Melanie Sponholz
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The retreats I have attended with Susan in Austin provided an ideal learning environment. I have no doubt that every element of the schedule and environment was intentional and reflected Susan’s consideration of and caring for the group’s diverse personalities and needs. Reflecting on one retreat that included meditation and learning about the Enneagram, the whole of our time together–both the formal content and the lived experience–was instructional. When Susan was talking this week about the importance of creating an environment for learning that was safe and comfortable for all students, I was visualizing her home in Austin. There was just the right spot for each of us to land and settle. Everything was bright, and clean, and comfortable, and welcoming. Great care went into maintaining balance, between interaction and introspection, dialogue and silence, work and rest. The sunrise swims at Barton Springs are magical. I am incredibly blessed in this life to be able to break from routine and spend time in such a lovingly and intentionally constructed container for growth with other seekers. I learned so much about the dharma, the enneagram, myself, the power of curiousity, and and the immeasurable value of attention to the present moment and life lived intentionally. Could go on for pages: )
Less ideal learning environment? Flash back to returning to school when I decided to change lanes from working in publishing to working in health care. I enrolled in Columbia’s post-bac premed program, where we were in classes with the pre-med undergrads. Hello, forced curves and cut-throat competition. I remember leaving my first exam thinking, “I definitely got a D on that.” Yup, got a score in the 60s, but that was a B+. Crazy town. Everyone there was marinating in anxiety and coffee. Good times. I did learn a lot, no doubt. Many brilliant professors, and thankfully I did find “my people,” mostly other slightly older students, who enjoyed collaboration. But there was very little joy in the experience, and every step felt like a hurdle between us and “winning” the race to grad school admission.
Liana, thank you for sharing all of this. It all feels so relatable and familiar to me: ) I especially appreciated the way you frame working with emotions as a teacher and finding a way to allow our emotions and experiences inform our responses. It’s tricky, but it’s human: )
Rosie, your experience is very similar to mine–a blurry line sometimes between friendliness and too much self-disclosure. The advice you share reminds me of something I’ve heard Susan say–maybe with respect to giving the gift of dharma–that sharing your wisdom is only a gift if it is wanted/requested by the receiver. Thank you for sharing!
The safe and soft places in our lives are such a big part of what makes us able to hold boundaries and weather storms in other landscapes. Reading your thoughts reminded me not to take my spots of refuge for granted. I felt this so deeply, and I thank you for sharing this with us.
I have experience the connected-but-separate dynamic through much of my professional life. As a physical therapist, I often worked with patients with complex health and social circumstances. I specialized in working with geriatric patients, which often involved intensely emotional family dynamics, as my patients struggled with the fear of lost autonomy and family relationships shifted as children stepped into the caregiver role. I treated many patients in their homes, helping them gain or maintain the ability to function in their daily lives, and that setting often lends itself to deeper personal sharing and connection than clinicians experience in more institutional settings. Trust between provider and patient is essential for optimal health outcomes, and in situations where a patient was lonely and isolated or family function (or dysfunction) was impacting outcomes, it could be hard to maintain clear boundaries as a healthcare provider. It can be hard not to shift from caring about to taking care of when working with such lovely and vulnerable people. I depended on a network of other professionals, including physicians and social workers, to make help me connect vulnerable patients and their families with resources and avoid overstepping the limits of my expertise and role. Maintaining professional boundaries in some instances could be heartbreaking, but the rewards of the work far outweighed the difficulties.
Thank you, Lauren. I like the sense of comfort and compassion you find in discipline. One of the things that drew me to the Open Heart Project originally was the revelation via Susan’s instructions that I could come back to the breath–start over–as many times as needed. It’s what gave me the courage to practice.
Stina, your joy is contagious: ) I think I would love digging into a project or undertaking an arduous journey with you! And how fabulous that you received such a fitting name. Thank you for sharing.
Rosie, I love the idea to give something away to generate a sense of richness. It’s a beautiful twist on fake it til you make it, and I will definitely put it into use!
Colin, thank you for sharing your personal journey. It feels so familiar to me, and I am inspired by your progress, since I am a bit behind you on the road of dropping my poverty mindset baggage. Truly lucky to be here with Susan and this group to help me on the journey.
I feel most connected to patience. I grew up in a house where keeping the peace necessitated having a finely tuned sense of the interior lives of others. I am a recovering people pleaser. There are certainly difficulties with being wired for constant emotional surveillance, but after years of work on reconnecting with my own interior life (thank you, Susan, the Enneagram, and therapy), I can enjoy my instinctual drive to understand what makes others tick. Now I look forward to connecting with all kinds of people. Interacting with other people is just the most fascinating thing! The chemistry with another person is such a mysterious thing, and even in the darker dynamics of clashing opinions or opposed objectives, there is beauty in sensing beyond the words and behind the body language, trying to feel my way to the motivation, fears, and hopes underneath, or wherever those things reside. I am very slow to be agitated and naturally shift towards figuring out the why behind the vibe. Ironically, I am much more patient dealing with significant obstacles and conflicts, and much quicker to lose patience dealing with trivial matters, as my kids will attest: )
I can struggle with generosity–definitely because I doubt my own richness. I have an irrational scarcity mentality in light of my actual life circumstances at the present moment. Past instabilities combined with my self preservation subtype (there’s the Enneagram again) may be at the root? I can vividly remember reading Little House in the Big Woods as a child and savoring the description of the Ingalls family laying in stores for the winter–filling barrels with potatoes, stringing garlic. Somehow the corner of my mind is always anticipating lack and holding on to things “just in case.” Awareness once more is spurring a slow remodel of the neural pathways, but much work to do here, especially since it is the foundation of being of benefit to others.
I am so appreciative of this space to share.
Susan, it was so lovely to share this first time instruction experience with you. You were brave to go first, and I felt calm and centered as we sat together. When it was my turn to instruct, I felt like you had created a safe and accepting space for me to step out and give it a try. Thank you: )
Hi Lauren: ) Like Colin, I appreciate you sharing your thoughts about leaning on the technique to help sidestep self-consciousness. And I too am so happy to know we will have many opportunities to practice and find our own voice. Glad to be on the journey with you.
Colin, your essay so clearly evokes an understanding of your experience teaching. Probably because it seems very similar to my experience, I feel “right there with you” on your thoughts about the awareness of getting lost in the weeds, and having a sense of unanticipated awkwardness. It is such a gift that we are partnered with others in this beautiful, beneficent group, so that we can move through these bumpy starts feeling safe and understood.
I was more excited than nervous about providing meditation instruction–it’s all in how you frame the feeling. Just call it excitement, instead of anxiety, and it glows in a positive light: ) Going into it, I felt like the instructions would feel intuitive, since I’ve heard and followed them so many times over the years. However, I felt a sense of hyper self-awareness while giving the instructions and had to keep returning to the meditation from the spectator seat. I guess in some ways it was like the returning to the awareness of the breath, but my self-judgement was much more harsh. I was pulling myself out of the present by scrutinizing the moment and instruction that had just past.
The post-instruction discussion by the group was very comforting and provided food for thought about forging forward on the path to teaching. I appreciated the discussion of being there to care about, but not take care of our students, since part of my self critique was centered on whether I was meeting the student’s expectations. Getting in the groove, so to speak, is staying open, receptive, and present–Placing attention on the process as it unfolds and truly sitting with the student, not sitting in the stands with a scorecard. Simple not easy, but I’m so grateful to have the opportunity to come back to trying as many times as needed. So grateful for Susan and this beautiful group of people to share this with.
