The best laid plans

I am on a mission. Or I thought I was, until the hotlink disappeared half way through the 9 weeks.

Summer is a’coming, and since I quit smoking last year (10 months and 3 weeks ago exactly) those first few pesky pounds have turned into an all-round poundage nightmare. In the vein of full disclosure I admit I’m addicted to Pinterest, but the compulsion to pin led me to a million other things  a workout that could – in theory – whip me back into shape within 9 weeks.

Yes. Absolutely. I will do this. Every. Single. Day. 18 weeks after first deciding to tackle this challenge, this pretty much sums up where I’m at:

I blame it on not being able to access last four weeks of the program. Or maybe it’s because Dollarama carries Zero chocolate ganache bars for a measly 69 cents?

Whatever the reason, I’ve decided to make up the rest of the program. Take for instance my new adventure that has me speed walking across a large building numerous times a day for one reason or another. My first thought was “whoa! I’m going to drop pounds like crazy walking three miles a day in here!” On second thought, a whole section of one hallway is covered in mirrors, making it glaringly apparent the Zero bars are still winning – for the moment.

As a matter of course, I began to ponder on the perception of how getting/staying/increasing one’s thin-ness (as I’m madly baking for a bakesale – how ironic) makes a person more “successful”, “attractive”, or “fashionable”. I know my own inner monologue has changed lately – I’m kinder to myself, I’m finally starting to appreciate the fact that I have hips, and I am learning to love the curves they give me. And it appears the pendulum may be on the backswing: going through the grocery line tonight the fashion/gossip mag headlines were screaming “too thin!”, “obsessive dieting!”, “walking skeleton!”. Finally. It appears that it’s not too late for common sense to make a comeback in the human race after all. Speaking of race, I’d best race my buns back into the kitchen before I burn the 1000 -calories-per-bite brownie delight. It’s for the bake sale. Really. I promise.  :-)

Question of the Day: Do you tend to obsess on your weight? How are you going to break that thought pattern?

Sheer Doggedness

Uh, Dad? You missed one. Hey, you missed another one! I WANT THAT SHARK...don't make me ninja-scissor-hold you.

Persistence. Doggedness. Tenacity. It’s how I’ve responded to a multitude of challenges this week. And I’m talking significant challenges – challenges enough to make a grown woman grind her teeth in frustration, enough to break down and hit the store for a 2 litre of diet coke after having successfully been on the aspartame wagon for the five previous days, enough to blissfully contemplate the benefits of winning the lottery for the express purpose of buying my own island and becoming a benevolent dictator of what would likely be the world’s smallest non-acknowledged country.

My inner thoughts were, for the most part, unrepeatable a dogged repetition of various mantra’s such as:

• what doesn’t kill me will make me stronger
• there is nothing that chocolate can’t make better
• don’t make mountains out of molehills
• beach, sand, rum, beach, sand, rum…

So what did this week’s refresher course in human drama teach me? Simply this: the precious gift of being able to choose my attitude is mine for the taking. I can choose to take things personally and deride myself for not doing things the right way or a better way. Or I can choose not to allow minor inconveniences to turn into the bogeyman-of-all-things-that-are-work and let him invade and steal my personal life time over something inconsequential and trivial. I can choose to be steadfast in my belief in myself and forgive myself for little mistakes along the way. There is a learning opportunity in every situation – even those which are less than pleasant. Each experience I embrace hones my ability to do things better the next time.

And so I doggedly persist in staying positive and, Eureka!, suddenly I’m not focusing on the gargantuan shadows cast by little molehills. Instead, I’m motivated to pick up a shovel, play an impromptu game of “Whack-a-Mole” and wallop those pesky little molehills of self-defeat into oblivion. Moral of the story? Playing “Whack-a-Mole” decreases stress and builds character…unless you’re my dad at the fair with three little girls watching him play the game, fully expecting him to win each of them that really BIG stuffed shark. No pressure  :-)

Question of the Day: what steps do you take to ensure your molehills don’t become mountains?

Finding the Goods: the MARCH challenge

don't let the sun go down on your 'good' - write it down & remember. (I take pictures of my 'goods' too...this sunset was one of them)

There are many ways writing can be used to create positive change in one’s life. Part of my 2012 strategy is to explore a different writing focus every month. The first two months have been interesting: throughout January I kept all the printouts from the self-check out counter at the library, taped them into my journal and wrote what caught my fancy about the items on that checkout list (double bonus: it also turned out to be a great way to track what books I ended up wanting to add to my own personal library). February has been spent focusing on redeveloping my “things to do today” list-making ability…as my new adventure has indicated early on that multiple pages of these lists (per day! what have I done?) are a necessary evil…aacckkk!

This is what is on the agenda for March: I’m going to record all major activities of each day. At the end of each day, I’ll use a “goodness” scale (from 1-10) to assign an overall rating to that day  - where 10 is a “most brilliant!” day, 5 is a “standard issue” day, and 1 is a “can I just crawl in and not come out for a week?” kind of day. Come the end of the month, I’ll review my entries and look for a correlation between days that scored 6 or higher and the activities I recorded for that day. Having then identified the “good” factors in my life, the goal will then be to integrate more of these types of activities into my day and – in theory –  have more good days! I urge you to try it and see what you discover as you find the goods in your own life.

As for me,  I had so much fun with January’s Library Challenge, I’ve decided to continue that particular challenge for the rest of the year. I can only imagine how many boxes of journals I’d be lugging around today had I done this faithfully since I signed up for my first library card at age 6

Question of the Day: I’m looking for guest posts from anyone who takes on the March Challenge. Please let me know by the end of March if you think you’d be interested.

Perception is Everything

Suddenly, my need for new furniture seems rather insignificant

I spent the last two weeks organizing ‘stuff’ for my new adventure. I had one major rule…whatever I was taking, it had to fit in the car. Over the course of a week, I plowed through more stuff than I ever remembered owning. Finally I had to stop and take a break from it all. When I sat down to peruse one of my favourite websites, lo and behold…here was this picture. Suddenly it struck me: why do I have this incessant need for ‘stuff’? I certainly can’t take it with me when I’m dead and gone. What is more important in my life – things or experiences? From this perspective, my stuff doesn’t make a whit of difference to the world as a whole. If I got hit by a bus tomorrow most people would be talking about me…not my stuff (unless you’re my aunt, and then you’d be putting dibs on my shoe collection…).

Now don’t get me wrong…I have nothing against a luxury 500 thread count set of sheets enveloping a luscious pillow top mattress or a comfy reading chair. But if someone told me I had to use a hard-earned ten thousand dollars to either furnish my house with brand name stuff  or experience things that interested me (opera houses, beaches, travel & photography, camping/hiking, etc) to which choice would I instinctively (and honestly…) gravitate towards? (why do I torture myself such questions?)

I agonized over my inability to make a clear choice…then I realized I needed both! Now if I won the lottery, getting 100% of both would be a non-issue. However, as I’m still punching a clock, it became more important to me to identify how to create balance in meeting these needs. So I assigned a value percentage to each aspect. Experiences was the clear winner at 70%, ‘stuff’ at 30%.

Of course, this whole exercise smacks of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs – it’s frightening how simple, yet correct, this model is. Even though I know that I can’t take my ‘stuff’ with me, it serves a more immediate need: perception of safety and belonging somewhere (a welcoming, safe place to live), and self-esteem (my space represents my own individual self).

When these needs are being adequately met, we have the opportunity to move into a state of self-actualization and maximize our experiences during the time we have on this earth. Did you catch the problem presented in my last sentence? Yes…that’s it:  ”…adequately met…”. Ask anyone to define their perception of “adequate” and it is likely to be radically different from the next person’s definition. Hello eternal paradox…how much is enough? All I know is that having had to load, and unload, the almost unbelievable amount of stuff I managed to cram into one car, my incentive to “live light” has increased exponentially

Question of the Day: how do you define “enough” ?

the comfort zone

Change your comfort zone...expand your life.

There are days that I definitely feel that my “live dangerously” factor has seriously plummeted. Days when I’m scared that I’m fast becoming mired in the complacency of middle age. Days when it’s just easier to not do what I know needs doing (procrastination can sometimes be a good thing, but let’s face it… most times it’s not). Days when I question if I have the energy left to instigate the changes required in order to meet my three year plan.

I spent some time thinking about why I felt this way and it came down to this: Fear (and not the healthy kind). That’s it. Plain and simple. Do I like this answer? Not particularly. And the deeper question is, why does “live dangerously” foster fear and hesitation now, unlike before?

Sometimes change is hard and it’s just easier to keep on plodding along the way we are, where we are. Fear is the master of disguise – “Better the devil we know than the devil we don’t” – and it becomes such an insidious habit that we don’t notice (or we get really good at making a whole pile of excuses) until our dreams get sent to the back row in the theatre of life. We “settle”.

So I look at acknowledging this fear in my life as a good thing – because I’ve identified it and it no longer has any strength and influence when exposed in the light of day. The determination to live free of these fears drives me to say “YES” to new adventures like the one I’m starting in two weeks…moving 8 hours down the road (and as my Norwegian friend always tells me…it’s obvious I’m Canadian because I measure distance in hours, not kilometers) to take on a new project for the next twelve months. It creates a bit of initial chaos, but the possibilities are endless as to what this project will bring into my life.

As I’m still willing to shake things up (especially if it’s a martini, but I digress) and step outside my current comfort zone I would have to say that, for the moment at least, I’m safe from complacency

Question of the Day: what holds you back and why?

The open road

What roads have brought you to today? What new roads will you be taking this year?

Formally, the new year begins at the stroke of midnight tonight – leaving me exactly 2.5 hours to finish writing my list of goals for the next year. I do this somewhat halfheartedly for the truth is September always feels like the start of the new year to me (maybe due to years of always starting a new school year?) so my December 31st musings seem more like a mid-year recap.

Regardless, I still think it’s important to review where I’ve been and where I’d like to go. I find the act of physically writing slows down our thought process – it forces us to take the time to ruminate more deeply about what it is we are writing, and the why’s and how’s behind our thoughts. Following this good advice I’ve created two “top five” lists…one reflecting the past year, and one outlining the year to come: 

2011: Roads to Today

1. Started a second business and discovered skills in a previously unexplored creative area
2. Experienced times of emotional upheaval and life chaos that brought about a new outlook on life, changing some of the goals and ideas previously held
3. Able to spend considerable more amounts of time with my two lovely nieces, deepening our already close relationship
4. Had a beautiful summer that allowed me to baste myself into a deep tan, while working at the same time
5. Re-evaluated my long term goals and drastically revised my three year goal (which leads me into my 2012 list…)

2012: Roads to Tomorrow

1. Meet New People – with the underlying goal being one of these new people had better be Mr. Right because I’ve had enough of the Mr. Right-Now’s
2. Join a community theatre group and participate  on stage, or behind stage
3. Faithfully practice my Spanish – and find a tutor to practice with – so that I’m reasonably fluent in time for me to move to a Spanish speaking country for 3 months next winter
4. Complete my latest “book in progress” and improve my marketing and public relations skills
5. Join a gym to drop these now more-than-pesky 20 pounds I’ve packed on since I quit smoking
6. Not die at at the end of the Mayan calendar (just kidding)

When I look at these lists somehow the last year seems to have been not that exciting. Truthfully, it was really more of a year spent in self-reflection and a goodly amount of time was spent on changing myself for the better from the inside out. To put it simply, it was the year I practiced introversion.

Then I look at my list for 2012 and it simply screams “Extroversion!!” I think that will prove to be the biggest change of all. Because life is an open road…we can choose how fast to drive, which direction to go, and what side-road adventures we may want to explore. Sometimes the winds of change blow so strong that we are more or less required to change directions and use a different road than we had planned on – and who knows? We may get better mileage on that new road. We may experience situations we never expected on that new road. We may meet new people we’d have never otherwise met. Me? On my new road I fully expect to meet drop dead gorgeous Mr. Right standing beside his Harley holding a sign that says “Karen or bust” (heck, I’m willing to run him over if that’s what it takes to introduce myself)  and then it’ll be an adventure-for-two from there on in

Question(s) of the Day: do you make lists? Do you follow them? Why or why not? Do they motivate you or depress you?

It’s Christmas Day

גרייס, חמלה, אהבה. הוא איתנו. תמיד.

Christmas can be many things to many people…it can be loud, quiet, boisterous, reserved, filled with cheer, or filled with unspeakable loneliness. Huh? you ask, how can you be lonely when you’re surrounded by people beaming with holiday happiness?

It’s a reality for many. For the first time in my life I would be perfectly content to bypass the whole holiday scene and drop my lonesome butt on a beach somewhere instead. I find loneliness easier to bear when I’m literally by myself. It’s much harder to bear loneliness when surrounded by hordes of chattering, cheerful people. I must say there are times I feel a bit like Gollum – two halves of me talking to each other – one side says “…it’s not so bad, the kids are fun to be around, the food is fab…”, the other side says “…get out, run! and don’t look back…”

We feel alone. We feel adrift in a world that we’re somehow out of sync with. We are drained by the energy it takes to paste a smile on our face while hiding the vast loneliness in our heart. But know this. You are NOT alone. You ARE loved. I love you. God loves you. I may not know you, but in the simple act of reading this, we are connected – we are part of the same heart, however briefly.

I’ve come to accept the fact that I’m only human (I know…shocking isn’t it?) and I’ve learned to give myself some private time to let my holiday smile slide off my face and work through the maze of emotions coursing through me. Then it’s time to balance out the sad/glad scales…I sit down and purposefully record on paper (it makes things so much more tangible to write them down instead of just thinking them) every single blessing that’s come my way…from parking spaces in crowded parking lots to people who have willingly held me up while I faced some of my biggest challenges yet.

So today I say to you: Be Blessed! Blessed with peace. Blessed with hope, courage and faithfulness to move in the direction you are called. Blessed with honour and bravery to do what you know is right. Blessed with so much love that it overflows your soul and lights up your very self from the inside out. Blessed with kindness for others…and for yourself.  Blessed with such joy that laughter wells up from within and surrounds you with a cloak of happiness. May you be blessed and wrapped in the grace and mercy of God today and every day…Merry Christmas!

Finding your bridge

A nice Scottish lad wearing nothing but a kilt and a killer accent? You'd best be moving out of the way or risk being trampled as I cross that bridge in a heartbeat.

Have you ever felt like you really don’t belong where – or when – you are? That somehow, “real” life is happening in a parallel universe? We chafe at that separation…we struggle to bring into focus fleeting images seen only from the corner of our eye, our heart hears the echo of horns, a haunting call from a different world and we yearn to answer that call. There are days our very soul cries out in its need to reach out and breach the gulf – to discover if today is the day we finally get to take our place in our “real” life and become our “real” selves.

It reminds me of the movie Brigadoon (see full synopsis here) where the magic of Scotland (and a lovely stone bridge) allows a most handsome Gene Kelly to cross over into an enchanted world. For a brief time, he crosses that thin separation between “here” and “there”. There are days I truly think I’m in the wrong place and time, and wish that I, not unlike Gene Kelly, could simply cross a bridge into the world I seek in my dreams, the world my heart tells me exists…somewhere, sometime.

What if I could cross that bridge and step into my ‘right’ self? Would I do it? Would I leave everything behind and irrevocably take on a new life? Would I in turn do great things and have no regrets? I imagine that I would live a most extraordinary life in a world where bravery, loyalty and honour were of highest value.

The wanderings of a vivid imagination can take you many places and I admittedly have always devoured books that deal with time travel and imaginary old worlds (I blame Tolkien, Donaldson and a few others for feeding my fearless imagination). In the event that you were wondering what you were going to read over the Christmas holidays, here are a few of my long-time favourite books that will take you on an adventure to wonderful, magical lands. And while you’re reading, I’d like to think I’ll be in Scotland looking for my very own Brigadoon bridge

Here are a few starters for you:

(if you’re able, please buy these at your local independent bookstore and support your community!)

Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien (synopsis)

The Mirror of  Her Dreams / A Man Rides Through by Stephen Donaldson (synopsis)

The Blue Sword by Robin McKinley (synopsis)

Outlander by Diana Gabaldon (synopsis)

Are you a Crack(ed) Pot?

Real questions refuse to be placated. They barge into your life at the times when it seems most important for them to stay away. ~ Ingrid Bengis

I can always tell when I’m on the edge of momentous change. What makes me so prescient? you ask. I know because every time my life has geared up to take a 90 degree turn at 100 miles an hour I am overwhelmed, compelled, obsessed – by questions, questions, and more questions. I question my dreams, my confidence, my skills, why I haven’t done greater things with my life, my emotional landscape, my financial situation, my potential, the steps needed take to make change occur…

I find these questions are such in their ferocity that my mind starts vibrating like a jackhammer…non-stop really (and thankfully usually reduced to a dull roar once I’ve reached the other side of change unscathed). But there are always one or two questions that become prominent. They stick their busy little noses into not only my waking hours, but interfere in perfectly good escapism by insinuating themselves into my dreamworld as well.

I do my best to create ‘real-time’ answers to these questions because I believe that the energy of change never allows us to find final answers to our most compelling questions. That which compels us will never be fully satisfied with our meager attempts at a ‘final’ solution. Instead, we must seek real-time answers that will allow us to break free from the cramped pot that is currently limiting us.

We can be revitalized by change and continue to grow, or we can curl up our roots, refuse to water our souls and wither in a pot that was never made to hold us forever. So whom do you choose to be? The one who chooses to evade confinement in a worn-out pot? Or the one who chooses to close eyes and heart in willful blindness because it’s easier than changing pots?

Me? I appreciate being in clay pots – they break easily and as long as I’m willing to create a bit of a temporary mess, I have complete confidence that I will always land up in a spacious new pot

Question of the Day:  What has cracked (or is cracking) your pot?

Flying with the Eagles

Isaiah 40:31 -but those who hope in the LORD will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.

It takes faith to fly – even Peter Pan knew that. Using the winds of change to soar like an eagle gives you a broader perspective. The higher you are, the greater your range of vision. Macro vs. micro. Big vs. little. An eagle can sense the storm coming and makes plans to use the potentially destructive forces to its advantage. The key here? The eagle doesn’t moan about impending danger and doom. The eagle sees it as an advantage, the chance to soar higher than it may have otherwise chosen. The eagle uses the storm to renew its strength by letting the wind do the work. And the eagle’s skill is such that it can use the wind to find its way to fly above the storm – out of harm’s reach. The eagle chooses to embrace the gifts and opportunities it has been given within the very framework of destruction, and finds freedom -  and a new life path – in the process.

Take refuge in the strength of hope as you take your figurative “step off the cliff” (willing or not) knowing that you’re either about to learn to fly or someone’s about to catch you

Question of the Day: what puts the wind beneath your wings? (other than Bette Midler that is…)