(Written in March 2011)
Lynelle had a new book on Focusing, (The Power of Focusing by Ann Cornell) written by a woman who’d studied with Eugene Gendlin and gone on to teach lots of classes. So she’s developed the technique into a fine art of getting to connect and converse with inner knowing. I’ve been trying to use it with the fear, but it’s not working. I think I’m trying too hard. I imagine if I say “Hello” to it the way she suggests it will fade or change, so I’m really trying to make it go away. Of course that doesn’t work. I wonder if I could work with the next layer, the one who wants it to go away. I immediately hear a burst of words: “I want to have a life! I’m sick and tired of being disabled by this low-grade fear! I wish it would go away!” and while I write these thoughts down I feel warmth and strength in my belly. O yes, she’s angry, and she’s standing there, hands on hips, the angry 5-year-old and I just smile, I’m glad to see her. “You haven’t painted in a long time!” she complains. I get an image of a grey stone shape labeled FEAR and then painting it out with red. Yes, maybe I can do that. But it’s also true that the fear is part of me so I can’t just make it go away. It’s like a terrified baby, lying there screaming, and my integrity and compassion demand that I just sit here with it, let her know I’m not going away. “I’m still here, I’m not going to make you talk if you don’t want to, and I’m not going to abandon you.” “You abandon me all the time!!” “I’m sorry, that’s true, but it’s not my intention to abandon you, and if I do leave you, I’ll always come back.”
Wrote more in my journal but I could still feel the frightened one. I thought of leaving her somewhere and got a panicked “Don’t leave me with her!” meaning the 5-yr-old. I reassured her, asked about Mama Greene. Baby still felt scared. So then I said “How about if I carry you next to me in a Snugli kind of thing?” I could feel her warmth & gratitude & love. I can feel it now. “There, there, dear, I’ve got you.” The 5-yr-old says “What a wimp!” I say “I think you’re jealous and you’re welcome to come along on any adventures today.”
I made a Jizo with a clinging baby, a little how I feel my inner baby clinging to me. I put his arms around the baby and bent his head to look at it. I like the result. The thought of the baby clinging and being held is comforting.
I had promised the 5-yr-old that I would paint so I went up to the studio. I squeezed out some black & white paint & covered two pieces of paper with sponged grey labeled “FEAR”.
This was the start of a long period of feeling really great. I made another of the new style of Jizo, and I kept going with the grey fear painting. I taped the two pieces of paper together and covered them with sponged black & white. Then I spent some time making a stamp that said FEAR. After stamping FEAR all over the painting in both black and white, I started painting red flames coming up from the bottom and starting to cover all the grey. This ability to persist with a project is new and felt really good.