Have you given thanks today?

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The mind is like a crazy monkey, which leaps about and never stays in one place. It is completely restless and constantly paranoid about its surroundings. From “Trapping the Monkey” in THE TEACUP AND THE SKULLCUP: CHOGYAM TRUNGPA ON ZEN AND TANTRA. Page 72

Lying in bed, ‘doing nothing’, is a great opportunity to reflect, and to ‘do nothing’. At least, it would be a great time for such indulgence if my monkey mind didn’t keep interfering.

“Don’t be so lazy. Get busy.” Its voice whispers with a sibilant hiss oozing like steam seeping from a lumbering volcano.

The more rational part of me leaps in to defend my indolence. “Get busy doing what? I don’t have to go into the office today. It’s an extra long weekend. Relax.”

But still the monkey mind persists. “There’s gotta be something you can do. Quit lying there justifying lying there. Nobody likes a lazy person.”

Ahhh, the power of the monkey mind to disturb peace of mind and tranquility.

Oh, and Beaumont the eager pup too! He wants to get out and play. I will him to relax. Be calm. Be patient.

Buddha is quoted as having said,“Patience is the greatest prayer.”

If I had one prayer, it would be, “Thank you.”

Perhaps gratitude is the most powerful force for healing.

As I lay in my bed I whisper to the birds at the feeder, “Thank you for brightening my day. Thank you for your song. Your lithesome spirit. Your twittering verse.”

I look up through the green leaves turning gold of the birch and the red buds of crabapples peaking out through leaves and gaze up at dull grey sky above and whisper, “Thank you for your shade. Your whispering leaves. Your beauty.”

Gratitude.

To fall into prayer I must surrender my ego’s need to justify my existence — my state of doing nothing, as well as my state of doing ‘busy’. To surrender, I must release my need to feel that everything I do matters. As my daughter Alexis wrote in a blog, “I am nothing. And everything… I do not matter. And yet, I am matter, so I must.”

I must surrender my need to matter enough that my matter becomes all that matters to me. When I matter enough to cherish the goodness in my being me, to respond from my highest good, no matter the weather, the time of day or night, or the circumstances surrounding me, then I will have fallen into that place where all that matters is — the moment in which I breathe.

I move into gratitude, the gateway to patience. If I had but one prayer, let it be, Thank you.

The question is: Have you given thanks today?

When giving spare change isn’t enough.

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“Do you give to panhandlers?” one of my co-workers asked as we sat chatting about working in the sector and homelessness and what it means to end it. She is new to the homeless serving sector having come from the management team of a large retailer. She tells me how working at the Foundation has changed her perspective, helped her respond more compassionately, but still, she doesn’t feel comfortable constantly giving money to people on the street.

I never know if I’m doing the right thing, my co-worker said.

And I understand.

I used to give to people on the street who asked for spare change, and stopped. I never felt like I was doing enough. The giving always left me feeling empty. So now, I smile and acknowledge someone’s presence and tell them I don’t have any change, or that I can’t give them any money. But I always acknowledge them. Always let them know, I see you. You are real to me. Not a problem on the street I need to ignore. You are visible.

Several years ago, while teaching a class in self-esteem at the homeless shelter where I used to work, one of the students shared the story of finding himself at the far end of the city with no money to pay for a train ticket back downtown. He’d gone out to the south end in the hopes of getting a job he’d heard about. He hadn’t planned on not getting the job and only got one-way transit fare from the job office at the shelter.

When he got to his destination, the job was already filled and he had no way back downtown. He was stuck.

It would have been easier for me to hold someone up at knife-point and demand their money instead of panhandling for it, he told the class. But I don’t want to go back to jail so I begged.

I had never thought of panhandling as a stay out of jail card but for this 32-year-old man, life had always been about taking what he wanted by force. He’d learned the ropes in foster care and then juvenile detention and then, ‘the big house’ once he’d turned 18. The two years he had just spent not in jail represented the longest single stretch of time he hadn’t been incarcerated since he was 12 and started his relationship with the criminal justice system.

 

To this man, panhandling was the lesser of two evils. Going back to jail or panhandling to get back to the shelter for the night.

Panhandling stripped him of dignity, he told the class. People either didn’t look at him and pretended he was invisible, or those who did look at him saw him as ‘less than’. Some even called him names, mocked him where he stood, holding his ‘worthlessness’ in empty outstretched hands for all the world to see.

So often we look at panhandling through our eyes of judgement, or getting to choose, ‘is it right to give money or not?’. Seldom do we see it from the perspective of the asker. What does the act of panhandling do to the human being standing with outstretched hands hoping for a handout?

Desperation lead that man to panhandle. Not laziness. Not a need to feed his addiction or a desire to live off the system.

He’d never known true freedom. Never known what it was like to come home from school to sit around the kitchen table doing homework, laughing with his siblings and having a loving parent patiently guide him through the intricacies of life and living cooperatively within the world. He’d never been taught it wasn’t right to steal. He’d only been taught it was the only way to get what he wanted/needed. He’d never been shown how to be ‘a man’. He’d only been shown how life is a battlefield, it’s do or die, take or perish.

And there he was at 32 learning how to live outside the justice system, learning how to get by in a world that was foreign to him. People expected him to ‘know’. But he didn’t. He’d never been taught the ropes of life and never been shown how to navigate it in peace.

Last I heard from him, he had moved on from the shelter. He was living life beyond ‘the big house’. He had his own place. A good job. Friends to share the good times, and to lean on in the bad.

“If you’d told me this would be me,” he wrote in an email he’d sent me to let me know how he was doing, “I’d have told you that you were the one on crack.”

To read more on the subject of panhandling, the Homeless Hub recently shared this article:  How should I handle being asked for spare change?

Create a little beauty in the world everyday

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Create a little beauty copyDo you remember learning how to write? Or count? Or tie your shoelaces or  do a thousand things you do everyday, without thinking, now that you’ve mastered their doing?

Do you remember those first hesitant movements to create a consonant or vowel on the page? Or those first tentative thoughts adding up two numbers?

In this world of information overload and technological connections spreading news as fast as a wildfire searing through the woods, learning to read and write and do arithmetic is a seminal activity. Anything is possible once the letters and numbers on a page become clear.

I was reminded of learning to read and write last night as I headed back into the studio. I took Beaumont for his walk. Emptied the dishwasher. Thought about watching some mind-numbing TV or playing solitaire on my iPad.

I chose to walk into the studio instead. Like learning to read or write, or any new task, it can be scary to face the possibility of creating something out of nothing. It can be daunting. It can make me want to go and clean the toilet just to avoid the expansiveness of that blank page calling for my creative expressions.

I did it anyway because I want to Everyday, create a little beauty. Share a lot of love.

And the only way I can do that is to take actions that create the more of what I want to have in my world.

Everyday, create a little beauty. Share a lot of love.

Part of art journalling is the allowing myself to experiment, and to learn.

My nature is to want to make it all perfect. Yet for me, art, by its very definition, is perfect exactly the way it appears, not the way I think I need to make it happen.

To allow perfection room to appear in its own creative way, I must allow myself space to breathe into the perfection in every imperfect stroke of paint, little dot that’s not quite completely circular or cursive letter that isn’t quite equal in size or weight to the letter before it.

I must let go of judging the outcome and allow the outcome to be the perfect expression of my creative process. I must give myself room to be imperfect to savour the perfection of the moment.

Just me and the page. Me and the paints and inks and tools of the trade that bring such joy to my heart I feel at times it just might burst.

And of course, now that he’s perfected the art of the stairs, I get to enjoy having Beaumont on the floor beside me, chewing on a rawhide or playing with a toy, or, as happened last night, one of my shoes he surreptitiously carried down to the studio for his own personal chewing enjoyment.

Now that’s perfection!

When a hug is all you have to give.

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Year’s ago, while sitting in a coffee shop by myself, a young woman sat at the table across from me and cried. I remember thinking at the time that I would like to get up and ask her if there was anything I could do. To offer a listening ear, a hug, some reassurance to help her through whatever the pain was she was feeling in that moment.

I did nothing.

At the time, I was immersed in my own drama and angst, faltering on life’s road as I sank deeper and deeper into a relationship that was killing me. I remember thinking, what can I offer her when I am so sad and scared myself? How can I give her solace when I am so lacking in peace of mind?

I let my fear of rejection hold me back and I did nothing.

Fast forward several years and the inertia of that moment reminds me to not let fear hold me back from reaching out to those I encounter on my path who I sense are in need of solace.

Recently, at a play during the Fringe Festival, I sat beside a young woman who, even though the play was a comedy, began to cry with heart-wrenching sobs in the darkness of the theatre.

I wanted to reach out and hold her hand and let her know, she was safe.

So I did. I did not let my fear of rejection, or being wrong in my summation of the situation, hold me back.

I made the human connection. She gripped my hand tightly for a few moments, her sobs eased and the play moved on.

After the play we stood and chatted for a few moments and I asked her if I could give her a hug. “I don’t know what is happening in your life right now,” I whispered as I wrapped her in my arms. “I am sorry you are in such pain.”

She clung to me for a few moments, gripped me tightly, thanked me and then stepped back. We went our separate ways.

On Sunday, while walking with Beaumont at the off leash park, a woman walked towards me. As she wasn’t walking a dog I called Beaumont to my side. I don’t like him to bother people unless invited. As the distance between us closed, she called out and said it was okay for Beaumont to greet her. I come to the dog park to get a puppy fix, she said. It’s hard to be sad when watching the antics of dogs, and their owners, she added.

We chatted for a few moments and she kept dabbing beneath her eyes with a kleenex. I thought her tears were caused by the smoke that has clutched our city for the past week as the winds have blown the smoke from the fires south of the border north.

Are you okay? I asked.

Not really, she replied.

I looked at her as tears streamed down her face and asked, “You seem very sad. Can I give you a hug?”

She started to shake her head from side to side and midway stopped and said, “Yes please.”

And we embraced on the ridge overlooking the river. And the smoke swirled around us and Beaumont sat at our feet.

I’m getting a divorce, she said. It’s really awful.

I’ve had one of those I told her. It hurts. But it does get better. In fact, it gets so much better I just got married.

She stepped back out of our embrace and said, “You did? You actually trusted a man enough to do that?”

I smiled and told her that it wasn’t about trusting a man, it was about learning to trust myself enough to know, I am okay, no matter what happens.

We were married 35 years, she told me. He left me for his cousin.

That must have really hurt, I said.

She nodded her head.

I am sorry for your pain. Sorry this happened to you, I told her. In time, the pain will ease.

Will the tears stop? she asked.

I smiled and told her yes. They do.

Thank you she said, and we parted and went our separate ways. As she walked away she stopped and turned back towards me and said. “Thank you for the hug. I needed that.”

Years ago a young woman sat in a coffee shop across from me and cried. I did nothing.

I thank her today for teaching me the value of doing something whenever I have the chance to make a connection and let a stranger know, I see you. I do not know what burden you are carrying but for this moment, let me help you carry it so you do not feel alone.

Namaste.

Canada’s Affordable Housing Crisis

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Sliding stock markets, sinking commodity prices and retracting of the global economy.

The news is filled with stories of clouds hanging low over the economy, of turmoil and unrest, political disenchantment and economic disaster.

And so the world spins.

I spent Wednesday last week at a roundtable meeting on Canada’s affordable housing crisis. We met with hopefuls running in the Federal election — 2 Green Party candidates at the first session. 6 Liberals at the second. 5 NDP at the third. The Conservatives did not turn up.

Sponsored by the CHRA (Canadian Housing and Renewal Association), our goal as organizations involved in homelessness and housing is to raise the issue of Canada’s affordable housing crisis on their agenda, and thus, to make it into a national conversation this election.

The candidates who came were passionate, committed and interested in learning more about the issues surrounding housing and homelessness. And, they wanted to ensure we understood why their Party is the one to vote for.

Though the NDP has long fought for a national housing strategy, it is the Green Party who has taken concrete action this election by announcing on August 25th the Party’s plan to invest in social and affordable housing.

Yet, even in their statement, there is evidence of their lack of understanding of the depth of the issue, and the causal factors that lead to homelessness.

In the media release that The Green Party distributed on their proposed National Housing Strategy, Lynne Quarmby, an electoral hopeful is quoted as saying, “The leading cause of homelessness is poverty.”

Not true.

Homelessness is first and foremost a result of governments (all levels) failure to plan and action a housing strategy that would make available, safe, secure and affordable housing at a scale that is aligned to meet the needs of the population.

Homelessness is an outcome of what we have done to create it.

Since the 1990s, with the withdrawal of the federal government’s investment in affordable housing, provinces and municipalities have struggled to respond. In their report on The State of Homelessness in Canada 2014, authors Stephen Gaetz, Tanya Gulliver and Tim Richter state: “Declining wages (even minimum wage has not kept up with inflation in any jurisdiction in Canada), reduced benefit levels–including pensions and social assistance – and a shrinking supply of affordable housing have placed more and more Canadians at risk of homelessness.” (Source Document) 

The report goes on to state:

“The rise of modern mass homelessness in Canada can be traced directly back to the withdrawal of the Federal government’s investment in affordable housing and pan-Canadian cuts to welfare beginning in the 1980s. In 1982, all levels of government combined funded 20,450 new social housing units annually. By 1995, the number dropped to around 1,000, with numbers slowly climbing to 4,393 annually by 2006. Over the past 25 years, while Canada’s population increased by almost 30%, annual national investment in housing has decreased dramatically, by over 46%. In 1989, Canadians contributed, through taxation, an average of $115 per person to federal housing investments. By 2013, that figure had dropped to just over $60 per person (in 2013 dollars).”

Homelessness didn’t happen because a whole bunch of Canadians decided they didn’t want to stay at home. It happened because they did not have access to the resources and affordable housing they needed to live at home.

The Green Party’s release also states that Canada is the only OECD member without a national housing strategy.

Not true.

Most OECD members do not have a national housing strategy. What can be stated is that Canada has a rate of social renting less than the average of any other OECD country. Canada does not do a good job of taking care of its vulnerable populations. As an example, rental households most in need of support are female-led lone-parent families, seniors living alone, aboriginal families and recent new comers to Canada. (source)

A comment often heard when talking about homelessness, and one stated by one of the Green Party candidates, is that we are all one pay cheque away from homelessness.

Not true.

We’re not all one pay cheque away. Most of us have resources, and an inherent resiliency that can sustain us longer than one pay cheque should hard times hit.

That’s because, most of us are not forced to continually make decisions between putting food on the table, a roof over our heads or school books in the hands of our children. Most of us have had the privilege of being able to build lives that fulfill our dreams and allow us to feel like productive members of society. Most of us have had relatively easy access to the resources we needed to get an education, job training, health care and health supports that ensured we have what we take for granted; the daily comfort of knowing we are at home, secure and safe in our world.

For those living on the margins, whose lack of resources and limited resiliency are impeded by social policies that do not provide access to adequate income and/or housing, tough economic times call for them to do what they’ve always done. Dig in. Hunker down. Keep existing. Keep going from one door to the next hoping to find access to the resources that truly will make a difference between having nothing, and having the opportunity to lead their children, and themselves, out of poverty.

Unfortunately, for the one in ten Canadians Statistics Canada reported as living in poverty after the 2009 recession, they’ve been down so long, there is no upside to their economic situation, no matter where the world is at. No matter the economic times, vulnerable populations remain vulnerable in the face of scarcity and plenty. Unless, we do something different.

What can you do to make a difference? Join in the conversation. Help raise affordable housing onto the national agenda. When a federal candidate comes to your door, ask them, “What do you know about Canada’s affordable housing crisis?” And then ask, “What do you and your party plan to do about it? How can I help?”

Nourishing heart and soul.

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My laptop is not well.

It’s been churning and spinning, slower and slower.

So… no blog today. 🙂

I did try working on my piece on my Ipad but it just isn’t the same.

While I have been able to post using the Ipad, I don’t feel as flexible nor as confident.

So, another choice to let it go for today and simply be present in the flow.

This weekend is my mother’s 93rd Birthday celebration. My sister arrived last night and we are about to take Beaumont to the park for his walk.

Tomorrow, my family are coming to celebrate my mom’s birthday dinner together.

Spending time with those I love in the ‘real’ world feeds my heart. It nourishes my soul.

May you spend your time this weekend nourishing your heart and soul.

Namaste.

The choice to come back tomorrow.

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I have something to say and am struggling to find the words to say it.

The issue isn’t personal. It’s national in scope. Political. It’s about a social issue, a cause near and dear to my heart.

One of my foundational premises of writing here is that it takes me 45 minutes to write and post each day.

I’ve just spent two hours working on this piece and I’m still not satisfied with where it’s at.

It’s a great lesson. To let it go as is or to keep working on it.

I’m choosing the latter.

It is much too important a subject to just let loose a rant that is incorherent or lacking in depth.

So I leave it for today and will come back to it tomorrow.

Have a good one!

Walking the trap line: Homelessness in the city.

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I am walking south on the street when I spy him walking on the avenue, from the east, towards me. His face is obscured by a scraggly salt and pepper beard, his eyes are hidden behind long hair that hangs about his face. He’s wearing a rumpled green rain jacket over an equally rumpled dark coloured shirt and pants. In one hand he carries a big black garbage bag and over the opposite shoulder he totes a black computer bag.

He looks visibly homeless and for a moment, I do not recognize him.

He sees me. Stops and peers intently at me through piercing blue eyes.

I look back. We smile at each other in recognition.  

“M!” I call out in delight. I am happy to see him. And we step into eachother’s arms for a hug.

It’s rush hour. Traffic is stopped at the light at the corner where we stand. People glance at us and stare. 

A middle aged woman in business attire. A middle aged man in ‘street’ attire.

We are an odd pair. 

We hug again and I ask him what he’s up to.

“Walking my trap line,” he says and he shakes the black garbage bag slightly. It rattles with the sounds of cans and glass bottles.

I laugh. Oh yes. The trap line. 

It is one of the songs created for Shelter from the Storm, the musical showcase of songs from the homeless shelter the Calgary Drop-In & Rehab Centre staged in July as part of Sled Island. It was amazing.

M. was one of the artists who contributed to the show, both musically and technically. He is gifted in so many ways. A regular at the art studio I helped create at the shelter, every Friday afternoon he can be found on the second floor of the shelter, manning the sound system for ArtBeat, a one hour musical interlude where musicians from Calgary, and elsewhere, share their talents with the clients and staff of the Drop-In.

For M, ArtBeat is a baby he helped nurture and grow into one of the ‘to be at’ musical venues of the week. From helping paint the backdrop to setting up the sound board and ensuring the technology works every week, M has played a part.

We walk west along the avenue together. I am on my way back to the office from an early morning breakfast meeting and M. is checking his trap line for possible catch. A bottle in this bin. A coin left in the parking machine. He is efficient in his checks, barely breaking step with me as he casually lifts the lid off a streetside bin or dips a finger into the silver change slot of a parking machine lining our route.

As he checks, we walk and talk and catch up on eachother’s lives.

His father passed away recently. He went to the funeral.

Years ago, that might not have happened. Since becoming involved in the art scene both at the shelter and in the city, M has reconnected with the core of his being. Artist. Musician. Craftsman. Human.

In his reconnection to his creative self, he has reconnected with family, visiting and checking in with them regularly.

It is not something that happens often in homelessness. People drift away from family, away from the roots that once held them in place.  They drift away and learn to live on their own carrying the burden of homelessness as a shield, a blanket. They become isolated. Disconnected. The shelter and its people, the street and those who call it home, become their family, the place where they are known and where they know they fit.

The past was a place that hurt. They don’t want to go back. Many times they can’t.

And so, they mourn what was lost and carry on and when news of someone they once knew arrives, good or bad, they tuck it away and focus on the street ahead.

They’ve got trap lines to check. People to meet. Places to go.

I met an old friend on the street the other day. we chatted about where we’ve been. About family and friends and shared experiences of creative expressions at the shelter where I used to work and where he still lives. They’re getting closer to finding him a place to live, he tells me. He’ll be out soon.

And I hope it’s true.

I left him at the corner of 7th and 4th. 

I turned south towards my office and he carried on in the opposite direction, the black plastic bag filling up with the product of his labours as he walked the streets of the concrete jungle where his trap line is set and he knows its path.

I am a father, a son, a brother, an uncle, a friend. I am a writer. A musician. A carpenter. An artist. I laugh. I cry. I bleed. I hurt. Which of these are diminished because I am homeless? he once asked me.

None of them, I replied.

In the tapestry of our life.

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Beaumont keeps growing and enriching the tapestry of my life. 

Life is a beautiful tapestry. Colour and feeling woven together, threads drawn, threads snipped. Threads that hold their weave forever, threads that loose their warp and loosen. Each day threads connect, disconnect, Weave in. Weave out. Up and down, in and out in a rhythmic wave of motion.
The tapestry of my life is created beneath a warm and gentle weave of waves rolling into the sea, pulling under, pulling out, pushing forward. Each person, each encounter, each moment creates a delicate, vibrant thread, to be followed, to be left alone, to be explored, to be cherished for the value it adds, then tucked into the warp so that it doesn’t unravel.

We each have our tapestry. Vibrant. Colourful. Filled with design. Sometimes balanced. Sometimes just a riotous explosion of feeling and texture and colour and design.

Sometimes, we step back and look at a thread and see where its value has created a unique perspective that will last a lifetime. Sometimes we step into a colour and discover its value is the length of the space it fills. No matter the length of the thread, its value is integral to the overall weave and warp of our tapestry.

Like colour. To enhance green, to make it pop out, the artist adds a hint of red at its edges. To make blue sparkle, a touch of yellow. Each colour adds value to the next.

Each encounter in my life adds depth, meaning, value. I carry with me memories, lessons learned, feelings felt, ideas explored. I carry with me the touch of someone’s gentle words upon my heart, the imprint of their laughter. Their smile. Their eyes.

Every thread adds value not always seen to the one who has linked their to mine, just as I do not always see how my thread has linked to theirs.

Yet in our connection, story is made, story unfolds.

In our connection, lives are enriched, touched, changed.

May the tapestries of our lives connect and create beauty and awe with every breath.

Meanwhile, back in the studio…

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   Art journal entry, August 23, 2015. Louise Gallagher

And so I come back to the studio, the canvas, the unknown, the mystical nature of creation.

I come back to my creative essence. My mystical core. My mysterious creative drive. I come back to this space where the canvas waits to be explored, to be created upon, within and with. To be seen. Known. Felt. Experienced.

To this space where I enter knowing that I must trust.

Trust in being here. Trust in being part of this sacred space. Trust in the process and in letting go of what I believe I know is true, to explore what is possible when I do not hold onto believing I know. The answer. The outcome. The end before I’ve even begun.

And I breathe.

In each breath I feel the presence of the wonder and awe of creation. And I feel fear’s presence. It nudges and pulls and grabs at me to stop. To not create. To not let my expressions become visible.  

It is true. Amidst the wonder and awe, fear is also present.

I want to run from fear. Instead, I hold my ground and greet it. Hello fear. I see you. I hear you filling my thoughts with your fear of the unknown. I hear you questionning my creative purpose, my creative voice, begging me not to express it for fear I will make a fool of myself. People will laugh at what I create. People will think of me in less than terms.

It’s okay fear. I see you. I acknowledge you. I know you. You and your compansion are part of me too. Self-doubt. Worry. Hesitation. Your constant yammering about who am I to think I have something to express. Is this really me, this artistic soul? Or am I just pretending to be the ‘me’ who creates? Who am I? What am I? How am I? Is this creative urge my trust self calling me to express itself? Explore my need, my heart’s desire to create?

I will not heed your fears. I will listen only to the expression of my creative urgings pushing and pulling at me to be released.

I must.

And so I breathe.

I breathe into the presence of fear and allow fear to breathe freely so that I can create free of fear and its companions.

And with each breath I feel the presence of wonder and awe flowing freely, filling in the spaces fear has left behind as it flew into the winds of freedom.

Wonder and awe are present. So is joy, love, contentment, bliss. So many other things are present, even in fear’s presence.

I breathe.

You are all welcome here. I do not fear you. I embrace you. You are all part of my creative process.

Like the moon needs the sun to find its light, and the sun yearns for the planets to hold their orbit around its warmth, I need all of me to be present here so that all of me can be expressed freely.

And so I breathe. And so it is.

Namaste.

****************************

I have been away from the studio for awhile. I have come back to its sacred space. I am so blessed.