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.
Two hundred and eleven weeks in a row of writing a Chicken to close out the week.
And now two weeks in a row that I’m sitting in the Hypothalamus (my new/new-ish office) to post it.
Hi. Friday. Chicken. Let’s do this.
The hard stuff
Huge PTSD trigger Saturday night.
I was walking home from the street fair and there were fast running accelerated footsteps behind me, and then I spiraled into the dark places.
Luckily for me, this person did not have bad intentions, despite several creepy and clueless things they did to indicate otherwise. And luckily for this person, I did not break a bottle over their head, though I was ready to. Understatement.
Then it took many, many, many hours to get my grounding back.
More on PTSD from the blog.
Too much social.
Overwhelmed.
I usually know to stay away from people, but this week there were lots of great people, and so that was hard.
And once I reach that state of overcooked, it takes a lot of time to come back to a baseline of force-fields-are-in-order.
Friday.
I fell apart on Friday too!
This time, work-related.
Luckily Marisa was there to comfort me.
That part was lovely. The overwhelmed, overworked, hormonal chaos, generally getting lost in all the scripts of hopelessness and helplessness was not fun.
On the other hand, having a friend to lovingly stroke your hair and bring you juice and say all the right things….that is a very big deal.
Still: overwhelm. The worst.
The awful, awful piece of news.
I received a terrible piece of news this week that I cannot and do not wish to talk about.
So I’m not going to talk about it.
But it shook me up. Very, very much.
And that was a big shadow over everything else this week. Lots of taking time out to interact with old fear, and stuff from then, and the real-life repercussions of right now.
Oh please, miracles. Show up. Now is the time.
Now is the time. Now is the time. Now is the time.
Trying to maintain receptivity and look for the hidden openings.
I will resolve this, but I do not yet know how. Trust and faith were a big deal this week, and it was hard.
Extreme heat.
It was something like 104 degrees Fahrenheit in Portland yesterday.
That is not okay.
The good stuff
Dance.
I bounced it out this week, and that made everything better.
Social was fun!
On Saturday I spent four hours with my playmate, two hours with Rebecca, and the rest of the day with Marisa, Ben and Chris.
There was fascinating conversation, delighted laughter and joyful singing for Stompopolis.
Plus I got to show Stompopolis to people who know nothing about it, and they got it.
Another thing: Chris gave me a clew, which was important.
And I didn’t fall apart during the day even though spending a day with people is really hard for me.
Harmony.
Incoming me is the best.
She had amazing ideas all week.
Shiva Nata
So much shivanautical play. So many gigantic epiphanies and mini-sparks of goodness.
And suddenly remembering quietly forgotten things that turned out to be incredibly useful and important.
Playdate. It is changing, and this is fascinating.
Everything changes. But. Playdating has been shifting and morphing in interesting ways.
Last week the fun of playdating was the ALL THE TIME of it. Let’s have a playdate and another playdate and then another one.
This week it was more like the Playdating was the regular way of being, and everything else I did was a break from playdating.
Related to this: I feel happy and peaceful and delighted.
This week had lots of things that were pleasurable.
Affection and loving sweetness and excitement and moments that were big moments.
This week had people I care about.
Especially Marisa who was here to hold my hand and pet me.
Mojo. It is back.
Mojo came back, business-wise.
On Friday I felt like a giant failure who (say the monster committee) has ruined everything! Despairing. But by the next day I felt the return of the business savant.
Like being a brilliant inspired business genius again who is a smart risk-taker and yes, okay, currently doing a crazy, yes, this is true, but it’s a FUN CRAZY!
YEAH! YEAH!
I can do this. That was exciting. I needed that. Because it’s been a long, hard year of hard with opening Stompopolis.
Beach day.
Ohmygod. Beach day.
This one was important. Big things happened.
A big chunk of my sadness is gone.
I walked across the saddest bridge and did not think about how it is the saddest bridge.
I walked by the place and it was no longer the saddest place.
Things are moving and changing. This is big.
Toozday.
Progress. Finally. Sweet loving help — and perspective! — and general adoration from my playmate. Then took that to a day of work-play-partnering with Marisa.
Marisa is the director of Math Camp. I am the director of the Playground.
Between the two of us we know more than just about anyone when it comes to CULTURE and cultivating/creating/distilling culture and explaining that.
So we were able to put our skill sets together and do miraculous things.
She threw together a terrific draft of the Plumlet, which I love.
I came up with new systems.
Fantastic progress!
Huge progress in general!
Wednesday! And Thursday!
Huge amazing magic happened at Stompopolis!
We played! We sorted things out!
We finalized the packages and pricing and everything there is to know about how we are running this like a speakeasy and not a gym, and how many member mice we can have playing there and all the things!
And we wrote an On A Mission From God statement (not a theistic one, that’s a Blues Brothers reference, obviously, we’re putting the band back together!).
“We’re putting the band back together.”
“Forget it. No way.”
“We’re on a mission from God.”
Anyway. It’s basically like a mission statement. But more fun.
We wrote one for Stompopolis, for the vision, for me, for the Pirate Crew and for the Noodler who is in charge of crew.
And we tracked all the things that need to happen in the Very Stuck System.
And we made progress on the Grand Refueling Station (formerly the Nap Room).
The point is ALL OF THIS IS GOOD, and we are closer than ever!
I AM FEELING HOPEFUL!
This is such a big deal. All caps forever!
You guys! You guys! It’s happening.
A better piece of news. And a return.
Someone close to me who unexpectedly dropped out of my life several months ago mysteriously showed up again this week.
And said pretty much word-for-word the exact thing I’d been wishing they would say, but did not actually believe would ever happen.
So that was beautiful and perfect, and just a few hours after I made a wish about that.
Tiny hopeful yay.
The fun part of the Chickening happens here.
Tabstravaganza! Or: what’s Havi been up to with all those open Firefox tabs?
- I got to this video from Claire! It’s beautiful. A tribute from Gotye to the people who cover his song, and linking to their videos. Neat.
- Like so many things, I got to this via my Second Favorite Nick. This video of Julia Childs is my new favorite thing. Possibly ever.
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 comes to you via my brilliant Marisa:
Baptism by Sandwiches
They’re loud and soft and everything good.
Though, of course, it’s really just one guy.
Hallo Hallo! I am saying Hallo Hallo. Announcement time.
Picture me wearing that crazy hat…
Okay. If you have been thinking about getting something from the shop, here’s your heads up.
You might want to do that now.
Because things are about to get shaken up a little once Stompopolis opens to the public. There will be reconfigurings. Now is a good time to get stuff. Is what I will say for the present.
More to come. But for now: if you want a thing, definitely get it.
That’s all!
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
Havi, what a gorgeous Chicken!
Now I want to see Carrie Fisher blow up a hotel.
As for me? A long time of no chickening. No assessment, no acknowledgement.
Mostly because work has been so hard for the past while that I gave myself endless permission to Just Not Review It.
However, now I feel a need. This is a few weeks’ worth of chickening…
My Ouch Hards:
– 2 days of a flu so bad I couldn’t figure out that walking thing.
– A 3-day vacation that mostly wasn’t… ended up working through most of it.
– I am now working away from home 5 days a week. This is Not Good when the commute is 2 hrs each way.
– The Really Unpleasant work meeting that was 3 hours long.
– Important people trying to change my priorities to fit theirs. (Silent retreat on details.)
– Household mess driving me a little berserk.
– The blood sugar crash of DOOOOM.
– The utility bill so insane even the customer service rep was surprised.
– Itch itch scratch scratch aaaargh skin stooop it
– Very little time to write. Not even time for the feathers to come.
– Wanting. Wanting so much, but not getting.
My Whee Goods:
* The Curiosity Rover!! YAY!
* Very yummy soft-boiled eggs.
* Cheeseless pizza – from the place just downstairs, no less!
* Clive Barker art on DeviantArt.
* Finally made an appointment to get my hair cut.
* While the utility bill uppercut was seriously painful, the inadvertently good aftermath was that I had/have to be home to test the meters. Yum working from home.
* Re-finding some of my energy receptiveness.
* Lovelyman agreed to be my beta reader!
* … and he LIKES what he’s read so far! Enough that he whispered it to me as I was dropping off to sleep (normally he doesn’t want to wake me.)
Sending loads of love to every Chickeneer, wherever you all are.
Whee the chickens, all the fridays, and Math Camp goodness combined with Playgroundness? Not sure why that delights me so much, but it does!
Week week weak….
-hmn… that moment of finally feeling the grief. oh man it was self-contained though.
-the crabbiness of last weekend. man! crabby. boo self. and containing the crabby, which feels no good but scientist-beth says is better the spewing the crabbiness.
-the aching feeling of something that wants to be known and discovered by you can’t quite put your finger on it and a loop of frustration thereby: but really since I figured it out, in retrospect it was a delicious, anticiplayful wanting.
+oh. right. last friday night and saturday was full of hard and mutual crabbiness. and then, again, it worked its way into an evening of loveliness. (theme!)
Week Week strong yay!
+having such a hard time thinking of the hards.
+the lovely new people and their surprisingly lovely little dogs!
+the FOOLISHNESS/PAIN/FRUSTRATION/RAGE shiva nata! that cracked open and released some really deep stuff about all of those. + it was in a class, and seemed to be really good for client too! + the lovely sssssllooooowwwww yoga after.
+the key lime pie that was an aesthetic failure and every-other-way success
+the buying of the plane ticket! slow steps to panama-reality!
+new pieces of morning page rituals
+thursday. all day. wanting to, and finally seeing an aspect of myself – clarified, unique, and newly understandable. so much more sense is made of all of the actions. ever. basically. hooray! knowing oneself, it is a long and rewarding road. Frank.
+dancing! ecstatic dancing ftw forever! wow.
love to the chickeneers on the high seas!
Chicken-chicken-chicken! Yay, chicken! (And saying “We’re on a mission from God” in weird John Belushi voice!)
The Hard:
Monday. Will silent retreat, but set everything else off-step and made me headachy. For 4 days.
Then wednesday, when I got my site temporarily shut down due to stupid system/financial avoidance/monster acking, and then forgot a coaching client, and got all sucked into “must make book cover mock up” when I am not even asked. Grrr. And then beating self up for time-wasting. And not chickening. And argh.
Thursday — related to silent retreat. No work accomplished and much arghing.
Too. Frickin’. Hot.
The GOod:
Remembering that first day of Rally I didn’t do much either. And needed to do stuff that wasn’t work so i could do work. And ease. With a side order of fun (like a fairground stripper!)
Super secret big author actually emailed me back! And said she would look at my book with an eye towards a cover quote! And there was much rejoicing (yay!)
Daycare. Better than ice cream and sex, consecutive or concurrent.
Signed up for studio session with Cairene! Best. Evah!!
Glad to be chickening again. Much love, guys. 🙂
Oh week. You were quite a week.
(One thousand yays for On a Mission from God Statements! I like this!)
The Hard:
– Stuff wrapped in stuff with a bucket of stuff and a side of stuff.
– Which is to say: panic attacks and not sleeping and unnecessary drama I can tell I’m causing as I cause it and all the associated pain and blegh. STUFF. I was in it.
– And fear. And disappointment.
– Realizing how sad I’ve been forever about a bunch of things I didn’t even know how to be sad about.
– Finding a hidden heartbreak. And not yet having the resources to mend it.
The Good:
– Final stoopid resounding very-long-in-coming epiphany of: “there needs to be space for me,” and “I am in charge of this.” Or more like: “Hey! I can create space for myself! And when I don’t know how yet I can still focus on trying to find out how and then sometimes miracles happen!”
– Two miracles! Of spaciousness! And safety! The superpower of “there is room for Rhiannon somewhere in this day.”
– Drive through car wash! An amusement park ride for HSPs. Especially if you’ve watched lots of Bones, because there is the anticipation of a dead body falling on your car, so it’s kind of like a roller coaster plus a haunted house that happens to clean your car. And then your car is clean.
– Related: driving my car places! Like downtown! Independence, movement, competence, discovery, badassery, joy. Singing along with all the songs on the radio!!
– Even while noticing/feeling/falling apart about the heartbreaks and the sads, getting to see these things even as I’m shifting them for the better. Noticing the pattern is changing, and quickly. Knowing it won’t be like this forever.
– Having the most beautiful moment with the most beautiful stranger and how much everything changed.
Love love love to everyone!
Havi, you are SO fun. And also good people. I hope for more little tiny yays, until they are a big echo-whisper that sounds like rain, rain in the desert of HAPPINESS.
it rained today, I live in a desert, and it rained enough to cool the earth and water the white sage plants that we grow. And i made my first sale of white sage, and I got some monies, and I had a very good day.
HAPPY WEEK.
The Hard:
Horrible anxious feelings early in the week. Feelings that led to the lopping off of various commitments and extensions. Felt like an overgrown tomato plant that couldn’t bear fruit. Now the power is concentrated, fruit shall bear.
Realizing that when I said “more please” I really meant “not quite ready for more yet” and now I have to reexplain what I meant.
Not wanting to race anymore (not a proxy) and realizing that when I come back from my Sunday race I’d have to start my next training.
A saddish heart today, which could also be good because it means my heart can feel.
The Good:
An understanding race director who let me unregister so that when I come back from the race on Sunday I can begin new pursuits and let others fade back into the background.
Knowing myself enough to know that I don’t want to race. That I don’t want a second date with M. That I am happy alone. That Match is not the way for me to meet people.
A house cleaned in tiny bits and pieces so that I barely know I’ve done it. And yet, here it is clean!
A new mystery book.
Staying in a hotel room tomorrow night where I can binge on reality television and Lifetime movies.
Yay you + Marisa! <3
The Hard
+Days like today when all I want to do is sit on the couch and play video games.
+The war against the huge giant nasty hairy spiders continues
+Goodbyes – or more specifically, worrying that I am disappointing people, in this case by leaving.
The Awesome
+Figured out that really I do want to be doing exactly the thing that I am really good at but swore I didn’t want to do. Yay really important self-awareness stuff!
+Got a gig!
+Got invited to Idaho to hang out with a friend at her lake cabin while we work on her product launch (the aforementioned gig)
+Yay running away from the spiders!
+Actually wrote stuff… little trickles of my writing mojo coming back.
Happy weekend!!
Oh Friday, you are almost over. I spent so much of this week dreading you, and now it’s done. Deep sigh.
The Hard:
– So much stuff. All of it my stuff. At inopportune moments. Felt like every button I have was pressed at some point this week. Facepalm.
– Patterns and rollercoasters. Being familiar with the pattern and struggling to give myself permission to just be in the hard and observe the pattern without beating myself up about fixing it.
– My boat is full at the moment. Finding gentle but firm ways to remind myself to steer my own sailboat and not let anyone else climb aboard. See also: avoiding the impulse to help steer others’ sailboats.
– Worst interview experience in recent history. I felt like I had to defend my past and my choices, as well as point out that I was in fact not lying on my resume. Just, ick.
– Puppies are wonderful creatures. Even when they wake up to play at 4:30 am.
– Dealing with the public when I wasn’t in the right headspace to do so.
The Good:
– The terrible thing I was dreading today turned out to be not so terrible. I kept my cool and got the answers I needed to move forward. Also, a new and unexpected ally.
– A fantastic interview last weekend, which turned into a call back interview for early next week! Dance dance.
– Asking for help, and receiving it.
– Puppies are wonderful creatures. She reminds me to play and helps me meet people and tells me she loves me when I need it most.
– Major breakthrough on [silent retreat]. There are now maps and ideas galor. Hopeful and excited about this project for the first time in a while!
– A serendipitous meeting that translated into a new contact for the theatre company.
– Huge space clearing and cleaning of our house, which I had been meaning to do since we moved in three months ago. The entire building felt shifted and clearer after only a few minutes. It felt good to get the gunk out of the space.
And that’s it for me.
Here is a bowl of hugs for those who would like them them, and a bowl of weekend sparkles for people who want those (or, you know, take both!)
Cheers Chickeneers!
The Hard
– 6 days of helping my parents move into their new home
– lost routines, not enough sleep
– it is the end of my summer break
The Good
– my parents are finally retired and settled in a new house and the uncertainty formerly surrounding all that is gone
– green smoothies and 3-ingredient “brownies” (1c walnuts, 1c dates, and 1/2c unsweetened cocoa powder combined in a food processor and pressed into a pan and chilled in the fridge … tastes EXACTLY like brownies)
– playtime at Sephora for new eye makeup to wear in Vegas next weekend
This is me, loving Stompopolis from across the country! Beaming love and sparklepoints through my secret tunnel! Saying yay for how other people will get to see the amazingness that I got to see! Yay!
Okay. Chicken.
The hard:
*Got ANOTHER cold at the end of the week. I am ouchy-throat-mouse!
*Discombobulation in the EXTREME. I came home from vacation even though I planned a sort of gentle re-entry, it ended up being kind of crazy.
*I still have no rituals! Because I have only been in my new house for 3.5 of the six weeks I’ve lived here, so everything is still in limbo. This is understandable! And also hard.
*Spent the week feeling fuzzy because of not-enough-sleep and also impending cold and shortage of rituals.
*Money stresses, and monsters saying I just cannot do it.
The good:
*I came to an agreement of sorts with my practice! And I finally figured out the technical thing I needed to put it in practice. This is exciting.
*The cold progressed quickly to the being-bored part of being sick, where you don’t actually feel all that awful.
*I had a surprise visit from C!
*I thought of something that might help with the money stresses and it was totally easy to enace.
*I bought plane tickets for exciting visit to Texas in the fall. Pretty sure that if fairground strippers live anywhere, it is Texas. I will check it out for you all (like a fairground stripper).
*Gratitude project is feeling awesome and not annoying or forced. Also ties in to my new tiny sweet thing. Shhh.
Oh, Chicken, la la la la la la…
So much good this week!
* Presentation went well,
* Writing is going well, dreaming and plotting making me giggle.
* Research for the fanfiction and literacy presentation is fun, and my co-conspiritor on the paper likes what I have so far. (whew!)
* Two, count ’em, two! Brilliant product ideas in totally different streams.
* Rally in slightly over three weeks!!!
* And best of all, the project that I’ve been stressing about for six weeks…. Its still there, still unsettled. But there’s been a shift. I realized what was freaking me out, refocused on the other things, and now, I feel lighter.
The hard:
Too many things in my brain!! Not enough time!!
So, apparently I need to do lots of work with systems. sigh.
Cluck! Been away for a few weeks. But back. Yes. Hi!
Hard stuffs…
– Little Lad was home sick for a WEEK with an ordinary, humdrum, everyday cold. He gets so knocked around by so little. My vulnerabilities around his sickness (guilt, wishing things were otherwise, sadness, resentment, guilt over resentment).
– time scarcity gremlins. I am becoming aware of how much influence they have over me. So, noticing is the first step to disarming them, right?
– crappy hard pattern between me and [redacted] that is very hard. I am interrupting it so that it doesn’t resolve in its normal way which is bad for me. So it has got quite intense. I wish things were otherwise.
– Wednesday, which was full of rage. Thursday, which was full of rage AND self-doubt and anxiety and S.H.A.M.E. Knock-me-out, home-all-day-hiding-and-surviving-it total shamestorm. YUK.
– money stresses, and waiting for bureaucracies again. Ack.
– I want a community that isn’t JUST scattered over the globe, but right next door and down the street and regularly together In Real Life. It makes me miss being part of a parish. And means that I spend a lot of time online with all the associated risks and distractions and addictive qualities of that, and ooooooh the judgements of other people. Hooooo boy…. judgements. But you know what? I mofoing well CLAIM my right to my online communities, because the places I hang out are not the erky-blargh-filled places that People-Who-Have-Judgements assume that ALL places on the internet are like. Dammit! And community is ESSENTIAL for healing. It’s the critical element. So defending my choices in relation to my community-connecting was hard, and wishing that I had other options for finding similar sense of community, in the hard, was sad. Hard. Sad. Yes. Community. *wistful sigh*
– some small amount of fetal curl crying over The Tragedy Of It All post-ephiphanies. Just a little.
Good stuffs…..
+ I have communities and safe places and people to hold me in their hearts when everything in my life feels hard.
+ epiphanies landing. Again. The same ones, but deeper. The same ones that have been landing since they were first written about in the Vedas. Separation is illusion. All is one. Everything you do matters, so do it with as much consciousness as you can. It is the nature of the human experience to forget this stuff SO THAT WE CAN REMEMBER IT AGAIN. Everything that everyone has ever done, ever, EVER, has been the best they knew how to, that they had the capacity, skills, resources, experience, wisdom, support, courage, awareness and blood-sugar level to do. Everything. Which just fucking sucks on a lot of levels because of All The Pain. And is also totally liberating because everything is as it should be, even the painful bits. Even THOSE painful bits. And those ones. And yes, even THOSE ones. And the fact that we cannot bring ourselves to believe this at this moment? Is as it should be. Of course it is. See also: fetal-curl crying and general, full-body, whole-soul destuckification. Ow. Om.
+ everything. Even the hard stuff is good. Life: pretty much the best thing ever.
xoxo
The hard:
Tired
Air conditioner sounds like a freight train & sleep has been elusive
Instability of sovereign boundaries due to (silent retreat) Confusing
Lost my temper! Actually this was hilarious even to the poor person in my crosshairs who thankfully didn’t take me seriously, it involved me yelling the word “apocalypse” & much swearing into someone’s voicemail. (the next voicemail included the words pms and sorry about 4 times each) I realized: I never really lose my temper ( flipping someone off while driving is nowhere near this magnitude), what a weird thing! Something is changing.
All these boring things on a long boring list I don’t have time to do & don’t want to do & am too tired to do
The good:
Felt non drained when talking to someone who previously I wasn’t ok with boundary wise & it was ok & sweet
Paleo diet for food allergies: doing it gently & dammit I feel better without the raw dairy I love so
Did a bunch of shivanata, realized I have a belief that if I’m not overwhelmed it is because I am just not paying close enough attention. Omg. It feels like I won’t survive unless I am overwhelmed. I knew this but never so clearly. Very old belief.
Signed up for more health plan covered miraculous emdr to quickly clear this belief fingers crossed in September. Amazingness that anything useful is covered
Got beautiful writing studio cleared, saged up, cleaned out, organized, fixed the “apocalypse,” got a schedule & streamlined my rituals. Organized, easily, a 4 month explosion of book notes. It looks and feels beautiful.
I get to have my super secret potion tomorrow, I am so grateful for this. True miracle.
Today’s new moon wishes felt really happy and aligned with actual possibilities & liklihoods.
I listened to a ton of Robyn & drank a ton of kombucha & that is happy & fizzy
The dog’s ankle might heal & fuse on its own, less scary & awful than what they told us lastweek
Great news from the Ancestral Health Summit confirming so many energy & life supporting habits my intuition has been feeling really happy with lately anyway, yay bone broth & bacon.
Love to everybody & your gwishes
Hard:
* the Missing Out blues
* the what-are-my-options eeks
* the not-liking-my-options wahs
* lost/lapsed connections
* a vengeance of bug bites
Good:
* don’t need to know where I’m going to see what needs doing
* good eats
* good friends
* good dreams (yay to the VPA!)
* progress on refi
* progress on decluttering
* new tank tops
Shalom uvracha, y’all. (Peace and blessing.)
Ch-ch-ch-ch-chicken!!!
This week’s hard:
– The workshop I thought was Monday-Tuesday from the minute I signed up for it was actually Sunday-Monday, so when I showed up on Monday they were already halfway through and I had to play catchup and I felt like an idiot and I missed out on a whole day of play! Waaaaa!
– Bigtime outsider syndrome in lots of different areas right now.
– Realizing that I need to pull back a little bit on using my full name out in public forums. Feeling a little weird about it, because I am who I am and that’s that, and pulling back makes me feel like I’m trying to hide something when I’m not, but it is what it is right now.
– Creepy guy staring at me in the bagel place yesterday the whole time I was there. Really lessened the enjoyment of my indulgence.
This week’s good:
– Tuesday bonus day when everyone thought I’d be away all day and I wasn’t. I did not disabuse anyone (except Awesome Husband) of that notion.
– Light at the end of the tunnel on a PITA situation.
– Hit a milestone on a personal project.
– Three bags of stuff to Goodwill. Making room for new & fresh.
Happy weekend, Chickeneers!
Part of me wants to have a long and rambling Chicken this week, and part of me wants to keep it short and snappy. We’ll see who emerges victorious!
The hard stuff:
–I got triggered by something one of my partners said. The monsters of No Matter What You Do, You’ll Never Be Good Enough were raging at me, and it felt as if it would last forever. (It didn’t.)
–Thing I’d been feeling anxious about for many weeks finally happened. The pouncy, unexpected aspect of the thing was part of what I dreaded, and sure enough, POUNCE! SURPRISE!
–Driving in downpours. I do not like this.
The good stuff:
–Family trip to Hershey, PA went well! Really, really well! I think each of us had our own separate fears of Doom, but we were all committed to enjoying ourselves, each other, and the day, and we really really did!
–The pouncy thing was ultimately okay. I stood in my sovereignty.
–I found my way through the triggery stuff, and had some beautiful epiphanies as a result. An inner, strong voice managed to transmute “nothing you do is good enough” into “you can do nothing, and still you are good enough.” I may not be translating this well here, but it was world shaking, and moved me to tears.
The coming weekend will be filled with adventures, and I am filled with hope. Lighting my candle!
Another week done gone… Sigh.
Hard:
– The headache that wouldn’t go away. It got better, it got worse, it never quite quit. It made everything harder.
– The usual aches and pains.
– An unintentional shoe came my way because of someone else’s carelessness. The worst thing was that it hurt even though I already knew about the content of the shoe.
– Stupid computer problems.
– There’s a hard thing I don’t want to do and I have to and I don’t want to and I have to because I am a grown up and it is my role to do it and I don’t want to. So I keep putting it off and it is getting harder to think about it and harder to avoid it and I still really really don’t want to do it.
Good:
– Milder temperatures.
– Rain! An actual downpour that I could go out and play in!
– Further travel planning is under way.
– A burst of interest and enthusiasm for a research/writing topic.
– Progress on something that has been stalled since forever.
– I did a hard thing and it went okay. I wore a grown up costume and did entry beforehand and it helped.
– Time with my sibs.
– Hanging out with my beloved.
– Hanging out at the bookstore; I found a great new book by a favorite writer and a great new book by another writer whose work I am just getting to know. And an interesting light-hearted “business-y self-help” book that has me chuckling.
– Books! I live surrounded by books. I always have access to books.
– Internet! I hardly ever do FB or other social media, and I do email once a day or less, but I’m online a lot, diving into the great river of resources for my research and writing.
Sending good wishes to all, hope for the hard to get better and for the good to grow.
Love to all! This week was the end of the lunar cycle so things kinda gentle fell apart tol the new moon on friday
the suck:
-the week was okay really, except for some Uncertainty around guest arrivals etc. unlike otehr guests i have learned not to amend my ways for this one
-then Friday at noon, my editor emailed me that my book will NOT be publsihed, that the ms did NOT mee ttheir expectations. the feedback was candid and oooooouuuuuch. so much diapointment! saddest of sad faces
-and after that, my stuff came out andup began the Monster Chorus of Doom.
-the worst thng of all was how kind the Monster were. they didnt berate me, they just smiled and shook their heads and said we didnt expect different
-and kept reinding me of a snarky commnet my husband made when i was exulting about the book getting published. “how many books u sold? huh? ehat kind of a return your ever gonna get on this thing?” I guess we know thst answr now
-oooowwwww
-got thrown off my center and blew off some thing i wanted to do for my self case that’ll show me
-school starts next week = paperwork, expenses and busy busy busy. are we ready? plus oldest kid is beginning middle school and she needs more support all the time, and her being in middle school is kinda triggering me
-playing with friendly dogs, i kep going thru weirdness aorund it
the Good:
– a focused week at work
-a mental health day on monday
-hawt sex last weekend.
-proud of my ability to get shit done these days
-having fun with Operation Natasha. scheduled expensive haircut at aveda salon in the cool old neighborhood. looking for body care/wellness iptions and all of the sudden they are appearing
-i have so many peices and now they are starting to fit
-this New Moon has brought in so many fanatstic changes. just today i have journaled, doen ritual, chores, morning Sit (every day, soooo proud of this) PLUS Flailing, hitting my sobriety goal, pilates follwoed by pranayama. I hope to be writing ina lil while.
-somethign profound shifted in me yesterday after i ot rhe bad news about my book. mayeb it’s part of the new moon energy, but i just knew it was time to recommit, on a deep level, to my work. to all of my work, of which the book was a small, though cherished and important, part.
-Slighty Future Me who is Also a writer immediately stepped up with the kind of gentle sage advice i needed yesterday. surprised and touched by this, happy that i am taking such good care of myself. seriously, i’m feeling awful about it.
-not letting go of my art. i’m not stopping. i am recommitting. i am open to new approaches and change.
-despite momentary snaps of freking out, i am more gentle with the kids lately.
-my ritual work showed me the next steps. This lunation is the Moon of Hummingbirds. i am inviting Hummingbirds in.
Aaaaaah.
The hard:
A really hard situation for some people I care about.
Broken internet for a huge chunk of time on Tuesday and Saturday.
A rather intense visit from All the Fear.
Having a hangover. Whoa, kind of forgot what that felt like.
Disappointment.
The same pattern repeating itself. boo!
The good:
Actually recognising All the Fear as fear and not truth, pretty much as soon as it turned up.
Going to the writers group on Thursday, even though I nearly didn’t. Time with real people + sharing some inspiring ideas.
My friend’s birthday party on Friday. People, conversation, getting to dress up. Muchos fun.
Realising that I need to spend way more time around people, both in groups and one-on-one.
My friend got engaged! I’m going to be a bridesmaid! So happy + excited!
Warmth! Sun!
Walking along the beach and paddling in the water.
Books!
Sending good weekend wishes to everyone!