Archives for category: pain

Birdsong and Smiles

February 17, 2014 //

No pictures today. I wish I could photograph the sounds of the song birds outside my window happily aware of being safe from the cat (mostly because of the rain), and enjoying the morning. Perhaps they are commenting, too, on the shitty service around here? I need to refill the feeders today. The rain falls. I sip my coffee, catch up on my email, eye my plan for the day and the gray rainy skies.

On a morning like this, the tragedies in the news reflected in the dismay of FB friends seem farther away from the moment I am in, right here, right now; this is a precious moment of chill and calm and peace. Something more than a quiet morning, or an extra day off. I’ve no reason to celebrate the existence of presidents, really, so… I celebrate the morning.

A good night’s sleep matters so much. Starting my day with what has become a stabilizing routine of meditation-yoga-meditation, generally followed by coffee, and email or a few minutes of writing, feels very natural and unforced. The day that follows a morning like this may not always be without challenges, or without stress, but whatever challenges and stress I do find myself facing are more easily managed. It’s lovely and feels rather grown up. Progress. Growth. Change. It actually does ‘work’ to change ones practices to support desired experiences. When life sucks and experiences all feel pretty bleak, undesirable, challenging, stressful, frustrating, disappointing, and lacking in fulfillment or satisfaction, it can be incredibly hard to believe that our choices and practices have so much to say about it. I’m convinced.

So…back to the birdsong, back to the morning. I hope you find every reason to enjoy the day, to grab your moment and make the most of it, and to practice what feels good to you and builds a good foundation for the future you desire. I’m sure going to! 🙂 Today I will change the world.

Tags birdsong, gardening in the rain, meditation, mindfulness matters, nothing like a good night's sleep, practice makes perfect - what are you perfecting?, ptsd, TBI, the happiness trap

Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Logic & Reason, Love, Menopause, Metaphors, Mindfulness, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, women, Words

Life Needs a Caution Sign

January 30, 2014 //

Or two, or three, or hell – let’s just pave it into something comfortable, predictable, and mapped, settle into easy contentment, and call it a day?

I had a great day at work, yesterday. Sometimes I have the strange sensation that ‘work life balance’ may actually mean that when things at work suck, things at home are lovely, and of course…the inverse of that would then be true as well. That, thankfully, is fanciful bitterness with struggle, and with the simple ups and downs of life. We’re each having our own experience. The experiences we have are not all uniformly pleasant, or comfortable. I guess I’ll keep practicing the practices that seem to build a life that is more up than down, more content than not, easier than hard, more pleasant than unpleasant, and see where all that goes.

This morning isn’t my best morning. I woke crying from dreams that contained content ripped from the most difficult moments of the prior evening. It was nearly an hour before my brain would even acknowledge that the evening had ended on a relatively positive note – or at least finished somewhat supportively. My heart feels heavy, and tears are queued up waiting for a reason to spill over. This is one of my least favorite emotional states.

The bottom-line is that I want more than I have in life, in love, emotionally, sexually, even financially (although that one is very low on my list, and exists more to bolster the likelihood of other things I value being attainable). I think wanting is probably pretty commonplace. It takes wanting to reach a sense of being without, after all. I even understand the connection between craving and discontent, and how difficult life can become when we desire only those things that are out of reach, or when we lose sight of the wonders we already have in our life. I started 2014 knowing that ‘sufficiency’ is a big deal for me, and that ‘contentment’ is an emotional experience I enjoy, and a quality I would like to develop and support. What I don’t know is where the subtle distinction between genuine contentment and ‘settling’ for something is, and how to recognize it. Is there a difference?

I struggle to communicate with the people nearest to me. Setting boundaries, sharing needs, speaking calmly and explicitly about what I want, what supports my needs over time, being honest about how I feel in the moment, or in general, these are all very difficult for me to begin with. Doing them well is something I find myself working so hard at, and still not succeeding with any reliability. At least, if I am succeeding, the outcome is incredibly unpleasant much of the time. This morning I woke wishing I could just stop talking at all. No more words. No speaking. No writing. No.More.Words. I seem to have a gift for saying too much, or phrasing something in the worst possible way. I rarely feel actually understood, or even heard. (It makes it so much ‘worse’ that there was a time and a relationship in which I did feel understood and heard, making it something possible in life that I just don’t have now.)

This morning I have a lingering feeling that the things that matter most to me are simply things I can’t have, or will experience only very rarely. I want very much for that to just be okay, if it is true. If it isn’t true, I’d like that emotional cocktail to just go away. I would like to have a better understanding of ‘sufficiency’. Enough. What is ‘enough’. How to I get that? I have the nagging suspicion that even intimacy is easier/better when approached mindfully… but I’m not sure I ‘get’ how to approach it at all. I suspect I may not have correctly labeled whatever the hell I think the experience of intimacy feels like, and am chasing an unknown experience, or ‘shooting at the wrong target’.

I am grouchy and things suck this morning. I am very human, and even though my intellect politely reminds me that ‘this is a construct of your own thinking and you can choose differently’ and my recently-more-mindful-and-learning-more-all-the-time heart tells me ‘this too shall pass’, I’m hurting now, and it is hard to stop picking at it. Soon I’ll head to work, and the process of getting there will distract me for a time, and maybe it will be forgotten when I head home tonight?

Right now is right now. Right now I feel like giving up. I’m frustrated, hormonal, and cross. I spent the night with my fears and nightmares and woke feeling sad, tired, and crying. Right now is harder than it has to be, and right now I’m struggling. This too – quite inevitably – shall pass. Time runs out, moves on, and brings change. So. Yeah. (I hear myself laugh out loud, it sounds a little worn down and bitter, and I think about how lovely yesterday was – that passed, didn’t it? Yep. So…this will as well.)

Some lovely pictures from yesterday…

We can build serenity.

No matter how much I am hurting in the moment, there is more to life and the world than my pain.

Things can seem so complicated and overwhelming…

Getting right up close doesn’t always simplify our view of things.

I am grateful that my experience this morning is largely subjective and a construct of my brain. I can find my way to something different. Compassion first, then, this morning? I pause with a certain surprise to realize that as I typed those words, my internal critic was hurling invective at me, launching emotional weaponry, and rallying my demons… I’m not always fully aware of the nasty bits and pieces of old hurts and old programming ‘going live’ to defend themselves in the background. Grim. Definitely compassion first…well… sort of first. Okay, not even a little bit first – that would have been a more positive start. Still human. I tested me. lol

Compassion, then, this morning – now that I see how much I need it.

Today, I am human. Today I face my hurts with self-compassion, and my certainty that emotional states rely on choices, too, however inevitable or permanent they feel in the moment. Today I change the world.

Tags ACT, emotional weaponry, how do I reach you?, how long do I have to meditate to fix that?, love and lovers, mindfulness matters, ps I love you, ptsd, taking care of me, TBI, who holds the buddha's heart?, you know it ain't easy

Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, Free Will, grief, Love, Menopause, Mindfulness, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, Sleepless Nights, women, Words

3:00 a.m.

January 7, 2014 //

Yesterday was a weird and difficult day that followed on the heels of a strangely drawn out night. Drama. Grief. Stress. Turmoil. Doubt. Anger. Pain. Hurt. Insecurity. Sorrow. Words. Moments.

Somewhere near, in the distance. 3:00 a.m.

Sometime minutes after 3:00 a.m. I found myself walking (again), just trying to breathe. I’m nursing an injured knee; I didn’t care, or feel it. My arthritis is giving me major grief; I didn’t notice or attend to it. Life, in general, is quite good; I could not feel it or connect with what feels good in my experience. My PTSD was in the driver’s seat. I had been pwnd by the chaos and damage within. I walked until past 4:00 a.m. I was up at 1:00 am, and I never slept again that night, until after dawn’s terse reminder that the day had begun in earnest, and even then the short disturbed hours of sleep I snatched from the day were dark and troubled and hardly worth the bother – certainly not ‘restful’.

I saw it coming early the evening before. That’s pretty new, but falling short of useful. I ‘fired a warning shot’ by verbally alerting my loved ones that I was at risk, but my effort was insufficient to halt the emotional freight train. In the moment, everyone having their own experience, each fully invested in their own needs-of-the-moment, my warning was both disregarded, and just not important to anyone but me. It was one of those “I hear you, but” moments. (Note to the reader, my own perspective built on experience, is that when someone I am in an emotional dialogue with says “I hear you, but…” they are not only not actively listening, they did not actually hear what they said they just heard, because the entirety of their focus is on what they are about to say.)

My OPD (Other People’s Drama) flared up ahead of my PTSD. A wiser woman would have shaken her head in dismay, given hugs all around, perhaps said something wise about self-restraint, open dialogue, compassion, disappointment, and regrets – then walked the fuck away! I am not yet that wiser woman. I failed to take care of myself by making an attempt to ‘be in the moment’ to ‘be supportive’ to people who matter to me. It was a choice that resulted, for me, in a loss of emotional balance, the exhaustion of my own emotional reserves, disruption of good sleep practices, terrible nightmares, a lot of time spent soaking in powerful emotions like despair, sorrow, anger, resentment, fear… (and much, much more! Call now!)

When my symptoms did finally flare up beyond what I could manage through force of will, I was in familiar, bleak, territory. I walked. A lot. I cried. A lot. I shook quietly trying to force myself to go through the motions of simple conversations. I made notes on pieces of paper to remind myself to attend to simple tasks like brushing my hair, my teeth, showering…(I wrote the same reminders on my calendar, on my gadgets, devices, apps…but as is often the case, I avoided handling delicate devices (and power tools!) because my unsteady hands, and uncertain temperament, can be unexpectedly disabling.) Habits built over a life time to cope with the emotional wreckage. I went through the motions of every day things. Meals. Chores. Taking down holiday decor. I got through the day. Day became evening, and evening became night. I forced the shadow of myself through the motions of a mostly ordinary day hoping to avoid having the experience linger into the next and dropped into an exhausted surrendered sleep at a pretty routine time. It doesn’t always work, but I find myself more hopeful more often these days, open to successes, and less likely to count on failures.

Yesterday. Not pretty. Shall we move right along, then?

Here it is today. I woke at 6:00 a.m. drenched in sweat, but just hormones, not nightmares, and I felt rested and calm. When I realized I was awake, anxiety began to surge with memories of yesterday. Then I remembered; that was yesterday. Today is an entirely new experience. The feeling of relief that washed over me was motivation to rise and do my morning yoga sequence, and the stiffness and pain in my back eased as I moved through the poses. Each breath brought me closer to a real smile. The anxiety receded. The new day begins.

I spent unmeasured time meditating after my yoga, before my coffee, and on the tail end of that I took a moment to focus my awareness on my loves, each as individuals, the beings they are rather than who I would like them to be. I took a moment to appreciate their best qualities, to feel fondness and gratitude for the joys we share, to feel compassion for their struggles with their own unique challenges as beings, as well as those challenges we share as humans and as lovers, a few moments to breath, to love, to recognize and be whole and well with myself as an individual being on my own terms.

Will today ‘be different’? How can it not? It’s a different day. Still, there are choices to be made – and some of them are mine, even when the struggle of the moment isn’t. Understanding there are choices to be made is a good step. Making better choices in the moment is an entirely other challenge of its own and one I expect to work on as a lifelong endeavor.

So…here it is a new day, and I’m starting it with a good night’s sleep behind me, a great coffee on the side table, a smile, and a few choice words. A nice start. I hope to make good choices today, that meet my needs over time. Today, I will spend the day building. Today, I will change the world.

Tags 3:00 a.m., can't buy me love, love or money?, mindful loving, money changes everything, OPD, ptsd, TBI, what time is love?, what's your Big 5?, who are you?, you know it ain't easy

Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, Free Will, grief, Healthy Living, Love, Menopause, Mindfulness, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, Sleepless Nights, winter, Words

Road Signs and Highlight Reels

December 29, 2013 //

I woke early this morning, filled with a sense of purpose, and slightly concerned I might have ‘overslept’. It was 6:00 am. I didn’t feel rushed, but I also didn’t want to, so I remained committed to the purposeful moment, and moved through my morning routine contentedly. It was the start of an excellent Monday… only… today is Sunday.

I’m still contented; early mornings don’t distress me. I slept well after a couple difficult nights, and a day of illness, and feeling both well-rested and ‘well’, it is a lovely morning thus far.

I took time to meditate, and my yoga practice felt relaxed and deep, and I was patient with myself. I enjoyed the satisfaction of doing a couple new asanas with fluidity and grace, having practiced them enough now to be able to do them without refreshing my memory immediately before doing them. One of my partners had been pointing out how much bad posture was also causing elevated stress (through physical discomfort) and I added a couple of asanas to my yoga sequence specifically to help improve my posture, overall. It’s been helping. I also got my eyes checked – because by far the most common scenario for my bad posture is ‘hunched over the computer/my laptop’. I did indeed need new glasses. Just knowing my eyesight is a factor in my posture, and thus my pain and stress levels, I adjusted my settings on my laptop so that everything is a tad bigger and easier to read. 5 years ago, having to take such an action would have peeved me for days, and caused me to feel very blue over ‘aging’. This year, it was really a pretty matter-of-fact thing, without stress. Why wouldn’t I take advantage of the user preference settings in my own computer to suit my current needs? Anything else would be…ridiculous. I’m eager to have my new glasses, too.

Somewhen during this morning’s meditation, thoughts of road signs [on life’s journey] and highlight reels [of life’s important moments] drifted through my consciousness. I observed them, as words and ideas, and let them drift on by. They lingered in the background, wanting to be considered later, and here I am considering them.

It would be pretty convenient if life did have ‘road signs’, wouldn’t it? “Abrupt Change Ahead” for life’s unexpected challenges, perhaps, or “Caution: Slow Self ” for those groggy mornings? We try so hard to benefit from the wisdom of others, and with such limited success, sometimes. Is that a lack of trust? Is it a lack of understanding that the experiences of others may be truly relevant to our own? Is it a misplaced sense of our uniqueness to the detriment of our similarities? Is it a lack of will competing with the possibility that even those acts or qualities that do not serve us well, may serve us somehow? I find myself wondering if I can somehow imagine those ‘missing road signs’ as I experience my now – by inserting a gentle “Yield” sign in those moments of stress before escalation, or a bold “Stop” sign in that breath before saying just the wrong thing? If I could, would I mind them or disregard them? That got me wondering… am I a ‘good citizen’ in my own experience? I suspect that last one could easily amount to an entire day’s thinking…

Highlight Reels are something totally different, but still somehow potentially instructive and cautionary. I often explore a montage of relevant memories when I tackle life’s curriculum. New lessons often prove to be significantly less ‘new’ than I experience them to be initially, and there is value in considering prior opportunities to have applied the lesson facing me, as well as considering what future opportunities there may be. There is also value in contemplating past successes – with precisely what I am learning, and things that are quite different in some way.

When do those ‘road signs’ become paralyzing anxiety? When do ‘highlight reels’ become self-deprecatory or punishing rumination full of futility and despair? If the most useful question is not ‘when?’… what is it?

Not even a thousand words, and no pictures, and I notice the morning wearing on gently. It’s 8:00 am, and although it is a Sunday, I hear a partner making coffee in the kitchen. This morning’s words are more words in a recreational way than words with any urgently serious intention. Casual words. Reflective words. Neither road signs nor highlights – just words. I will set them aside, and return to the immediate and beautiful ‘now’. 🙂

Today I am compassionate. Today I am content. Today I am changing the world. Sundays are good days for change.

Tags be the change, buddhist boot camp, change is coming, highlight reels, living in the moment, MBSR, mindfulness for beginners, New Year's Day, One Hour, ptsd, Road Signs, TBI, the happiness trap, thinking it over, Time and timing

Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Logic & Reason, Menopause, Metaphors, Mindfulness, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, winter, women, Words

On the Solstice

December 23, 2013 //

I took a long walk on the Winter Solstice again this year. Most years I have, it definitely counts as a ‘ritual’. This year I took a camera – and I think it is the first year I have taken pictures along my Solstice journey.

Last year’s Solstice walk was spent fretting aimless and sorrowfully, mostly about my brain injury – an event something like 30 years in the past, but last year it was new information for me. I was also deeply, and profoundly struck by the heinous gang rape in Delhi just days before – an event so powerfully traumatizing that the whole world paused to take notice, and rape became an everyday topic of conversation for a lot of people. My post-traumatic stress symptoms had flared up, and my sense of self, and all the bits and pieces that are ‘who I am’ started to unravel. It was a painful and very lonely time in my life; even surrounded by people who love me, I felt isolated and alone. For me, on that Solstice, it was simply an uncomfortable walk ruminating fretfully and unproductively. I did not write in my journal. I hadn’t started my blog. I was silent; words had failed me.

This year’s Solstice walk was very different. I eagerly ventured forth, feeling hopeful, content, and satisfied to take my time with my journey. I brought my camera, a smile, and a serene heart. I went to a favorite small forest near where I live. I grinned happily at a little girl in the parking lot who noticed me removing my shoes. I take my walk bare footed (or for as much of the journey as I can, weather and fitness permitting), it’s been my practice as long as I can recall, and has a certain sacred feeling to it, for me.

I walked about 5 miles. 5 miles of soft winter sunlight. 5 miles of sodden mossy paths dripping small sparkling gems of recent rainfall from leaf tips and branches. 5 miles of birdsong and frogs peeping. 5 miles of oak, maple, and pine. 5 miles of fern and lichen. 5 miles of squirrels playfully managing their affairs. 5 miles of sweet-scented breezes, and the regular beat of my own footsteps. I walked 5 miles and managed a handful of pictures, a couple of hours of quiet observation, and a few minutes of meditation wrapped in forest. I’d share all of it, if I could. As it is, I can really only share the pictures, and some handful of words that don’t really do the experience justice.

I enter the forest, shortly before noon.

The path as metaphor was a common theme.

Beautiful details, up close.

So much dripping moss.

Ferns nestled between tree trunks.

Gazing skyward.

A miniature world.

‘The distance’ is trees. I consider the living depth of field.

A lot of lichen, visible in all directions.

Several sorts of lichen in this forest.

A soggy path lit by soft winter light.

Sun filtering through the trees.

Near to noon, and at the edge of the forest.

The noon solstice sun.

5 miles is a lot of path…

…more to see around every bend…

There are ferns.

So many ferns.

A mossy tree hung with pine needles.

A little festive…

More paths to walk.

Some paths are darker.

Small wonders.

…And more ferns.

More paths, and I keep walking.

The hustle and noise of humans being is silent here.

Crossing a creek.

There are, of course, more ferns.

The sun breaks through the trees, reminding me time is passing.

A spider’s hammock.

Up close, sparkling rain drops like jewels.

Reflected sky, and a metaphor for reflection.

My companion while I meditate.

The end of the journey.

By 2 pm the sun was already beginning to drop lower in the sky. I finished my walk with a smile, and a few deep breaths, and returned home to love and holiday spirit, home and hearth, and mindful service. 😀

Tags A winter's walk, ACT, following the sun, MBSR, mindfulness matters, ptsd, reflections, TBI, walking my own path, Winter Solstice

Categories Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships

Birdsong and Smiles

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Life Needs a Caution Sign

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3:00 a.m.

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Road Signs and Highlight Reels

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On the Solstice

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