Where I cover the good and the hard in my week, visiting the non-preachy side of ritual and self-reflection.
And you get to join in if you feel like it.
This is a Saturday afternoon Chicken rather than a Friday one, because I was having a rough time of things due to all the explosions this week. This works out well for me, because while yesterday was a nightmare, last night ended with such sweetness. I appreciate having a little extra room to look at what was beautiful in the week.
Wanna chicken? Let’s do it.
What worked?
Interrupting the pattern.
Poke!
Remembering that even the tiniest interruptions count.
Tiny tiny interruptions.
Little moments of “I am noticing you, pattern” and “I am learning about a new piece of you, pattern”, and “we are in relationship, pattern” and “look, I did one tiny thing differently this time so now you are different and so is our relationship”.
Next time I might…
More transition time.
The first few days after coming back from a trip are not Doing Days.
Except I want them to be Doing Days, and then I get frustrated when nothing gets done.
This time, I knew I’d be low-energy. But I didn’t really get to what extent.
So I over-booked, and then things kind of fell apart a little.
Revisit the Book of Me.
It has the information I need.
The hard, challenging and mysterious.
- So dark in the (…metaphorical…) hallway.
- The Mystery of writing an 1800 word Chicken about this week and then losing it and not being able to retrieve it.
- The Mystery of the city I used to be in love with and what happened to it or what happened to me, because I do not love it anymore.
- The Mystery of that pattern where I do a thing because I think it will make someone else happy, and then no one is happy.
- The Mystery of how the Idea of Freedom and the Feeling of Freedom are not the same thing, and what do I want to do about that.
- The Mystery of Depletion and how much of it there is, and how it seems sometimes to be ongoing.
- The Mystery of people who owe us money and aren’t paying it.
- The Mystery of how did I let it go this long.
- The many, many mysteries that have to do with shame about tightness and lack. And edges. We investigated those a lot this week.
- I can’t take American Independence Day. I cannot do it anymore. Next year I have to be somewhere else.
- The 8am explosions on the 5th. Actually, all day long explosions on the 5th. But the one in the morning especially. I have woken up to enough explosions, thank you very much.
- My poor sweet body is freaking out from PTSD and explosions and stress. Like a scared horse. I’m talking to it and loving it, and it is going through a rough time. Bruises, aches and pains, heat rash, stuff.
The good, reassuring and delights.
- Beach.
- Epiphanies.
- Sweetness.
- I can handle the hallway. I am getting good at hallway.
- Being adored.
- Colleen the Signmaker was here and she gave me a gift in the form of a pinecone. This gift was the exact right gift and also I like that the form was there too.
- Drake came to town, and this was good.
- I get 90 million sparklepoints for not having a total terrifying screaming meltdown on the 4th of July, and only being generally miserable instead.
- Dancing. Body loves the dancing.
- Being in my stuff and having someone say, “I love you, and whatever comes up, I will greet it with love.”
- A thing that used to be an area of lack and deficit is now an area of PLENTY. Maybe this will cross over to other parts of my life, I would really like that.
- Last week there were 3 not-good options that had just been reduced to 2 not-good options. This week there are lots of options, and some of them are super fun.
- I know what I want, and I am happy about it.
- Having released and emptied so much, I’m no longer attached to any of the things that were causing pain. This is new and big.
- I am okay.
- I have the most wonderful friends in the world.
- This is right.
- Things change, they just do. When I remember this, I can play.
Superpowers!
A superpower I had this week…
The superpower of noticing what is different.
And a superpower I want next week.
The superpower of enjoying the hallway.
Salve.
This week’s salve is the salve of instantly remembering — and appreciating — that Now Is Not Then.
It sparkles slightly, because of all the PRESENCE in there.
These salves can’t be seen, but the production factory has delivered enough to me to distribute by way of the magic of the internet, so help yourself. There is enough.
Playing live at the meme beach house — the Fake Band of the Week!
Background. Ez and I make up bands. Stu (retired Bolshevik-fearing voice-to-text software) once invented hanging out at the Meme Beach House“. It’s just one guy.
This week’s band is:
Metaphorical Idaho.
It’s just one guy.
Hallo Hallo! I am saying Hallo Hallo. ANNOUNCEMENT.
We are in a bit of a crisis, which I will tell you more about later.
It is interesting, and not particularly fun, and — like all hard things — very, very useful.
If you have been thinking, “man, I would love to get X from Havi’s shop sometime”, it would be so very helpful if you could do that now. Now is a good time.
That’s it for me …
Join my Friday ritual in the comments if you feel like it. Or call silent retreat!
We let people have their own experience. We’re supportive and welcoming. And we don’t give advice (unless people specifically ask for it).
Wishing you a glorrrrrrrrrrrrious day, a restful weekend and a happy week to come.
Shabbat shalom.
p.s. It’s fine if it’s not Friday anymore. There’s complete chicken amnesty — join in whenever (or not) and it’s no big deal.
Follow
Leaving a tiny sparkling heart here <3
The Good:
[silent retreat]
The Hard:
[silent retreat]
I’m sorry to hear that there is a crisis. Wishing you lots of sales and resolutions and other solution-contributions.
What worked? Going at my own pace
Next time? Wash my face more thoroughly. (Negotiating bikram teacher’s urgings that we avoid wiping sweat away from face vs. stinging in my eyes when sweat + sunscreen mix.)
Hard, challenging, mysterious, devastating:
* a friend died
* a tense discussion
* a lack of info
* feeling pinched re fall plans
Good, reassuring, delightful:
* feeling balanced enough to attempt toe stand
* making some right choices
* some progress on my yard
* Hsieh Su-Wei — Taiwanese winner at Wimbledon!
Superpower, this week: negotiating with the headmistress
Superpowers, next week: filling in the gaps. And transforming resentment.
Thank you for the salve. Warm wishes to all y’all.
Chickening in seekrit this week. *sends love to all the Chickens*
<3 <3 <3 {{{ h a v i }}} <3 <3 <3
Things that worked:
– being patient with myself, as best I could
– yes, tiny interruptions still count, yes they DO
– more patience with the parts of me that perceive this fact to be a grievous …insult… to the parts of me that are in pain
– that thing when you start applying patience and love to ALL your reactions sometimes the annoying ones start to seem… smaller and cuter. Which sure, pisses some of them off because they think maybe you’re not taking them SERIOUSLY.
– anyway, monsters/ fuzzballs/ colouring/ taking extreme care with the shading of a buttmonster’s butt and how this takes some of the charge out of the monster-pain
– which just leaves you with some slight frustration and sadness about how Now is not yet Future Then wherein all this shit is integrated and resolved
– and then you sigh and Annoying Twinkly-Eyed Wise Crone (a character in your head) reminds you how all this is Part Of The Miracle and you start feeling muthafugging GRATEFUL and then BAH!!! Feeling sorry for yourself is pointless and empty and you have to start taking action and actually just deal with the Discomfort of New and it’s not so bad as Monsters told you it was going to be and then shock for scared parts of me and frustration from brave parts of me and then return to the top of this list of Things That Worked this week.
You see? It gets FUNNY. Which is slightly ANNOYING! And would you look at these damn ruby slippers here on my feet the whole time and WHA??? It’s the journey not the destination love, ain’t it. Does life really have to be a series of cliches and truisms? Isn’t that annoying?
No, it’s funny. Not to mention the extra humourous fact that it’s never going to be thaaat much different because New Shit To Deal With is going to replace This Shit once it IS integrated and resolved so…. like…. live in the now and be grateful and happy and let it go? Duh?
FINE. *shakes fist ruefully while smiling*
Next time I might:
– put a time limit on how long I give myself to indulge in Feeling Sorry For Myself and then dissolve my resistance to Actually Just Dealing With The Discomfort Of The New. (Or maybe dissolve my resistance to dissolving my resistance? Meta!)
Hard things
– someone’s Terrible Misunderstanding of a decision I made (which was, admittedly, not a great one) which is resulting in very high levels of self-consciousness and fuzzy monsters feeling unsafe.
– feeling alienated from the mainstream. Dudes, I want my white, western, middle-class privilege! Otherness? For me? Beyond a wholesome intellectual appreciation of it? Ahem. Thank you Universe for this Miracle in Dis-Guise. Seeing as there are way more people in Other than there are in Privilege. Let’s hang in the real world.
– Wonderbaby had chicken pox. Varicella virus why much you be so mean? Blisters on the palms of her hands??
– I sense that the Dragon is getting cranky. I need to consult with the Dragon-Tamers but I’m afraid they will say he needs more gold than I can feed him right now and I will have to (oh god!) get CREATIVE.
Good, (which I typo-ed as ‘God’ TWICE) (okay angels, I get it) Welcome and Delightful things
– FINE, tools, techniques, destuckifying yeah yeah (so grateful so grateful so grateful) and subsequent lack of Completely Freaking Out
– I made a decision. Just did it. It is done. A new chapter is about to start and there will be consequences and I Choose To Deal With These and Figure It Out As I Go Along.
– This song… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KcrqSeeNf88
What would life be like if I lived EVERY single second so completely that there would be no urge to try again? To love/sing/pray/seek/die so completely and magnificently that “yep, been there, done that, bring on nirvana”? And besides, aren’t I grateful for all the less-than-complete and less-than-magnificent moments I’ve had. Bring on samsara, I like singing and loving and living, so, wow… This Has All Been Right. Oh man!
#philosophicalchicken
Omcluck baby. xoxoxoxo
How is it already Friday? Don’t we say that a lot? And yet — how has it only been a week since the last Chicken? Time sure is funny.
Claire! ((Your poor baby!)) The palms of her hands! Not fair!
So. The hard things this week included: a day or two of feeling down-ish and worried, back pain above and beyond the usual, feeling a bit embarrassed, and that whole weird visit with the visiting brother-in-law. Also MrB having more of the same scary-bad and the appearance of a new one.
The good things this week included: friends, meeting people, a party, a potluck, surprise encounters with people I like a lot, time at the bookstore and my favorite cafe, the Floop, the Outdoor Refueling Station, rest and replenishment, chocolate, sparkling water, being appreciated, and a really nice visit with a different set of in-laws who make me like MrB’s family. Plus presence, and presents, and some strategic absences. And lovely weather. Nice nice nice.
Hello, Chicken, and hello, Chickeneers. <3
What worked? Slowing down, gently and consciously, when I felt stress mounting.
Next time I might…experiment with a bit more mindfulness regarding what I do, from moment to moment, and whether it’s what I really most want to be doing in that moment.
Hard stuff:
–Anxiety about one or two specific things, surfacing much more often than I would like.
–Patterns and monsters dancing together.
Good stuff:
–Noticing the pattern-and-monster dancing, and introducing tiny changes. This is indeed a very good thing.
–Road trip!
–Feeling beautiful, inside and out.
–One specific facet of not-rightness is well on its way to being resolved.
This week’s superpower: soothing and smoothing.
Next week’s superpower: emptying and replenishing! Oh, and also more soothing and smoothing. Because I am allowed to have all the superpowers!
Lighting a blue candle, and gratefully applying salve…
Hello everyone, cluck cluck!
Havi i was thinking of you on the 4th and I’m sorry it continues to be so rough.
Claire, poor baby! I hope she feels better soon.
what worked this week: Exiting the Day, white flower mornings, using my lists, breathing and humming.
the suck:
-worrying about the Vast Number of Files that I’m working on and NOT finishing
-more sad about the cranky lawn. there is a situation of No Sovereignty that is making me cranky, in additon to our lawn looking like a vacant lot compared to the emerald carpets all around.
-the ways in which the above thoughts are not even my own. fucking suburbia
-telling the coven I am withdrawing. Knowing this might mean the coven just folds. Having to be okay with that.
-I go to interval trainign every week. I am making every effort to avoid sweets and empty bad-snacks. I am now almost 150# and my thighs rub together and it’s unpleasant. WHAT THE !@#$%^^&&^%$#!!!!!
-my inability to write beautiful soaring prose about the Most Important and Closest thing to my heart. Frustrating
-plus a fucking deadline on the above. One hour of false start friday, no movement yesterday. MUST be finished by tomorrow night.
the sparkle:
-my worries about scolding over the Vast Number of Files has not happened. My supes are fine with what I’m doing, and I have refined my processes ove thr past few months. I should be able to closeout soem of those files this week.
-the incredible sense of relief and being-on-track once i pulled the trigger in leaving coven
-i like training, i like the weights and i like bein able to run and I love that i’m getting stronger and have more endurance
-pulling out some clothes from the closet and realizing I have some nice things to wear, I should wear them more
-2 two hair clips, a small fish and a BIG peacock.
-Cherry Creek Arts fest!! I have not gone in almost 15 years and it was not nearly as daunting and pushy as I expected. (i think going alone was the ticket)
– a $20 solution to the ugh sprinkler issue. efficacy + sovereignty = BIG WIN
-new ritual options!
-going downtown and hanging down town and realizing how much i love Denver.
-fun things on the horizon! Burlesque fest and classes!
-fractal flowers: seeing how they connect, knowing i am understanding this better in my mind
Oh my goodness, when did this week even begin? How are we here?
The Mysteries:
– Ongoing Mystery of the [silent retreat]. Wrapped up in so much pain and blame and guilt and shame and general mysteriousness.
– Things that are sweet AND bitter. And I so no longer want the bitter but I miss the sweet so much. Things that I perceive to be a bind.
– Ongoing pattern of waking up with horrible, crippling anxiety. I keep reminding myself, “it’s not that the world is ending and your life is a miserable mess – you just woke up, honey. It’s morning. It’s okay. Shower and go outside, you will feel better. You’re okay.”
– Change.
– Loss.
– My mother. I pity her but mostly I really rage at her, which (I discovered) is actually a reflection of my internal self-directed rage. Hard, hard, hard.
– Having new huge realizations about what needs to happen in my business and why I haven’t done it yet. This accompanied a lot of pain because, while it answered lots of burning questions, it brought forth a batch of new questions with lots of emotional charge to them.
– I don’t think of myself as a cynical person but I realized that I am so cynical right now, almost like a caricature of a bitter woman, when it comes to relationships and marriages and such. (Big surprise, given [life]!) I’m not impressed by it, I am interacting with it consciously, but it is still hard. Oh, protective mechanism! Thank you for trying to shield me from so much pain again. But you hurt in and of yourself.
– Monies.
– All of the things I don’t know. My relationship to not-knowing. (It cripples. This is my experience right now. Not forever.)
– I want to be different than I am. And my relationship to wanting-to-be-different-than-I-am.
– The mystery of WHY ISNT IT ALL SORTED OUT YET.
– I don’t know how to eat. Which is hilarious because I love eating and I am the most amazing cook. So this is a genuine mystery.
– I started to feel like I don’t know how to help people anymore. Which is also hilarious because helping people is my favorite and I am super-smart and have the best tools. So… what’s the block?
– All the painful beliefs I’m still holding onto.
– Things that ended without resolving. Or… things that I perceive to have not resolved. Ouch.
– I know so much, my thinking is so abstract, I don’t know how to talk about it to my Right People.
– Seeing something completely horrible and undeserved and violent happen to my darling Claire and seething at the unfairness of it all.
The delight:
– Waking up in a tent next to a lake, listening to rain. I felt like an elf. No words.
– You know what? I experienced more spaciousness, more presence and permission and hopefulness regarding my relationship to Ongoing Mystery of the [silent retreat] than EVER before. All due to me remembering to use the superpower of meeting myself where I am. And it was marvelous. I alternated between feeling very much okay about it and stomach-knot state of doom and gloom, and when I was in the latter, I was able to be compassionate with myself. HUGE, huge progress.
– Letting the FS archives heal and restore me.
– New insights and pieces of usefulness regarding Operation Solitudinal.
– People who want to help me. Melissa. Charyl. Dan. Jason. Probably a bunch of people I’m not remembering right now.
– I have acquired male friends who are fantastic and hilarious people, who adore me and believe in me and are not interested in sleeping with me. This is new and feels really, really refreshing and I like it so much.
– My co-conspirator kicked my butt, hard, and I liked it.
– Accidental productivity.
– Air conditioning. In my room.
– I would also like to say that I just woke up from a dream this morning in which Leonardo DiCaprio was hitting on me really hard and I don’t know where it came from but it made me kind of smile-y.
– Drinking wine at the pier.
– Happiness is simple.
– I realized that, the more I work, the happier I get. This was surprising and important.
– Facebook kind of made me happy this week.
– Glimpses of Incoming Me, which is just a purer form of my essence, which I already have today.
– Slowly untangling the things that were tangled up for a long time, which I hadn’t been able to visit. With spaciousness and permission and safety.
– I find many things delicious and I would like to consider this a superpower.
– Lots of things I don’t know are figure-out-able and people want to help me.
– I am practicing asking for help.
– The best thing: “I am a great beauty. The world might not think so, but the world is wrong. Beautiful is an identity, a label I wear.” I started to play with this and found out the most marvelous, sparkling truth. When I started to wear the label of ‘Great Beauty’, the world and everyone around me became so much more beautiful.
– Meeting myself where I am. It is the best thing ever. EVER.
– Havi. Havi could do no wrong in my eyes.
– There are lots of questions and pains and mysteries, but there is a deep, underlying, undulating KNOWING of purpose and everything-is-okay-ness.
– I recently spent a lot of time being terrified by time (hah!) and I noticed this and then time wasn’t so terrifying anymore. Which means I’m in bed still and feeling pretty good about not having to get up.
– Biggification is a side effect of destuckification. When I remember this, it feels like a huge ass relief.
– Progress isn’t movement forward. Progress is dissolving untruths of the moment. This feels kind.
– I am so intelligent and earnest and kind and beautiful and I want to do so many wonderful things and I have a soft child-heart. That’s what a lot of my problems/mysteries come from but I would not want to be any other way, really!
So much love to all the other chickeneers.
Oh, I want to leave this here, too.
What worked?
– Meeting myself where I am.
– Doing ONE pose a day.
– “what would it be like if we did this with no drama?” <- it was my favorite question that I asked myself. I think I want to ask myself this every day about everything forever.
– FS archives.
– Going to Starbucks. I know, surprising, but it worked for me this week.
– "I am a great beauty. You don't agree? Sorry you're wrong. You DO agree? Why, you are very wise. I think you are a great beauty, too."
– Slightly insane visualizations.
Hand on heart sighs for the hards.
The Mysterious & Challenging. The menfolk, as usual. Silent retreating because it’s all been said, and marching ever onward checking the guidebook and trying to trust my heart and inner compass.
The Good and Delightful.
3 days on the boat and the sand and the ocean. Under the bluest skies. With the bestest friends.
A day to be NOT on the boat today. In the coolest home, with time to do my chores, and eat vegetables, and prepare for the week.
My air conditioning. Not having to think about the heat wave much, which I know is a privilege.
Hard:
– all the singing, coming right at the end of the week that I had set aside to do nothing
– the prospect of going back to work tomorrow
– will we have some money some time?
– apparently beetroot still disagrees with me
– all of the hot
– we do not have a car, people, OK?
– I have been in the sun and now I have a headache
Good:
– singing, because singing is also good even when it is hard
– week of doing nothing, in which many things got done
– friends! emailing me!
– very much writing, which is mostly coming together in an encouraging way
Experimenting with:
– reserving the right. For example, reserving the right to take a year off choir come September. I might not actually do that, but reserving the right means that I can take it off the stress list
Yay for relaxed rightly timed chickens!
Yay for lack transformed into Plenty!
and Yay for my big adventure this week: standup paddleboarding – not standup jardiniere, as the iPhone would have it. I think there will be more of this in my future…