Courage to Complete

Update photo from neighbor of Minou refusing a treat.

Home now, unpacked and showered.  The kitty ate 3 meals a day and only threw up twice while I was gone.  I was reminded that when I left for the workshop I thought it was possible that I would talk about my cat a lot; I was really making myself nervous about if that would be a good use of my time.  You see, cats turn you into a crazy cat person! They do it slowly so by the time they’re 13 or 14 you didn’t even notice anything changed and people roll their eyes right in front of you as you talk about your cat and you keep talking!  I don’t think I mentioned her once during the workshop. My worrying about her refusing to eat was, of course, a complete waste of energy.  I do feel validated that one of the days my neighbor went through three different kinds of food kitty refused  and then her boyfriend fed the kitty the same food and she ate it!  I’m imagining it’s proof that cats will go to great lengths to play mind games with humans, even risking their lives for a laugh.

Expressing my vulnerability. Cred: Genevieve Shouff

I feel much better being home than I thought I would.  I was dreading coming home because 1) I started having such a grand ‘ol time and enjoying my new honest friends I just wanted to keep being around them –and- 2) It would mark the beginning of the completions I promised to initiate and the completions I know I need to make.  Completions are conversations with people I have unfinished business with.  It might seem big or small, but the point is that I still think about it and so it festers and poisons my mind; Brad Blanton says “Get over shit and be happy!”.  One man from the workshop has already initiated a completion with his father and posted the early report of the conversation on our secret Facebook group.  I both scare and inspire myself with his post. I know I will likely have similar results with people in my life as I did with people in the workshop.  After all, someone once resented me for my face –all the time— I survived and am over it: and it has nothing to do with me. (Side note: I resent hyperlinks for high-jacking underlining; I imagine it will never be quite the same and we’ll be forever waving the little hand cursor over it trying to “go” somewhere else.  Sigh…)  

I welcome anyone who knows me and wants to engage me in resentments or appreciations, to get a copy of Radical Honesty, read the chapter on anger (if not the whole book), and let me know you’d like to talk.  Ideally a completion happens in person, but face time or skype works in a pinch.  If you are a relative of mine you will likely eventually hear from me, and I’m pacing myself, so if you have something pressing, call me up!  I am aware I am using this blog to keep me from chickening out on this part of the work, and what the heck!  So what?!  If you are making yourself nervous like me, just remember I happily survived people resenting me for my face and for how I breathe and for crying and for talking…. And they survived me resenting them for their face, for crying, for laughing, even for standing in a doorway once.  And then there were really wonderful appreciations and ones I didn't care about and ones I resented... we're keepin' it human here!  It’s really much much better on the other side of the communication!  Whether you have a beef or some love for me or someone else, the book helps a lot.  Here’s a real link (not just an underline) to the book and others by Brad Blanton http://radicalhonesty.com/store/books/

One of my fav pics from One Tree Yoga Studio by Meredith Rom

I am presently reading Practicing Radical Honesty, which has a guide on how to start a Radical Honesty group.  I imagine I will start a group in the North Bay, so if you’re interested drop me a line at sarahdomke@gmail.com.  I do not promise any timeline on this aspiration, but it is a start.  We also have Taber, the main trainer other than Brad, in Oakland CA, so it’s quite a treat to have such wonderful support nearby!

Also: I am going to continue to post pictures of myself on this blog for now because Sarah Domke, the playboy bunny, has considerably increased her real estate on our google image search.  If you really want to help me out, google us and click on my pictures first  and more often…  though I wouldn’t ask you to not look at hers ;) 

I am still accepting donations to my Radical Honesty fund & offering 10 more Yoga or Energy Work sessions at 50% off.  Energy work available via Skype.  For more info or to contribute go to http://www.sarahdomke.com/#!radical-honesty/c1b2i

so long or not

Last day, we've completed the workshop now and I'm waiting around for whatever the fuck is happening.  Ironically, or perhaps it's quite fitting, I am pissed right now.  The organization with getting to the airport and cleaning up is not to my liking and I resent being asked to have done so much work while here.  I was wanting to savor this time with the few people who have not left already, or at least to wander around in the Denver sunshine kicking clods of dirty melting snow.  Yesterday I went on a walk to the park and had a lovely session on the swings (video above)

I have not gone outside very much during this workshop and so when I have it is the most magical experience.  We're sort of in a rough neighborhood, but stepping out after being in this stuffy bed and breakfast schleping through resentments and appreciations feels like stepping out into heaven!  I felt like I was seeing the world for the first time, the snow and the sunshine, the transvestites and highschool students... everything was beautiful and new and just fine in the universe.

I went upstairs after writing the above to take a little nap after expressing my resentment about the organization of our departure day, receiving resentments for my resentments, feeling the need to sleep off my grumpiness, even though the initial body sensations accompanying my irritation had passed.  I was told that there would be a half hour before anything would happen.  I set my alarm for 30mins and drifted in and out of dream state in my upstairs room.  When I came down, everyone who was not in my airport group was gone!  People I felt very close to and was very much attached to saying goodbye to and squeezing tight to my heart one last time.  When I found out from one of the women in my group I immediately muffled my disappointment saying "it's okay" when she said "sorry".  I went back upstairs to try to retreat back into dreaming, only to cry hard for myself, feeling after all like I don't matter to them.  It was just me and one other woman in the big old bed and breakfast at this point, as some other people in my group went to drop luggage off at the hotel so we can all fit in the car later.

I wrangled my mind from those old familiar places of abandonment and loneliness.  I listened to the voices that said "they don't really care" -- "You ruined it by expressing those last resentments" -- "you were stupid to think you belong" and on.  and on.  I listened and watched and noticed sensations in my body.  I looked out the window wistfully from my little bed, and then I took some deep cool breaths.  I jump-started some other thoughts remembering things people said to me "you're so easy to love" -- "I learned so much from watching you, thank you" -- "I healed myself in your presence" -- "you have a great ass".....  I kept feeling my body and breathing and told myself "it doesn't matter what people think about you, and you happen to have been loved by these people" -- "it has been a confusing day with schedules and it just didn't work out" --"you did withdraw and take a nap, they might have thought you didn't want to be disturbed". I gathered myself up to go downstairs and wait for my other buddies to come back and all go out to dinner.

RIP Ujjayi (for now)

8 angle pose in the Laguna de Santa Rosa.  Photo cred Marissa LaBrecque

I have a really loud ujjayi breath that I quite enjoy and tends to either trigger people or help them in their own breath.  Here at the workshop my breath has been the source of much resentment expressed.  Though I have completed with those people, I’ve decided to suspend my ujjayi breath for now to keep my focus on other things I want to get out of the workshop.  If I get time during the day I’ll go do my own practice with my beloved whisper breath.  A theme for me has been holding who I know I am while other people get triggered by me.  The ujjayi breath gives me a great opportunity for me to practice this, though with all the work we do all day long, I am feeling the need to get some breaks. 

There has been a lot of resentment expressed about me saying I’m a healer and a yoga teacher, the ujjayi breath seems to be a way to refresh the resentment!  I have felt at times that I was being targeted or worn down about this and that I had to fight for myself.  However, I get that we are each here to put down whatever strategies we had before the workshop and surrender to the process here.  So Brad does not want me to breathe ujjayi, I am hardly allowed to explain things, and we had been in what seemed to be a stalemate about tracking sensations in the body.  Until the other day…

Brad gave me the assignment to just feel, not think, and let my body do whatever it wants, eyes open while “Judgmental Prick”—let’s say his name is Mark -- was in the hot seat (Gestalt therapy style) about an issue in his life.  I had been coming into a crescendoing emotionally raw place that Brad had been circling in on getting me to just feel and not do anything about it.  I dove into the assignment, and it actually felt like quite a relief to have permission to just be my freaky self.  I was breathing deep, moaning, sobbing, rocking, coughing and even gagging as Mark went through various similar expressions as the coaches tried to ferret out his feeling, especially anger.  I felt like I was being a super freak and was likely opening myself up to lots of resentment and that people would think I was full of shit, but I stayed with it, not thinking, just feeling and letting my body do what it wanted. 

Numerous times I would feel like coughing or gagging and I’d allow myself to do it, and shortly afterward, Mark would too.  A number of times I would cry when Mark was holding back, but then when he would cry I would feel at peace.  Once my head went all the way back, jutting out my neck and chin and after a bit of that I opened my eyes to see he was doing it too!  I felt like I was channeling his emotions and physical sensations, especially the unexpressed ones.  At one point I felt a primal scream brewing in my belly and at that point inside of myself, I refused to deliver it.  I started to feel very angry as I saw him going into sadness while I was convinced this was a case of sad=mad; I refused to scream for him.  The funny thing looking back is that one of the reasons I did not scream is because I am much more comfy in the realm of sobbing and gagging than I am in the realm of growling/screaming from the depths of all my repressed anger.  I then started to feel sorry for myself that when I just open myself up sometimes I sponge up other’s emotions and I will either be helpless to my own experience or I will have to put a clamp on it and walk around controlling myself all the time.  At this point, feeling sorry for myself, imagining myself as this homeless freak channeling other people uncontrollably all the time, I began to sob for myself.  I had let a thought come in and distract my empathic trance with Mark.  One of the trainers sitting nearby put her hand on my shoulder and said to me “Open your eyes and look at reality”; I told her I was too tired, she said, “that’s why you need to look”.

Now.  Her timing was incredible in that the very moment I let some thoughts come in and I started crying for myself, she brought me back in.  I spoke with her a bit about it today and it seemed that while we may be saying similar things, we don’t feel like we agree.  I’ll tell ya, though, this was a very validating experience for me about who I am and strengthened my knowingness.  I am a trigger and a catalyst, which is one of the ways I am a healer.  I don’t think many people in my group would agree with me on this using the word “healer” but I have had a number of people come up and thank me for the work I’m doing and telling me they’re learning a lot.  No one has resented me for being a freaky feeler during that hot seat session, and Mark was not even aware of my presence!

All of this gets me to thinking that it would do us all well to use curiosity as our go-to mode when something that triggers us or is new comes along.  I imagine that the people who are triggered by the word “healer” have a sort of BS charlatan judgment of healers: It’s no wonder, there are so many frauds and unethical people in the field, and my sense is that there are many more people who are legit.  Healing in my opinion is not something you do to someone, it’s something two people do together through a combination of techniques rooted in allowing the truth and mirroring. 

Since that session I have felt much more grounded and much less resentful about not doing my ujjayi breath.  It is so beautiful to go through these little muddy hells and come out the other side with a lotus in my hair.  Actually, another language tool we work with in the hot seat is to replace “it” with “I”, even if it is grammatically fucked up.  So: I am so beautiful to go through these little muddy hells and come out the other side with a lotus in my hair.  And on to the next!

Swimming with Sharks

When I first saw this photo I only saw my legs crooked in the air, and then I was like "I fucking did that!"  This pose is called Titibasana and was taken by my endlessly dear and talented co-conspirator Marisssa LaBrecque who is also a yoga teacher and the owner of yogaatthemercantile.com

Overview of Radical Honesty language:

The idea is to get as close to reality and the present moment as possible.  This is based on the idea that you can only observe what’s inside of your body, what’s outside of your body, and what’s going through your mind.  Brad calls it "inside, outside, upside down" The main phrases are:

·      I resent you for [something specific like what they said, how their face or body looks –no interpretations/judgments/abstract concepts)

·      I appreciate you for [same as above]

·      I notice [specific sensations in YOUR body in the moment]

·      I imagine [this is where you can use interpretations and judgments, but not often]

·      I made myself [scared, annoyed, sad], about your story (or whatever you made your self feel over that someone else did)

I dove into the deep end here right away, letting all my incongruencies be seen and becoming what I imagined was a target for people to start practicing their resentments on.  I was getting “I resent you for… saying you’re a healer, saying you’re a yoga teacher, talking so much, saying you’re a body expert” –that last one I don’t remember saying and was either imagined by the person who said it, or it flew out of my mouth in a hot defensive moment trying to access my anger and actually just explaining myself (not allowed because my story is not part of reality).  Well, I dove in, and then yesterday (day 3 or 4) I started to feel some coolness in my body, some pleasurable tingling sensations and I imagined I was coming into a clearing.  Also, I had been wondering at what point everyone starts to fall in love with each other and then it seemed to be happening for me, I was really starting to love everyone! 

Loving everyone cooled my resentments and also my desire to express resentment.  Brad warns about this in the book Radical Honesty that when you start to feel good there is danger of going back to being full of shit when you start to experience some positive results and want to hold onto that feeling, creating an expectation.  So often we lie to please people so that we can get a desired outcome… that might be the only reason we lie!  I am experiencing such a desire to hold onto the benefits I earned and I am noticing myself going back into withholding my judgements and resentments, however small.  The appreciations, on the other hand, have been like a masturbation for me as I came into this feeling of space and healing while I have been appreciating people left and right today.  It’s just that it seems especially nitpicking when feeling good to admit that you have a judgment of someone and therefore resentment toward them.  In reality it has nothing to do with them, but we use this language and express our anger as “I resent YOU for” because that’s the truth about how it is playing out in our head, that is part of the lie. The "story" is what we use to justify our lie and make us feel like a better person for having the judgement or resentment.  Brad says "get mad and get over it".  I works, but you have to keep doing it as long as you fucking live.  Fuck has been a very helpful word for me lately :)

Anyway, I got a nice break, and the work I’ve done has landed me squarely in this community.  In addition to beginning to fall in love with everyone we are really becoming a group.  And now I’m going back in.  I have at least one “date” with someone to process today –he who has been very quiet about what’s going on in his mind is now introducing himself to us as a “judgmental prick”, wants to talk to me.  I have offered to teach a yoga class during our day break today.  I have a number of attractions to navigate, some mutual, some not.  I also find everyone attractive in varying degrees.  I am standing again on the shore of the mess that I am so good at creating and diving in once more to swim with the sharks in my mind. 

I am aware that I am burning my life to the ground.  Parts of me are dying that I am both am eager to kill and am scared shitless to lose.  For now I have to loose all hope that I will be at all recognizable when I return, and just maybe some parts of who I am, the true parts if there are any, will carry over.  I am learning to consider the possibility that I am constructed completely of BS.  I'm definitely not all BS, but it's part of the process of letting things die that need to die.  What is on the other side I have absolutely no idea.  Also I'm starting to think that saying "phony mustaches bursting into flames" in the description of this blog feels flippant, but it still cracks me up, so I'm keeping it... for now.

If you would like to support me in this journey, I am accepting donations and offering 50% off of services purchased until March 9th to be scheduled when I return.  To donate or purchase go to http://www.sarahdomke.com/#!radical-honesty/c1b2i   If you dig it, drop me a line at sarahdomke@gmail.com

Getting Dumber

Sad=Mad

The main theme for my learning today is that I have been an expert at converting anger into sadness.  I had some huge processing in front of the group about my life story I told last night.  And then I also had to process later after lunch with a woman and tell her I resented her for something she did that had been festering in me and I was scared as shit to say so.  We all agreed to tell the truth here, and that includes not withholding.  We are being trained to watch our minds and as soon as possible get a reality check on things that we are starting to tell stories about.  So I knew as I was feeling pissed and scared and persecuted and sorry for myself that I was going to have to come out with it, and soon before I became too convincing to myself!  I had a breakthrough in expressing anger with her when she told me that she likes it when people yell "fuck you, I resent you for..." to her, it's a thrill for her.  I appreciated her for saying that, I imagined it gave me the courage to really go for it, afterall, she likes it!  After yelling at the person you check in and notice how your body feels, and maybe rate the amount of rage you feel on a scale of 1-10.  I was having a hard time rating my anger because I was feeling sadness.  So she agreed to give me a pass on rating my anger and instead rate my sadness considering it as a sort of translation of my anger rating.  We had to end on a "3" and then she expressed her resentment to me, we both expressed appreciations, and we walked off to dinner much much happier and lighter, which... I would get checked for saying "happier and lighter" because they are stories/judgements and not describing reality; it can feel like going through a language land mind, but I'm starting to get it!  Brad Blanton says you're healed (my word, not his) when you're down to being dumb and making the simplest observations: "you're a man! my heart tight! you have a shirt! my face hot!"  Well it's working because I can barely form sentences when talking to others.  I'm again so exhausted, I feel emptied of a bunch of shit, and my body is sore.  Good night!

Yes, AND

Bad feng shui, but it's my little space

Hoo eee! Today, day 1 of RH, we’re introducing ourselves to the group sharing: Name; age; where we’re from; net worth; debts; income; what we don’t’ want to share; how we shoot ourselves in the foot; what we hope to get out of this workshop.

What if I am a drama queen? 

4 people into introductions I finally got my turn, I had been jetting my hand for 3 of those before I got in.  Just like in my Forrest training when we did truth speaking circle and I was half way around a circle of 30ppl, the energy and sensations in my body were feeling overwhelming and out of control.  I could feel their pain and torment vividly.  I worried that when it came to me there would be no me left in it and just a jumble of things I can relate to and feel but cannot affect.  Brad coached me toward blubbering, which I began rather easily, but not all the way, I only had 10mins.  I opened with my confession of being clairsentient and feeling overwhelmed in the moment with everyone’s feelings and stories.   Here’s a paraphrased sample of the dialogue:

“Where do you feel it in your body?”

My heart, my solar plexus, pressure in my head, my throat, hands activated in a tingling sensation up my arms and through diaphragm

“How’s it changing now?"

It feels like a big… [gesturing with hands down I was seeing a black hole beneath me]

“Not what it feels like, that’s a thought, how does it feel?”

--this went around a few times before I came to:

Numb

“Where”

From the waist down

“Good.  And now what do you feel”

Early morning view from my little tower.

Flush of heat down my arms and face

“Awe, good, you feel the heat”

Yes, you can see it, I know. (I was quite flushed)

And, as always, the coaching is around ‘it’s not about them or us, it’s about you”.  Yes, and everyone else too.  I feel like this is so taken for granted that it is assumed that shutting it down  [my perception that not everything I feel is me] that it is not even questioned… except by me and others who understand me (few), but it’s like we have to go underground.  It’s funny because while it’s said ‘don’t take responsibility for others’ it’s also saying take responsibility for what you feel –so if I feel others and I take responsibility for what I feel then I’m taking responsibility for others.  Yeah, that’s it! (Indignant tone, I’m making a joke)  One woman came up to me afterward and validated me, said she understood what I felt and we had an intense whispered conversation about feeling and knowing things that maybe aren’t expressly ours.  And don’t get me wrong:  it’s all both and.  AND: I am feeling resentful for the lack of consideration that there might be some truth to what I’m sharing about my experience that is not all a fucked up story to avoid taking responsibility.  It’s becoming clear I have to take a stand for myself and no one may understand, most will think I’m being a drama queen and just resisting the growth.   Or something completely unexpected and wonderful could happen!  I certainly do have resistance going on and pent up anger, resentment, bitterness… yes, AND.

After my turn and all the crying and sensation tracking in my body, I did not have that problem of feeling overwhelmed by other’s stories.  I feel exhausted now, maybe I just didn’t have the energy or I shut it down somehow or it just worked.  There definitely is something to this work that is working (workity work work, ha-ha! no editor here), and I feel just so tired and antisocial now.  People are hanging out having intense conversations, and I usually love that kind of thing, but now I need to discharge and rest.  That’s what I’m doing, writing here in my springy cot in the weird little Denver window room. 

It’s really going deep for me right now that this is all being filmed.  I’m being asked to bear all, and I thought I was willing, but with the cameras rolling it completely raises the bar.  The idea is that by the end of the workshop you don’t care who knows anything about you at all.  There are also people here who are on their 2^nd, 3^rd and 26^th times.   Already we are giving each other strength to keep opening and letting go.  Brad said I am too smart and hopefully by the end of this retreat I will be much dumber (others had a similar diagnosis).  It feels awkward to hear stuff like that because I totally agree with it and I teach a lot of it already.  I crave the recognition that I know and I really get it,  while feeling like I’m being called a hypocrite for teaching something I have not mastered myself.  They don’t know what I teach yet, but I will be teaching some morning classes while I’m here.  I’ve been going over and over this for the last couple of years with teaching because my lessons come through when I teach others.  I do a good job too, but I’m not a master of them, I’m more like a scrappy guide who forges through the swamp offering my example and cheering us forward.  By the time I’m a master of something it’s too boring to teach, I want to be on the teetering edge and I don’t want anyone to tell me I have to know where I’m going with it or what will happen.  I want to trust the process, and when I do, it works.  So why do I muck around trying to explain it?!  I want someone to say what I’m doing is okay, and my sense is that rather than finding the recognition and validation for what I’m doing from any of these people (or any of you readers) that I will probably find it in that numbness below my waist.  I’m going in, but first I’m taking a nap.