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November 16th, 2011 Today at my women’s bible study group the discussion was on that horrible word – discipline. You know – that thing that we all love to avoid and we’re supposed to do but don’t want to do. The question that was posed was:
“If you hear that someone has a lot of self-discipline, or “is disciplined,” what images come to mind: positive or negative ones?”
As we tossed this question around, the subject of “to do” lists came up. We all make “to do” lists and then discipline ourselves to work through the list all day long, checking off each item until we’re done. When the list is completely checked off it’s “Ahhh…done!”. We feel accomplished. We feel good. But what about the days when we are happily going about checking off our items and we are interrupted? The list gets forgotten and we attend to the interruption. Hours go by, we make our way back to the list only to find there isn’t near enough time left in the day to finish it. We feel dejected. We feel unaccomplished. Most days our well-intended “to do” lists set us up for failure, no matter how disciplined we are.
One woman raised her hand and offered a new approach to “to do” lists. She said each morning she gets out her blank sheet of paper for her “to do” list. She presents the blank page to God as a blank slate for her day and asks God what He has in mind for her day. Then, each evening she sits with the blank paper and makes a list of all the things she did that day. Everyday she ends up with a full list of accomplishments, no feelings of failure, and amazing things she never dreamed she could accomplish had she made the list in the morning herself.
How many times does our day fall short of our actual potential because we limit ourselves by what we put on our “to do” lists?
And so, as another day goes by, make a “to do” list or….maybe don’t…..and..I have written.
November 15th, 2011 After my languid day yesterday, I drove back to the cape today. When I got here I got groceries, put my stuff away, raked leaves, put away lawn furniture, and…went to 6 pm yoga.
There’s something to be said for languidness. Paying attention to what my body needed yesterday and practicing that self-care, made all the difference today. Granted, being back at yoga after being away for 9 days wasn’t easy, but after driving 4 hours it was worth it. Pay a little attention to yourself today – tomorrow it will pay off.
And so, as another day goes by, all that’s left is shower, dinner, and my back to my own bed, and…. I have written.
November 14th, 2011 Today when I woke up I just knew my day wasn’t going to go as planned. I had planned to drive back to the cape, but for some reason I decided against it and stayed in NY one more day. I didn’t feel quite up to par and just took the day to lay low and stay in the apartment in front of the tv. Not like me at all. Not a day goes by that I don’t either go to the gym or yoga. Today was decidedly different. The last time I stayed in NY on a Monday and had a feeling I shouldn’t drive back, my mom passed away the next day. Naturally staying here today made me once again focus on loss. The day seemed like it was stopped – like a space in time. My husband and a good friend were here for me today. Their gifts of love and friendship helped me through a difficult day. A day caught in space and time. A day I needed to stop and regroup. Now, at the end of the day, I feel rejuvenated and ready to leave and resume normal life tomorrow. Today I consider a lucky day because….
November 13th, 2011 This week, while in NY, I spent way more time shopping than I ever do when I’m home at the cape. (This is probably due to the fact that there are no leaves to do here.) I spent two days in two different malls. I have a long cardigan sweater that I love and wear everywhere, and it’s time I get another one. Two days, two different malls, 6 hours of shopping, and all I came home with was three pairs of socks. My daughters would not be proud. Make no mistake, I do love the socks, but in all that time spent combing the malls, why couldn’t I find a decent sweater? Because I couldn’t look for one. Every store was stuffed with inventory and Xmas sales. There was just TOO much stuff to comb through. It looked like too much work as soon as I entered each store, and after a few passes up and down the isles, I gave up and walked out of the store. At one point, I actually found a store that had a generous selection of sweaters. My hopes lifted and I started to gather up a few to take into the dressing room, but the selection went on and on. Everywhere I turned – great sweaters – lots of cardigans – and 50% off. You’d think I’d be in heaven. No. Too many to even choose 6 to try on. I left the store, walked the entire length of the mall, had a sandwich at the food court, then drove an hour back home.
It seems the longer I live, the more I see, the more I hear, the more I read, the more people I meet, the more I travel……the less I know. The more I learn, the more I see that there is that I don’t know. When I feel sad, angry, or hurt I jump to people to make me feel better. If only so and so would do this or that I’d feel so much better. Like shopping, I spend days doing this. Overwhelming myself with “if only” scenarios. Then I hear a song. Within its lyrics contain the answer that’s as simple as buying a pair of socks. After hours of searching for help to feel better by thinking, reading, feeling sorry for and overwhelming myself, I finally stop and listen. And what do I hear?
“I lift my eyes unto the hills. Where does my help come from? My help comes from the lord, the maker of heaven and earth.” (Praise You In This Storm – Casting Crowns)
How could I have missed that? It’s kind of good that’s it’s only the middle of November – clearly I have not yet mastered this “listening thing”.
And so, as another day goes by, time spent with Pandora pays off, and…. I have written.
November 12th, 2011 Sitting here watching the Penn State game and feeling bad, just so bad….for the students, especially the seniors (it’s senior day), Joe Pa, the alumni, and…most especially the victims. It’s a tremendous tearing down for all affected. Everyone will be changed by the heartbreak of it all. Next, the healing will have to begin. The building back up of so much brokenness. I pray God will be with all those so deeply hurt.
Once again, by sitting here listening, my GPS is being adjusted. October was about visiting old gauntlets and handling them in a new way. November is about being still, listening, and finding that inner peace. Through the Penn State happenings, my direction for December is being laid out before me. Shedding. The peeling off of a very old skin, worn thin by the last 20 years of my life. It’s dried up, cracking into pieces, and is no where near strong enough to support the next phase of my life.
If 2011 was about breaking down, I can make a sound guess that 2012 is going to be about building up. Slowly. In a new way. Step by step. Still somewhat painful. 2012 will be about growing a new, stronger, tougher skin, ready for the challenges of the coming years.
And so, as another day goes by, my marching orders were delivered in my morning meditation (below), and…I have written.
November 11th, 2011 The new book, The Secret Lives of Wives by Iris Krasnow, is making it’s way around the talk show circuit. Today the author was on The Talk just as my husband walked in from work. Ms. Krasnow was making the statement “today women don’t need a man. We have sperm banks….” My husband took great exception to the comment. I explained who she was and what the book was about. I told him this author interviewed a lot of women who have been married 20 plus years and asked them what made their long term marriage possible. He listened to a bit more of her on the show while changing his clothes and had more to offer on the man’s point of view. I, of course, had way more to offer on the women’s point of view. We headed out the door to do some shopping and our discussion lasted all the way to the mall. We arrived at the mall, busied ourselves with our errands and came back outside to a driving blizzard. Instead of eating out, we decided to make a quick stop to the grocery store, grab some wine, and go home to cozy up and eat by the fire.
As I’m writing this, my husband is busy cooking the dinner. On the drive home I contemplated the whole scenario above, along with the book. I thought about the three hours we just spent together doing mundane things, but how much we still enjoyed being together. Now I ask myself the same question the author was asking the women in her book. We have been married 36 years. A trip to the mall and grocery store on a Friday night is still enjoyable to both of us. How is that?
It’s simple. We LIKE each other. We find each other interesting. We really like talking to each other. Even a trip to the mall is enjoyable after being apart all day. After 36 years, we are still each other’s favorite person to talk to at the end of the day. We respect each others opinions and agree to disagree.
During the ride I shared my reasons for our lengthy marriage with my husband and told him we should write a book on this topic together and include both the male and female points of view. He just looked at me, and then said, “Oh look at what they’re doing down there”, pointing to the heavy equipment still fixing storm damage in the Mohawk River. I asked him what he would say was responsible for our 36 years together. He replied, “Novocain.” We both dissolved in laughter and knew I was right.
And so, as another day goes by, the book is downloading as we speak, and …I have written.
November 10th, 2011 This week my meditation has been about working on The Basics. What I learned today touches on what I was writing about yesterday. Yesterday I wrote about self-appreciation and self-care. In my focus on the basics this past week, a lot of what I read was about taking care of oneself being a basic step to growing, changing, and moving forward with life.
The first 6 months of my journey overcoming suppressed grief was spent doing an inordinate amount of sleeping. For the first three months, I spent 10 hours a day in one chair, sleeping on and off, and then going to bed at 10 pm and sleeping until 6 am. I would get up, go to yoga, and by noontime climb back into the chair til 10 pm at night. My only two goals each day were to drag myself out of the chair to wash my yoga clothes and to try not to go to bed before 10 pm. The next thee months I made myself move out of the chair at 3 pm for a walk, and gradually added a small afternoon exercise routine, but by 6 pm I was back in the chair exhausted. Months 7,8, & 9 I added running and increased the exercise time to 90 minutes, after which I stayed active until early evening.
During this whole time period I was very concerned with the extreme fatigue. It scared me. I was so glad to see it begin to get better. In months 10, and now 11, I am 95% back to my normal activity level of one year ago. I have even reached the point where I actually don’t even want a cat nap after lunch on most days. But on the days I need it, I listen to my body and I do it. It is only now I can look back on the progression and realize the extreme fatigue was actually my body shutting itself down to protect itself during the healing process. This was my own observation and conclusion.
Today I was relieved to find this stated in my meditation:
“Remember if you’re going through a time of deep grief or intense change, you may need more sleep than usual.”
I was overjoyed to read that I was not off-base in my thinking. My journey isn’t quite complete yet, and I still have a few days where after yoga I’m totally spent. Knowing that this is a normal part of putting the last few pieces of myself back in place, gives me great relief.
At the end of the third month, on the first warm day of spring, I’ll never forget the day that I became aware of self-care. I was driving back from yoga, the sun was warm in the car, I was at the end of my rope, so deep in pain, and I stopped at a stoplight. I looked up at the blue sky and just said, “God, today, just take care of me.” That was the day I got out of the chair for the first time at 3 pm and just went and sat out on the patio. I looked up once again at the sky and decided tomorrow I’ll walk down the road. And those were my first steps to recovery.
I will never forget that day. It will always stand to remind me to stop and take care of my most basic needs – both physical and mental. Alongside good food, sleep, and exercise, stands admitting what I went through, facing fears and insecurities head on and talking about them to people that really matter.
And so, as another day goes by, the listening goes on…..this week has been about listening to my body and respecting the things it asks for, and ….I have written.
November 9th, 2011 “You were born with potential.
You were born with goodness and trust.
You were born with ideals and dreams.
You were born with greatness.
You were born with wings.
You are not meant for crawling, so don’t.
You have wings.
Learn to use them and fly.”
– Mevlana Jelalu’ddin Rumi
We are all put on this earth to serve other people and contribute. That is the sole purpose of our existence. My view of service used to be somewhat distorted. I always viewed “service” as helping in shelters, Peace Corps, food pantry, mission work in other countries, – a volunteer organization of some kind. I didn’t think of the jobs we are paid to do everyday as “service”.
Today I went to the gym, then for an eye exam, then to the mall and the grocery store. After reading the above over morning coffee, in each place I went I took note of the people going about their work day providing kindnesses, conveniences, as well as necessities for me. Whether we are volunteering or doing our paid jobs, we are all in the exact place we were meant to be in order to provide service to other people. We are all important. We all have wings that we unfurl each day as we go about what we sometimes think as just “another day, another dollar”, on this earth.
It’s easy to think when we’re in the middle of draining the pasta for dinner and the kids are arguing that it’s just another mundane day and we’ll get up and do it all over again tomorrow. When you have a family and work full time, it easily becomes the hamster wheel. As we quiet the kids and put the meal on the table, that is the time to think fleetingly “this is an important job”. When the alarm goes off at 5 am and you make it to your place of employment just in time by 8 am, again think fleetingly, as your coffee spills on your shoe, “This is an important job. I am an important person, with greatness and potential to give to those I come into contact with today”.
Last year, during my second year of retirement, I was knocked a little off kilter as I began missing my main means of service. Suddenly stopping teaching after 35 years didn’t hit me very hard my first year. It was this past year that feelings of “not doing anything to help anyone” began to creep over me. These loose ends were an added part of my journey. I had to morph into a new way of giving. I knew my hospice work was important, but what about what I did with the rest of my time? Slowly but surely people began connecting with this blog and just knowing that writing about my journey was helping others move along theirs, made me realize that my “importance and greatness” were not all used up just because I no longer teach.
Retired, working, being a stay at home mom, – it doesn’t matter. Our “importance and greatness” of what we have to offer others is never drained or used up.
Read this one more time – slowly:
“You were born with potential.
You were born with goodness and trust.
You were born with ideals and dreams.
You were born with greatness.
You were born with wings.
You are not meant for crawling, so don’t.
You have wings.
Learn to use them and fly.”
Now, whatever the very next thing you’re going to do after reading this, pause and fleetingly consider it’s importance as a service to yourself or others. Whether it’s going to brush your teeth, get the clothes out of the dryer, send an email, or read to your child – sigh and know your exactly where you’re supposed to be doing very important things necessary for caring about yourself or someone else.
Yes, I said caring for yourself. Caring for oneself is a form of service to God, too. He has given us the responsibility of taking good care of ourselves, both physically and mentally, so we may be in tip top condition to go out and do His work again tomorrow. If I had let myself cave into fear, anxiety, and depression this past year, what good would I be to anyone else? I’d be a liability instead. Self-care is paramount in being able to be of service to others. So, as you finish reading this post, in addition to doing for others, remember to do one nice thing for yourself today, too.
And so, as another day goes by, we walk this journey hand in hand, and….I have written.
Below: Struck by beauty in the mall parking lot – even trees contribute…..
November 8th, 2011 I recently made a new friend at the writer’s workshop I attended on Saturday. She friended me on Facebook. I was reading through her page and found this:
“There are three things you can’t hide: the sun, the moon, and the truth.”
Just this morning, while watching the news, my husband and I were discussing how things buried in the past can come out and bite you in the ass (Cain & Penn State). We said we hope young people entering high profile careers will learn from these stories and think twice before compromising themselves because 15 years from now it will come back and haunt them and everything they worked for will be gone in the blink of an eye. It always gets found out. The truth really is as big as the sun and the moon and none of them fit under the carpet.
As devastating as it is for high profile people, what about us low profile people who don’t even have 100 friends on Facebook? For us, too, it is devastating. Falling and failing in front of family and friends causes emotional pain and damage. Sorry doesn’t cut it. Forgiveness isn’t even on the radar. Hours are spent alone muttering about the “if onlys”. Hindsight is 20/20. The road to forgiving oneself is a long one. Being completely dismantled as a person is painful. Being put back together hurts twice as much. Facing who you were is excruciating. Being bent and honed into who you will be in the future takes more than you ever imagined you had in you. I saw all this in Conrad Murray’s face when the sentence was delivered. (To me, he was not expressionless) And that’s how it is for us commoners, too, when we don’t think before we act. I can’t imagine having it displayed all over the morning news.
Thank God there is a God because there is no easy way out. I’ve learned you have to walk through it. You have to feel every feeling. To try to sweep it under the rug only leads to unstable mental health. Pretending it never happened doesn’t work and only lasts so long. The first step toward changing and healing is to just simply stop. Stop everything. Stop thinking. Stop talking. Stop trying to explain, apologize, and justify. Stop crying and kicking and screaming. Just stop.
Once you’ve stopped, remain still. Arms by your side. Be a vehicle for the spirit. You’re not dead, it didn’t kill you, so the spirit will move you. It’s just important YOU don’t move you. Be quiet in mind, mouth, and actions. Just listen. It is then that God allows us to take that first step toward healing.
Eleven months. Eleven months have passed. I started out with being a vehicle for the spirit in January, and now, in November, the lesson is listening. I’ve come full circle and the answer is the same – surrender. I’ve tried all my own ideas and ways. Exhausted all possibilities. And what did I learn? The same thing I wrote about in January. “Lean not unto thine own understanding” cause I don’t understand a damn thing.
God is steady. He is the only one who knows all. I’m reading a book that is wonderful, but it’s the title that has the most impact on me: “Fear Not Tomorrow-God is Already There” by Ruth Graham.
Imagine trusting someone who already knows the future instead of my fearful, insecure, unsure, self? Once I let Jesus take the wheel, as the song says, I did find that peace that passes all understanding. My life improved steadily from that day forward in ways I could not imagine.
Trouble is, I couldn’t just say it. I had to listen daily. Not just petition for things I wanted or wanted to happen. I had to stop everyday and listen. I have come to the conclusion that listening will always be a part of my daily meditation. I am careful now to let God think before I act.
Some of us learn the hard way, but I feel really bad for those that have to learn on national TV. I do pray that our young people today entering professional careers err on the side of wisdom and divine guidance as they shape their futures.
And so, as another day goes by, I’m still listening, and….I have written.
November 7th, 2011 Believe it or not, today in the Cape Cod Times I read about two Gods. It seems most everyone, with the exception of the Atheists, believes in one sovereign God that connects with His people in many different ways called religions. Many religions, still one God. The two Gods I read about today are different because of the belief that lies in the hearts of the believers. Some believe in a judgmental God, others believe in a loving God. The question is: Which God serves us better in the midst of the turmoil our world is in today? Or, the better question, which God is it better for us to serve in this uncertain world?
A Baylor University survey was actually done on this and the findings do seem plausible. We live in times of high anxiety and it was found that people who served a loving God fared healthier, stronger, and better in general than those that serve a judgmental God. Without going into the specific findings, (they can be found on today’s editorial page of the Cape Cod Times. The article is entitled: Healthy Thinking About the Almighty by William McKenzie) it stated that those who serve a judgmental God, and attend fire and brimstone churches, experience a significantly higher level of anxiety and anger in their lives. I can see that – if someone were shouting “Sinner! Repent!” at me all the time, I’d be anxious too. Those that serve a loving God with a warm relationship and believe He is responsive to them, were found to have fewer mental issues, and “churches that espouse a loving, warm God, best allay our worries”.
I, myself, serve a loving God – and it’s a good thing because I supplied enough anxiety and fear for myself this past year and He spent 11 months taking it away. (or I should say, teaching me how to let it go) My God is kind and loving, but no pushover either. He grabs me by the collar and gives me a wake up call when I need it and He slows me down and makes me pay attention, such as this month-long “listening experience”. (I tried a couple of times to offer Him suggestions, but I still get “listen” – I don’t think I’m ever going to get that personal assistant’s job). I guess this is what you’d call a responsive God, even though for the last 11 days His only response is “listen”. Difficult as it is, I appreciate my God just the way He is. I have never felt so centered and peaceful. Listening and not asking, begging, and doing has begun to teach me that my whole world really IS in His hands. I am beginning to know exactly what that Paul dude meant by “the peace that passes all understanding”.
And so, as another day goes by, I guess everybody needs to find their own Jesus (He’s a topic for another day), and ..I have written.
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