Practice Grace

Stolen from the lovely Hannah

I'll write more about this later but for now, I don't want to lose these beautiful words.

Looking over my List of things to do before I go and I feel like I should amend it.  Just this week alone, I have been published in a magazine & met Beth Orton.  Both of these items have been on Mondo Beyondo lists before.  This weekend after watching Florence & the Machine, I decided that I want to find a reason to twirl on stage.  Someone recommended belly dancing.  That doesn't scare me as much as it used to.

The power of words

Earlier this week I told my husband that if he ever wanted me to put our son to bed at night so that he could play his Star Wars online game, then he could just ask me.  He told me that he didn't like to ask me for things because he didn't want to hear the comments that came with that request.  I sat there dumbfounded and told him that it sounded like he thought I was a selfish bitch.  He just sat there ignoring me.  So I said, "really?  You think I'm a selfish bitch?"  *crickets* Once again I asked "Really?  You think I'm a selfish bitch?"  He looks at me and asks me what I want him to say.  I tell him that I want him to say "No, you are not a selfish bitch" but his silence speaks more than his words ever could.  Wow!  I was called selfish by my husband and I'm not quite sure how I feel about that.
The next day a co-worker from Latin America told me that I needed to be nicer to him.  I told him that I was normally being sarcastic but that I would be nothing but a pleasure from now on.  So twice in one week I am reminded that words hurt.
Two days later a friend calls me to tell me that she was at the bank when a sweet old lady was in front of her in line and was trying to cash her social security check and get cash back.  The teller would not let her get cash back because her account was overdrawn.  My friend gave her $40 because she knew that was what I would do if I had been in the same position.  This is the same friend that I gave $50 to when I won $100 back near Christmas.  I told her that she just paid everything forward & it felt beautiful.
Watching TV last night I was crying because Grey's Anatomy was so sweet.  Then I watched the video below and cried some more.

The power of words indeed.  My husband walks downstairs and looks at me.  "Are you crying?"  He always laughs at me when he catches me being sappy.  I reply "Yes I'm crying.  I saw something beautiful.  I'm a selfish bitch and a hopeless romantic.  You get both."  He just shook his head, smiled, and went into our room.
I spent a lot of this week pissed because I was told this.  Now I know that it's true and as much as it sucks, I asked to operate my life from a place of joy this year and I'm not doing it.  I asked to learn to be nicer to my husband and I suppose this is the golden opportunity.  I don't like it and it is very uncomfortable but my husband never says anything.  Granted he also said nothing this time but his saying nothing spoke volumes.

The Guest House

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This being human is a guest house.

Every morning a new arrival.

A joy, a depression, a meanness,

some momentary awareness comes

as an unexpected visitor.

Welcome and entertain them all!

Even if they are a crowd of sorrows,

who violently sweep your house

empty of its furniture,

still, treat each guest honorably.

He may be clearing you out

for some new delight.

The dark thought, the shame, the malice.

meet them at the door laughing .

and invite them in.

Be grateful for whoever comes.

because each has been sent

as a guide from beyond.

~ Rumi ~

From Essential Rumi

by Coleman Barks

What have I learned lately

Taking a cue from Ms. Superhero herself, what have I learned lately?

1) According to my 5 year old, you should never trust a talking monkey
2) Glitter, sequins, and sparkle thrill me & that's ok
3) Yoga is one of the best things that has ever happened to me.  I don't know why I stopped doing it for so long.
4) Choosing joy is always better than being right
5) Grace is an important part of life
6) Peanut Butter & Co's Bee's Knees is unbelievably good on an Oreo
7) It's ok to have guilty pleasures
8) I love blowing the mind of my kid.  Baking soda+vinegar=amazing volcano to a 5 year old
9) I made gravy for the first time this week.  How is that even possible and why was I so scared?
10) I do not like to clean my bedroom.  Why is this?

Happiness is a form of courage

Wow!  That is so true.  It does take great courage to choose to be happy.  To choose again and again to not get swept away with negativity when things don't go as planned.  It takes great courage to give up control and go with the flow.  It takes great courage to choose joy & love.

It is so much easier to yell when I am angry.  It is so much easier to give my husband the silent treatment.  It is so much easier to be passive aggressive than to recognize out loud that I am being passive aggressive.  It is so much easier to listen to gossip than it is to stop it.

This year I decided to live with joy.  I am choosing every day to roll around in it and celebrate it.  I am doing things that make me happy, no matter how ridiculous.  I own shoes covered in sequins and glitter now.  They make me smile every time I see them and I see other people smile too.  I am choosing to be more joyful in my body.  I am doing
yoga regularly & making sure I get a massage once in a while.  I am complimenting people more, smiling more often, speaking less, listening more, and generally trying my best to not let things rub me the wrong way.


All of this said to show that to choose joy, to choose happiness over and over again is hard work.  It's hard to not let other people affect me.  It's hard to walk away from the unsolicited advice, to bite my tongue, and to keep quiet.  This week I sent out envelope after envelope of stickers that said "You are beautiful".  I never put my name on the envelope.  I just sent them out with the return address of "the Universe" and see what happens.  My friends have had lots of fun putting the stickers up around town and I've had fun stalking them on facebook to see what they did with them.  Things that like that make choosing joy & happiness the only way for me to live.

Creating Space

Recently I accidentally texted someone which led to a big conversation.  This man was the man that I chose to give up my virginity.  I was, what I believed, in love with him.  I was 16.  What did I know?  What I have realized over the years was that I was not in love with him so much as I was in love with the idea of him.  I wanted someone to love me as much as I loved them.  It wouldn't have mattered who it was.  However, I really wanted it to be him because I felt a connection to him.  I always have. 

We met at church camp when I was 13 and we spent a week hanging out.  Nothing serious.  About 2 years later I show up at drum camp and he was there.  I almost jumped out of my skin.  I then spent the next 3 years obsessed with dating him.  When that didn't work out, I slept with him.  When that still didn't make him love me, I did everything in my power to make him never have love.  I was miserable.  I drove past his house constantly and I would call and hang up on him.  This was way before the time of caller id or the internet.

So I'm texting him throughout the day because I had started this conversation and it finally came up that I liked him in high school.  When he asked my why I never made a move, I reminded him who he was talking to.  He said he knew who it was and I reminded him that I had the hugest crush on him and told him the things that I used to do.  He had absolutely no idea.  He didn't remember any of this.  I mean, he remembered the good stuff but had no idea of what I considered to be bad.  I have lived with this shame and regret for 20 years.  I was so ashamed of my obsession.  I was so ashamed of the way I allowed him to have power over me.  Turns out he was completely unaware of any of this.  Totally unaware.  I am still sitting with this and the tremendous release I feel. 

Tonight I read When you let go of something big, something that has held a place of power over you, it creates space.

What in the world am I getting ready to create?

Tat Tvam Asi in action

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Think of someone you admire. Realize that who you see them to be is largely your own projection. What you appreciate about them is within you. If it wasn’t, you wouldn’t be able to see it in them. Next time you actively appreciate a quality in someone else, don’t forget…

Acknowledge it in yourself too.

I am totally digging this website.
They give me something to ponder every day.

Giving is Receiving-reminder

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It’s an immutable law: what you give, you receive. It’s not an exact exchange and may not always even be apparent. It’s more of an energetic law. When you love, others love you. When you find the value in others, they can’t help but value you. When you’re judgmental, you’ll feel judged. Moral?

Only give what you want to receive.

Gratitude 24/7

Love and wishes

I have a friend that wants to be a mom.  She has had this ache for as long as I can remember.    She deserves to be a mom.  She is one of those women that you want to be your mom.  She's the woman that you
want to be your child's godparent because if anything did happen to you, you know that she would step in and take over exactly where you left off.
She has had this hole in her soul that is almost full.  She has been chosen by another beautiful woman to be the mother of her unborn son.  This mother has no idea what her sacrifice is doing to my friend.  She has no idea how beautiful she is making my friend.  This is the role my friend was born to play.  We were talking last night and my friend was telling me how she has been writing out her life story since September.  She lost her mother soon after we graduated high school and she wanted to make sure that the child that is chosen for her will know everything she ever wanted him to know.  I think what she was doing was making space for this child to come into her life.  There
was a lot of work she needed to do.  A lot of thoughts that needed to be thought out and brought to light.  There were a lot of things that needed to be let go.  She needed to create the space to manifest her intention.  It's hard for
me to imagine but my friend was actually creating a space for more love.  She is already so full of love and compassion, but as I well know, your capacity for love increases three fold when you become a mother.
My point of all this is that I need to have a very difficult conversation that I do not want to have.  I have held a grudge for 9 months now and I need to let it go.  It has festered and grown.  In fact, I'd have to say that it has become easier at this point to be angry than be truthful.  I know the time has come to have this conversation so that I can continue down the path of joy that I have started to create for myself.  It's time for me to create more space.  I know something illuminating is headed my way and I need to create the space for it.  I can feel the shift headed my way.
I read Hannah's blog this morning.  I swear this girl is always a step ahead of me.  I totally enjoy walking along behind her.

The moment we blew the puffs off the dandelion and told the Universe

our giddy dream something was planted, more than just the seeds to

grow new dandelion blooms.

The beauty is that we don’t have to wait for the angst to shift us

around. We can create it now, tomorrow, in the next 5 minutes. Wishing

on a star is not the shift. It is the wish.

Just like my friend above, I have put my wish out there and the universe has answered loud and clear.  I know exactly where I am headed and it is scary.  It's scary in a good way though.  I feel excited and creative.  I feel beautiful and strong.  I feel things that have been dormant in me so long, I forgot they were there.  I sing again.  I laugh more easily but I need to have a conversation with another one of my best friends because I do not know if she wants to be part of this new me.  I am moving into a life of joy.  I am choosing joy, love, and gratitude more often than not.  Acting and
reacting from a place of joy is becoming my way.  It is a slow process, but the release I am feeling is incredible.  I am attracting bigger & brighter souls into my life.  I am being supported by loving people and I am feeling very nurtured.
I want her to be a part of this shift but I have to figure out what that means.  She knows me better than anyone and sometimes that can be challenging because she knows how to guilt me.  She knows how to destroy me.  She knows how to life me up.  She knows how to bring me down.  I need to have this conversation so that I can create my own
space to allow in what needs to come.

Things I enjoy most in life

1)  Giant laughter
2)  Yoga
3)  walks outside
4)  Long, intense conversations that make me pause
5)  Dancing
6)  One hour at the gym
7)  One on one time with those I love

Ten good things

1) Working on this
2) My sales at work this month have been incredible
3) Plans for vacation
4) 30 things to stop doing to yourself
5) My son loves to walk hand in hand with me.  I savor this for all it's worth right now.
6) Lancome juicy tubes
7) Mini-missions that I will be tackling next
8) Learning to let fear be less seductive
9) Motivation
10) joy joy joy joy joy

Community

Seriously I am so happy that I found Amanda. No she doesn't know me and no I don't know her but her writing came along at a time that I have needed it.
Tonight I read "When we are open to sharing, helping & encouraging one another – we are helping the whole community thus helping the world." 
and it got me to thinking...
I decided towards the end of last year that I wanted to be love.  I want to stop wishing for who I could be and start being that person.  I want to be the person that you hang out with and leave feeling better than when you arrived.  I want to open my home to those that need it.  I want be open about who I am.  I want to help others be open about who they are. I want to encourage people to meet their potential.  I want to beat fear. I want to stop allowing it to be so seductive.  
I want to find women that support me and lift me up.  It's been hard learning to trust others, especially women.  I always felt like women had an ulterior motive for befriending me.  I'm over that now.  I have learned that if we love and support one another then we can do amazing things.  I try to text or email my girls every once in a while just to remind them that I love them.  
I am so proud of the community I am currently building.

gifts

I have noticed this week that I haven't been looking for gifts as easily as I once was.  I've been offered a chance that really scares me.  It is a tremendous opportunity and I know I'm going to leap and do it.  It's the fear of stepping out of my comfort zone and living with that for the past few days that has left me concentrating only on the opportunity.

Today I make the intention to let that fear go.  I know this gift, THE gift, is exactly what I've wanted and will be one of the best things I've ever done.

I also need to sit with my inability to accept a compliment.  I'm horrible at this as well as having my photograph taken.  I don't understand why this is hard for me to welcome and embrace.

How have you been wild?

1) Almost died after the birth of my child but fought and stayed alive
2) Danced naked around bonfires
3) Traveled all around Scotland on my own
4) My first flight ever was to England.  I flew alone. I landed alone and I stayed in Europe for over 3 months
5) Got married
6) Slept on the beach
7) Met David Byrne and actually talked to him *faint*
8) High fived almost every member of the Polyphonic Spree while whilrling like a dervish around them.
9) Partied way too much when I was younger
10) I have traveled all over Latin America
11) I snorkeled in Belize even when I was freaking out b/c I thought I would drown.  I recognized that I was having a panic attack, decided that I could not let my child see me like that, kicked a few sea turtles, and then allowed the guide to take me around.  It was one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen.
12) I'm a fabulous curvy yogini and not afraid of showing it
13) I did a motherf*@$ing headstand a few weeks ago!

Intuition

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I've always had the power to know when someone is in trouble or needs help.  They come into my mind and I think about them obsessively.  Every time I do this it is because someone is hurting.  It may be that they've had a fender bender, they are depressed, they are sick, they have someone close to them that is sick, or I am getting ready to hear from them.

I didn't notice I had this ability until I was just out of college and I obsessively thought about my friend Nicki.  I called her b/c something kept telling me that I needed to.  She had been in a car accident that morning.  When I obsessively thought about another friend of mine, he had also been in a car accident.  I thought about my friend Leah last year only to be contacted by the Discovery Channel a few days later because she was going to be featured on their Investigations show.  I actually thought the email was a joke at first and almost didn't respond.  This weekend I emailed a friend of mine only to find that she is going through a tough time with her daughter just having surgery and her mom having surgery this week.  What a horribly tough time.

 

I've often wondered why I have the ability to do this and what I'm supposed to do with it.  I've often had friends joke for me to please not think about them because I have never been wrong in this thinking.  I wonder if this is part of my healing ability.  I'm putting it out there that I would like to understand why I have this gift.

Yoga

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Yoga is not about the pose.

It’s not the alignment of

toes or hips or shoulders.

It’s not about the form.

Yoga is an invitation to

explore, not a command

performance. It speaks

the language of the soul.

In the flow of breath and

motion, yoga coaxes us

from the confines of the

known, across the silent

threshold into vastness.

Yoga is the union of prayer

And movement, guided from

inside. It is healing and the

joy of saying yes to life.

Breathe, relax and feel the

body receive its own truth.

The seed of freedom flowers

within each of us whenever

we are open to what’s real.

By Danna Faulds

Poems from the Heart of Yoga

Go In and In

Ten good things

1) Days spent in pajamas and only getting dressed to take a yoga class
2) Meals simmered in the oven for hours warming the house and smelling delightful
3) Learning that lighting up my face is one of the best things I can do.
4) 50 ways to show gratitude.  That gives me one project a week, right?
5) Doors opening and the opportunity to follow my bliss
6) My son comes home almost every day with a new song that he has learned
7) Planning a hike this weekend to get outside
8) Discovering the BEST word of the year in JOY!
9) Finishing my 100+ list.  It took almost 2 years, but I did it!
10) 90 minute massages that keep rocking my world several days later

Ray of Light

Thanks to gratitudetwentyfourseven, I have something to think about today.

 

There’s a pure spark of light in everyone, even if you can’t see it. If you want a better relationship with someone, imagine talking to that part. They will respond to you according to how you see them.
See the light.

 

This relates to the Tat Tvam Asi mantra that I can't stop thinking about.  How am I like that which I am judging?  What is it that I see in the other person that causes me to judge them?  How am I like this beautiful person sitting right in front of me?  I can recognize in them something that I must work on in myself.  If I find myself judging someone because they constantly whine & complain and yet do nothing to change their life, what am I doing to change mine?  If I find myself judging someone because they have gone to bed with someone new again, what am I not honoring of in my own life?  If I judge someone because they don't value themselves, what am I devaluing in my own self?  When I see someone with a behavior that I consider out of control and crazy, what am I doing in my own life that is the same?  Have I eaten well or have I eaten easy food that makes me feel like shit?  Am I listening to my body's need to move?  Am I living my own desire?  How am I like that which I am judging?

I know that there is always something to see about myself in my judgements.  I am learning to embrace the duality of me.  I am learning that the bad opens the window to more good.  I can acknowledge the darkness and by shining a ray of light on it, I am able to heal it & dare I say transcend it? 

 

On the flip side of this, we see the light & beauty in someone else because we see our own beauty.  I did a meditation recently where I stared deeply into another woman's eyes for 2 mintues.  Now this doesn't seem like a long time but 120 seconds of staring with pure intent into another's eyes is intense.  I was paired off with someone that I felt a real personal connection to and at first my little monkey mind was bouncing around.  I was petrified that she would see that my eyebrows were a little wacky that day.  Would she notice that my eyes tend to cross if I stare at one place for too long?  Would she notice that I could use a good waxing?  Then I thought that she was probably thinking the same things I was.  She was probably just as insecure as I was and in that moment I felt something open up & release in me.  I came to the point that the longer I stared at her, and the more comfortable I became with really looking at her, the more I noticed her beauty.  She became almost radiant to me.

 

I am going through a tremendous change right now.  I can feel things shifting and evolving.  I can feel my life grabbing onto what it wants and I'm trying to get out of my own way.  Tat Tvam Asi is going to be a huge part of this.  It's there to help me remember my empathy and to let go of judgement.  I took a yoga class once where the instructor asked an elderly woman if he could touch her and help her to get set up for the practice.  She gleefully said yes and that she had been widowed for years and the thing she missed most was being touched.  That vibrated within me and pushed me further down my path to seeing that we are all one.  A simple gesture changed 2 people's lives that day.  I am that I am.  Tat Tvam Asi.  I SEE YOU.

Mantras

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Sat Nam  "I am"

I am joy unfolding

Tat Tvam Asi  "Thou art that"

That which you see in others is b/c it resides in you

Gifts I've been receiving

I've given myself an entire day of catching up on my DVR.  I have stayed in my pajamas all day and I will be going to yoga in just a moment.

Yesterday I had a pajama day with my son, did a yoga opening for the new year, cooked dinner for my hubby, son, and brother.  I love it when they go back for seconds and tell me how good it was.

I am setting the intention now to pay more attention to being kind to my husband.

Setting my intention to receive

Two or more words that represent the essence of my desire:

Joy and patience

Joy in my life.  Joy in my relationships.  Joy at work.

Patience with my family.  Patience with myself.  Patience at work.

I will recognize joy by being anything that makes me smile.  Something as simple as a balloon all the way to a gut grabbing laugh.

Patience will be recognized by the moment I want to begin an outburst but I take a breath instead.  NOT a passive aggressive breath, but a pause to let go of what is bothering me and to change my feelings.

I will notice the small things to open myself to the grander things

100+ Things I'd Like to Do Before I Go

I've been working on this list since early 2010 and it's about time that I finish it.

1) ride in a hot air balloon
2) learn to play the ukelele
3) skydive
4) travel to Greece
5) learn to play the harmonica
6) Do a headstand (Dec 5, 2011)
7) Take a jewelry making class
8) Make a personalized mixed tape for each of my closest friends
9) Host a themed dinner party in an outrageous location
10) See the Grand Canyon
11) Go to Disney
12) Watch the sun rise on the east coast and set on the west coast on the same day
13) Visit the Nile
14) Travel to the Dead Sea
15) Perform some sort of spoken word on stage
16) Take a cruise with a group of fun, creative women
17) get a pixie cut
18) Hang out with the Amish for a weekend
19) get rid of cable
20) become a yoga instructor
21) learn to hula hoop
22) Visit Machu Picchu
23) Visit Paris
24) Take K to New Orleans
25) Make something I would hang in my house
26) Learn to shuffle cards in a fancy manner
27) Speak Spanish fluently
28) Learn to play backgammon
29) jump rope like I did when I was a kid
30) Be completely debt free!!!
31) Visit the baths in Iceland
32) Have a Holi colored powder fight
33) Find a church or place of worship that resonates with my core values
34) Make a difficult dessert
35) Go to 100 wacky American roadside attractions (like oversized chair, large radio flyer wagon, dinosaur where Pee Wee sat, etc)
36) Visit Kate's Lazy Meadow Hotel
37) Own a house with a front porch
38) Meet Tom Robbins
39) Hike in Patagonia
40) Have a conversation with David Sedaris
41) Go backstage at a Tom Petty concert
42) Make my own set of post cards
43) Ride a horse
44) See the Aurora Borealis
45) Spend 2 weeks in Tuscany
46) Spend a month at Plum Village (if not longer)
47) Carnivale in Brazil with a local
48) Learn to cook Arroz con Pollo like a Costa Rican
49) Drink whiskey in Scotland with my son (when he is much, much older)
50) Be featured in a magazine or on TV b/c of my weight loss
51) Roll down a sand dune at Jockey's Ridge like I used to when I was a kid
52) Learn to play guitar
53) Paint something and give it away
54) take a knitting class
55) Go horseback riding in another country
56) Take a solo trip to a quiet cabin in the middle of nowhere
57) Learn how to use a camera that is more interesting than a point and shoot
58) Go on a second honeymoon with the hubby
59) Relearn and own a piano
60) Take a class with the little one
61) Save an emergency fund that equals 6 months of our salary
62) Hang out with R for a really long, lazy weekend
63) Learn to love with my whole heart
64) Eat a dinner that the little one has prepared
65) get another tattoo
66) Visit at least 50 different waterfalls
     1) Orchid Falls, Belize (plus other waterfalls in Cayo, Belize)
     2) Sliding Rock, NC
     3) Looking Glass Falls, NC
67) Stand on a balcony on Bourbon St in New Orleans during Mardi Gras and throw out beads
68) Kiss the Blarney Stone
69) Go to New York with the hubby
70) Teach a self-help class like my yoga instructor did
71) learn to drive a motorcycle
72) Own and use a bicycle
73) Find something active that I enjoy doing
74) Complete a 5K
75) Complete a 1/2 marathon
76) Complete a marathon
77) Go white water rafting
78) See the Red Rocks
79) Go To Mesa Verde, Colorado
80) Read all of Kurt Vonnegut's books (he's dead and still publishing them)
81) Start 5 holiday traditions
     1) put up the tree the first weekend in December
     2)
     3)
     4)
     5)
82) Own a completely fun car like an El Camino, Jeep Wrangler, or Mini Cooper
83) Learn how to surf
84) Learn to belly dance
85) walk across hot coals
86) Take the family to Galapagos
87) Photograph Nova Scotia, Canada
88) Own a vintage dining table
89) Buy furniture for my bedroom
90) See the pyramids in Egypt

91) Swim with bioluminescent plankton in Puerto Rico

92) Have a family portrait taken
93) Get my palm read
94) Try accupuncture
95) See a musical on Broadway
96) See the cherry blossoms in DC
97) Donate my hair to Locks of Love or similar charity
98) Volunteer with the little one
99) Lose 100 lbs
100) Have a life changing conversation with a stranger
101) Drink an expensive bottle of wine by myself
102) Visit Graceland
103) Participate in a Tough Mudder
104) Visit Lake Como in Italy
105) Learn to spin fire
106) Go with the hubby to Vegas