Do You Know How Beautiful You Are?

Dear friends, 

A few days ago my mind was wandering as I sat in the passenger seat of my friend's car. During a lull in the conversation, an image began to form in my mind: 

A mirror with the words, "Do you know how beautiful you are?" written around it. I let my mind continue to clarify the picture and then told my friend, "I know what my Art Squared piece is going to be." 

For 11 years Louisville Visual Art has hosted a fundraiser, Art Squared, for which artists donate a square piece of particular size to be auctioned. I submitted a piece for the first time last year and am happy to do so again this year. 

After the car ride, I started working on the piece, first writing on the canvas in a spiral, "Do you know how beautiful you are?" over and over. Then I covered it with paint. I'll put a round mirror in the center and around it, I'll again spiral the words. 

As I've been creating, I've been reflecting on the question. How many of us truly see the fullness of our being, all the ways we shine brightly, the ripples of love emanating from our simple existence?  

I suspect most of us don't see our beauty clearly. I can recall times I've wished a friend or acquaintance could see their light shining in the same way I could. A few months ago a friend expressed that same wish for me. Until she said it, I hadn't even realized how much I was obscuring the radiant parts of me from myself.

I've been offering myself more grace since then, practicing care for the parts of me I judge to be less-than, practicing connection with my brightness even during circumstances that may not feel easy, bright, or beauty-filled.

When I am confident in my love-core, what I believe is the essence of each of us, I can respond from that center. When I am only aware of the gnarly parts of me, the hardened places, the parts that may seem grimy on the surface, I may respond from those shallower, less steady places. I want to respond more consistently from the center. 

Since the beginning of 2024 I've been spending a lot of time in my studio, mostly creating collages. The studio is a place where my whole being comes out. Yesterday's time there included working on the Art Squared piece focused on beauty and on a piece about rage. Externalized in this visual form, I can see all parts of me as beautiful. 

As I'm writing, I'm thinking about Howard Thurman's words: "Don't ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive and go do it. Because what the world needs is more people who have come alive." 

Isn't that when we're at our most beautiful- when we're doing what makes us come alive? 

The thought bring conflicting emotions- joy for those who can do what makes them come alive, gratitude for the ways and places I come alive, and grief for those who don't have the same access to what gives them life and amplifies their beauty. Rather than following the grief at this moment, I'm going to focus on the joy, gratitude, and aliveness. And I wonder:  

What makes you come alive?

Where and how do you see your own beauty? 

One place I connect with mine is in retreat spaces. On Sunday I'm offering this month's Savoring Time mini-retreat, with the theme of Bloom! These sweet times to slow down have been so life-giving, so beauty-filled. 
 
Saturday was going to be the start of The Artist's Way. Recognizing that my excitement to start as soon as possible was a bit hasty, I've moved the start to August 17th. If you were considering the process and summer dates didn't work, I hope you'll join us in the fall. The Artist's Way offers many, many opportunities to connect to your own beauty and the beauty around us. 
     
To learn more about upcoming offerings, visit this page. If they speak to you, I hope you'll join me.  If you know of others who'd love this work, please share with them!

With love, 
Cory

If I Asked You To Name All the Things You Love...

Cory looks up, to the camera, hand on heart. The words “If I asked you to name all the things you love, how long would it take for you to name yourself?” are in the top right of the image. Photo credit: Natosha Via

Happy Valentine's Day!

I've been thinking about the words in the image above for a few days now:

If I asked you to name all the things you love, how long would it take for you to name yourself? *

If you're like me, the answer is... I don't know how long it would take...depends on the day, hour, minute. I am practicing the art of self-love and self-compassion. It is, like so many things I write, talk, and teach about, a creative practice, an ongoing experiment.

A week ago I was in the third Zoom session of a class to learn a sequence of yoga moves. Before the class, I had had another Zoom meeting, then rushed out to run an errand, and rushed back home for the class. I was wearing jeans that were a little too tight, not ideal for a yoga class, but didn't have time to change if I wanted to arrive on time.

As we started the class with meditation, my mind was still rushing. I noticed my too tight pants. I was a little hungry. I hoped that my cats would come near me for a pet as I saw a few other people's cats do on the screen. I felt the cold air around me in my old and breezy house, as well as the heat of my nearby space heater that I couldn't get positioned quite right. You can probably guess that this was not my most focused meditation.

We finished the meditation and were invited to ask questions about the practice. This was when my bad student tape kicked in. I hadn't watched the previous week's recording and though I had practiced the sequence, I hadn't done so daily as we were encouraged to do. There was no way in hell I was going to admit these grave transgressions. If I didn't ask questions, no one would know just how bad of a student I was.

After a few people asked questions, there was new content teaching and then it was time to practice. I had made it through the first part without anyone finding me out!

Except that this week before doing the sequence we were going to start with the optional prostrations.

Oh, s**t. I had never done the prostrations. I could only guess that they'd been taught in the second class, so since I hadn't watched the recording yet, I hadn't learned them. Maybe I could figure them out by trying to watch while we were moving through them.

Other people's cameras were not positioned in a way that I could see the whole flow of the prostration. I was caught, fully visible on camera, being recorded in my fumbling! I tried to fake my way through and was relieved when we finished and were moving to the safe territory of the familiar sequence.

Then twice as we were going through each part of the sequence, someone helping the primary teacher offered a couple of posture corrections. The person made general statements, not directed at any one person, but I was certain she was talking to me. Caught again!

We finished the sequence and went into a closing meditation. Finally, in those last minutes of class I calmed down, sank into my body, and felt relieved that I had made it through my epic failure.

I write this story now with a smile on my face. On Wednesday I talked to my friend who teaches the class. She said that though she was trying to keep an eye on everyone (I think there are 12 of us), she hadn't noticed that I was struggling. I laughed as I told her that that meant I had done my fake-out well, because I hadn't wanted anyone to see I didn't know what I was doing!

Though that class experience wasn't my favorite, I am incredibly grateful to have had that hour of discomfort. It reminded me of the vulnerability of being a student, of learning something new, and opened my heart wider to the people I work with and how they (some of you) might feel sometimes because an old tape starts playing about the kind of student or person they (you?) are. It reminded me that the best place to start, the only place we can start, is right where we are. It reminded me that the best way to learn is not by pretending that we know something we don't, but by asking questions.

My friend's care when we spoke a couple of days after the class reminded me that I don't have to be the perfect student (whatever that even means) for someone to love me. I don't have to be the perfect anything for someone to love me or for me to love myself. I also know that I want to keep learning, keeping one foot on the ground of humility and placing the other in the sea of self-compassion.

With these things in mind I choose today to name myself, to put myself high on the list of what I love, who I love. My wish for you on this Valentine's Day is that you, too, name yourself as a beloved, placing yourself high on your love list.

*I only noticed my typo (D missing in “would”) after publishing this. I decided to leave it, a choice to love myself even when I misspell a word.)
~~~

If you are a woman, one way you might put yourself high on your love list is by joining Reimagining ME:Mindful Explorations, which starts a week from tomorrow- Tuesday 2/22/22! At its core the program encourages us to practice connecting with ourselves, both with humility and the deepest of self-compassion, to re-member who we are - unique, beautiful, irreplaceable beings in a web of Interbeing with one another. This program brings together practices of Compassionate Communication, creativity, and body awareness. I was going to close the registration today, but am keeping it open. If you're not quite sure and want to try a session before committing, you can register for the first session a la carte.

Re-writing Those Darn Old Stories

I just wrapped up a 5-week Compassionate Communication class. The last session of the class always focuses on self-empathy. That theme runs throughout the entire class, but we take a whole session at the end to delve into topic and practice. We identify some of the mean messages we tell ourselves- the ones that judge, criticize, shame, and blame. One of my teachers calls it the Path to Self-Destruction, or if taken to its greatest extreme, the Path to Suicide.

Somewhere along the way most of us have internalized unkind messages so deeply that we now hear them in our own voice and we believe them. Even when we develop habits that may serve our well-being (eating healthy foods, getting enough sleep, exercising), we might do them with an undertone of shame, blame, or threat to ourselves.

In the class, after identifying the self-violent messages, we notice the feelings associated with the message and the needs beneath the message. Seeing the needs, we name some strategies, small steps we might take to meet the needs that we’ve uncovered. I’ve noticed that sometimes people identify strategies that are just as unkind as the initial messages they’re working with- those “should,” “have to”, “need to” messages, or straight out demands, “Do this!” The strategies are still coming from a place of self-judgment, rather than self-understanding and compassion. In those cases, we may dig a little deeper into the person’s feelings and needs and then work together to brainstorm other ways to meet the needs that incorporate self-kindness.

In The Artist’s Way, one of the weekly tasks is to work with this (slightly modified) mantra: Treating myself like a precious gift makes me strong. I love this mantra. I use it when I notice myself getting all self-judgy. Recently I found myself in a storm of self-judgment, questioning my value to other people, and deeper than that, my value, period. Then I remembered my mantra. I wrote it in my journal enough times to move me out of the story of unworthiness and stagnation and into one of worthiness, one with a new plot line. In the new story, I was my own hero. I was kind to myself. I remembered that my worth is not dependent on anyone else’s opinions or actions toward me. I took action to meet my needs. I re-wrote the story. It felt good!

The tricky part about these stories is that when we re-write them, we may think we’ve done so with permanent ink. We celebrate! Then we look at the paper to see the ink fading to invisibility, and the old story appearing again.

It may take us by surprise. It may make us weary. “That again?” And we so we do the work again, re-write the story again, perhaps with new plot twists, perhaps with the ones that have been successful before. 

We’re all works in progress. Re-writing the story is an ongoing process. It’s a practice. It’s an experiment. We can do it alone, but I think it’s best when we find the right people to write with, the ones who can support us in becoming our own heroes and to whom we can offer the same.

Shall we write together?