Archives for category: Summer
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Level Up!

July 6, 2014 //
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This morning I woke slowly, a second time, having returned to sleep upon waking much early during the wee hours. I woke feeling pretty good, and pretty balanced. I still do, which is nice;  not everyone in my immediate vicinity is similarly fortunate. We are each having our own experience. Interestingly, so far this morning I am feeling content to enjoy mine without struggling in the face of experiences other people are not enjoying so much. It goes further, this morning; I have a certain flippant desire to say “That’s all you’ve got, Universe? You hit like a bitch.”

I experience the small emotional triumph alongside my immediate irritation with myself that I still use idioms that make light of the experiences of women, cast us in a bad light, frame us up as weak, ineffective, powerless, unskilled or unworthy.  It’s not okay.  I am struggling with language, with my emotional dictionary, with the assumptions I make, with hurtful old programming, and with ancient biases still lurking in the shadows that I have yet to address. This is a very human experience.

It’s been an emotionally complicated weekend. Unmet needs outnumber needs that are met. Moments of discord and pain have been far more frequent that moments of great contentment or joy. Small successes often haven’t been the successes I most desired – or needed.  Small failures have felt larger than life.  I’ve been in great emotional pain much of the time since my last therapy appointment. Mindfulness doesn’t mute that, in fact I seem to feel my feelings far more acutely but with far greater self-compassion and a willingness to accept that emotions are simply that: emotions. They have no greater weight or import than I grant them. I am learning to make peace with my emotional experience, and to be more comfortable with my feelings, and less willing to compromise the integrity of my experience. I am learning to make room in my own heart to be who I am. As I said, it’s a very human experience.

Today is a good day to be open to what the moment may offer.

Today is a good day to be open to what the moment may offer.

Today I’ll keep to myself, and savor the small delights a sunny Sunday has to offer. It’s enough.

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Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, Healthy Living, Love, Menopause, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, Summer, The Big 5, women

The Ups, The Downs, the Friendships

July 3, 2014 //
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I have some amazing friends. I spent time with one of them last night, after an incredibly difficult and emotional therapy appointment. We didn’t talk about therapy. We didn’t talk about ‘my issues’. We got caught up on ‘things in general’ and shared some laughs, some compassion, and some connected time. It was exactly what I needed. Awareness. Support. Affection. Openness.

Things in therapy are headed for deeper waters these days. This is the first time therapy has ever held real promise of reaching emotional wellness… I try not to get my hopes up, and simply be present, and continue to practice what is working now.

Strange stuff in the news; a lot of articles seem more ‘emotional‘ than I recall news tending to be. It’s probably ‘just me’; like anyone else, I read the news in the context of my own experience, and of late it has been an emotional experience. I’m not running from that. I am learning to value my emotional experience, make room for it, and allow it to speak to me. I am choosing to spend less time with people who are not in a place where they can also respect my emotional experience. They have their own path, I’ll let them walk it without interference from me; we are each having our own experience.

Each having our own experience, walking our own path, and making our own choices.

Each having our own experience, walking our own path, and making our own choices.

Much of the afternoon yesterday I felt raw, exposed, vulnerable, and on the edge of panic. I don’t waste any time during my one-hour session with my therapist, we dive into the rough stuff straight away, these days. I walk away feeling certain the effort – and progress – are worth the money. It’s still hard to be near ‘my fellow man’ for hours afterward, and the idle chatter of people who don’t share my experiences grates on my raw nerves. It’s okay; hanging out with a friend is a salve for raw nerves, every time.

Some metaphor about blooming in shadows, or perspective, or... hey, it's a flower. Flowers are lovely.

Some metaphor about blooming in shadows, or perspective, or… hey, it’s a flower. Flowers are lovely.

The world isn’t seeming a very nice place lately, and it’s not for any lack of loveliness; there are flowers and birdsong aplenty, children’s laughter is still commonplace, and there’s no shortage of sunny summer days. People can be so mean to each other, though, so cruel, so callous. ‘Political rhetoric’ is sometimes so vicious, so lacking in compassion, that it  hardly seems that anyone is still aware that the outcome of the things being discussed effect people. Real people. Human beings. Has everyone forgotten? It’s not actually ‘about’ ideology – none of it. It’s all about people, and most everything we do and choose ultimately is.

Please be kind to people. Crazy people, sad people, angry people, frustrated people, people whose ideas are not your own, people who are famous, people who have been overlooked; it costs nothing to be kind, and it can change the world. Please be kind to women people, men people, children people. Please just be kind – there isn’t room on this planet for even one more jerk.  Please be kind to people you just don’t understand, and to people you understand only to well, and dislike completely; kindness can change hearts, and open minds.  Please be kind to yourself, too; you won’t find yourself being any kinder to others than you are capable of being for yourself. Please be kind to sick people, and to people struggling to be well on limited resources. Please be kind to people who are suffering, even when you are suffering, too. Please just take a moment to be kinder than you knew you could, and to understand that each time you do, you prepare yourself for a better world by helping to create it. I’ll do it, too.

Today is a good day to choose kindness. Today is a good day to reach out to a far away friend. Today is a good day to look ahead to better days, and make the choices that create them. Today is a good day to change the world.

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Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, grief, Love, Menopause, Metaphors, Mindfulness, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Rape, Summer, The Big 5, women, Words

The Spectre of Discontent

July 2, 2014 //
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Yesterday was blazing hot (for where I live) and the heat of summer blasted the face of the streets and buildings with ferocious and unrelenting boldness. It got to a high of 97 degrees (F) or so.  I still did my midday walk, although I made doubly sure I was well hydrated. I still walked the pieces of my commute that required travel in the hotter part of the day. Why not? I used to live in Fresno. Yesterday it was something like 105 degrees (F) in Fresno. lol. I will happily take on the 97 versus the 105.

Hello, Sunshine!

Hello, Sunshine!

Perspective matters.

The evening felt very short. There wasn’t much shared time to connect over the day’s details. I started, but didn’t finish, a favorite movie; I had trouble being really engaged. I feel pre-occupied. I feel… discontent. It could be hormones. It could be the state of the world. There are a lot of details of life that can result in a feeling of discontent.  It’s a very human experience.

As it turns out, I require very little to feel contented. A state of calm and contentment is pretty natural for me, given a calm environment and pleasant circumstances. Life isn’t always so orderly. Desires and expectations can definitely undermine a feeling of contentment.  Things simply ‘going wrong’.  Frustration, although it is an emotion all its own, can sure share the stage with discontent, in my own experience; I rarely feel contented when I am also frustrated.  Feeling unheard can result in a profound feeling of discontent. Actually… discontent seems a rather gentle warning siren in my emotional life that something is amiss. When I listen, and attend to the feelings, and take care of me it is sometimes a simple matter to get my experience back to some pleasantly contented state of being.  Ignoring discontent is like a promise to seriously derail my emotional balance at some later time.

I am putting a lot of study and practice into being more emotionally intelligent.  It matters, quite possible more so than intellect, education, or so many other cognitive characteristics. Our emotional intelligence is what we bring along for the fun when we interact with other people.  For much of my adulthood I have been severely deficient in the area of emotional intelligence…and I learned late that a quick wit, a decent education, professional drive, competence…none of that means shit if I am also callous, mean, terse, and insensitive; people will not want to connect with me, or be able to do so easily, and the experience of rejection is unpleasant, to say the least.  I didn’t figure it all out at once – not sure I’ve ‘figured it out’ anyway. I didn’t approach the issue wanting to improve my emotional intelligence. When I headed down this path, I didn’t even know ’emotional intelligence’ is a thing. Still working on it, still studying, and still asking more questions than I am seeking out ‘answers’.

This morning I am making room for feelings of discontent. It’s a very personal experience, not directed outward; a conversation of sorts, with myself.  When meditating on gratitude and loving kindness don’t ease a developing feeling of discontent, these days, I embrace the feeling as simply being part of my experience of the moment, make room in my heart to be compassionate toward myself… and start asking questions. I don’t set the bar high on answers. I have found answers are often not really necessary as much as awareness and tender acceptance of my needs and desires. I am learning to treat myself well, and truly honor my own experience. It’s pretty wow sometimes, particularly in moments of discontent.

I still feel discontented. It could be as simple as the house filling with disorderly looking stacks of boxes; a variety of household projects ongoing require rooms to be emptied, the contents boxed up for safety.  A partner’s recent shipment of household items passed on from a deceased family member add to the clutter. My hiking gear, art supplies, books… I have too much stuff, or too little space. Discontent, for me, often feels like I’ve lost my sense of ‘sufficiency’ or order, on some point or another.  I find myself wondering about the value of scaling down from a king size bed to a twin; panic sets in with a vicious attack by my brain – challenging the status quo with novel thinking, or challenging some point on which I have become complacent, can be really hard on me, but it’s also very good for me in terms of flexible thinking and being adaptable. I give myself a mental wink and a smile, “Look at you go, Brain! Very creative!” I manage not to become invested in the suspiciously convenient narrative offered.

Flowers; not just pretty, also a favorite metaphor for blossoming in our own time.

Flowers; not just pretty, also a favorite metaphor for blossoming in our own time.

More meditation. Yoga. Another espresso. A few minutes in the garden at dawn. Discontent can sneak attack with little provocation; I find it important to be wary, watchful, and compassionate with myself. It’s a very human thing to become caught up in emotions. Dealing with emotions is not my area of greatest strength. I keep studying. Practicing meditation. Making more room to feel my feelings, accept my experience, and show myself some consideration. (The Big 5 again: Consideration)

I still feel discontented. At some point, I will accept some opportunity to make a change that may change my emotional experience for the better. Choices matter. Perspective, too, matters. Today is a therapy day. Maybe there is hidden wisdom to be revealed? Maybe not. Maybe just more practice, but it helps to talk through the challenges.

Blue skies on a summer day, even in the face of the emotion of the moment.

Blue skies on a summer day, even in the face of the emotion of the moment.

Today is a good day to practice. Today is a good day to show myself compassion. Today is a good day to acknowledge what works, what feels good, and what satisfies. Today is a good day to say ‘thank you’. Today is a good day to change the world.

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Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, Hormone Hell, Menopause, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Summer, The Big 5, Words

Having Brunch

June 28, 2014 //
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I don’t know what it is about brunch. Maybe that the menu is sometimes delightfully unexpected? Possibly it has more to do with the profoundly leisure characteristic of ‘brunch’. No one has ‘a quick brunch on the way to work’. Having brunch is about taking time, slowing down, and stepping away from the routine sorts of meals of the work week. I rarely see signs advertising weekday brunches; brunch is for days off. I like leisure. Brunch is also not a solo meal. I may have a mid-morning or noontime meal composed of foods that are both ‘breakfast’ and ‘lunch’ – but if I am doing so alone, I don’t call it brunch. (I call it scrounging for something to eat, most likely. lol)  Brunch is probably my favorite meal if I had to choose one…or perhaps tea…or ‘tiffin‘, but that last is simply because I enjoy how it feels to say the word. lol

Many years ago, a work colleague (who would prove to be a most loyal friend of many years) left our shared employment. My reaction surprised me at the time; I felt insecure about losing touch with him. Deeply so. I didn’t really ‘get it’, and the medications I was on at the time weren’t helping me with that. I did what made sense at the time. I invited him out to brunch the following Sunday. For a long time – years? – we continued to ‘do brunch’, now and then even ‘breakfast’ (generally earlier, on the way to somewhere), regularly and frequently. We tried out brunch spots all over the area. I look back on those experiences as being some of the best times of those years. Loyal friends are rare enough, add that to a routine of a leisurely and excellent brunch and I find that any time I recall it, that experience is an experience I want to repeat.

I was just on the edge of writing a lot of words about emotions, friends, investing in what I enjoy most…sometimes it is enough just to do. Life is about verbs and choices.

Today is a good day for brunch with a friend.

It's about the conversation more than the coffee.

It’s about the conversation more than the coffee.

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Categories Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, Summer, The Big 5, women, Words

One for You

June 26, 2014 //
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Good morning – or afternoon, or evening – I hope that the moment you find yourself in feels comfortable and that you are content, if not generally, then at least right now.

Yes, you.

This post is for you. Each of you, all of you, any of you. Because you are reading these words. Because you stopped by just this once to check out this blog, for some reason, today. Because you’ve bookmarked it and read it often. Because you clicked a link to my blog from a comment on some adult blog, figuring on more of the same, and instead of being disappointed, you’ve come back a few times to read more. Because you don’t even know me, and find value in sharing some piece of my experience anyway. Because you do know me, you know me well, and you quietly read each post, rarely speaking up to make a comment or observe a detail, or offer a helpful suggestion, understanding perhaps that there is a fundamental loss of privacy happening, between you and me, when I write and you read – and knowing me, you understand how vulnerable and raw that may actually feel. Because you know me, not as well as you’d like, and you remain curious and fascinated, and enjoy the vicarious ‘insider information’ that occasionally feels like you know so much more about me now.  Because you’re a troll or a spammer, out there doing your thing, and some one time, some one post, actually touched you – you’re still spamming me, but you made one pleasant, sincere, heartfelt comment that even had good spelling and grammar.  Because you are you, and you are reading these words, long after some little joke of mine has begun to wear thin, or some metaphor has finally be over-worked to death.

This post is for you. Thank you. That’s really it, just a thank you.  I kept a journal for years, you see, and although I write nearly compulsively, and often find I ‘don’t get it’ until I see something in words, I found myself drowning myself in the very words I love so much, and writing endlessly the damaging ruminations and negative thoughts I was stuck on. I wrote volumes. This is the simplest truth, I know; they are stored in a bin or two in the attic, save for some small number that have more meaning, or capture an important time of change. Those sit unread on a bookshelf by my bed, in case I need to ‘check myself’ about who I was then, or what events seemed to be about at that time.  As 2012 drew to a close, and I approached my 50th birthday, my whole experience sort of crashed in around me and I found myself mired in pain and doubt and regret, and frankly unsure that continuing to live had any value at all.  I didn’t really discuss that detail of my experience with anyone. I tried once or twice, and it was quickly apparent that I wasn’t getting anywhere, or making a connection.

Writing in my journal wasn’t helping me, anymore, and I was no longer sure my writing had value of any kind, or any purpose, or have anything of interest to any person. I was quietly planning to ‘check out’. Then… life went from bad to worse. It was all pretty subjective – the factual details of my experience of everyday life just weren’t particularly ‘bad’, not even a little. It was my emotional experience, my personal, subjective, internal experience of ‘self’ that had finally just caved in.  I started this blog then, aware at the time that these could be the last things I had to say, to share, and for me that meant that doing my best to make them ‘worthy’ and genuine and real was important to me.  This blog ended up being a big piece of ‘saving my life’.

This is no longer a salvage operation. I’m building on the best of who I am learning to be, and taking those tools, and experiences, and each day working to be just a bit better at being me, at being the best of me, that I can. You’re part of that. Thank you.

Why am I saying ‘thank you’ today? Because you thanked me first.  Yesterday was an interesting day for that.  I got a flurry of emails about a particular post, and it happens now and then, and this particular flurry of grateful and appreciate words felt so warm and nurturing – not saying thank you would be rude.  Thank you for caring how I am doing. Thank you for finding value in my observations on life, and my commentary on my challenges, my growth, my progress, and life’s curriculum.  It’s an amazing journey, and it matters to me that we’re sharing it.

I hope your today is a success – however you define it – and that your choices are wise and support your needs over time. I hope today the challenges seem less challenging and more rewarding, and that you take a chance on you. You deserve the best you have to offer. You matter.  Thank you for reading my blog.

Like a potted rose slaking its thirst on a gentle rain; I'm grateful.

Like a potted rose slaking its thirst on a gentle rain; I’m grateful.

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Categories Brain Injury, Healthy Living, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, Roses, Summer, The Big 5, Turning 50, women, Words
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