Episode 2: Collecting Difficult Moments, with Ally Bogard

On the energetic and practical wisdom of gathering difficult moments; seeing them as food for your journey.

0:00
Eternal Two Step by Mark Nepo, p.33, Things That Join the Sea and Sky

02:40
Collecting difficult moments like little gems.
Don't try to avoid them; gather them up like fuel, food, treasures.

04:18
When you're a child, the imagination still reigns; there isn't the impression of meaning just yet… the meaning of what's occurring is entirely open to our interpretation. Meanings begin to be collected and change us. Collecting difficult moments puts us back into the world of imagination, allowing us to reclaim creativity.

06:13
That moment you started to feel like the adult with your parents.
Collecting moments of trusting that everyone has their path.
AB the pleaser; letting go of the need to control other people's experience.
Collecting the difficult moments makes them sacred. Reclaiming lost bits of ourselves, our imagination.

07:45
Self Compassion practice; Rod Stryker- Sanctuary app
What hasn't been healed? Acknowledging what hasn't been healed. Giving love and compassion to those aspects. What is it that hasn't been healed?

09:00
EB the fixer; growing the heart v. boundaries. Committing to self in the midst of relationship.

10:15
AB: Loving yourself is never somewhere we get, it's a never-ending journey.
Knowing that you, yourself are your person and committing to that.
"Her" film: the computer loving her 800 humans.
What if my self-love can be so big, it doesn't get rid of my self-hate, it can simply expand to hold and encompass it?

12:45
Practicalities. Scheduling. What is on your calendar that map that self-love?

AB: I tend to schedule things for someone else; having spare time means meeting myself in the blank spaces. Schedule the void diligently. The busyness is just my way of avoiding myself. I don't want to keep accumulating difficult moments without processing the wisdom / extracting the gold from them.

I have to make mandatory space in the early morning. So I determine the energy I run in the day. And at least once during the day touching down with someone that nourishes me.

17:45
On distractions
EB: Business is my favourite distraction; traveling is a good way for me to just stare into space and get great insights about how I want to show up.

19:15
EB: collecting difficult moments with kids; realizing that she doesn't need to have Jonah be anything or anyone other than who he is.

21:00
EB: Taking space to take space in order to respond to a difficult moment as it's happening. Moving from baseline overt volatility to softening.
AB: Moving from silent treatment / avoidance / repression to learning how to fight.

24:00
EB: Learning from James' experience with mens' work how to listen, communicate. On truly listening. Accepting what the other person is telling you, and then also offering your side.
AB: Can I suspend my first judgement of thinking this is "good" or "bad" - the wisdom of hindsight teaches me that all the tough moments were other than what I thought was being asked of me.

I'm grateful that life or God always knew what was needed.
Who do i want to become with what's happening, so that we aren't passive bystanders?
What current of energy are you running in your system?

27:00
In all difficult moments you were met by grace.
Seth Godin - difficult moments will not be helped by brute force.
How can we get creative with what's happening or happened.
We're not passive bystanders.
Choosing what kind of energy you're running in your system.

30:00
With what are you identifying in this particular moment?
Flexible identities v. fixed identities.
When we look at collecting difficult moments; it's not the identity about what happened, but what we chose to do with it. eg. I was abandoned, so I chose not to abandon.

AB chooses her charity: Navajo Water Project fundraiser.
33:00
Help provide solar power and water where need is greatest in our land.
EB realizing early on the lie being told in American history books.

35:15
AB: When you stop working, do you feel that your existence doesn't matter?
If i stop, it's almost as if everything is about to fall apart.
EB: Trying to stop being perfect or productive in every moment; just practicing sitting still.

36:45
3 QUESTIONS

1. What needs healing?
AB: Developing an unshakeable faith in God and trust in the Creator/ Divine Mother. Remembrance that we're being walked. I'm doing my very best to live with an unburdened heart.
EB: To heal my judgement, learning to contextualize the person i'm judging. Becoming more deeply familiar with what the other side is doing / saying so it's not surprising anymore.

Van Jones on Tami Simons, Insights at the Edge.

2. What's your favourite view?
AB: Eye to eye, voice to voice, heart to heart.
(We never get to sit together and just be eye to eye with no device, no distraction.)
EB: The back of my son's neck. Formerly my Papa's. James' too.

45:30
3. What does prayer mean to you?
AB: Prayer means recovering a lost language - the true mother tongue. Prayer got taken out of our hands and put into the hands of others. Prayer is a place where I have to humble myself. Ask for help. Say thank you. Silent prayer makes me wonder who could listen to my quiet, inner place. That must be inside of me, inseparable from me; it's a redirect to something inside that's listening, that wants to hear.
EB: Provides confirmation that it's all inside of each of us. Prayer used to be more asking and collapsing. Now it's more the relaxing rather than the asking. Affirming my humility. The fact that I don't know, i don't have an answer, and i don't know what to do. But i'm listening.
AB: Praying for God's will - the woman AB met in MX stopped praying for her perceived needs and started praying for God's will, soon realising that her needs were met, under God's will, and her mission was just to get right with what is. Being grateful for exactly this moment. How do I get right with this.

ASSIGNMENT.

Hear and map what your inner voice has been telling you about difficult moments. Make it artful, beautiful, scary, real.
From the map, write a list of what scares you and/or a list of your dreams.
Bless things more. Find aspects of your life to bless.
Ask a couple of people for feedback. How am i handling difficult moments? What could I have done better today? Don't "identify" with what feedback they give you; identify with what you can do to heal it.

"Eternal Two Step" by Mark Nepo.
From Things That Join the Sea and Sky

Difficult moments are like little deaths. Get good with them.

RESOURCES MENTIONED:

Roshi Joan Halifax
Van Jones on Tami Simons, Insights at the Edge