The Music Room

I want to tell you about a recurring dream I use to have as a child.....

I'm on a beach and, my lord, it is gorgeous. Waves crash lightly on the shore and then seem to float back, and there's gulls and a blue grey sky. I feel at home as I waltz to myself slowly down its curve. The most splendid feelings continually wash over me and I feel so desperately at home.

Although I am young, perhaps under ten as I am dreaming, in the dream I am older, a mature woman I seem to be. As this mature woman, that is me, takes the stroll, I feel radically pulled to continue walking even though I've been walking for a very long time. I want to know if there is an end to this path, and then suddenly as I wrap around a final bend, the sand runs into a cliff face that jutts out into the water.

It is an impressive mass of rock, so thick and heavy with stabilty. AND...there is a large gaping hole within it, BECKONING to me to walk inside. This cave seems my destiny. In my dream I feel filled with this foreboding presence, this sense of knowing that I am on the right path. So, instead of being afraid to enter this dark cave all on my own, I just go in. Step after step it gets darker and darker....scarier. And then I feel something change beneath my feet. No longer do the tiny grains of sand rub and grind, but a softness appears that is luxurious. The fear leaves and I feel gripped by curiosity.

"Where am I?" I think to myself and start to run my hands along the walls. Oddly enough I feel wall paper and doors! It is as if I found a secret passage into a hidden mansion. How did I get so lucky? I slowly open a door and feel light spread over my face. The room comes to life! It is a garden. Flowers bloom and antique watering cans liter the ground, along with bags of seed. And birds, so beautiful and filled with song, echo in my ears and dance in the air before my eyes. "Wow," I think, "too much beauty for one space."

In spite of the wonderment around me I know that I must move on. I am drawn by other things. And from here on rooms seem to connect like puzzle pieces and blend into each other endlessly. And they are all beautiful and worth visiting, yet I always move on. Until, I turn a very special handle.

I creak open the thick wooded door, inhaling the fresh smell of wood and mystery. I suddenly feel so bizarrely at home....before I even see what is inside I know that this is the final room I will enter. But what is inside? I could never have guessed. And then, once again, the light shines itself over me and I am over taken by harmonious blessings. An orchestra of light and string and muscle awaits me. A blend of victorious music almost burns my ears! I see the bends and curves of notes and instruments, and watch them move, yet not a soul resides within this place. Only me and my dream, my path.

And the music room seemed to be the end of it. So many a time in my childhood I felt afraid of this room yet inexplicably drawn to it. I'd wake up at different points in the dream, not ready to go on. How could my destiny be the one thing I was most afraid of conquering?

Yet hear I am, age 26 and ripe with the will to conquer. I smell the ribbons of success flickering in the distance.

I wait tenderly for the room that I know is my home.

In My Meditation

Massive amounts of stress lead me to meditate last night. Wow, I just felt so AHHHHHHH! and UUUUGGGGHHHH! And felt trapped by the feelings, like they were controlling me, which I can not STAND! Being controlled by negativity is not cool. I felt a little brainwashed. This happens to me when I am under a lot of stress....my mental strength weakens and thoughts creep in that I do NOT like to listen to. Degrading thoughts about myself, worrisome thoughts about things which worrying can do nothing to improve, and a general dissatisfaction with myself that makes me feel that nothing I do is good enough. Thoughts like that just cause problems and make things harder so I got down to business to banish them.

You'll need a chicken's foot, a frog's heart, dried grass and some fairy dust. Boil a large amount of water in a cauldron and first add the fairy dust. Alright, I'll stop. But it almost sounds easier to find fairy dust then to re-program my brain through meditation. Oddly enough this mind trickery works so very well, and is not as hard as it seems after practice. The first practices are the hard part. Even now I really don't do it for that long when I do do it....just enough to calm me. I want to find that peaceful moment again.

So I pick two phrases, last night one was "I love me" and the other "I release my stress," and I close my eyes. Then when I inhale I think to myself or say aloud "I love me." And then I breath out and say or think "I release my stress." I focus on breathing and the meaning of the words and on not letting any other thoughts penetrate my consciousness. That's the challenging part. I'm always shocked at how many terrible thoughts want to barge in on me while I am doing this....thoughts like, "why are you doing this" or "this won't work" or "you can't fix stupidity" or "you really should have done more today"....the list could go on and on. And then I have to tell them to shut the hey up! In response to such nastiness from my ego or what not, I just keep breathing and say the words.... "I love me."

In these moments I allow myself to be enough, just as I am, with all the things left undone, with the feelings I've hurt, with the extra cheese I ate, with the patience I lost, with the love I haven't had the time to give. It's really so liberating. It's like a real safe place. Anyway, after doing that for awhile last night I stopped feeling so gosh darn overwhelmed and crazy and fell asleep. And I slept really well. :)