn M. Berry

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I spent a couple of hours today watching the documentary, The Bridge, after a friend suggested I see it.  Although it is well done and captivating in a voyeuristic I-can’t-believe-I’m-watching-this sort of way, I felt sick after I saw it.  The bridge in question is the Golden Gate Bridge; the subject of the documentary is the 24 suicides that occurred there in 2004.  Apparently the Golden Gate Bridge is the most popular spot in the world to commit suicide.  People have been known to fly into San Francisco just so they can jump off the bridge there.  The documentary shows footage of a number of people just moments before they plunge to their deaths.  Initially, as I watched, I instinctively covered my eyes.  Later, I sat on my couch in a state of surreal disbelief watching as regular people fell like stones into the waters of the bay below the bridge.  As they took their lives, these desperate souls were nearly always surrounded by others walking their dogs, pushing baby strollers, and snapping touristy photos.  Without fanfare, they simply climbed over the bridge’s rail and jumped.  One young man stood up on the railing and fell in a backwards swan dive to his death.  I cannot shake those images.  Friends of several of the individuals who died at the bridge that year were interviewed as part of the documentary.  Each one of them expressed their surprise, sadness, guilt and disbelief.  Fathers, mothers, sisters, brothers, friends and colleagues of the dead wondered collectively what “went wrong.”  As the documentary continued, I began to wonder why each one of these lost souls found their way to that particular bridge at that particular moment.  What drove them to take such a drastic measure?

Although I cannot and do not claim to understand what drives one to suicide, I have had personal experience with it.  Twelve years ago, a close friend of mine committed suicide.  At the time, I felt tremendous guilt and sadness over the choice she made.  Part of me romanticized her decision and part of me was angry about it.  I thought about the selfishness that it entailed in terms of her three-year-old daughter.  She wrote in her suicide note that she felt her daughter, “would be better off” without a mother.  She felt that “no mother was better” than a mother who suffered from relentless black moods caused by her bipolar disorder.  My friend was also a heroin addict.  She’d been clean for 4 years when we met, but she fell off the wagon about 9 months before her death.  She circulated through another round of rehab, but she was never on track again.  She’d ruined her liver and run up an exorbitant amount of credit card debt, using cash advances to feed her habit.  Her mother took her daughter once she figured out my friend was using again.  I think the bleakness she felt over losing her daughter, along with the break-up of a romantic relationship she was in, drove her to take an overdose of over-the-counter meds containing codeine. She knew that the codeine would attack her liver and kidneys causing them to fail, but just to be sure, she followed up with several speedballs of heroin.  She wrote a sometimes incoherent suicide note in which she admonished her family not to keep her alive: “If this doesn’t work, pull the plug.” Despite a valiant effort including dialysis and blood transfusions, she never regained consciousness after her intial trip to the hospital.  She died ten days later in the ICU, just six weeks before her 29^th birthday. 

I often remember silly things about her: the smattering of freckles on her nose; her love of crumpled linen outfits; her fake fur zebra car coat; the brazen way she didn’t apologize for her drug addiction or her days as a “working girl” to support her heroin habit.  She was prone to a kind of depression that cannot really be put into words.  Winston Churchill tried, when he called it “the black dog.”  All light in the world is gone.  Everything is black.  Nothing matters.  Nothing ever will.

Although I have experienced severe clinical depression, I would never consider suicide.  I may have had momentary flashes of imagining my own death – we all have – but I could never act on those feelings.  As a Buddhist, I believe that life energy cannot be destroyed by me or anything else.  I see death as a moment of transformation.  I will leave one form and enter another.  Leaving my life before the universe wants me to go is something I can’t get my arms around. 

Still, I think about the excruciating pain my friend was in, and I imagine those lost souls throwing themselves off of the Golden Gate Bridge, and I wonder if there are limits to what the human heart can endure.  Maybe there was no other choice for those people.  Maybe starting over in an “unknown country” is preferable to enduring another day of hopelessness.  How can I – a woman who has deep faith in the inner workings of life – possibly know?

I guess I am left with more questions than answers.

© 2008 Shavawn M. Berry

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Between 1776 when the Declaration of Independence declared that “all men [were] created equal” here in the United States until the ratification of the 19th amendment (a woman’s right to vote) in 1920, women were seen as second class citizens.  They were, literally, the property of their husbands and fathers.  Most women today probably cannot imagine a time like the time in which the stalwart women of the suffrage movement lived.  These women had no say in public life.  After dinner there was an expectation that women would retire to a drawing room to drink sherry (or tea) and talk about the rearing of their children.  Meanwhile, the men smoked cigars, drank scotch, and discussed politics, justice, current events and the economy.  The message was clear: men were in charge.  Women were not.

All that began to change as the women’s suffrage movement began.  Starting in 1869 with the National Women’s Suffrage Association, Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton’s organization for women, followed closely by Lucy Stone’s group, the American Woman Suffrage Association, these women (and hundreds like them) sought to secure women’s voting rights.  In 1890 the two organizations became the National American Woman Suffrage Association and worked tirelessly for thirty years to assure passage of a constitutional amendment to change the voting laws in our country.  In 1917 a Suffragist named Alice Paul was arrested outside the White House (where she and others had been protesting the lack of equal rights for women).  She was sent to a workhouse where she staged a hunger strike.  For 22 days she refused to eat.  At that point the workhouse staff began force-feeding her.  Eventually news of her imprisonment (and that of others in the movement) reached the media and President Woodrow Wilson was forced to intervene.  Another suffragist, Lucy Burns, also staged a hunger strike and was subsequently force-fed.  During the final years of the suffragist movement, Lucy Burns spent more time in jail than any other woman.  She was jailed on six different occasions for adhering to her beliefs.  Others involved in the movement included Inez Milholland, Carrie Chapman Catt, Ida Wells-Barnett, and Elizabeth McShane.

In 1918 President Wilson reversed his opposition to women’s suffrage and sent the 19th amendment to the US Congress.  It passed the House with 2/3rds majority but failed in the Senate by just two votes. However, the suffragists did not give up.  They had the amendment resubmitted the following year and it passed the House 309—90.  It went on to pass the Senate by a vote of  56 to 25.  It was then sent to the States to be ratified by a majority.  The following year, Tennessee became the 36th state to pass the amendment, and on August 26, 1920 women were finally granted the right to vote.

This proud history is something that all women should know.  A century ago, women protested, went to jail, starved themselves, and worked without respite for all women to have the right to vote.  When we go to the polls next month, let’s think of Alice Paul, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony and the countless others who made it possible for us to be there.  Let’s show our gratitude by voting.  We should never forget to honor their sacrifices on our behalf.

For more information on the Suffrage Movement, visit this link on Iron Jawed Angels: http://www.hbo.com/films/ironjawedangels/pdf/student.pdf

© 2008 Shavawn M. Berry

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Our deepest fears are like dragons guarding our deepest treasure – Rainer Maria Rilke

October is the month where we start our descent into darkness each year.  For some of us, the darkness and mystery may seem frightening.  The shadows may contain wildness, ghosts, even nightmares.  What will we find as we begin our way through the “dark forest”?  Fall surrounds us like a thick mantle. The cycle of life unfolds before our eyes as trees shed their leaves and ready themselves for the sting of winter.  We have passed the Autumnal Equinox (September 22) and are moving into shorter days and longer nights for the next six months.  At the end of this month, All Hallows Eve (Halloween) awaits, along with Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) and All Saints Day.  There is a palpable sense of falling into a place where we will have time to hibernate and linger in the moist darkness, avoiding the cold weather outside, and the slow blast of winter.  Winter’s a time of reflection allowing us to prepare for the imminent rebirth (Spring) that follows.  It is a time to remember and assuage our losses, confront our fears, and run headlong into solving life’s mysteries.  Death surrounds us like a pungent soup.  We must walk with death, decay, and dying in order to set the world on a path toward renewal.

In his book, The World Behind the World, storyteller and mythologist, Michael Meade opens with this admonishment: Run toward the roar.  He tells an ancient African teaching story about the way that lions hunt.  They use the oldest, most harmless of their group to settle on one side of the plains, while the strongest, fiercest hunters sit opposite him.  The old lion is useless as a hunter, but still possesses the most frightening roar.  The pride silently waits as a herd of water buffalo or zebra approach.  Once their prey is near, the old fellow roars as loudly as he can.  The frightened prey runs in the opposite direction, straight into the snares of the savvy hunters.  Meade uses this story to illustrate what he believes is the importance of running toward our fears and the darkness that envelops them; for it is only by facing one’s fears, that fears are dismantled and overcome.  We cannot walk away from what we grips our throats in fear.  We must turn and face it, often discovering that the fear that had us quaking in our boots is actually a toothless, old lion possessing nothing but a big voice.

Usually we are afraid of the unknown, the unfamiliar; we are frightened by the parts of ourselves that remain untested and untried.  We are scared of looking foolish, ignorant, or stupid – so we don’t ask questions, we don’t stretch to see new things, we don’t try on this or that coat made out of a myriad of beautiful threads, for fear it won’t fit.  Perhaps we are too small or too big.  Embarrassment, shame, or ego prevents us from throwing our hat into the ring and trying something different.  Here’s the thing: perhaps at the bottom of that well that we do not want to fall into, is the answer to a serious problem in this troubled world.  What if we are the ones who contain the piece of the puzzle most needed to solve it? 

Marianne Williamson wrote in her book, Return to Love, “Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.”   Boy, is that the truth!  In facing our fears, we begin to build a life that is not blown over every time a storm comes.  And, the fact is, storms are an inherent part of life.  There’s no use trying to outrun them.  All that will get you is a serious bout of blisters and a case of blinding weariness.  I have learned that there’s nothing safe about the status quo.  No renewal waits for those who stand in one place, calcified by fear. 

This month I plan to create a Day of the Dead altar celebrating my father’s life.  Playing Patsy Cline CDs as a backdrop, I will remember the twang of Daddy’s voice when he sang along with the radio.  I will eat candy corn and cook stew to warm and sweeten my days.  I will view the trials facing me (and this country and this world) as opportunities to dig deeper and find my way thorough them, to discover a pathway into much needed change, renewal, and rebirth.  I will run toward the roar.  No experience in life comes without gifts.  Let’s see what walking into fear has to teach us. 

© 2008 Shavawn M. Berry

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“When everything is breaking down, something new is breaking through.”

We are living in unprecedented times.  Our economy appears to be collapsing, families are losing their homes to foreclosure, and our government seems to have run amok with no concept of restraint or responsibility.  The feeling that our lives have meaning and that our individual struggles matter has been lost in the madness of this particular moment.  Some people might contend that things are dire, and that we should be afraid, very afraid.  I disagree.  I believe with my whole heart that we are living on the cusp of one world that is on the verge of becoming another.  Something new will be born of this chaos.  Something bright and beautiful will be pulled out of these dark, tumultuous times.

Recently financial guru, Suze Orman, was on Oprah.  She was there to (again) sound the alarm about our financial house of cards, encouraging all Americans to “stop lying” to themselves and living beyond their means.  A couple was encouraged to let their home go because they could not afford it.  They had $90K in credit card debt, and the husband had been out of work for 18 months.  Ms. Orman admonished the entire audience regarding the fact that Americans have lived with out of control spending in their personal lives and that that sense of entitlement has been trickling down through our economy during the past thirty years.  The crisis on Wall Street did not happen in a vacuum.  It happened because of the unprecedented spending of not only our government, but of our citizens, as well as a lack of regulation to protect consumers from predatory lenders and money managers.  The fact of the matter is that wages in this country have remained flat for quite some time.  Although Americans are extremely productive and innovative, the structure of our economy has not shared the wealth that the productivity has produced. The average worker sees no difference in his or her paycheck, in spite of longer hours and more and better technology. 

Still, despite the knowledge that our wages have remained flat, we continue to live (and spend money) as though our wages have increased.  Most of us live paycheck to paycheck.  I know I do.  Although everything is increasing in price, my check remains the same.  However, there are things I want and need, so more often than not, I buy them.  We all do.  Each one of us has bought into the idea that having a certain lifestyle or a certain kind of possessions says something about our worth (or worthiness).  According to Motley Fool (www.fool.com) writer, Morgan Housel, in “The Fake it Till You Make it Consumer,” “We’re a debtor nation, with the average American household being the proud owner of nearly $10,000 in credit card debt — a figure that equates to more than 20% of average income.[…] The figures on consumer credit card usage will make your brain hurt — 11% annualized growth on outstanding balances for November, and total credit card debt quickly approaching $1 trillion.”

Suze Orman contends that we have forgotten that, “people should be our number one priority.”  She asserts that Wall Street greed is the result of a fatal flaw in our system of values.  If money is more important than people, then it is OK to allow family after family to collapse under the weight of mortgages that both the individuals involved and the lenders and speculators who profited off them, knew they could not afford.  It is OK for the fabric of our society to unravel while hedge fund managers get wealthy off the mistakes and suffering of average Americans.  Who cares, right?  The “silly fools” deserve what they get.  We have all heard the chatter:

When the going gets tough, the tough go shopping;

Sink or swim;

We are not our brother’s keeper; 

Everyone needs to pull his or her own weight;

It is not permissible to be weak or weary or to make mistakes;

If you don’t have enough money, it is your fault!

It seems to me that all these crises we are currently experiencing are signs that the status quo — the way in which we have operated in the past — is no longer working.  We need to move into a new system of values.  We need to awaken to discern what is truly important: people and shared values, commitments, and responsibilities.  As a recovering shopping addict, I am beginning to see that other than food and shelter, there’s not much that I truly need.  There are plenty of things I desire, but I don’t need them.  I would love to open my heart and meet someone with whom I can share meals and conversation and silence with.  I would like to live my life on the basis of my values and convictions, offering service and caring to those less fortunate than me. All those things cost nothing.  Reading a library book or admiring the sky at night is free.  Exchanging ideas or singing at twilight has no price tag.  I do not need a thousand hours worth of videos.  I do not need a Lexus, a Rolex, or a Louis Vuitton bag.  If you truly have the discretionary income (meaning you can afford your house payment, car payment, gas, utilities, groceries, insurance, health care, and incidentals without using credit) go for it!   But for most of us, we do not have any “discretionary income.”  We just have bills to pay and a smaller and smaller check to pay them with.

To me, this whole crisis is a wake-up call.  We have wandered too far off track.  We need to get back to the heart of things: caring for ourselves and others (whether we know them or not).  How we treat the “least among us” says a lot about the heart of our values.  We can do better.  We need to take care of our planet and treat its inhabitants with kindness. We need to strive to fill our lives with meaning, not stuff. If we can do that, we will see the dawning of a different and better kind of world.

© 2008 Shavawn M. Berry

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I am interested in the conversation that has ensued since Sarah Palin’s vice presidential nomination.  Can women can have it all? 

I grew up during the turbulence of the 60s and 70s, and benefited mightily from the work of feminists, who burned their bras and walked out on convention, in order to permanently change the status of women.  Women in my mother’s generation did not have a smorgasbord of choices available to them.  My mother once told me that besides marriage, she had the option of “teaching, secretarial work, or nursing.”  Other than a nunnery, all other doors were closed.  My mom wanted to go to college, to dance like Martha Graham and Moira Shearer, to wander the earth learning and growing in much the same way that I did as a young woman.  Instead, she married my father when she was 19, and gave birth to four children by the time she was 28.  She threw her creative spirit into our home.  She read voraciously, teaching us to live our values and use our minds and talents.  Although she juggled a very tenuous financial situation, she still managed to make each one of us feel as though we were special, loved, and everything she’d always wanted out of life.  I admire the hell out of her tenacious spirit.  My mother is a warrior woman if there ever was one, but did she want more out of her life?  Possibly.  I am sure that there are many things that are still on her life’s list as aspirations and dreams.  How could there not be?

As a young woman, I recall my mother’s admonishment that I would have to choose: a career or marriage and children.  I resented her for it, and went out of my way to prove her wrong.  But― it turns out― my ambition as an artist, musician, songwriter, and writer all trumped my capacity to carve out space for anything else.  I have stretched my capacity and would love to share my life with someone, but I will not shove the rest of my life into a thimble to do so.  Loving deeply is something I have experienced though, even if I have not been married.  I have risked my heart and I have gotten it broken.

I don’t have any children.  Having a child was something that I assumed would eventually happen for me; however, I never met a man I wanted to have a child with, and even when I did, he was divorced and had exercised his option to have a vasectomy.  At 40 it became clear that children (whether biological or adoptive) were not likely for me.  Instead, I nurture hundreds of students, some of them in their first year of college, some just diving into the idea that they are individuals with voices and dreams and ideas for the future.  I have fostered dozens of young women over the years through my Buddhist practice.  I am proud of all of them.  Many have gone on to get their doctoral degrees, to travel the world, and to offer themselves up to make a difference in whatever they do.  I “parent” my pets, and I am a tender friend, but at least for this lifetime, I will not physically give birth to a child. 

Years ago I was with a girlfriend when she had her son.  Moments after Alexander was born, I held him in my arms and walked through the delivery room singing to him through a rush of tears.  He was not my son, but in that one slow moment at the opening of his life, I was the person singing in his ear.  I treasure that memory.  I lost touch with his mother years ago; however, I hope that he’s turned into a beautiful, grounded, well-adjusted young man.  I doubt I will ever know, but I keep that moment wrapped up inside of me as a reminder of not only what I chose to forgo this lifetime, but also that there are many ways to nurture our fellow human beings.  Parenting a child is just one of them.

So, can women have it all?  I circle back to that question.  I guess it depends on whether you prefer to savor one beautiful meal, or devour a whole table of food.  In both instances you are eating, but who is really enjoying the process? At the end of all this I am struck by the idea that although there are some women who manage to have a man, a family, a career, and time for themselves – those who do are rare, and those who do often have a lot of help. 

My mother told me a few years ago that “women can have it all; just not all at once.”  She felt that you have to sacrifice something in order to be a good parent.  These days, I tend to agree.  You can have a relationship, a career, a home, a family….but there will be bumps and sacrifices along the way. 

I get irritated when I see society implying that all women should be striving to have it all.  There is a weariness I associate with that sort of expectation.  The fact of the matter is that we are not all cut from the same sort of cloth.  I feel bad for women (particularly those currently trying to juggle marriages, children and work) when the social mores seem to be saying that there is “something wrong or lacking” in a woman who is not all things to all people.  

Some of us need to focus on one thing and one thing only.  I have no desire to be a pole dancer for my partner, while simultaneously giving birth to twenty children, cooking a gourmet meal, scouring the oven and the toilet, and giving a quarterly report to the board of directors of a multi-national corporation.  It is enough to get up every day and be the best teacher and the best writer and the best woman I can be.  As a single woman without children, I have a lot of freedom.  I can do what I want with my days.  There is time to read, to sit, to pray and to think.  I am in charge of the life I am living.  There is a certain catharsis in that.

We each make the choices that we make.  We always have to live with the consequences of those choices.  And although there are moments in my life when I mourn the loss of those things that I have not experienced during my life, I realize acutely that I have absolutely no regrets about the choices that I have made.   In fact, every day I become more and more aware that I am, in fact, exactly the woman I dreamt I’d be.   So, although, I don’t have it all, I want all I have.  That is a good place to be.

© 2008 Shavawn M. Berry

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There is something very cathartic about acknowledging the blessings we have.  Writing about what we truly appreciate about our circumstances, even when they are challenging, is the first step to finding a calm, centered place of peace inside ourselves.  It allows us to truly see our fortune as human beings. Focusing on developing and maintaining an “attitude of gratitude,” does wonders for our ability to see how truly wonderful (full of wonder) our lives are. 

Starting a gratitude journal is simple.  Get yourself a pretty notebook and cover it with pictures of things you love.  Buy a series of colorful pens to write with. If you are like me and you prefer to type your journal entries rather than write longhand, you can create a word document that you add to each day, or use journaling software (like Life Journal, www.lifejournal.com ) that is available for purchase.  Once you have your journal, choose a time of day (evening often works well in terms of reflection) in which to write about what you are grateful for.   Each day try to list a minimum of five things that make you glad you are alive. On some days discovering what you are thankful for will be easy. 

On more difficult days, you may simply write things like, “I am thankful for the challenge of my illness, my anger, or my grief.” 

It is relatively easy to be grateful for the victories in our lives, but there are gifts inside our sorrows and losses as well. 

Whether we’ve won the lottery or not, we have reason to be thankful.  And when we offer up our grateful hearts, we make room for more abundance, love, and sustenance to come our way.  Gratitude is absolutely crucial.  Why should Spirit shower us with more if we cannot even see what we already have? Each one of us has a plethora of reasons to give thanks.  That is why keeping a gratitude journal can be a life-altering experience.  Writing down all the ways in which you are truly blessed will transform your life.  Try it. You will be amazed. 

© 2008 Shavawn M. Berry

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