Anticipation Is Part of the Plan — sara lynn lashbrook

I opened my eyes at 9:03 and it is now 9:15. In that span of time so many awareness’s have come….

Things have to end. That is the nature of things. Things separate. Things drop. Things fade. Sometimes this happens with grace and ease. Sometimes this happens with grief and sadness. Sometimes this happens with questions like what if and why? And sometimes it is a combination of all of these things swirled together into a big mass, a huge tangled knot. I acknowledge that this awareness, this awareness of loss is here. Loss of friendships and relationships that at one time were my family. I acknowledge that this is here and that there is nothing I can do about it. I cannot control what others think in their mind or what they say to one another out loud. I am not able to explain or justify my choices and actions, share my perspective. These are all defense mechanisms, shields to not feel, attempts for things to be any other way that they are.

A long while back I gave my sister a magnet that said ITS ALL ABOUT ME. I want to ask for it back. For I know now, that it is all about me. It, meaning how I see and perceive, how I make meaning and understand, it is all from my stance as a witness. What am I seeing? What am I perceiving? What am I noticing? What sense am I making? What understanding am I drawing? Things can be no other way than the way I am. I can take a victim role and make others out to be villains. I can be passive and feel I am a martyr. I can speak up and feel like I am a hero. All of these stances are true, I know them all for I have donned each costume, each mask.

It is all about me. It is all about my relationship with my mind. My mind that has engrained patterns and set ways of doing and being, responding and reacting. Like autopilot. It just goes, on its own. And now, through my practice I am catching on to it. I am noticing its trends, it tendencies, its habitual ways and I am catching them much faster than before.

As Beloved Jeanette shared with me yesterday, “it was this way, until now.” Yes, it was one way for hundreds, thousands of interactions. It was that way until the now, the now when I break the pattern, the familiar patterns of interacting out of fear and stepping fully within myself, full embodiment of my practice and speaking my truth, in alignment and with harmony. Not placing blame on others- saying you did ______ and it made me _______or off loading my feelings and emotional sensations onto someone else, saying they way I am is their fault, the way I am feeling is as a result of them and their choices. NO. What is theirs is theirs and what is mine is mine. I can take responsibly for me. I can speak what wants to be shared through me. I can step when I want to step. I can be me and when I am me, without any constraints or restraint, without the thought of what will happen if I say _______ or what will they think when they hear _______. I already know the answer. They will leave. They will go. They will talk. They will share stories and gather. And that is what they will do.

Or at least that is the way it was. Until now. Who knows what is on its way, what is on the horizon once I break free of this pattern of being. I know that I live in a feedback loop and what I put out I receive. Give and receive. Receive and give. One and on it flows like this, this cycle or offering and receiving, receiving and offering. Life is offering me new ways of being and I am receiving these new ways as a new being, aware of the patterns and habits that have defined and guided my way for so long. Until now. So now, as I switch up the footing to this dance, what new moves will arise? Oh yes, this dance. This lovely dance. The vibrations coming and moving me, they way love wants to move. The way I want to move! So exhilarating! So exciting!

It is what I do that matters. The choices that I make are the ones that matter. For so long in my life I made choices for others, thinking about what they would like, think, say and do. How they would respond to me, what they might think or say to others. None of this matters. It is outside of me. All of it is outside of me. What matters is my relationship with myself. My integrity with myself. I am the one who lives with me. I am the one who inhabits this body. I am the one who is in conversation with this mind. This is the work I am here to do, to tune into and to pay attention to. Here, within me. Noticing what sensations are arising. What subtle messages are being shared. What signs are being delivered. The latter, is the big work right now, it is a whole new language, a whole new way of communicating that I am exploring. There are many messages and signs that I am receiving and getting ‘right’ and I know I have gotten some ‘wrong.’ I know I have misinterpreted some messages and signs, and these misinterpretations have costs friendships and relationships to end. This I know to be true. I also know that I am learning. I am here to learn and to learn we must take steps and explore the unknown. What we call mistakes, for me are opportunities for growth, for expansion. I caught a glimpse of a fortune the other day that read – Mistakes are portals for new discoveries. Yes! I thought. Yes, they are!

This morning, when I woke and had more than 15 thoughts run through my mind in the 12 minutes before I sat to write- one of them being the quote from Alice and Wonderland that was on a journal that I used when I was a part of a team working to write a Special Education side to a Charter:

“Alice laughed. 'There's no use trying,' she said. 'One can't believe impossible things.'

I daresay you haven't had much practice,' said the Queen. 'When I was your age, I always did it for half-an-hour a day. Why, sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast. ― Lewis Carroll

Something caught my eye. A tiny green speck. Could it be? Could it be? Yes, it is. A new bud, pushing through and emerging from a stalk of a jade plant that I had recently cut off because it had died. It shriveled up and was no longer receiving nutrients to grow. And there it was, right before my eyes- new growth.

Reminding me that yes, somethings have to drop, get cut or come to an end for new things to come.

Which brings me to the songs that I woke with, replaying in my mind from when I heard them the other day in the car. Dan Fogelberg’s Part of the Plan and Carly Simon’s Anticipation (check out the lyrics that speak to me below). I can hardly wait for what is on the horizon, what is on its way. I catch myself, dreaming and wondering, creating plans and visions in my mind. And then I bring myself back and say, be here Sara. Be here. Here is when it is all happening. Right now. Right here.

In love with life, exactly where I am, right here, right now.

Believing, knowing that ANYTHING IS POSSIBLE IF YOU ARE WILLING.

And I am!

Loving you,
Sara

Part of the Plan, Dan Fogelberg from the Souvenirs Album 1974

I have these moments all steady and strong
I'm feeling so holy and humble
The next thing I know, I'm all worried and weak
And I feel myself starting to crumble

The meanings get lost, and the teachings get tossed
And you don't know what you're gonna do next
You wait for the sun but it never quite comes
Some kind of message comes through to you
Some kind of message comes through

And it says to you
Love when you can
Cry when you have to
Be who you must
That's a part of the plan
Await your arrival
With simple survival and
One day, we'll all understand
One day, we'll all understand
One day, we'll all understand

Your conscience awakes and you see your mistakes
And you wish someone would buy your confessions
The days miss their mark, and the night gets so dark
And some kind of message comes through to you
Some kind of message shoots through

There is no Eden or heavenly gates
That you're gonna make it to one day
But all of the answers you seek can be found
In the dreams that you dream on the way

Source: Musixmatch

Songwriters: Dan Fogelberg

Anticipation, Carly Simon from the Album Anticipation 1971

We can never know about the days to come
But we think about them anyway
And I wonder if I'm really with you now
Or just chasin' after some finer day

Anticipation, anticipation
Is makin' me late
Is keepin' me waitin'

Source: LyricFind

Songwriters: Carly Simon