the guilt has gone-evaporated. the experience of the past week showed me that there is no reason to have guilt. I did what i knew to be the best thing for all of us. there was a lot of pain-it caused a lot of pain but that pain isn't as it was a couple of years ago-there may still be some pain but it's not all associated with our splitting up as a family.

Gary told me how i was. and there is truth in that. but it is how i was-not how or who I am. Now it is seen, acknowledged, allowed, i think the pattern of behaviour will be weak, no more powerful or long lasting as an echo. For sure, i admire people, their qualities, their talents-i love them and let them know that and the time spent with others will have an intensity but no longer will i translate or interpret that as anything more than it is. Thank you gary-for pointing that out. It's very clear. there is no need to do that anymore. It is not who i am. I do express the feelings that i have towards others , i enjoy to do that-i feel that i want to share that-i suppose i have such enthusiasm when i come across, certain traits, talents, expressions of life and understanding-i love to love that in others and in things . I can't help but fall for it-and why should i not fall for it? that is personality -this personality.

Our lives-in a week

How do I write this-put it into words? I've questioned the reason, the point of spending a week, with Gary my estranged husband, in our flat. Of course, on the surface, practically speaking, factually speaking, he came to visit louie, our six year old son who he'd not seen for three months or more-so he needed to see him and louie needed to spend time with his dad.

He could have stayed in a hotel-he didn't have to stay with us, in the home he used to live in until i wanted our marriage to end and for him to move out. But louie wanted his dad here and I didn't feel a need to object or stop that happening even though there was a certain amount of trepidation about what may arise what may come to pass in that week. So, i thought there is something in itself-I sort of don't want to do this so therefore it's a reason to do it.

There was a feeling that there was more of a point to this-a learning, a realisation , a need to revisit or face this man who had represented so much . I had deep seated guilt at spiltting up the family, as well as feeling unsure about how Gary may feel being in his old home with a lot of his old stuff around him, in a conventional family situation, albeit temporary-where it no longer really exists. A bit like a pop up shop-there today, gone tomorrow but with so much occuring in between. And how would it affect me? Who knows what's lurking there? Who knows what may appear? And louie-how may it affect him, would be feel happy being around both of us and how would he be when the time came for his Daddy to leave again when he'd been so looking forward to him coming? There was no feeling of is this right or wrong-I know it's neither-it's just what was going to happen and letting it. No control. Freefall and see where and how you land.

Well i've landed on my feet, quite softly-at times though, floating down and at others tumbling very quickly. I see, i think, what this was about. Though, perhaps as there is more distance -more dust will settle and it will be even clearer. It wasn't easy. It wasn't awful. It's difficult to listen to someone telling you how you are when you know it's not how you are. It's someone's idea of you-their own perception firmly held onto. At times I felt the need to explain myself, defend myself even or at least respond but I realised I wasn't being heard. It's still frustrating when someone refuses to hear you. i think that gary perhaps described someone that I was , how i used to be, what I thought I wanted, what I went after-certainly i recognised some of it. Someone who falls for people and puts them on a pedestal. Someone who feels for people and wants to be the one to ease their pain while at the same time being the important and indespensable one in that persons life. Yes, that would be true. It's no longer the case. And though old patterns die hard, they do eventually die. They have died and perhaps there are echoes and rumblings occasionally , burning intensely until fading into the nothing again. We know it takes time for the old machinery to cease whurring completely.

And so, as he vented his rage at being taunted in a bar about who i may have been with and told me that i was childishly looking for the one and that I am both selfish and patronising and not looking after myself emotionally and how badly i behaved during some of long our time together and and never loved him when we married and had our son, I felt waves of annoyance, amusement, sickness, disbelief, intolerance, frustration, impatience and then just listened and watched as it went on as it always had. And still I care for this man, I find him unusual and like no-one I've ever known. I do question his sanity sometimes because his ability to listen and make consistent eye contact and his ever changing moods swinging from soft to viscious, warm then cold, tender then mean are so fast firing that it can leave you reeling and confused. And i married him! I was wondering how I remained so long in such a mad world with him.

When he asked me why , my reason why we had to split up-I replied that he was consumed with all that was wrong in the world and I was in love with all that it is. And that's it really. And i fall more and more in love with it and there is no need to find the one-this is the one and I'm open to all that comes with that, I'm part of it. And if someone, one day appears to share this with, then perhaps i'll do that but there is no search on to find and be with anyone to the exclusion of all others and all things.

It's like this week was a junction or an intersection where the past, and the present stood together at one point, a bit like the cross. It was turbulent, emotive, difficult and yet not, necessary and part of everything. Like revisiting the past in the now and as we did, past lines, patterns, feelings, thoughts all appeared. There is love between us and we share louie. Beautiful, beautiful louie. Gary is an agitated person who tells me that i'm missing the point somewhere along the line. I asked him what he thought the point was. He tells me that I'm a jelly head and I replied that's maybe the case but I am a happy jellyhead.

I feel like I could sleep and sleep. i wouldn't change this week. Not at all. It was a chance to peer closely at some things and see what has gone, diminished, and for louie to be with his dad. I'm not sorry we're separated -it's the best for all of us to flourish. It was never going to be conventional anyway. We need to be inventive and creative as far as getting together is concerned-perhaps in different places, on trips in towns and villages and occasionally in our respective homes. but the coming together for father and son will be quality time not a difficult day to day existence and Gary and I will continue our tricky relationship which has something significant at it's source.

I continue, as always

it's all about LOVE

I realised clearly last night that one can never know another completely and really it's not necessary. We want to in order to elevate our status and standing with another, our importance to another- but there is no need.
The closest person to me, my son, who i carried in this body and held as he took his first breath and fed on milk from this body and nurture carefully, daily is still operating independently from me. He's not really 'mine'-no one is ever anybody's. The love between us is perhaps the strongest, most intensely felt-constantly flowing in both directions but there is so much about him i'll never know and don't need to know.
All in need to do is love him and that just happens, it's just there. In that love i'll see him, watch, sense, feel and enjoy the essence of him, know his nature-let our true nature communicate and dance freely. I say,'my boy' because he looks like me, he has my genes, he is of this body but I don't own him, there is no ownership. This I understand clearly. I am a parent, a mother and I see what that means.

He had a whole world going on last night in his room, when he was meant to be asleep, that was nothing to do with me. He changed his bed clothes to another set of clothes, changed his bedtime story on his CD player to something else, emptied his wardrobe, ransacked his room and set up little displays of toys. He didn't want to sleep, he was on a mission that only he could understand and I let him do it.

As I changed his clothes back and removed his crocs and put him back into bed at 10.45 when he had exhausted himself, I saw that all I can ever do completely is love him.

Waking Up to Oneness and Celebrating Separateness

Yeah! Love him! The point of existence is clear -living, breathing life as art-art as life

i like i love

I like unmani. She's no nonsense-direct,down to it-with humour and care. She's right, it can be lonely, it is nakedness, vulnerability, it requires courage, wilingness to stand in this, time and time again. The thoughts may keep coming, patterns of thought, groups of thought but they have less and less power, become more and more distant and they are meaningless-like puffs of smoke from a cigarette. I see the thoughts, watch them,but this is stronger, what this is, what i am is prevalent, primary, the thoughts come and go within.

One man today at Unmani's Meeting in Not Knowing said he still wanted to hide and protect himself. I feel the opposite. I want to stand in the face of it and take whatever comes to get to naked truth. I like being hit hard by truth-it can be shattering, I want it to be shattering, going deeper and deeper into this. Now i know, i want to know more, i want be immersed in it completely. There's nothing to lose-no-one to lose it.

I like not knowing. I really like it-the pressure of having to know, feeling like you know or should know creates big problems-it is the problem. And the more people pretend to know, act like they know the more ludicous and removed they become-the more separated they are. This is a glorious, massive mystery. As a little person, it's impossible to compete with it, to hope to know and understand and conquer it. That creates misery.

I love the mystery. I'm in love with the mystery-i am the mystery along with all else...

STRIKE

standing in the face of truth, however harsh it may be, I die somemore and it feels good.
there is nothing to hide from, nothing that needs protecting, -blow apart any remaining notion or hanging on of an identity or attachment to any part of the story. The things that keep dragging me back-look at them, face them, see them, meet them, then they fall away, dissolve into nothing, made of nothing. They have no substance.

this.here.right here.right now...there's only this

Bill Hicks: What is the point to Life

underneath it all

am I just really, really tired or...some days are odd like I'm not at all connected-not in it at all-it's happening, I speak, I interract but the connection's not there. Gary called, i missed it, he left a sarcastic text-a reaction came like hot water scalding my insides and a feeling of me and him descended-not a nice feeling-irritated, uncomfortable. It passes.

sporadically the effort of going along with it, getting mixed in with all the other stories co-existing, becomes a bit of a chore. Some days it's enjoyable, really easy and flowing, fascinating and endlessly interesting but others i want to be still and quite, just noticing, reading, listening or contemplating.

always i love louie-sweet, gentle love as soft as his skin, as fragrant as him-even when I'm frustrated with his mad energy bursting all over the place-i love that boy. it is all reflected in him, in his image and presence -in an unadulturated form-that's why it's so whoozy-it's like mainlining LOVE..pure

the stage is set

Sometimes, places are appearing as real as a film or stage set and the action that takes place has the significance and quality of an improvised play. As it's happening, you need to buy into it to make it work, do it with conviction and truth but it feels like nothing more than playacting. There are times, when I have, during an audition thought, this is ridiculous; don't believe it, I don't believe me or what I'm doing or saying and now there is a similar thing happening in life. The roles that people play have become very obvious.

Recently, as I entered the room for an appeal hearing for Louie's primary school place, I was struck by the heightened situation set up. The three people on the panel all stood up as I entered! The chap supposedly arguing the case against allowing Louie into the school of his choice, read solely from his notes, uncomfortably, seldom looking up. The clerk was a youngish, pleasant woman, there to tell me how it would progress, what would happen at each stage. I felt partly amused by the goings on, even though it concerned my son. It felt silly but still, doesn't the game has to be played if we are to participate in life?

The people on the panel all introduced themselves and told me their credentials for being there;children of their own, in education, on board of school governors. One man was a 'lay person.' They listened to the admissions authority case and then to mine. We asked each other questions. I spoke with absolute clarity and ease in a situation that would otherwise have created too much emotion stopping me from being effective. I knew only what was happening at any given moment. I was unable to refer to notes because I could only be concerned with that which was happening. I felt compassion for the admissions guy and also for those on the panel. They couldn't help and they knew that they couldn't. It was a farcical situation beacuse an Infant School decision can only be overturned if a mistake has been made in allocating the places and it hadn't. Or, if a decision is deemed to be unreasonable or perverse and the whole thing is set up so that's impossible to prove.

Still, there was a point where the role playing took a back seat and we did communicate. There was warmth and a meeting and an understanding that we are the same. It was momentary but it was there. I just did what I had to do, to the best of my ability-I suppose they did too. We were all playing the game, in a way, all playing our designated roles.

Explaining of the hook: The release of the contraction, the tension that comes with being a separate individual. It's gone, just evaporated into the ether. I always had me with me, my story, my history, my burdens, my limitations and beliefs and insecurities. I don't think about it now, carrying all that lesley stuff around-that's off the hook. I sometimes think, where is it, where is that sense of her that I always had pinning me down-I find it if i look, remember, but really I have to make the effort to reconstruct it. Of course there is a shadow, a taste, the funny character but that contracted idea of Lesley, set, formed and limited...just gone, I think.

off the hook

It's perhaps not always wise to say it as it is because it could piss people off. But, I'm wondering if the whole liberation thing has happened? There is a release. that's the best word that I can find to describe the simple off the hook feeling. Instead of tight -it's free. Instead of bound, it's loose. Instead of closed it's open. It's just off the hook. Simply a release and the whole of life carries on the same but it's so subtley different. Nothing seems to be that dramatic, awful, terrible, impossible, un-do-able and it all feels creative. Every second, movement, happening feels vital and alive. As it is mentioned in Francis Lucilles' The Perfume of Silence, it is as if we are the sharpened tip of a pencil creating each moment fresh from nothing-out of nothing comes something and it can or could be absolutely anything at anytime. It hasn't been written until it appears and when it appears it's absolutely as it's meant to be because that is what's happening and though it may seem to be uncomfortable, difficult, discordant at times, it's in perfect balance.

Letting go of it all to do it's thing in great harmony is exciting, liberating, a complete and total relief...

Ruperts Retreat

Last weekend was spent at Rupert Spira and Ellens home in Shropshire. Very lovely place-very lovely people. I always think that Rupert sparkles-his eyes shine and he seems to take great delight in communication. I love his London meetings, his absolute clear style of exploring and explaining, the nature of consciousness- his encouragement to enquire ever further, deeper, relentlessly. His way is satisfying and poetic and totally resonates.

The weekend was thorough, delving, stirring and shifting and friendships-well one in particular- were tested and forged stronger than before. This was a weekend of enquiry into non duality, the nature of consciousness which at times, expanded into literally trembling vastness and then settled to a more subtle all over love. Emotions wafted around, passed through, sometimes lost at sea but knowing that then settles to become buoyant love.

There is courage needed to allow this to happen, to go further, deeper. It seems the courage is there. Walking home down the street where I live on sunday night after an eventful journey home, there was only movement in the bigness and I felt panic rising. Sometimes it's seems so much to take and I momentarily wonder what on earth I've got myself into here. Why, I even bothered. Wouldn't life have been OK just carrying on as it was-was it so bad?

Of course, I know the answer, just at that those times, I long for the comfort of familiarity, all that I know and have always known, myself -or what i believed to be myself. It is a dichotomy. I brought this on, I know I did. It was literally a surrender, a readiness that said bring it on! I didn't know how it was going to be so there were no expectations, just a willingness to let go.

Sometimes, it's a struggle, the lost feeling is way more scary than anything else I've known-like being in the wilderness but it's just the outer layer which is making itself known-just what's niggling, maybe doubting. It's OK. It's a small price to pay. Lost and then found-and found is totally, completely IT.

NOTICED

This morning there were phonecalls from Customs & Excise and then Lloyds bank fraud department. What may have been alarming appeared not so. In fact, it seemed amusing and not real. The woman from C&E spoke very fast and informed me that they were missing accounts from 06/07 and 07/08. They were late, I could be fined, court orders, daily interest-didn't let me speak. I let her, listened and saw how easy it could be to be threatened and intimidated, flustered, worried and angered. There was none of this. The call was taken without any kind of emotional stirring and what I can only describe as no personal attachment-therefore there was no-one to be threatened.

Lloyds bank were being over cautious with debit card transactions, checking that they were mine. They were. Again, there was a feeling of the conversation not being real-like it was an improvisation-a made up piece of theatre that seemed believable but really wasn't real.

There is a danger of not taking things seriously because sometimes they seem ludicrous, just so silly and preposterous. Can I be too laid back-too unbothered or too laissez faire? It's not that things don't matter because some things do, it's just there is much less drama surrounding everything. It's seen differently.

Is it because the person who was at the centre of it all-me-Lesley -seems not be there, leading the show, making it happen, keeping it together? Instead, it all happens anyway and it's allowed to and it's observed, enjoyed and seen to be alright whatever it is because all things are going to arise in any manner. They just are-and seeing that-knowing that, allowing that and recognising it is a warm relief.

HOMEGIRL

I'm loving being at home. Being, being the operative word. It rained all day and the wind blew. Being inside, cosy, watching it, drinking tea, cleaning the kitchen, arranging things, with my little boy all day, in the house! It was blissful. Nothing was needed -apart from food. Louie said, 'let's go shopping tomorrow, mummy.' So, there was no food bought and it was Ok because there was enough to make a sort of picnic tea which he loves. And there was fruit with chocolate dip.

The point is the day seemed very, very long and then it was 8.40 pm and Louie was till up and i had no idea how it came to be that time. There was an enjoyment and appreciation of it all, just a love of it all, an ease of being which is joyous. Ordinarily, i feel that I would have been frustrated by this day, achieving little and staying indoors. But it's the being that seems important-just fully being-seeing, recognising. It was a full day, fully seen, enjoyed, loved, appreciated, savoured, sat in.

It's the simplicity of nothing happening but everything there-right there. Nothing and absolutely everything.

And this is still a wonder to me. I realised that phonecalls were made, deep cleaning was done! emails were sent and piles of paperwork was filed and sorted. It all happened, flowed from here. There is a cruising quality to life. A flowing, cruising quality. I'm told that there's no going back.

TODAY

Of all the things that could be done today, this blog is what happened! I wanted to have somewhere to record the simple things-and some less simple things-that are noticed continually.

The recurring thing that cannot be overlooked is the understanding that it is this present presence that is primary. It is all. It is what is happening. It is all that is happening and it can't be ignored. It makes it tricky to make concrete plans-think too far ahead, recall back, in detail and be too concerned by what could/might/should/almost/didn't happen. I am engrossed in the bigness of now, with all the minute detail and am struck by things that would normally pass me by while lost in thought about something past or future. It presents some practical problems but at the same time, everything that needs to get done, somehow seems to happen without too much bother. Or maybe that's just how it seems-which is good enough.