Tag: inspiration

Pass On the Sugar Please

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“The most difficult thing is the decision to act, the rest is merely tenacity.” – Amelia Earhart

When a friend recently complimented on pulling off two birthday parties for my daughter in one weekend (trying to keep numbers low), she said, “I don’t know how you do it.” And I thought to myself “I know how – a whole lot of sugar!”

I have a serious sugar addiction. When my meditation teacher did a really restrictive purge of sugar a few years back, I wondered why in the heck would a person want to do that. Because it’s just sugar. It doesn’t make me irresponsible, impair my ability to operate any machinery, or steal in order to afford it. Right? I was so proud that I’d gotten off the dangerous train of drinking too much wine that I thought there was no way I’d start limiting my sugar.

But I’m 52 years old, have had two c-sections in the last 6 years, my knees and my hips hurt and I want to live longer enough to see my kids have kids – unless they wait as long as I did to have kids and then I have no prayer of that!. And not only do I want to live that long, I want to do it being as active and comfortable as possible. I’m not likely to climb any big mountains soon but I’d like to rock climb, hike, bike and run around with my kids!

So for the past 2 weeks I’ve stopped eating foods with added sugar and also given up Diet Coke. Initially I had a persistent headache that wouldn’t stop until I drank enough water to make it through. But I’ve also slept better, had more consistent energy, and been less achy. I love candy and I feel like Diet Coke is the drink of gods. But when I crash after having either, I’m starting to recognize it’s not worth it.

There’s a little voice inside me that whispers, “You are going to give up something else?” It’s that self-indulgent, whiny presence that wants to frame change as if I am losing something and when I listen to it, I stay stuck. But when I listen to the centered voice that rings of Truth, I find the wisdom that with change comes the gift of freedom.

Now I’m finally understanding why my meditation teacher did the sugar purge. Because if I’m going to sit and listen deeply, I also need to pay attention to the signals my body is sending me. Sometimes I hate awareness but it always gets me somewhere worth going…

Ride the Wave

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“You can’t stop the waves but you can learn to surf.” – Jon Kabat-Zinn

I started meditating this morning and instead of bringing me peace, more and more fears popped up. Fear of my son’s transition to a new classroom and teachers at school. Fear for how the mornings and evenings would go for me as I try to support him through it and get him to eat, sleep and change diapers. Fear of whether his little friend at school was still enrolled. Fear about whether my fellow carpoolers would remember that it was early release for our daughters at school today and pick them up on time.

Sometimes meditation uncovers crap that I’d prefer to leave boxed up.

I sat on my meditation cushion just trying to observe the fears as they popped up. Soon I was just pouring with sweat and sitting in an uncomfortable heap. But after a few minutes, maybe five or maybe ten, I ran out of worries. All of a sudden I realized I could hear my neighbor’s fountain in their back yard and then I opened my eyes and the sun was coming up. Everything, including me, felt sunnier.

Life keeps teaching me not to interrupt the natural cycles. By letting my worries and fears pop themselves up and wear themselves out til I was empty, I naturally filled back up with faith. Leaning into the process and sweating it out, I am learning to ride the wave instead of fighting the current. My younger self fought the current the whole way insisting on keeping the worries on the inside, the sunniness on the outside and being enervated by the battle the whole day long. But I’ve found when I ride the wave, sooner or later, I am delivered back to solid ground where I continue on with the day, surprisingly refreshed.

Love Language

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“At some point, you have to realize that some people can stay in your heart but not your life.” – Sandi Lynn

“I probably won’t see you tomorrow,” my friend Rachel text me, “I’ve got this door project with my dad.” Reading that, I felt a deep ache for my dad because doing projects with him is one of the things I miss most. My family’s love language is projects. I know that’s not exactly one of the five from the love languages book but it’s some combination of acts of service and spending time together combined with getting stuff done!

Our project time was when we got to hang out without great pressure to talk and go to the neighborhood hardware store to get something and chat with all the folks that worked there (I think if my dad hadn’t chosen to be a pastor, he would have loved to be a hardware store guy). I miss the way I always learned some little trick from Dad and most of all the way we’d envision what we were doing together and my dad would throw his arm around me and say, “It’s going to be great, Kid.”

Even though he died unexpectedly in a bike accident, he left me with a list of things we’d always do this time of year. Seal the grout in the tiles we put up along the sides of my driveway, clear the drain field at the base of my driveway, and stain the deck. I do these things and feel my dad with me. We did these things together so many times that I can practically hear his light banter and feel his joie de vie. In fact I went into the hardware store yesterday and Marty, the guy that always consulted with us on projects, was there and I felt this shiver pass through like my dad was right there with me.

Since he’s not here, I do the next best thing and teach my kids the family love language. I’m amazed that the longer he is gone, I don’t miss him less, I just become him more. As we clean the drain field, I can practically hear my dad laughing with my son as he tries to use the cordless drill to get the screws out. I channel his oohing and aahing with my daughter as she pulls out the worms and slugs that having been living in the rich dirt that collected in the drain. He might not be here but this must be the way that love and warmth are passed from generation to generation. We remember the things they love, feel the glow of being together and then pass the spirit on.

It’s going to be great, Kids!

Dare to Dream

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“Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it.” – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

I had three days this past week where both of my kids were at school/daycare. Do you know what I did? Nothing. Well, not nothing exactly.

I allowed myself to believe that we could start to find a regular routine for school and work.

I relaxed that core part of my body that has been holding me upright for 18 months as I’ve been afraid that if I didn’t stand tall my little family would crumble.

I breathed in to the space created by being able to give up the jobs of teacher, school janitor, lunch lady, PE coach, and school social coordinator for a 6-year-old.

I dared to dream that I might have some energy left for me to grow as we return to more normal days.

Like famed psychiatrist and author Dr. Scott Peck answered when asked how he gets so much done – “it’s because I spend two hours a day doing nothing.” I suspect doing nothing looks different for every person – meditating, reading, praying, playing but out of it comes a renewed spirit.

I think of all the hard times I’ve gone through – divorce, grief, sickness, this pandemic and how there’s an inflection point where all of a sudden I realize that I’m through it. Not that I believe that this pandemic is done, especially because my kids are not yet eligible to be vaccinated and not the day-to-day was bad. It’s just that I was holding back a little reserve in order to gut it out.

When I first started mountain climbing, a guide taught me how to pressure breathe. To breathe out so forcefully that all the stale air in the lungs is expelled and it is possible to take a full inhale. The last three days feel like one big pressure breath, an exhale so powerful that I feel invigorated by all the fresh air I was able to breathe in.

And all that extra energy reminded me that it’s been a long time since I believed that I could really dream about what else is possible in my life. That’s what I did for the last 3 days – dreamed big, audacious dreams.

Negotiating Inner Peace

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“The hurrier I go, the behinder I get.” – unknown

Yesterday I was trying to read my meditation books to start the day. In one there was a poignant passage about all the past leading to now and the future proceeding from this here but all we have is the one golden moment of today. In another, it was about pausing to appreciate our accomplishments. And the third was about setting forth into the world with the intent to unify and belong instead of to conquer and thereby treading a gentler path through life.

All I could think was “I don’t have time for this sh!t! I’ve got to get stuff done!” It started this internal dialogue that went like this:

[Practical Me] Really beautifully written messages but sometimes I just don’t have time to consider anything at any depth.

[Philosophical Me] Ha – isn’t that the point? That we could spend all of our todays just getting stuff done and putting off any search for meaning and appreciation for beauty until long after it’s gone?

[Practical Me] Yes, but today I really have so much to do. It’s the first day of school, the first day of the month and I have so much work to get done.

Here’s where I negotiated peace between my selves. Yes, there are sometimes where I don’t have time to consider all the sides, the long-term implications and all the other things that can become in their own ways a buffer between me and the experience of life. Sometimes I just have to act.

But it’s the feeling of being in a rush that can be settled out before jumping in. That there is a tiny space for setting intention to be mindful in my efficiency. A moment to be purposeful, not panicked. A note to myself that yes, today is in fact sacred. I will pause to acknowledge accomplishments. And in doing all I need to do, I will try to unify and not to break any things in my haste.

Motorcycle Man

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“Every time you are tempted to react in the same old way, ask if you want to be a prisoner of the past or a pioneer of the future.” – Deepak Chopra

Let me paint the picture of my usual morning. I awaken early to do yoga, meditate and write. The house is quiet. Both kids are in bed sleeping and if the cat is inside, she’s curled up on the top of her tower resting. I do yoga silently in the family room and then I make a cup of tea and light candles to meditate by. I sit on my meditation bolster and start a breathing practice or two…and then at 6:37am a guy rides by my house on a motorcycle so loud that I can hear it for a block before and a block after.

This has been going on most weekdays for the last eight years. I remember meditating before I had kids with my beloved dog and the motorcycle would often set off a car alarm when it went by. I thought it was funny then – like a “wuhoo, now we are all raring to go!” But these days because it wakes up my toddler, I’m irritated.

I’ve tried accepting the irritation, appreciating it as a teacher, thanking it for drawing me away from my own monkey mind. None of it has made me feel more kindly towards the motorcycle man.

Until I made up this story about a child who grew up in a house that was too quiet. No one talked because if they did, all the feelings that they’d been holding right under the surface would blow apart the family. So they sat and stewed and this little boy dreamed of escaping to anywhere it was loud. When he grew up, he found himself in a marriage quite like his parents and couldn’t break the pattern by daring to speak until she finally did and what she said was “I want a divorce.” Alone, angry and confused he bought a motorcycle so loud that he could yell, scream and cry when he was on it and no one would hear. It was his freedom and even though he still had to work early mornings 5 days a week, he could feel unfettered on his way in. I hope the motorcycle man is growing freer to express himself in ways beyond the motorcycle every day. Now I’m rooting for him as he drives by.

Even though the story is utter BS, it helps me make friends with my experience. As I’m floating down the river of life, I’m trying to learn not to struggle with things I can’t control. Besides, this morning ritual is probably why “motorcycle” is one of my son’s favorite words and he can identify them by sound. Even as I’m working to find peace in to this daily occurrence, someone else in this house loves it showing me yet again, life is a subjective experience.

Creating a Clean Slate

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“The power of imagination makes us infinite.” – John Muir

There is a small room on the top floor of my house that isn’t on the way to anywhere so it’s filled with kids toys: wooden blocks, games, a big dollhouse, barbies. I was helping (that’s code for doing all the work while my kids were present) clean it up the other day and wondering why kids don’t want to play somewhere that’s messy. After all, they aren’t living up to any social mores that tell them they need to be tidy. And when we were interviewed on the local news during the heat wave, my toddler licked ice cream off the table so some portion of the greater Seattle area knows he’s not worried about dirt, dust or germs. It must be something like to be creative they need a clean slate.

That reminds me of my writing process. I meditate and then I write. Meditation declutters my head of to-do lists and chatter. And clears the game board so I am free to make new associations. Most importantly, it erases any sign of “me” so my inner editor is not calling the shots.

Something I read in Shonda Rhimes memoir, The Year of Yes comes back to me as I think about writing. To paraphrase (because at the moment I can’t find my copy of the book which has certainly been disappeared in kid chaos) that her writing process is such that it feels like she has to run 5 miles to just get to the start of writing. And then if she’s interrupted, it’s like she has to run 5 miles back to get back to reality. And to start again, it’s running another 5 miles. I’ve heard other writers describe their process similarly like Brené Brown saying that she has to go deep to write and normal life ceases to be possible.

These descriptions make me think that like with my kids, creativity is sparked when we make some space to begin. There is a Zen saying, “You should sit in meditation for 20 minutes a day unless you are busy. Then you should sit for an hour.” And that makes me laugh, but mostly because it’s true. Just think of what I could create if I could clear my mind…

Low Battery Indicator

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“Worry does not empty tomorrow of its sorrow, it empties today of its strength.” – Corrie ten Boom

The battery in the carbon monoxide detector ran low last night. At 11:21pm actually which is when I opened my eyes and realized that the high-frequency pip-pip-pips I was hearing weren’t actually a part of my dream but something else. Then I was thrust into comical action mode as I, being as quiet as I could, hunted down which safety device was emitting these sounds before it awoke the kids. When I got my hands on the thing I stood by the kitchen sink trying to slip out the battery and sleepily tried to reassure myself that it was just a low battery warning and not an alarm itself. On one hand, I wasn’t sure I even knew what it would sound like if it was trying to alert us but on the other hand, there was nothing on inside the house that I thought could be producing carbon monoxide.

I was pretty sure it was low batteries. But that isn’t a 100% and a lot of worries can slip through that crack between pretty sure and positive. And I’m quite sure I’m not alone with this, but when I’m worried, it’s hard to go to sleep.

Worrying for me is that need for certainty. To be certain that everyone is safe. To know what will happen in that meeting I’m thinking about. To have a response to any criticism that I could imagine might arise. To know the end of the story. Worry is the indicator that my faith is running on low batteries.

As I climbed back into bed, I suddenly felt exhausted by my monkey mind worrying through all the factors prompted by a device that is supposed to keep us safe. The only thing I think of was to count the things I was grateful for instead…

That the kids didn’t wake up

That I have other detectors that were silent

That my heart was beating slower now

That now I had an idea of what to blog about in the morning

That I managed to get a good night’s sleep after all.

Sibling Supportiveness

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“There’s a sun in every person – the you we call companion.” – Rumi

My kids and I were sitting on my bed reading books before bed and my 6-year-old daughter leaned over and kissed my toddler on the head and said, “Love you, Baby.” He said, “No kiss, La-la.” And so I kissed him on the head and he said, “No kiss, Mama.” But he was smiling so we kept kissing him and he kept saying “no kiss” and laughing.

My kids have such a sweet relationship. When they are in the car and my toddler hears a siren or other noise that scares him, he’ll say, “cared”, my daughter will say, “Want to hold my hand?” and he does.

I work hard to make this happen. I sit with them as they work things out and act as interpreter. I also narrate why he mimics her so much because he thinks she’s the coolest thing ever. I do this because I grew up as the younger sibling of someone who hated me. She was four years older than me which is the same age difference as my two kids. When we’ve talked about it as adults she said, “I don’t know why I was so mean to you.”

My opinion is that my sister has always struggled with feeling like she didn’t belong in our family because she was the one “realist” amongst a pack of optimists. I came along and the easy, happy disposition I was born with challenged her fighter, questioning nature and it is her makeup to push back.

Whatever my sister’s reason was, I find it fascinating to think about the dynamic now. Having kids that are the same age difference has been fear-inducing and healing for me. I was terrified that the same pattern would repeat itself. And now I’m starting to trust that there isn’t any scary truth that four years difference makes siblings not like each other.

There isn’t a more influential factor on my parenting style than the wounds of my childhood. I was scared to live with my sister – scared that anything I professed to love she would destroy. If I had long hair, I was scared she’d cut it off at night, if I liked a particular stuffed animal, I was scared she’d take it or destroy it. To be fair, I don’t think she ever did – but she threatened a lot. And I think I’m still scared of admitting I love something in case that means it’s taken away.

My mom was tired of kid squabbles by the time I came along as the third child. She was ready to move on with her own professional and personal development and given how talented and smart she is, that was only natural. But it meant that telling her my fears or about the conflict was not a fruitful path. She’d call it tattling or say we both caused it, no matter what happened. There was no path to resolution for me as a child – no understanding, no naming it and no way out of fear.

So every day I work at building trust between my kids and making sure they are source of comfort, not anxiety for each other. It heals me alongside helping them. It’s another reminder to me that nothing is wasted in this life – every wound can become a source of knowledge and inspiration. I hope that long after I’m gone, when they are scared, they will still talk to each other about it and hold hands.

Fear of the Dark

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“Go into yourself and see how deep the place is from which your life flows.” – Rainier Maria Rilke

I have a clock that projects the time and temperature onto the ceiling of my bedroom so that lying in my bed I can open my eyes and when they finally focus, I can see what time it is without so much as moving a muscle. It’s a pretty silly gadget but I’ve had it for more than 10 years and since it continues to display the time, I can’t very well justify getting a new clock. But it has to be dark enough in the room to see the numbers so I was surprised this morning when I awoke at 5:24am and could see it on the ceiling. The 16-hour days of summer have passed and even though it took me a couple more minutes to adjust to that and get myself out of bed, I loved getting up in the dark, it has an extra layer of quiet.

When I was younger, my sister used to call my “Pollyanna.” Which I think was a compliment but our relationship is fraught so it’s hard to tell for sure. Whether she meant it kindly or not, she definitely was using it according the Meriam-Webster definition “a person characterized by irrepressible optimism and a tendency to find good in everything.” In other words, I’m a little bit sunny – or maybe a lot.

So it’s taken me a long time to appreciate my dark sides. Like how uncomfortable I am when things are edgy and pessimistic. And my inability to foresee that things just might not work out. The era of COVID has been a terrible time to be an optimist – I’ve been wrong on every prediction of when things would go back to “normal.”

Just as I’m enjoying the shorter days, I’m also learning to accept that I can be both light and dark. In fact, sunniness without some down time is exhausting. There’s very little I can do about my optimism which seems to be innate but as I’ve learned to listen to my fears, anxieties and wounds I’ve found a deeper humility by leaning into all of me. As I help my kids name their frustration, disappointment, envy and jealousy, I am finding it easier to name mine. The other day when I was feeling envious of a professional colleague who seemingly has no trouble promoting themselves, something that is very difficult for me, I named it and instantly felt more human.

When I rolled out of bed in the dark this morning, I found it more accepting of my sleepiness and more sacred in the quiet. Somehow, it’s easier to bring all of me, light and dark, to the meditation cushion when the sun hasn’t yet come out. The candles I light every morning glow brighter in the dark and I’m starting to discover that I need to accept both in order to fully see.