In which I cover the good stuff and the hard stuff in my week, trying for the non-preachy, non-annoying side of ritual and self-reflection.
And you get to join in if you feel like it.
Wow. There was a lot of week in this week, again.
And it whooshed by at an astonishing pace. I am slightly stunned to be here. Hi, Friday. You feel sweet today.
Mainly because me-from-last-week remembered how much I rage against Friday appointments (even if they do get to be called trysts), and she set things up for me to have spaciousness today. Thanks, honey.
The hard stuff
July.
A lot of old pain about not-ready.
The second hardest conversation in the history of Havi.
Well, maybe the third hardest.
But still really hard.
And agonizing to think about having it, which made it worse. And avoiding it, which made it worse. And doing lots of other things which ALL made it worse. Nice.
Not pain, exactly. Tightness.
The thing about agonizing over something that is going to happen that you don’t want to happen (confronting someone about a thing that they aren’t going to like!) is that it doesn’t just happen in your head.
The body-mind is processing everything everywhere all at the same time.
So there was all these layers of tension in my body. Not pain, exactly. Just endless tightness and constraint. Tightening and then curling up. Recoiling.
And it was hard for the sad, scared parts of me who think that now is going to be exactly like then. Because they don’t believe it will ever be safe to speak our mind.
So there was that. They would rather I maintain a situation that hurts my body to hold it than that I risk everything through living truthfully. So that was a lot of internal negotiating right there.
Knowing a thing and not being able to say the thing.
It would be inappropriate to say the thing, and it’s none of my business.
But then I feel pain watching people I care about making choices based on something that is not in integrity and they don’t know it’s not in integrity.
I do not wish for advice on this. I am just noting the challenge of it, and how this subtext was an added layer of tension in this week and in my body-mind-self this week.
Feeling an emotion that was unfamiliar and uncomfortable.
Tenderness.
Not one of my superpowers.
It kind of freaked me out. A lot.
That was probably useful. I didn’t like it though.
Too much to be done in too little time.
Decisions not yet decided.
Needing more space and time than I currently perceive to be available to me.
That’s one way of putting it.
Accidentally ingested a thing that had sugar in it.
And promptly fell apart.
Then couldn’t remember that this was why I was feeling anxious and panicky all day.
So I was thoroughly convinced that something was actually wrong with me, and not remembering that this was my body reacting to something it perceives to be poison but thinking it was reacting in this highly emotional way to actual real-life circumstances.
Ugh.
Decision-making.
Especially when there are lots of people and timetables involved.
Double-especially when I don’t have all the information.
Triple-especially when I feel vulnerable.
Change of plans.
A thing I was tremendously looking forward to on August 3 is now not happening on August 3. Something else is happening on August 3 instead, and it is a GOOD thing, and I am adjusting to this.
Congruencing.
I asked for it in the vision of Possibility and Anticipation but man, hard work!
I am congruencing, as a verb. An active one. Bringing things that are disharmonious into more harmonious ways. Or really: noticing all the things in my life/space/work that are incongruent and then finding out what I know about that.
Guess what? Bringing things into alignment is a great way to run into all of your stuff. This was not news to me, but somehow I forgot about just how much stuff I have.
Hi, stuff. I learned a lot about you this week.
The good stuff
Congruencing!
It required courage and presence, but ohmygod.
So many things changed this week. Symbolic things. Big tangible things. Furniture moving around.
And just generally changing the positions and alignments of things in space, hoping that the mental will reshape in turn. Which it has been. A lot.
Hat Parade. Hat Parade!
I went with lady Chuck, and it was fabulous: small, kooky, adorably Portlandian.
Oh, and David and Rhiannon were there too, which was such a great surprise but also completely unsurprising as they are exactly who you would expect to run into when gathering for a hat parade.
The parade: mostly an assortment of very petite birdlike women in extreme vintage mode with shingled hair, wearing cloches, dresses from the late 20s and early 30s, gloves, parasols.
I was way underdressed, in all senses of that word. So it was fun to have company that was, like me, taking the notion of hat parade more into the general theme of “Let us wear outlandish hats and march together, because oh boy hats!”.
Next year I plan to make tiny popsicle stick signs that say Hat Parade! I feel strongly about hats. And also about parading for no apparent reason whatsoever other than HATS! It gives me faith that Stompopolis (the huge new part of the business that we are currently in the process of opening) will be a grand success if it can happen in a city where people can enjoy a preposterous DIY parade on a tiny theme.
I’m not explaining this very well but it was somehow reassuring. The main thing: It was fun! And Potter, my mouse (not really a mouse, I mean yes of course he is a mouse but not the kind that is alive) had his picture taken by tourists, multiple times. We were a sight.
Monday.
Danielle and I went on our Clandestine Executive Board Meeting (it’s a proxy!) and it was incredible, and everything about this week was better because of it.
I have a new bedside table.
This is how congruencing works. This should not be changing how I sleep and how I wake up and how I feel in general, but it is.
Wally! He’s back!
Wally is my brilliant physical therapist (shhh, code for massage, lalalala).
When he is not around, I am a sadface mouse. But he is back!
And he was able to do a lot of wonderful helping with the tight-painful-constricted emotional gunk I was going through.
July.
There are so many beautiful things about July. I am not going to list them all here, but I have been noticing them and appreciating them.
10 27 is now both a noun and a verb, and also great.
[Hmmm, silent retreat on 99% of this but I will say that I am experiencing extremely high levels of joyfulness related to it.]
Colleen.
My beloved Colleen – Communicatrix! — was in town and we had a looooong delight-filled breakfast and talked about hearts and minds and ideas.
I love her.
And I think I may have convinced her to run away with me this November for a private rallying of hearts and minds. It will be epic.
The (rarest!) superpower of Actually It’s Completely Perfect Like This.
This is the superpower I always want! And it was with me all week!
Missing the bus and being delighted about it, stuff like that.
Writing.
My writing mojo is BACK, and I wrote wrote wrote all week.
And processed things on the Floop! Which was amazing.
Thank you, words. I knew you were not gone forever.
A beautiful ritual, set into motion.
The secret Congruencing Coronation at the Royal Court! A new true secret something!
A thing I have wanted for years and years was finally initiated, activated, set into motion.
It happened with ease and grace and swiftness, exactly as requested. Everyone smiled at me. Everyone I encountered was warm and friendly. It only took a few minutes. There was no drama at all. It was smooth, beautiful, supportive. I rang all the bells! And ate a bell pepper!
All of Portal Land sparkled with me. And it is the birthday of the Steel Bridge, which is important to me, for a variety of reasons.
I could not be happier about this.
Fireworks were fine!
Usually (as you might know if you have been reading this for a few years) I flip out on the fourth of July. I have serious PTSD from all the explosions from then, and I don’t react well.
And somehow this year wasn’t the hellish nightmare that it usually is. I spent the day preparing for it, and I was weirdly fine.
For the first time ever since being in actual explosions happening in real-time, I was not falling apart. I was not even scared. The gap between my brain thinking that now is that moment at work, saturday night, the bomb shaking the street, diving and resurfacing behind the bar, watching Ofer open the door, registering that the cafe across the street is now gone and I think: these people on the ground are dead and … all the way to me-now realizing that no, this is just my lovely neighbors being celebratory and no one is in danger, well it’s much smaller.
Much.
This was new and also astonishing. I feel grateful to all the shiva nata I did this week that helped strengthen my force field and release old traumatic rules and experiences.
New superpowers.
Oho! This was also because of all the crazy shivanauttery. It was AMAZING. I don’t even know what to say about it other than that.
The difficult conversation was okay.
First of all, ALL THE SPARKLEPOINTS to me for even having it. I have deep avoidance of confrontation, triple especially for ones I need to start.
So all the points!
For doing it, not avoiding it, not putting it off, being with it, staying present, not crying, not getting distracted by distortions, staying connected to today’s superpower of [+independence], not letting the other person’s stuff become my stuff, not believing that hurtful things said about me are truth, and remembering that someone else’s pain filter does not need to be my filter. The things I feared most did not happen, we were able to come to a temporary agreement that I hope will lead to the thing I actually want, in good timing.
We both were able to remain calm and patient throughout, which was a really big deal.
I did not get the thing that I wanted, but I know more about how to navigate this now. And that is a really big deal.
I know what I want!
Finally.
What a great feeling.
Playing live at the meme beach house — it’s the Fake Band of the Week!
Background? Ez and I make up bands. Stu (retired Bolshevik-fearing voice-to-text software) once translated “people will hate me and be jealous” to “they’ll hang out at my Meme Beach House“. It’s just one guy.
This week’s band:
Medium Squeaky
Surprisingly, no harmonica.
Though they do make a fair amount of noise.
And, as it turns out? It’s actually just one guy.
Hallo Hallo! I am saying Hallo Hallo. Announcement time.
Picture me wearing that crazy hat…
Guess what? We finalized the dates for the 2013 Rallies! THIS IS ON.
There is ONE in February. And ONE in April. And that’s it for next year because I am the full-time director of Stompopolis (our new amazing space, which you will get to visit and play in at Rally in addition to hanging out at the original and super secret hidden Playground), and also because CONGRUENCE! It means I have to slow down.
These two rallies are going to be absolutely incredible. I already love them. Rally! Rally!
February (Rally #24!) is open to the public. The April Rally (Rally #25!) is Floop-only.
So if you want to Rally this year come in July or September. And if you want next year, grab February. Unless you’re at the Floop in which case April is an option too!
I know Rally prices were supposed to go up to full price this week but I felt like a jerk for not giving anyone warning, which yes, that’s my usual mode of operating, unintentionally, just because I forget and stuff sells out. But it still seems like it would be nice to actually let people know for once.
So. Giving a reprieve of a couple weeks. We’ll figure this out.
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
Sending everyone heart-sighs for the Hard and lots of enthusiastic Yays for the Good! I wasn’t planning to chicken this week, but suddenly all this mental clucking started, and it wants to come out.
HARD:
• A general bewildered feeling of Where Did the Week Go? Mid-week holidays and other It’s-a-Sunny-Summer-Day-in-the-Northwest-So-Don’t-Expect-Efficiency-from-Anyone unspecified wackidoo-ness threw me for a loop. What day is it again?
• Firework noise. I like the sanctioned firework shows. Loathe the illegal M-80s blown up at 1 am, yards from my bedroom window. I turn into the 4th of July equivalent of the cranky old cat lady on the block who keeps any frisbees that stray into her yard.
• Having my face shoved into a bouquet of Stuff (mine and theirs) before, during and after a family visit. Especially during an encounter with a trio of Bolivians. Sometimes it was amusing (at least when recounting the story later). Other times, not so much.
GOOD:
• Such beautiful July days! I love the time of year when the Northwest suddenly flips a switch, and it’s hello, summer! That’s the kind of clockwork I can get behind.
• We got to watch the (sanctioned) fireworks show from a SECRET HIDDEN ROOFTOP TURRET. That’s not even a proxy. I felt like a secret agent who’d accidentally stepped into a Frances Hodgson Burnett novel.
• I made an illustration of a bunch of vegetables. It turned out better than what was in my head. That never happens. Ever.
• The superpower of Eloquence. Which came to my aid when I found myself in need of crafting a thoughtful response to a direct, loaded, stuff-laden question from a family member. I was so immersed in Sovereignty that I smiled for an hour afterward. Wow.
• The best iced latte, straight up, that I’ve ever had in my life. With every sip I had to say, “Wow!” out loud. Thank you, Top Pot.
• “Medium Squeaky” is my new favorite band. I suspect they might be from Canada. Or at least signed to the Secretly Canadian record label. If I ever get to see them (him!) live, I’m going to set up a Cheese Curds Food Cart outside, and people can order the “Medium Squeaky” before the set. Awesome.
Happy chickening to all!
Ringing all the bells!
And yet again I am completely baffled by the concept that a week has gone by, and confused by what may or may not have happened in it. Calendars ahoy!
The Hard
– Sleep schedule completely off and getting worse. No sleep. Too much sleep. Sleep at the wrong times. Incredibly convincing dreams in which parasitic worms are devouring my flesh…
– There is a thing in my life that is not congruent (specifically not the least bit sovereign) in any way. I hate it. And (not surprisingly) attacking and villianizing that part of me has made things worse, not better. What’s surprising is just how much worse.
– The fourth of July. All the pain from all the fourths of July. Which was combined with accidental sugar ingestion. And getting locked out of and then locked into a mall. And sobbing in a movie theater.
– The fifth of July, when all the emotional and body stuck from the fourth combined into massive body stuck that created even more emotional stuck and things were very very bad for a very very long time.
– So very much missing my two best friends. Epic loneliness. Combined with massive frustration about the neighborhood I’m living in and how much it’s not where I want to live. Several emergency drives up to Northeast to breathe it in and cry. I want to live near people I like in a house with a yard! I want this so much I can’t believe it.
– Learning about all the boundaries. Mostly by having them disregarded/blown over/ignored, etc. Excellent data about everything that’s not okay with me, but it is hard hard hard.
– No food I’m capable of cooking/eating at home appeals to me in the least. There is no money for eating out. My strategy for dealing with this so far has been thrice daily tantrums. Not the most adaptive.
The Good!
– Hat Parade! Havi already did a smashing job of describing it. Very much fun!
– Congruencing here too! Not as much as I wanted, but I had kind of ridiculous expectations, actually. At any rate – the living room is gorgeous now and completely different. And all the altars got rearranged until they feel good, which is the most important part.
– Going to Stompopolis completely ready for four hours of working-in-the-soft sort of things, and instead writing an entire ebook. In something like half an hour. From this crazy in-flow space where I literally couldn’t keep up with the words (but damned if I didn’t try). Mmmmm…magic.
– Proving that she or he is related to me, the baby went from way underachiever kicking-wise to way overachiever in about a week. Last night the kicking/somersaulting/baby yoga/whatever was so intense that you could *see* it and definitely feel it from the outside. Which made the hubster’s month. Which made my month.
– The Floop! I don’t think I can even express the brilliance and kindness and sparkling magic of what people have been writing lately. I’m blown away by the processes going on in everyone’s lives and by how eloquently they can share it all! I cry, I laugh, I sigh, I reread, I noodle. Serious inspiration.
– Someone I love made a huge step forward professionally this week and I am proud and excited and they are glowing.
– Board games! Suddenly I’m wanting to play board games all the time. And I have been doing so. Losing spectacularly over and again, but enjoying myself.
– Okay, so it was a little cool to spend 30 minutes finding my way into a locked mall through secret corridors and etc., and it was really cool to wander around inside it while it was completely empty. And the fact that we got locked in as well was cool in retrospect, once we figured out how to get out. I felt like some pregnant limping version of a ninja.
(The above does not actual involve me breaking any laws or even rules. The funny thing is that the mall was technically open.)
– Professional pictures from the wedding! They are so beautiful! There are a bunch in which *I* am so beautiful (surprising) and I don’t mind most of the rest. I feel strongly about how much I love pictures of people!
– OOD! It was the best ood and it had been growing inside of me for a long time and it came out. And then I made a collage of it and found a.)the exact phrase “Objects of Desire” in a magazine I was cutting up, and b.)that double-sided tape is spectacular.
That is all. 😀
Hooray for congruencing!
This week… so much hard, and so much good. So I think I’ll take it J
The hard:
Realizing I have to quit something I believe very passionately about. But I’m way, way over my capacities. I’d like to think I could inch back, but the situation isn’t very boundary respecting. So I need to step out of it entirely, and then in a little while, see if I can add more involvement.
Having meetings that terrified me. This doesn’t usually happen. I’m pretty unflappable about most things. But there’s a… thing. And its super important to me that it happens. And it’s big and complicated and I really need about 10 people to get behind it before I can even start moving it forwards. And two of those, probably the hardest two, were this week.
Realizing that I’m missing part of my revision notes for a novel. This is not good. I’m missing the entire ending chunk. Cue panic.
The good:
Odd reconnecting with things I love, and realizing that I have to make space for them.
Reexamining another project, and realizing that its on track after all!
Meetings of terror that went well, and make me thing that this thing of chaos might actually work!
Smooth, easy writing. Not much fiction again yet… but nonfiction has been flowing well, and I’m at least trying to find all the parts for the fiction.
Panic about those missing notes being turned into thoughts of maybe its time to work on something else… at least an outline? Worth pondering.
Fabulous chickening to all!
I am sending love to all the chickens, for all the weeks that happened this week. Oh, and here’s mine!
Hard:
–No electricity at home for four days. Four long, hot, steamy, smelly, filthy, fetid days. And, because our water comes from a well with an electric pump, no electricity also meant no water. No ability to flush toilets. Lots of food had to be thrown away. (Reminding myself now that there really is room for everyone’s unhappiness at the fountain, that even though many people have suffered far worse hardship than I did at the hands of last Friday’s storm, it is still okay for me to acknowledge my own suffering.)
Good:
–My daughter and I had a coming of age ritual for her, just the two of us (she turned thirteen recently). We’ve been planning this for months, but not in an extremely detail-oriented way, so I really didn’t know how it was going to turn out, but oh, it was marvelous! Sweet and beautiful and moving and special. I couldn’t have asked for better. I am going to cherish this memory for the rest of my life.
–Feeling just generally strong and powerful and magical and hopeful and a whole lot more like me than I remember feeling last year at around this time. I like this, and I can hardly wait to see what happens next!
hello chickeners! clucking at you!
The suck:
-tuesday nite shoe launch. lasted almost an hour
-which triggered some very bad headspae for me which lasted into the follwoing day
-and compelled me to at out, in an immature non-sovereign way.
-because desoite the unnecessary ahrshness, the reasons I was called out, were very valid
-falling back into an old pattern i had started to see shft
-worried that I’m enagging in too many unconscious psychdramas
-arious aches and pains
-down to my last week of recoverie and not wanting to go back to work and childcare just yet
-shared soemthing ery inbtimate and vulnerable, felt a bit judged and misunderstood
the sparkly:
– was given a projet that I resented and stalled on. did it today and it was easier than I thought and kinda successful too
-my new awesome purple dress
-writing and painting
-Flailing, not every day but close. making real progress in committing Level one to memory
-reading good books and watching good movies
Short because of leaving
Hard
– unsovereign break up of official/professional supervisor relationship. lots of blaming as usual and unclear personal attacks
– running into my stuff, after feeling feelings of amazingness. the stuff was big and really hard and overwhelming.
– unclarity about the future and other people’s worries piling on top of it.
Good
+ epic date. kissing in the rain. dancing to a new song. feeling all the feelings and i not believing they are there and they are
+ congruencing. i am congruencing along here! big shifts are happening and while there is hard it feels like … mmm the right direction.
+ unsouvereign work relationship is over. over. not going back there ever. and nobody can make me.
Saturday chicken for me 🙂
The Hard
The thing I’ve been worried about being hard, was hard, but not in any of the ways I expected. It found totally new and surprising ways of being sucky. Meh.
Watching other people in their stuff and feeling useless because I was unable to make it better for them. (Oh yes, because, I’m not in control of everything, y’know, lol, hello old stuff of mine!)
A holiday that wasn’t.
Rain, cold and tents – not a good mix!
The Good
My ood is working well. Such a good process thanks to @Havi 🙂
Got the tent dry & put away
More proper holiday to come so looking forward to that.
Love and sparkles to all chikeneers
Oh, Chicken! I’ve missed you!
“I have deep avoidance of confrontation” — this is totally me. So much hard. You deserve all the sparklepoints.
This week’s hard:
– So. Much. To. Do. Week number I-don’t-even-know of constant work-work-work.
– Extreme heat, and people not being able to shut up about it. I can deal with it so much better when I don’t think about. Constant reminders of how hot it is are not helpful.
– Having to work with incomplete information.
This week’s good:
– Stayed on top of everything that had to be done, and didn’t feel panicked about it.
– Carved out some thinking time and made some plans.
– Hit a milestone.
Happy weekend, Chickeneers!
Chicken 🙂
The Hard:
– Needing to find something out, asking all the pertinent agencies and still not getting answers. In fact, not even being understood at one of them, and having the person there shove her concerns down my throat instead of listening to my questions. Ugh. There is a part of me that is very angry/frustrated about this and a part of me that is hurt about not being understood and feeling as though there is no one to talk to.
– Having stupid automated bus chip card not work because of stupidness. The bus driver did let me on the bus but I had to walk back because no cash.
– Depression. I think? Or just exhaustion and need for sleep. I wish I could be okay with this and think of it as just something my body needs (and it would make sense for my body to need this much rest, really) but right now all I can feel towards it is anger/frustration and hopelessness. Noticing.
– Other people in my group not taking responsibility for their stuff, derailing group discussion, wasting everyone’s time. So much bleh.
– Not really caring about school. Part of needing rest, but this is what triggers the hopelessness/”there must be something wrong with me” response.
– A difficult creative writing class where a lot of my stuff came up.
– Eating stuff with lots of not-so-good consequences for my tummy.
– Having trouble staying on budget. Need to think more carefully about why this is happening.
– Realizing that my two housing options for next year really…aren’t. So now I have to actually find something. (but – so tired!)
The Good:
– The walk was actually okay.
– Tattoo! Finally got it! The whole experience was wonderful, and now I have Bunny’s name written on my body. It feels good 🙂
– Nice sushi dinner with friends
– Calling that one agency where the woman was lovely and understood what I was saying, even though she didn’t have the answers.
– Being able to say “no” to something I really didn’t want to do.
– One good thing about the tiredness is that it stops me from offering to help people with their stuff. Perhaps I can see it as an exercise in sovereignty.
– Feeling like some more hiatus-ing is in order. I like the idea of this.
Thank you for this space, all.
Hello hello Chicken and Chickeneers!
So much love and joy and mrrrr to everyone’s Chickens!
Two weeks of Chickening here, since I wrote the Chicken last week and didn’t post it. Because sometimes life is like that. 😉
My Ouch Hards last week:
– Wow, work, you’re really stepping up the craziness.
– Sitting on a wooden box in my office for 3 days last week still reverberating through my hips and body.
– Toothgrinding at night…
– …and subsequent migraines.
– The friend with whom I was collaborating on an art piece was having many crises during the week, and I was non-NVC with her… I told her she wasn’t allowed to punish herself. Bad me.
– Household mess driving me a little berserk.
– Cats getting sick from eating fallen hydrangea leaves. Guilt attached to that.
– Sunsickness and sunburn on my shoulders, for the first time in years.
My Whee Goods last week:
* Carl Sagan in the LOC! Woooo!
* OMG the chair. THE CHAIR. And Lovelyman put it together for me!
* Swimming! In a pool that felt good! (Most pools feel gross to me.)
* …annnnd I loved the swimming so much I was resolved to make my own sunscreen for once.
* My friend accepted the intention of my communication. *phew*
* The art exhibition rocked. The art piece I performed in blew a bunch of people away.
* The basil is growing exuberantly and the oregano and chives are sneakily assembling themselves.
* A crazy-gorgeous thunderstorm last night, and experiencing it in mid-sleep with snuggles. Mmmmm.
* All sorts of gorgeous feathers! [a proxy {but kinda not}]
* Made it through this past 2-week period without overspending. Yay go me!
My Ouch Hards this past week:
– Heat wave.
– Getting the aches and pains associated with a coming storm…
– …but no storm came. WAH!
– Sore legs and feet from performing in the aforementioned art piece.
– Household mess got worse.
– NO TIME NO TIME monsters being really hella loud.
– Spending too much. WAY too much.
My Whee Goods this past week:
* HOLY CRAP thinking about the feathers. SO awesome. Forgetting time and space! This is really multiple goods – for me to forget where I am on public transportation is huge.
* My boss letting me focus on only the most important thing. Freeing and relaxing to not have to address [crap what doesn’t matter right now].
* Shopping for and getting the sunscreen ingredients! I will be making some tomorrow!
* Cleaning. Organizing. Making FLOOR SPACE. Mmmmmm.
* Getting leg massages from the Lovelyman.
* Somehow managing to process the guilt about overspending.
Sending loads of love to every Chickeneer, wherever you all are.
Ringing of all the bells!!! And all the points!!
Yay for Monday. By far the BEST day of the week. 😀
The Hard:
Stress leading up to vacation, lots of having to remember what is mine to carry and what is someone else’s. Letting them carry what is theirs is better for everyone.
Lots of sad feelings coming up with songs that I couldn’t change or get away from. Leaning into the sadness.
The Good:
Match date went well. No sparks but really interesting and fun night.
Post match date hanging out with my friends and being glad for them.
Lobsters! Yum.
Boat trips to see whales and giant ships and beaches and islands. Heaven.
Possibilities.
I haven’t Chickened in a while, but earlier I was reflecting on how this week sucked, and then I realized some awesome things happened this week too, so it suddenly seemed appropriate to Chicken!
So hello Chicken!
The Hard
– The oppressive unrelenting heat! I hate heat! My body hates heat! I don’t have air conditioning in my apartment so I pretty much didn’t want to move or do anything the entire week. I spent most of my time napping because my body literally couldn’t handle anything else. Which also means not doing yin yoga or pilates all week which only made things suck even more!
– Extreme lack of money and all the associated panicking about DOOM! Not fun!
The Good!
– Wonderful friends who invited me over to share their air conditioning, food and beer on the 4th of July when I was sweltering in the heat of my apartment with no money for the food and beer that I wanted. And they even made sure to buy me veggie burgers since they knew I wouldn’t eat the meat they were grilling! So much appreciation!
– Super sweet and somewhat unexpected support from a friend when I hit a breaking point with the heat and the whole week of hard when my power went out on Friday night. Also, important related realizations about relationships and time.
– Meeting and hanging out with Sarah when she stopped in Chicago on her road trip! We tried a new pub I’d been dying to try and went to a concert in the park! Andy came, too!
– A day of going through all the fun new equipment we got at work! It was like Christmas in July! Ha!
– Some big epiphanies-are-stoopid moments regarding biggification and how now is then! This is huge!
– Karaoke with awesome new friends! SO MUCH FUN! 🙂
It was a week of good moments against a background of hard, but the good was so very good!
*kisses to all the Chickens*
I had a good week, and then the weekend went sour. Two things, which I’ll be processing on the Floop: I asked a question on an internet forum, was misunderstood, given advice I didn’t want or need, and someone through a shoe. And an email from a family member triggered stuff about my relationship with another family member. It didn’t have to but I let it happen and then I stewed around in it for way too long.
I hate it when I do that. So, an early VPA: that I will find the lesson in what happened. The more I learn about what I do to myself that triggers bad feelings, the happier I can be.
Hi to all!
Here’s my chicken:
The Hard:
It’s been hard to keep re-finding motivation and hope, particularly when I find myself craving unwise forms of respite, and when I notice that my progress on mundane projects is not nearly as fast as I’d like.
Also, news re J’s health.
Hard but also good:
I did stone-skipping about NEEDS. (Scary!)
Good:
Feeling like I may be learning useful things. I’m especially pleased about having crafted some Qs to ask myself when I feel tempted to seek unwise forms of respite, and then using them, 3 times in a row, with a feeling that the internal process and negotiations were important and useful. Even though (silent retreat).
Also, stone-skipping re what I know about how determination works for me.
Also, the fact that the audiobook I’m listening to about habits has info that MAY fit in VERY usefully.
Also, writing and singing two self-blessing songs, getting some health supplies, getting some extra-wide binders for PROJECTS.
And giving myself flowers as an effort-medal. (White centaureas from the farmer’s market! Very cool, like tiny fireworks!)
AND getting beautiful art from Chandler, and happily passing on four of the postcards to friends who I dance with, three of whom knit. (Thanks, Chandler!!!)
I’ll play with:
– Asking myself the questions some more.
– Singing the self-blessings some more.
– Planning look-forward possibilities for the NEXT day, some more.
– Changing phone display colors, some more.
– Maybe doing an ABCDEF exercise early in a day?
– Maybe putting useful info re how determination works for me into a phone memo?
– Maybe trying out a song for “Now I’m going to do X!”?
– Maybe seek some ideas for more Now Is Not Then magic?
– Maybe do stone-skipping about possible things to say to J.
Q for myself: did I do “I’ll play with” in last chicken? How did I do?
Sending rainbow hugs!
Cheers, Chickeneers!
The Hard
– 4 days in Indiana with temps greater than 100 and humidity like crazy
– feeling schlumpy
– dealing with the Summer-Is-Half-Over-and-You-Haven’t-Accomplished-Enough Monsters
The Good
– proposal accepted to the International Higher Education Teaching & Learning conference
– listening to my body
– receiving some data that I’ve been asking for since November
Mmm…a sleepy Monday chicken.
The hard:
OMG the interrupted sleep and dysfunctional sleep patterns.
Trying to do way too many things.
The 25 minutes spent waiting in a queue in a shop to pick something up and the crappy response from their customer service team when I complained about it. And one of the items not fitting, meaning I need to go back to the same place to return it. Bah!
The good:
Lavender farm! Beautiful and peaceful and owned by the most lovely people. Followed by a wonderful afternoon in Chichester. Mmm…
Shaman weekend! So much goodness, connection and healing. Meeting the most wonderful people. Yummy food + drink. Amazing, beautiful, powerful.
Now soaking myself in this new feeling of sure-footedness.
Plus hanging out with my friend. Yay!
Good public transport mojo was with me.
Eating the best chips EVER on the beach, in the sunshine.
Nights of decent sleep. Bliss!
Wishing you all beautiful weeks.
Whispered hello as I enter a little bit later than most people here!
Hard stuff
– full house + unsettled baby + sickly lad = four-in-the-bed x two nights in a row = ow. Tired and grumpy.
– lookit my halo hosting a party for my brother-in-law’s 60th at our house with people I don’t know. It was fine, not too much hard work just, y’know, not a thing I delight in. And halo polishing exercises feel far less fulfilling than they used to.
– mess, wet weather, medicine that needs to be administered twice a day thirty mins away from meals, meals, laundry and everything else that ‘everyone’ can manage to manage and I appear to be unable to manage, at least not as well as I would like to be able to.
– Lad got sick with tonsillitis and it was enough to drive me back to the doctor at last but I feel awfully guilty because the real hard truth of it is that I compromised his well-being for six months because of story, story, excuse, story, excuse. None of which is relevant to the fact that he needs a certain kind of care and support to thrive and be well in the world and I failed to meet those needs.
– busy-ness and tiredness and anxiety and old pain hanging around between my love and I.
– my vpa got completely and utterly ignored. I feel shtoopid. Auto-correction genius suggests that I feel ‘stooped’, and that might be more accurate actually. Progress: it is slow……..
– while I was a bit mental last year I booked in to do a thing this year (an amazing big wonderful lovely thing) and wasn’t able to do it. And I wanted to be able to do it next year but I can’t see any ways this could happen. It feels so far beyond possible. I am sad, and also caught in ‘you’re not being creative enough! You’re manifesting failure here! Ugh, you’re SO crap at everything!’ monster blah. Ugh. And sadness.
Goooooods
+ public libraries. What have I been doing all these years not using them?
+ flooping it up at the floop. Bells!! Resonance! Ommmmmm
+ help, holidays, roadside assistance, my love and all the other sources of support in my life.
+ got Lad to the doctor and got herbs to a) fight off pathogen and b) support and fire up his energy and immunity and resilience.
+ party was fine and I still got inside to watch Dowton. I love Downton. I love how prepared I am to defend that hour of my week.
+ seeing Lad playing with his cousin and noting that aaaaah I see it now, he definitely has made progress. Maybe he will be fine at school next year after all. Anxiety grip on my heart eases a little.
+ other stuff. I’m here, I’m conscious, I’m exiting the middle as my normal way of being. And that’s all you can do. That IS the practice. Progress may be slow, but it is being made. Even when I can’t see it cos I’m too close.
I’m sure.
Xoxo