Living-Deliberately.com

Great post from Beth on this subject today. Check it out!

Open question:

“When you need to change something in your life, what motivates you to move from knowledge to action?”

• When are peanuts miracles? When there millions of them growing on a day so hot that surely they must be roasting right there in the sun, and the dry wind blowing my hair into my face smells thicker than the butter they soon will become.
• When are peaches miracles? When you’re eating one within 10 miles of the lush tree it was plucked from, grown to full ripeness that bursts in your mouth when your teeth break the skin, and the juice runs in golden rivulets of goodness down your chin.
• When is an afternoon rain a miracle? When you’ve been driving for 400 miles in an old van without air conditioning, a heat index over 100, and children sick and tired of months of road trips. When little tears of discouragement find their way from the corners of your eyes and from under the rim of your sunglasses, drying faster than the next breath from that hot wind. When a friend calls to say they are praying for you and within moments the sky starts to swirl with blue gray clouds, embracing the road ahead as if the clouds themselves were angel’s arms, and the resulting drops of cool water fall at such an angle as to not require the windows be closed. When that rain is really wild grace refreshing your spirit, kissing your tears, and giving you enough hope to keep on.
• When is a song lyric a miracle? When it so perfectly sums up what drives the next step, “Just because I’m losing doesn’t mean I’m lost, doesn’t mean I’ll stop.”

Just a few funny moments that came across because that delicious 3rd year is so preciously unique: He woke up the other day and said, “Mommy, I need a vampire for my nose.” (he meant a humidifier!) A friend of his sister’s was teaching him to sword fight and said, “en garde”. He responded with, “I God”.

In 10th grade, Mrs. Kravitz taught me that a good research paper is double spaced, with 1 inch margins all the way around. So when the words crowd together and the lines are too close to see between and there’s no room for a little red-ink-editing, it’s time for reformatting. Today I raise my glass to the goal of having a little more room in the margins. Cheers!

Many thanks to the phone calls and emails and comments I got encouraging me on my swim!

Today I swam again but this time I didn’t run or do strength training first. I was fresh and I had a good carb/protein breakfast. I completed all 16 laps across the pool! Some of them with a kickboard, some side stroke, 1 back, 1 breast…but the point was, I made it across, my breaks were shorter, and I didn’t feel like dying :-).

I probably can’t run AND ride after yet but I think I could one or the other. That’s what I’ll try next.

Onward!

I think it’s a good thing that I have deep stores of “Red Headed Determination” because this is the step in the process where otherwise, I’d step off the train.

Yesterday I began the swim portion of training for the sprint-triathlon I hope to complete. I’ve been averaging a 5 mile run/walk with a 13 mile bike ride and recently added strength training once a week as well. The heat was causing me to wheeze so I’m super grateful for our discounted Y membership with it’s gym and pool access. I won’t be choosing a race in the heat of a Florida summer, for sure, and likely will avoid those with an ocean swim all together. We’ll see though. The ocean would provide less by-stander visibility and looking-obnoxious-whilst-swimming is a definite fear.

Most of the races I’ve looked at incorporate a 400 yard swim. In our pool that is 16 laps. I did have a few factors working against me yesterday:

• a hard morning work out, where I’d pushed my legs especially hard, having newly discovered this cool weight machine that targets what I call “handle bar butt”
• a swimsuit that is too big, with shorts that were chosen for mountain hikes near streams, not lap swimming. I’m also about 3-4 sizes smaller now than when I bought it and the thing sort of drapes. Not great for streamlined, fish-like movement!
• Heat of the day, on the weakest day of my month, with Day 8 of an ongoing migraine

But still, my swimming is embarrassing. My strokes are sloppy and I couldn’t do two laps in a row with the same stroke. I was gasping at each touch of the wall and by lap 7 (I only made it 8!) thought stopping mid-lap and sinking quietly to the bottom sounded like a fine option! Only the side-stroke got me across without feeling like I was dying and I think this is part because I don’t have to wonder how I’m going to breathe with that particular stroke, nor do I create wavy lines down the lane with my wonky back stroke.

It feels vulnerable and obvious out there! No one else was swimming laps so the only others there were the lifeguards, cockily sitting perched just above my lane, and the pre-teen boys yelling “marco!” and “polo” over in the shallow section. My old mantra of “I just want to finish the race” was drowned before my eyes when I instead got a glimpse of my super-white, “had 5 babies” body as the LAST one struggling across the pool in this absurd goal of finishing a freakin’ TRIATHLON. What the heck was I thinking in setting this goal in the first place?

My “most embarrassing swimming story” goes like this: the last time I was in a lap pool was in 2002, when little Wheaton was taking his first batch of swimming lessons. We were at a college pool and there were several competitive swim teams who also used the pool for practices. I was swimming along at my typical “snail’s pace” and these kids were in the next lane. I envied their endurance, their in-sync breathing, their perfect stroke. I did NOT envy their dictator of a coach. But that afternoon I heard him screaming at a group of girls, “Clean it up! You can swim better than that! Don’t you ever let me see you swim like HER!” And yes folks, he was pointing at my pathetic, panting, self. I wanted to drop to the concrete bottom right then and there.

I’ve got lots of voices to reprogram in my head and not all of them belong to a manipulative and controlling ex-husband. Some of them are from guys like that swim coach, who kept me from a public swim for 6 years. I’ve got to learn how to swim better, to care less about how it looks, and complete the goal. But oh how humbling it is to realize how far I am from achievement, how unrefined it will probably look right on through the race, and how much vanity there will be swallow in order to cross the finish line.

After my swim practice I worked with Rowan, who is just learning to swim. I hold his little hands and we kick across the shallow end to grab the wall and we just repeat it over and over until he’s tired out. At every touch of the side he yells, “YAY Mom! I did it! I’m awesome!” I’d love just a touch of that unabashed self-love and enthusiasm. Out of the mouths of babes.

Oh, and I guess we can still say, “It’s the ECONOMY, stupid”. Not going to wax verbose today on politics. But I would just like to say:

• I don’t care that Obama is black.
• I don’t care that Hillary is a woman.
• I don’t care that McCain is old.

I didn’t formulate my choice on anything but issues and the need for change. I resent the constant suggestion that an election has to be driven by race or gender or age issues. In fact, I consider those who keep proclaiming that it does to be further evidence of an “out of touch” mentality that I increasingly have little time for. Get a clue. When our backs are breaking from a system THAT DOESN’T WORK we can see past superficial, skin deep, facades and are quite intelligent enough to vote. Boxes are old-fashioned. That’s all the news from Lake Woebegone today folks…

Some random thoughts:

• Since my feet are planted in two cities, Knoxville and Jacksonville, I’ve decided to start writing reviews of my favorite places in each. They are two very similar cities that both feel like “home” to me so dual living just might end up being a pretty good fit. First up will be cupcake bakery reviews!
• I’m test driving a new social playground, Plurk.com! It’s FUN!! Some very smart people decided to take the micro-blogging format and add threaded conversations and a timeline, so that it’s more like a fleshy, rounded, romanesque version of Twitter. Come find me there and play along: I’m Sixredheads (of course!)
• I’m officially jealous of people with an office. I started my business in my closet and love the portability of laptop-working; in fact, that same ability to be mobile is what makes work life possible right now. But I do crave a quiet place to write actual content and think two thoughts in a row without an interruption!
• I only saw one entry for the Goal Progress Update. If you wrote one, make sure I have your link and I’ll choose the bag winner on Wednesday of this week!
• Two new blogs I found via Plurk: Mark’s Fitness site and Desi’s taste of Italy. Enjoy!

Awhile back, maybe 6 weeks or so ago, I started feeling aware of a need to dream some new dreams for myself. The purest fact is, my life has radically changed over the past year. Congruent to all this change, I’m also accomplishing several of my older dreams and goals. I see myself in a new light, a new context. Some of this is due to the therapy I’ve been going through while I coped with the divorce and the reasons for it… my inner voice has changed how I speak to myself, in every aspect from how I look to what I think I can do. Or, more honestly, it’s changing, present tense, because it’s a helluva thing to change about oneself and HARD.

Oprah used to say (maybe she still does) that, “God has bigger dreams for you than you can dream for yourself”. I love that spin on the scripture that talks about the “plans He has made”.  And I guess if God doesn’t keep us in static little boxes, neither should we do so to ourselves.

Ever since I was a little girl I’ve had the ability to “decide what to dream” as I fall asleep at night. I start by describing to myself a setting and imagining myself in it…then as I fall asleep my mind continues on, usually in full color and usually with a plot. Now and then I’ll dream little seemingly mundane moment in my subconscious mind and then years later actually find I’m living that moment, leading to a punch of deja vu that has taught me to pay close attention to the “setting” of those “mundane” moments in my dream hours. They can provide powerful contextual clues as to how my life is going to change in the future.

So when the thought came over me a few weeks ago that I needed some new dreams I had a choice: deliberately plan some or wait for new ones to arrive without my determination at work. I decided to wait. Something felt wrong, and very small, about list making and controlling it. I wanted to be surprised, to open my mind, to let something in that might be very different from anything I can presently conceive of. To decide on my own what to dream felt too restrictive and confined.

Waiting on a dream is a little tense. Or, at least, it can be. Without a future vision I’m not really sure what I’m working for and I’m the kind of person that needs to have a goal in sight in order to maintain endurance. Open ended work is discouraging to me and trials become monotonous and purposeless. Tracking back across the past month or so, I can see days that reflect that.

Revelations don’t happen in a big BANG in my experience….rather, there is a build up and repetition, though it may be subtle, in the days just before, that make the revelation, when it finally comes, ring more true. It feels right because even on a quiet, subconscious level, there has been some level of preparation going on. And so it goes: a friend will mention something here, an observation is made there, mental files are constructed, feelings are recorded into the body’s memory.

Yesterday I took my children to the beach. Our beach days sit within my Mother Remembrances as some of the most special, most fun, most jubilant days we’ve ever had together. The wide open space, the continuity of the ocean, the relaxation that comes from interacting with such a massive force…we are at once at peace and happy to be together. There has never been a sibling fight at the beach and “Mom always plays too”. Anytime I need that kind of healing reminder that there is something bigger than our lives and our problems, we head to the ocean. Even better is being there with loving friends, and such was our day yesterday.

Despite three applications of high level sunblock though, we all came away a bit burned. And with a heat index of 104, it only took a few hours to wear us out. We came home smiling but exhausted and as a result, had a pretty quiet day. By evening my mind felt clear and blank….I couldn’t concentrate but didn’t feel troubled by anything either. Just really, really light and spacious. I’ve felt that before while praying and meditating, but to my memory, not ever from the elements. It was a profound feeling of peace.

And a more ideal way to drift into sleep must not have ever been! I think I smiled as I fell, hearing loving words run through my thoughts as softly as my head rested on the pillow. A cologne sample nearby my bed permeated the air and crickets scratched at the stars. The dreams came vividly and strongly and when I woke up to white sunlight this morning, my thoughts became conscience extensions of the dreams. The contrast of how I typically do it, that is, deciding consciously what to think before sleep, hoping that it continues in dream land, occurred to me.  I was glad I had not attempted to control the gift of their coming. These dreams were full, “5 senses” dreams and I could fully remember them in the morning.

Today I’m wondering which of them will come true. Or perhaps what portion of all of them will become reality.  In a few places, I can trace them to memories. In every case they possessed content that in conservative smallness, I’d be tempted to doubt their possibility. But dreams aren’t really about being conservative or small or cautious. Dreams, by their nature, provide a way to envision a life or experience that is outside our realm and tightly drawn lines. They are not a pre-determined coloring book of artwork and that is why I’m glad I made the choice to wait for these. The result is amazement and curiosity and dare I say it?…. hope.

So I thought a little update might be called for…

I did indeed have a weepy, overwhelmed day in which I had little energy to carry my own load. And, after removing the job of “hoping” from the pile, I got several notes from loved ones who carried that job for me for a little while. And along the way….

• some nice stranger on the roadside cut the smoking belt from my van, ending the jet-noise and meaning we got home quite nicely.
• I  FOUND MY CAMERA…oh joy! It was in a bag I never put things in so had forgotten that one time I had, and in hours of music-less driving, remembered. So the car thief didn’t get it after all; just my  music and buds.
• the cats didn’t die. They panted the whole way but we had no Feline Fatalities and they are happily hiding under my dad’s spray booth at the moment. Mama Cat, nursing fine.
• If getting nasty, controlling email was a problem, it has been temporarily alleviated via a server fire that took out email and many sites for  a bit. Inconvenient to be sure but it’s not without it’s silver lining. I needed a spam-free day anyway!
• I made all my appointments and worked in a visit with an old friend besides.

Thank you to my blessings, both seen and unseen. I’m moving “onward” today and I know it’s because of such loving support. I’m thinking one can’t live very deliberately in a bubble.

Today is a bad day. Yesterday was a bad day too but it took a few more hours for the last straw to be drawn. I know it used to be my habit to try to find the “bright side” of bad days, like some kind of Emotional Spin Doctor. Then, it grew into a cynicism tinged with a survival instinct: tuck your head and press on, “it is what it is”.

I think life has room for both. I also think I’m finding some comfort in what Thomas More calls, “Dark Nights of the Soul” in his book of the same title. That is…when one is suffering, it’s okay to not work like a banshee to try to find the good in it. It’s okay to not numb it away. And it’s okay to feel tired and not like fighting on sometimes.

He uses the word, “Incubate”, and when I read it, it was like a warm blanket on a cold day (which, by the way would also be one way to incubate one’s hurting soul). He means to rest. To just feel what it is. To not aggressively wish it away or manipulate it. Take care and nurture yourself instead.

My counselor says something similar. She says, “Well you’ll need to be gentle with yourself right now. Be kind to yourself.”

Physically, of course, life does not always provide an actual niche to crawl into and sleep something off. There is no beach retreat or quiet hours sans responsibility in which to heal. So it’s those times when the emotional space needs to be found, even if the outer self is going about business as much as usual.

It’s why I say out loud now, “this is a bad day”. Honest acknowledgment is necessary for incubation, and ultimately, healing.

Yesterday my car was robbed; the petty thief stole my MP3 player with ear buds, my camera, and strung the contents of my daughter’s purse across the seat. I had to “herd cats”, making me very late leaving town. The same cats got deathly ill, puking and pooping simultaneously in the car (they were in a rabbit cage thank God). We missed our turn off and swung 2 hours out of our way, got stuck in paralyzing traffic. Then, the car AC broke; the smell of burning rubber from some belt stinging our noses. It took $82 dollars to fill my little van tank (oh the criminality of gas prices!!!). There was NO MUSIC the whole way and I was tired. Some nasty man in a truck made a loud comment to me through my window while I ate my burger. And then, my car started sounding like a loud jet.

I got where I was going, even in enough time to meet my goal. I got nasty, controlling email, reminding me that some problems will never go away. Then I got some sleep on a very comfy couch. And then I woke up this morning and looked at my most-beautiful red-headed nephew and sweetly-mischievous niece; oh baby days sweep past so quickly. I don’t know if the car will run well enough to make it to the next stop, the day of appointments waiting for me. The server, which hosts all my business sites in addition to another few thousand, had a transformer fire and is currently down. Life is uncertain.

But that final straw came over coffee, with sun just a little too bright and my eyes just a bit too heavy from sleep: Every time I travel, which is almost weekly and has been for months, I am leaving someone I love. It is one long, seemingly endless, chain of “good byes”, “I love you”, “be safe”. There are no arbitrary places I visit, no places I’m anxious to leave.

In order to meet responsibilities, I have to masochistically work *towards* more “good bye” moments. I have to press on, keep moving, taking care of this and that, going here and there. I have to bide my time and hope some things will still be there in a future that may have more permanence. I have to hope that everyone else on the road is sober, that the trucks have secured their loads, that they are paying attention when the rubber flies off their tires. I have to hope that 215,000 miles can add another 50,000 to it, and confidently at that. And on and on.

Bottom line: I have to hope.

Always Goodbye-ing eats away at the energy to hope. Maybe that’s where an Incubator is called for most: a safe quiet-yet-honest place to lick wounds and have some of that energy renewed, when there have been too many small losses to bear. Today I don’t have any answers or platitudes. Today I just want to rest and let someone else do the hard work of hoping. And on the inside, that’s what I’ll be doing.

I think it’s important to note that this doesn’t mean there is “hopelessness”. I’m not without it; rather, I’m too tired to strive for it at the moment and thankfully, have others around me who I trust. Having security with them makes them a vital part of an incubator because it’s SAFE to not always be strong and happy-clappy.

To have a bad day is normal and it is human. It can exist without martyrdom or depression or despair or accusation. I’m letting it BE, knowing it will pass, knowing it is here for today.