Tag: faith

What I Know, Not What I Think

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“The Heart has its reasons, that reason does not know.” – Blaise Pascal

I have a lot of opinions about all that’s going on in the world. Don’t worry – I’m not going to tell you them. I realized the other day that not only do I get a steady dose of news from my media intake, but I also am getting a whole lot of other people’s opinions about it from newsletters, expert commentary, inexpert commentary, memes, and more.

This a-ha made me realize that I needed to take a breath and find ground in what I know instead of just what I think. My dad was a great believer in the wisdom of the heart. The quote for this post was one of his favorites.

So here’s what I know:

No one knows the future, no matter what credentials they have.

People working together can accomplish great things.
Pitting people against each other can lead to temporary gains but comes at a cost.

There are real feelings in the pancake vs. waffle debate.

One suffering soul can hurt a lot of people

Healing is always possible but it takes hard work.
It’s my responsibility to do my work so that I can try not to add suffering to the world.

Believing is a way of life. If something requires me to check what I believe at the door, I should be doing everything I can to resist.

When I feel rushed, oppressed, and worried, the best thing to do is slow down, remember what I know, and find the next right thing to do. The rest is in God’s hands.
Believing that there is Higher Power helps me to work hard in the day and sleep at night.

There are an infinite number of things that can bug me – and the at least the same number that can delight me.
Whether I find one or the other, depends on me.
Developing the discernment between what is irritating and what needs to be fixed is a constant practice.

Love is all there is, to quote the Fab Four.
Being mindful of expansive love changes my experience: love of all the precious people around, the beauty of nature, the delight in the air I breathe, the gift of the day I’m in.
Uncertainty triggers fear and moves me out of love.

Navigating uncertainty takes energy.
Patience takes energy.
So sleeping and eating well can truly change the world.

When choosing between the standard and the ultra, always make the ultimate pancake recipe

The golden rule to treat others the way that I want to be treated works to reminds me to flip my perspective.
But I will never know what anyone else’s experience is like.

Sharing of authentic stories is transformative.
Opinions rarely brings us together. Swapping stories often does.

There is no one else I can be.
Conversely there is no one else others can be.
People change; but not how you want or when you want them to.

Slowing down how I roll helps me find more opportunities to be kind.

Effort brings outcome.
Exercise is worth it.
Setting goals that are bigger than I believe I can accomplish will take me somewhere.
There is nothing I can wear that will replace confidence.
It is possible to live through hard times and learn from them.

My dad once wrote, “The distance between our heart and our head is about 13 inches. When our hearts are right, our heads will follow along by believing.“
And that leads to the last thing I know for this post: A hopeful heart is a powerful thing.

(featured photo is mine)

You can find me on Instagram @wynneleon and LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/wynneleon/

I co-host a storytelling podcast featuring authors and artists with the amazing Vicki Atkinson. To tune in, search for Sharing the Heart of the Matter on Spotify, Apple, Amazon Music or Pocketcasts (and subscribe) or click here. Or the YouTube channel features videos of our interviews. Please subscribe!

My other projects include work as a CEO (Chief Encouragement Officer), speaking about collaboration and AI through the Chicago Writer’s Association, and my book about my journey to find what fueled my dad’s indelible spark and twinkle can be found on Amazon: Finding My Father’s Faith.

Connecting the Dots

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“You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something – your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.” – Steve Jobs

Like the quote for this post, I couldn’t see how all the dots on this story connected until the end. But I know how it started — when I showed up at the school playground Monday afternoon with an envelope full of money.

I’d signed nine-year-old Miss O for Glee Club. Because she’d joined the after school club late, the teacher gave me a pro-rated fee for the activity. She hadn’t included a payment link. So in the spirit of not wanting to make any more work for her, I put $160 in an envelope, sealed it and wrote only the teacher’s name on the front. My plan was to hand it to her when I picked Miss O up after class.

But I had to pick up five-year-old Mr. D at the regular end of the school day. I was talking with other parents when he came over to tell me that two kids weren’t letting a little kid go on the playground. Another parent and I went to investigate. Two boys had a smaller one pinned. As we tried to convince them to let him go, one hit the kid a couple of times and the other kid kicked the smaller kid when he was on the ground. Then they walked away.

We helped the smaller kid get a shoe back on and then as he got up, he started to follow the other boys. I said something to him about letting things cool down but he either didn’t hear, understand, or agree.

I walked back to the other parents. Something caught my eye across the playground. The kids again had the little boy on the ground and were kicking him. Some instinctive thing kicked in and I started running the 100 yards towards where they were yelling, “Stop! Cut it out.”

Let’s be clear – I’m an endurance person, not a running person. If my yelling didn’t scare them, I bet my awkward sprint probably did. One kid let go, the little one got up, and the second kid started chasing him with me running after them both.

Fortunately, the director of the after school program was alerted by my yelling and came over to handle the situation. No doubt that not only he was more qualified but he also had a relationship with the kids. I walked away knowing the situation was in good hands.

But when I got home, I couldn’t find the envelope with the cash. I felt sick about it. However, I rationalized that my adrenaline fueled run across the playground was worth it.

I knew this wasn’t the Glee Club teacher’s problem so I figured out how to Venmo her the money. When I returned to pick up Miss O at the end of the after school class, the teacher said to me, “I got the money.”

Confused, I asked, “The Venmo?” She shook her head and said, “The envelope with the cash.”

A student had found the envelope on the playground and tracked the teacher down to give it to her.

I don’t know how you connect the dots in this story. But for me, it was a God moment. I felt a shiver as I saw in hindsight the hand of something bigger than me drawing the thru line from start to finish.

(featured photo from pexels)

You can find me on Instagram @wynneleon and LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/wynneleon/

I co-host a storytelling podcast featuring authors and artists with the amazing Vicki Atkinson. To tune in, search for Sharing the Heart of the Matter on Spotify, Apple, Amazon Music or Pocketcasts (and subscribe) or click here. Or the YouTube channel features videos of our interviews. Please subscribe!

My other projects include work as a CEO (Chief Encouragement Officer), speaking about creativity and AI through the Chicago Writer’s Association, and my book about my journey to find what fueled my dad’s indelible spark and twinkle can be found on Amazon: Finding My Father’s Faith.

Envisioning The Future Without the Filter of the Past

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“We have more possibilities available in each moment than we realize.” – Thich Nhat Hanh

After almost two years of working for the company that I sold my company to, I’m back in the business of working for myself. I’ve spent two-thirds of my career as a self-employed computer consultant. The inclination to build my business exactly as I did before is so strong – kinda like muscle memory. But that doesn’t honor that all the ways I’ve learned and changed since I did this previously.

So I love the inspiration I find to build outside of the box. Here’s one from Mark Nepo:

“It was a curious thing. Robert had filled the bathtub and put the fish in the tub, so he could clean their tank. After he’d scrubbed the film from the small walls of their make-believe deep, he went to retrieve them.

He was astonished to find that, though they had the entire tub to swim in, they were huddled in a small area the size of their tank. There was nothing containing them, nothing holding them back. Why wouldn’t they dart about freely? What had life in the tank done to their natural ability to swim?”

–The Book of Awakening by Mark Nepo

In addition, my meditation teacher, Deirdre recently gave me some powerful imagery. She said we need to envision the future without the filter of our past.

I’ve spent enough years hiking and climbing to know the wisdom of why we continue on the same path we’ve always used. It helps keep us from getting lost and if we have to backtrack, we know the way.

But for almost every trail system I’ve been on, there are certain intersections where you can easily traverse to another path. Because some paths don’t go to the place we are trying to reach.

I’m trying to keep that in mind as I navigate my next steps. I feel so lucky that I am at an intersection point that has made doing something different not only possible but also preferable. It’s like the Universe has left some bread crumbs to a different route. I just need to follow them. It’s easier to type than it is to do.

For anyone navigating a similar intersection, consider this as an encouragement to envision the future without the filter of the past. As Thich Nhat Hanh says, “We have more possibilities available in each moment than we realize.“

(featured photo is my daughter, Miss O, when she was almost two years old confidently finding her path)

A Fond Farewell

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“Let us live so that when we come to die even the undertaker will be sorry.” – Mark Twain

I’ve become entranced with a word lately: inkling.

Inkling according to Merriam-Webster is a slight knowledge or vague notion. It comes from Middle English yngkiling meaning “whisper or mention.”

When I think of the inklings I’ve gotten, they relate to the niggling feeling that something is off. I’ve had inklings about big events like when my business partner told me of my ex-husband’s infidelities and right before I was laid off. Kinda like a surprise party when everyone stops talking to you in advance.

And I get inklings about little things like when one of my kids is about to catch a cold. Something isn’t quite right about how they react or eat food and it sets off the radar.

For me, inklings are closely related to the internal God whispers, those insistent notions that seem Divinely inspired. On a recent morning when I meditated, I had the urgent sense that I needed to reach out to our dear blogging friend, Julia Preston.

Later that day, I discovered that she’d passed away the night before at the age of 85. She hadn’t blogged much after her cancer diagnosis but she’s been present in emails and comments in the last few months.

After I published one of my favorite posts about the words I become entranced with, My Love Affair with Words, Julia jokingly asked what word I associated with her. I had no hesitation before responding “luminescent.” Julia glowed with love and light for all. She faced her diagnosis with that same delightful curiosity about what comes next.

Her last blog post hinted about the light and love we all can (and should) tap into. Julia left us with the question in When We Gonna: “When are we gonna turn the world around with the power of our thoughts? When are we gonna create light instead of dark and love instead of fear?“

Julia was laid to rest yesterday. For anyone who has an inkling to do something in her honor, her favorite causes were St. Jude’s Children’s Research Hospital and the ASPCA.

RIP, dear Julia. Your light and love remains!

For more about Julia’s profound impact, please see Vicki Atkinson‘s beautiful reminiscence in Collective Gratitude: The Feast Before the Feast

And Julia’s most recent book is available on Amazon: Voices: Who’s In Charge of the Committee in My Head?

(featured photo from Pexels)

Showing Up and Telling Stories

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“I do not understand the mystery of grace — only that it meets us where we are and does not leave us where it found us.” – Anne Lamott

One of the books I read in my morning meditation time is Listening to Your Life by author and pastor Frederick Buechner. My mom and I were talking about it a little while back. She mentioned that some find his writing to not be doctrinal enough. Funny because I read him and find at times that I think he’s too doctrinal.  

When I was trying to understand how my view of faith differed from that of my dad (and mom) as I was writing my book Finding My Father’s Faith, I read Dr. M. Scott Peck’s book Further Along the Road Less Traveled. In it he describes four stages of faith.

The first stage, chaotic/antisocial, he reserves for people with anti-social tendencies; his second stage is formal/institutional in which faith is governed by an outside body, typically the church.

Dr. Peck calls stage three people “skeptic/individual.” Often stage three people are children of stage two people who have been raised with the values of the church but fall away from the formality and governance of it.

He then describes these stage-three people as usually scientific, truth-seeking people who often begin to see patterns in the big picture that tie them back to the beliefs of their parents and when they do, they transition to stage four, mystical/communal, “people who have seen a kind of cohesion beneath the surface of things.”

Those stages rang true to me and I found comfort in the classification of it all. Regardless of the theory behind it, I suspect that whatever our ideologies are, it’s a narrow band trying to find others who are align exactly or even fairly closely.

But I think we transcend that when we tell our stories. For me, authentic storytelling skips the doctrinal distinctions in the head and goes right to the heart. Here’s one that recently struck me, Buechner tells the story of a friend showing up when Buechner’s daughter was sick. He’d come from 800 miles away without any advance notice and then spent a couple of nights hanging out.

Buechner said they didn’t do anything particularly religious – went for walks, smoked some pipes, took a drive. “I believe that for a little time we both of us touched the hem of Christ’s garment, were both of us, for a little time anyway, healed.”

For me, it hits me right in what I believe is sacred: showing up, being present, holding space for one another to tell our stories.

Life: Perfect and Precious

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“Our life experiences will have resonances within our innermost being, so that we will feel the rapture of being alive.” – Joseph Campbell

Two weeks ago, on the same day that my niece had a baby, I got laid off from my job. I know that seems like two disparate events. But hear me out because they are the both the birth of new things.

It’s not hard to see the first. My beautiful niece says that she’s having a hard time sleeping when the baby is sleeping because she can’t stop looking at him. “He’s just so perfect.” And she’s enthralled with interpreting his every expression and sound.

I’ve seen the pictures – he indeed is absolutely perfect and precious.

Losing my job was a shock. I’ve never been laid off before and so it was a completely new experience. But twinned with the surprise was a feeling of elation. I was free. I try not to act giddy when I talk to the others affected by this layoff. But honestly, and I promise that this isn’t toxic positivity or denial, for me I knew this was a really good thing, even when it signals hard work.

I’ve been an entrepreneur for most of my career so I suspect that helps take an edge off the fear. And when I peal back that cover, I have a chance at seeing underneath to the opportunity. Similar to babies, I have to work hard to decipher the signs and signals of the bread crumbs where life leads me.

Life comes with pain – kinda like childbirth. And on the flip side, it too is perfect and precious to have the opportunity to keep growing.

P.S. Everyone that I’ve seen in real life has been able to take one look at me and sense the burden lifted from me. If you are worried about me, truly, I’m fine, the kids know and it’s all good. One of the things I’m so grateful for this week of American Thanksgiving is the gift of time with them.

(featured photo from Pexels)

It’ll Be Alright In the End

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“Everything will be alright in the end, and if it is not alright, it is not the end.” – The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel

Months ago, when I signed Mr. D up for his very first summer camp (rock climbing, in case it matters), I assumed that it would start at the same time as Miss O’s. For his age group 3-5, the camp ends at noon. Miss O’s older group goes until 3pm. But certainly they’d start all the groups at 9am, right?

When I took a closer look before the camp started this week, I discovered Mr. D’s doesn’t start until 9:30am. When I realized that detail, I started inwardly groaning about the inconvenience.

But just briefly. Because in the last dozen years, I adopted a shift that has made an immense difference to my happiness. I started assuming that “it” is for the best. That whatever is irritating me is just an opportunity opening that I can’t yet see. Or that I may never totally understand because it’s above my pay grade.

This has a Biblical basis (Romans 8:28), and a Buddhist basis, but I don’t think it requires a particular spiritual tradition. It’s just an act of staying open to the possibility that there’s a perspective that I can’t yet see.

For anyone that is thinking this sounds Pollyana-ish, I get it. But this change came from the darkest days of my life when I was stuck in all the feelings of failure after my divorce and clueless about what I was going to do next.

So many things came from that vulnerable time in the dark: my meditation practice and faith, the conversations with my father, my two beautiful children, my writing. And also this idea that I should stop doubling-down on irritation and instead stay present for whatever is unfolding.

It’s easier to do this for things like camp drop-offs. In this case, the payoff came almost instantly. Of course, it was beneficial to have Mr. D’s camp start a half hour later. He got to see his sister get dropped off, and then have some time warming up on his own.

 It gets harder when the kids are sick and I have to cancel my hair appointment. Or the babysitter cancels and I can’t go out with my friends.

So, I practice with the small irritations – believing that it’ll be alright in the end. And if it’s not alright, it’s not the end.

A Piece of Advice

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“I always pass on good advice. It is the only thing to do with it. It is never of any use to oneself.” – Oscar Wilde

This was originally published on 5/18/2022. Heads up – you may have already read this.

“Enjoy this time, it goes so fast” is the single most repeated piece of parenting advice that I’ve heard since having kids. Since I chose to become a single mom at an older age than my friends, having my kids at age 46 and 50, I hear it both from my peers and the older generations which makes it bear even more weight for me.

My kids are now 2-years-old and 6-years-old – there are a lot of parenting years I have not yet covered. But in the phase of parenting I’m now in, there are very many life skills my kids haven’t mastered both in terms of basic care and feeding and also regulating the emotional ups and downs of life. It’s a very physical job that takes a lot of patience. But while I’m needed often for kissing boo-boos, the beauty of this phase is that my kids’ problems are small and my kiss can fix almost anything that happens to them.

Breaking the advice down and applying it to where I’m at: “Enjoy this time.”

Enjoy this time which means enjoy this phase that’s a lot of work and is full of ups and downs. Enjoy this time which means celebrating it even when my shoulders are heavy with the responsibility and worry for this family. Enjoy this time which means treasuring every drop of this intimate closeness even when it’s full of sticky, raw emotion both positive and negative. Enjoy this time which means cherishing the weeks when it’s completely impossible to complete my personal tasks and create a stable experience for my kids when they are sick, the world is sick, or even when I’m sick.

And then “it goes so fast.”

It goes so fast implies that if I look away for a second, it will change to something else. It goes so fast means that time is ticking even when it’s not fun. It goes so fast tells me that if I’m dreaming of a moment in which I can have a routine that isn’t so urgently tied to others’ needs, I will miss something unfolding in the life of today.

And back together, “Enjoy this time, it goes so fast.”

Enjoy this time, it goes so fast tells me to savor what I have. Enjoy this time, it goes so fast implies a richness to the mess of a life I have now. Enjoy this time, it goes so fast means that this is the heart of life experience beating right now.

Now that I break it down “enjoy this time, it goes so fast” doesn’t seem specific at all to parenting. Perhaps we all need this reminder to touch this moment we are in.

(featured photo is mine of me and my kids, at age 2 and 6)

Hurry Scurry Worry

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“Enough is abundance to the wise.” – Euripides

Of the things I think about, time and love have to be the top two topics. Sometimes they are separate thoughts, but often time they are combined in the same thought. Struggling with how to love and appreciate the moment, and the dear ones I’m with, when I’m often in a hurry.

It doesn’t help that June comes with six birthdays of family, including Cooper the dog, and dear friends, including mine in mid-June. That’s always a reminder of time with a “capital T.”

On a recent Sunday morning, I was deep in the vortex of hurry worry. This year, my mom signed Miss O up for a youth choir in a neighborhood church.  Miss O has a lovely voice and it was a fantastic activity for her. My mom managed all the transportation, and even took Mr. D along for some of the practices. All good.

But on the Sundays the choir performed, it was a struggle to both watch Miss O sing and keep Mr. D entertained throughout the service. So, on the particular Sunday morning in question, I came up with the idea that Mr. D and I would walk to the church to expend a little of the morning energy while Miss O went ahead with my mom.

Mr. D and I left with enough time to walk the eight blocks, but not extra. As we were walking, I was feeling the time pressure to get there. Enough so that it prompted me to remember the meditation practice I’ve been working on to not hurry. I said a prayer.

When I told my mom about this later, she asked, “What did you pray for? That Mr. D wouldn’t find anything interesting along the way?”

“No,” I answered. “I prayed that we’d have enough time. Then I enjoyed the walk without looking at the time and it all worked out.”

It’s funny. We can either pray/hope/wish/focus on everything to go right. Or pray/hope/wish/focus on being okay with how things work out. The latter has worked better for me.

For another way to stretch capital T time please listen to our Sharing the Heart of the Matter podcast: Episode 69: All You Have to Do Is Ask with Wynne and Vicki

Vicki Atkinson and I are big believers in the power of story – to connect us, to create intergenerational healing, and to make meaning out of the events of our lives. Each episode of our podcast will start with someone telling a story in each episode.

To listen to the podcast, Search (and subscribe!) for Sharing the Heart of the Matter on Apple, Amazon, Spotify or Pocket Casts. Or subscribe to our YouTube channel to see a video clip of each story: @SharingtheHeartoftheMatter.

The Glass is Refillable

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“Only the closed mind is certain.” – Dean Spanley

This was previously published on 9/28/2022. Heads up – you may have already read this.

I was traveling last week, something I haven’t done without my kids in 7 years. I’d perfectly engineered the school drop-off and transfer to the nanny, filled the fridge with food, done all the laundry, and even unloaded the dishwasher. I thought I had everything well in-hand.

But then I got to the airport and all my planning fell like a stack of cards. My flight was delayed. My transportation to the hotel when I arrived at the destination changed so I needed a last minute rental car. I took a wrong turn and had to back up in a strange car on a dark road. I didn’t know how to navigate New Jersey turnpike tolls and was guessing. I got to the hotel so late that they were no longer serving food so I ended up eating the cup-of-soup noodles you get by pouring hot water over and they are only marginally less chewy than styrofoam. Then as I gave up and just tried to sleep, I could hear a very faint security beep if I lay on my left side so I had to only lie on my right. Anytime I forgot and turned over, I woke up.

I was tired, pissy, disappointed and completely spent.

More than that – I was surprised. My congenital optimism as described in  Rose-Colored Glasses had predicted none of this. When a couple of days later I talked this over with my friend who is a self-proclaimed pessimist, I asked if optimists and pessimists suffer the same amount: optimists from disappointment and pessimists from catastrophizing.

My friend asked something like, “Why can’t you set your expectations differently?” Well, I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t get that right either. I could imagine how things would go wrong but I doubt I’d be any closer to reality.

“People who wonder if the glass is half empty or full miss the point. The glass is refillable.”

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Refillable – yes! But first I have to empty it of all the bubbly stuff I put in there to begin with. What works for me is to get up every morning and meditate to make friends with uncertainty. That practice of mindfulness helps me to embrace that I have no idea how things are going to unfold, no matter how much I’ve planned…or maybe even more poignantly, how much I’ve dreamed.

Whether we come at it from a perspective that everything is going to be great or that nothing is going to work, the truth remains that we don’t know. Even the people that I’ve met who identify as realists don’t know how something will unfold. Being optimists, pessimists or realists might set the tone of how we feel about the day before us but the mystery of life remains that we can’t predict how life will turn before us.

This brings to me something I heard Franciscan Priest Father Richard Rohr say about certitude.

“The thing called certitude is a product of the enlightenment, and it did so many good things for us, science and medicine but it made us feel that we have a right to something that we really don’t. Our ancient ancestors grew up without expecting that. So they were much more easily able to hold on to mystery in general, God in particular. Whereas we worship workability, predictability, answers – we like answers.

We think we have a right to certitude.”

Father Richard Rohr

With the help of meditation, I come back to knowing that I don’t know and then I feel more able to improvise. When I touch uncertainty, I let go of my plans. When I empty my head and hands of the vision of me being in charge, I more readily accept the mystery unfolding before me.

The glass is refillable. Indeed it is. I concede that it might be my optimism that gets me up and ready to practice refilling it. But whatever it is, I have to work at it every day, meditating in order to make friends with uncertainty in a practice to embrace the mystery again and again.

Meditating on uncertainty on my recent trip helped me enjoy the experience: it wasn’t as I had expected but it had lots of twists and turns that fed me in significant way. That interpretation might sound optimistic but it’s much deeper than that – its meaningful. And isn’t that part of what we ultimately want from life?

(featured photo from Pexels)