Author: Martha Holden

She wore a sequined mask. It was a drab February afternoon, the waiting room of a chiropractor’s office. I complimented her on the mask. She described how young women age, say, eight to thirteen, would have their eyes light up at the sight of it. I suggested that she was giving them a gift in expanding their sense of the possible. What I think of as the gift of odd. 

I have friends who are odd. I suspect that some of my friends find me odd. When I was younger, I did not want to associate with, or be associated with, people who were odd. I was afraid of being shunned, of being considered odd myself. Then I had a friend name herself “an odd duck,” and my appreciation of the gift of odd came to be. I began to accept and be grateful for the expanded territory of Possible which this friend offered me. This friend was accepted in our community. If my “odd” were smaller, or different than her “odd,” I might still be acceptable. 

Once I started to expand the territory of my self-permission, something within me wanted more. The gift my “odd duck” friend had given me wanted to be given to others, to be passed on. The gift of, as my sequin-masked new friend put it, being one’s self. 

Let’s see how this fits in with the spark work. The spark cannot be extinguished. It can, however, be baffled. The bafflement, we have come to see, leads to distortions, which, in turn, lead to both the inner and outer layers of defense.  

My bafflement is usually about my safety. Not about being safe, but about feeling safe. Since my spark cannot be damaged, nor put out, I am essentially safe. But if I am not feeling safe (which may be to say that I am not secure in claiming my spark) I’ll start casting up distortions: “Maybe if I do this I’ll feel safe” or “If I have that I’ll feel safe.” That twists me, distorts me, is painful, and so leads to defenses. 

Can using the spark concepts help me to be willing to be the oddity that I am? Well, I believe that if I want to help someone or want to be part of the global solution, using my spark is the simplest, surest way to do that. As I claim my spark, through it reaching out to affirm and connect with the spark in the other, I am part of the solution. That feels good. But also my spark is strengthened by this eleemosynary effort. 

My strengthened spark acts to erode my defenses: maybe I don’t need them so much anymore. It can clarify my bafflement: Ah! O, yes, now I remember. My spark cannot be extinguished or corrupted.  So I am safe. I may not be feeling safe, but that is likely just an outdated habit. I am safe. So I can be who I am, becoming my true self, odd or not, sequined mask or not. I am safely becoming my true self. You can too!

Deb D. asks for some guidance concerning the practical application of acknowledging the spark in others and even in ourselves. I can respond only from my experience, being ever more starkly aware that we are each unique ‘energy events’ and learn and process in our own unique ways. So here is Deb’s query, which I shall respond to below, and you are invited to add any response you have in the Comments.

Thanks to all for this wonderful way of being in the world. I can see the beauty in the idea but I’m wondering about the practical application of acknowledging the spark in others and even in myself.  Say I’m standing in a conversation with someone and I’m feeling that I’m not getting what I want. They are not “coming around” to my way of thinking.  Do I say to myself, this person has the same spark of humanity that I do?   What words do I use, even in my mind to help me stop and recognize the spark? In the midst of a difficult conversation, do I say to myself, “Stop and listen and see if you hear – love? Truth? Pain?”  Some guidance would be helpful.

Thank you, Deb, for this. I like to think of the spark work as a practice. I need to have had some practice at claiming my spark before I can expect to engage its benefits in a challenging situation such as you describe.  That’s one of the uses of the meditations on the website, or joining the meditations we are offering on Sunday afternoons. These help establish the ‘neural pathways’ through which we may access our sparks, they get us used to the practice.

In a tough situation such as you describe, I find that it is the pain, my own discomfort, that reminds me of the option to claim my spark. Once I remember that I can do that, through my spark, I affirm and connect with the spark in the other person. For me, I don’t tell myself anything. I just remember that I can do, and move into doing it, what we term ‘claiming our spark’.

If I am having difficulty claiming my spark, I remember (or hope to remember!) to connect with my roots. This brings me stability, access to living wisdom, and connection with the community. So I feel safe. Feeling safe, I become willing to hold “what I want” more softly, willing to let that shift and modify to become what is best in the situation, what is the peaceful solution. I am no longer invested in the other person coming around to my way of thinking. Being safe, and grounded, I want what is best for all concerned.

Once I am in this ‘space’, I am able (so far!) to affirm and connect with the spark in the other. Our experience in the Discovering the Peaceful Solution workshops is that, indeed, the peaceful solution emerges. Quite quickly and easily if all concerned are claiming their sparks, and connecting with and affirming the sparks in the other. If you are the only one using the spark work, it can take longer; but still, I find that when I am faithful in the work, the peaceful solution does indeed emerge.

As you can see, I do not use words to myself. There is nothing better about this, it is just the way I process things. So I hope that, if using words is what is helpful for you, you can shift what I have to offer in a way that works for you.  I am sure that if you want to do the spark work, that you will be able to find a way. And when you do, I hope you will share it for the benefit of all of those whose ‘wiring’ is not like mine! -Martha

 

During these past months, many of us have come to be more dependent on the internet. Through it, we have been able to stay connected with friends and families, participate in meetings and other events, and keep track of what is going on in our country and the world. Chances are that many of us would be less sane without it. Along with this increasing dependence we may have experienced, and we probably know some who have experienced, the internet being “down”. I am less wound into the internet than many folks I know; but still, I can imagine the disorientation and distress of those who lose their internet connection (or cell signal) in these times.

We may not be able to keep the internet from going “down” when we need it, we may not be able always to have a cell signal, but I think that we can develop a practice that can soften the shock should that happen. We can develop our acquaintance with the innernet, and practice turning to it for connection.

As I see it, “underneath” the innernet and more resilient, ancient, and indestructible is what I am calling the innernet, that subtle and incorruptible connection we have with all humanity, indeed, with all creation. The internet may “go down;” the innernet may sag from lack of awareness and exercise, but it cannot “go down”. Our bafflement, distortions, and defenses may block our access to it. We may be living in denial of it. We may be living as if it were “down”, or as if it never existed. Yet it is there. It exists. That, at least, is what our experience in the spark work implies.

Can we explore becoming defter at accessing the innnernet? At developing and exercising our use of this resource? Let’s sketch out how it might fit into our spark work.

It is a foundational premise of the spark work that our sparks cannot be extinguished. They cannot be put out. Neither can they be damaged or corrupted. They can be defended, distorted, and baffled; sometimes (generally, to be honest) all three. We might suggest that the innernet, as the implicit, inchoate, connection between all sparks can similarly not be corrupted or damaged. Our access to it can be corrupted or damaged through our bafflement, distortions, and defenses, through our conscious or unconscious misuse or neglect or denial. But the innernet is there, available, in all its integrity.

Our spark work can support our becoming defter at using the innernet. Through our spark work, we can explore its possibilities. Again by analogy to our becoming agents of transformation, I suspect that our exploration of the innernet will be most effective and satisfying if our sparks are strong. It seems that this means, again and still, that we need to be willing to be transformed, that we are asked to allow our defenses to be eroded, our distortions be released, our bafflement be clarified. What do you think?

-Martha