My heart isn't a fist (even if my spirit feels kicked in the nuts)

This election season is over. And it’s not how this (nasty) woman would have liked it to go. While watching the electoral votes come in I picked every scab I ever had and fell asleep with a heavy heart, dreaming about being afraid at gas stations in the middle of the country for some reason.

I am grateful I do not hold my heart like a fist. Today I am sad, but my heart is not tight. My heart is disappointed and sure, a little sacred. I feel “other,” marginalized, out of step with, apparently, most of “my” country. 

Even though my spirit feels kicked in the nuts, and “we” lost, that doesn’t have to mean LOVE loses — like the end of The Grinch we can at least have some light because it’s in us. That said, I am sad today. I’m not in shadow, because I don’t choose from a place of shadow. And a taste of this shadow makes me want to barf. How dark and scared a place is that makes this kind of choice for our world. And who’s “our” anymore?

As I feel the umbrella of shadow encroaching I breathe and listen to Hillary’s concession speech and cry into my cat’s belly fur. I will approach with the “open mind” she mentions, but I’ll also hope that this man is a lot of hot air, without a hair-trigger on The Button.

The popular vote shows that a majority believes similar to me, to put it in overly simplistic terms. That was somewhat of a comfort, because at first I felt like the majority of the country wanted me and “my kind,” whatever that means (dyed haired liberal weirdos?), dead. So to consider that Hillary got more votes is something, yet this is just another giant slap in the face to my fellow Americans and humans that aren’t actually “other,” they’re us.

I liked reading several beacons of hope on Instagram, including yogi Guru Singh and Qoya founder Rochelle Schieck. Singh talks about noise versus signal in the growth of human consciousness, and how it’s our job to suss out the signal from all the noise. Schieck writes about being able to hold and accept a paradox of belief from our fellow humans and trusting that love always wins.

This came to me via Linda Sivertsen:

Throughout material mechanics there’s always a ratio of signal to noise, and the noise is consistently more prevalent than the signal. This is how matter operates. The purpose of individual human existence is to develop a consciousness that recognizes pure signals within this overwhelming noise. Throughout history there’ve been despotic individuals and movements, driven to find advantage in the noise; to appeal to the fear of noise, and then ride the waves of its storms to gain from its destruction. This is the nature of barbarism, a uniquely human condition influenced and organized by sociopathic inclinations . . . attitudes that have no empathy. This has become more prevalent since the ice ages destroyed the food-stocks and human ancestry defaulted to near-cannibalism. The ability to separate pure signals from overwhelming noise is the purpose of meditation, and at its highest levels, this awareness is known as awakening . . . as enlightenment. This is a specific capacity that empowers the electromagnetic field . . . your aura. The signal to noise ratio is like a needle in a haystack. There’s a riddle: “How do you find a needle in a giant haystack? With a giant magnet!” When all the overwhelming noise registers on the sounding board of your life, the signal can be located by increasing your electromagnetic field to such a degree that you don't deal with the noise . . . it's noticed, but not engaged. You don't register it as value, but as an essential carrier-agent of the pure signals you attract. Evolutionary reality employs this signal to noise ratio to create environments of crisis; they stimulate growth, which enables change and adaptation to survive and thrive. Those who take advantage of the noise, for the purpose of self-gain, are servants of this evolutionary process . . . they stimulate those who are approaching enlightenment. Our prayer is that you’re not discouraged by the noise, but see beyond these charades and parades to embrace the pure signals they contain . . . shed the noise and the antics of those who take advantage of destruction and recognize it’s all part of cosmic nature . . . locate the signals and use them for good.

A photo posted by Guru Singh (@gurusinghyogi) on Nov 9, 2016 at 4:20am PST

The below came to my attention via Danielle LaPorte. Rochelle Schieck's movement ritual practice of Qoya completely helped save me last winter. She is wise and gets to wisdom through the body. 

Mood. I was leaving my friend's apartment in NYC this morning at 5am for the airport and saw these withering pink roses in front of a world map. Mmm. My sadness was for myself and for all who who are experiencing heartbreak today~ not solely for the political loss, but for the perceived diversion from the values that we hold at our core~ of love, of unity, of prayers for peace. Many of the circles I participate in are devoted to the rise of the feminine in each individual, relationship, organization and corner of the world. Last night was an opportunity to have one woman as herself, and as an ambassador of the feminine within each of us, rise. Instead, it became a wake up call to for me and for everyone who feels their inner voice activating them to more passionately participate in co-creating our world. A time to strengthen in spirit and practice. It also was a sobering realization for the need to be better at balancing and bridging our inner sense of reality with the shared reality of others. Could this be the ushering in of our evolution of consciousness beyond duality and polarity and exploration beyond paradox? If spiritual maturity is when we can hold two opposing viewpoints at the same time and see them as both true, maybe we can do that here? All of the initiations I have/we have been through already~ to trust love (even here), to know how to calm the mind, heart, body and nervous system (even here) and to see the sacred at play (even here) will serve us in the unfolding power of the forever now. Inevitably, we know how this ends. Inevitably, we always come back to love. However, the grief and the sorrow is not weakness. It is the honoring of our human experience. It offers awareness, especially about being humble and compassionate to all beings. May our tears moisten the soul soil, so the seeds of those pinks roses can bloom again, in a different form. Even though today may feel like the impending darkness of winter, Hope Springs Eternal. The cycle of life continues as we dance with it and it dances with us.

A photo posted by rochelleschieck (@rochelleschieck) on Nov 9, 2016 at 4:55am PST

I appreciate this perceptive from Karen Brown, a friend of a friend: "I can't get on the ‘it's going to be OK’ positive bandwagon. It's not for women, it's not for people of color, it's not for immigrants, it's not for LGBTQ ... so please, beautiful, loving, positive, particularly white straight friends, please understand that I can't be in that place today. I know you mean well, but take a moment to check your privilege before expecting everyone to dust off and move on.”

One heartening chart shows “how the future voted,” with most of the country so blue from 18-25 year olds’ votes that Hillary would have gotten 504 electoral votes and Trump only 23. So perhaps we’ll move forward eventually with equality after all. Someday.

From Eliza Byard (@EByard) on Twitter.

Progress hurts, I know. Especially when it feels like going backward.

I'm wearing my moldavite earrings today, which seem appropriate, because moldavite is from a meteor and not of this world and I'm feeling a little not of this world today. (I regularly feel not of this world, I guess, but it got brought home today, whatever "home" is.)