Under a Cornflower Blue Sky

Hiking at Barr Lake before the leaves came out this spring

These last two years have a been a wild ride. The grief part was not so fun, but the rest I've enjoyed more than a body has a right to. After I let go of the need to control my world (and the idea that I actually could control my world--ha ha), I had a lot more fun.

Talking to a new friend last night at happy hour, I explained my philosophy. Nothing really irks me, or if it does, it's momentary. Sure, sometimes I get down or anxious, but now I can recognize the old pattern (neural, emotional, behavioral, physical, whatever) and that it doesn't serve me anymore. The lesson of, "Notice it, sit with it, laugh about it, and then let it go," has sunk in after much repetition and practice.

"You realize that's an extraordinary claim to make," my friend, Adam, said, referring to my self-proclaimed ability to be content and happy 99% of the time. I looked at him and smiled. That's all I can do these days, smile and laugh. But he believed me. I could tell. There are some people you meet, and you immediately know they are genuine. He's one, and I'm one.

Finally, finally, I'm doing nothing but attracting the right kind of people into my life. These are the folks who speak their truth, have a deep understanding of how lucky they are to have the things they have, and can accept who they are right now while being open to change. Manifestation is a powerful, powerful tool.

And speaking of lucky, I haven't made a gratitude list lately. Here it is, in no particular order:

• Friends and family who love me, support me, and challenge me to be a better person
• My teacher and classmates in the year-long seminary program I am about to complete (see my website at TheDivineInYou.com for more info on my intuitive healing and spiritual facilitation services)
• A beautiful community to live in, and the bike path I can hop on at a moment's notice
• Sunshine, the smell of flowers and freshly mown grass, bird song
• A reliable car
• Healthy food to eat
• My health
• A certain little brown dog who lives with me
• Technology
• Music in its infinite variations
• Really good stout beer
• Consciousness and connection to the larger world

Amen!

More recent adventures that are part of the new, "Let go and have fun" philosophy:

Messing around at the Stock Show in January

Visiting the tiny little house I grew up in this spring

About to dig in to a delicious dessert to celebrate the New Year

Happy Solstice! or What a Year Will Bring

Cut to me staring at my computer screen in utter disbelief, exactly one year ago. It was around midnight on the longest day of the year, and the world as I knew it came to an end. My assumptions about love and trust were called into question. My identity, as it had exactly four years earlier when I lost my job, was blown apart.

Slowly, or some might say quickly, I rebuilt. Boy, was I ready for it, too. It was about time I concentrated on fixing me instead of everyone and everything else. I learned a lot in therapy.

Lesson #1: slow down.

Lesson #2: slow is fast.

Lesson #3: the need to fix others masks the need to look inward.

These lessons were what my friend Emily calls two-by-four moments (you know, because you feel like you got hit in the head with a two-inch-by-four-inch piece of wood, which, if you don't know, is also six feet long--let's just say big). And they just kept coming.

I worked hard. I took a close look at parts of me that I would have preferred to leave in the dark. I learned how to let myself feel and not judge those feelings. I learned how to show loving kindness to myself, because if you don't do it for yourself, it's tough to ask it of those around you. Today, I'm just happy that life can be this good. And simple. I love simple.

A supporting sister and best friend are my rocks, and they call me out on my crap when I'm slipping back into the old ways. New friends that I feel like I've known forever keep popping up. I get a big, dopey grin on my face when I think about my kind, loving, patient, fun, funny boyfriend.

I lost 57 pounds. I wish them well on their journey, because I'm not going to go looking for them. I started cooking again--a piece of the old me that I happily reintegrated. A new career called to me, and I'm doing the difficult but fulfilling training to become the best me I can be in that role.

I have a lot of adventures. A community of folks showed up to teach me how to speak the new language of acceptance and peace. The universe takes care of me. I'm in love with the world.

This is bliss.

Ready for a celebration

Already celebrating with my sister

My boyfriend's dog, Lulu, demonstrating my philosophy of life: it's all good; let's just take 'er easy on the couch

I Am a Yogini

When I started practicing yoga seven months ago, I never dreamed it would be instrumental in my transformation from caterpillar to butterfly. I was simply in search of something--anything--that would help me cope with the changes in my life. The stress had to have an outlet.

A teacher in a recent yoga practice explained that when caterpillars cocoon, they don't just grow wings. Some cells change chemically. Embryonic cells that were present from the egg stage start to divide. The caterpillar reforms into a brand new being.

"Basically, they turn into goo," she said, translating for anyone who might be getting lost in the talk of cellular transformation. "And we do that in yoga practice over time," she explained. I couldn't agree more.

With the guidance of many patient and loving teachers, I have broken down old thoughts about my mental and physical barriers. I've learned how to connect my breath to my movement. I've reached places inside my mind and body I never even knew were there.

The physical benefits are astounding. My muscles are more toned and I am stronger than I have been in my entire life. I am flexible, as evidenced by my ability to twist my body like a pretzel. I can balance my entire body weight on one leg while lifting the other leg straight behind me and my arms straight in front of me.

But even more important than the physical benefits are the emotional and mental benefits. Yoga calms me. It reminds me to look inward. It makes me remember that my thoughts show up physically somewhere in my body, whether that's in a sore neck or an upset stomach.

At the beginning of almost every practice, the teacher reminds me to set an intention for the time I'm about to spend. This habit of setting intentions crosses over into all areas of my life, with the result that I get exactly what I intend most of the time. The teacher instructs the students to breathe in all good things that the universe has waiting for us and to breathe out healing, light, and love for ourselves and the world.

Language I've learned in my journey with yoga:

Hatha: union of the sun and the moon--a joining of mind and body that results in strength and vitality

Om Namah Shivaya: there is no literal translation, but I've interpreted this as, "I honor the divine in myself, in you, and in all beings."

Namaste: a greeting that means, "I acknowledge the divine and innate goodness in you"

Om: a chant that reminds us that everything we do should be for the betterment of the universe

The incorporation of the language of yoga into my everyday world is an outward manifestation of the inner change--the transformation from caterpillar to butterfly. Physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual adjustments are all a part of my journey. It is something akin to the deconstruction and reconstruction the caterpillar undergoes. I see what the teacher was trying to help us acknowledge. I am a yogini.



Photo credit: Ambro at freedigitalphotos.net

Upsy Daisy

Some people are lucky to ever get a flash of knowing, where they can see how interconnected we all are: us to each other on a face-to-face level, us to each other on a super-conscious level, and us to a higher power. Lately, everything is coalescing for me, and I get the sense of knowing more and more continuously. It happens so much that I vibrate at a higher level. I live in that world of connectedness almost all the time now.

I love it here. It's stunningly beautiful. It's warm and bright and happy. It's better than sitting on a rock in the silent desert in the heat of the day. It's better than hearing the birds fly over your tent early in the morning. It's better than floating in a cool pool on a hot day. It's better than seeing a wild animal in its natural habitat before it sees you.

Why is this world of connectedness better than any of those things? Because I can see and feel and hear them any time I want to. Not just remember them, but actually experience them. If you'd told me that a year ago, I'd have told you that you were coo coo for cocoa puffs. Well, I wouldn't have told you to your face, but I'd have thought it for sure.

And now, well, I'm a believer. The more I open my mind to the world and all of its possibilities, the bigger my heart gets. The more my heart expands, the more my soul grows. They keep chasing each other, laughing and tumbling through fields of daisies, like children who never contemplate day's end, or if they do, it's only to give a moment's thought to how much fun they'll have tomorrow. And if I think regretfully of the past, one of them tells a joke that involves chicken feathers. Or asks me what shape I think souls take. Or sends me to kirtan to chant and bliss out.

So here's that shakes out in a workaday world:

I laugh a lot.
I do more of the more meaningful work.
More than ever before, I see all sides of things.
I attract like-minded people into my life.
I learn things at the speed of light.
I forgive easily.

Here's it shakes out in life:

I breathe. Deeply.
I sing my heart out in the car.
I get high on protein, yoga, and endorphins.
I listen to hip-hop music super loud and turn the bass up to get the full effect.
I really feel for the guy who fell off his bar stool at the local divey bar.
I do cookies in unplowed parking lots.
I flirt and watch what happens.

Exercise as Meditation

It's been a while since I last posted: I've been working quite a bit and spending time on volunteer endeavors. I've also been creating space and new energy for spring, the new year, and the new decade. A piece of creating that energy is getting outside again to work in the garden and walk.

Walking in the neighborhood is convenient and quiet, which I appreciate. But I also walk on trails and in open space parks to change the scenery and listen to new bird song. No matter the location, I notice the little things, like how the bare spring branches look against the blue, blue sky. Or how tiny the purple flowers are on the ground cover that has just greened up. Or how the grumpy old man who walks with his grumpy dog twice a day, every single day seems a little less stooped when the weather turns warmer.

The robin's song is calming, while the grackle's and the red-winged blackbird's calls give me a little jolt of energy. When there is water, I tune in to the sound of it and slow down to admire a particularly fast or slow place in the stream and think about the fish that are (I hope) swimming there. Sunlight-dappled trails, stunning views of the mountains, and watching the growth of the leaves on the trees engender an intensely meditative state even while I am breathing hard and working with my hand weights.

Interestingly, what I do not like about these walks is interacting with other folks on the trail. Colorado walkers and bikers usually say hello as they pass, and I don't want to say hi back. Being an extrovert, this seems like a contradiction in my personality, but it does drive me a little mad. I am "in the zone" when I'm walking, and having to make eye contact with and greet dozens or hundreds of people takes me right out of it. I feel like I'm dating or networking at sonic speed, which is exhausting.

Exercise, for me, is meditation. I've tried to problem solve on these walks alone, and my mind is just blank. I wonder how many other people feel the same way. Perhaps we could all just say no to speed dating on the trail and instead focus on our breathing and just which shade of blue the sky is today. Would that make the time spent outside more satisfying, and more fun?

The Power of Positive Thinking

A story called "Emotional Training Helps Kids Fight Depression" aired this morning on National Public Radio. The story opens with an adult man talking about how he's lived with negative self-talk his whole life. After years of cognitive behavioral therapy, he finally replaced the self-flagellation with talk of, "I'll be able to do it better next time."

The interviewer moves to a class full of 10-year-old kids, where the teacher is trying to teach them emotional resilience skills so that they don't spend a lifetime telling themselves they're not good enough. Good enough for what? For whom? Why do we kill the joy in children so early? Programs like Smart-Girl try to mitigate the effects of this social training, but how much permanent change can we effect when the problem is so big? Why, as a society, are we stuck in this endless loop of unfulfilled unhappiness?

Sometimes (and I wish there were more of those times), I feel so connected to the universal consciousness that I float free, blissfully unshackled from the tape in my head. In those moments, I see and know and feel everything and am at peace with it all. The moments don't last long, but I know from conversations with others that I'm lucky to have them at all. Oh, to capture the complex path of neural connections that happens in those moments and be able to repeat them, on command. Maybe scientists should focus on THAT task instead of curing all of the diseases we develop because of stress and constant worry.

But I do my part by being involved with Smart-Girl, curtailing my own recording, and demonstrating for my mentee Consuelo that setbacks are temporary and not to be taken personally. We shall overcome.

Interrupting the Negative Thought

Interesting technique from a book I'm reading called The Little Book of Letting Go:

Instead of trying to replace a negative thought by telling yourself you're really happy (or should be happy) about something, interrupt the thought the minute you recognize it as negative or unhealthy. Then, instead think a "connecting" or loving thought. Examples of connecting thoughts: the last time you really hugged your spouse and were in the moment, a time when you talked to someone who really "gets" you, a specific moment when you felt at one with nature.

If your negative thought was about a particular person, try to think a connecting thought about that person. If you can't, just think a connecting thought about anything or anyone. It's powerful. Try it.