Lofty Dreams

Tired.  Long day.  Wanted to do so many things.  Got lots done and was definitely distracted.  It happens ...often.  I wake up inspired, then I get caught in the minutiae.  I think that, somehow, if I just get this done, or that done, then I'll have cleared space for myself.  Guess what?  Doesn't happen.  The To-Do list is endless.  Crossing one thing off is like a grain of sand on the beach.  There’s so much more.

Was feeling very grounded and introspective this morning.  Stopped at Starbucks after dropping my son off at his Driver Training Course, then headed to the Lake to sit with my introspectiveness.  I felt the pull to write...and why do I believe that the inspired moment will last, or that I can recreate it later.  Somehow I think that what is coming through me is from me, and it will last or be easily recalled.  In the moment it feels real so I believe it.  Then, once again, it fades and is gone.  I get tapped on the shoulder.  Whispered to, in my ear, and what do I do?  I shush it away like a bothersome housefly.  The inspired moment is gone.  I want to force myself to recall something, anything.  I get bits and pieces, but nothing close to what it was this morning.

I write because it feels good, easy, comfortable.  Writing is my thing, yet I am intimidated by it - not my writing, of course.  I am intimidated by the title.  To be an author would be an amazing treat.  To be like Elizabeth Gilbert, having written one successful book after another.  Wow.

So many words make up a book and yet all anyone ever does, who writes a book, is just let out details of their lives onto "paper".  Everyday details.  Is seems so easy ...and daunting.  Everyone that I recall paying attention to as a writer has some training in the matter.  Having gone to school, majored in English or Journalism or some such thing.  Having come from a family of writers.

Something in me feels equal to them and yet another part of me feels so inadequate.  That voice in my head that likes to feed my fears, reminds me that I have no qualifications to write a book.  Who am I to have such lofty dreams, to think that I can produce something of that magnitude and deliver it eloquently and with humour?  Deep down, there is a part of me that thinks I can. 

Capturing a Moment

Started this on 12/12/12.  Hmmm.  

Reached the point where everything points to writing. 

Ever gotten to a point in your life where nothing makes sense. I’m here.  Nothing is making sense.  I’m angry.  I’m sad.  I’m having one of those days.  I’m wondering (again), what the hell is going on, who’s life is this and how the hell did I get here?  Is this for real?  Is this actually the life I created...’cause nothing seems to be working right now.  Another dead end.

I keep hearing it in my head, that haven’t-I-told-you-this-before-voice.  “Write, just write.”

Nothing else makes sense.  I could just write about my life.  What if all I ever needed to do was to just write about what is happening?  It couldn’t be that simple.

I could treat this like photography.  If it were, I wouldn’t say, “oh, I’ll get that picture later”.  Photography is about capturing a moment in time.  There is no, later.  It’s now or it’s gone.  Either I choose to take the picture or I choose not to.  If I see writing that way then perhaps I can get what’s in me, out.  Here is a moment in time that needs to be captured. 

It’s not about words.  It’s about feelings. It’s about the feelings associated to a particular moment.  That combination make it unique. 

In photography it’s not about the subject, it about the subject at that particular moment that makes it unique - the lighting, the mood, the angles, the composition of that unique moment.  Writing is no different. 

Aaaah, I think this is a special moment.  I think I have discovered something very important in the evolution of my desire to write.

Brenda Ueland, in her book, If You Want to Write, says, everyone is talented, original and has something important to say.  She says, everybody is talented because everybody who is human has something to express.  Try not expressing anything for 24 hours and see what happens, she says.  Apparently we’ll feel like we will burst and we’ll want to write or draw or sing or make something.

Everybody is original, according to Brenda Ueland, if we speak from our true self and not from the self we think we should be.  If we speak or write from that place we cannot help being original but this joyful, imaginative, impassioned energy seems to die out of us at a very young age.  Why? Because we don’t see what we do as great and important.  We let obligation take its place.  We don’t respect it in others.  We don’t keep it alive by using it.  We don’t keep it alive in others by listening to them.

There is nothing else for me to do.  I am here, at that point where, to make sense of it all I must write.  Write what I live.  Write what I suffer.  I will risk, through fear, criticism, self-doubt, that I may be uninteresting!

UnPackaging

We all arrive in packages.  Neatly wrapped.  Protected.  Arriving safely.  Unbruised.

We all end up so differently.  The currents and tides of our lives shape and polish us so differently.  Some are hard where other are soft.  Some are weak where others are strong.

Time beats against us.  People and things and places and experiences brush against us.  Sometimes softly, gently, nurturing.  Sometimes abruptly, aggressively.  Bruising us, breaking us.

How do we heal?  How do we reconnect?  What do our scars look like? What do they say about us?  How have the bruised and broken parts reconnected?  Have we grown around the pain?  Have we hardened to it?

If we are all in packages, when do we let ourselves out?

Unpackaged at childhood, we are raw and open to the world.  We are gingerly taken out of box and carefully placed on a shelf, to be allowed to begin our journey.

For some, the uncovering is less than loving.  Maybe their box was knocked off the shelf. Hurt and hindered, the fear from the fall, the fear from the jolt, they vow never to leave.  Never wanting to remove the packaging.  After all it could only get worse.

What happens if our packaging is aggressively ripped off of us?  No warning.  Invaded.  Battered in the process.  The world is violent.   The world is not safe.  The world is something that cannot be trusted or respected.  "I cannot trust myself."  "I do not like myself."

Unpackaged people are free, wild and wonderful.  Unrestricted, uninhibited, supported by life and here to make a conscious difference to be in this world the way their insides truly are.  Organic.  Freeflowing.  DIFFERENT.  A celebration of the unconventional lovefest that they are fully committed to being a part of.

I Have Questions

Why do I feel so inadequate sometimes? Why do I feel that I am not enough? Why do I feel that what I am doing is not enough? It makes no sense - this feeling of being less than. Where does it come from? It feels old. Like someone I've known before I was fully aware of who I am.

Who are you? and why do you come to visit with me? What do you want? When will you go? I don't particularly like you. My world is uncomfortable when you are around. What do you want from me? Are you trying to scare me? Intimidate me? Keep me separate?

When I am in touch with my wholeness you are no where to be found. When I am feeling joy, you are also nowhere around. When I am focused and peaceful, you are elsewhere. Are you really there or are you there but do not matter to me? Do you live in this house or will you follow me if I move somewhere else?

Do you know my name? Do you know what is important to me? Do you know what I long for? Wish for? Pray for? Do you know how strong I am?

Are you my friend? Are you here to keep me company? Do you love me? Or are you just as scared as I am? Do you get angry like I do? Do you feel lonely too? Are you afraid of losing me? Do you just want to be loved and accepted and acknowledged? Held and told how brilliant you are?

Are you separate? or are you a part of me that I do not see, don't want to accept, love and acknowledge?

Maybe you need attention, just like me.

You are my sadness. Welcome. All of you is welcome. Feel free to stay as long as you like. We will sit and have tea as we look out into the bright, loving world that surrounds us, supports us, embraces us.

We are one ...and there is room for everyone ...including joy!

Be With Your Darkness

Be, in the darkness
Be, with your darkness
Let it be
See

Don't be afraid, have no fear
Don't be afraid, for there, indeed, is nothing there

Darkness, the ultimate in nothingness
Let it envelope you, see what comes
See where nothingness takes you
For in the emptiness there is much fullness
For it is in the emptiness that you will find your truth

Be, in the darkness
Be, with your darkness
Let it be
See

There is more to see in your darkness
There is more to be revealed than by light
Light illuminates the surface, darkness has depth

In the darkness there is doubt
We doubt our strength, we lose our trust
Yet there is nothing, just you with yourself

Be, in the darkness
Be, with your darkness
Let it be
See

In the darkness I sometimes find a child
She is afraid, she is crying
In the darkness, she calls out, to be found, to be held

I know this child of my darkness has strength
I know she is wise
I trust her and am thankful for her company

We sit, together, in the darkness
It completely surrounds us
She sees me and says,

Be, in the darkness
Be, with your darkness
Let it be, and
See

...for there is greatness inside you

Say What You Need to Say

"You better know that in the end, it's better to say too much than never to say what you need to say..."



Thank you for your support, John.

Onwards and upwards, I go.

Knowing just how loved and supported we ALL really are...

I Have the Perfect Life...

...yet I fight with myself, sometimes. Want to crawl back into that box. The voices in my head, they sing to me, a false lullaby. They try to entice me back, into the darkness. I must push against the urge and call out to anyone who can hear me because the silence outside the box frightens me. I fear being alone, without direction.

There are faint cheers in the distance and I must trust that they will sing louder and louder and lure me towards them. My truth will make itself clear, once I accept my world outside the box.Once I let go. Let go of how I think things should be.

My mind wanders from place to place, space to space, thought to thought. I am flung in different directions, yet all I claim to want is to be centered. I want to be secure where I am, and curiously looking out to what will be next. I want to be still, yet do not choose stillness. I choose, instead, from fear.

I dost protest I am too quick to criticize my intuition. Too quick to negate the strides I take. I am told, GO FOR IT! Then watch as the Universe co-creates with me.

So I affirm:

I am a strong woman, with a powerful sense of intuitive selection. My gut feelings are true and real and I flow with them easily. I lead. I arrive at the right place, with the right people, at the right time. I am open, joyful, peaceful, successful, respected and wealthy.

I am where I am. I move forward from where I am. I am me. I will delight in being me and uncover the talents that are imbedded in my truth. Only I know myself. Only I do what I do. Only I see the way that I see. My perspective is unique and cannot be replicated.

To the fear in my belly - I feel you! and I will still unlock my passion. I will not allow you to imprison me and keep me from being authentically in this world.