1. What is the sound of your own voice?
2. Letting go: For next year, I’m letting go of…
1. In browsing through a few other blogs, I see that some have interpreted this prompt very literally, as in 'what do you sound like'? I have a good speaking voice -- clear, moderately pitched, from the diaphragm rather than the throat, and I enunciate well -- all those speech classes, I suppose, and the acting. I can project -- or used to be able to -- to the back of a sizeable room -- unfortunately, it also took a long time to learn how NOT to project and to lower the volume when I was talking in a group or to a friend.
But I think this prompt asks us more to listen to who we are, the authentic person within. When we speak, who is talking? The good daughter or wife or mother who does what she is expected to do, but not necessarily what she wants to do? The employee who is careful not to express opinions too different from those of her peers (even though she has some strong opinions that may differ wildly from those of others)? The friend who is aware that she is perhaps being taken advantage of, but doesn't want to cause the friendship to crash and burn -- for a lot of reasons? The volunteer who is burned out because nobody else seems to step up to the plate?
Each has its own voice, but when we utter the words, we learn a little more about who we want to be in addition to who we are.
As I have aged, all those other voices have melded -- or are melding -- into one voice: who I really am and what I really think. Mostly. What I have learned is to keep my counsel a little more carefully, too. I still don't want to offend, but I have learned that saying nothing is often the most powerful statement. I have learned that those who are truly my friends will hear me loud and clear, and that I have nothing to fear by allowing them to do so -- in fact, it deepens and ripens a friendship. I no longer have to please an employer. And I pretty much do as I like, with little regard for what anyone expects me to do!
Speak your truth. Be who you are. Be kind, but be honest. That is the sound of your own voice.
2. Let it go, let it gooooooo....
Like most everyone else, I loved and related to Elsa's song in "Frozen" and have actively worked on letting stuff go for decades now, long before the song was a note in someone's brain.
And for decades I have worked to let go of the self-criticism, the judgement I heap on myself, and the people-pleaser part of me that worries about whether I'm fitting in or saying the right things or doing the right things so that others will judge me favorably. Yeah.Yuk.
I've come a really long way with that. I probably will never be there completely, but I care a whole lot less about it than I used to, and I'm way more gentle with myself. This year I have actively started to work on the almost subconscious judgement towards others: the part that says "doesn't that woman look in a mirror before she goes out like that?" Or "look at those filthy pants, and down around his knees! Yuk! I can see his boxers!" Or "those kids are totally out of control and there is no one in sight -- who DOES that!" Or "geeze, that tattoo is so offensive! Why would someone do that?"
And so on. It is so ingrained in me -- and I suspect in most of us -- that I have to consciously stop the train of thought, and I have started to say a little prayer for the person as soon as I notice the judgement. I don't know what their lives are like. I don't know what kind of parents they had or why they do what they do.
Most importantly, it is NOT MY LIFE TO MANAGE.
So I'll continue letting such judgement go in 2015 -- the judgement that looks in the mirror with unkind eyes, and the judgement that looks at others with unkind eyes.
Showing posts with label expectations. Show all posts
Showing posts with label expectations. Show all posts
Friday, December 05, 2014
Monday, August 26, 2013
Once in a Blue August Moon: Day 6 -- Zeniths and Nadirs
The prompt: The zeniths and the nadirs. Where have the highlights and low points
been for you so far in 2013? Where are you now? How would you like your
year to end?
Actually, you'd think I was on antidepressants (I'm not): I haven't had moments of great joy nor of great sorrow this year, and I'm oh so good with that continuing.
I have had moments of tremendous gratitude, like when I came out of the anesthetic after surgery, gasping and sleepy, but so glad I was awake and alive and all right.
Quiet and all-encompassing feelings of gratitude and enormous contentment at very ordinary things, like sitting with my honey and kitties, watching a favorite television show, in a darkened great room with woodstove firelight flickering; tiny white lights high above the stove in a built-in alcove silhouetting the angels I have sitting there, some from my mother including one painted by one of her close friends (both of them now dead), another from a wonderful former client, and all watchful and comforting.
Pleasure at attending a live theater performance -- we don't miss many, if any -- from the Cascade Theatre or Riverfront Playhouse or Shasta College in Redding. The variety of plays and talent is broad: some are fun because the cast members try so hard; others are memorable because the acting is so professional; others reflect such amazing talent in the script. Occasionally, as in "The Women of Lockerbie" which we saw yesterday at Riverfront, and "Fiddler on the Roof" at the Cascade a few months ago, both outstanding script and exceptionally talented cast combine for an unforgettable and stunning performance. I love watching live theater. I love being on stage in an amazing play even more, but those roles don't come often.
I've found little delights in mundane things: wearing a fun pair of comfortable shoes that make me smile every time I look at them. Savoring a piece of really delicious pie with good friends. Feeling sleek and stylish every time I get my hair cut in the precise, angled style I am wearing, greys and whites gleaming in the salon light, and swinging neatly as I walk. Stretching and moving in the dim yoga studio, imagining the muscles and ligaments easing into the familiar positions, and the spiritual grace of 'namaste' we offer at the close of the session. Loving the gleam of clean floors and fixtures after my friend has worked her magic on my house.
Clean, soft sheets every week and the cool green bedroom where we sleep every night, holding hands as we drift off. Reaching to touch my honey in the night, just grateful he is there and breathing.
Anticipation at traveling in our new-to-us travel trailer with our beloved kitties coming along rather than being left at home or in a kennel where they are frightened and surly because they are not with us -- and the comfort we all feel at being together in bed every night. The prospect of spending more than a week beside our mighty-mighty ocean in several campgrounds, reveling in the crash of waves, the salt air, the age-old power that emanates from its depths and stills our souls and minds.
There are low points as well, but far fewer.
Moments of frustration and apprehension: learning that I would have to have a general anesthetic rather than a twilight one just before I went into the OR.
Times of worry and fear for a loved one who seems to repeat the same patterns without ever learning the lessons that I see so clearly. Ongoing grief for the loss of what might have been, and reluctant distrust in what I am being told and not told.
Anxiety and fear during episodes of afib that seem to occur approximately monthly, although they nearly always revert spontaneously within a few hours to a steady sinus rhythm. (And such gratitude that they do.)
Where am I now? I work daily on gratitude and calm and energy, focusing the energy where I need it most at that moment. I know that nothing is permanent; everything changes, and that the good (which I try to savor as it happens) will pass away as well as the not-good. I am grateful to be who and where I am, and overwhelmingly grateful that I am loved so dearly and deeply by a man who I love just as dearly and deeply. That is THE BEST of my life.
By the end of the year? More joy. More things that make me smile and feel happy. Any health apprehensions addressed and resolved, or at least treated. More awareness of how great a gift life is EVERY SINGLE DAY. More writing. More decluttering of stuff. More spirit.
Amen.
Actually, you'd think I was on antidepressants (I'm not): I haven't had moments of great joy nor of great sorrow this year, and I'm oh so good with that continuing.
I have had moments of tremendous gratitude, like when I came out of the anesthetic after surgery, gasping and sleepy, but so glad I was awake and alive and all right.
Quiet and all-encompassing feelings of gratitude and enormous contentment at very ordinary things, like sitting with my honey and kitties, watching a favorite television show, in a darkened great room with woodstove firelight flickering; tiny white lights high above the stove in a built-in alcove silhouetting the angels I have sitting there, some from my mother including one painted by one of her close friends (both of them now dead), another from a wonderful former client, and all watchful and comforting.
Pleasure at attending a live theater performance -- we don't miss many, if any -- from the Cascade Theatre or Riverfront Playhouse or Shasta College in Redding. The variety of plays and talent is broad: some are fun because the cast members try so hard; others are memorable because the acting is so professional; others reflect such amazing talent in the script. Occasionally, as in "The Women of Lockerbie" which we saw yesterday at Riverfront, and "Fiddler on the Roof" at the Cascade a few months ago, both outstanding script and exceptionally talented cast combine for an unforgettable and stunning performance. I love watching live theater. I love being on stage in an amazing play even more, but those roles don't come often.
I've found little delights in mundane things: wearing a fun pair of comfortable shoes that make me smile every time I look at them. Savoring a piece of really delicious pie with good friends. Feeling sleek and stylish every time I get my hair cut in the precise, angled style I am wearing, greys and whites gleaming in the salon light, and swinging neatly as I walk. Stretching and moving in the dim yoga studio, imagining the muscles and ligaments easing into the familiar positions, and the spiritual grace of 'namaste' we offer at the close of the session. Loving the gleam of clean floors and fixtures after my friend has worked her magic on my house.
Clean, soft sheets every week and the cool green bedroom where we sleep every night, holding hands as we drift off. Reaching to touch my honey in the night, just grateful he is there and breathing.
Anticipation at traveling in our new-to-us travel trailer with our beloved kitties coming along rather than being left at home or in a kennel where they are frightened and surly because they are not with us -- and the comfort we all feel at being together in bed every night. The prospect of spending more than a week beside our mighty-mighty ocean in several campgrounds, reveling in the crash of waves, the salt air, the age-old power that emanates from its depths and stills our souls and minds.
There are low points as well, but far fewer.
Moments of frustration and apprehension: learning that I would have to have a general anesthetic rather than a twilight one just before I went into the OR.
Times of worry and fear for a loved one who seems to repeat the same patterns without ever learning the lessons that I see so clearly. Ongoing grief for the loss of what might have been, and reluctant distrust in what I am being told and not told.
Anxiety and fear during episodes of afib that seem to occur approximately monthly, although they nearly always revert spontaneously within a few hours to a steady sinus rhythm. (And such gratitude that they do.)
Where am I now? I work daily on gratitude and calm and energy, focusing the energy where I need it most at that moment. I know that nothing is permanent; everything changes, and that the good (which I try to savor as it happens) will pass away as well as the not-good. I am grateful to be who and where I am, and overwhelmingly grateful that I am loved so dearly and deeply by a man who I love just as dearly and deeply. That is THE BEST of my life.
By the end of the year? More joy. More things that make me smile and feel happy. Any health apprehensions addressed and resolved, or at least treated. More awareness of how great a gift life is EVERY SINGLE DAY. More writing. More decluttering of stuff. More spirit.
Amen.
Sunday, August 25, 2013
Once in a Blue August Moon 13: Day 4 -- The Word
The prompt: What word did you choose as your travelling companion in 2013? How is it
working for you? Where have the surprises been? If you didn’t choose a
guiding word, what word sums up your year so far? And why?
I didn't so much choose the word as it chose me. Really, given the surgery I had at the end of December and the painful walking that I experienced most of last year, clearly the word for 2013 had to be 'Recovery.'
I expected it to be primarily about my physical recovery. I'd had a triple arthrodesis -- a fusing of the three primary joints in my ankle -- and from all the research I'd done, I knew recovery could take up to a year. My energy teacher, Jessie, told me it would take four to six months. My focus was to follow doctor's orders, healing energy work, and doing all I could do.
By Feb. 20, slightly less than eight weeks post surgery, I was in a walking boot. Less than two weeks later, the doc told me I could transition into a shoe whenever I was ready, and I began physical therapy a week later, clinging to my walker. Physical therapy was wonderful: the therapists helped me rebuild strength, I continued to focus healing energy into that leg and throughout my body, and in no time I had graduated to walking with a cane and in my wonderful Alegria shoes. By the last PT appointment at about 18 weeks post surgery, I used the cane only on unsteady ground or to help keep some distance between me and others in crowded places. Today I go pretty much anywhere, although if I'm walking on a trail or land, I want a walking stick. While there is still some numbness in my toes and along the outer edge of my foot, I walk better than I have in a long time. My energy is good. My attitude is positive.
What surprised me is that the level of recovery went so very much deeper. Enforced rest and non-weight-bearing gave me time to think and reflect on what I'd been doing, what made me happy, what made me feel anxious and tense. I didn't do things I'd previously taken on through my admittedly overdeveloped sense of commitment because I couldn't do them physically, and for those things I could not back out of, I found other ways to handle them, unexpectedly freeing me from a lot of that false responsibility for someone else's actions/choices that I'd assumed. Nope, I can't pick you up from the hospital. Nope, I can't bring you a check today. No, I am no longer able to serve in that position. Nope, nope, NO.
Somewhere in all that time, I decided that I am not going to do things that I don't feel passionate about. I am not going to spend my time with people I don't enjoy being with, or who make me feel less than. I am going to take care of me first, not second or last. I will do more of what makes me happy. If I feel tense or angry or taken advantage of, I'm out. My focus is on saving the only life, living the only life that I can -- mine.
What a gift, this recovery! Those choices have not closed me off, they have opened me up to possibilities, to fully enjoying and participating and caring, and to new ways of being, more fulfilling, to a more generous life. I no longer feel anxious and angry and tense (well, hardly ever), and I know how to work with those feelings when they do surface.
I'm not recovered. I am recovering, just like an alcoholic who stops drinking but knows s/he is only one drink away from relapse. It is a process that requires daily attention and intention, this living joyfully stuff. If I don't work with my body and my foot, I will relapse into laziness and pain. If I don't work with my mind, I will relapse into old, long-practiced behaviors.
I like where I am too much to stop working on this recovery thing.
I didn't so much choose the word as it chose me. Really, given the surgery I had at the end of December and the painful walking that I experienced most of last year, clearly the word for 2013 had to be 'Recovery.'
I expected it to be primarily about my physical recovery. I'd had a triple arthrodesis -- a fusing of the three primary joints in my ankle -- and from all the research I'd done, I knew recovery could take up to a year. My energy teacher, Jessie, told me it would take four to six months. My focus was to follow doctor's orders, healing energy work, and doing all I could do.
By Feb. 20, slightly less than eight weeks post surgery, I was in a walking boot. Less than two weeks later, the doc told me I could transition into a shoe whenever I was ready, and I began physical therapy a week later, clinging to my walker. Physical therapy was wonderful: the therapists helped me rebuild strength, I continued to focus healing energy into that leg and throughout my body, and in no time I had graduated to walking with a cane and in my wonderful Alegria shoes. By the last PT appointment at about 18 weeks post surgery, I used the cane only on unsteady ground or to help keep some distance between me and others in crowded places. Today I go pretty much anywhere, although if I'm walking on a trail or land, I want a walking stick. While there is still some numbness in my toes and along the outer edge of my foot, I walk better than I have in a long time. My energy is good. My attitude is positive.
What surprised me is that the level of recovery went so very much deeper. Enforced rest and non-weight-bearing gave me time to think and reflect on what I'd been doing, what made me happy, what made me feel anxious and tense. I didn't do things I'd previously taken on through my admittedly overdeveloped sense of commitment because I couldn't do them physically, and for those things I could not back out of, I found other ways to handle them, unexpectedly freeing me from a lot of that false responsibility for someone else's actions/choices that I'd assumed. Nope, I can't pick you up from the hospital. Nope, I can't bring you a check today. No, I am no longer able to serve in that position. Nope, nope, NO.
Somewhere in all that time, I decided that I am not going to do things that I don't feel passionate about. I am not going to spend my time with people I don't enjoy being with, or who make me feel less than. I am going to take care of me first, not second or last. I will do more of what makes me happy. If I feel tense or angry or taken advantage of, I'm out. My focus is on saving the only life, living the only life that I can -- mine.
What a gift, this recovery! Those choices have not closed me off, they have opened me up to possibilities, to fully enjoying and participating and caring, and to new ways of being, more fulfilling, to a more generous life. I no longer feel anxious and angry and tense (well, hardly ever), and I know how to work with those feelings when they do surface.
I'm not recovered. I am recovering, just like an alcoholic who stops drinking but knows s/he is only one drink away from relapse. It is a process that requires daily attention and intention, this living joyfully stuff. If I don't work with my body and my foot, I will relapse into laziness and pain. If I don't work with my mind, I will relapse into old, long-practiced behaviors.
I like where I am too much to stop working on this recovery thing.
Wednesday, August 21, 2013
Once in a Blue Moon -- Day 1
For the next 11 days, I'm going to try to participate in August Moon 13, a writing prompt exercise from a couple of bloggers I read regularly. I tend to respond well to prompts, and even though the next week or so looks very busy as we prepare for a trip to see family, it is good for me to exercise this part of my creative self.
You can participate too. Just click here to sign up.
Today's prompt: How have you treated yourself this year? Have you kept your intentions?
My intention for this year was very simple: to recover as completely as physically possible from the foot/ankle reconstruction surgery I had in late December.
I am doing that. For the first two-plus months of the year, I was totally non-weight-bearing, although somewhat mobile, thanks to my knee scooter and a wheelchair. My wonderful husband prepared meals, did shopping, fed cats, retrieved mail and papers, and helped me as needed while I pretty much sat in his recliner with my foot elevated and read, watched movies, and worked on healing energy flowing through my body and into my leg and foot.
Three months of physical therapy re-started everything: I was becoming mobile, regaining strength, reclaiming my self and letting go of parts I no longer wanted in my life. While my foot is still healing, with some numbness still in the toes and ball of the foot, it is stronger and more sure than it has been for more than a year, and I can walk without pain, although as with anything, when I over-do, I can feel it the next day. It's been a long time since I used the cane too, although I'm not sure I want to try a lot of uneven or sloping walks without a walking stick for balance.
And that's fine: if we need a little support to help balance ourselves, we should use it -- no matter whether physical or emotional or mental or spiritual.
I've been blessed with support this year from friends as well as from my husband, and I am deeply grateful for the visits, the meals, the prayers, the conversations, and the love. Knowing the difference it has made in my recovery, I am determined to help others along the way as they need help.
I am still too hard on myself. I still feel like I should 'accomplish' something every day in a very practical way -- cleaning, exercising, cooking, sorting through the closets and drawers and boxes that contain things that no longer serve our needs and finding new homes for them or discarding them. But I am remembering those early months of this year when it was enough just to 'be,' not to 'do.' There is accomplishment in reading, in resting, in petting kitties, and in contemplation as well.
I continue to understand that mine is the only life I can save, although some days I need to read Mary Oliver's miraculous poem "The Journey" several times to remember that.
You can participate too. Just click here to sign up.
Today's prompt: How have you treated yourself this year? Have you kept your intentions?
My intention for this year was very simple: to recover as completely as physically possible from the foot/ankle reconstruction surgery I had in late December.
I am doing that. For the first two-plus months of the year, I was totally non-weight-bearing, although somewhat mobile, thanks to my knee scooter and a wheelchair. My wonderful husband prepared meals, did shopping, fed cats, retrieved mail and papers, and helped me as needed while I pretty much sat in his recliner with my foot elevated and read, watched movies, and worked on healing energy flowing through my body and into my leg and foot.
Three months of physical therapy re-started everything: I was becoming mobile, regaining strength, reclaiming my self and letting go of parts I no longer wanted in my life. While my foot is still healing, with some numbness still in the toes and ball of the foot, it is stronger and more sure than it has been for more than a year, and I can walk without pain, although as with anything, when I over-do, I can feel it the next day. It's been a long time since I used the cane too, although I'm not sure I want to try a lot of uneven or sloping walks without a walking stick for balance.
And that's fine: if we need a little support to help balance ourselves, we should use it -- no matter whether physical or emotional or mental or spiritual.
I've been blessed with support this year from friends as well as from my husband, and I am deeply grateful for the visits, the meals, the prayers, the conversations, and the love. Knowing the difference it has made in my recovery, I am determined to help others along the way as they need help.
I am still too hard on myself. I still feel like I should 'accomplish' something every day in a very practical way -- cleaning, exercising, cooking, sorting through the closets and drawers and boxes that contain things that no longer serve our needs and finding new homes for them or discarding them. But I am remembering those early months of this year when it was enough just to 'be,' not to 'do.' There is accomplishment in reading, in resting, in petting kitties, and in contemplation as well.
I continue to understand that mine is the only life I can save, although some days I need to read Mary Oliver's miraculous poem "The Journey" several times to remember that.
“All shall be well, and all
shall be well and all manner of thing shall be well.” ― Julian of
Norwich
Saturday, April 06, 2013
Scintilla#13, Day 16
The last prompts. Okay, I'm really late to this particular party.
1. What would it have been like if your life had turned out the way you wanted when you were a kid?
2. We bet there was a story you wanted to tell that didn't line up with any of the prompts. Write it anyway - and use it to write a one or two sentence prompt that others could use to tell a good story of their own. Then, share it with us, if you're comfortable.
Well, there are lots of stories I still have to tell, usually prompted by something that stirs a memory or an emotion. I'm hoping I'll be around for a long time to tell 'em.
I've been thinking about the first prompt since it came out, however, and I've already sort of spoken to that one in the Day 7 post about event horizons. Most everything that has happened since I was a kid is because of the choice I made about where to go to college, and then to stay there.
When I was a kid, I wanted to be a nurse. Then a pediatrician. I loved kids; wanted to have four or six of them. Loved babysitting and did a lot of it. Helped in the church nursery and with the four-year-old Sunday school classes. I hung onto the medical field as a career goal pretty much until I butted heads with chemistry classes and realized that medicine was going to require a lot more math and science than I had any interest in -- or aptitude for -- taking. Scratch that one.
Had I stuck with the medical field, I would not have chosen the college I did, and everything would have been different. Everything.
When I hit early high school, I had a spiritual experience at church camp that convinced me I wanted to be a minister (United Methodist Church), and pretty much held onto that through most of high school, even being awarded a Christian service scholarship. It's quite likely that at times I was fairly insufferable, although my view of Christianity and the church's place in the world was very ecumenical and very involved with social justice issues -- clearly a precursor to my admittedly liberal opinions as an adult. I got to attend a variety of church-related conferences and workshops, and met so many interesting people in doing so.
And then in the latter part of my freshman year, that goal changed. I had joined various 'Christian' groups on campus -- not difficult in a church-related college -- and taken the 'Baby Bible' required courses: a semester of Old Testament studies, a semester of New Testament studies. But I started to question everything, including the core Christian belief of the Resurrection: clearly not a good thing for a wanna-be clergyperson to do, huh. Scratch that one too.
As it was, I experienced infertility and my then-husband and I adopted our daughter after a multi-year wait. Scratch the four-to-six kids.
And scratch the boyfriend I had for four years in high school and early college, too, and with whom I'd planned to spend my life. He's gay and is in a wonderful long-term relationship: they came to our wedding in 2000.
I am so grateful that my life has unfolded the way it has, even through the hard stuff and the heartaches. I would never have believed that at age 50 I would fall in love with a man who deeply adores the quicksand I walk on. I would never have believed that I would move to California (of all places -- Colorado would have been so much higher on my list back then!) and live by the ocean and end up in a rural valley between mountain ranges in a house I designed with my honey. I would never have believed that I would do even half of the things I've done -- not all of them pleasant, but each remarkable.
And that's all good, isn't it. We create our own destiny, minute by minute, year by year, experience by experience, hopefully building on what we learn to create a life we love. I have no expectations for these coming years of my life -- other than hope they will be numerous and happy -- but instead try to live and cherish each day, one at a time, and give thanks for it. What an incredible ride it's all been so far!
1. What would it have been like if your life had turned out the way you wanted when you were a kid?
2. We bet there was a story you wanted to tell that didn't line up with any of the prompts. Write it anyway - and use it to write a one or two sentence prompt that others could use to tell a good story of their own. Then, share it with us, if you're comfortable.
Well, there are lots of stories I still have to tell, usually prompted by something that stirs a memory or an emotion. I'm hoping I'll be around for a long time to tell 'em.
I've been thinking about the first prompt since it came out, however, and I've already sort of spoken to that one in the Day 7 post about event horizons. Most everything that has happened since I was a kid is because of the choice I made about where to go to college, and then to stay there.
When I was a kid, I wanted to be a nurse. Then a pediatrician. I loved kids; wanted to have four or six of them. Loved babysitting and did a lot of it. Helped in the church nursery and with the four-year-old Sunday school classes. I hung onto the medical field as a career goal pretty much until I butted heads with chemistry classes and realized that medicine was going to require a lot more math and science than I had any interest in -- or aptitude for -- taking. Scratch that one.
Had I stuck with the medical field, I would not have chosen the college I did, and everything would have been different. Everything.
When I hit early high school, I had a spiritual experience at church camp that convinced me I wanted to be a minister (United Methodist Church), and pretty much held onto that through most of high school, even being awarded a Christian service scholarship. It's quite likely that at times I was fairly insufferable, although my view of Christianity and the church's place in the world was very ecumenical and very involved with social justice issues -- clearly a precursor to my admittedly liberal opinions as an adult. I got to attend a variety of church-related conferences and workshops, and met so many interesting people in doing so.
And then in the latter part of my freshman year, that goal changed. I had joined various 'Christian' groups on campus -- not difficult in a church-related college -- and taken the 'Baby Bible' required courses: a semester of Old Testament studies, a semester of New Testament studies. But I started to question everything, including the core Christian belief of the Resurrection: clearly not a good thing for a wanna-be clergyperson to do, huh. Scratch that one too.
As it was, I experienced infertility and my then-husband and I adopted our daughter after a multi-year wait. Scratch the four-to-six kids.
And scratch the boyfriend I had for four years in high school and early college, too, and with whom I'd planned to spend my life. He's gay and is in a wonderful long-term relationship: they came to our wedding in 2000.
I am so grateful that my life has unfolded the way it has, even through the hard stuff and the heartaches. I would never have believed that at age 50 I would fall in love with a man who deeply adores the quicksand I walk on. I would never have believed that I would move to California (of all places -- Colorado would have been so much higher on my list back then!) and live by the ocean and end up in a rural valley between mountain ranges in a house I designed with my honey. I would never have believed that I would do even half of the things I've done -- not all of them pleasant, but each remarkable.
And that's all good, isn't it. We create our own destiny, minute by minute, year by year, experience by experience, hopefully building on what we learn to create a life we love. I have no expectations for these coming years of my life -- other than hope they will be numerous and happy -- but instead try to live and cherish each day, one at a time, and give thanks for it. What an incredible ride it's all been so far!
Thursday, December 29, 2011
Reverb11 -- Day 29 -- Shake it up, baby!
#1 Prompt: Shaking Things Up - Looking towards 2012, what can you do to shake things up a little next year?
#2 Prompt: Expectation: What is on expectation you fiercely held for 2011 that you wish to let go of before 2012? What steps are required to putting it to rest?
#1 -- Hooyeah. I think retirement is gonna shake stuff up pretty good without any effort on my part at all. For the first time since August 2007, Tony will be home with me every day, all day, and neither of us will have a J.O.B. We can sculpt our own days, our trips, our routines, we can go to matinees in the middle of the week, we can be couch potatoes whenever we want.
I expect the year to be interesting, exciting, enjoyable, and joyful. Even the parts about washing windows and putting down gallons of RoundUp -- because we don't have to wait for a decent weekend! Yay for retirement!
#2 -- Generally I try not to have big expectations about much of anything but to try to watch events unfold the way they will. Especially as a 20-30-something, and beyond too, I would plan out events in my head and anticipate them with great delight, and then be bitterly disappointed (and a bit of a martyr, too, if I'm honest) when things didn't work out the way I'd expected them to. I remember, for instance, a visit to the Maine coast many, many years ago (I was in my mid-20s), and we'd planned to have a picnic on a beach and then go for a dip in the ocean -- something I had never done, much less in Maine. The day dawned cloudy and quite cool with threatening rain, and the ocean was every bit as frigid as our northern Pacific coast, and I was soooo disappointed that I whined and complained for the rest of the day, endearing myself so greatly to my husband and parents, of course.
Some years later I read a horoscope book that discussed in depth the characteristics of the Scorpio-Sagittarius cusp, and was smacked upside the head by the 'martyr' description that was included in some undesirable traits. Ever since then, I've tried to keep my expectations in check and to squelch the inner martyr.
The biggest expectation I can think of for 2011 was Tony's retirement date which for several years we'd anticipated happening first in May (which got changed in August 2010) , and then in mid-August, which didn't happen. Then it was going to be July 31, 2012, but after a couple of months of wrapping our heads around that date, the Universe intervened once again. It might actually have been today, but he agreed to stay on a bit longer, so at this writing it will be March 31 at the latest. I don't think that will get pushed out again.
We were able to let go of the different dates as the situation changed, and I'm proud of that. We worked together to talk it out and work through the different scenarios, and once it was past, we let it be and didn't revisit it.
That's really how I try to live my life these days -- kind of like being on a ship on the ocean and needing to keep your balance depending on the size of the swells. Some swells ask a little effort more from us, but everything changes from moment to moment. We can anticipate, but we must remain flexible and ready to move quickly. Not a bad way to live, I think.
#2 Prompt: Expectation: What is on expectation you fiercely held for 2011 that you wish to let go of before 2012? What steps are required to putting it to rest?
#1 -- Hooyeah. I think retirement is gonna shake stuff up pretty good without any effort on my part at all. For the first time since August 2007, Tony will be home with me every day, all day, and neither of us will have a J.O.B. We can sculpt our own days, our trips, our routines, we can go to matinees in the middle of the week, we can be couch potatoes whenever we want.
I expect the year to be interesting, exciting, enjoyable, and joyful. Even the parts about washing windows and putting down gallons of RoundUp -- because we don't have to wait for a decent weekend! Yay for retirement!
#2 -- Generally I try not to have big expectations about much of anything but to try to watch events unfold the way they will. Especially as a 20-30-something, and beyond too, I would plan out events in my head and anticipate them with great delight, and then be bitterly disappointed (and a bit of a martyr, too, if I'm honest) when things didn't work out the way I'd expected them to. I remember, for instance, a visit to the Maine coast many, many years ago (I was in my mid-20s), and we'd planned to have a picnic on a beach and then go for a dip in the ocean -- something I had never done, much less in Maine. The day dawned cloudy and quite cool with threatening rain, and the ocean was every bit as frigid as our northern Pacific coast, and I was soooo disappointed that I whined and complained for the rest of the day, endearing myself so greatly to my husband and parents, of course.
Some years later I read a horoscope book that discussed in depth the characteristics of the Scorpio-Sagittarius cusp, and was smacked upside the head by the 'martyr' description that was included in some undesirable traits. Ever since then, I've tried to keep my expectations in check and to squelch the inner martyr.
The biggest expectation I can think of for 2011 was Tony's retirement date which for several years we'd anticipated happening first in May (which got changed in August 2010) , and then in mid-August, which didn't happen. Then it was going to be July 31, 2012, but after a couple of months of wrapping our heads around that date, the Universe intervened once again. It might actually have been today, but he agreed to stay on a bit longer, so at this writing it will be March 31 at the latest. I don't think that will get pushed out again.
We were able to let go of the different dates as the situation changed, and I'm proud of that. We worked together to talk it out and work through the different scenarios, and once it was past, we let it be and didn't revisit it.
That's really how I try to live my life these days -- kind of like being on a ship on the ocean and needing to keep your balance depending on the size of the swells. Some swells ask a little effort more from us, but everything changes from moment to moment. We can anticipate, but we must remain flexible and ready to move quickly. Not a bad way to live, I think.
Wednesday, August 31, 2011
Letting go -- again
That old lesson of letting something/one go seems to constantly be in front of me, but a blogging friend posted a poem the other day that really helped me understand the concept in a new way, easier to wrap my head around.
It said:
It said:
To "let go" does not mean to stop caring.
It means I can't do it for someone else.
To "let go" is not to cut myself off.
It's the realization that I can't control another.
To "let go" is to admit powerlessness,
which means the outcome is not in my hands.
To "let go" is not to try to change or blame another.
It's to make the most of myself.
To "let go" is not to care for, but to care about.
To "let go" is not to fix, but to be supportive.
To "let go" is not to judge, but to allow another to be a human being.
To "let go" is not to be in the middle, arranging all the outcomes,
but to allow others to affect their own destinies.
To "let go" is not to deny, but to accept.
To "let go" is not to nag, scold, or argue,
but instead to search out my own shortcomings and correct them.
To "let go" is not to adjust everything to my desires,
but to take each day as it comes and cherish myself in it.
To "let go" is not to regret the past, but to grow and live for the future.
To "let go" is to fear less and to love more.
That's my new plan for the rest of 2011 and forward into 2012. Be who I am now, let go of my need to control and please, seize the day for the good that we find in each one, and let regret go.
It means I can't do it for someone else.
To "let go" is not to cut myself off.
It's the realization that I can't control another.
To "let go" is to admit powerlessness,
which means the outcome is not in my hands.
To "let go" is not to try to change or blame another.
It's to make the most of myself.
To "let go" is not to care for, but to care about.
To "let go" is not to fix, but to be supportive.
To "let go" is not to judge, but to allow another to be a human being.
To "let go" is not to be in the middle, arranging all the outcomes,
but to allow others to affect their own destinies.
To "let go" is not to deny, but to accept.
To "let go" is not to nag, scold, or argue,
but instead to search out my own shortcomings and correct them.
To "let go" is not to adjust everything to my desires,
but to take each day as it comes and cherish myself in it.
To "let go" is not to regret the past, but to grow and live for the future.
To "let go" is to fear less and to love more.
--Unknown--
It's not new, it' s just new to me. The quote is all over Google.
Perhaps it feels relevant because we are on the cusp of change again: our youngest princess has moved to the Seattle area with her family to start a new, hopefully better life, although it's been a rocky start since her husband's (felony child-abusing) ex immediately filed a declaration that resulted in her receiving the three older children temporarily, and creating great turmoil. A court session tomorrow should result in V and D getting the kids back, and visitation mediation happening via phone. Nonetheless it has been difficult all around, especially for the kids, who have lived full-time with V & D for more than four years now. We've been on board to listen and soothe and comfort, and help as we are able.
Perhaps it feels relevant because I have worked hard to 'let go' of Princess #1 and my tendency to want to micromanage her life and choices, and for the most part am succeeding. Doesn't mean I'm sleeping all that well at night, when the ice weasels come out to play, but I'm not in her face all the time anymore -- healthier at least for me; it has got to be less frustrating for her. Her choices and decisions are hers to make, not mine, and the consequences of those choices also are hers, and I am not going to make them mine. The poem above helps me feel less like I'm abandoning her or that I don't care, because I do, very much. But I am not the responsible party here.
That said, I spent a good bit of July and August on the car search and ended up reasonably happy (although my tendency to second-guess myself after the deed was done appeared at least briefly). That's done. I've let it go. (really)
And we're looking at some changes in our lives too, although until it is actually fact I am not saying exactly what it is in this forum. These are good things, though.
Another thing I'm in the process of doing is letting go of all the people I used to be: a very busy career woman, an active church and choir and committee participant, an involved mom with a school-age child, a do-it-yourselfer who painted, papered, stripped wood floors, made most of my clothes as well as R's dresses and tops. I'm not there anymore; I'll never be there again, nor do I want to go back.
I confess to having some ideas of making some simple clothing again, since I find it hard to find styles I enjoy in colors that are pleasing, and especially for a reasonable price. I will probably end up volunteering in some capacity eventually, although nothing is singing loudly to me right now. I want to nurture my creative side again: I've been so caught up in managing R's affairs and illness and the business details of that for so long, and there is always something around here to clean out or tidy up or cook or fold, and so I've procrastinated finding my creative self for a long, long time. I want to let the need-to-ought-to-do stuff slide more and spend more time reading a novel or even beginning to write one, finishing the charm necklace I started two years ago and do more repurposing of my old jewelry., I want to put my ideas for landscaping our yard into action and start getting the bones in place.
I do not want to spend more time worrying about other people's lives and how they could fix them if they just listened to me. I want to let that go. All of that.
And I'm also beginning to accept where I am on the great wheel of life. I have fewer years ahead of me than are behind me. My butt-time career is really over, and I won't be climbing any more corporate ladders, not that I ever really did, with so much of my working life spent in non-profit and public sector areas. While I'm pretty tech-savvy and I read a lot about pop culture, I'm not in the main target audience for anything except Medicare supplemental insurance and walk-in bathtubs. I don't offer opinions anymore to anyone who will listen, and sometimes I'm sorry I opened my mouth when I do, partly because I'm realizing that disagreeing with a long- and strongly-held opinion is pretty useless and usually merely frustrating.
Life is short, too short to spend one more moment doing things and saying things that don't much matter to who I am. I'm letting go of the desire to please people, sometimes just by not saying what is in my head and at the back of my throat, but most definitely by not putting myself in a vulnerable situation in the first place -- i.e., doing something somewhere with people that I don't really care much about. I'm letting go of other people's expectations of what I will do or how I should act, and am resolved to be just who I am.
Yes, it IS all about me from now on!
(Well, that'd be me and my honey. But he loves who I really am, warts and all, and encourages me to be more me. It doesn't get better than that.)
That's my new plan for the rest of 2011 and forward into 2012. Be who I am now, let go of my need to control and please, seize the day for the good that we find in each one, and let regret go.
Sunday, March 20, 2011
Saving the only life I can
Like many whose nature it is to take care of others, I have an almost overwhelming need to make things 'all right' when I know a friend or relative is having problems, sometimes to the point of obsession and to the detriment of my own sleep and daily life.
I want to 'fix' it. I want to offer advice and care. I want their issues to be resolved and for them not to be troubled with whatever it is.
I've done this all my life.
Over the years I've learned to (mostly) shut up and only offer advice if I'm asked, although I still sometimes venture an opinion if I think it will be received as it was meant -- to be helpful. I don't leap in anymore (hardly ever) with my superwoman cape bearing food, money, or tangible 'help' that might ease the pain of whatever issue it is for the individual.
I am especially guilty of asking too many questions, mostly of my daughters, although I have curbed that urge significantly in the last year or two -- admittedly probably not to their satisfaction. I try not to offer unsolicited advice very often, at least.
But I have mom-radar that works overtime and picks up little things here and there that sometimes can feed my obsessive mind and fertile imagination. Sometimes I'm wrong and everything is pretty much okay. And I hate it when I'm right and things start crashing down.
I want my children (and friends) to be okay, to have lives that are satisfying and reasonably calm and with enough of everything to keep them healthy, safe, fed, clothed, warm, and housed.
But I also understand with everything in me that is rational that I cannot live their lives and make their choices for them. I must be okay with watching them fail sometimes and without trying to fix anything.
(I'll admit that both Tony and I have, in the past, 'fixed' things, at least somewhat: Made it easier to get to a goal, or offered support when maybe it would have been better to stand back, lovingly. But we've worked on reasonable boundaries for our behavior and for their expectations, and it has succeeded fairly well, although not without some occasional pain and angst on both sides.)
When someone you love makes choices that appear to be dangerous either to their health or well-being, setting boundaries becomes far more difficult, and yet even more essential.
I've invested much time and money and worry in our girls, especially as some issues have proven to be so huge and ongoing, even a matter of survival. It's taken a toll on me that I've realized more clearly in recent months, and I've been working on relinquishing control, whether by giving my opinion or taking charge of getting things done, or checking in (asking questions).
I got smacked upside the head last week, though, when I was reading through the new O Magazine issue. It was one of our recently frequent stormy, windy nights with rain and very strong gusts howling outside, and I was reading in bed, just prior to turning off the light (as I do every night).
The issue is about poetry and the importance it has for so many of us, how it's shaped our actions or given us touchstones to live by. (I've especially loved Robert Frost since I first read him so many decades ago and still can recite several, for instance. )
On this night, though, I was reading Maria Shriver's interview with poet Mary Oliver. Shriver had included her favorite of Oliver's poems, "The Journey," which I read after I'd finished the article.
And it said exactly what I've needed to hear in exactly the words that would resonate so deeply that I couldn't rationalize my behavior and feelings anymore.
I've read it every day since, (puddling up every time) repeating the last words over and over to myself: "...determined to do the only thing you could do--determined to save the only life you could save."
That would be mine.
And that's my new mantra. It's making things easier for me, actually. It's on the order of the old 12-step saying, "I am powerless over people, places and things" -- but somehow it has been especially meaningful for me right now.
There is more of my life behind me than is ahead of me. I will not abdicate that in favor of someone else's life, no matter how much I love them and want to make things better.
I still have hopes and dreams and plans to achieve for myself. And nobody else can do that for me except me. No one WILL do that for me except me. And I must allow those I care about to do the same for their own lives, regardless of what I might think about it. It is not mine to live.
So I'm finally moving ahead with my own life: taking care of me first, doing things I want to do, living more in the moment -- my moment, not someone else's moment.
And I'm keeping my head up, watching for the stars to break through the clouds. Because they will. They are.
I want to 'fix' it. I want to offer advice and care. I want their issues to be resolved and for them not to be troubled with whatever it is.
I've done this all my life.
Over the years I've learned to (mostly) shut up and only offer advice if I'm asked, although I still sometimes venture an opinion if I think it will be received as it was meant -- to be helpful. I don't leap in anymore (hardly ever) with my superwoman cape bearing food, money, or tangible 'help' that might ease the pain of whatever issue it is for the individual.
I am especially guilty of asking too many questions, mostly of my daughters, although I have curbed that urge significantly in the last year or two -- admittedly probably not to their satisfaction. I try not to offer unsolicited advice very often, at least.
But I have mom-radar that works overtime and picks up little things here and there that sometimes can feed my obsessive mind and fertile imagination. Sometimes I'm wrong and everything is pretty much okay. And I hate it when I'm right and things start crashing down.
I want my children (and friends) to be okay, to have lives that are satisfying and reasonably calm and with enough of everything to keep them healthy, safe, fed, clothed, warm, and housed.
But I also understand with everything in me that is rational that I cannot live their lives and make their choices for them. I must be okay with watching them fail sometimes and without trying to fix anything.
(I'll admit that both Tony and I have, in the past, 'fixed' things, at least somewhat: Made it easier to get to a goal, or offered support when maybe it would have been better to stand back, lovingly. But we've worked on reasonable boundaries for our behavior and for their expectations, and it has succeeded fairly well, although not without some occasional pain and angst on both sides.)
When someone you love makes choices that appear to be dangerous either to their health or well-being, setting boundaries becomes far more difficult, and yet even more essential.
I've invested much time and money and worry in our girls, especially as some issues have proven to be so huge and ongoing, even a matter of survival. It's taken a toll on me that I've realized more clearly in recent months, and I've been working on relinquishing control, whether by giving my opinion or taking charge of getting things done, or checking in (asking questions).
I got smacked upside the head last week, though, when I was reading through the new O Magazine issue. It was one of our recently frequent stormy, windy nights with rain and very strong gusts howling outside, and I was reading in bed, just prior to turning off the light (as I do every night).
The issue is about poetry and the importance it has for so many of us, how it's shaped our actions or given us touchstones to live by. (I've especially loved Robert Frost since I first read him so many decades ago and still can recite several, for instance. )
On this night, though, I was reading Maria Shriver's interview with poet Mary Oliver. Shriver had included her favorite of Oliver's poems, "The Journey," which I read after I'd finished the article.
And it said exactly what I've needed to hear in exactly the words that would resonate so deeply that I couldn't rationalize my behavior and feelings anymore.
I've read it every day since, (puddling up every time) repeating the last words over and over to myself: "...determined to do the only thing you could do--determined to save the only life you could save."
That would be mine.
And that's my new mantra. It's making things easier for me, actually. It's on the order of the old 12-step saying, "I am powerless over people, places and things" -- but somehow it has been especially meaningful for me right now.
There is more of my life behind me than is ahead of me. I will not abdicate that in favor of someone else's life, no matter how much I love them and want to make things better.
I still have hopes and dreams and plans to achieve for myself. And nobody else can do that for me except me. No one WILL do that for me except me. And I must allow those I care about to do the same for their own lives, regardless of what I might think about it. It is not mine to live.
So I'm finally moving ahead with my own life: taking care of me first, doing things I want to do, living more in the moment -- my moment, not someone else's moment.
And I'm keeping my head up, watching for the stars to break through the clouds. Because they will. They are.
Monday, May 10, 2010
Mother's Day
I've decided that I don't much like Mother's Day. I don't like the slightly envious, slightly guilty feeling Mother's Day leaves me with every year.
Honoring mothers is fine -- but that's something that should be done more frequently than once a year. No, it's all the hype that surrounds it.
What about mothers whose children are in prison? Mothers who have lost a child? Mothers who beat and abuse and neglect their kids?
Or, sadly, mothers who have lost a child to an accident and for whom Mother's Day is a terrible reminder of a loved child who is no longer there.
Or women who wanted desperately to be mothers but aren't. Won't be. Can't.
Advertising would have us believe that every family has a Norman Rockwellian or Hallmark card mother -- someone who bakes cookies after school, who is always there to soothe the fevered brow, who is at every sports event, who helps with homework, is perfectly slim and toned and tan and coiffed and manicured. One who rarely gets moody or angry or doesn't do the dishes after supper and always has a clean, neat home, enough money for groceries and mortgages and a decent wardrobe, whose children always have enough money to play sports and have cute haircuts and the latest fad in clothing. Yaddayaddayadda....you've seen the ads too.
I don't know any mothers quite like that and actually never did. But it's a standard that somehow I feel slightly guilty for not achieving.
I miss my own mother on Mother's Day. And of all the lovely Mother's Days we celebrated together throughout her life and mine, I always remember the one Mother's Day that I and my brother (and father) forgot when I was maybe 11 or so. Mother didn't say anything until evening when it was quite evident than we hadn't gotten her even a card, and then she pretty much exploded into anger and tears and hurt, and nothing we could say made up for the hurt feelings our forgetfulness had caused. I don't know that it ever did, although we all tiptoed around her for the next week, bringing her little goodies and doing special things, and eventually it blew over. But I never forgot. I bet she didn't either.
She kept a little cup and saucer on her dresser for years that I bought the day after Mother's Day and gave to her late, and it always reminded me to be careful to remember birthdays and Mother's Day and Valentine's Day and the like. I didn't much like seeing it there because it reminded me of my own thoughtlessness.
I never forgot it again.
And try as I might, rationalize as I may, I am always a little apprehensive as the day approaches, not wanting my children to forget and yet trying not to expect that they will say or do anything. And trying not to have slightly hurt feelings if they do forget or call at the eleventh hour with a sheepish "Happy Mother's Day."
Sometimes I feel like a very meddlesome mother, asking way too many questions and judging too much in my reactions to the answers I get. Sometimes I feel that I interfere too much in their lives, and yet I struggle to balance how much to say and do with the situations that have an impact on my life and finances and emotions -- for various reasons. Our relationships are complicated and not without issues on both sides: perhaps everyone's are as well.
I'm happy for those whose children have always showered them with gifts and cards and flowers, and whose families join to make Mother's Day a big celebration.
I'm happy for the mothers who have wonderful adult-friend relationships with their children. I'm also envious of them.
I love my daughters and I know they love me. But life choices and circumstances can paint different scenarios than that rosy-Rockwell-Hallmark card ideal of motherhood. Not all relationships must conform to that picture in order to be valid and sufficient. Our relationships are works in progress, and some years they feel better than they do other years.
But they will never, ever, be the Hallmark card kind of relationships. And I guess I wish they were, at least a little, and feel sad that they aren't and won't be, at least a little.
Honoring mothers is fine -- but that's something that should be done more frequently than once a year. No, it's all the hype that surrounds it.
What about mothers whose children are in prison? Mothers who have lost a child? Mothers who beat and abuse and neglect their kids?
Or, sadly, mothers who have lost a child to an accident and for whom Mother's Day is a terrible reminder of a loved child who is no longer there.
Or women who wanted desperately to be mothers but aren't. Won't be. Can't.
Advertising would have us believe that every family has a Norman Rockwellian or Hallmark card mother -- someone who bakes cookies after school, who is always there to soothe the fevered brow, who is at every sports event, who helps with homework, is perfectly slim and toned and tan and coiffed and manicured. One who rarely gets moody or angry or doesn't do the dishes after supper and always has a clean, neat home, enough money for groceries and mortgages and a decent wardrobe, whose children always have enough money to play sports and have cute haircuts and the latest fad in clothing. Yaddayaddayadda....you've seen the ads too.
I don't know any mothers quite like that and actually never did. But it's a standard that somehow I feel slightly guilty for not achieving.
I miss my own mother on Mother's Day. And of all the lovely Mother's Days we celebrated together throughout her life and mine, I always remember the one Mother's Day that I and my brother (and father) forgot when I was maybe 11 or so. Mother didn't say anything until evening when it was quite evident than we hadn't gotten her even a card, and then she pretty much exploded into anger and tears and hurt, and nothing we could say made up for the hurt feelings our forgetfulness had caused. I don't know that it ever did, although we all tiptoed around her for the next week, bringing her little goodies and doing special things, and eventually it blew over. But I never forgot. I bet she didn't either.
She kept a little cup and saucer on her dresser for years that I bought the day after Mother's Day and gave to her late, and it always reminded me to be careful to remember birthdays and Mother's Day and Valentine's Day and the like. I didn't much like seeing it there because it reminded me of my own thoughtlessness.
I never forgot it again.
And try as I might, rationalize as I may, I am always a little apprehensive as the day approaches, not wanting my children to forget and yet trying not to expect that they will say or do anything. And trying not to have slightly hurt feelings if they do forget or call at the eleventh hour with a sheepish "Happy Mother's Day."
Sometimes I feel like a very meddlesome mother, asking way too many questions and judging too much in my reactions to the answers I get. Sometimes I feel that I interfere too much in their lives, and yet I struggle to balance how much to say and do with the situations that have an impact on my life and finances and emotions -- for various reasons. Our relationships are complicated and not without issues on both sides: perhaps everyone's are as well.
I'm happy for those whose children have always showered them with gifts and cards and flowers, and whose families join to make Mother's Day a big celebration.
I'm happy for the mothers who have wonderful adult-friend relationships with their children. I'm also envious of them.
I love my daughters and I know they love me. But life choices and circumstances can paint different scenarios than that rosy-Rockwell-Hallmark card ideal of motherhood. Not all relationships must conform to that picture in order to be valid and sufficient. Our relationships are works in progress, and some years they feel better than they do other years.
But they will never, ever, be the Hallmark card kind of relationships. And I guess I wish they were, at least a little, and feel sad that they aren't and won't be, at least a little.
Wednesday, August 05, 2009
Life is short. Plan accordingly.
I was reminded again last night that life is unpredictable and that it can be so fragile. Every single day is a gift for us to use.
I received a medical update on a friend who unexpectedly had a heart attack about three weeks ago, but other issues have been uncovered during the course of treatment, and she is not expected to recover. This is a woman who acknowledged to me a few months ago that her life had been all about miracles. I don't know that there is going to be one this time.
I still have a message on my voice mail from her.
We seldom know when something is going to change our lives forever, be it an illness, a death, an event. Oh, yeah, there are predictable things that will change lives, like marriage, divorce, pregnancy, but I'm talking about things largely uncontrollable that happen.
I am so grateful for what I have, for the people in my life who I love and who love me back. Once again I am trying to make the most of every day, to do what I can to move things in a good direction and to expand my horizons, to provide for 'the order' of our household. I try to actively practice gratitude and right living.
That's really all I can do. All anyone can do. Just be aware.
***************
It's just been too hot to even think, much less write. July temps shot up to 116 on our front porch recently, and we had a streak of 100-degree-plus days where I felt like a mole with blinds drawn and the air conditioner running full tilt. Because the humidity was more than 20 percent and the temps were over 105-106, the swamp cooler just wasn't adequate to cool things down in here -- that happens most every July and into August.
But we've got a rare cool snap right now and my windows are open. It's not even supposed to make 80 tomorrow, with a good possibility of storms -- which, of course, bring with them the fear of lightning-started fires.
It is a welcome respite and a reminder that summer is on the way out. It'll be October, likely, before things cool and rain comes back, but come it will, and there are reports of an El Nino year, which would increase the likelihood of adequate rainfall this winter. I don't want floods, but rain would be great.
My poor little garden doesn't much like the heat, and has really struggled between deer-munching, water service employees not turning the water back on, and a broken soaker hose, and also some sort of black bug or disease that leaves a black, sticky residue and kills the plants. My cost per tomato may be pretty high this year! But I'm already planning to cover the garden in manure and newspaper over the winter, which should give the soil a boost for next year. The rhubarb is looking great -- but the rest of it seems stressed.
I've gotten things cleared out inside, mostly, and have been walking at least a mile most days on our new treadmill -- yes, once we realized that 6 a.m. was going to be pretty dark in the winter and during our heat wave was still pretty warm for exercise, we broke down and bought a treadmill. Actually it works well -- Tony gets on it before he goes to work, and I walk sometime during the day. I've watched a dvd and also listened to some podcasts, so it goes quickly. And it's helping. My hips, back and knees don't hurt anymore and I don't feel so creaky. It also is helping my poor balance. (and how I hate to admit that exercise DOES help...)
Now to just keep it up.
***************
I don't feel very profound these days. I'm just focused on each day, doing something for the good of the order, tending the things I need to do, meeting the few deadlines that I still have, cooking good-for-us food, doing something to sort out the clutter most days. The girls still have their individual issues, but largely I'm uninvolved, since I know I can't really do anything to either move them ahead or solve them permanently. I've cut way back on asking questions (pat on my back!), partly because it does me no good to worry about things I can't do anything about. I'm trying to be open to new possibilities, but mostly I'm just taking care of old business. That's okay for now, I think.
I still read every day, but nothing that just grabs me by the throat -- newspapers, magazines mostly. I want a couple of books that capture me with their plots and make me want to read all day long, and I can't even find anything on Amazon that seems to meet that criteria right now.
We're watching movies and tv series most nights -- but the series are on HBO and Showtime, mostly. Mindless stuff, tv, for the most part, especially the stuff we're watching. That too is not necessarily bad.
I don't like summer very much -- never have. It's hot, it's sticky, it's something to get through until the weather turns cool again and we can be outside without feeling so uncomfortable, and the nights call for blankets to snuggle into. No, I don't want snow either....
***************
A year ago this week R and I were driving from Alabama to California. She said yesterday that it didn't seem that long ago, but when I think about this year, it has been a long, hard haul for both of us, and some of the issues are still very present. I hope this second year will be better.
I received a medical update on a friend who unexpectedly had a heart attack about three weeks ago, but other issues have been uncovered during the course of treatment, and she is not expected to recover. This is a woman who acknowledged to me a few months ago that her life had been all about miracles. I don't know that there is going to be one this time.
I still have a message on my voice mail from her.
We seldom know when something is going to change our lives forever, be it an illness, a death, an event. Oh, yeah, there are predictable things that will change lives, like marriage, divorce, pregnancy, but I'm talking about things largely uncontrollable that happen.
I am so grateful for what I have, for the people in my life who I love and who love me back. Once again I am trying to make the most of every day, to do what I can to move things in a good direction and to expand my horizons, to provide for 'the order' of our household. I try to actively practice gratitude and right living.
That's really all I can do. All anyone can do. Just be aware.
***************
It's just been too hot to even think, much less write. July temps shot up to 116 on our front porch recently, and we had a streak of 100-degree-plus days where I felt like a mole with blinds drawn and the air conditioner running full tilt. Because the humidity was more than 20 percent and the temps were over 105-106, the swamp cooler just wasn't adequate to cool things down in here -- that happens most every July and into August.
But we've got a rare cool snap right now and my windows are open. It's not even supposed to make 80 tomorrow, with a good possibility of storms -- which, of course, bring with them the fear of lightning-started fires.
It is a welcome respite and a reminder that summer is on the way out. It'll be October, likely, before things cool and rain comes back, but come it will, and there are reports of an El Nino year, which would increase the likelihood of adequate rainfall this winter. I don't want floods, but rain would be great.
My poor little garden doesn't much like the heat, and has really struggled between deer-munching, water service employees not turning the water back on, and a broken soaker hose, and also some sort of black bug or disease that leaves a black, sticky residue and kills the plants. My cost per tomato may be pretty high this year! But I'm already planning to cover the garden in manure and newspaper over the winter, which should give the soil a boost for next year. The rhubarb is looking great -- but the rest of it seems stressed.
I've gotten things cleared out inside, mostly, and have been walking at least a mile most days on our new treadmill -- yes, once we realized that 6 a.m. was going to be pretty dark in the winter and during our heat wave was still pretty warm for exercise, we broke down and bought a treadmill. Actually it works well -- Tony gets on it before he goes to work, and I walk sometime during the day. I've watched a dvd and also listened to some podcasts, so it goes quickly. And it's helping. My hips, back and knees don't hurt anymore and I don't feel so creaky. It also is helping my poor balance. (and how I hate to admit that exercise DOES help...)
Now to just keep it up.
***************
I don't feel very profound these days. I'm just focused on each day, doing something for the good of the order, tending the things I need to do, meeting the few deadlines that I still have, cooking good-for-us food, doing something to sort out the clutter most days. The girls still have their individual issues, but largely I'm uninvolved, since I know I can't really do anything to either move them ahead or solve them permanently. I've cut way back on asking questions (pat on my back!), partly because it does me no good to worry about things I can't do anything about. I'm trying to be open to new possibilities, but mostly I'm just taking care of old business. That's okay for now, I think.
I still read every day, but nothing that just grabs me by the throat -- newspapers, magazines mostly. I want a couple of books that capture me with their plots and make me want to read all day long, and I can't even find anything on Amazon that seems to meet that criteria right now.
We're watching movies and tv series most nights -- but the series are on HBO and Showtime, mostly. Mindless stuff, tv, for the most part, especially the stuff we're watching. That too is not necessarily bad.
I don't like summer very much -- never have. It's hot, it's sticky, it's something to get through until the weather turns cool again and we can be outside without feeling so uncomfortable, and the nights call for blankets to snuggle into. No, I don't want snow either....
***************
A year ago this week R and I were driving from Alabama to California. She said yesterday that it didn't seem that long ago, but when I think about this year, it has been a long, hard haul for both of us, and some of the issues are still very present. I hope this second year will be better.
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
You can say that again
From one of the bulletin board sites I read regularly came this post:
"I cannot love a person out of their life lessons ... they cannot love me out of mine either!
We all learn what we learn along the way and maybe, just maybe,
that is exactly howthe Universe plans for us to learn, slowly, intensely, and individually."
Smacks a punch, hm?
From another one:
"You begin and end somewhere and I begin and end somewhere else. Healthy boundaries are the foundation to healthy relationships. Don’t take on what you don’t own. Let others be responsible for what they are responsible for."
And also this one:
" If nothing changes, nothing changes. If you do what you’ve always done, you’ll get what you’ve always gotten. In order for things to change, you must change things."
The last two are from Getting Past Your Past, a blog I've read mostly daily for months. While I am not, thank god, in an abusive relationship nor have ever been, my daughters have been. I've shared some of these writings with them from time to time, although I also realize that you don't hear and see until you are ready to hear and see. But mostly I read because the lessons are good ones for any relationship.
I'm trying to learn to hold my tongue these days rather than instruct/inform/lecture/berate -- which, these posts remind me -- is pretty useless when you're dealing with anyone, sick or not. Sometimes silence is indeed golden -- something I forget too many times.
This is one of my life lessons: to learn to be speech-less sometimes, to remember that all the talk in the world will not effect change if the person doesn't want to/isn't ready to change.
All I can do is take care of MY business, to establish boundaries I need.
I'm grateful for the Internet and the lessons that are out there on so many wonderful sites, just waiting for us to find them, like books in a library. We teach each other by our stories, we encourage each other with subject-oriented bulletin boards. We are not alone in our experiences, or in our pain. That is important to remember.
"I cannot love a person out of their life lessons ... they cannot love me out of mine either!
We all learn what we learn along the way and maybe, just maybe,
that is exactly howthe Universe plans for us to learn, slowly, intensely, and individually."
Smacks a punch, hm?
From another one:
"You begin and end somewhere and I begin and end somewhere else. Healthy boundaries are the foundation to healthy relationships. Don’t take on what you don’t own. Let others be responsible for what they are responsible for."
And also this one:
" If nothing changes, nothing changes. If you do what you’ve always done, you’ll get what you’ve always gotten. In order for things to change, you must change things."
The last two are from Getting Past Your Past, a blog I've read mostly daily for months. While I am not, thank god, in an abusive relationship nor have ever been, my daughters have been. I've shared some of these writings with them from time to time, although I also realize that you don't hear and see until you are ready to hear and see. But mostly I read because the lessons are good ones for any relationship.
I'm trying to learn to hold my tongue these days rather than instruct/inform/lecture/berate -- which, these posts remind me -- is pretty useless when you're dealing with anyone, sick or not. Sometimes silence is indeed golden -- something I forget too many times.
This is one of my life lessons: to learn to be speech-less sometimes, to remember that all the talk in the world will not effect change if the person doesn't want to/isn't ready to change.
All I can do is take care of MY business, to establish boundaries I need.
I'm grateful for the Internet and the lessons that are out there on so many wonderful sites, just waiting for us to find them, like books in a library. We teach each other by our stories, we encourage each other with subject-oriented bulletin boards. We are not alone in our experiences, or in our pain. That is important to remember.
Monday, December 29, 2008
Full house
Both the princesses and the little princeling are living under our roof at present, and I'm doing pretty well in keeping my cool, if I do say so.
It's not that there is no drama. We brought Princess V and the princeling from Redding very late Saturday night after her BF came home smashed and got belligerent, and she called 911. She and Princess R went up there today to collect most of the rest of her stuff. And I got to babysit....which I also did yesterday.
A side note: amazing how those skills never leave. I'm changing diapers, feeding, and hoisting him around on my hip like I haven't had a 30-year gap between babies...
All of them are moving out this week to live together in a little house R found about a month ago. Do I have my doubts? Oh yeah. Am I worrying about how it will work? Nope. Really.
About a month-six weeks ago I made a very conscious decision to stop trying to manage anything except my own life, and I've done a good job with it with only a few slips. Both girls have spoken to me, worried that "something was wrong" because I seemed so "fragile."
Makes me laugh! I am anything but fragile, and Tony told both of them that too. I'm just not asking as many questions nor offering much advice, and I told them both that, and that the lack of questioning was probably what they were noticing! I'm watching it unfold, watching as they make choices and decisions, and trying to be passively supportive. Which I am -- not necessarily with the choices or decisions, but I am about THEIR RIGHT TO DO SO.
In other words, folks, what I'm doing is practicing actively what I preach so often: we make our own destiny. Nobody else can determine the course of our lives except we ourselves.
If it works and nothing catastrophic happens, I'll be thrilled. Am I skeptical? You betcha. But I'm trying not to project that out, either. I'm just trying to enjoy having our grandson here to play with and rock and feed (and give to his mama to change the stinkies). And enjoy having both girls here too, for the bit of time left. I'm offering help in finding stuff for the house and a bit of money to help, but it's up to them to accept it or not, and I'm not offended if they don't want the help.
So next weekend we should be back to two of us with two cats. Sounds good to me.
I'm glad they're both here and safe for the moment, and I hope things will work out for them, but I am no longer interested in managing the process. That's good growth for me, and also for them.
Meanwhile, we're going to see Antsy McClain and the Trailer Park Troubadours tonight at the State Theatre -- just Tony and me. Ought to be a great way to unwind!
It's not that there is no drama. We brought Princess V and the princeling from Redding very late Saturday night after her BF came home smashed and got belligerent, and she called 911. She and Princess R went up there today to collect most of the rest of her stuff. And I got to babysit....which I also did yesterday.
A side note: amazing how those skills never leave. I'm changing diapers, feeding, and hoisting him around on my hip like I haven't had a 30-year gap between babies...
All of them are moving out this week to live together in a little house R found about a month ago. Do I have my doubts? Oh yeah. Am I worrying about how it will work? Nope. Really.
About a month-six weeks ago I made a very conscious decision to stop trying to manage anything except my own life, and I've done a good job with it with only a few slips. Both girls have spoken to me, worried that "something was wrong" because I seemed so "fragile."
Makes me laugh! I am anything but fragile, and Tony told both of them that too. I'm just not asking as many questions nor offering much advice, and I told them both that, and that the lack of questioning was probably what they were noticing! I'm watching it unfold, watching as they make choices and decisions, and trying to be passively supportive. Which I am -- not necessarily with the choices or decisions, but I am about THEIR RIGHT TO DO SO.
In other words, folks, what I'm doing is practicing actively what I preach so often: we make our own destiny. Nobody else can determine the course of our lives except we ourselves.
If it works and nothing catastrophic happens, I'll be thrilled. Am I skeptical? You betcha. But I'm trying not to project that out, either. I'm just trying to enjoy having our grandson here to play with and rock and feed (and give to his mama to change the stinkies). And enjoy having both girls here too, for the bit of time left. I'm offering help in finding stuff for the house and a bit of money to help, but it's up to them to accept it or not, and I'm not offended if they don't want the help.
So next weekend we should be back to two of us with two cats. Sounds good to me.
I'm glad they're both here and safe for the moment, and I hope things will work out for them, but I am no longer interested in managing the process. That's good growth for me, and also for them.
Meanwhile, we're going to see Antsy McClain and the Trailer Park Troubadours tonight at the State Theatre -- just Tony and me. Ought to be a great way to unwind!
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
Quietly contemplating choices
After a couple of days of turmoil on all fronts, lots of fear and ice weasels, lots of reading about coping and consequences, we are in a place of relative calm tonight.
Our child is safe and okay, and has made some decisions about where she wants to be. For my part, I am determined to give her back the power I've assumed on her behalf over the last few months, and to stop treating her as though she were an errant teenager.
For this moment, I believe what she is saying is the truth.
And if it is not, that too will eventually come out. Truth always does.
But everyone deserves at least a couple of do-overs, y'know? So this is one.
I do have a problem with control: I like knowing what is going on and alllllll the details -- always have, and that has caused problems in my relationships with my daughters in the past. If I really get honest about it, I think I see the "right" thing to do, and I push and push to have it go in that direction.
For me, the hardest thing is to let go of that control. While I say "I am powerless over people, places, and things," I often don't actually ACT it. or believe it, I suppose
My brother would agree that I am and always have been fairly bossy. (ooo...that is SO hard to admit, especially where I know he's going to see it)
And I also have to admit that my own life has not always been a textbook of the best or the right way to live. I've screwed things up pretty well any number of times. No, I never suffered horrible consequences like getting thrown in jail, getting arrested, gravely serious injury (although I bear a few scars here and there, and there are a few instances I really don't like remembering), or doing injury to others, at least injuries that are visible.
But I'm sure I gave my mother and father more than a few sleepless nights, and caused my ex some major heartburn. I'm sure I lost a few friends -- although I'm not sure that they were all that great a friend to begin with.
So the lesson I need to find in this is to accept the consequences of my own behavior, of my own choices, and to let go of the need and the desire to direct the choices and lives of others -- my daughters, my dear husband, or my greater family and friends.
It simply is NOT MINE TO DO. Not mine to manage.
Whatever my daughters choose to do in their lives are theirs to manage and to live with. I will never, ever stop loving them. But I am not responsible for their choices. I cannot control their mistakes. And we ALL make mistakes.
Mine in this instance was probably in jumping a bit too quickly to conclusions, and trying too hard to control things.
If there is risky behavior from either child, it is they who will bear the consequences. I cannot save them from that, try as I might. And to jump in to either condemn or rescue is equally as bad.
So tonight I will turn my attention to myself, and ask for the serenity to accept those things I cannot change. And for the wisdom to know the difference. I don't lack for courage, but wisdom to know has definitely been an issue in the past. I just didn't realize how great an issue it still was.
And I am grateful that she is safe and okay for now, that she has made a CHOICE to be where she is, and that her people radar has kicked in enough, at least, to override her stubborn nature and allowed her to see the danger.
I will turn my worries and fears and control over to the care of God/dess, and try to keep myself on the path to serenity. This is a journey. It matters what I do every day. But neither will I beat myself up unnecessarily. It is about progress, not perfection, and I am working on my own issues.
Thank you for your prayers and your love. It is all that which has brought this to be where it is tonight, of that I am sure. Keep them coming -- and I will hold you close in my heart and in my prayers as well.
Our child is safe and okay, and has made some decisions about where she wants to be. For my part, I am determined to give her back the power I've assumed on her behalf over the last few months, and to stop treating her as though she were an errant teenager.
For this moment, I believe what she is saying is the truth.
And if it is not, that too will eventually come out. Truth always does.
But everyone deserves at least a couple of do-overs, y'know? So this is one.
I do have a problem with control: I like knowing what is going on and alllllll the details -- always have, and that has caused problems in my relationships with my daughters in the past. If I really get honest about it, I think I see the "right" thing to do, and I push and push to have it go in that direction.
For me, the hardest thing is to let go of that control. While I say "I am powerless over people, places, and things," I often don't actually ACT it. or believe it, I suppose
My brother would agree that I am and always have been fairly bossy. (ooo...that is SO hard to admit, especially where I know he's going to see it)
And I also have to admit that my own life has not always been a textbook of the best or the right way to live. I've screwed things up pretty well any number of times. No, I never suffered horrible consequences like getting thrown in jail, getting arrested, gravely serious injury (although I bear a few scars here and there, and there are a few instances I really don't like remembering), or doing injury to others, at least injuries that are visible.
But I'm sure I gave my mother and father more than a few sleepless nights, and caused my ex some major heartburn. I'm sure I lost a few friends -- although I'm not sure that they were all that great a friend to begin with.
So the lesson I need to find in this is to accept the consequences of my own behavior, of my own choices, and to let go of the need and the desire to direct the choices and lives of others -- my daughters, my dear husband, or my greater family and friends.
It simply is NOT MINE TO DO. Not mine to manage.
Whatever my daughters choose to do in their lives are theirs to manage and to live with. I will never, ever stop loving them. But I am not responsible for their choices. I cannot control their mistakes. And we ALL make mistakes.
Mine in this instance was probably in jumping a bit too quickly to conclusions, and trying too hard to control things.
If there is risky behavior from either child, it is they who will bear the consequences. I cannot save them from that, try as I might. And to jump in to either condemn or rescue is equally as bad.
So tonight I will turn my attention to myself, and ask for the serenity to accept those things I cannot change. And for the wisdom to know the difference. I don't lack for courage, but wisdom to know has definitely been an issue in the past. I just didn't realize how great an issue it still was.
And I am grateful that she is safe and okay for now, that she has made a CHOICE to be where she is, and that her people radar has kicked in enough, at least, to override her stubborn nature and allowed her to see the danger.
I will turn my worries and fears and control over to the care of God/dess, and try to keep myself on the path to serenity. This is a journey. It matters what I do every day. But neither will I beat myself up unnecessarily. It is about progress, not perfection, and I am working on my own issues.
Thank you for your prayers and your love. It is all that which has brought this to be where it is tonight, of that I am sure. Keep them coming -- and I will hold you close in my heart and in my prayers as well.
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
Words that change lives
Sometimes you know you've made a difference in someone's life. They tell you, or you can see for yourself. (I'm not thinking so much of family here as I am friends and more casual aquaintances, or teachers and students, or co-workers -- those kinds of relationships.)
And sometimes -- probably more often than not -- you don't know. You might hope you have, but you may never know. Or you simply don't realize the impact of your words.
Sometimes it's a positive thing, isn't it -- someone gives you a compliment at a moment when you really need to feel good about yourself or what you're doing. And sometimes it isn't: you're criticized for your faults or actions, perhaps unfairly, perhaps not, but it sticks with you, probably all your life, and rankles, or hurts, or pinches a bit.
My high school English teacher made a huge difference in my life. Mrs. Simmons encouraged my writing and handed me books that were not the sort I usually read (although I always was a voracious reader, which she knew), but books that would challenge my thinking, teach me critical analysis or a style of writing. She was not a teacher you loved, but she was good -- and I didn't appreciate how good until I was in college. When I got into a classroom to teach my own classes, I found myself using so many of her techniques to help my students learn to analyze what they read, to express themselves clearly and accurately.
And I told her so in a letter. She was deeply appreciative -- said she had never received such a nice letter from a former student, and was glad to know she'd made a difference. We corresponded for a year or so, off and on. But I got to say thank you.
I also remember an offhand comment from a high school acquaintance that has never left me. She was one of the cute, short, bouncy girls of the '60s; I was tall and not terribly comfortable in my body, and had to push myself out of self-consciousness. I was highly sensitive to criticism (still am more than I'd like to be, alas). There were several of us talking in the girls' locker room one day, and she turned to me and said, "You are so loud! Your voice carries too much. Everyone can hear you all over."
Of course that made me even more self-conscious and embarrassed, and I tried for years to stifle my laughter, my enthusiasm, and my voice level. Only after I'd done a fair bit of acting did I realize that a voice that carries is a huge asset in theatre, and I learned to control it much better. But it hurt for years, and even now, after -- ooo -- some 45 years, I remember how it stung. And I remember her name.
More than 10 years ago I was active in an Internet chat room -- before I'd ever even contemplated a move to California. There were amazing people there -- funny, very well-read, extremely good writers, imaginative. There were special friendships formed there, and several had met in RT -- real time. At least one couple had married. It was a magical year with that group, and I also got to meet several of them in RT.
I'll never forget an online conversation with a few members of that group while I was out here for the first time. I'd come for a 10-day training session and fell in love with the Bay Area. Nearly as soon as I arrived, I knew that I belonged in California, even though it was going to mean turning my life completely upside down, and I think I knew on some level that I was ripe for that change even before I got on the airplane.
One of those new friends told me as I was waxing on about how right it felt here, how I believed I needed to be here: "Then make it happen, sister. Make it happen."
For the next six months those words were my mantra, and I indeed made it happen by researching, by talking to anyone who could help me realize that goal, and by examining what I truly wanted from life and who I truly was becoming (rather than the person I'd been who often acted in accordance with other people's expectations of me). I left a marriage, I left friends, I left a job (although my company created a new one here for me), and I found my life.
But her words were the catalyst that made me believe that I could really do it.
We never know when a casual comment may make all the difference in another's life, change their perception of themselves, give them hope or courage, devastate them into failure.
Choose your words carefully. Say thank you to someone whose words have deeply and positively affected your life. And don't allow the negative stuff to control one more instant of your precious life.
And sometimes -- probably more often than not -- you don't know. You might hope you have, but you may never know. Or you simply don't realize the impact of your words.
Sometimes it's a positive thing, isn't it -- someone gives you a compliment at a moment when you really need to feel good about yourself or what you're doing. And sometimes it isn't: you're criticized for your faults or actions, perhaps unfairly, perhaps not, but it sticks with you, probably all your life, and rankles, or hurts, or pinches a bit.
My high school English teacher made a huge difference in my life. Mrs. Simmons encouraged my writing and handed me books that were not the sort I usually read (although I always was a voracious reader, which she knew), but books that would challenge my thinking, teach me critical analysis or a style of writing. She was not a teacher you loved, but she was good -- and I didn't appreciate how good until I was in college. When I got into a classroom to teach my own classes, I found myself using so many of her techniques to help my students learn to analyze what they read, to express themselves clearly and accurately.
And I told her so in a letter. She was deeply appreciative -- said she had never received such a nice letter from a former student, and was glad to know she'd made a difference. We corresponded for a year or so, off and on. But I got to say thank you.
I also remember an offhand comment from a high school acquaintance that has never left me. She was one of the cute, short, bouncy girls of the '60s; I was tall and not terribly comfortable in my body, and had to push myself out of self-consciousness. I was highly sensitive to criticism (still am more than I'd like to be, alas). There were several of us talking in the girls' locker room one day, and she turned to me and said, "You are so loud! Your voice carries too much. Everyone can hear you all over."
Of course that made me even more self-conscious and embarrassed, and I tried for years to stifle my laughter, my enthusiasm, and my voice level. Only after I'd done a fair bit of acting did I realize that a voice that carries is a huge asset in theatre, and I learned to control it much better. But it hurt for years, and even now, after -- ooo -- some 45 years, I remember how it stung. And I remember her name.
More than 10 years ago I was active in an Internet chat room -- before I'd ever even contemplated a move to California. There were amazing people there -- funny, very well-read, extremely good writers, imaginative. There were special friendships formed there, and several had met in RT -- real time. At least one couple had married. It was a magical year with that group, and I also got to meet several of them in RT.
I'll never forget an online conversation with a few members of that group while I was out here for the first time. I'd come for a 10-day training session and fell in love with the Bay Area. Nearly as soon as I arrived, I knew that I belonged in California, even though it was going to mean turning my life completely upside down, and I think I knew on some level that I was ripe for that change even before I got on the airplane.
One of those new friends told me as I was waxing on about how right it felt here, how I believed I needed to be here: "Then make it happen, sister. Make it happen."
For the next six months those words were my mantra, and I indeed made it happen by researching, by talking to anyone who could help me realize that goal, and by examining what I truly wanted from life and who I truly was becoming (rather than the person I'd been who often acted in accordance with other people's expectations of me). I left a marriage, I left friends, I left a job (although my company created a new one here for me), and I found my life.
But her words were the catalyst that made me believe that I could really do it.
We never know when a casual comment may make all the difference in another's life, change their perception of themselves, give them hope or courage, devastate them into failure.
Choose your words carefully. Say thank you to someone whose words have deeply and positively affected your life. And don't allow the negative stuff to control one more instant of your precious life.
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
Examining the Secret -- and yourself
There's a comment from a "John Curtis" on the posting below that rants about self-help and how it is all an attempt for each of us to find someone to tell us how to think and feel, etc.
I wrote a response which you can read below his.
And then I did some poking around to find out who this guy is. If you click on his name, you'll be taken to a page that no longer exists. HOWEVER, in back of the address is a URL for a group that is against "fraudulent self help." You read it for yourself (if you want to take the time).
Clearly the group hates the current popularity of the secret -- but tucked in their list of opinions is one that basically says that if you want it to succeed, you first must focus your attention on what you want, and then take action to get it.
Duh.
That hardly qualifies as fraudulent self-help in my book -- in fact, it's the only thing that truly works, imho, no matter what program/church/practice you follow in your own life. It's what I've been saying in this blog for the past three years: you create your own destiny by the choices you make (or don't make).
There is no easy way. You can't read a book, hear a sermon, watch a video, and sit back and wait for things to happen. It takes work and patience and gratitude and more work. And the results you get may vary from what you thought you wanted -- but my experience is that it works better than what I'd planned.
Yes, people are making lots of money writing about the secret. So what? TV evangelists make lots of money talking about church. Does that make what they're doing fraudulent or wrong? No. The evangelistic entrepreneurs may believe what they're advocating, but they also know they can make a living from people who will abdicate responsibility for their own lives and choices. And there will always be those people.
As with any program/practice/church that I've EVER been involved with, I've taken some of the secret concepts and tried to apply them to my life -- always with an eye towards living a better, kinder, more productive life, but also being true to who I am. I don't swallow anything whole anymore, and that to me is just plain ol' common sense. Question. Examine. Discard some, save others. (can you hear strains of "I did it myyyyyyyyyy wayyyyyyyy" floating in the background?) That's me.
You do it your way.
I wrote a response which you can read below his.
And then I did some poking around to find out who this guy is. If you click on his name, you'll be taken to a page that no longer exists. HOWEVER, in back of the address is a URL for a group that is against "fraudulent self help." You read it for yourself (if you want to take the time).
Clearly the group hates the current popularity of the secret -- but tucked in their list of opinions is one that basically says that if you want it to succeed, you first must focus your attention on what you want, and then take action to get it.
Duh.
That hardly qualifies as fraudulent self-help in my book -- in fact, it's the only thing that truly works, imho, no matter what program/church/practice you follow in your own life. It's what I've been saying in this blog for the past three years: you create your own destiny by the choices you make (or don't make).
There is no easy way. You can't read a book, hear a sermon, watch a video, and sit back and wait for things to happen. It takes work and patience and gratitude and more work. And the results you get may vary from what you thought you wanted -- but my experience is that it works better than what I'd planned.
Yes, people are making lots of money writing about the secret. So what? TV evangelists make lots of money talking about church. Does that make what they're doing fraudulent or wrong? No. The evangelistic entrepreneurs may believe what they're advocating, but they also know they can make a living from people who will abdicate responsibility for their own lives and choices. And there will always be those people.
As with any program/practice/church that I've EVER been involved with, I've taken some of the secret concepts and tried to apply them to my life -- always with an eye towards living a better, kinder, more productive life, but also being true to who I am. I don't swallow anything whole anymore, and that to me is just plain ol' common sense. Question. Examine. Discard some, save others. (can you hear strains of "I did it myyyyyyyyyy wayyyyyyyy" floating in the background?) That's me.
You do it your way.
Saturday, September 29, 2007
My 10th anniversary
I left Birmingham, Alabama -- my home for seven years--10 years ago yesterday. I arrived home -- my childhood home in Springfield, Missouri-- the same day and spent two days there with my parents and brother before I started my trek to California and a new life.
I *had* to do it. I had known for some time that I needed to be elsewhere, in a different life, because I did not want to say, at some hopefully far-distant day when I'm near the end of my life, "I wonder what would have happened if..." I did not want fear to keep me from fully living -- fear, nor complacency, nor indecision, nor codependence, nor the expectations of other people. I did not want to settle for the life I had.
I visited California on a business trip earlier that year for 10 days, and knew almost from the moment the plane touched down that I needed to be here. I'd never had any desire to live here until that time. And after that, I explored every possible avenue to find a way to come. Persistence paid off -- that, and some colleagues who believed in me--and my company created a job for me in the Bay Area where there were two offices.
It was the best move I ever made.
If I'd been told then that 10 years later I'd live in a little town in northern California with a husband I adore, living on land with a house I got to plan, and that I'd sell real estate, I'd have wondered what they were smoking. And dismissed it as pure fantasy.
What I've learned in the past 10 years:
I am grateful and blessed. Thanks be.
I *had* to do it. I had known for some time that I needed to be elsewhere, in a different life, because I did not want to say, at some hopefully far-distant day when I'm near the end of my life, "I wonder what would have happened if..." I did not want fear to keep me from fully living -- fear, nor complacency, nor indecision, nor codependence, nor the expectations of other people. I did not want to settle for the life I had.
I visited California on a business trip earlier that year for 10 days, and knew almost from the moment the plane touched down that I needed to be here. I'd never had any desire to live here until that time. And after that, I explored every possible avenue to find a way to come. Persistence paid off -- that, and some colleagues who believed in me--and my company created a job for me in the Bay Area where there were two offices.
It was the best move I ever made.
If I'd been told then that 10 years later I'd live in a little town in northern California with a husband I adore, living on land with a house I got to plan, and that I'd sell real estate, I'd have wondered what they were smoking. And dismissed it as pure fantasy.
What I've learned in the past 10 years:
- I can do just about anything if I'm willing to work at it and am patient. And persistent.
- I am a loving and very loved woman who has discovered wonderful things about this body -- and a little more about taking care of it.
- There are soulmates. I never expected such love to come to me, and I am deeply grateful every single day for my husband.
- If you wait to seek happiness until you have a job, a house, a car, a child, lose weight, stop smoking, whatever -- you will never have it. Life is in this moment: it is all we have, one moment at a time.
- If you don't like where you are, who you are, or what you have, change it. You are the decider of your life's path, and of who you are.
- It is never too late to change. Not until you are expelling your last breath.
I am grateful and blessed. Thanks be.
Wednesday, June 13, 2007
Talk to me
Some days you're the bug. Some days you're the windshield. Today was a windshield day.
Expectations. We all have them in some form, whether it is of ourselves or of others. They come from so many sources, from so many influences in our lives, beginning when we are tiny, dependent on our parents for food and shelter and emotional nurturing. We're taught how to get what we want partly by watching how others get what THEY want.
Like this: if mom is manipulative and martyristic in order to get what she wants, chances are the kids are going to grow up emulating at least some of her behaviors. If mom works hard, tries to be fair, is honest and ethical, guess what. Some of that is going to rub off too. Even in adulthood we watch how others get promoted or rewarded, and emulate those behaviors -- which can account for the intensely political culture found in most of corporate America. Or, truly, in just about any job situation.
We want to please others in order to be rewarded with approval, with love, with affection, raises, whatever. We need to meet expectations in order to do that. And when it all gets totally FUBAR is when we don't know what those expectations really are, and those who have 'em aren't telling us, won't communicate with us, perhaps don't even really know themselves exactly what they expect.
What we know is that we failed to meet whatever they were, and we're gonna get punished: someone stops speaking, there is a bad performance review, reputations are smeared, relationships deteriorate.
For me, my inner judge holds a big fat hairy session in which I am always, ALWAYS found guilty and wanting.
Okay, at least I recognize it and I'm better at keeping the judge in his chambers than I used to be. (But sometimes he talks really loudly through the door.)
And even then, there's a vague uneasiness that hangs over me, a feeling that there should have been something I could have, should have, would have done better that would have met those unarticulated expectations and made it all better.
In truth, the only person I can fix is me. I don't read minds. If I don't know what someone expects, my chances of success are about as good as being able to compose a symphony by throwing rocks at a piano in a dark room.
Clear, honest, open communication can be hard to listen to sometimes, but it is so far preferable to hidden agendas and disappointment, and all the angst that can bring on. It can take a long time to recover regardless of whether you're the one who didn't get them met or the one who didn't meet them. And if you can't talk about it to figure out what happened, nobody wins. Ever.
Tomorrow starts with a clean windshield again. But I feel pretty spattered up tonight.
Expectations. We all have them in some form, whether it is of ourselves or of others. They come from so many sources, from so many influences in our lives, beginning when we are tiny, dependent on our parents for food and shelter and emotional nurturing. We're taught how to get what we want partly by watching how others get what THEY want.
Like this: if mom is manipulative and martyristic in order to get what she wants, chances are the kids are going to grow up emulating at least some of her behaviors. If mom works hard, tries to be fair, is honest and ethical, guess what. Some of that is going to rub off too. Even in adulthood we watch how others get promoted or rewarded, and emulate those behaviors -- which can account for the intensely political culture found in most of corporate America. Or, truly, in just about any job situation.
We want to please others in order to be rewarded with approval, with love, with affection, raises, whatever. We need to meet expectations in order to do that. And when it all gets totally FUBAR is when we don't know what those expectations really are, and those who have 'em aren't telling us, won't communicate with us, perhaps don't even really know themselves exactly what they expect.
What we know is that we failed to meet whatever they were, and we're gonna get punished: someone stops speaking, there is a bad performance review, reputations are smeared, relationships deteriorate.
For me, my inner judge holds a big fat hairy session in which I am always, ALWAYS found guilty and wanting.
Okay, at least I recognize it and I'm better at keeping the judge in his chambers than I used to be. (But sometimes he talks really loudly through the door.)
And even then, there's a vague uneasiness that hangs over me, a feeling that there should have been something I could have, should have, would have done better that would have met those unarticulated expectations and made it all better.
In truth, the only person I can fix is me. I don't read minds. If I don't know what someone expects, my chances of success are about as good as being able to compose a symphony by throwing rocks at a piano in a dark room.
Clear, honest, open communication can be hard to listen to sometimes, but it is so far preferable to hidden agendas and disappointment, and all the angst that can bring on. It can take a long time to recover regardless of whether you're the one who didn't get them met or the one who didn't meet them. And if you can't talk about it to figure out what happened, nobody wins. Ever.
Tomorrow starts with a clean windshield again. But I feel pretty spattered up tonight.
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