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What Will You Do With The Moment You’ve Got?

June 25, 2025 //
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I’m sipping my coffee in the office, thinking about things that have nothing whatsoever to do with work. I’ve got surgery tomorrow (minor), and a day off for recovering after that. The weekend is ahead, but I’ll likely be at least somewhat impaired (due to the specifics of the surgery). Doesn’t really matter, I’m just letting my mind wander, thoughts drifting by like clouds on a summer day. “Nothing to see here.” I’m just enjoying my coffee and a few minutes before the day begins in earnest.

…Clear liquids only for the next 24 hours (I say that like it really matters, but I don’t guess it does)…

I breathe, exhale, and relax. The steady wush of the ventiliation in the background does not blot out the whine of my tinnitus. I notice it, but I let that go – it’s not “important” or relevant to the moment (or to most moments), it’s just an irritant (if I focus on it for too long). Pleasant enough beginning to the day, I guess. There’s nothing wrong here. The sky is gray with heavy summer storm clouds – no colorful sunrise. My back aches. I put that out of my mind, too, as much as I am able. There’s nothing much to be done about it.

I sit with those thoughts that linger, making room for gratitude and thoughts of my garden. I feel fortunate to have gotten to see “Golden Opportunity” bloom (for the first time since she was planted in 2021!), before the deer ate those flowers and every bit of tender new growth from that rose bush. Oh, sure, I fuss about it and it’s aggravating, but like many of life’s most useful lessons, if I make room in my experience to understand a bigger picture, and develop a more nuanced perspective, I could learn something that has lasting value. I sit thinking about what drives the deer to my garden each Spring and early summer, and what they don’t eat. I contemplate what I could potentially do to discourage them from eating my roses and tender salad greens without wrecking the aesthetic of the garden with a lot of ugly fencing. I look at pictures of my roses. The specific thoughts I think in this quiet time are less important than that I do take this time for myself, to “hear myself think”, each day. It is a means of building resilience, and also of ensuring that I feel appreciated and heard by the one person who has to listen to all of my chatter (and internal dialogue) – the woman in the mirror. Self-care matters. This is part of that.

I sigh to myself when I glance at the clock and notice the time. Of course. It’s time to begin again.

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Categories Allegories, breathe, Free Will, gardening, gratitude, health, meditation, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Perspective, Practices, Relationships, Roses, Summer, The Art of Being

Live a Little (More, Better)

June 4, 2025 //
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I drove to the office with a love song in my head. Sweet, endearing, lingering in my memory as a recollection of a time when I yearned for the sort of love I enjoy right now – although back then I didn’t actually believe such love existed at all (it was just that far outside of my own experience of life and the world). I get to the office, pour some coffee, and put on my playlist of “silly love songs” to coast into the new day. (Every song on this list is deeply meaningful to me in some way, with regard to love and loving, but admittedly, some of my choices may not make sense to anyone else – it’s not about that, though, is it?) My reflection smiles back at me in the window. The morning sky is gray and threatening rain. I breathe, exhale, and relax. It’s a lovely morning anyway.

I woke from a deep sound sleep this morning, with serious thoughts still occupying my consciousness, left behind by my dreams. Something about choosing to be less negative, as a means of improving my quality of life, and sharing that thought somehow with those dear ones in my life who are reflexively deeply negative without really giving any thought to how that colors their experience over time. You know the sort, I’m sure (hell, maybe you are that sort – I once was, myself)? I’m talking about the folks whose humor is mostly pretty dark, often very sarcastic, sometimes self-deprecatory in a somewhat disturbing way to listen to? The folks who seem to complain at least a little bit about almost every experience they have? The ones who say “no” or reject ideas before an idea can be fully presented or a sentence completed? Yeah. “Those” people – the chronically negative buzzkills in our lives, who likely mean well, and may even think they are being “realistic” or humorous… How best to communicate to these people that the negativity they embrace with such firm commitment is not only a noteworthy “bring down” in any group (and potentially not as amusing as they may think), but potentially also the actual key to why they feel the way they do in the first place?

…I definitely get tired of chronic bitching almost immediately, and sarcastic “humor” and bitterness unleavened by real joy in life is exhausting to deal with…

What you plant in your garden determines what you harvest, but you’ve still got to pull the weeds.

I smile, listening to the love songs on my playlist – it’s hard to be annoyed while also wrapped in love. I sip my coffee and make room for gratitude; I’m fortunate to be so well loved, and to enjoy the opportunity to love so deeply in return. No doubt that colors my thinking. Certainly, becoming a more positive person generally (at least for me) followed falling in love with this singular human being who is now my beloved Traveling Partner. Sometimes it almost feels like that was some kind of shortcut or cheat code, but when I’m honest with myself, there was a fucking ton of work, and verbs, and practice of practices that also followed the beginning of this relationship – and those things could have been done, and occurred, and created the profound benefits that they did, without regard to being in love. They were choices. That the inspiration to make those choices was this profoundly deep emotion is mostly coincidental (although I wouldn’t change it for all the billions in the world). It’s doable without falling in love.

Bitter is not one of the flavors of Love.

How does one make a change from chronic bitterness and negativity to becoming a pretty positive and upbeat person day-to-day? Are there some “simple steps to being happy” that are being withheld from common knowledge? I don’t even know the answer to that question – I just know what steps I took, myself. Happy to share, I hope this is useful for you in some small way.

  1. If you need therapy, get therapy. How will you know? If you’re chronically miserable, you probably need therapy. If people around you are regularly suggesting therapy, or asking if you’re in therapy, or inquiring about your mental health and whether you’re okay, you may benefit from therapy. Just saying; sometimes we can’t make our journey alone.
  2. Be selective about the practices you practice. We become what we practice. If you practice chronic negativity, bitterness, sarcasm, that’s what you become, and what you fill your life with.
  3. Put your own self-care high on your list of things to do, every day.
  4. Be choosy about your media consumption – what you fill your head with will determine (often) what the content of your thoughts will likely be.
  5. Consider some sort of contemplative practice (like meditation) – make time in your day to “hear yourself think”.
  6. Embrace small joys and celebrate small wins. It just feels good – a lot better than feeling annoyed, disappointed, or bitter.
  7. Practice non-attachment. Clinging to expectations and assumptions is a fast track to being discontent and disappointed.
  8. Do good. Another way to feel good about life, is to contribute to the good in life.
  9. Live! Embrace change. Explore uncertainty. Try new experiences. Learn new things. Walk unfamiliar paths. The menu of The Strange Diner is vast – look it over.

Life is too brief. Don’t waste precious limited mortal moments on pointless performative negativity. Live authentically – and enjoy the joy you find (and create)! Just saying – you do have choices.

I smile and have another sip of my coffee. Good coffee. Good playlist. Good time to begin again. (Good luck on your journey!)

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Categories Allegories, anger, anhedonia, Anxiety, breathe, forgiveness, Free Will, gratitude, Healthy Living, inspiration, joy, Love, meditation, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Perspective, Practices, Relationships, The Art of Being

You Think You Know

August 7, 2024 //
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I’m sipping my coffee, thinking about people and our propensity for insisting on certainty and “knowing”. For every knowledgeable studious article written by a subject matter expert, there’s a comment section full of random voices that strike a strident and insistent tone while insisting they know more/better, objecting to some researched detail or conclusion. It’s super annoying. I raise my coffee in a vague gesture of respect towards the rising sun, thankful that Dunning and Krueger gave the phenomenon a name. Too bad about all those bullshit thinking errors, Humanity. Do better. Try… listening. Try learning. Try demonstrating some understanding that your individual perspective is quite limited and you don’t know everything.

… We’re each having our own experience…

It’s rarely possible to truly understand what someone else is going through. Even when we share information with each other, there’s a likelihood that something may be lost in the process. We don’t truly share our understanding of the meanings of words. Hell, maybe even the way we see the world around us varies with our individual perspective and vision? Certainly we make a ton of shit up as we go along, eh?

It’s a pretty morning. I slept well and deeply. My Traveling Partner restored my sunrise alarm (a silent alarm that simply brings up the lights gradually to wake me).  It was nice to fall asleep knowing I would wake up gently. No noise. I slipped out without waking the household and headed to the trailhead. I’m sitting at my halfway point thinking about life, love, perspective, knowledge, and… people. We’re strange fucking creatures, emotional, petty, and often fairly fucking stupid… but not without our charms, I suppose.

… I think about my Traveling Partner, and the enduring love we share…

I decided to go into the office today. No particular reason, I guess, I just don’t feel like dealing with chaos and with my Traveling Partner and the Anxious Adventurer both home today, I anticipated projects getting done and a high potential for frequent interruptions. Decided not to fight it, just be elsewhere so I can focus and work quietly.

My health and fitness journey continues to progress. Being “on the shot” has allowed me to drop several other medications as my health improves, which is excellent. Today I restart physical therapy. Strength training is an important next step for rebuilding muscle mass and improving strength and tone, but I need a bit of help where I am, presently. Seems sensible to take advantage of the availability of a good PT provider to get started down this path. I’ve dropped a bit more than 20lbs so far, but I don’t want to end up “skinny fat” in a sagging shapeless meat suit. 😂 Time to get to work seriously.

I see my therapist tomorrow. Needful, with the stress of my Traveling Partner’s imminent surgery just ahead and the chaos of the Anxious Adventurer moving in. I’m taking my self-care quite seriously, even putting time on my calendar to make my intentions explicit. Reminders are helpful.

… Another day, another opportunity to begin again…

… I wonder where this path leads?

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Categories breathe, Free Will, gratitude, health, Healthy Living, meditation, Moments, Oregon Trails, Perspective, Practices, Relationships, solo hiking, Summer, The Art of Being, weight loss secrets

Listening, Practicing

May 5, 2024 //
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It was early when I got to the trailhead. The rain started, again, as I arrived. It didn’t matter, since the gate was still closed. I sat quietly through the few minutes of waiting,  listening to the rain falling, meditating, waiting, drinking coffee I was grateful to have stopped for (what with the waiting and all).

The gate opens now at 05:30 a.m., and daybreak comes much sooner than it did just a few weeks ago. I move the car into the parking lot, up a hill from the couple of spaces outside the gate. It’s still raining, and I’m still waiting. I’m pretty good at waiting.

I sit with my coffee watching the dark rainy night slowly becoming a gray rainy morning, listening to the rain falling steadily,  drops tapping on the car. Surely there will be sufficient break in the rain to get a good walk in? I think it over, unperturbed by either potential outcome. I find my mind wandering to my upcoming camping trip and wondering if it will rain there, then, too? I’ll go prepared for it.

My head aches ferociously this morning. My arthritis is also quite painful. Head, neck, back… so much pain. I’m glad it’s Sunday. I can put more time and energy on self-care. There’s still laundry and dishes to do… no doubt other things I am overlooking for the moment. Still, it’s a gentle relaxed morning. I’m contented and pretty merry in spite of pain.

I start the car and give the windshield a swipe with the wipers; it sounds like the rain may have stopped, and I want to “take a closer look” before I get out of the car and put my boots on. It’s just a slow spattering of random occasional raindrops now,  suitable for walking…

Once my boots are on, I step onto the gravel trail with a crunch. It’s time to begin again!

A lush and rainy Spring morning

I get back to the car a bit damp, after getting a mile down the trail, and turning back when the rain began falling more steadily, again. The trail along the marsh and riverbank is scented by blooming trees and wildflowers. The rain contributes petrichor and that certain specific freshness of a rainy day. No flocks of geese overhead, but the robins don’t mind the rain, and busily went about the business of finding tasty morsels in the leaf matter and muddy ground along the trail. They watch me as curiously as I watch them.

As I change my boots for sneakers, I think about the day ahead. Already another “benchmark day”, and I have been looking forward to it. Seems a good one for tidying up, too, or helping my Traveling Partner with his projects. Maybe both? I’m not rushing to return home; I know my partner is sleeping and likely had a restless night. I am making a point of giving him time to get some restful sleep before I return home and start making noise. (We’re both fairly light sleepers, prone to being a bit noise-sensitive.)

I sit quietly, contentedly listening to the rain fall, before I begin again… again.

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Categories Allegories, breathe, Free Will, gratitude, health, Healthy Living, inspiration, Love, meditation, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, Oregon Trails, pain, Perspective, Practices, Relationships, Sleepless Nights, solo hiking, Spring, The Art of Being, turning 60, weight loss secrets

Gas Petal is on the Right, You #%&@&*$$#@!!!

September 12, 2018 //
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Well then.

I did get safely home. I did not rant at cars the whole way or fill the entire universe with vile invective. I did not. The one momentary loss of reserve happened to occur while I was on the phone with my Traveling Partner, as I was making a feeble attempt to disregard the guy ahead of me driving 10 mph in a 30 mph zone, during rush hour traffic, with cars bumper to bumper behind me – and blue skies and open road ahead of him. Well, shit. That was frustrating. It’s an everyday practice now; can I get from point A to point B, driving a car in traffic, without losing my cool? I generally can, these days. Now and then, I’m just… astonished to the point of lost perspective that people can be such shitty drivers so much of the time. I mean, seriously? What the hell. Safety first, definitely, but omg, then? Please also actually just drive your damned car like you plan to get somewhere. lol

…On the other hand? I set myself up for it today. I went in to work early. I worked without taking breaks. I failed to have a second cup of coffee when I got to my desk. I think I had a bite of lunch…but I clearly did so mindlessly; I don’t remember it at all. I hear it was a great lunch at the office today… I almost certainly had something… By the time I got into afternoon traffic, great dark storm clouds were blotting out the sinking sun, it was much later than I’d have left under other circumstances. I had a headache, and my blood sugar was almost certainly low. The other drivers weren’t the only shitty drivers on the road; my own judgment was surely impaired by my approach to the task, as I was rushing toward my destination, attempting to “beat my blood sugar home”.

(…Um… That’s not how that works.)

I was doing a fairly shitty job of really adulting today… but I was highly productive. For my employer. At the expense of my well-being. Which does not remotely achieve the goal and purpose of working for a living. See that? That’s a word. Words matter. They convey meaning.

I got safely home – even found my lost perspective shortly after I got off the (hands-free) phone call with my partner, who made a point to keep it super short (even though we enjoy talking). It was no doubt evident I was not at my best. He’s sharp like that. Aware of my mood. Aware of my… awareness. 🙂 First thing in the door, once I arrived home, I heated up some soup, and took care of the thing most likely to drive volatility at that point, my blood sugar. I took time to have a big glass of water. I took time to reeeeeeally stretch, and then relax. I went out onto the deck and inhaled the rain fresh air, and watched the storm clouds moving in for more. I sat down to tackle an errand I’d have been in no shape for, if I hadn’t managed my self-care, and then re-assessed the evening.

I rushed off without writing this morning, and didn’t even notice. In the settling gloom of twilight, arriving home rain scented to a stress-free space, I started seeing the thread, how the day developed from that first rushed moment, and never, ever, let up, not even once. It wasn’t a bad day. It was, in fact, generally speaking, a good day – pocked with challenging moments that weren’t even actually bad, just very busy. I’m tired. Cognitively fatigued, but brain still buzzing with busy-ness. If I don’t hop down off this mental treadmill, there won’t be any sleep for me tonight, and the work day will start even earlier tomorrow, and I’ll be short-tempered, error-prone, and lacking in both perspective and sense of humor. Get me tired enough, pile on a few more days, and I fall back on routine and process to keep me going to the point that any deviation at all holds the potential to see me really losing my perspective and ability to reason clearly. So… “Let’s have none of that…” I think at myself. Amused by the notion that just throwing words at the problem could solve anything. This? This needs action. Action… not words. Action …words? Action words.

Verbs.

Fucking verbs again. Damn it. I’m tired and silly. I’ve given all of what I had, today, to my employer, and really there’s nothing much left for me. Acknowledging it is enough to fill my eyes with tears, and my lip trembles. I feel like a child… Then, I wonder what I think I mean by that?

I keep sipping on my soup. It’s warm and comforting. Filling. Soothing. Tears never quite come; I’m finally taking care of this person I say matters to me that I’ve been fairly literally abusing all damned day. I let myself have that moment of self-directed anger. I really “listen” to the frustration and, yes, even “hurt feelings” that result from just treating myself like dirt all day. In my mind, I imagine a toddler storming at a parent, raging, stomping, “I’m mad at you!!”.

…”Yeah, kid,” I think back at myself, “I’m mad at me, too. I can do better. I’m sorry.” My eyes fill again briefly, and the moment passes. I feel myself pout a bit mentally, when it hits me… and I hear that hurt child-like inner voice again, “you didn’t leave any time at all for cartoons”.

Shit. That does suck.

I glance at the time. I really do need to slow things down, a lot, or I won’t sleep. I put aside the notion of doing more, other, stuff. I dim the lights quite a lot. Yoga, meditation, and an early night will have to do this evening. It’s a poor choice to stare at an illuminated screen for any length of time, this late, all wound up this way. I take a few moments to medicate, and get ready to head for my meditation cushion.

It’s time to hit the reset button. Tomorrow I can begin again. 🙂

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Categories Allegories, anger, Anxiety, autumn, Brain Injury, forgiveness, Free Will, Frustration, Healthy Living, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Moments, more than a little bit of bitching, pain, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Practices, Relationships, The Art of Being, The Big 5, Words
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