Becoming Unhinged

The poem below was written months before major changes took place last year. I can see within this piece the extreme shifting in the techtonic plates in my life ~ how it foreshadows everything my family and I have experienced since. Sometimes the chaos has to take over and do its work before I can reclaim order.

Unhinged

I could rage in the face of Fear
Become paralyzed in its merciless gaze
I could struggle in its embrace
Or vomit at its feet
Or split
Into a berserker frenzy
To rip out and devour its
Raw and still pulsing heart
I could bathe in Fear’s blood

But I can’t deny its existence
I can’t look away
Or hear that it’s all going to be OK
Or silence my voice when it’s finally discovered
Its own keening magnitude
I won’t be mollified
Simply because my fear
Unhinges you

I am unhinged
Unglued
Shattered
Flayed
Exposed

Fear dances contortions
In my brittle bones
Comfort words and strong arms
Won’t release me from its grip

You can’t do this for me

Chaos will birth me into something new
Fear is a Shadow midwife
Allow for change
It will change
It’s the only promise I can make you
It’s all that I can give you
Until I’m reconstructed
And rise with ashes in my hair

4-26-12

What's My Motivation?

Playing with Smokey Joe


There’s an old joke in theatre circles. Actors always analyze the parts they play, questioning why their characters would or wouldn’t behave in certain ways. What motivates the character? So, during a rehearsal, the director asks the actor to walk across the stage, and the actor responds “What’s my motivation?” Without skipping a beat, the director says, “Your paycheck.”

Of course, I was never paid to be on stage while I was in college. No financial incentive there. And now, many years later, I find myself in metaphoric director’s shoes, asking my horses for certain behaviors. I can almost hear them ask, “What’s my motivation -- and where’s the paycheck?”

In the past eight years, I’ve abandoned the idea of controlling my horses. Control is a great illusion. In a physical contest, my horses will win – hooves down -- unless I bully my way through our encounters. I’m not interested in bullying. I’ve discovered that collaboration is really a better goal. I’d rather accomplish things together, as partners and friends, than have to pretend I’m stronger or in charge. I ask rather than demand. It seems to work better for us.

Motivation factors into the collaborative dance. Sure I can ask for a behavior, but if it doesn’t make sense to the horse – and if I’m not clear about what I want – why should my horse want to cooperate? What’s his motivation?

I needed to break behaviors down into smaller increments, layering new information onto the already learned behavior. It comes down to this:

Whatever I’m asking has to make sense to my horse. An intelligent being questions the reasons behind any request. Horses are really no different than most humans in this way. There has to be some purpose or meaning involved, other than because I said. Common sense – horse sense -- requires me to consider what the horse understands as a reasonable request. The next step for me is to ask for a simple behavior that, when achieved, results in a reward. Rewards make sense. Simple behaviors transform over time into more complex skill sets, all based on motivation and paycheck.

Enter the clicker and a bag full of horse treats. Horses eat approximately 75 % of their waking day, so food is a logical and inviting “paycheck” -- not to be mistaken for a bribe. A bribe is something you dangle in front of someone before a behavior to coax the person (or horse) into doing what you ask. A reward comes after, when the behavior has been satisfactorily presented.

In truth, food equals motivation – but it’s not the only motivation. My horses now see the clicker and treat pouch and know we’re going to play. The interaction has become a game, less about eating and more about connecting and figuring out puzzles together. It’s fun, and horses love to have fun! Now there’s a great motivating factor!!

And what does the clicker do for me? It requires me to focus on exactly what I’m asking. If my horse doesn’t understand what I’m asking, I have to adjust and communicate more clearly – asking for less or simply asking for something differently. If I’m not clear, how can I expect my horse to understand? After all, we don’t exactly speak the same language.

So, the clicker trains me, too. When I’ve asked clearly and clearly see the desired behavior, the click isn’t just for my horse, it’s for me, too. It says, “I got it right! Yea for me!!”

And Yea for all of us who endeavor to bridge the communication gap in positive ways! What’s the motivation? The paycheck? At the end of the day, I think my paycheck is mutual love and friendship.

Visitation of the Muse

Visitation of the Muse

The Muse made her presence known
at a little hour of the morning.
2:32 A.M.

A lightning flash of rapid fire inspiration.
She shot at me random strands of poetry …
She sparked vivid images of beaded art
and profoundly shaped figures in clay…
She frantically chanted fragments of the opening lines
of a novel that I have yet to birth…

And there, in the groggy fog
of the morning’s little hour,
I rolled the pillow over my head
and told the Muse to shut up.

Nora Place Morbeck
April 22, 2011

Stalled -- Insights from a Self-Coaching Moment

George ~ outside on a sunny day, 2010

Stalled

I spend a good part of each day with horses. Blended with barn chores are moments of opportunity to observe, reflect, learn and grow ~ those blessed self-coaching experiences that re-shape my understanding and perspective.

George is a young Quarter Horse stallion, and like many stallions, he lives a life of confinement. He doesn’t have a pasture to share with a harem of mares, so he lives his life in a stall with only brief excursions into a larger environment. It’s a lonely existence, and my heart aches for this horse, who is not mine and over whom I have little decision-making ability.

I let him out of his stall as weather and timing permit, and in the past his usual response has been a burst of enthusiasm. He runs in circles, bucks, and leaps into the air with the sheer exuberance of release.

Yesterday, though, presented a far different scenario. I opened George’s stall door, and he simply stood and looked at me, unwilling to leave the confines of his stall. Perplexed, I called to him ~ then tapped on the side of his stall ~ then offered him feed pellets ~ then waited patiently for him to make a decision to come out. All to no avail.

In that moment of puzzlement, it dawned on me that I’d stepped into a coaching moment.

What, I reflected, is my “stall” and what reasons do I have for being so unwilling to leave it? What is the invisible barrier that I refuse to cross? How does being “stalled” serve me?

The stall isn’t, after all, a very roomy or comfortable place, so I hesitate to refer to it as a “comfort zone” ~ more like a “discomfort zone.” I know every inch of the stall. It's dull and uninspiring and I don’t really want to be stalled in the first place, in any sense of the word. And, of course, there’s a much bigger space just waiting for my emergence. So, what’s keeping me confined and how do I get out?

The first answer is usually the clearest, and my first heart response was this: What keeps me stalled is self-limiting beliefs, perpetuated by the little voice of self doubt whispering in the back of my head. External limits and expectations ~ those I allow to be placed on me by others ~ serve to give the self-doubt a louder voice, which blocks me and keeps me from stepping into something bigger and better.

My Truth is that the stall door is open. The barrier is an illusion.

I slipped a halter over George’s head and walked a few steps out of the stall. He dug in his feet and refused to budge.

How many times do I dig in my heels to my own detriment? I resist the pull into a different set of circumstances. What is the force that could propel me forward?

I offered George love and understanding and encouragement, acknowledging his fear and resistance. I applied gentle pressure, allowing him to take his time to cross the threshold.

I realize that I’m not on anyone else’s time schedule. I love, understand and encourage myself. I apply gentle pressure and make choices that feel right for me in my own time. Allow the experience to expand, to unfold and to reveal itself with greater clarity in its own time.

George stepped out of his stall and transitioned into an open space.

I step out. I transition into whatever open space is next for me...

Meg with Eva

Meg with Eva

Because she needed
to lose the memories
to make a clean start …

Because of the instinct
to get out of her own way,
to trust Fate
to become something Other …

Because nothing was hers
to cling to ~ not really…

Except the hair and the ponies
and the intensity of the Mom-bond.

She chose to fly ~
not away from, but toward.
With the herd gathered
and a child in each hand,
she leapt forward into the Void.

And she left the hair behind.

Nora Place Morbeck
10/16/2010

A Bonfire of Procrastination: Apologia for Clutter

Where to start?...
and how?...
and why?...
What is my motivation?
What is the purpose?

To tidy after the woefully untidy?
To glower in resentment
amongst heaps created
by the oblivious and unconcerned?
To grudgingly un-clutter
what no woman has un-cluttered before?

I live in a world of possibilities.
What are my options?

I could throw a Pity Party for one,
a celebration of sulky procrastination.

I could, in a fit of dissociation,
deny the very existence
of the clutter.

I could, better yet,
touch a match to all of it –
howl and dance naked in reckless abandon
like a Pictish blue warrior –
while sparks leap toward the sky.
Sacrifice the clutter to the
purification of flame!
Make such a fiery end to procrastination
as to be the glorious inspiration
to all other Domestic Goddesses!!

Or …
I could just suck it up and clean.

Nora Place Morbeck
10/16/2010

Nose to Nose with Smokey Joe