Archives for posts with tag: mindfulness

Good-bye, Old Friend

May 23, 2013 //

So many metaphors…hard to choose just one. (detail from “Anxiety” 2011)

I’m saying good-bye to an old friend.

A steady rain falls this morning, like a lifetime of tears falling in a day; the sort of respectable rainfall that farmers count on, and that quickly turns a pleasant walk into a test of endurance. I like rain. I especially like rain from a warm, dry vantage point with a hot cup of coffee. I’ve got my coffee, the rain, and if I want to reach into my heart and touch something that hurts, I have my share of tears, too. I also have a headache. The headache is part of this particular good-bye.

You see, after more than a decade, I am finally saying good-bye to prescription anxiety medication. Aside from this headache, and a few somewhat surreal days, it hasn’t been too difficult. I was most concerned about some potential that I’d suddenly be taken over by the level of anxiety that was my everyday experience before I embraced Big Pharm’s tempting sales pitch. A decade is a long time to take a drug, and I’m not surprised that the experience of withdrawing from it is more profound than the assurances and platitudes the literature provides; nearly all the research I’ve been able to access is based on clinical trials of short-term use (6-8 weeks), and none of it is based on a decade or more of continuous use. Actions have consequences. A decade is a long time to take a drug. There is too much information available, and a lot of recent reporting, regarding how business interests have resulted in a substantial amount of medical research being suppressed, or actually manipulated for a desired outcome, and similar sorts of things that frankly scare the hell out of me every time I look in my medicine cabinet. I’m painfully aware, too, that doctors are people, not gods, and just as prone to fraud, deceit, greed, error and simple incompetence as anyone else. I am serious about embracing a genuine experience of who I am – of being myself. Really being myself. So, the time had come to back up my recent progress with real trust that my experience is improved, and that I am more whole than I had been, and am capable of continuing to grow and improve my experience, and heal my ancient hurts. I decided to take care of me in a different way. Big Pharm didn’t fix my issues, and couldn’t – they had 10 years to make it happen. lol. My turn. For real. I’m learning, healing, growing…and I am happy to see 50 without having to take mind-altering drugs to endure my experience, pacify my fears, or ‘make me presentable’ for the rest of the world. The headache today is worth it.

…not going to dwell on it… (detail of ‘Broken’ 2012)

I’m still human. I still feel anxiety. I still have things to work on, to work out, to understand more clearly. I have more to learn. I still have PTSD, and I’m still learning new skills for managing that experience more effectively. I still have a TBI, and I’m finally learning things that address that part of my experience directly, and that matters more than I ever know how to describe.

There’s always another lesson in life’s curriculum, isn’t there? My morning thoughts and contemplation are interrupted. I am finding that my concentration is limited for now, as I say good-bye to this ‘old friend’. I’m not sorry to see it go. But it is a complicated good-bye.

…each having our own experience. (detail of “Emic” 2012)

It is sometime later, now. The serenity of the morning didn’t last, and while that is disappointing, I’m finding that I am ok, myself. Anxiety is what it is, and I’m ok. My own experience, right now, right here, is one of relative calm; concerned, aware, and finding significant perspective in the beauty of a rainy day, and the many shades of green I see. Some experiences have more value than others, and for the moment a rainy day trumps anxiety and ‘what if’ scenarios.

Respect…consideration…compassion…reciprocity…openness…my ‘Big 5’ only look easy on paper. I’m finding that getting there is still a destination, and the journey requires an everyday commitment to mindful choices, and awareness. I want it to be easy. I accept that both effort and will are required; this is not about easy.

I’m tired and my head aches. That’s worth it, too. I’m giving myself my self for my 50th birthday.

“Who am I? Wait…I had something for this…” (detail of ‘Kronos’ 2002)

Tags I'm not a superhero, it's a verb, learning to swim, mindfulness, perspective, turning 50

Categories Anxiety, Art, Brain Injury, Free Will, Healthy Living, Logic & Reason, Menopause, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Turning 50, Uncategorized, women

Don’t Pull That Trigger!

May 15, 2013 //

Wow. I dislike what ‘news’ has become. Political corruption? Hardly news-worthy, it’s an everyday thing, and it will continue to be for as long as we elect corrupt or corruptible human beings to positions of power. It would be nice if a politician had to accept that role with the clear contractual understanding that he or she could not ever personally profit from that role in a direct way, or if anyone in power were ever actually held accountable for what they themselves force the nation to endure by their decisions or actions. This is not an article about politics, or news. I found it profoundly adult to hear Angelina Jolie go public with her account of choosing a double mastectomy over her very high risk of aggressive breast cancer…and found myself dismayed and in some cases disgusted that anyone would choose to criticize her choice; it was hers to make. Period. It’s a shame that women without that level of income, or those resources, don’t have the opportunity, realistically, to make that choice themselves. This is not an article about breast cancer, or the limited health choices that women without means face, or feminist issues of gender-limited personal freedom and choice. Not a day goes by that the news doesn’t have another story about rape, and equally heinously, another story about what women ‘can do to prevent being raped’; rape is prevented by people not committing non-consensual sexual acts against others, it isn’t more complicated than that. Don’t rape. The news these days just isn’t worth reading most of the time. Not because the information isn’t valuable, not because some of what is observed isn’t newsworthy, but because the presentation of so much information is tainted with bias of one sort or another to the point that it isn’t ‘information’ at all; it is marketing, propaganda, spin, color, or outright lies. ‘Fact-checking’ relies rather heavily on someone, somewhere, being able to tell the difference between fact and opinion. lol.

I’m frustrated by how easily my balance can be disturbed by the media. ‘News’ that is intended to distress, to frighten, to alarm, to ‘call to action’ rather than inform, advise, or enlighten isn’t ‘news’ at all – it is an attack on my consciousness. I avoid it. I ask friends to stop sending me links to things. Ah, but we all use Facebook, don’t we? Well, I still do – some very dear friends and loved ones use it as their primary form of communication, long distance. It’s hard seeing some of the things people post. More and more of my friends use ‘trigger alerts’, which I value. I’m using them more, too.

28 days… one menstrual cycle away from being 50. lol.

Spring is still unfolding all around me. I love the walk to work in the mornings; strolling past each neighbor’s garden, seeing the flowers opening day by day, feeling the soft chill morning air against my skin, or perhaps a tender misty rain falling – like this morning. I keep returning to my own garden, morning and evening, watering, watching, loving…

“Kiss of Desire”, kissed by a misty morning rain.

I love the colors of morning, and the surprises…

“Graham Thomas” blooms for the first time this year.

Last year we picked out some roses likely to do well in this garden. “Graham Thomas” was one, and already quite large and eager to take his place as master of the central flower bed. I’m quite delighted, also, with “Ebb Tide”; covered with buds and blossoms of a rich deep purple.

“Ebb Tide” wowing me.

Old favorites draw my eye, too, and I smile even thinking seeing “Baby Love” on the other end of my walk home tonight. Selected with sentiment and love, she was the featured rose of my last garden, a much smaller space – too small for my grand plans. lol.

“Baby Love” will bloom like this through the year and well into November.

My garden is a sanctuary where ‘the news’ can’t reach me. When I’m in my garden, I am in the moment, aware, engaged, and being on this extraordinary other level. Still working on mindfulness practices I am hoping will one day be very natural in my experience, as natural as stepping into my garden.

A mystery rose.

…Life has a lot of lessons to share, a lot of mysteries to reveal. Perhaps one day I will find mindfulness an easy part of being, and figure out what that mystery rose is, or find the words to tell the world “You have no power over me.”

In the meantime, I meditate, practice mindfulness, consider my Big 5, learn better skills for taking care of me, and hope to ask the questions that reveal my own heart to me most clearly. In between, I garden. 😀

Tags baby love, gardening, life's mysteries, mindfulness, news that's fit to print, rape culture, roses in spring, surviving trauma, trigger warnings

Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, Free Will, gardening, Healthy Living, Logic & Reason, Love, Menopause, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Rape, Relationships, Roses, Spring, Turning 50, women

I’ll Be In The Garden

May 13, 2013 //

I was pretty happy to see Monday arrive, this week. My weekend was a lot of Sturm und Drang and I was frankly relieved to be done with it. Between my hormones and rampant OPD (Other People’s Drama), the weekend was neither relaxing, nor especially productive, for me. I’m not really complaining; some good dialogues came out of it. (I suppose people also learn something about their driving when they are involved in a traffic accident.)

I have to walk my own path…

The weekend, on the other hand, was lovely and warm and sunny. Every minute spent in the garden was wonderful. More roses open their buds every day.

“Nozomi” (Pink Pearl) soon she’ll be covered with tiny pink buds…

“Nozomi” showing off her delicate blossom, for now just this one.

I enjoyed getting down at eye level with the garden now that the weather is fair and mild, and the ground isn’t muddy. The perspective is different, and I definitely needed a change in perspective more than once this weekend!

At ground level with the vinca, dewy from being watered.

Some of the bold big blooms I am waiting on keep me waiting like an old-fashioned cliff-hanger, tempting me with a hint of color through still-tightly wrapped petals.

Most of the peonies in the neighborhood have opened; mine apparently sense my watchfulness. lol

The roses are lovely, fragrant, and totally showing off.

“Ebb Tide” looking her best.

“Kiss of Desire” is new in my garden this spring.

“Secret Recipe” is an old favorite, and one of my most challenging roses to care for; she’s high maintenance. lol

I can’t take enough pictures of “Baby Love”; cute, easy, and lovely.

The hummingbirds alerted one of my partners recently that I was slow to refill their feeders; one dive bombed him at garden’s edge, as he attempted to relax with his coffee! Hummingbirds are one of my favorite garden visitors, and it delights me that my garden has such wonderful tiny visitors.

I could go on and on about the garden. It is my refuge from every day stress, when I find my mindfulness and meditation practices need a helping hand. In my garden I am ‘here’ and ‘now’ in a very engaged and present and immediate way, and it feels effortless and natural. I don’t mind the challenges in the garden; I understand them. I don’t always understand the challenges between people, and those frustrate me much more than some powdery mildew on a rose, or a slug eating the greens, or a few days without rain. A challenge in the garden is easy, as easy as recognizing the issue, troubleshooting the root cause (lol), developing/determining a solution, and applying the chosen solution. Repeat as needed. Why are people so much more complicated? (I’d shout that at you if I thought it would be helpful… but shouting rarely makes anything easier to hear.) Anyway, we all know the answer if we admit it to ourselves, don’t we? Why are people so complicated? Because they choose to be.

I’m making other choices for myself these days. I don’t always ‘get it right’. It’s not a contest. There is no ‘finish line’. There will be no awards ceremony, no report card, no pat on the back. But I’m taking better care of me, and understanding it more when things aren’t a good fit, or my experience is unsatisfying or unpleasant. I still have more questions than answers…and that doesn’t trouble me, generally. If I’m not stressing the answers, I’m also not worried about ‘being right’, or ‘making it work’. I’m finding it easier, much of the time, to make good choices that are tending to meet my needs over time, and improve my experience.

I suppose there is more…but today is proving to be an odd day. I feel the pressure of ‘things on my mind’ and I am feeling a bit fussy and raw. I have been spending too much time on OPD, a potentially worthy investment in time because one of my needs is ‘harmony in my relationships and a calm environment to live in’, but I ended up doing so almost entirely at the expense of things I wanted to do for me, or with my partners, and I definitely committed too much limited weekend time to it. I am very ready to have some of my other needs met. Today is something a bit new – I’m able to recognize and understand that my subtle shift in mood toward being a bit cross isn’t about what is going on around me right now – it’s about how I handled what was going on around me in days past and that I ‘missed the mark’ on taking care of me in some way. It is also clearly a ‘me thing’ and not about the choices or actions of others in any direct way. (It feels good to have a better understanding of my experience, and maybe to the point of being able to make practical choices to meet my needs as a result.) 🙂

Well, having said all that… it’s on with the day, eager to return to the garden.

Tags baby love, by any other name, ebb tide, gardening, kiss of desire, life, love, mindfulness, roses, secret recipe

Categories Anxiety, Brain Injury, Free Will, gardening, Healthy Living, Logic & Reason, Love, Menopause, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, Roses, Spring, Turning 50, women

A Tear or Two

May 8, 2013 //

Impermanence

Like a soap-bubble frozen in glass
deep blue in the sun
sometimes a shimmer or a shadow
a change in perspective
suddenly silver like a child’s drawing of the moon
on white paper
a simple blue glass gazing ball
old-fashioned novelty
garden accent
a fragile blue glass bead big enough
for a grown up.

Is it the way of things
to leave?
to be broken?
to be cast aside no longer valued?
no longer remembered?
The best things in life seem so fragile.

I will not see this blue ball again in my garden.
A replacement for another broken ball.
Tears falling.
Each one a precious something
or other
remembered for a fleeting moment of sorrow
to be replaced by another.
Or forgotten.

Another tear.
Another glass gazing ball.
Another sorrow.
Another “I’m sorry”.
Another moment.
Another celebration.
Another memorial.
Another love.
Another life.
Another garden.
…If only my memory were not also impermanent.

The gazing ball, a gift of love, that was broken today.

Tags gardening, gazing balls, impermanence, letting go of the little stuff, love, memory, metaphors, mindfulness, tears

Categories Brain Injury, gardening, grief, Love, Metaphors, Mindfulness, Perspective, Relationships, Roses, Spring, Words

Making a Distinction

May 8, 2013 //

I had some interesting thoughts this morning over my coffee; they lead to interesting discussions over coffee with my colleagues later on. Discussions of ethics, language, and the way we make distinctions between one thing and another. Definitions of terms really matter, circumstances and context make a difference, and every individual brings their own experience, and their own values as an individual, to every conversation. I’m pleased to work with ethical people who are good-natured and compassionate. I learn something from them every day about being compassionate and treating people well. Even when we don’t agree, the opportunity to reflect on a divergent perspective is valuable.

Work in progress…

Yesterday evening I enjoyed an opportunity to hang out with friends we haven’t seen in a while. Good people. Kind people. I didn’t want to be tired at the end of the evening. This morning I woke with thoughts of ‘going home’ to other old friends, reconnecting with other people supremely dear to me. I will, sooner than later, but perhaps not as soon as I would like to. I keep contemplating the urgent importance and value of connections…friends, lovers, family…even strangers crossing my path in some unexpectedly serendipitous way…my most cherished memories are almost all memories of some connected moment. I want to put more attention on those connections, build them and invest in them with effort and will, not just haphazard circumstances and fond memories. I think I’d like to make a point of visiting a far away friend or family member at least once a year. It seems too important to waste more time with ‘oh, we’ll see each other again, eventually…’ – because maybe we won’t if I take that approach? Our mortal time is finite.

Afternoon thoughts are different than morning thoughts… there was something to say yesterday, and now it is long forgotten. I did get some pictures…

Blackberries have begun to bloom…and I must have taken a dozen pictures, not one came out clear and sharp. lol

A grand old oak stands in the sunshine along my journey.

…a small wilderness along the way, so fragrant on a warm spring afternoon.

Bold and lovely, the peonies are opening.

Even humble chives show their best colors in the afternoon sunshine.

The light is different in the morning…and at twilight…and at midday. I see different things. I think different thoughts. Today I am awake and aware, without drive or purpose beyond being in the moment. A lovely quiet morning, meditation and a latte, and then with time slowed down to the moment, I went into the garden to water and see the sunshine at dawn. It isn’t a sunny morning, at all. It is gray and overcast, and the light is so different, filtered, soft, and muted. Still a delight to my senses, and I happily watered the potted roses, giving each a good drenching. Again this year I struggle with powdery mildew – and in the Pacific Northwest that’s an annual event. Spring will harden to summer, and new leaves will unfold and the roses will continue to bloom; for now, many of the more delicate varieties have that powdery menace as they fatten their buds for the first flowers of the year. I love each rose nonetheless, and the stories they have to tell of my life and loves: Sheer Bliss, X-Rated, Magic Carousel, Kiss of Desire, Nozomi, Secret Recipe, Baby Love…they each have a page or a paragraph, meaning that goes beyond flowers.

‘Baby Love’ this morning.

The garden path and ‘Splish-Splash’, my oldest potted rose.

So lush in spring, my garden, my paradise…

After the peace of the garden, the walk to work was calm and serene, and a continued sensuous pleasure. I feel good today. It’s the rare morning that I don’t feel pain. It’s easy to enjoy the details and the surprises in the world around me when I don’t hurt. I see more. I think less. It is easier to simply be. I found myself rather puzzled at one point, contemplating the number of times I have been chastised as a child or criticized as an adult, for the pleasure I get from being still… no wonder it was hard to find peace and balance! I was being continuously coached to give up the very thing that provides me the opportunity to find those things! 🙂 I don’t feel like I am searching for peace and balance, anymore. I feel like I am building them, within my own experience.

Someone else building peace and balance along their journey left this behind for me this morning…

Tags being, coffee and conversation, ethics and language, mindfulness, powdery mildew, roses in spring, turning 50

Categories Brain Injury, Free Will, gardening, Healthy Living, Logic & Reason, Love, Menopause, Mindfulness, Perspective, Post Traumatic Stress, Relationships, Roses, Spring, Turning 50, Uncategorized, women

Good-bye, Old Friend

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Don’t Pull That Trigger!

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I’ll Be In The Garden

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A Tear or Two

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Making a Distinction

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