Sue Bender - Stretching Lessons

I never plan to write a book.

Instead, something happens.

The inspiration for Stretching Lessons came from a four-year-old boy I have never met. A friend described a conversation she had with her nephew, Kyle.

How big youre getting, she had told him.

Oh, Im bigger than that! he replied.

A simple conversation.

A few words.

But the words went straight to my heart.

I felt goose bumps.

My body knew something important had just happened. But I am not someone who listens to her body. My heart and intuition, yes, but never my body. Bigger than that! my rational mind protested. What does that mean?

I didnt have an answer.

But I trusted the goose bumps.

Messages, important to hear, take me by surprise. They always come in a form I am not expecting. These tingling sensations from inside my body were a strong and visceral signal. There was something worth knowing, even if I didnt know what that something was.

What was my soul trying to tell me?

What were the goose bumps trying to tell me?

Learning to listen to my body was like entering a foreign land and having to learn a new language. This new language didnt depend on the things I have always been good at:

Struggle

Effort

Working hard all the time

Like a hermit crab that had outgrown its shell, I needed to stretch out of this exhausting way of conducting my life. But I seemed unwilling or unable to get out of the tight, constricted space I was in.

Kyles words offered an invitation: Could I dare to be bigger? Could my mind and spirit grow in ways I hadnt thought possible?

Stretching Lessons is about that search.

Perhaps within each of us there is a need to stretch.

Perhaps within each of us there is a daring spirit that whispers to be heard.

My hope is that by telling my story, you will find the courage to trust your own voiceto listen to what your soul is trying to tell you. If you are willing to trust, to have faith in the unfolding, we can go on this journey together.

Together we can stretchand dare to be as big as we really are.

STRETCHING

Spending too much time hunched over the computer, trying to write, I decided to sign up for a stretching class. Just Stretch it was called. It would be healthy, I thought, and I was prepared to be a good and earnest student and work hard, as I usually do. Instead, I heard a miraculously flexible instructor, Nancy, say:

PRACTICE ENJOYING. DONT PRACTICE STRUGGLING.

The suggestion was startling, revolutionary, and sweet: Pain doesnt have to be your teacher.

Unlearn the habit of trying, she said after we began to stretch. Its not about tryingits about allowing.

But trying is my middle name, I wanted to shout. How do I learn allowing?

Back at my desk after class, I wrote Nancys words in large bold letters with lots of * * * * * next to each one. Though there was nothing to show on the outside, even the possibility of doing what she suggested made me feel calm inside. All I could think was, I hope this class never ends!

I felt like a person whod been too long in the desert, hungry and thirsty, suddenly offered delicious, unfamiliar nectar. Nancys last instruction rings in my ears:

Listen to the whispers.

STRUGGLE

Could I quiet down my own noise to hear the soft whispers from within? What happened next was a shriek, not a whisper.

Talent is doing what comes naturally, a friend announced.

What do you think comes naturally to you? she asked me. The answer came quickly and with great certainty:

STRUGGLE! Im an expert at STRUGGLING.

The swiftness and clarity of my response made me laugh. But it wasnt funny. My old, familiar voice of judgment chimed in: Havent you learned anything? Arent you wiser?

I am wiser.

And I am still struggling.

Have good things grown out of my exhausting habit of struggling? Absolutely. Ive written two books using struggle as my method. But after seventeen years of this single-minded obsession with writing, I still didnt think of myself as a writer.

Working this way only confirmed an old belief of mine: good things will come to me, but I will have to work hard and work all the time to make them happen. I wondered if I also believed I had to struggle in order to earn the right be happy.

Theres a difference between hard work and unnecessary suffering .

If I were composing an ad for a relationship magazine and deciding to really tell the truth about myself, I would say:

Expert at struggle , longing for ease. Signed: EAGER.

Im sixty-six years old and I want to learn about ease. Even writing the word ease or saying it out loud has a magical effect on me. The expression on my face softens, my shoulders drop two inches, and Im able to take a full and deep breath.

I want to learn about ease, I announced to my wise friend Mitzi, with a determined ring in my voice. Im going to use my natural talent for struggle to learn how not to struggle. Sometimes, too earnest in my search for answers, I forget to laugh at myself: My struggle toward ease .

Mitzi told me about a time, many years ago, when she was taking a dance class in college. The teacher asked the students to imagine themselves holding a heavy ball and then lifting it over their heads. Mitzi was very busy trying to lift the heavy ball, never succeeding at getting it more than three inches above the ground, only stopping her labors for a moment when she heard the group laughing.

She looked up and saw all the students with their balls over their heads, watching her tugging at her invisible ball. She had succeeded at creating the heaviest ball.

I dont think you always have to suffer in order to do good work, Mitzi said. After all, I was the one who made my ball too heavy. The task hadnt been difficult. I created my own struggle.

She turned to me and asked: Could you begin to imagine a release from the struggle? A gentler way to change? Could I find a release that feels good and doesnt require so much hard work?

Looking at release on the page, I see ease tucked in.

Today, Valentines Day, a card arrived with a handmade heart and, in a friends beautiful handwriting, a reminder from Rilke:

Be patient

toward all that is unsolved in your heart .

MORE GOOSE BUMPS

Something happens. Nothing extreme or dramatic. A chance meeting. Something we could not have predicted, a shift, ever so slightand our life takes a turn.

Jungian analyst Robert Johnson calls these seemingly random occurrences slender threads . They appear in many forms, and lead us forwardallowing our lives to unfold.

The life of your destiny, a friend once told me.

What a splendid thoughtthe life of our destinyand the image of slender threads guiding us.