Archives for posts with tag: be the change
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Relaxing

February 28, 2016 //
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Stormy sky. Garden planted with cool weather greens. Patio tidied up, sorted out, and rearranged. A container of tiny alpine strawberries planted, too, for summer delight – or for the birds; it’s hard to be sure from this vantage point, on a rainy Sunday morning, air filled with the scents of rain and mown grass, and the sound of birdsong.

I woke early, considering I wanted very much to sleep later, and was a bit surprised to find it raining, although rain was in the forecast. It’s just that I usually sleep quite well on rainy mornings. This morning I woke, groggy, struggling to focus and really be awake. I lazed in bed awhile longer, pointlessly as it turned out; my stuffy head resulted in my own snoring waking me, each time I started to return to sleep. Bummer. I got up.

My first cup of coffee was enjoyed as I chatted with my traveling partner across the internet. It’s now hard to imagine life being any different, although it was well after 1997 before the internet, or even email, really featured heavily in my experience. The two of us agree that we each need a break from our devices; I’ve been staying off the computer, generally, for most of the weekend. We postpone tentative plans made earlier; it’s inconsiderate to share sniffles deliberately, and we prefer to invest in our mutual and individual wellness quite differently. It’s likely to be a day of ease, watching the rain fall, perhaps spent in the studio, but it will be spent in a solitary way, today. I don’t much feel like going out today. It seems like a very good day to read, to meditate, and perhaps to send note cards here and there, to far away friends. 🙂

I contemplate coffee #2, not yet made, and remind myself that on a Sunday the caffeinated coffee cut-off is noon, otherwise my sleep may be disturbed. I choose for myself, based on my own experiences, and recognize that it wasn’t always an issue. Certainly, when I was much younger, it was as if my coffee cup was affixed permanently to my hand, and I drank coffee without regard to time of day. I have changed as I have aged – I’m pretty sure we all do, in some way or another.  I give thought to the week’s meals-to-come, and double-check the pantry. Sunday is a good day for practical things; it is a good indicator that I’m a bit under the weather that I have no energy or will for actual housekeeping today.

A rainy day relaxing, today it is enough.

A rainy day relaxing, today it is enough.

Some days ‘doing my best’ means taking care of myself, this fragile vessel, and little more. It’s okay for this to be the case. I listen to the rain, now pounding the roof, and rumbling down through the downspout to the french drain at the corner of the building. It somehow manages to be a lovely day, in spite of the rain, in spite of feeling a bit stuffy, in spite of feeling disinclined for go, or do. Today is a good day to spend it relaxing with the woman in the mirror, and listening to what she has to say.

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Categories Brain Injury, Free Will, gardening, health, Healthy Living, Love, Mindfulness, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, The Art of Being, The Big 5, Words

My Own Sliver of Sky

February 27, 2016 //
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Beautiful night sky.

Beautiful night sky, a view as I leave home for work in the morning, before dawn.

I was glad to see the work day end yesterday. It was a grueling week on a number of levels, and at the end of it, by Thursday, I was also not really feeling well. I made it an early night Thursday evening, crashing out at a childlike hour of evening, and resenting the early pre-dawn hour at which I wake on Friday. I really wanted to sleep more, longer, later, more deeply… just sleep. Friday raced by, and ended fairly early (my work day starts fully 2 hours earlier than usual on Fridays). I got home with no clear plan, and again found myself crawling into bed content to end the day quite early.

The night sky.

The night sky, on some other night. 

I woke unexpectedly a couple of hours later, no identifiable reason but feeling very restless and uneasy. I got up and took a seat on my meditation cushion, in front of the patio door with the blinds open to the night sky. I sat for some time just looking out into the night. Stress faded with passing clouds, I found contentment in moonlight and thoughts of how soothing I find a view of the sky. I sat for a long while, meditating, gazing into the night sky. Eventually, I returned to bed.

I slept 12 hours, and woke feeling rather uninterested in waking to face the day. I lingered in bed for some time, nearly an hour more, meditating and dreaming in a half-sleeping half-waking state of consciousness that found me reminding valued coworkers not to crowd me so closely; even with the week behind me, work found its way into my restless consciousness.

The morning has been leisurely and filled with love and friendship, and music – an unexpected gift this morning, and I have enjoyed it without attempting to define, excuse, justify, or limit this beautiful experience. The quiet has returned, now. I find myself thinking about having a view I can ‘call my own’, here. Everywhere I have lived there has been at least some sliver of sky, some particular angle I could contemplate, free of people, industry, clutter, or suburbia. Sometimes I’ve had to work at it a bit, finding some particular corner of a sofa in a loft with a single window looking at sky above roof-tops, or a view of green space between homes or buildings. One lovely thing here in this new space is that the patio and my studio both look directly out at the park, uninterrupted by human endeavors with the exception of occasional runners and walkers passing by, and a small playground easily omitted from view by choice of angle, or disregarded during hours when no children are playing – as during my evening meditation, last night.

The view from my desk, in the studio.

The view from my desk, in the studio.

Today is a good day to enjoy the view, and a few quiet moments. Today is a good day to slow down, to be present, to enjoy each moment as it is. Today is a good day for gardens, and rain showers, and nesting ducks in meadow grass. Today is a good day to set aside stress and confrontation in favor of acceptance and ease. Today is a good day to choose a better window on the world. 🙂

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Categories Anxiety, art and the artist, Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Love, Mindfulness, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, The Art of Being

Finishing Touches

February 24, 2016 //
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I arrived home last night quite exhausted. I made it a gentle evening, and crashed out quite early. I slept well and deeply, and woke comfortably to the alarm. In all regards, quite a nice way to finish off a challenging work day and move on. I woke this morning having forgotten about the closet doors. When I moved in, there were no closet doors at all. They were still on order and not yet installed. They arrived, and were installed yesterday (with the exception of the closet door in my bedroom, at my request). I had inspected the work when I arrived home, and not given it another thought. This morning I awoke without having closet doors in mind, and was a bit startled when I stepped into the studio to write… closet door. Big broad, vast, visually impressive, white sliding closet door… across the entire end of the room, where previously the shelves with my art gear, and the top shelf with not-yet-unpacked breakables sit safely, had been ‘part of the view’ since I moved in. It was a bit odd. Different. More… ‘finished’.

I find myself thinking about ‘finishing touches’ generally, you know – those items, tasks, elements, and moments that really round out an event or experience in a way that feels ‘complete’ and satisfying, or fulfills some specific aesthetic. Love, too, has some opportunities for ‘finishing touches’ – and that could be quite a literal thing, as with tender contact, touches, and afterplay following sex, or something deeper – like the unexpected love note days later, found tucked away somewhere undiscovered, found in passing during a difficult moment, filling a tense emotional space with love and recognition. Finishing touches seem to be more about an awareness, a perception, than about the thing themselves… and I continue to contemplate finishing touches as I sip my coffee.

Reflecting on a turn of phrase or a metaphor provides new perspective.

Reflecting on a turn of phrase or a metaphor provides new perspective.

There are ‘finishing touches’ along the far reaches of the negative spectrum of my emotional experience, although I generally don’t call them ‘finishing touches’ so much as ‘the straw that broke the camel’s back’ or ‘the deal breakers’. The ‘finishing touch’ on my first marriage was how my spouse treated his son, and his mother (in both cases, badly). The finishing touch on the long-term relationship that followed was a complex singularity – an evening of trampled boundaries, disregard, unexpected violence, inconsiderate nastiness, and intimidation; it was a hell of a finish, no doubt, and quite a sudden cascade of deal breakers in one seemingly endless evening. The finishing touch on a relationship that followed – a ‘long term’ relationship characterized after-the-fact by its brevity (less than 3 years), was the development of a peculiarly chronic neglect, disregard, and emotional weaponry launched by a mentally ill partner; I was in no shape to provide the support she needed, and I needed day-to-day simple decency from a disordered partner unable to provide that to anyone, in any relationship (at that time). When I think of those events in the positive terms of ‘finishing touches’ rather than the negative terms of ‘deal breakers’ and ‘last straws’, I find myself feeling more settled and content with the way things turned out; it makes sense that those relationships ended, and the events that finished them off do settle things, in a fairly ‘completed’ and ‘finished’ way, providing a ‘why it makes sense’ that they ended. I find myself aware that a ‘finishing touch’ is a form of closure – and it is found within, requiring no assistance from another party, no ‘last words’, no ‘parting gift’, no give and take; it belongs to me, and exists as part of my own understanding of myself, and the context of my life in which I exist. The ‘finish’ of a finishing touch is a perception, and as such, also beyond the realm of argument, requiring no validation. 🙂

The closet doors do result in a more finished look here, generally. The paintings hanging in the hallway provide a similar sense of things being ‘complete’ and ‘finished’. It feels comfortably grown up, and properly a residence, in a way that differs slightly from #27, which I so recently adored, and moved from. It is a similar feeling to moving from the barracks as a young soldier, into housing ‘on the economy’, or moving from a college dorm, into a ‘real apartment’. My previous apartment was set up for artistic live/work…but so small and compact that it was very nearly a studio apartment, and felt rather like a spacious bedroom sometimes. This new space feels very like a house, from the inside, and having separated my studio and creative work space from the rest of the residential spaces, also very comfortable… and sometimes strange. It seems more… finished. I’m still getting used to it, and sometimes find myself simultaneously delighted and vaguely uncomfortable with the spaciousness, or feeling both relieved and uneasy to have it generally all to myself. I remember as I write those words that growth itself often feels very uncomfortable indeed. I smile. I am okay with where I am in life; that feels really good.

Begin again; the finishing touch in one moment becomes a cherished reminder of the beginning for another.

Begin again; the finishing touch in one moment becomes a cherished reminder of the beginning for another.

The leisure morning at home nears its end. I notice when I check the clock. Finishing touches are possible here, too; there is time for some housekeeping, and those are the finishing touches on my morning that become my beautiful welcome home at the end of a long work day. 🙂 It’s a very good day to treat the woman in the mirror well, and to live my values authentically. It’s a very nice day for finishing touches.

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Categories Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, The Art of Being, The Big 5

Wow – This is Ordinary!

February 18, 2016 //
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It’s a Thursday, poised gently between a week in progress and a week nearly over. I slept well and deeply, waking at some point before the alarm went off. I told myself, this morning, that if it were as little as 15 minutes before the alarm would go off, I’d just get up. Seemed quite likely I’d get up regardless… I checked the clock, and noticed it was a bit more than half an hour before the alarm would go off… generally, I’d get up… Peculiarly, this morning I contentedly rolled over, wrapped myself in warm covers, agreeably admitted to myself as sleep overcame me that I’d most likely feel groggy when I woke… only…

I woke to the insistent beeping of an alarm clock that I had trouble locating by feel; it was quite literally out of reach, which seemed oddly metaphorical in my waking moment. I struggled with twisting to reach the lamp switch as the alarm continued to beep. I woke stiff and aching, and had managed to place the alarm clock quite completely out of common reach, on the far side of the nightstand. Finally. Silence. I stood with some effort, and made my way to the bathroom rather sluggishly.

I dither through my morning routine…heat the water for coffee now… or after my shower? After. Music? No music? Music. Fuzzy spa socks until I leave for work…or put on my hiking socks? Spa socks. Dark roasted Java, or medium roasted Uganda? Java. Sweater or t-shirt? Sweater. Back and forth, options being considered, choices being made, and the day begins to take shape for this one singularly ‘me’ human being of middle age, soft sweater, modest means, and generally gentle habits… I see the words, and sense a much younger version of me somewhere in the distance of time with a scrunched up ‘WTF?’ look of quizzical wonder on her face. “How did we get here?” I smile to myself – feeling the warmth of my affection for this ‘stranger within’, this ‘me’ creature, and think of the miles we have walked, the internal demons of chaos we’ve battled together, the endless practice, the choices to change… There is no question, really, how I got from ‘there’ to ‘here’ – there have been verbs involved, and will, and choice, and change.

How beautiful that each new day I can choose to begin again!

How beautiful that each new day I can choose to begin again!

I am in some physical pain this morning; the weather is rainy again, and my bones ache with it. I’m not bitching, just saying it is an element of my experience that can tend to color my thinking if left unaddressed. I make a point of taking care of this fragile vessel. Today has all the ingredients of being a very pleasant one. (Still verbs involved.)

I can recall a time when being asked to change seemed more constant than being valued or appreciated as I was, which I recall as being very rare. I don’t doubt from my perspective now that this was a ‘true’ experience from my perspective then. I felt frustrated, and criticized. I felt inadequate. I felt angry – and the anger mostly came from how astonishingly rarely anyone else seemed willing to change at my request, as though I were uniquely flawed, and they were singularly perfectly beautifully human just as they were.  It hurt a lot to view the world that way. It grew and festered until it became a fairly constant internal fight that often ended resentfully with a simultaneous feeling of ‘fuck your change!’ and capitulation to pressure, to coercion, to fear of withdrawn affection, followed by all the brutal self-criticism as I attempted to force change on myself to meet someone else’s needs. My soul fairly continuously cried ‘what about me?’ within the context of relationships that were purportedly intimate. What a fucking mess.

It became a very big deal to live authentically – which definitely required that I start figuring myself out, fast. Turning my own attention toward the woman in the mirror in an honest way, unreservedly and unashamedly in my own corner, being genuinely supportive of my own needs in a strong and positive way was another very big deal – and the verbs were definitely piling up alongside new practices. Every change I chose for myself, because that change met my own needs and held potential to take me further down my own path, made change itself just a bit less terrifying, and a bit less alienating. Instead of changes imposed on me somehow making me less and less me over time, I began to choose change for myself, based on my own values, my own needs, my own aesthetic. Life changed with me. The changes I chose were for and about me, about being the woman I most want to be, myself, and about living my values quite openly and comfortably. A lot of things begin to change around me, and within my relationships – for one thing, it quickly became clear who enjoyed and valued me, for real. “Faking it” in life was not only no longer a choice with value – it was no longer an option. What a relief!

"How many more miles?" doesn't ask a question that needs an answer.

“How many more miles?”  is not a question I need to ask.

This is not an epitaph to a journey. The journey is not the destination. There is no ‘finish line’, no scorecard, no ‘pot of gold’ – because there is no end to the rainbow for this tale of wonder. Another day will dawn, and I will begin again. Each day is so powerful as an opportunity to choose to live life willfully, eyes wide with wonder, mind open to the possibilities, and aware of the world and my fellow travelers within feeling constrained or encroached upon by their values, or their freedom. In this moment, here, this morning, I feel ‘whole’ and ‘well’ and a whole bunch of other lovely words about the ‘me’ that is, versus the woman I wasn’t, for so very long. Strangely – this is what feels ‘ordinary’ today. 🙂

Change is like a doorway on a longer journey.

Change is like a doorway on a longer journey.

…Oh…hey… We’re still here? My mind wandered. A quick montage of recollections of other times, harder times, different times, some even fairly recent times, and I humbly observe that although this morning feels very good – and also very ordinary – I’m very human, and there will likely be other less pleasant times to come… somewhen. That, too, is very ordinary. I’d say something insightful about impermanence, but I’m not sure there’s more to say than ‘impermanence is a thing I can count on’. Weather changes. Job changes. Mood changes. Relationship changes. Health changes. Lifestyle changes. Change is. I think what I’ve really been saying this morning is that being the authority on change in my own experience, being the entity choosing the changes, and keeping that power of choice and action for myself – to use it as a tool, rather than as a weapon, and to make it one of the processes of order, rather than part of the chaos – has been a profoundly positive thing for me.

Yes. Of course there are verbs involved. Isn’t today a good day for some verbs? 🙂

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Categories Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Oregon Trails, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, solo hiking, The Art of Being, women, Words

Art, Music, Words

February 16, 2016 //
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This morning I am relaxed and alert after a good night’s sleep. I woke too early to a distant peculiar high-pitched whine; the train in the distance crawling slowly through the night, sometimes loud, sometimes noisy, doesn’t often wake me but in the wee hours this morning it did. It wasn’t relevant to the overall quality of my sleep, or this lovely quiet morning over coffee.

I enjoyed quite a nice weekend, and although I started it having to deal with my challenges it was skillfully done, generally, productive, emotionally nourishing, fun, relaxing, and fairly entertaining. I spent much of it at home in this beautiful space I am creating for myself, and a lot of it painting. I’ve been needing this so much – over the years of adult creative lifetime I have yearned for adequate space to paint. I’ve done some amazing work perched on the edge of couches, crouched on the floor in a corner, spread out across kitchen counters, dining tables, or on an easel of good quality and sturdiness wedged into a corner of one room or another, cautious about paint being flung thoughtlessly here or there… attentive to immediately clean up, every day, every time… I’ve gotten close to have real studio space once or twice, only to see it jerked out of reach at the last minute. I was well into my 40’s – almost 50 – when I understood how much I yearned for dedicated creative space to work. I put it aside as a fantasy. I put it aside as unreachable – so many times. (If this isn’t obvious; it was often my own choices that put fulfillment of this desire out of my reach.)

Most of my partners and lovers have respected my artistic side, some of have truly loved my work; I feel certain that had it been commonly understood how badly I needed more room to work – understood by me, myself, too – I’d have been ‘here’ sooner. One of life’s many missed details – handled. I smile thinking about how many conversations with my traveling partner over the years have come back to making a viable solution to the need for room to paint become a reality for me – even our very first conversations as friends often wound around back to quality of life matters being needfully inclusive of this thing I did not have at that time; he recognized it as a ‘need’ when I still thought of it as a daydream without substance, forever out of reach. Over the course of our 5 years together, he has regularly pointed out potential solutions – and when it was clear that there was profound value for me (and us) in my living quite separately day-to-day, it was the artistic space that sold the idea first, healing was a bit of an afterthought (for me). I’ve been well-supported in this partnership – as an artist, as a woman, as a human being, and as a friend. How the hell do I say ‘thank you’ for all that?? Well… by painting, I guess, and making the choice to live alone have value beyond the separateness of it. 🙂

One of the faces of Love, and another way to take care of me.

One of the faces of love, and another way to take care of me.

I spent the weekend in my studio. I love the way that sounds. I spent it getting it set up, and using that time of making order out of chaos to ‘get my head right’ on Saturday morning (Friday afternoon and evening I wasn’t really good for much, dealing with a flare up of my PTSD and focused on very basic self-care). By midday Saturday I was painting. Sunday I was painting. Monday I was painting. Somewhere in the midst of all that, I found time to read, to eat, to shower, to love – the love matters most, perhaps, but without all that other stuff, who is here to be loved? I enjoyed the time I spent with my traveling partner Sunday – and there was no awkwardness in his departure. “What would you be doing if I left now?” he asked pleasantly after hanging out a while. I smiled and gave it some thought, the answer was an easy one, “I’d be in the studio, sitting with the new colors and the canvases I am working on, thinking about that”. He smiled back at me and observed that the timing seemed good. No stress, no emotional weirdness – an easy (for both of us) comfortable (for both of us) departure, freeing us (both) to move on with the day quite naturally. It was quite lovely, both the time together, and the time apart. What more could I ask of love?

There are now four canvases in various stages of completion in my studio, and they are not a frenzy of similarly themed work using a similar palette for economy. They are not being rushed through to avoid inconveniencing a household starting a new work week. Each is an entirely unique experience with color, texture, subject; I am able to slow my pace to a moment by moment approach that feels completely different – and worth exploring. Mindful painting? Is this a thing? The path veers in a new direction…

…I walk on, enjoying the view as I begin again. Today is a good day for art, for music, for words – a good day to feed my heart and my soul, not just this fragile vessel. 🙂

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Categories Art, art and the artist, Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, solo hiking, The Art of Being, The Big 5
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