Breaking Bonds, page 10
The Desert Fathers tradition included the Jesus Prayer, a method of repetitive prayer to help with contemplation. The formula was to repeat “Lord, Jesus Christ, Son of God” on the in-breath, and “Have mercy on me, a sinner” on the out-breath.4 The repetition is not only comforting; it helps to release unsettling, negative, and obsessive thoughts—a form of mental activity known in Buddhism as the monkey mind.
Some repetitive phrases are known as mantras. They are instruments of thought that are helpful for dealing with mind chatter. “Om Shanti Om,” is a popular mantra often employed by yoga practitioners. Shanti means “peace” in Sanskrit.
The difference between mantra meditation and centering prayer is that centering prayer is not an exercise in focusing attention on something, such as a mantra; rather it is concerned with the intention to consent to the presence and action of God in your life during the time of prayer.5
According to Cistercian monk Father Thomas Keating in his book Intimacy with God: An Introduction to Centering Prayer, whatever makes a connection to God most accessible to you is what you should do. You may initially feel frustrated, and your mind may not be able to grasp God, but you can learn to be at home in the cloud of unknowing.
Meditation in the ancient tradition of the Kabbalah uses repetition of the many Hebrew names of God to enhance awareness and connect to the divine presence. Repetition is used to crowd out unwelcome thoughts, attain peace, and bring about positive changes in life. The aim of Kabbalah meditation is to make the practitioners carriers of the light of God.6
It may take some experimentation to find what works to calm the monkey mind in your meditation, but your peace of mind is more important than anything else. For convenience and out of the tradition of my faith, which is Catholicism, I use masculine pronouns to identify God, but many other people either don’t think that God has a gender or that God encompasses both genders. My personal belief is that God is beyond knowing and description.
When you meditate, find a quiet space. Turn off the ringer on your phone and lock the door if you must, so that you won’t be disturbed. Sit with good posture, in a comfortable chair with both feet on the floor and your hands gently resting on your thighs close to your knees with your palms face up. If there is not much privacy in your home, use the bathroom as your meditation room.
Close your eyes and imagine that you are surrounded and infused by white light, then breathe. You could try counting to four when you breathe in and when you breathe out, pausing for two counts in between. Imagine that you are breathing in the light of God and breathing out negative energy, unproductive thoughts, and limiting beliefs.
You may also want to concentrate on a phrase or word as you breathe in and out. Try love, peace, or Abba (“father” in Aramaic and Hebrew). If a thought comes, acknowledge it and be patient, and bring your focus gently back to your breath. Come back again to your breath or your word every time you notice that your mind has wandered.
Answers may not come during your meditations, but instead over the next several days or weeks. At some point during the day you may get an idea or sense of “knowing,” or you’ll get a message in your dreams. You may want to write a question and put it under your pillow before you go to sleep.
Keep a pen and paper by your bed to write down your dream as soon as you wake up so that it is not forgotten. You may get divine guidance that you will not be able to remember later if you don’t write it down right away. Write down as many details as you can, and you will be more likely to figure out their meaning.
Dream messages are usually symbolic and archetypal, as well as personal. The meaning of your dream symbols may differ markedly from a dream interpretation book, so you will have to interpret the messages yourself. They are just for you in language that you can understand. As many dream messages are in metaphor, it may take you a little while to figure out what the messages mean for you. Fortunate coincidences may start to happen. You may meet someone who can help you. Be sure to ask for help if that is the case. There is a reason why that person is showing up in your life right now. Accept help that is offered. Always say thank you, as gratitude is a magnet that draws more good things to you.
PRAYER POWER
“Some things have to be believed to be seen.”
―MADELEINE L’ENGLE
In her audio program The Power of Prayer, medical intuitive Carolyn Myss says that the role of prayer is mainly for personal transformation, truth, insight, illumination, and the inner journey. According to Myss, prayer can be a petition, such as for health, protection, or guidance, but it should not be used to ask for unnecessary material things.7 She is deeply influenced by Saint Teresa of Avila, who wrote her renowned treatise The Interior Castle in 1577 as a practical blueprint for an intimate relationship with God.
You may pray for God to remind you of what is important. Or pray with humbleness for God to give you the ability to see clearly, to see the truth in yourself and others, and to give you the strength, protection, and guidance to do what you need to do. You may also use prayer for the examination of conscience so that you can be a better person, one willing to make the sacrifice to change for the better so that you can be of service to others. That is the way to peace and true joy.
Prayer helps us establish a deeper connection with God and transformation of the self. It does not change other people. You have no control over anyone else. Only yourself. So, pray to adhere to right thought and right action. As you change for the better, so will your outer circumstances. Be a work in progress with God’s help. Pray for the grace of faith. Pray for world peace.
During my divorce, I mostly prayed when I was extremely upset and unable to hear the voice of God or my intuition. I didn’t have the tools to connect with God in a meaningful way. After praying for guidance, I stumbled upon helpful books and people.
To have a direct contact with God, you will need to be calm and receptive, listening in the stillness of your inner being so that you can feel at peace and loved because you are. Your role in praying is to have faith that God hears every one of your prayers. Pray and then let go. Trust in a power higher than yourself.
You may get the answers to your prayers in different forms, such as an urging, a knowing, a dream, a serendipitous contact with the right person, a book or video, or a conversation. Sometimes no answer is the answer. It may not be the answer that you want, but it may be the one that you will receive. Be receptive and pay attention. It is still up to you to take the right action based upon the guidance you receive.
Pray and have faith. When combined with correct action, prayer changes outcomes.
Remember, you can’t just hope or pray for change. You have to be the initiator of change.
A good motto is: Pray and prepare, then act.
COMMUNITY
“From a practical standpoint, we must have certainty not in the Creator and His ability to protect and care for us, but in the efficacy of the tools that He has provided for us.”
―PHILIP S. BERG
You may need more than meditation and prayer to get you through difficult times. A sense of community with other members of your religious community and your spiritual counselor—whether that is a pastor, minister, rabbi, imam, or meditation teacher—could help you to stay grounded and feel a sense of belonging that you don’t have at home.
Feel free to stay at your current church or temple if it feels satisfying to you. If not, try other churches. Go for a walk with God in a park and appreciate the wildlife. Be open to trying different things until you feel as though your soul’s needs are being met.
If you believe that things in your life are hopeless and you will fail, you are right. If you believe that no matter what happens, you will survive and thrive, you are right.
Your beliefs are a prayer, so what do you choose to believe?
SACRED SIGNS
“Look deep into nature, and then you will understand
everything better.”
―ALBERT EINSTEIN
I recommend that you read Animal Speak by Ted Andrews to learn how to recognize and interpret signs from the animal world. I received a crucial omen soon after my divorce when I thought all the risks were finally over. A large red-tailed hawk flew into the middle of my front yard, which faced a very busy street, and perched on my lawn for a long time. I just happened to look out the window and noticed that it had remained there, turning its head from side to side, keenly observing its surroundings with great interest, unperturbed by the noise of the traffic. It was odd that it did not fly off, so much so, in fact, that its presence seemed surreal. I recognized at that moment that it was a divine sign that something urgently needed my attention and I wasn’t yet seeing the whole picture.
According to Andrews, the hawk is the messenger bird, meaning we should pay attention whenever it shows up.
We often get sacred signs from the animal kingdom or in our dreams when we most need them. As it turned out, on the day the hawk landed on my lawn I had received an email from my ex-husband demanding that I sign quit claim deeds related to the divorce and mail them to him right away. If I had done so without protecting myself first, it would have potentially ruined my credit. I would have had no recourse other to pay his mortgage payments if he didn’t pay them himself. Essentially, I would have become his financial hostage.
I thank God and that red-tailed hawk for giving me the gift of reminding me to check the implications of my ex-husband’s demand carefully. Apparently, my lawyer had overlooked this issue while preparing my divorce decree. Thankfully, I received a warning from a bird of prey, a messenger from heaven.
Pay attention to what is going on around you. You may get useful signs in unexpected ways. I got this message from nature because I noticed that it was there. Receiving it was not an unusual occurrence, and I am not more special than anyone else. Signs are all around you, too, which you will see if you pay attention. The more time you spend in nature, being alert, the more likely you are to get guidance like this.
MUSIC MAGIC
“The only thing better than singing is more singing.”
―ELLA FITZGERALD
Listening to music can be healing when we are in pain, especially classical music, folk music, pop, or soft rock. There is some indication that music affects levels of oxytocin and can trigger the release of endorphins, a natural opiate. An article entitled “Music on the Brain,” published in Time, described the research of Robert Zatorre, a neuroscientist at McGill University in Montreal. In studies with PET scanners, he has shown that the parts of the brain involved in processing emotion light up with activity when a subject hears music.8 Also, listening to the right kind of music can lower your blood pressure.9
It is important during this difficult time in your life for you to avoid listening to music that saddens you or that sounds loud and aggressive, which could cause your body to release stress chemicals, such as cortisol. Your brain already has been flooded with cortisol because of the stress and fear you’ve experienced in your marriage and possibly in court or mediation. Cortisol and other stress-related hormones can decrease the size of the hippocampus in the brain, which has a significant negative effect on learning and short-term memory.10
Fortunately, these effects also can be significantly reversed if you take care of yourself during and after the divorce if you minimize your exposure to additional stress and actively do whatever you can to activate your relaxation response, such as with meditation or the right kind of music.
Since ancient times, people have understood that music has healing properties. Neurological music therapy now has given an explanation why. Because positive mood affects the capacity for memory, it is important for you to listen to positive music in the car or wherever else possible.11
The fact that certain music heals makes sense considering that everything is in a state of vibration, including us. Everything is sound vibrating at different frequencies. There are an upper limit and a lower limit to the frequency of sounds that the human ear can hear. Some other animals hear sounds that we cannot at higher frequencies, such as dogs and cats, or at lower frequencies, such as elephants. From subatomic particles moving around the nucleus of an atom to planets in distant galaxies that are rotating around their stars, everything is in motion, vibrating at a particular speed. You could say everything is making music.
When we are happy, we feel lighter, and our level of vibration is faster. When we are depressed, we feel heavy, and our vibration is slower. It is necessary for you to tune out the negative messages you receive from your husband and from some music, especially songs containing lyrics that degrade or objectify women, as these may trigger traumatic memories and symptoms of PTSD. If you hear a song with offensive lyrics on the radio, change the station immediately or turn it off. Remember that everything you choose to listen to affects your perception of the world.
Tibetan priests and Christian monks have practiced chanting for many hundreds of years because it is sacred and spiritual. This practice has many health benefits for the body, mind, and spirit, including lifting depression and lethargy and giving one a profound sense of peace. Humming, or self-created sound is particularly soothing to the central nervous system.12
Humming for five minutes can help you lower your breath rate from fifteen to seventeen shallow breaths a minute to as little as four to six full breaths per minute. Slowing down the pace and deepening the breath will lower your blood pressure and heart rate, increase your levels of neurochemicals and hormones, such as melatonin and pain-relieving endorphins, and reduce the levels of stress-related hormones in your body. It’s fun, fast and easy.
Sit comfortably with your eyes closed and let your jaw, facial muscles, and shoulders relax. Take a slow deep breath into your belly and then make an Mmm sound while you exhale with your lips gently closed. Repeat for up to fifteen minutes.
It is a good idea to sit quietly for a few minutes after you are done and pay attention to how peaceful you feel.
If you like that, also try the sound of Ahhh, which is great to do when you are tense.
Making your own music never felt so good, and you don’t even have to be able to keep a tune to do it. I sure can’t.
IN THE BEGINNING WAS THE WORD
“No matter how difficult and painful it may be, nothing sounds as good to the soul as the truth.”
―MARTHA BECK
It is extremely important that you pay attention to the words you speak. What you say out loud has even more power than thoughts that you have not verbalized.
Pay attention to how you talk about yourself. Sometimes we don’t even realize the negative way in which we talk about ourselves to other people. We say things like: “I could never do that,” “I’m not that smart,” or “I’ll never have . . .” Words are so powerful that you can convey a self-defining image through repetition that becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. Never limit yourself. It’s bad enough that other people have done that to you. When you catch yourself starting to say something self-deprecating or self-limiting, please stop. Reframe the ideas in a way that is truthful yet positive and encouraging.
Start talking about yourself positively. I am not talking about bragging or being arrogant. Say instead, “I can do that,” “I can learn how,” or “I will work to have what I want”. Then do it.
Other people, including your children, lose respect for you if you put yourself down in front of them. They even may begin to feel superior to you because of it. Some women automatically say, “Excuse me,” when someone else bumps into them. This is a form of submission. If you accidentally bump into someone else, it’s certainly appropriate to say “Excuse me,” but do not apologize when there is nothing to apologize for. Stop apologizing for your existence. You have a right to be here, as much as anyone else on this planet. Have enough belief in yourself not to put yourself down in front of anyone.
If you make a mistake, apologize for it sincerely, make amends, but only apologize once. You have no control over whether the other person will forgive you. Do not keep apologizing, as it only keeps you powerless and stuck in the mistake. Forgive yourself, make any necessary changes to avoid making that mistake again, and move on. Remember, the other person makes mistakes, too. Do your best and keep trying. If the other person keeps bringing up the mistake, ask them what is bothering them, as you have already apologized. If they don't accept your apology, let go of the matter. You may need to let them go if they are unwilling to forgive.
All your spoken words are important, as they “speak” to your integrity, so keep your promises, tell the truth, and avoid negativity and gossip. Silence is better than speaking without thinking. It will help you to become a better listener.
Avoid exaggeration and white lies. If some of your friends encourage any of these tendencies, it may be time to find new friends.
It is imperative that you not make promises to your children that you may be unable to keep. The best course is to make as few promises as possible. Say “I’ll try, but I can’t promise”, which is more honest. Trust is hard earned and easily lost.
Treat yourself with respect by not allowing others to mistreat or disrespect you in their words also. Your outer circumstances change when you change the words that you use when you talk to yourself as well as to others and insist upon being spoken to respectfully.
You are not selfish for taking care of yourself. You take better care of others if you are at your best. You also provide a positive example when you set boundaries with your children regarding how they talk to you. Your insistence shows them how they will be able to take good care of themselves as adults.
There is tremendous power in the word no. Use it to set boundaries and to stop letting other people treat you like a doormat. If you don’t give yourself permission to do this, what do you think that your children will do when they find themselves in a similar situation? Say yes to a good life and to taking care of yourself with your vocabulary.
