Because it’s Friday AGAIN. And because traditions are important. In which I cover the good stuff and the hard stuff in my week, trying for the non-preachy, non-annoying side of self-reflection.

And you get to join in if you feel like it.

Oy, what a week. What a week.

As my father likes to say — only he says it every single Friday — it was a long week today.

And it’s kinda been a whole week of days like that.

So bear with me.

The hard stuff

Moving? What?

Sometimes a really obvious decision doesn’t get made because you’re too busy focusing on how much you dislike the situation you’re in.

The way out is right there, and you ignore it.

This week I finally realized what I’ve known for six months.

That the place I live with my duck and my gentleman friend is just not the right place for us. Even though we’ve been pouring time and energy into finding ways to make it a place we actually like.

We don’t, though. So it’s really just time to move.

And while I’m thrilled to be leaving our one neighbor with the drumset and the other one whose kid is learning to play the trumpet, and love the idea of being somewhere that’s more supportive of our work and the way we like to live ….

Ugh. Moving. The last thing I want right now is another freaking project.

Yeah, yeah, I know it’s all going to work out. I just don’t want to deal with it right now.

Stupid authenticity. It’s hard!

So a lot of you know that I had a hard time publishing this very intimate, personal post this week.

I feel very differently about that now, after a gazillion people emailed and twittered and filled out contact forms on the site to say how important it was for them to read it. One woman even wrote:

Your quote (everything that is against me is an illusion) quite possibly saved my life today.

And if that’s the case, I’m happy that sharing some of the hard stuff in my own life is useful and inspiring to people needing something genuine and comforting in that moment.

It doesn’t really make it less hard, though. I’m always telling clients that vulnerability is sexy, and that the more human you are on your blog, the better it is for everyone.

And I like to think I’ve been pretty good at modeling that kind of thing.

This time, though, it just felt really, really intimate.

I don’t mean the circumstances in question, because I honestly couldn’t care less who knows that I used to live in total squalor, or that I went through some really rough times financially. Or that I’ve lived with a bunch of drag kings.

It was talking about my sweet, precious system of self-learning and self-work — and how it came into being — that felt really fragile and vulnerable.

Feeling so grateful for everyone who drew strength from my vulnerability and who shared things that made me feel stronger. Thank you!

The good stuff

Internet friends!

So even though I like a lot of my Twitter friends better than some of the people I actually know in real life, I’ve yet to actually meet any of them.

Not even Emma or the wonderful Sparky Firepants, who both live in town. The same side of town.

But @melle — if you’re a Twitterite, or Melle — if you’re not, was in town this week from a place you’ve never heard of in Ontario, Canada. With Andrew, whom I know about only from reading her blog.

Melle is so, so, so one of my favorite people on Twitter.

We have complicated Guilt Bouts (Jewish vs Mennonite), and — for people who don’t actually know each other — spend an inordinate amount of time being inappropriately rude and making fun of each other.

Anyway, we went out to dinner with our gentleman friends and my duck, and now I know for sure that Melle is just as great in person as she is online. Plus she’s cute.

And she has one hundred and four ducks. Can you imagine? I barely manage to stay on top of things just living with Selma and all of the associated duck drama. I love Selma, but man, what a diva.

Tashlich. Tashlich is where it’s at.

So I mentioned at the beginning of this ridiculously long week that Rosh HaShana might be my favorite holiday.

And the reason for this is Tashlich.

Tashlich is a ceremony/ritual/thing that happens on the first day of Rosh HaShana.

You take your duck and you go to a body of water — whoah, did anyone else just get hit with an image of a Gary Larson cartoon?

”Suddenly, Professor Liebowitz realizes he has come to the seminar without his duck.”

You don’t need a duck. You need some bread crumbs. And you go to the water and symbolically cast away everything you regret or no longer need from the previous year. In the form of crumbs.

And it’s the most awesome, wonderful, cleansing ritual ever. I can write more about this some other time, but let’s just say that this was the highlight of my week.

The generosity of others

I announced this already but Dave Navarro from Rock Your Day blew me away by making a super generous offer to all of y’all in the general Fluent Self orbit. He also implied that I’m green and wrinkled, but fine, I’ll ignore that.

The deal is: if you’re quick enough to have grabbed my Procrastination Dissolve-o-matic before this Sunday night when the long launch ends, and you forward your receipt to dave (AT) rockyourday.com, he’s giving you his Never Procrastinate Again program. As a present. You’ll get it by the 15th.

That’s not the amazing part, though. The amazing part for me is this:

There’s so much competitive crap in the online world with people getting caught up in trying to muscle each other out and talk over each other. But it turns out that there are also people who share the love and really get it, because hey, there’s always more love.

And that it’s really about getting the message to the right people in whatever form they need to digest it. Go read his post.

Best part yet to come!

Tomorrow I’m having breakfast with the amazing Jennifer Louden and Mark Silver — two of my favorite … colleagues? friends? people I admire like crazy?

Oh, finish that sentence any way you like. They’re so amazing, and Selma and I are totally looking forward to buttering biscuits with them, if you know what I mean. I have no idea what I mean.

That’s it for me ….

I’m off to bake challah, talk to a client and get a chunk of work done. And yes, absolutely join in my Friday ritual if you feel like it and/or there’s something you just want to say out loud too.

Yeah? What was something hard and/or good that happened in your week?

And, as always have a glorrrrrrrrrrrrious weekend. And a happy week to come.