What's in the gallery?
We dissolve stuck and rewrite patterns. We apply radical playfulness to life (when we feel like it!), embarking on internal adventures (credo of Safety First). We have a fake band called Solved By Cake. We build invisible sanctuaries, invent words and worlds, breathe awe and wonder.
We are not impressed by monsters. Except when we are. We explore the connections between internal territories and surrounding environment to learn what marvelously supportive delicious space feels like, and how to take exquisite care of ourselves. We transform things.* We glow wild.**
* For example: Desire, fear, worry, pain-and-trauma, boundaries, that problematic word which rhymes with flaweductivity.
** Fair warning: Self-fluency has been known to lead to extremely subversive behavior, including treasuring yourself unconditionally, unapologetically taking up space, experiencing outrageously improbable levels of self-acceptance, and general rejoicing in aliveness.
What's in the gallery?
We dissolve stuck and rewrite patterns. We apply radical playfulness to life (when we feel like it!), embarking on internal adventures (credo of Safety First). We have a fake band called Solved By Cake. We build invisible sanctuaries, invent words and worlds, breathe awe and wonder.
We are not impressed by monsters. Except when we are. We explore the connections between internal territories and surrounding environment to learn what marvelously supportive delicious space feels like, and how to take exquisite care of ourselves. We transform things.* We glow wild.**
* For example: Desire, fear, worry, pain-and-trauma, boundaries, that problematic word which rhymes with flaweductivity.
** Fair warning: Self-fluency has been known to lead to extremely subversive behavior, including treasuring yourself unconditionally, unapologetically taking up space, experiencing outrageously improbable levels of self-acceptance, and general rejoicing in aliveness.
Naming the rain.
Remember when we named the moons?
I just found this cool, related thing! And it’s so perfect.
I was catching up on posts from Suzette Haden Elgin (swoon!) and she was talking about rain and naming types of rain. Twenty-seven of them.
This was inspired by a writing-form from Ron Carlson called “The Twenty-Seventh Rain” …
“THE HITCHHIKING RAIN, almost cold, a rain we had to ignore as we faced Route 8 …”
And she liked it so much that she came up with her own run of rain names:
“THE DRAGON RAIN that chased us across the fields and down the roads and wrapped us all up tight in warm wetness.”
Awesome.
So — of course — how could I not do some rain-naming of my own?
Havi’s Rains
- THE RAIN OF THE UNENDING SOAKING while headed to work, wondering how to make bearable nine hours of standing behind the bar in wet jeans and squishy cold socks.
- THE RAIN OF THE PORCH SWING that is solid and steady but never cold, and is sometimes accompanied by a glass of something, no ice.
- THE RAIN THAT FALLS ON YOUR TENT when you have a sprained ankle and are half-hiding half-dozing under mosquito netting, dreaming of someone special to you. And then there they are.
- THE RAIN OF LATE FOR SCHOOL always makes you feel a little more guilty, drops falling from the ends of your braids.
- HITTING THE GROUND RUNNING RAIN when lightning strikes right above your head, and you and your gentleman friend realize as soon as you pick yourselves up off the ground that a quick run to the cafe was actually a terrible idea.
- THE RAIN OF APOLOGIES. I’m sorry.
- THE RAIN OF NOT HAVING ANYWHERE TO GO because you have nowhere to go and this has been true for so long, and ducking into Tomer’s cafe, knowing that someone will buy you a coffee or a beer eventually.
- THE RAIN OF HOPING NO ONE WILL NOTICE THAT YOU’RE CRYING.
- THE RAIN OF THE GREENHOUSE that gives you permission to spend another hour curled up with your book and your bear and some cushions.
- THE MISTY RAIN OF DANCING THE DANCE OF SHIVA BY THE OCEAN. This rain is so fine that it breathes on you through the trees. Have you done Dance of Shiva in the rain? It’s like being the rain, that’s how beautiful it is. As if you are a fish or a flower or a star. It is liquid math. It is the perfection of nature and I am being it and it is inside me and through me and around me and just me.
- THE RAIN OF WATCHING PEOPLE MAKE SCRUNCHED-NOSE FACES against it. Because it was so sudden that no one has an umbrella. And you are on a tiny covered bench, watching the nose-scrunching.
- THE RAIN OF REBELLION AND DELIGHT that comes while everyone is nose-scrunching and running for cover. There is one little kid in a striped shirt who walks slowly, looking up, with a delighted smile. His hands are moving around his head and his expression says: Look at this! Drops! On me! They tickle! How completely wonderful to be alive in this moment and have water drop on my face! Wheeeeeeeeee!
- THE COMING AND GOING THUNDERSTORM RAIN OF TAOS that gushes and stops, gushes and stops, while I write and write and write, leaning up against the wall of the room where Willa Cather listened to the rain too.
- THE RAIN OF THERE IS NO REAL WORK TODAY when you work in an orchard … and so you wake up blinking, knowing that the day will be slow and meandering, painting ladders and taking long breaks. Another mug of instant coffee on a red-checkered table cloth. Sorting screws and bolts. Missing the trees.
- THE RAIN OF WEARING A SCARF AND GLOVES IN JULY in Berlin — in July! — hugging the borrowed, soggy peacoat to yourself, wrapping yourself up in imagined warmth and knowing that California is waiting and that the money for the ticket will emerge from somewhere. Because it has to. Because you remember the winter. And your hands remember the feel of hauling up buckets of coal from the scary, scary, scary basement.
- THE RAIN OF YES I LIVE IN PORTLAND* that is so strangely gentle. Look, it’s raining. Again. Walking through it, hand in hand with my gentleman friend, it leaves drops on my eyelashes. It’s a pretty rain.
*My brother has a little ditty he likes to sing that goes like this (must be sung out loud): “I live in Portland, Oregon … I think it’s going to pour again …”
- THE RAIN THAT MAKES TINY HOLES IN MOUNDS OF SNOW.
- THE RAIN OF KNOWING YOU DON’T HAVE TO GO ANYWHERE that is especially good for napping. But also for baking bread.
Play with me?
You totally don’t need twenty-seven. You don’t even need ten.
But five rains? Three rains? One rain?
Do you want to name rain with me?
It’s a pretty neat thing.
Very Personal Ads #7: support and solutions
Personal ads! They’re … personal! Very.
So my itty bitty personal ads made me realize that it’s time to make a regular practice of trying to feel okay asking for stuff.
Ever since I posted the first one asking my perfect house to find me, which united me with Hoppy House, I have been a fan of the madness that is personal ads.
And now it’s my weekly ritual. Yay, ritual!
Let’s do this thing.
Thing 1: remembering that there are many forms of support.
Here’s the situation:
I have this sticky pattern that I’m working on.
What happens is that I encounter a financial challenge or set-back-ey thing that forces me to reevaluate certain plans.
And then I feel anxious. And then I use my sneakified Let’s Go Make Some Monies technique (it’s very sensible, actually and not woo-woo-ish). And then I start to feel better.
Which is great, yes.
It’s just that the thing I’m trying to work on right now is building a different pattern.
And the new pattern I’m working on involves being able to remember that there are many forms of support and sustenance, and that not all of them involve me actively making something happen.
I’m trying to remember (in my body and in my head) that Making The Monies Under Duress — while a very useful skill — is just one of the many ways that support can come into my life.
I can still use my technique. I just want to stop relying on it so much.
Ways this might work:
My eyes will open to all the support that is already around me.
I will have big crazy realizations while doing Shiva Nata, and the resulting epiphanies will be swift, hot and buttered.
Something astonishing will happen and this something will be full of grace and coolness.
Simple changes. I’m open to surprises.
My commitment.
I will continue to be totally grateful for this skill I have, that I learned the hardest of hard ways and that has saved my ass on more than a few occasions.
I will even teach my technique at some point (so far I’ve only given it to private clients and my Kitchen Table people).
As new forms of support come into my life (or: as I get better at recognizing the many forms of support that are already there), I will wave to them happily and say hi!
I will practice trying to experience what it’s like to be joyful and playful with this theme of support.
I will be kind and patient with myself when hard, hard memories come up from those times when I felt completely bereft of support.
Thing 2: I need a new server. And a perfect simple solution.
Here’s the situation:
I never, ever thought I would complain about this — and yeah, I’m not complaining — but this site is crazy popular. And I have a lot of sites.
And my Kitchen Table forum is ridiculously active, and the upshot is that it really, really needs its own server so it can stay speedy.
And of course this is not the best timing since I’m off to teach in North Carolina this weekend and then flying off to Berlin for two months of giving workshops.
Here’s what I want:
Perfect simple solutions.
I already have the perfect person to set everything up for me (thanks to a past Very Personal Ad that brought me the fabulous Tech Pirate Charlotte.
But I want everything else to go smoothly. And I want a chunk of money to cover tech support expenses, which have been pretty out of control this year.
Ways this could happen:
I don’t know.
I’m just asking for a happy, easy resolution to this situation.
My commitment.
To be appreciative and patient. Or try to be.
Progress report on past Very Personal Ads.
Just to update you on what’s happened since last time.
Last time I asked for recommendations for places to hold a retreat. And got some thirty plus suggestions.
One of my pirate crew is going through them and figuring out which ones can work best. So that was cool!
I also learned that a lot of retreat places have appallingly confusing websites and also seem to be fond of having their “about our rates” pages actually be Error 404 pages.
Oh how I give business lectures in my head when I’m hoping to bring someone a huge chunk of income and they don’t let me.
I don’t know if there is news on Chrisandra’s ad from last week, but she wrote a more thorough ad and it’s awesome and I will post it here as a comment.
And I am still mulling things over with the title of the Shivanaut’s Manual. But we got some super interesting suggestions and I have my thinking cap on. So that part is awesome too.
Comments. Since I’m already asking …
I am adding to my practice of asking for stuff by being more specific about I would like to receive in the comments. And that way, if you feel like leaving one (you totally don’t have to), you get to be part of this experiment too. 🙂
Here’s what I want:
- Your own personal ads, small or large. Things you’ve asked for. Or are asking for. Or would like to ask for.
- Thoughts or ideas about ways any of the personal ads listed here could come true.
What I would rather not have:
- Reality theories.
- Shoulds. As in, “You should be doing it like this” or “That’s not the right way to ask for things — instead it should be like x, y and z”
- To be judged or psychoanalyzed.
My commitment.
I am committing to getting better at asking for things even when asking feels weird. To give time and thought to the things that people say, and to interact with their ideas and with my own stuff as compassionately and honestly as is possible for me.
Thanks, guys!
Friday Check-in #54: Irony and Pixels edition
Because it’s Friday AGAIN. And because traditions are important. In which I cover the good stuff and the hard stuff in my week, trying for the non-preachy, non-annoying side of self-reflection.
And you get to join in if you feel like it.
Oh, Friday. How I have missed you.
I think this week was somehow extra long.
Selma has been especially anti-social and doing lots of hiding in the closet. I think it’s because she knows we have a lot of travel coming up.
Anyway, the week.
The hard stuff
Ran out of my healthy boundaries. Oh the irony.
So I have this genius bottle of Healthy Boundaries spray.
No, seriously. It’s a thing. That you can buy. I know! I got mine here.
When I bought it, the whole “having healthy boundaries” thing was basically my big life theme.
So I figured, even if having a spray for it (seriously, what?!) totally doesn’t work, it could at least remind me that this is the big thing I’m working on.
I wanted it to be one of my wacky daily rituals to help keep me focused on healing this particular piece of extra-determined stuck.
Plus Deborah is one of my students and she’s amazing and I wanted to support her.
So I started using it. And then — to my complete and utter astonishment — the healthy boundaries stuckness just kind of stopped being an issue.
I don’t know how to explain it better than that. It almost seemed to heal itself. I kept using the spray in my morning meditation, but it just wasn’t a big deal anymore.
But this week we had guests and I realized: oh crap crap crap I’m out of healthy boundaries!
Which is really funny. Except that I really did want my spray. Now I’m just going to order a bunch of stuff at once, just in case.
Three weeks!
Despite the fact that I go on a little teaching pilgrimage to Germany every single year, it always sneaks up on me.
So I’m flying in less than three weeks and basically only just realized that now.
Eeeeeeeeeeeeee. So much to do.
The stress. Ugh.
Seriously? I’m broken out like a teenager.
It’s charming.
The good stuff
My favorite uncle came to visit!
And he brought plums! From his tree!
And a loaf of bread that he baked.
And everything is better when he’s around.
Sitting on the porch swing with my gentleman friend.
This is the best part of summer.
The New Mexico food cart.
One of my favorite things about Portland is its strong food cart culture.
That’s even kind of why we moved here. Yes, I am the kind of person who can be swayed by food carts.
But the New Mexico food cart? Yum!
We went on a pilgrimage there with Denise. It was practically an expotition. And then (extra random!) ran into Dana the Spicy Princess who was also headed there at exactly the same time.
Fabulous.
“If you’re such a genius, how come you’ve got butter on your tie?”
Actually, I am kind of tempted to steal Naomi’s line where she crowns herself “the greatest marketer in Christendom!”
But I’ll just say that I did the quietest, most hidden tiny secretive “hey, I’m teaching a course” announcement ever (one paragraph in the Wednesday Item! post).
And it filled up in under twenty-four hours. With the most amazing people.
Yay. Seriously, let’s hear it for non-promotional hard-to-get marketing that isn’t actually marketing.
Also, it’s my party and I can quote Moonstruck if I want to.
And I’m really, really looking forward to teaching this stuff.
Also, I redid my Shivanaut postcards.
I’ve had these postcards forever (three years? more?) and they so desperately needed a redesign … and I’ve finally run out.
Actually, I hadn’t actually read one of them in years because you know, what kind of person reads their own promotional literature or whatever it’s called?
And was astonished to find out just how spectacularly useless and boring it was. (Really? I send those? To people?)
Anyway, I sat down and scribbled out new text. It took about five minutes.
My gentleman friend: Brilliant writer mouse!
Me: Remember how many weeks it took me to write the copy for the first batch of these? Good grief! The strugglings! The agonies!
My gentleman friend: Yeah, and it wasn’t even very good!
Me: Awwwww … foot-in-mouth mouse.
The new ones are GORGEOUS. And funny. And I love them.
And … new at the meme beach house!
Yes, that’s a Stuism too.
My brother and I have this thing where we come up with ridiculous band names and then say in this really pretentious, knowing tone, “Oh, well, you know, it’s just one guy.”
So this week, I bring you:
Pickles Per Inch
My gentleman friend: “Do you mean pixels per inch?.”
Me: (shrugs) “It’s just one guy.”
But where are the Stuisms?!
I know. Actually, I feel kind of bad about it.
But most of the posts this week were written a while ago. You know, so I could put my time to working on the Shiva Nata Manual For Crazed Shivanauts. Right. Still no title.
So I was mostly editing this week, which is something that Stu is terrible at.
So no Stuisms. He’ll be back next week. Loud and clear, I’m sure.
That’s it for me …
And yes yes yes, of course you can join in my Friday ritual right here in the comments bit if you feel like it.
Yeah? Anything hard and/or good happen in your week?
And, as always, have a glorrrrrrrrrrrrious weekend. And a happy week to come.
Naming the moon.
I’m reading the book Slow Time by Waverly Fitzgerald for … I don’t know, probably the fourth time.
If you don’t count all the times that I just pick it up and start reading a page or two.
It’s one of those “it lives by my bed” books. Just seeing the cover makes me happy.
And I got to do a teleclass with Waverly last week for my Kitchen Table program (we’re spending three months working on clearing up some stuff in our relationship to time).
It was pretty spectacular. She’s just as sweet and thoughtful as I’d imagined she would be.
Anyway. I wanted to do one of the exercises from her book with you.
Naming moons.
What I love about this exercise is the playfulness.
It gives you lots of space to appreciate markers of natural time … without having to necessarily challenge your functioning world that’s made up of artificial time.
It’s also about awareness. And about choice. And about noticing things. And about bringing some of you into the things around you.
And it’s about wordishness, which is pretty much my favorite thing ever.
So if Native American tribes would name full moons (Moon of Popping Trees, Thunder Moon, Moon of Storms) …
And there are Chinese names for new moons (Peony Moon, Harvest Moon, Kindly Moon) …
Waverly thinks we should get to create moon names too! Ha.
Her students have beautiful ones.
Like The Moon of Putting on Socks (October).
Or Firefly Moon for July.
I am going to try naming my moons.
The Moon-Names of Havi’s Year.
September: The Moon of Beginnings
October: Crunching The Leaves Moon
November: Red Boots Moon
December: The Moon of Doing Yoga Under Blankets By The Fire
January: The Moon of Being Pulled To Travel Somewhere Warmer
February: Contemplation Moon (but also Roller Derby Moon!)
March: Wishing Moon
April: Walking Moon
May: Barefoot Moon
June: Lilac Moon
July: The Moon of Berries Every Day For Breakfast
August: Porch Swing Moon
Do you want to play with me? Yay.
So if you want to share some (or all) of your results here, or just to describe some of what you’re noticing while doing the exercise, that would be so cool. And fun! And really interesting.
And then I won’t have to feel like I’m being all weird by myself.
Wheee! Play with me!
Item! Justify this!
A somewhat goofy mini-collection of stuff I’ve been reading, stuff I’ve been thinking about and oh, some completely random crap.
Basically the stuff that never gets mentioned here because I’m not the kind of person who can just make some teeny little point. Not into the whole brevity thing, as the Dude would say.
Actually, I’m under the strict compulsion to write ten pages about anything on my mind. So this is me. Practicing brevity.
Brevity. Right.
This post was about a hundred items (Items!) long and I had to toss a bunch.
Shall we?
Item! Post No. 30 in a series that has yet to do anything to actually justify its existence.
Item! An itinerary for doing nothing!
It’s no secret that I’m madly in love with Kelly Parkinson (aka Copylicious Kelly) for all sorts of reasons.
But this post about just how profitable doing nothing can be is totally brilliant.
Even though she blames me for all sorts of ridiculous things.
“There are dealmakers who eat soup at their desks and work 15-hour days.
And then there are creators who take walks in the middle of the day, who dare to sleep a full 8 hours, who do absolutely nothing–strategically …
Because sometimes the best thinking happens after I haven’t thought about anything at all.”
Genius.
She’s @copylicious on Twitter.
Item! Painting is food for words!
Beautiful post (and a beautiful painting) from Christine Martell.
She talks about the connection between visual art and writing and how hard it is (even when we know that connection exists) to justify doing the thing that feeds us.
It’s a great post.
“Painting is food for my writing
Writing is hard. Paint flows.
Yet I find myself spending most of my days writing (or trying to), and not giving myself the space to paint or do other visually creative things.
I still fight the inner demons that judge the visual work as not really working, or just playing … I still battle the inner demons, the messages from other times, people, and places.”
She’s @cmartell on Twitter.
Item! Lagniappe!
Interesting post about why it’s silly to convince people (through your advertising and marketing) that they’ll be treated “fairly”.
“If the most your customer can say when he walks out your door is, “I was treated fairly,” your business is pitifully stale and you have virtually nothing to advertise…”
It’s really just worth reading though for the description of Fat Charlie and the delight he takes in making sure people get a little extra.
“Order ten pounds of potatoes and Charlie will happily toss potatoes onto the scale until it reads 10″ then he’ll find a particularly nice potato and place it on the top of the pile with a beaming smile and an exclamation of, ‘Lagniappe!'”
Lagniappe!
(I can’t even say that without being transported back to my favorite cafe in Vancouver where every day is a glorrrrrrrious day!)
Thanks to Ankesh who is @ankeshk on Twitter for pointing me this way.
Item! More stuff about retreating …
The lovely Amara Ann Bertorelli (whom I met at Jennifer Louden’s fabulous Writer’s Retreat) has been writing some sweet, thoughtful pieces about the retreat-ing.
And about some of the cool stuff she’s been processing.
Since this is something I’ve been meaning to do, it was super interesting to read.
Also, there is a lovely picture of all of us (I’m the 3rd from the left in the top row, sans Selma, and Amara is at the far right of that row).
“And in the midst of that, it hit me. If I can surrender to getting it totally wrong and not really knowing or caring what’s next during the dance, then I can probably do that in my life as well. Down with perfectionism! Down with uber-planning! Up with whatever!”
The woman can write!
And she’s @EdgyAngel on Twitter.
Item! Eating. Lunch. Alone. Together.
I loved this piece called Eating lunch alone together from Japandra (Sandra in Japan).
She’s just neat. Her blog is sweet and always interesting. And I just really enjoyed the feel of this. And the pictures.
“This is one of my favorite lunch places. I just realized I had no idea what it’s called – I just think of it as “the place with the yellow flags out front near the office.”
She’s @sandrajapandra on Twitter.
Item! Finding your Right People: the clinic.
Yes, we love Right People.
Because having them (and them having you) means that you don’t have to have a “target market” (ew ew ew ew) or be all weirdly promotional or anything.
Anyway, people have been asking about this. A lot.
And I have ridiculously strong opinions and all sorts of advice to give on this.
So Selma and I are doing a clinic. A figuring-out-who-your-Right-People-are-and-how-to-talk-to-them clinic.
It’s tiny. It’s cozy.
Fun will be had.
So I should give you a link, right? You can read more stuff about the Right People clinic here.
I imagine it will fill up insanely fast. Which is why I’m not promoting it. So that you guys (hello, my Right People) can find it first. Sneakified me!*
(Also you should read it because I am funny. And because there are some good resources at the end).
* EDIT: sorry, the clinic sold out within twenty-four hours. Apparently I wasn’t sneakified enough! Next time.
Item! Update from the land of the Peculiar & Hilarious Shivanauts!
The “peculiar and hilarious” thing comes from Melynda’s sweet bit about Butterfly Wishes.
So Sandy (brand-new Shivanaut) had two or three epiphanies just from reading the first part of the first ebook. She blogged about them too.
She wrote:
While I am all about the epiphanies (I think… frankly, I’m a little shaken up and stunned!), you should put a warning label on this stuff. If I get 2 epiphanies just after reading part of the first ebook, what will happen when I actually start to learn this stuff? Will my head explode with wisdom and understanding?
And that just made me laugh.
I also posted on the Shivanaut’s blog about whether or not Shiva Nata has anything to do with avodah zarah (worshipping false gods), and about how I need your help with a title for my Shiva Nata manual.
And about some of the cool things that happened in Taos.
Quite a week, in short.
Item! Comments!
It was very cool the other week when I got to work on my practice of how I ask for stuff and you guys gave me the best recommendations ever!
Here’s what I want:
- Things you’re thinking about.
- A fun word that gets even better when you say it over and over and over again.
My commitment.
I am committed to giving time and thought to the things that people say, and to interacting with their ideas and with my own stuff as compassionately and honestly as is possible for me.
Even though asking for what I want still feels awkward for me, I’m just going to remind myself that this is a thing I’m practicing.
That is all.
Happy reading.
And happy Blustery Windsday. See you tomorrow. And maybe at the Right People clinic? Because that would be the bomb.
EDIT: sorry, sorry, sorry, the clinic filled up within the first twenty-four hours — no more seats.