A breath for these tough times

Sending out extra wishes of Safety & Sanctuary for everyone in the path of the hard things, what a scary time we are in, inhaling and exhaling, for compassion, strength, courage, swift and steady miracles.

Announcement on Emergency Calming Down Techniques

I’ve been reeling hard lately in some cursed combination of heartache, numbness, political anxiety, winter stuff and some wild panic episodes.

Have been holding on (for dear life) to my Emergency Calm The Hell Down Techniques, and it helps.

I am giving away a copy of these (ebook + audio recordings) to anyone who gives any sum of money to the appreciation funds / discretionary fund in the hopes that we can all keep practicing together, for each other and for the collective, and also for ourselves in these scary times. ❤️

On my own behalf

As always we begin with Acknowledgment & Legitimacy

The hard things remain hard, the scary things remain scary. Sometimes it seems like you just take the tiniest peek online, and there is even more hard and scary than before.

This isn’t what I am writing about today, and also it is in the air, part of the background hum.

And so, as always, a breath for Acknowledgment & Legitimacy, the starting practice. The pre-step. The step one that is also the step before step one.

Interrupting the chaotic-chaos cycle with a moment of pause to make space for what is, right now, and all the extremely reasonable feelings that bubble up in response.

Here we are (you are here, I am here)

Sometimes we are actively working on or with the situations and the feelings around them.

And other times we are playing at the edges, or working on one theme sneakily through focusing on another theme.

That’s what we are doing today.

Starting with what is surpriseful, as a form of delight, and of mood-shifting…

And then figuring out how we might invite more of that in, and does it, as it so often does, start with acting on our own behalf? It might!

Surpriseful!

I got a good birthday surprise last week. It truly surprised me. It was, as a friend put it, wondrous and whimsified and surpriseful.

Some of you already know this story, because I started this website in 2005, which is 21 years ago aka 3×7!

But I like telling it. When I was seven years old, on my birthday, my dad’s friend Brian bought me cotton candy. I’d never had cotton candy before, and it was a very thrilling moment for tiny seven-year-old me.

My dad, joking around, said something like, “Oh great, look how happy she is, now you’re going to have to do this every seven years!” And Brian was like, challenge accepted…

And so, every seven years, on my birthday, no matter where I am in the world, cotton candy finds its way miraculously to my doorstep.

Pleasantly re-surprised

A lot happens in seven years. It’s really a generous container of time.

Anyway, I had forgotten this was a divisible by seven birthday (49), and was busy having mixed feelings about the day, and my life, and sort of generally everything.

But then I was pleasantly and delightfully surprised (re-surprised!) when Jose drove up with a mystery package.

There was no return address and no note, but when I saw the cotton candy, my mood shifted instantaneously and I was as delighted as a seven year old at an amusement park.

How beautifully surpriseful. Not really anything to do with the cotton candy itself which is like a stand-in for being loved and remembered, but the ritual and the remembering and the act of care from afar.

Neutralizing

The surpriseful gift of cotton candy on my doorstep also had a lovely neutralizing effect on some feelings I had about a birthday card from a friend that was really not what I wanted to read at all.

It was a good reminder that some people can glow love in a way that is warm and kind and needs nothing from you, and some people can make their love all about them.

And I can act on my own behalf and notice this, and choose the kind of love that feels supportive.

I can receive information about what kinds of connections I want to nourish, and which can fade away because they don’t support me and there is no care for me.

Molasses

I don’t know about you, but I yet again got my ass handed to me this week by the time change.

It is so hard for me to remember that the springtime version of it, and the dramatic shift in [when there is and isn’t light] does something intense to my brain weather and absolutely destroys my body’s ability to sleep or even rest.

So this week I have been moving like molasses. Gravity feels heavier, everything extra-stuck and sticky.

There have been long 4am Witching Hours of thinking unenjoyable thoughts.

Meanwhile, jogging and hiking and yoga, activists I normally enjoy, feel heavy and profoundly unappealing.

I have mostly not been doing any of the things that help me feel better, like going outdoors, and even when I do, I am very grumpy about it.

Noticing, allowing, making space

Sometimes it’s easy to think that “acceptance” has to mean “I am putting up with this”, and it doesn’t.

I don’t have to like a feeling or a situation or a relationship dynamic, obviously, and I can also notice when fighting it isn’t working.

Acceptance is active, not passive. A way of saying “okay, I am noticing what is, and noticing how I feel about it, and let’s work with what is, given the energy and tools we have.”

Maybe the superpower of MOTIVATED is not available in the moment, so what is available instead?

Is there anything surpriseful that can shift my mood or my energy?

Or do I just need to keep acknowledging that the morning darkness combined with not sleeping combined with the news combined with the personal situations can be a lot…

Rise / sink

Something I have been journaling about a lot, in many contexts, and also discussing with my friend Kathryn is the theme of “people don’t rise to the occasion, they sink to the level of their training.”

And sometimes (often), I have to remind myself that for me, in my own training, the training is not what looks like training.

The training is not the getting up early, or doing x minutes of jogging or y minutes of yoga.

The training is the compassion, the meeting myself where I am, the constant re-applying of Acknowledgment & Legitimacy.

The training is taking a breath to RESET RESTART, or even remember that’s an option.

The training is the training

The training is tenderness towards myself when I can, and being understanding about the circumstances in the moments when I can’t.

The training is remembering and reminding myself to act on my own behalf.

Superpower of I Act On My Own Behalf. Which is also about: I am ready and willing to act on my own behalf. I prioritize acting on my own behalf.

Like with everything, we forget and remember, forget and re-remember. Forgetting is part of remembering, and that back-and-forth is part of the training.

We train to train. The training is the training.

Return to the why

I think a lot about why I still practice yoga, for decades now, and what I keep coming back to is this:

You do (or: I do) yoga to quiet the mind enough to engage in meaningful self-reflection, while practicing compassion towards yourself in all that you do, so that the clarity that emerges is also tinged with compassion and therefore is kind and usable.

You make shapes with your body while breathing your way through, because those shapes are interesting or compelling or fun or challenge you. Some of these shapes might be nemesis shapes! It happens.

And you observe your reactions, and breathe your way through that. And over time you get better at noticing when you are making a face! Or not making that face!

Or you practice laughing and being okay with making the face again.

You make the process (of everything) more conscious

You make the process more conscious.

And sometimes you lovingly tire yourself out enough to be able to just be alone with your thoughts for some moments, or sometimes even alone without thought, or to react to the noticing of a thought with sweetness.

This is why I train.

Some days this is incredibly hard and some days it is joyful and some days it is informative and some days I fight it. I try to stay neutral about this too.

The impossible obstacles

Lately, due to the Molasses Effect of the time change and the general horrors, and the various boundary issues, things that might normally feel like minor obstacles have ballooned into seemingly huge problems.

For example, yesterday I forgot to bring back inside the clothes I hung to dry outside. And then this morning I didn’t want to go outside to retrieve them, but I also didn’t want to do morning yoga with a clothesline as my view.

Fixing this, or even attempting to, suddenly felt like an Impossible Obstacle.

An Impobstacle, if you will. (Though it’s fine if you won’t! I get that it is a very ridiculous word.)

Sometimes I just need to make myself laugh, to shift the energy, to be a little surpriseful with myself, to get myself to act on my own behalf.

Impossible? Or just improbable…?

I texted Vincent about my dilemma, because he has the exact same level of ADHD as I do, so I knew he would get it, and he did.

He responded immediately: “Okay. There is no way that that is an impobstacle for you. At worst, I would say it’s an Improbstacle! I’ll tell you what. You tell me what time you’re going to bring in the laundry and I’ll fold the laundry that’s on my dining room table.”

And that worked. It got me to act on my own behalf.

And it got me to laugh, which always helps. For me, at least.

And then trying something playful.

RESET RESTART (press play)

Resetting. Parallel play. Any play at all.

The reminder that what feels impossible is probably not, and even if it is, it’s still always worth it to play.

Is it an Impobstacle? Or just an Improbstacle! Let’s find out.

With some playfulness. Just press play.

But it’s not just about play. It’s about play as a means to act on my own behalf again. To remember that I am worthy of care, and sometimes the way I can get to care is through play.

Naming some useful superpowers for these stuck and sticky times

And for acting on my own behalf…

What if it’s Easier Than I Think?
Hilariously Tiny Steps: what might this look like
Doing what helps (and if I can’t do what helps, then can I do the smallest possible amount of what helps?)
Focused Focus / Hocus Focus
Hey, whatever works
Add compassion, and then even more than that
Reset restart
Remembering: maybe this isn’t a doing time, it’s a resting/waiting/ clue-exploring time, or maybe I need to reset the energy with fun and with laughter
It Solves Itself
Trust in All Timing Right Timing
What feels surpriseful (and can I deliver some surpriseful joy to someone else!)

And here we are

Wishing lots of love and patience and compassion and the good kind of surpriseful surprises to everyone reading.

Wishing us whimsy and delight and the ability to reset with laughter when we can.

Wishing us tenderness and care from the people in our lives, as we deserve, and also the ability to give it to ourselves.

Wishing good qualities into the world, and for us to keep finding the fun in the training, so that when we sink to the level of our training because we can’t rise to the occasion, the training holds us with tenderness and care too.

May it be so. Or whatever is needed even more than that. Thank you for being patient with me this week while I rolled with various punches and took my time to find my day back to being able to write again. A breath for right timing, and a breath for sharing in community. I am so glad you are here.

May it be so, or something even better

Here’s to choosing life and aliveness, and being here, even when it is so fucking hard (and often it is), and to learning about ourselves, and finding some sparks if we can, or staying receptive to future sparks if we can.

I love you, I love that you read my thoughts here, thank you for that. It means a lot to me.

Let’s source some wild joy, some loving clarity, or whatever is needed most, let’s play.