The other day I was experiencing a bit of a rough patch. Emotionally, high-low and feeling so raw; mentally, the dryer called my brain wouldn’t stop tumbling; physically, I ached into the marrow of my bones. I mean, sheeeesh.
I called out, “I just wanna feel peaceful!”
Then I heard the Still Small Voice. “So, be at peace.”
It was then that I realized that I was insisting that life organize itself SO THAT I can feel peaceful… when I know that the way it works is that I FEEL PEACEFUL and life organizes itself around that frequency.
Now, not easy-peasy… but do-able.
I chose in that moment to find something for which to be thankful, breathed deeply a few times, focused on opening my heart-space, and watered my plants. I then took a few minutes to listen to a guided meditation and rest.
My nervous system calmed; I began to feel at peace. And the world around me began to look different. I saw more Hope, more Joy, more Community.
Emerging can be scary, uncomfortable… but only because it’s unfamiliar, not because we can’t…
If today you find yourself feeling out of sync, agitated, despaired, exhausted… some days, me too. We’re not alone in this metamorphosis! We’re emerging together… so take heart, slow down, breathe, reach out… know that I love you… and here’s a hug.
If you like these ponderings, please check out my 30-day journals. They’re just perfect for someone like you. 🙂 Downloadable pdfs on a variety of topics. Sure to encourage, inspire, motivate, and create meaningful ponderings. ❤
We’re BECOMING more human… we’re EMERGING from caterpillar-to-mush-to-butterfly. We’re experiencing all the drama, the depths, and the desires. We’re alchemizing, transmuting, and transforming. Welcome to your life!
Daughter called in a panic last night. Snow on the highway and she skidded. It wasn’t like last year when she lost control on the 219, doing a U-ey and hitting the guard rail. Still, it was damn scary for her.
And for me. There’s something about hearing your child’s panic that causes you to sit up at full attention and take charge. Or at least, that’s the way it for me. Mama Bear mode immediately turns on and I’m on the prowl. I will protect my young at any and all costs. I don’t mean to be this way. It’s an automatic reaction. And one for which I have no apology.
My children are my heart walking around outside my body. Protective a bit? Uhm, oh heck yes.
Mom, everything is okay. Well, kinda. Sorta. I’m, I’m, I’m pulled over and really scared. I skidded and I’m so afraid to drive now.
Daughter, with labored breathing and racing mind
Why is it that my first reaction is to want to get in the car and drive there and hug her and let her know that she is safe and I will always protect her? Like, it’s visceral. Fierce like a lion. Or a mama bear. I can almost feel the growl making its way up from my guts and out my mouth.
I will stay on the line with you. We will get you home safely! I will do whatever it takes, hon. I will never leave you.
Me… and I may have even actually growled but maybe not, I don’t know, I get lost and forget in all the words and sniffles
We both want to stay in control. To be in control and stay there, goddammit. She wants to control the weather and the car; I want to control the weather and the car and her safety and her happiness and her – oh god, well, her everything.
Truth. I can’t stay to know my children – or others, each and every one – are afraid, out of sorts, disappointed, discouraged, grieving…
And yet, all of these are part of our human evolution, our Becoming, our physical experience here on Mother Earth. Even my wanting to protect is an experience! Even my cringeing at anyone’s discomfort is part of my experience!
It’s all part of it. The Becoming. Every conversation, every experience, every feeling, every memory… all part of this beautiful EMERGING.
Daughter arrived safely at her gym, chewed up a short workout – which helped her calm down into her body – and we resumed our chat-while-I-navigate-these-sucky-snowy-roads. Nestled into her apartment, she bid me good night.
It’s these little things, these small moments and tiny conversations that make up a life, that create a more evolved human – one that is “more”.
more aware of their heart space
more awake to their role in others’ lives
more plugged in to this breath, this moment
more grateful for just this breath, this moment
more insightful
more wise
more peaceful, calm in the midst of the chaos
Two roads. I am meandering down the less taken. It’s making all the difference.
If today you find yourself panicky, sometimes me too. Breathe. Reach out. You’re not alone. We are not alone. And we are definitely, oh most definitely loved… and here’s a hug.
If you like these ponderings, please check out my 30-day journals. They’re just perfect for someone like you. 🙂 Downloadable pdfs on a variety of topics. Sure to encourage, inspire, motivate, and create meaningful ponderings. ❤
Me: How you feeling after the catheter was removed?
Her: Awful. I just feel drained.
Me: I’ll be right over!
how I responded to BFF’s post-surgery blues
And not only did I pop over for a visit… I brought massage oil. Because nothing grounds us into our bodies and relaxes us more than a foot massage. Yes, please and thank you!
It’s been a long journey for her. Numerous surgeries, recoveries, pain, disappointment when the pain continued and there required yet another operation. It’s just been a damn lot on her and it’s hurting me to witness her struggling in the midst of this latest invasive procedure.
But I remain hopeful! The surgeon is new and passionate and learned, asks good questions, appears wise and caring. She offered a different approach – yes, invasive – but one which we hope reorganizes the mess of organs and scar tissue in there.
The real purpose of giving massage is to foster more depth of feeling for one another in order to bring out the love that often lies buried beneath the pain of everyday suffering.
Robert Calvert
We had a few hearty laughs together, me with her feet in my hands. I can’t love her more than I do right now. She’s the BEST.
This is friendship. We care for one another, through good times and bad, fearful moments, celebrations, frustrations, and operations. It’s what we do, right? We’re there for each other, holding hands, hearts, space…
and sometimes even feet.
If today you find yourself drained, frustrated, and in pain… consider a foot massage. They’re grounding, energizing, calming… it feels good to be touched, listened to, honored. I’m sorry you’re struggling, dear One. I’m here for you… and here’s a hug.
If you like these ponderings, please check out my 30-day journals. They’re just perfect for someone like you. 🙂 Downloadable pdfs on a variety of topics. Sure to encourage, inspire, motivate, and create meaningful ponderings. ❤
Every single one of my children enjoys animals. As adults living in their own homes, some have adopted pets. I have grandfurbabes in the form of cats, dogs, gerbils, hamsters, hedgehogs, and rats.
Yes, rats.
Recently, SecondSon moved homes and, at one of the last treks, crated up the kitties for the relocation. Oh how the cats howled at being crated and moved! But they survived the transfer and are now nestled safely into their new space, acclimating slowly but surely.
New surroundings. New places to venture. New areas to hide in, dig up, pee on, sleep.
SecondSon’s house has a great vibe… we’re so happy for him! It’s been his dream to find a few acres with a creek and woods and a house to call his very own. Mission accomplished!
I drove the two hours there yesterday to paint the bedrooms and Feng Shui the furniture. The cats danced in the dust. They’re not helpful but remain super cute and entertaining, so…
It’s been a rough-but-worth-it season for SecondSon, who has done all the moving and paperwork almost all by himself. It’s been big energies the past couple of months for him. We couldn’t be more proud of his efforts or impressed by his tenacity and grit, vision and excitement.
We laud him loudly!
SecondSon was glad to have most everything transferred from the one house to the other. Living in limbo has been shredding his energies. He was anxious about moving the cats and hopeful that their transition to the new place would go smoothly.
Pets have a way of making a house become a home. Their frequency is calming, welcoming, grounding. Yes, it has been a bit of a trying time for SecondSon but…
But the cats approve, so there’s that…
If today you find yourself not here but also not quite there, you’re not alone. Transitions can take time and be exhausting. Ask for help… and here’s a hug.
If you like these ponderings, please check out my 30-day journals. They’re just perfect for someone like you. 🙂 Downloadable pdfs on a variety of topics. Sure to encourage, inspire, motivate, and create meaningful ponderings. ❤
The capacity for getting along with our neighbor depends to a large extent on the capacity for getting along with ourselves.
The self-respecting individual will try to be as tolerant of his neighbor’s shortcomings as he is of his own.
E. Hoffer
FurButt Gia and LilFurButt Peaches… two peas in a pod… enjoying an evening on the couch. Theirs is a simple world – heavenly, even. They’re fed, warmed, petted, tended. It’s a good life indeed.
They haven’t always seen eye to eye, paw to paw, tail to tail. Peaches was here first and claimed that Alpha vibe upon Gia’s arrival. Gia, all 75 pounds of her, begged to differ.
It’s been a journey… I guess even being a pet can be a lot. 😉
We’re thrilled to report that acclimation has been reached. They may even consider each other friends. They share the same water bowl, often eat the same food. (That’s not my idea… they each get their own food dish.) They nap on the same doggie bed upstairs in the hall and share the same end of the couch. There is peaceful co-existence among the pets here at our house.
Gia is fully aware of Peaches’ knack for the dramatic.
Peaches gives plenty of space to Gia’s awkward gait and occasional need to chase, bark, and otherwise disrupt the calm.
We don’t get harmony when everyone sings the same note. Only notes that are different can harmonize. The same is true of people.
S. Goodler
… and pets …
Why can’t we all just get along?
Husband’s favorite sentiment
Fear. Fear is why… but we’ll continue that convo another day… today, Gia and Peaches are getting it right and it’s a start. For this, we’re thankful.
If you like these ponderings, please check out my 30-day journals. They’re just perfect for someone like you. 🙂 Downloadable pdfs on a variety of topics. Sure to encourage, inspire, motivate, and create meaningful ponderings. ❤
Patience is not sitting and waiting, it is foreseeing. It is looking at the thorn and seeing the rose, looking at the night and seeing the day. Lovers are patient and know that the moon needs time to become full.
Rumi
Sister has asked me to create for her a long sound bowl bath on my YouTube channel. She enjoys these frequency-baths very much and wants something she can listen to as she nods off, something that is still playing should she awaken through the night.
Ya know, something 8 hours long…
Immediately I got to work! Creating, editing, looping, uploading, uploading, uploading.
UPLOADING.
Little was I aware that the uploading process would consume 36 hours of my life! Little was I aware that my browser was set to “go to sleep” every few minutes… which meant that, to maintain a connection for uploading to occur, I had to “wiggle the mouse” every few minutes… for 36 hours.
36 hours, people. 36 hours.
Well, the good news is… I’m nearly there! I’ve discovered a few things on this adventure:
I can reset my browser to stay the eff awake for an hour before I have to mouse-wiggle. This, of course, I learned AFTER the 36 hours. :-0
I am a really patient soul. I breathed into each hour, thankful for one more down and this-many-more to go… I amazed even mahself. 😉
I love my sister… well, duh, knew I loved her… but there bubbled up within me a Love that surpasses understanding… like a dog with a bone, a goddamn mama bear… a protective, relentless spirit arose within me that I knew was there for my children but hey it’s here for Sister too… ❤
The work has been intense, the labor long and tedious, but the fruit on the tree is pleasing and worth it all. I’m just so excited to share this labor of love and patience with Sister and my YouTube community.
Patience does not mean to passively endure. It means to be farsighted enough to trust the end result of a process.
Elif Shafak
Every single on of these souls is worth all my efforts… for truly, we are One. When any one of us is healed, cared for, tended to, gifted… WE ALL ARE.
That said… I am off for a nap as I anticipate with sheer excitement the culmination of many hours of work, a ton of patience, and one really great idea (thanks, Sis!) 🙂 ❤
If today you find yourself on the giving end, thank you. I receive your Love. On the receiving end? Thank you for accepting my Love to you. We are ONE… and here’s a work of art: 8 HOUR SOUND BATH … aaaaaand here’s a hug.
If you like these ponderings, please check out my 30-day journals. They’re just perfect for someone like you. 🙂 Downloadable pdfs on a variety of topics. Sure to encourage, inspire, motivate, and create meaningful ponderings. ❤
I was having an anxiety attack. It wasn’t a big one, and I was doing my very best to control it, understanding it, reason with it, push it into the corner and coax it back down in the basement.
Because I had company. And having a panicky episode is messy and embarrassing and oh-my-god-no-not-in-front-of-others… I’m not one to unpack all my shit out loud. Middle of the night, journaling, under a tree, to the FurButt… but not at a dinner gathering.
But energies do what they do. The body reacts the way it does and begs to be heard, seen, honored on its journey through the ache to healing. Nothing in us wants to be rejected, not even the pain.
I was being given the opportunity to welcome the emotions and memories bubbling up in this moment in response to an event that was happening that was triggering something from the deep. Uncomfortable, yes. Messy, oh friggin’ yes.
But here we were, being invited into the depths of my ache, into the recesses of Pain for the purpose of revelation and healing.
It’s a damn lot, this human experience. A damn lot. 😉
Husband knew I was struggling in the deep end and threw a life vest my way best he could: he talked me logically through the situation, pointing out how “your conclusions are wrong and here are the correct ways to think and so now all is well and please god feel better because I love you and seeing you like this is making me frustrated.”
I recognized his kindness but the life vest wasn’t helpful. I needed more than an intellectual argument to see me through to Peace.
Luke was visiting… he quietly asked if I would be open to putting my hand on his heart, his hand on my heart, and we breathed together. Deep breaths in (my mind is calm) and releasing breaths (my body is at peace.) Deep breaths in (thank you) and releasing breaths (I love you.) Long, long hug… we embraced until I pulled away, which was settling, grounding, assuring.
In this short few minutes, we had stepped out of time, out of space… into the Wonder-land of Peace.
Few words, energetic connection through the hands – such vital chakra points here – and the heart – big portal IN – and the breath. MAGICAL.
I understood that the young child within me had been abandoned and she created a story of death around that long-ago event that I had now brought into my present moment, and it was triggered by a current event (the SD card wouldn’t go into a camera I had just purchased… go figure, it would seem these two events could not be related but the body has a way of revealing unhealed parts in the oddest ways.)
Talking me through at that time wasn’t helpful. Approaching my body energetically through heart-hand-breath calmed my nervous system and created a frequency in which I could “hear” Husband’s logic.
Body’s nervous system first. Approach the body-held trauma first via energies. When ready, re-organize thoughts, allowing old mindsets to be revealed and re-storied. But the body FIRST.
Luke reminded me that I am the one who showed him the heart-hand-breath practice… yes, I knew this healing path… but I also have come to realize that healing is done in community, among us all, in safe space, willing hearts, open hands, and slowed breath.
It was a magical evening indeed.
If today you find yourself in panic mode, I really do understand what you’re going through… so keep going! Don’t stop! The only way out is through, IN to the heart space, that portal into the Depths where True Identity resides and healing abides. Let’s go there together… and here’s a looooooooong hug.
If you like these ponderings, please check out my 30-day journals. They’re just perfect for someone like you. 🙂 Downloadable pdfs on a variety of topics. Sure to encourage, inspire, motivate, and create meaningful ponderings. ❤
Having a child is like wearing your heart outside of your body.
Erma Bombeck
SecondSon bought a new house. We went to see it today. I love it! He loves it! The house itself needs work, yes, but it’s definitely worthy of being called Home. The land on which Home sets upon is DIVINE. I love it! He loves it!
Home is two hours away from me. I don’t love it! Neither does he!
And yet… he ventures on into this new territory. Excited, wide-eyed, full of ideas, dreams, hopes. I love it! He loves it!
The human heart was not designed to beat outside the human body and yet, each child represented just that — a parent’s heart bared, beating forever outside its chest.
Debra Ginsberg
I am finding this to be one of my most difficult seasons. SecondSon and ThirdSon live two hours and 26 hours away. I feel their absence deep into my bones and I ache. And yet, I rejoice for them. They’re living their lives out loud and making a splash. How can I be anything but beside them in excitement, encouragement, and elation?
Mothers and their children are in a category all their own. There’s no bond so strong in the entire world. No love so instantaneous and forgiving.
Gail Tsukiyama
And so, I’m learning to hold both. I’m learning to hold both deep gladness and deeper sadness within my heart, into the marrow of my bones. I am learning to show them my smiles and hip-hip-hurrah’s, saving my tears for the prayer closet and conversations with God and Husband.
Motherhood is the biggest gamble in the world. It is the glorious life force. It’s huge and scary — it’s an act of infinite optimism.
Gilda Radner
I see how my FiveBeautifulSouls are each journeying so bravely, so full of wonder and awe and a willingness to RISK and fail and try again and fall and get up and go at it again… and I feel proud. I’ve done well that my children would love themselves and honor their dreams enough to follow them, even when those dreams take them far from me. I have taught them to LIVE FULLY, to grab life by the short ones and give a good goddamn yank. I love it!
The art of mothering is to teach the art of living to children.
Elaine Heffner
Perhaps I’ll move someday or perhaps they’ll move again… and we’ll find ourselves closer in physical proximity. One thing I know is that our bond, our emotional proximity, is as tight-close-nestled-in as ever, regardless of where any of us call Home. There are no neighborhoods or states between our heartbeats. I love it!
If today you find yourself missing someone, me too. I really dig where you’re at right now. Perhaps walking beside each other for a stretch would help us both to remember that no distance or time can separate us from our loved ones. We are one. Always. Forever. No matter what… and here’s a hug.
If you like these ponderings, please check out my 30-day journals. They’re just perfect for someone like you. 🙂 Downloadable pdfs on a variety of topics. Sure to encourage, inspire, motivate, and create meaningful ponderings. ❤
I lighten my load so that others may change theirs
I learn to see so that others may also see
I forgave myself so that I may help others to forgive
I love myself so that I can bring out love to others
I am a lightworker
I live to give comfort
I live to shine loving light onto others
I live to heal
I live to give hope
I live for truth
I live to love.
Spent four hours with a dear friend from the long-ago. We chatted nonstop. We listened nonstop. We giggled, hugged, mirrored, honored. It was magical and I loved every moment.
We are both Intuitive Healers, Spiritual Guides with a passion to help others help themselves, to wake up, to discover, remember, and BE who they are. It is sacred work, sometimes exhausting but always exhilarating and rewarding.
She talked Numerology; Vibration and Frequency was my lingo… but at its core, we both spoke Love.
Each of us is on our healing journey still which keeps us humble and open, compassionate and gentle with others. I’m thankful to know her, to be able to share this leg of the journey with her. She’s high vibe.
She’s full of integrity. I like to believe this is where we meet, at our integrity and sense of responsibility.
She oozes great ideas, bold networking possibilities and cool workshop ideas. I do not. We do NOT meet here… 😉
Yep, it’s a good thing I know her… she gets me “out there” and invites me into her life, grabs hold of this introvert’s hand if necessary. 😉
Life will always lead you where you can do the most good. Your presence is needed here.
Friends. Holy connections. Sacred.
If today, you find yourself feeling lonely, whisper “I am open to a friend” and open your heart and arms to what comes next… and here’s a hug.
If you like these ponderings, please check out my 30-day journals. They’re just perfect for someone like you. 🙂 Downloadable pdfs on a variety of topics. Sure to encourage, inspire, motivate, and create meaningful ponderings. ❤
The first fall of snow is not only an event, it is a MAGICAL event. You go to bed in one kind of a world and wake up in another quite different, and if this is not enchantment… then where is it to be found?
J. B. Priestley
Yes, it snowed for the first time this latter part of the year. I was surprised, not having even an inkling that it was on its way. Awoke to take FurButt for her morning constitutional only to find that I would indeed need my boots, coat, hat, and scarf.
It was absolutely delightful!
With First Snow, everything looks different, smells different when it’s snowing. There is a calm, a hush that permeates the air, my soul. I feel more grounded, less stressed, more open. Excitement for the season ahead rushes through my veins and I ponder cookie recipes and get out pen and paper to log Christmas gift ideas.
First Snow. Enchanting.
Magical indeed.
Someone remind me of this when I forget at about the 13th friggin’ damn stupid snowfall and I’m sick of shoveling and where the hell are my boots anyway who thought it was a good idea to live here oh my god where are my gloves…
If you like these ponderings, please check out my 30-day journals. They’re just perfect for someone like you. 🙂 Downloadable pdfs on a variety of topics. Sure to encourage, inspire, motivate, and create meaningful ponderings. ❤
Writing Every Day Down 