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Operating Instructions
Recently it seems I‘ve been asked a lot how I come up with blog topics. There are a couple of ways actually. First, there are a lot of ideas that have circulated in my brain for a long time and I’ve never written in a formal way before. Many of them are stories I’ve used repetitiously in my career over the years and found them helpful. So sharing those is easy. I have an ongoing list that I draw upon from time to time.
The second way is when I feel a reaction to something going on in current events, or happening in my own life. My goal when I provide these is to offer another way of looking at something that might be happening, with hopes that it can be applicable to your life as well.
The third source is perhaps the most quirky. Sometimes I think I have a rather peculiar brain, but over the years I’ve learned to run with it, rather than fight it. Mostly what I mean by this is that when an idea hits me I try to capture it as best as I can. Often this is when I’m in the shower, or driving, or immediately upon waking up in the morning. I find that when I fail to get it down its usually pretty much gone forever. And I get a lot of ideas.
I like to think of these ideas as whispers from the Universe. They usually aren’t hand engraved announcements but rather a nudge to make me aware of something or more curious about something. When the latter occurs, I will often go dig up a little more information to better understand a topic. What I find so interesting, is that many times, its something I previously had no interest in.
My reason for sharing this with you is to encourage you to not “ignore” whispers. Perhaps you too, have a peculiar brain that you haven’t been “listening” to. One very common place people experience this challenge is in dreaming. Often, they will tell me that they don’t remember their dreams when they wake. I’ve found this is a cultivated practice. Try keeping a note pad beside your bed and jotting something down, even if you wake up in the middle of the night. Once your subconscious knows you are taking notes, it is more likely to be a little more forthcoming. You may find some helpful insight.
As for daytime whispers, try not discounting the information you take in and brushing it off. I’m not suggesting you try to find the shape of Jesus in your nacho chips here. I am however, suggesting that, my legitimization of events that many would chalk up to coincidence, has proven to be very helpful to me over the years. Anne Lammot titled her best-selling book “ Operating Instructions” after the phrase her father often used. She reports that he when he felt stuck, he would look to the sky and ask for his next set of operating instructions.
The biggest resistance in this arena for most of us is when we get a “message” that may be our operating instructions, we are not open to what may come, but rather are focused on what we want to hear. This often blunts us from hearing what we are offered. Another resistance is that we may not want to stop what we are doing and get quiet enough to take note. I am particularly resentful when my operating instructions come before my desired wake up time. I’ve also had to pull off the road a time or two in order to make notes. Now, I try and carry along a micro tape recorder and get down as much as I can even when I’m driving along.
Just to be clear, I’m certainly not suggesting to anyone that I hear “voices”. At least not in the technical sense. But like many of my other posts, cultivating a posture of mindfulness is essential in being able to notice what happens within you.
I’d like to finish today with a quote I love from children’s author Shel Silverstein
The Voice
There is a voice inside of you
That whispers all day long,
“I feel this is right for me, I know that this is wrong.
” No teacher, preacher, parent, friend Or wise man can decide
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A few years ago Taco Bell scored a great pun with their marketing campaign of “think outside the bun”. It was a clever twist on thinking outside the box. Are you familiar with what thinking outside the box refers to?
If not, here’s at least part of the back story.
Gestalt theoriest’s credit the phrase to experiments led by Karl Dunker in 1945. Subjects were given a candle, a box, thumbtacks and matchsticks and then asked to figure out how to attach the candle to the wall in such a way as to avoid dripping. The findings led the researcher to conclude the concept of “functional fixedness” or a person’s inability to see an object as itself, free of the meaning it has in the greater scheme of things. To learn more about this here is a link:
Another argued origin of thinking outside the box is associated with the The 9 dot puzzle. While the puzzle first appeared in Sam Loyd’s 1914 Cyclopedia of Puzzles, many management consultants throughout the 60’s and 70’s takes responsibility for linking the puzzle to a strategy for problem solving.
It works like this:
Take a piece of paper, and draw dots three across and three down so you have a square made of 9 dots.
The goal is to use only 4 straight lines (no taking your pencil off the paper), and connect all 9 dots. You may want to pause and try this a few times before I give you the spoiler.
The paradigm set up by the 9 dots causes most people to look at a “box” that contains the dots. They generally try and approach the solution by staying within the confines of the “box”. But its not a requirement, and in fact, can’t be achieved unless you go or think outside the box. To see the solution, click here:
Thinking inside the box or seeing something the way we are used to see it, (functional fixedness) is something we are all vulnerable to when we are faced with a problem. Our natural tendency is to try doing more of what we have done in the past. Sometimes it will work again. But very often it won’t. So we try and repeat it louder, faster, harder- still to no avail. Thinking outside the box means to leap into the area of what hasn’t been done before. But in order to get there, we have to become willing to see what we are looking at from a different angle or different lens.
In Dunkers experiments, people were only successful if they could use the box as fair game in their solution, rather than seeing the box as only something that held the contents of the other items. With the 9 dots solution, you have to be willing to draw lines that extend out beyond the boundaries of a box and see the space around the dots as fair game.
To solve problems in your own life you have to become willing to see yourself with a different set of eyes or labels than those you may be most familiar with.
Here is an example. I met with someone the other day who hopes to make a career change into sales. She has a marketing degree. She also worked her way through college as a server in a few restaurants. She said she gets interviews for sales jobs, but keeps getting beat out by people with more sales experience.
I suggested she wedge her foot in the door and begin talking about her sales experiencing rather than apologizing for the lack of it. She looked at me puzzled since she had just told me she didn’t have any.
So I pretended to be her in an interview and said the following as if speaking to a potential employer:
On paper it looks like I don’t have sales experience. But I can tell you that working as a server has given me a ton of sales experience. I have to begin selling the minute I walk up to a table. My attitude and demeanor have to convince the patrons that they want to invest in what is going to be a great experience for them. They may ask my opinion about menu items. I have to be knowledgeable about every item on the menu and have the ability to sell it honestly, whether or not it matches my own personal likes or dislikes. And then I have to try and convince them to buy more than they came in for. And I do it hour after hour.
My client looked at me surprised that it made so much sense to her. She had been seeing sales one way, and I went outside that box.
Do you need to look at your job, or your skills through a new lens?
How about a pathology or illness?
What about your financial state?
Could a significant relationship of yours shift by changing the paradigm through which you label it currently?
Drop me a comment, I’d love to hear your ideas and experiments.
Thanks for stopping by. I ‘d love it if you pass this on to someone else and suggest they subscribe as well.
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I’m having a bad hair day. I pretty much have bad hair days through most of April and August because these are the months it rains a lot in St. Louis and the humidity makes my hair fat.
And occasionally I have bad hair days at other times, but I also have some really good hair days. Today isn’t one of them, but I do know the difference.
I didn’t always though. When I was a kid I had this wild mound of super curly black hair. Actually it’s pretty much the same as I have now, just with no gray mixed in. I also didn’t have some of the great hair products I use now to keep my locks from oozing into the personal space of a person standing next to me.
Just about everyone I knew while I was growing up had silky straight blonde or light brown hair. But not me. So I felt like an odd duck. Okay I felt like an ugly duck. An ugly duck with bad untamable hair that had a mind of its own.
My mom, bless her heart, tried to do everything she could. I would lay my head on the ironing board while she tried to flatten it out. Not my head, just my hair. I can pick up the scent of singed hair a mile away. Over the years I tried every imaginable straightener on my own and professionally. I’ve spent a fortune on brushes, hair dryers, curling irons and OMG my retirement fund went entirely for creams, shampoos, conditioners, hot oil treatments and I can’t remember what else.
When I was about 4 my severely mentally retarded brother ran a wind up car through my hair. Cutting it out did not leave pretty results. Try picturing RoseAnn Rosannadanna with chopped out sections.
Along the way of my life, people would say “is it natural?” My answer was always “Who would pay to do this to themselves?” Others, (including my mother with baby fine poker straight hair) would say “oh you are so lucky”. I didn’t feel lucky.
But a few years ago, I did what the popular movie Frozen says. I “let it go”. I let my curls be whatever they wanted to be for the most part plus or minus a little anti frizz stuff.
Ironically, or not so, it’s not that unusual when a stranger says to me, an adult, “I love your hair”. And now I realize in fact that I AM lucky. My sister told me recently had left the house a couple times recently and realized once she was out and about haven forgotten to comb her hair. I can’t remember the last time I combed my hair. I don’t even own a hairbrush. I used to spend an hour a day blow drying my hair out. Now, my morning routine is pretty much limited to a 3 second glance in the mirror just to make sure no wild animals burrowed in during the night. We live on wooded acreage. It could happen.
Am I really writing an entire post about my hair? Nope. Stay tuned.
Recently, I received contact from a friend from about 30 years ago. Although we’re still trying to catch up on each other’s lives, one thing has become oddly apparent. Who she knew back then and who I knew her to be were two people that clearly did not exist. We both credited the other with possessing skills and strengths that were far from grounded in reality.
Perhaps we are simply blind or too inexperienced in our youth to see things of value properly. Maybe I will learn in 20 years that the things I think I see today are just as misguided. But what I now know is that my hair hasn’t changed much. I just have learned to see it from a very different lens. And similarly, the girl I was, back when my friend knew me, desperately wanted to live a life in which she could feel legitimate. The problem was that she took cues from everyone else to determine what that might/should be. It was only once I began to listen to my own voice somewhere along the way I created a life I recognized. I know today there are still people who see me as something they think I am, rather than who I really am. The difference is that i now understand it is their vision that is off, rather than whatever mask I have put forward.
I stopped wearing masks a long time ago. I found they messed up my hair.
Are there parts of yourself that you could appreciate in someone else, but fail to embrace within yourself?
Do people know you? Or do you let them know who you want them to see? Are you hiding your best attributes in fear that they won’t be good enough?
Do you try to mold parts of yourself into someone else or society’s criteria?
Are you judging yourself by a standard that is far more harsh than you would extend to another?
Is it okay to not be the same as everyone else? Or even the same as everyone expects you to be?
Thanks for taking the time to read my blog. I’d love to hear your comments. If you found this helpful, I hope you’ll pass it on to someone else. Until next time, take good care.
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I’d rather be a purple cow
I like Seth Godin. He is a quirky guy with great ideas, which are also sometimes quirky. Recently, I watched a TED talk of his and he used the example of working to find a business that is a purple cow. His point was that when we drive down the road, we see a bunch of cows, no one ever says “Hey, a cow”. But if we drove down the road and saw a purple cow, that would stand out and we might say “Hey there is a purple cow!”
I think Seth Godin is a purple cow. He is bald and wears funny glasses, and his style makes him stand out in such a way that, usually causes me to notice him even before he speaks. But his speaking as a marketing guru is worth noting as well. Through a blog, podcasts and several published books, he coaches people in business to, break outside the status quo and do something no one else had done. Smart.
But as usual, it got my mind wandering. And it wandered to the nursery rhyme you might remember:
I never saw a purple cow
I hope I never see one
But if I saw a purple cow
I’d rather see than be one.
I love nursery rhymes and children’s books, and often find them to have some of the most sage wisdom. But I actually inaccurately remembered this one the first time around. I transposed the last line to:
I’d rather be than see one.
And I’m sticking with it.
I don’t work with people every day to help them figure out how to develop a purple cow like Godin does. But as a therapist, I do often work with people who need to realize that I believe is their innate ability to be a purple cow, a green or horse, or whatever suits their fancy.
The dilemma for most people is that they too aren’t used to seeing purple cows and instead work to keep their color under wraps in order to fit in with all of the other cows.
In a recent blog (uniquely you) I talked about the importance of authenticity. If you are really a purple cow and you’ve made yourself brown or black, it’s hard to be authentic.
What is something you secretly always wished you had done? I’m not talking about the bucket list here. I’m talking about those things that you wanted to do, but felt you might not be good enough for. Or worse still, someone else thought you weren’t good enough?
How can you produce anything different if you keep your mind in the same small box that everyone else keeps theirs in? If you only play where the other cows play, eat the same food, rest at the same time, it’s hard to stand out.
To be a purple cow, means to think about what “I want” before seeing what everyone else is about to order. It doesn’t mean to become a narcissist and disregard everyone else’s wishes. It means simply to value your own separateness in conjunction with theirs.
To be a purple cow means not worrying who is looking at you, judging you. And it especially means to not worry about it even before you arrive somewhere by trying to anticipate their judgment. It means to wear what makes you feel fabulous.
Being a purple cow means to have your own feelings, rather than have them dictated by the group consensus.
Being a purple cow means to stand firm in your convictions.
Most of all, being a purple cow means to invest in the art of introspection to know yourself well enough to appreciate and value you.
Thanks for reading. I always appreciate your time and hope you’ll leave me a comment. If you like what you heard, please pass it on to someone else. Until next time. Take good care
The question is what are we hearing? We all have a tendency to hear the parts that make the most sense to us. We hear the parts that fit in the story we are writing for our lives at the time. This is true when we are having a dialogue with others by the motives we bring. It can also occur between the voices in our own head- the difference between what our eyes experience, and what our ears hear.
Let’s say I really want my husband to take me to Europe this year.
Hubby: Guess what honey, I got my bonus this year. That means we’ll be able to put the new roof on comfortably without touching our savings.
Me: Or take that European vacation we’ve always wanted to
Hubby: I don’t think we can do both.
Me: You’re right, your bonus isn’t that big. We can just wait until next Spring to do the roof with your next bonus.
Hubby, well I was planning on doing the roof this year. I mean Europe isn’t really a necessity, and the roof is important for keeping our investment in the house solid.
Me: You never want to do what I want. I’m just not important to your list of priorities. I’m always last.
Now in case you’re wondering if this is about me, we actually have a new roof on our house and I don’t want to go to Europe. But in the example, the wife hears stuff that simply isn’t in the dialogue and doesn’t hear stuff that is. Unfortunately, if the husband’s motives are pure, he is potentially trying to show his wife her value by making smart money decisions and protecting their investment.
Here is another example: If I’m writing a story about a great guy who is going to fall in love with me, take care of me forever and grow old with me in the rocking chairs on the porch, then my hearing filter goes like this:
Event My filter tells me
He is drinking excessively wow- he just likes to have fun.
He is working at McDonalds he is so humble, titles aren’t what matter
He is yelling at his mom he is a really emotional guy.
And this works the other way too- If my story is I’m a piece of crap and no one values me- my filter works like this:
Event: My filter:
Nancy invited me to go with her and her and i’ m sure she felt like she had to because
her friends. I was standing there
Ginger’s owner believes Ginger is hanging on his every word. Ginger on the other hand, is only hearing the parts that seem relevant to Ginger. And why? Because most likely, Ginger came to the exchange with a motive. In her case, get out of trouble, and get her owner to play fetch with her.
Are you aware of any motives you bring to conversations? If so, think about how they filter what you hear. If the conversations are ones that take place in your own head, think about how your pre-conceived ideas about yourself or what you are doing color what you hear back from yourself in the moment. To be a really good listener, means to be attuned to what the speaker is saying, or present in the moment of what you are observing without past judgment attached.
Most people do not listen with the intent to understand; they listen with the intent to reply. Steven Covey
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Although I identify myself as very spiritual, I am not a religious person. Nor am I even remotely biblically literate. However, over the course of my life I have attended a variety of churches and there are about 5 at best, sermons I can recall. I’d like to share a message that came from one of those. It’s not a religious message, but since I can’t give credit to the minister (since I don’t remember who it was), I at least wanted to be clear that this is not my original work. However, its something I’ve thought of many times and find useful. I hope you will too.
The story he told went something like this:
When I was studying to be a minister, I went to my mentor I asked him for advice about how to be a great minister. My mentor told me, “Remember this. When you fall on your face”….
At which point, the story teller interrupted his own story and said he was disheartened because his mentor had not said “if you fall on your face, but rather WHEN you fall on your face.”
And then he continued:
When you fall on your face, remember to fall forward. That way when you get up, you will be further ahead than when you went down.
I remember this story because I think its brilliant. The reality is that we all will fall on our face sooner or later. Some of us will fall down repeatedly. I am particularly prone to clumsiness. So learning to fall forward comes in pretty handy. It saves time.
Falling down, isn’t so bad. Sure, you can get a little bruised up. But it also gives you a different view point of yourself and the world. It can teach us humility, patience and even gratitude both from our ability to get back up, and for those who lend us a hand to assist. Falling down isn’t nearly as bad as being afraid to fall. – I’m going to say more about that soon.
What does falling forward look like? It means not considering yourself a complete failure when you fall. It means not telling yourself you are a jerk because you made a mistake. Falling forward means realizing that a little stumble doesn’t mean you start back over at square one. Even if you literally start back at square one, you do so with the knowledge that you were further ahead before and you can get back there again from memory. You don’t have to create the path all over again.
How do you feel about falling? I’d love to hear your thoughts.
No you are not confused… this is an off schedule post because I have a little news:
If all goes well, all future blogs will contain the option to “listen” to me read the blog, as well as, the current format in which you can read it yourself. So for those of you who feel crunched for time, you will be able to click on the screen and have it read to you.
In addition to the regular posts (and I have some fun ones waiting to be published), I am working on a series of e- mini books. If you heard of the Australian public service commercial called Dumb Ways to Die, it inspired me to write “Dumb Ways to Live”.
The final versions may or may not end up like the one’s I’ve begun and that are in my head, but right now there are 4 books in progress.
1) Dumb Ways to live
2) Dumb ways to screw up your marriage
3) Dumb ways to raise kids
4) Dumb ways to wreck your career
so…. stay tuned!
One of these will become free to subscribers as your “bonus”.
I also want to say thank you again for everyone who reads, and also for your great comments and feedback. The heavens have lined up and this week I have received some incredibly kind and wonderful feedback. I want this project to grow… so I hope you will pass it on and encourage others to subscribe.
The Golden Circle
– This blog is a little more for folks on the coaching side, although frankly I think its useful for anyone.
I’d like to introduce you to Simon Sinek. Simon is a human motivation author. His TED talk regarding the Golden Circle is one of the most watched TED talks to date. But before I go further, let me not assume everyone knows what a TED talk is.
TED stands for Technology, Entertainment and Design. It is a series of talks 15-30 minutes long that are available on the internet for anyone to watch. They come from diverse industries and disciplines . You can also access the free TED app on a smart phone and be notified when a new talk is posted.
So back to Simon and the Golden Circle. Simon takes you on a journey to understand the different motivations of individuals when they try to attain a goal. According to his theory, most people start with what they want to do and how they are going to do it, but can’t always articulate why. Sinek says that truly successful individuals/companies start with Why. He says people buy why you do something. (Buying doesn’t simply mean a purchase, but also includes, getting on board with what you feel is important).
For me personally, I loved this concept because understanding WHY I am a therapist is pretty easy for me to think about. I’m curious about people and the processes we use. I love the stories and the meanings of the stories people use to navigate their lives. I believe my primary role as a therapist is to interpret those stories, sometimes to add in new context or change the timing. And ultimately to help my clients to feel like they are their own authors, have a sense of agency, rather than simply playing a role that someone else has written for them.
I’ll let Sinek convince you- the link for that video is here: (Click on the words The golden circle).
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We went to the airshow last weekend. It was a great day weather wise and the show was exciting. The highlight for me, however was an exchange I had with my youngest son.
Because he anticipated the loud noise, my husband thought ahead to bring earplugs for each of us, which he distributed before we got out of the car. Once the Blue Angels were in full force Andrew and I both put ours on. These are the little foam chunk type of ear plugs. You basically squish them to stick them in your ear and they expand to block out loud noise. However, you can still hear a fair amount going on around you. Well, most people can, but my hearing is not that great to begin with.
A few minutes into the show however, Andrew began talking to me about what was going on around us. I told him I couldn’t hear him and he should wait. At that point, he pulled out one of his ear plugs and began to repeat what he said. It never occurred to him that taking out his ear plug, made neither his voice or my ears sharper. A little bit later he leaned in and said “if you want to talk to me, you don’t have to take your ear plugs out, I can still hear you.”
Have I mentioned before that Andrew is in fact gifted? He has a high IQ and is especially strong in math and science skills. Seriously he is. But he is also what I often refer to in a very loving tone as “a dumb little kid”. And as he continues to grow by leaps and bounds each day, it is that this child- like silliness that I will miss the most as he matures.
John Cabot Zinn is responsible for one of my favorite quotes which is, “Think of children as Zen masters in little bodies. They will teach you every lesson you need to learn in life”. It would be hard for me to pick out the millions of lessons my children teach me every day, which of them is the most important. (because I can certainly be a dumb adult). But the one I’m writing about today is of how it important it is to be able to laugh at myself. I’ve spent a life time trying to be smart enough, when in fact, one of the things I find so endearing about my child is the places where he is not yet “smart like the world”. It is an innocence so pure that it melts my heart. And it doesn’t feel too badly when I apply it to my own inadequacies as well.
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Is its always about me?
I picked up my son from school today. He got in the car, moaned a bit and turned his body completely away from me. I asked him if he was okay and he ignored me. I asked him again and he continued to ignore me. I asked him if he was upset with me or if something happened at school. Still no answer. We sat in silence on the ride home.
He entered the house, put up his backpack and sulked into the living room. His dad greeted him, and he offered little if any response. About 10 minutes passed. I was preparing dinner in the kitchen. Andrew came into the kitchen and without saying a word, barreled into me with an 11 year version of a bear hug. I hugged back still not saying a word. He was fine the rest of the evening.
When my husband and I first married he had to travel frequently for work. I soon learned that when Ben is on a job site he is extremely focused and compartmentalized. He has to have reminders to check in, although after 15 years with me, this has become a bit more natural for him. But back then, it was like pulling teeth to get him to remember that he was now part of a team and the other half wanted to know where he was from time to time. He would give his all to the job and by the time he got back to his hotel, often late in the evening he was pretty much shot. By the end of the week I would be missing him and happily awaiting his return on Friday evening. He on the other hand, would walk in, barely grunt a greeting, and pass me by, almost as if I was a ghost. He would go bed and crash for the night. He did not seem happy to see me.
The first couple of times this happened I wondered what on earth was wrong. Was our marriage already over? What happened on the road? Was he mad at me?
But then on Saturday morning he woke up and was his usual self. There didn’t seem to be any issue.
And then it happened again. And again. But after a couple of times I began to figure out that he was neither having marriage remorse nor a split personality. It’s Ben. As I said earlier, when he works… he works hard. And so by the time Friday night came around and he returned home, he had nothing left to give to anyone… including himself. So he did the best job he could of taking care of himself, which was, to go right to bed. After a good night’s sleep replenished his emotional stock, he was himself, still in love with his wife and our relationship proceeded as normal.
Fortunately I figured out fairly early into this process that I had a couple of choices. I could be mad, hurt, retaliatory or a host of other delectable feelings that don’t resemble my adult self. I could be dramatic- and at an earlier time of my life I probably would have been. But when I thought about what was happening, it was easy to separate his need to work the way he did and our relationship. Whether or not he could/should have worked differently is a different subject. The reality is that if his work habits were encroaching on our relationship, then we might have needed to look for a different alternative. But instead, I was able to take the route of adjusting my own expectations. Instead of planning for an ultimately disappointing reunion on Friday, I told myself that my husband wasn’t coming home until Saturday morning. Because in truth, that is the soonest the guy I loved would be showing up, even though the grumpy imposter was sharing our space. The Friday night arrival was basically a zombie not capable of giving me a high five or a gee I missed you so.
I’m not suggesting my son’s behavior is a “chip off the old block” here. But the similarity is that I can now more easily see that people can have there own brand of muck going on that causes their mood to flatten and it doesn’t have to be about me, just because I am the one in the room at the time.
I used to get very frustrated at the phrase “don’t take this personally”. I couldn’t understand how when you are the only person in the room to receive the message, how do you take it any other way? But I realize now that in fact, someone can be telling you something about themselves and where they are and it doesn’t have to be about you.. or in the example above, … me.
My son obviously was having a hard day or a hard hour or minute or whatever. He needed space. More importantly, the LAST THING… and I must repeat here (for my own benefit), the LAST thing he needed was to take emotional energy away from whatever was bothering him to focus on my insecurity or guilt or whatever I could conjure up to feel responsible for his mood. That’s not to say that when we’ve truly caused a problem for another we shouldn’t try work to figure out if we need to repair something
This is a situation in which to apply Covey’s seek first to understand. We can ask the other “are you okay, is there something you need from me” rather than assuming it’s about us and we need to go into fixing mode, even if we don’t know what we are to fix. If the other person isn’t ready to talk, then we have to learn to be patient and wait to see if the problem gets resolved without our input. Sometimes, that is the hardest part of all.
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Last week a woman was reportedly killed when she slammed into another car on the road. Authorities believe she was posting to Facebook how much she enjoyed the song “happy” at the time.
Yesterday I started to put a flash drive in my computer. It didn’t seem to want to go initially so I gave it a little extra push. It went in. And the screen went black. The computer would not turn on again.
This morning after I dropped my son off at school I was sitting at the entrance to my subdivision waiting to turn in, waiting for several cars to pass. The entrance is just after a blind curve. In the rearview mirror I saw a car coming around the curve very quickly fighting to slow down and avoid hitting me. Fortunately, I was awake and had a little extra room so I rolled forward a bit to give him more room. I noticed after he came to a stop he appeared to be picking things up from the floor board that had obviously fallen due to his abrupt stop.
Please don’t misconstrue that I think my two events are remotely comparable to the first tragedy. But the common link is that in the first two examples the intended plan not only failed, but it ended future plans in a flash (no pun intended regarding the computer). Fortunately for all, in the third case I was alert and present.
We all have in mind a strategy, a goal or a destination. We develop a path or a plan to get there and we can see it in varying degrees. We don’t normally work into the plan a provision for the crash, car or computer. But unfortunately, we often don’t take the time to be mindful in order to work in the provision for it not to happen.
What would have happened had the woman thought about the fact that she was driving and it was more important than letting her Facebook friends know about her musical preference?
What would have happened had I stopped and thought that it is not normal for Flash Drives to have such difficulty entering a USB port?
What would have happened if I had not been paying attention this morning at the entrance? Or if the other driver had been?
There is a saying “there is never enough time to do it right the first time, but there is plenty of time to do it over again and again.”
The art of Mindfulness is about slowing down, noticing the nuance of the ordinary both within and externally. It is a practice that must be cultivated to be effective. It is not only something one does, but something one is or becomes.
Is there anything you are neglecting or taking for granted simply because you are not aware? If you knew that your lack of awareness would cause it to change drastically for the worse, what would you do differently? Imagine playing the tape forward of the undesirable outcome. Then play it a second time in slow motion with a posture of mindfulness. You still have that opportunity.
What does it mean to you? Perhaps it is a time of great religious contemplation or absolutely nothing- When I was a kid I remember that my mother often bought each of us a solid chocolate rabbit. She worked in restaurants and was able to purchase these from a wholesaler making them more affordable. It would literally take us months to consume them and it often became a kind of game between my brothers and me. I’ve eaten my ears… My head is completely gone… and so the race to finish would carry on.
When my own children were small Easter looked like hiding plastic eggs around the yard or going to a Community Easter egg hunt. The giant and imposing rabbit walking around usually scared my son’s, and they were consoled only by the colorful plastic ovals filled with candy.
Whether or not you have a religious attachment to the day, Easter is still a day embedded with message of promise yet to come. Whether it’s unwrapping a chocolate bunny, opening a surprise filled egg or the blossoming of redbuds and spring flowers, there is something of jubilance on the horizon. Whatever is yet to bloom for you, I hope it is filled with joy, happiness and child-like wonder.
for an audio version of this post, click on the link below- if you are listening on a smartphone, you may have to scroll to the end of the post and look for the sound icon
If someone asks you to think of your “happy place”, where would you pick? For me, it is almost always running my hands through the silky curls atop my youngest son’s head. And fortunately, he is still young enough that I get the chance to do this in real life, not just in my mind. I think of it almost like a meditation. And it goes something like this…
Look at him
He is so beautiful
This moment is so perfect
Wow, I’m here, being with him right now
No, don’t think about it, just do it
Its great
It’s great that I’m here just being
Wait, I’m thinking about it again, I’ve left being to thinking
Think about him, be with him
He is beautiful
I wish I could stay in the moment
And so it goes when I try any form of meditation. I want to be “in the moment”- but I leave the moment to think about being in the moment. Productive? Yes and no.
I used to think meditation was the state of being absent of thought- just being still and void of thought and distraction. But I have learned that’s not really how it works—at least not for me. The real benefit I have learned from meditation is that it’s a place to practice bringing my mind back to the still and the quiet, if only for a second or two at a time. But the act of bringing my mind back itself is a useful skill that I can apply at other times in my day when I get distracted from what I want to be doing.
I walk into a room looking for my keys. I notice a glass on the counter. I start towards the glass and hear myself say “not now- just look for the keys”.
I want to sit at my computer to write, and an email comes through catching my eye- “focus on your writing, the email can wait”.
I’m cooking baking and following a recipe and my kids come to tell me about something non-urgent- I stop and listen to them. Oops- last week that resulted in my forgetting to put the eggs in to the muffin batter. They didn’t turn out so well. I wish I had used meditation.
There are a million distractions around us every single second. The choice to follow them… or not is up to us. Carolyn Myss calls this the act of “calling your spirit home”. Although we have a culturally prescribed proclivity towards doing several things at once, our brain can only process one at a time. Forcing it to do more is not good for us. The way to focus on a single track at a time is simply to practice. So pick your happy spot and visit often.
for an audio version of this post click on the links below- the file is split between two. if you are listening on a smartphone, you may need to scroll to the bottom of your screen and look for the sound icon.
When I divorced my first husband, we had to determine custody of our three dogs. I took one, he took two. Although imbalanced in numbers, it was fair enough because I took along “my girl”. Chelsea was a strapping 65 pound German Shorthair Pointer that I bought on my birthday. I used to say that if she were a human, she would have been a supermodel. She had beautiful features and a personality, from which, she communicated just by her movement, she was top dog. Chelsea could be equally aloof or loving, depending on how it best served her.
Beginning with my divorce, my life went through many transitions and Chelsea accompanied me on the journey. She took me through singlehood, remarriage, and the early stages of motherhood. Sometimes, when it seemed too rapid a change for me to know who I was, I looked at her to remind myself of the one stable that had not changed. She sat in the car in the parking lot of Barnes and Noble while I wrote my dissertation in the coffee shop. She greeted me warmly when I picked her up from the kennel on the weekends I went to Chicago for school. She waited patiently to lick the tears off my face following a disastrous bad date or a relationship woe.
I like to say she picked my current husband for me. She was so calm in his presence and clearly seemed to love him at first sight. And next came motherhood for me. Well, first came pregnancy and it was not a delicious experience for any of us. I was physically miserable and one night in my 7th month, my husband and I went out to dinner leaving Chelsea at home. We returned to find that, her activity earlier in the day had included eating rabbit poop in the back yard. How would we know this one might wonder? By the piles of black vomit on the beige carpet spread all throughout our house. All the while I cleaned the stain and the stench, I decided it was time for Chelsea to go back and live with my ex-husband. I was soon to be a mother of real children, and no longer needed this kind of “crap”- both figuratively and literally from a dog. And thus, I voted her off the island in my new world.
At least I did for a while. But I missed her. I missed her a lot. And I began commuting 25 miles each way to the home of my ex-husband for visitation weekends. They stretched in to longer periods of time. I continued to pay for her care. Once she tussled with a porcupine. The minute I picked her up from my ex- I realized her nose didn’t look right. A minor surgery later produced the quill that was lodged in her nose. I was still her momma.
But like her owner, she was starting to age. Since I did not see her every day the changes were probably more obvious for me than, they were for my ex-husband. He asked me to take her while he was going out of town. He dropped her off on his way to the airport. Almost immediately upon her arrival, I realized she did not seem like herself. That evening I watched her get very confused, backing herself into a closet as if she couldn’t figure out what to do next. She refused to eat a hot dog. Within a day I realized she was in really bad shape. I spoke to the vet. I called my ex-husband. I let him know that it was time for her to be put to sleep. He told me he had seen it coming, but didn’t feel like he could follow through. Chelsea had Huntington’s disease which is kind of like human Alzheimer’s. She could get worse, but not better.
The next morning I got up prepared to take her in. My oldest child was now five. He had grown up with Chelsea. My youngest, just barely two could pet her, but wasn’t all that attached to her. They interrupted their morning to say goodbye only at my request.
I took her through the Burger King drive through along the way. It’s a ritual we had done together many mornings before. She had no interest in the food. I thanked her for removing any shred of doubt I had, about whether or not, I was doing the right thing, at the right time. She may have been a supermodel, but she always loved to eat. When she refused again, I knew.
We arrived at the vet’s office. They administered the drugs while I held her in my arms. I pet her velvet ears and told her how much I loved her. She didn’t resist a bit. I held her until her beautiful coat turned cold. And then I left her body behind. She was done with it, and so was I.
I cried a lot. And then I cried some more. And then a little more after that. I held my children close, and I still cried. That first night I was lying with my 2 year old son Andrew helping him to get to sleep. The room was dark and I was fighting back my tears. I did not want to upset him and I knew he was too young to understand. Or so I thought. Without any provocation or explanation from me he simply said “It’s Chelsea”. Startled I asked “what?” I thought he was trying to comfort me. But he wasn’t looking at me. It’s as if he was looking at something else and he replied “It’s Chelsea, and she’s kissing you”. Andrew has always been a uniquely spiritual child.
Over the next few days my tears ebbed and flowed. I anticipated a certain amount of grieving, but I felt far more than I thought reasonable considering I now had “real children”. And I began to question why I still felt so much attachment to her. She used to be “my girl”. She was the closest thing I had to children, but she had been replaced in my world. Why hadn’t I moved on?
And then it hit me. The problem wasn’t in trying to compare if loving a dog child is as legitimate as loving a human child. The problem was in my failure to see how different they are in terms of what they bring to our lives and the role they play. I realized that although I love my children more than breath itself, they are primarily takers. The gift of our children is their ability to take from us the love we have to provide for them. Of course, they provide love back to us. But that love is developed out of the loving relationship we provide through caring for them. We love them unconditionally at first sight.
Dogs on the other hand-and I can’t speak for cats because I’ve never had one, are primarily givers. Yes, we give them food, shelter and love. They don’t care if our hair isn’t combed, if we brought home dinner from a place they like. They don’t care if we are in a good mood or how much money we make. They are ready to give us love to whatever degree we will accept it from them. And in those times when we aren’t, they will back away and patiently wait for the next opportunity. Their gift is their ability to give us whatever we will take from them. They love us unconditionally at first sight.
That realization allowed me to stop telling myself to move on from missing her, because I had it covered elsewhere. The truth is that with two beautiful boys of my own, I still didn’t have it covered. I now had other beautiful gifts in my world, for which I was grateful, but I didn’t have that one with the velvet ears any longer.
It’s been said that heaven is a place where every dog you have ever loved is waiting to greet you. I believe my girl and a few others are waiting there for me. I believe God gives us these precious creatures to remind us of what it feels like to be loved unconditionally. And while they don’t live as long as humans, I also believe he creates so many of them, so we don’t have to be without this symbol unless we choose to be.
About 2 years after Chelsea moved to the great beyond, we got our dog Snickers. She is no Chelsea! But then, Chelsea was no Snickers. Our family dog is something amazing in her own right. She loves each of us in our own unique way. Snickers, too, is starting to age, and I can’t imagine how I will manage that inevitable day of saying goodbye when it comes. And the anticipation is exacerbated by the realization, that she will probably be my last big dog, if not my last dog. I am getting older as well, and don’t really have the energy to manage 75 lbs. of romping muscle. I can’t imagine not having a dog in my life and so I’ll have to make that call when the time comes.
For now, I try not to figure that out. Today, I try to just make sure I spend as much time as I can rubbing her belly and ears and feeding her forbidden ice cream. And most of all, I try to take in all of the love she has to give me and not compare it to anything else or anyone else. In the moments I am with her, I am hers, all hers. And whether it is 2 minutes or ten, it is the occasion to experience being truly loved for the mere price of showing up. It is as pure of a love as a human can experience, diluted only by the presence of a little slobber.
As many of you know, last year I co-authored a children’s book with my 10 year old son Andrew. We published a few copies for friends and family. When I began the process of trying to put it on Amazon, I discovered that it needed to be 6 pages longer to meet their criteria. While that seemed like an easy enough task, it proved to be far more difficult.
First, I went back to our original illustrator and discovered that he was now depressed and not working. I waited several months in hopes he would return to the project. Fortunately, before he completely stopped working he had provided me with sketches of the proposed additional drawings. Eventually, I took these drawings to a new illustrator but discovered they were in PDF form rather than the design file format. So, more time went by to make that happen.
And here we are… finally! Today the book is on Createspace Estore
https://www.createspace.com/4237054.
It will take one week to get it on regular amazon. But if you purchase it through the Estore, the royalty is actually higher, so that’s my preference. And in case you’re wondering- Andrew gets all of the proceeds.
Thanks for your support if you purchase the book. I have to say I think its pretty darn cute and makes a great gift for a kid 9-14.
This is the third and final part of my burning the boats post- at least in this phase.
1. Identify the treasure
2. Identify what is in the way of the treasure
3. Develop a commitment to get rid of what is in the way
But how do you actually do that?
So, let’s use my example of writing.
I know I want to write. Something that is publishable.
That’s my treasure
What’s in the way of the treasure?
-anything I do instead of writing. Now of course I have responsibilities that have to be fulfilled. But, there are lots of other activities that I can spend time doing instead of using the time for writing. Any of those items could be considered obstacles for the treasure.
-fear could be an obstacle
Getting the idea?
Developing a commitment to get rid of what’s in the way:
I could
-make a writing schedule- agree to write 3 pages every day
-write every morning for one hour
-hire a writing coach
-submit an abstract that if accepted would make me required to finish the article
-commit to not participate in other activities unless my writing commitment was fulfilled for the day
-tell someone who would help me with accountability about a writing goal
Again, these are just some ideas to use as examples. Your boats are different than mine. By now, hopefully you are starting to take a look at things you may be thinking about doing, but haven’t gotten started. Today is a great day to take a risk!
There have certainly been moments this winter in which I feel like I’m trapped on the inside of a snow globe and can’t find my way out. The weather is a major topic these days-Even in casual conversation with store clerks etc. The other day at Bread Co, a girl told me she feels like a case study in Seasonal Affective Disorder.
Here’s what I know. Everybody is crabby! And I’m not complaining. I’m hearing more people growing concerned that their mood has been lower than they like for longer than they like. If that is the case for you right now, I hope you find some comfort in knowing you are not alone.
Some people can roll right through cloudy days with little impact on their mood. And others are strongly impacted by a lack of sun. But even if one isn’t plagued by SAD, the mere fact that it’s been so darn cold has kept a lot of people inside more than they prefer. Add to that the unusually large amount of snow this year and there is a pretty good epidemic of cabin fever. I also want to be careful to not minimize conditions that may be occurring in folks that are completely independent of the weather conditions. These should be addressed separately from this post.
So what can you do if you are among those with a case of winter blues? If in fact, you are a sufferer of SAD, you can investigate a light lamp. Some folks have reported good success with these- at least enough so to get them through. But if the issues are more related to just feeling cold and cooped up, you might consider some other options besides a long journey to Hawaii.
-Are there some old projects on your list that you’ve put off? Wouldn’t it feel great to get some of those knocked out? Now is a great time, because you’re not missing out on something else outdoors you would like to be doing.
-Is there a new skill you never have time to tackle?
-Any great books or movie classics that you’ve meant to get around to but haven’t yet?
-How about family games? Or putting together puzzles with others?
-How about using the time to get more organized? Clean out some closets, set up some systems.
-Want to try some new recipes? If you live alone, you can make them and take them to another group of people like workmates or another family.
Brace yourself, as more snow and weather muck is predicted for Sunday. And like most things, the weather isn’t something we can’t change, yet we are impacted by it. What we are in charge of however, is deciding how, and to what extent will be impacted.
Today i’d like to suggest two apps for iPhone/ipad I suspect they are available in android as well.
The other really cool part about this app is that you can email parts of it to yourself and it comes out like a “to do” list in bullet point format.
The second app is great for budgeting. With the popularity of Dave Ramsey and Financial Peace University, many people are back to using the tried and true “envelope” system for budgeting. Only this is the updated- at your fingertips on your phone version. I personally use this to keep track of certain areas that I want to be mindful of my spending…. like my crafting budget 😉
I just added some of my favorite stories like Eleven, Blind Men and the Elephant and The Starfish story to the Support Header on this site. These are stories I often refer to during the course of therapy. Now you don’t have to search for them or rely on my inept paraphrasing– they are right here for you whenever you want them.
Yesterday I was driving along when a newsflash came across my phone announcing that Philip Seymour Hoffman had died from an apparent drug overdose. Wow- Really? He had checked into rehab a couple of years ago and everyone believed he was on the straight and narrow. They found him on the bathroom floor with a syringe in his arm suggesting otherwise.
I’m not going to bash PSH. Let the poor man rest in peace from whatever demons tortured him. What I find troubling is that he is one in a long list that keeps growing. It’s certainly not that he didn’t know better. I suspect he knew all too well.
And so do I… and so do you… And yet- why is that we continue to do things over and over that we know without any doubt are harmful or even lethal to us? The obvious answer– we are human. But there are other humans that don’t, or at least not as often.
We can say it is our bad childhood, our bad marriage, we went to the wrong school, not enough money, education…. Another long list. But at the end of the day it really comes down to something very simple-although not easy- And that is that we have to make a decision every single minute of every single day- to live well or to not live well. To be our best self- or to not be our best self. And so often, we have created lives so full of noise, distraction and patterns that allow us to feel like we don’t have time to think through those decisions. Instead we just move like a pinball from bumper to bumper in a way that appears to be directed by everything and everyone except us.
Looking at only the day Hoffman died and saying it was from a drug overdose, I think does him a disservice on so many levels. But certainly not the least of these is discounting all of the events that led up to that fatal decision. Was he troubled? Maybe. Or did he just not want to feel some type of pain? Did he mean to end it all or was he just trying to get relief?
Addictions, vices, provide a temporary escape from the reality and hardness of life and that of course, is what makes them so attractive and appealing. Some are more temporary than are others. And we “treat” them by focusing on the symptom. We educate ourselves about the perils of alcohol, drugs etc.
But the symptom, I think isn’t the use of our vices– rather, its our unwillingness and fear to not use them. It’s our insecurity or disbelief that we will be able to live well if we meet life head on-on life’s terms, rather than on terms we feel are “fair” or desirable.
Someone told me once that “if you do what you are supposed to do, when you are supposed to do it, things generally turn out okay”. I believe there is a lot of merit to that- but it’s not full proof. Sometimes you can do everything you are supposed to do, and things still don’t turn out like you think they are supposed to. Then what?
Then what is that we need a plan B that is based on the 3Rs– Not reading riting and rithmatic, but Regulation, Resiliency and Reverence.
Regulation- how much do we really need? Do those needs come from an internal voice we recognize and trust?
Resiliency- Can we handle getting our needs met? Can we handle it when they don’t? How do we react/respond when needs are met and not met?
Reverence- Do we have a good balance between the desire to get our needs met and the needs of those around us? Do we appreciate what it means to have our needs met. Does it satisfy us?
I had to look at the date on my calendar just now to be sure.
Yesterday a friend told me she had begun training for a half marathon in April. She said she had completed the first week and now had 11 more to go. My first thought was, wow I have friends with much greater ambitions than I do. But my second was holy cow! April is only 11 weeks away? It seems like yesterday that I was lamenting about how quickly summer passed.
When I was a kid like most people, time seemed to pass so slowly. And yes, I remember that everyone said it would speed up as I got older. But I realize now that even my kids think time passes so quickly these days. They too never seem to have enough.
Time hasn’t changed, but we have. We are all so ridiculously over booked, over invested, overstimulated. And most of all we are deprived of being under deprived. Yes I just made that up.
Time used to drag on because we had to wait for things. We didn’t fill our summers as children with 12 weeks of camp in a 10 week summer. We had to wait for someone to communicate with us, visit with us, take us somewhere. We sometimes didn’t have anything to do except watch bad television on TV or go ride our bike some place. And in the long stretches of nothingness (deprivation) we got bored. And boredom made our time drag on.
Fast forward to today. Who has time to get bored? We don’t have time to finish projects because we are already on to three others. If we want to communicate with someone across the globe, we can send an email or text and expect a response back within hours if not immediately. If we can’t visit someone we can see them in face to face interaction over the internet. And while these are wonderful innovations that enrich our lives in so many ways, they do so at a price. The price of gratification is to some extent deprivation. We are deprived of our boredom. We are deprived of the ability to see time passing slowly enough to recognize its passing.
It brings up a paradox that eastern philosophers have already understood. The further you try to move from something the closer you get to it. Avoiding deprivation causes deprivation. Whenever we are trying vehemently to avoid something it means we are remained focused on the something, and therefore it is impossible to get free of it. If I want to avoid my aunt Gladys then I have to always know where my aunt Gladys is and what she is doing so I know not to be anywhere she is. This means that while I think I’m successful at avoiding running into her at the grocery store, I’m in a constant conversation with the version of her I’ve created in my head.
So to avoid losing or wasting time, we schedule everything. We make the “most” of our time by multi-tasking. Given the results, I’d have to defer to Dr. Phil on this one and say “how’s that working for ya?” As for me, not very well, given my surprise reaction to my friends declaration yesterday.
So what would it be like instead of thinking about what we have to get done, should get done, to instead fill our calendars based on what would add the most to me by doing? What would it be like to set our priorities in terms of is this an activity that is good for me, bad for me or neutral? And what would it mean to schedule in some “Nothing” every day.
I can hear you now. “Yea right! schedule some nothingness. Lets see you try that!” I am not suggesting that you block out a day, an afternoon or even an hour. It is really meant as a rhetorical question to think about when we are overscheduling to “save” time. I am not suggesting that we go back to the days without technology, only that we stay conscious of how silly our notation of “look, we are succeeding at eradicating something” is. Time doesn’t get preserved because we use it efficiently. Time doesn’t get preserved PERIOD. You haven’t succeeded at getting more time just because you do two things at once. You’ve made time seem more fleeting because you were so busy. Hopefully staying mindful of this promotes an opportunity to use a different criteria for deciding how to spend this precious commodity.
