Ampersand #30
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METROPOLITAN DIARY
Valuable tips
Dear Diary:
I was taking a walk in the Wall Street area a few years ago when I decided to pop into a deli.
I ordered a sandwich and began chatting with the proprietor as he made it. Our conversation eventually turned to the shop’s location.
I asked whether being in the Financial District ever caused him to play the stock market or led to his getting valuable tips from informed customers.
He paused his sandwich-making, put down his knife and looked at me with a perplexed expression.
“Every day, those brokers come in here,” he said. “They get their bagels, sandwiches, doughnuts, coffee, cigarettes … ”
He paused again and pointed toward the door of his shop.
“… and every day, they’re out there on the sidewalk, pushing and shoving on a door that is clearly marked ‘pull.’”
— Steven Scharff
from “Metropolitan Diary”i
n The New York Times
This quintessential New York City story made me laugh, of course, but then it sobered me rather quickly. How many times—even in the face of clearly marked signs—have you ever pushed instead of pulled? You can apply the question to doors, but I have a bigger one for you.
How many times in your life have you both pushed and pulled around some or other use of your own one major gift from Divinity? What I mean is Free Will.
Oh, I really want this, but … I don’t want that to happen … so if this (whatever it is) means that, then just skip it.
Well, wait … what is it you wanted?
Is it any wonder that so many of us have trouble manifesting what we truly want? In fact, let’s take the question further back. Is it any wonder that so many of us have trouble knowing what we truly want?
Remember Dr. Doolittle’s Push-Me-Pull-You?
I sometimes wonder if that’s how the Universe feels when dealing with our crazy, flip-flopping use of free will.
This is why I have been known to say that so many of us don’t live in free will, Beloved. It’s because we live much more of the time in Free Won’t.
Namely, what we don’t want, rather than what we do want.
Why? How? What do we do about it?
The short answer is: we stop thinking about what we don’t want. Cold turkey. What you don’t want is unimportant.
Don’t misunderstand. This is not to say that knowing what you don’t want is unimportant. Sometimes that can be vitally important!
This is to say, instead, focus within until you know what you do want, and spend most of your time focused on that.
There is a simple metaphysical reason for this: what you show interest in, increases. No more. No less.
If you’re more interested in what you don’t want, you’re going to manifest more of that.
If you’re more interested in what you do want, you’re going to manifest more of that.
So maybe there’s a lot of clarity about what you don’t want. Bravo. Brava. Hold still. Let the don’t wants stand sentinel around your free will until, what you do want arises organically from within you.
Caveat: this might mean you have to/get to hang out in I don’t know for a while. Maybe even longer than you feel comfortable there, but so? Isn’t that a better prospect than constantly manifesting disappointments because you simply haven’t given yourself the time to figure out what you truly want? I think so.
What you want, Beloved, always, but always arises best from within-out. There really are no exceptions. Sure, you might see a vintage Cadillac that you “want,” but is it the Caddy, or is it the perfect vehicle for you?
The next time you’re having trouble manifesting what you want, stop. Look around, see if there’s a Push-Me-Pull-You Crossing nearby. I can pretty much guarantee that there’s your sticking point.
Set the llamas free by holding still, and listening until your desire turns into a big brass band with you as its leader. Then, watch for miracles.
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“Two images surround this theme of Sabbath and leisure for me. The first memory lies buried in old poetry, the second in a rabbi whose name I cannot remember.
The first incident happened during my first year of high school, I think. I had somehow stumbled on the works of the French poet Charles Péguy who wrote, “I love. The one who sleeps, says God.” The words didn’t mean much to me at the time; if anything, they seemed a little silly, or at the very least, confusing. But interestingly enough, those words have stayed with me ever since. Now, decades of monastic life later, I have come to understand the wisdom of them. I have begun to realize their importance. Sleep, I now understand, is a sign of trust. The ability to rest gives the world back to God for a while. Rest, Sabbath, leisure all release a part of us that the corsets of time and responsibility every day seek to smother and try to suppress.
The second incident happened during a trip to Jerusalem years later. A local rabbi had joined us for the meal that celebrated the opening of Shabbat. I remember as if it were yesterday his final example of the perfect Sabbath observance.
“You see this?” he said, taking a pen out of his breast pocket and twirling it in his fingers. “I am a writer and on the Sabbath I never allow myself to carry a pen. On the Sabbath I must allow myself to become new again.”
In those two moments, I discovered what the psalmist tries to teach us in Psalm 46, about learning to be still. It is more than the simple observation that everyone needs to let go a little, to get rested enough to work harder next week, to change pace from the hectic to the chaotic. It is far beyond the fact that everyone needs a vacation. What this psalm verse teaches us is the simple truth that a soul without a sense of Sabbath is an agitated soul.
The first reason for the Sabbath, the rabbis teach, is to equalize the rich and the poor. Safe from exploitative labor on the Sabbath, the poor lived for at least one day a week with the same kind of freedom that the rich enjoyed. The Sabbath, in other words, is God’s gift to the dignity of all humankind. It forces us to concentrate on who we are rather than on what we do.
The second reason for the Sabbath, the rabbis say, is to lead us to evaluate our work. As God did on the seventh day, we are also asked to determine whether or not what we are doing in life is really “good.” Good for ourselves, good for the people around us, good for the development of the world. If that is true, then the reason we have nuclear bombs and pornographic movies and underpaid workers is precisely because we have lost respect for the Sabbath.
How long has it been since you’ve taken a day simply to reflect on the way you live—how fast, how balanced, how sensible, how realistic is it? The sad thing is that too often, we choose to fret about life, rather than reflect on it.
from Vision & Viewpoint,
Joan Chittister’s weekly email
“The Reason for the Sabbath”
Sister Joan’s words touched a deep, deep place within me especially when she cited, “the corsets of time and responsibility.”
Corsets is such a wonderful image for those two allegedly relentless drivers of human existence. Yes, we all live with an agreed construct we know as time.
Interestingly, just this week I learned that the time zones we all take for granted in the U.S.—Pacific, Mountain, Central, and Eastern—were promulgated by the railroad tycoons in the mid-1800s so they could synchronize their train schedules. FWIW…
And yes, we all live with responsibility for something, even if it’s only just ourselves.
And so, as something of a continuation of the previous article, I would draw your attention to both time and responsibility, how you feel about both, and whether you like how you feel about both or either.
If you do, good. If you don’t, did you know you can change it?
These two culprits are part of the reason we don’t let what we truly want arise from within ourselves. Instead, we get all … efficient … about desire.
Why? Why do we have to be efficient? Why are we bounded by time, or why do we allow ourselves to feel constrained by time when it comes to what we want? Does it really matter if it takes three days or three weeks or three months or three seconds to figure it out?
Honestly, it really doesn’t, but … and here it comes, seat belts on: you have to give yourself the time.
And that brings us right back to Sister Joan and her Sabbath musings.
“[Sabbath] forces us to concentrate on who we are rather than on what we do.” And here is the key to unlock the door to your true desires. It has nothing to do with what you do.
What you desire must come from your being.
If you don’t know what you want, and you don’t “have time” to figure it out, or you have “too much responsibility” to figure it out, it’s time for a Sabbath.
Yes, even if you have ten children. Trade Sabbath childcare with another mom.
There is no sadder story than a life caught in the doing so intently and for so long that the one living that life is no longer a consideration.
You, Beloved, are always the first consideration, and that means … what you need, what you want, what you genuinely desire is important. More than that, if you want it, the rest of us need it, which is only one of the myriad reasons you are here.
We need you, and what you, and only you, have to give. Keep your eyes on that, dear one, and have a Sabbath. All part of Ampersand living.
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And in LOTS of very happy publishing news right now …
I am very, very happy to announce that both the ebook and the paperback of the fourth book in The Boots & Boas Romances is up on Amazon. It’s called Upending Tradition.
I haven’t really taken the time to explain this series, so here it is for all the world to see.
P.S. The first one is free on Amazon, so you can have a taste before you commit your reading time … just sayin’.
Boots & Boas
Boots & Boas are butch-femme romances
based in Boston about
The Butch Brigade, queer buddies seriously committed to their chosen family. Think “Queer as Folk” meets “Cheers.”
Now, add a parade of scintillating femmes and all the challenges of everyday LGBTQ+ life.
Attending Physician
A chance collision. A burgeoning romance. A startling twist.
Psychologist Verity Spencer spends her days supporting her clients, so when a surrogate daughter goes into labor, she’s the stand-in mama in the room. On a momentary reprieve, so exhausted she can’t see straight, Verity crashes nose-first into the sternum of hot butch OB/GYN Dr. Raven Lange, on her own second 18-hour shift. Despite their fatigue, sparks fly.
Flowers. A date. A date cancelled. When they finally connect in person, it doesn’t take long for them to fall head over heels—and boots. Their relationship quickly moves in the right direction as Verity meets Raven’s toddler, but their bliss hits a roadblock when a client’s boyfriend does the unthinkable.
Will Raven’s Butch Brigade take matters into their own hands or will Verity be permanently scarred by trauma?
Arresting Rendition
A random sighting. A network error. A code that needs to be over-written.
Dex, the serious geek of Raven’s Butch Brigade, has a strict policy. He only dates geek femmes that are smarter than he is. No exceptions. Anything less and he deletes them from his life.
Enter Miriam Epstein-Seigel, a gay divorcée Ph.D. candidate in theatre at Tufts University, as she tracks adorable Dex through Davis Square. Miri and Dex stay in the friend zone because … she’s no geek girl, and he only dates geeks, remember?
A freak accident becomes a complete game-changer. That’s when Miri knows that she’s the girl to break all the rules, claim Dex’s heart, and rewrite his silly cancellation command for keeps.
Are Dex and Miri’s drives compatible or will this mismatch crash their systems for good?
Ascending Apparition
A fallen officer. A desperate consequence. A quest for justice.
Boston P.D. detective Terry Bradford hasn’t had a full night’s sleep in two years. He’s lost one partner in the line of duty and he’s about to lose another.
Gillian Gordon knows nothing of the recurring dream that haunts him nightly. All she knows is that after a year of promise and passion, he still won’t let her stay the night and she’s done with that noise. When Terry opens up, Gilly is totally on board to help her butch unravel the dream mystery.
A surprising twist finally brings some closure to The Butch Brigade over their shared loss.
Will they get justice for Detective Angela Andrews or will Terry and Gilly be defeated by influences from the other side of life?
Upending Tradition
A decades-old heartbreak. A hairdresser, well, two. A camily … yeah, a camily.
Julia Josephs and Leah Rizzoli have been besties only since forever. Happy as hairdressers since vo-tech, their counterintuitive connection is echoed in long-term boyfriends, Sam and Ollie. The two are salt of the earth, going gangbusters in their garage, The Boston Boys, sought-after by a lot of Beantown.
When a text message saying Broadway has shut down is followed by a visit from the capo of The Butch Brigade to a Femme Force movie night, it throws a total spanner in the works in the form of a spiny, little-known virus called Covid-19.
Just before the salons shut down for an indeterminate length of time, Julia is offered an opportunity that will mend her own long-broken heart and fulfill a lifelong dream at the same time. She’s not sure how she feels about it, though, so she decides the best choice is to try it and lie to everyone—her boyfriend, her bestie, and the whole Brigade/Force contingent—until she does know.
Will a chance encounter with a customer’s screen saver blow all of Julia’s relationships, not to mention her whole life, to smithereens or will The Butch Brigade and The Femme Force get down, get real, and endorse her choices …?
Impending Decision
Book 5 … already begun. This one is Jamie and Jayne’s story.
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And … after four solid months of research, which is, as always, still ongoing, I have begun to write Book Two, Jasmine Increscent, of my speculative historical fiction series, The Subversive Lovelies about four sisters in Gilded-Age New York City who just will NOT follow the damn rules!
It’s going along at a good clip of about 2,500 words per day. I’m hoping for a mid-summer pub date. These girls are great for the beach.
The first of the series is already published, Jezebel Rising, and can be found on Amazon.
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I’m still working out the tech part of The Chakra Compendium, never fear. It’s just taking longer than I thought it would. Surprise, surprise! I figure there’s a reason for it.
If you’re starved for chakra learning, go to my Patreon:
https://www.patreon.com/susancorso
for daily, bite-size chakra teachings. Eventually, I’ll pull each grouping into a Tiny Course which will be evergreen so you’ll be able to study chakras with me on your own schedule.
You can also find these mini-chakra teachings weekdays on LinkedIn—surprisingly, lot of business folx are into spirituality (Yay!)—and on Medium:
https://susan-15721.medium.com/
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Next time, I ought to have an exciting interview/profile to announce in a major publication. I have yet another podcast this week, and until next time, Beloved, take a Sabbath, and Be Ampersand, S.