Life's Lessons #31 BE Enough

Enough has been my word for 2013. 

It has been a remarkable word, teaching me so many things and reminding me of other lessons I have learned but lost track of or simply left BEhind, like old files or socks with holes.

What I know Now, that I did NOT even know I wanted [and needed] to know is that BEing Enough is simply a decision. 

It might NOT BE a decision I make sometimes, but it is always there for my choosing.

I am leaning in toward the New Year, the shared one, 2014. 

And a new word. 

But I am NOT leaving Enough out of the mix forever. 

That's the thing about a word that guides me through a year. 

It BEcomes part of me and, like my wrinkles, makes me know myself better.

I am oftentimes MORE than Enough.

For myself.

For others.

And sometimes NOT Enough.

Same.

Same.

Yet mostly Now I realise I CAN BE Enough No Matter What I might BE thinking.

Or what anyone else is thinking.

Or NOT.

It's Enough, knowing this. 

Life's Lessons #30 BE Happy Anyway

Things don't always go my way.

I can BE happy anyway.

People are sometimes very grouchy.

I can BE happy anyway.

The weather is unpredictable.

I can BE happy anyway.

Life changes and good things end.

I can BE happy anyway.

This is one of my very best and super-coolest lessons from 2013!!

BE HAPPY ANYWAY!!!

YES!!!! I CAN!!!

Life's Lessons #29 BE Still

I can often BE a fart in a skillet. I can scatter my energies and burn my candle at both ends and in the middle, just for good measure.

I don't have much of a To-DO List anymore, but my head is often full of what I have planned and what I need and what I want to accomplish Today, This Week, This Month, and so on.

Things happen that set me on edge. A quarrelsome conversation on the phone. Letting someone "get on my last nerve" and then drawing colourful highlights all round the situation. Eating too much and the wrong things. Drinking the same. Having a just this once attitude which ends up biting me hard once "this once" is long BEhind me in the rearview mirror.

If I don't spend enough time BEing and I spend most of my time DOing I know I am headed for a crash, boom, and very ungraceful fall.

I am a person who used to hate to BE alone with herself but also closed herself off from others and so constantly was baiting my own hook, so to speak. [no wonder I never fell in love with fishing...]

BUT NOW...

Right Now.

I am learning the value of just BEing Still.

NOT scattering energy, gathering candles, or putting heat under the skillet.

NOT making lists or plans or any of that sort of thing.

Letting Life BE Life even when it stings, burns, or pulls me so tight there is nowhere for the air to get out.

Making Time for BEing and NOT DOing the explaining it to anyone dance.

Relishing my Alone Time and loving that I so enJOY Solitude Now.

Many things are better with this tiny adjustment. 

BE Still.

That's what I've learned today.

Life's Lessons #28 BE Generous With Love

It is NOT rocket science, you know, this love thing. I know I can turn it into something as complex as brain surgery, but it is really NOT a thinking sort of thing.

I have been under the impression, most of my Life, and I am sure there are many who can attest to this, that Love is scarce. It is fixed. It does NOT have room for waste. It can BE burned as easily as old paper.

BE Careful With Love. That I understand. That I practise.

BE Generous With Love?! Now that uses an entirely different batch of muscles. 

It means that I must love without knowing if my love is returned.

It means I must give without knowing my love is received. Or appreciated!!!

It means I must love first. And when it is inconvenient. And when, well I suppose whenEVER!!! 

It means I will love without having any good reason to love.

It means I won't get to cherry-pick the recipients of my love.

But here's what I know. What I learned this past year. Over and over and over again:

Love is Generous with ME.

All those things I wrote above I learned by BEing loved. Generously.

So Now I am choosing to BE someone who is Generous With Love.

It might seem a LOT. Might BE way BEyond what I BElieve I can "afford." 

But there you go. BE Generous With Love.

Life's Lessons #27 BE A Friend

I am the last person I ever wanted to BE friends with. 

And no, I did NOT write that wrong!

I really am the last one on my list I would have chosen to BE a friend to.

Or to BE friends with.

So what can I say?! This is what is true for me Right Now.

The thing is though, I love that I was so wrong.

I love that I am righting this wrong, one breath and one blink at a time.

What I used to feel, when stuck with just myself, is so NOT what I feel Now.

And when I have a day to just hang out and BE, I am definitely the #1 person I want to BE with.

Every. Single. Time.

It's nice to know this.

Very.

Life's Lessons #26 BE Willing to Say WHEN

I think I have been blessed by a body that completely poops out when it is, as they say, time to stick a fork in me, I'm done. 

But there are those times when I try to push on, hang in there, keep going BEcause...

What I know Now, is that saying WHEN is brave. 

It is NOT an easy call. 

But I can DO it and I AM DOing it. 

Right Now.

Right Here.

WHEN.

Life's Lessons #25 BE a Rememberer

It isn't always easy to BE someone who remembers. 

In fact, sometimes it's perilous.

But here's the thing...

BEing one who remembers, who does the Next Right Thing,

Even BEfore anyone thinks they've been forgotten

Feels good inside.

Deep inside.

Where feeling is remembered.

Who among us canNOT count that a blessing?!

Life's Lessons #24 BE Aware of How You CAN BE

I've spent a LOT of Life BEing in a fog. Looking away. 

Refusing to take responsibility for my actions and reactions. 

I have been a Very Good Blamer. I am an extraordinary Grudge Holder.

And Now?! Well Now I am learning How I CAN BE.

How I CAN change my attitude in a blink.

Which way is the choice.

How I CAN stand up for myself, listen to myself, and NOT have to wait for someone else to make it okay that I AM Who and How I AM.

Christmastime is challenging for me. 

But only BEcause I say so.

THIS Christmastime is fresh as new fallen snow.

And so CAN I BE.

It's good, BEing aware of How I CAN BE.

It gives me Hope and then more Hope.

Life's Lessons #23 BE a Mess

I like things tidy. I like them streamlined. 

I like them simple. And then even simpler still.

But People are NOT things one can tidy up, streamline, or simplify. 

People are to BE loved.

And Love is messy. 

It is impractical. 

It sometimes hurts. 

It even goes away. 

Far, far away. Never to BE heard from again.

This is what I know to BE true.

So, I like things tidy, but I am BEcoming okay with BEing a mess.

LIfe's Lessons #22 BE A Little Braver

I am oftener than I'd like to admit a chicken. I won't say something BEcause I might cause something to happen that I don't want to live with having happened.

I will feel it and feel it and feel it. I will think it to exhaustion. I will lose sleep and sometimes eat at it. But I won't let it out of my mouth [or write it] BEcause...

So I am thinking that this is what makes me tired. Makes me feel my age. Makes a lot of the difficulties I have with my well-BEing, physically, mentally, and emotionally. 

Perhaps even spiritually...

Yesterday evening I said what I was feeling and what I had been thinking about for the past couple of days. I didn't say it to the people I was thinkingandfeeling it about, but I said it to someone who matters. Big time.

On the other side of having said it Out Loud, I wrote about it earlier this morning during my Writing Practise. I learned a few things there. In fact, this is one day I might actually go back and read what I wrote.

Or NOT.

The thing is, Life is going to go on. Whether I say what I think or tell you what I am REALLY feeling about something.

And, for as long as I am still on this side of the dirt and breathing in and out, I am going to BE thinkingandfeeling.

So what I want to BE is a little eensie tiny bit braver when I have the opportunity. 

I want to stop stopping BEcause you might NOT like me if you know that whatever it is I am holding back. I want to remember that whatever I am NOT saying is likely sneaking out somehow. And if I am going to piss you or someone else off it would BE worth DOing so with The Real ME.

MayBE I will see this differently after another night's sleep. It often happens like that. Or perhaps I will come to see tomorrow or the next day, or mayBE next week, that it really is NOT that important after all.

But still, I am going to keep trying to BE A Little Braver...

Life's Lessons #21 BE Alone

Perhaps this sounds odd. MayBE even a little depressing. Well, there you go. Life is like that sometimes.

Just stay with me a minute, okay?!

I used to dread having to spend time alone. Which is odd, when I think of it over the long stretch of my Life. I often craved time by myself when I was with people. I wonder, did I dread it, or did I just NOT want to BE it?!

Whatever, I have learned in this past year that to BE Alone is quite extraordinary. It is NOT the punishment I long BElieved it to BE. It is NOT even a consolation prize, thank you for playing but you are NOT chosen...

BEing alone is a skill. It is an art. It requires focus and attention and all the other good stuff we bring to what we often consider our "important work."

BEing alone is a gift. It is NOT BEing relegated to some back room or underground cave [both of which I often thought it to BE] but it IS a special place that is hidden, even out of sight when considered otherwise.

I have really come to enJOY my Alone Time as well my Aloneness. I don't know any other way to say it. 

Of course, it gets tricky, BEing Alone, when we have others who want us to BE there or we are committed to BEing somewhere or DOing something. Perhaps this is where I got it all sorted upside down and inside out.

BE Alone. BE with yourself without distraction or activity or particularly thinkingorfeeling anything. Just BE. Alone.

Of course, I have had to redefine what Alone and BEing Alone mean to me. I have had unexpected visitor feelings from my Past come up and bite me on the nose more than a few times this year. [even this week!!]

And I have also accepted that my definition[s] of Alone will likely go on shifting themselves, but that is all fine. 

I have learned and unlearned a LOT about BEing Alone in 2013. I suspect this will continue...

Life's Lessons #20 BE Prepared for Reactions

It's NOT a thing I like so much, my reactions, others' reactions, especially to ME. But it is a thing I must learn to navigate if I am going to BE here, on Planet Earth, in my Currie costume...

Sometimes I am a little reaction machine. Like the ball machines in a batting cage, I send out pitch upon pitch without thinking twice.

And sometimes it's more the windshield or the bug. 

In any case, reactions are part of Life. Every. Single. Day. Always.

So I am learning that I must BE in a place where I am prepared for them. And often I find I must BE strong enough to bend like the Willow trees when others' reactions to ME are sent forth.

I know that when I wake after 3 or 4 hours' sleep with my mind running in its highest gears that I am in for a bit of trouble if I am thinking I want to get some more sleep. And so it was last night...

I might've done well to BE ready for the backlash I got. Instead I just jumped on in, like someone jumping in to a rope skipping who hasn't an ounce of rhythm...

I could BE mad. And I will admit I am a bit irked. But I also understand. This is how I am made, apparently, with a BIG old bag of understanding that tells me I should NOT BE feeling as I am feeling.

But here's the trouble with that sort of a rule: It causes me to BE someone I am NOT. BEcause I understand does NOT mean I canNOT feel what I feel. I can feel like I feel AND I can understand. These things need NOT BE mutually exclusive.

So, preparation... that's the word of this day. That is the take-away from yesterday's reaction...

Life's Lessons #19 BE Gentle

How hard can it BE to BE Gentle?! Sometimes very. Or so it seems to me...

I mean to BE a gentle person but I often come at things like the only tool I have is a hammer.

I can BE Very Unkind when I don't stop and think BEfore my mouth flaps on with words that, once out there, need a lot of work to forget.

It happened just yesterday. I was in one instant kind and gentle and even a little bit funny in BEing so sweet. And in another rude, hurtful, and totally inappropriate.

I know so many people who have lost people so dear to them in the past year. It kind of comes with the territory, you know, BEing human, but it has been catching my eye a LOT more than it ever did.

MayBE it is harder to BE gentle, but it is NEVER wrong. That's the sort of straight no chaser thing I can really live by.

Life's Lessons #18 BE Quick to Forgive

Forgiveness seems like a popular topic in my head [and heart] at this time of the year. Of course, the truth is it is BIG most anytime in any year.

I read a friend's post yesterday where she talked about "nursing resentments" and withholding forgiveness as a sort of power play. She was spot on and caused me to look at my own track record in that department.

My Life is one of many broken connections. Some even severed. But I keep on thinkingandfeeling about these people, my part in the breakings, and I keep trying to grow in my capacity to forgive.

The thing is, I keep thinking that I have to DO something or announce my forgiveness in some way for it to "take" and really "work." Oh my...

As I look back on this year and all it has provided me in terms of Life Lessons, I think that BEing Quick to Forgive is one I shall continue to train myself in. I am VERY good at nursing my resentments and oftentimes, seeing the whole of what I have done BEing resentful and holding fast to my unforgiveness, I can only shake my head and BE willing to get better at this stuff.

Right Now.

No more wasting time with whether it is deserved, whether it will BE mutual, or whether anyone even KNOWS I have done it.

Oftentimes it is simply my own silly self I need to forgive. 

Need to let off the hook. 

Need to BE kinder and gentler and more tender with. 

Sometimes I just need to sit myself down with a cup of tea and a little quiet time. And suddenly things shift in perspective.

And others it's about Letting Go my end of that imaginary rope.

Life's Lessons #17 BE a Little Surprised by Yourself

I'm a pretty good one for developing habits and practises that support me. I'm far from excellent in this department, but I have REALLY grown in my capabilities this year.

WOW!!

Last week I was meeting with someone I am looking forward to working with and getting to know better in the year[s] ahead. We were having the best time discovering things about each other. I remember walking home feeling a little like I was walking on air. Ever since I have been having little epiphanies and ah-ha moments. It's been really nice.

Until...

Last night I got really impatient. Well, actually yesterday afternoon. One minute it was Gracie. The next it was my mum. NEVER, NOT once, until the middle of my night's sleep did I step up and take responsibility for my own attitude.

Instead of going back up to Mum's for a glass of wine, I excused myself from dinner with her in the dining room where she lives and walked home. It was a humbling walk and I was sort of grumping along all the way.

When I woke about 2AM, my stomach was DOing the grumping. Without realising it I sort of ate my way from getting home to falling asleep. And I have been really REALLY EXTRAORDINARILY EXCELLENT about NOT eating past 7 o'clock.

So sometimes I surprise myself. Works in the good ways and in the NOT so good ways. But I am learning that sometimes the greatest of Life's Lessons is one that involves opening my heart a little more to loving myself with all my flaws hanging like tinsel on the tree...

Life's Lessons #16 BE a Re-Framer of Thoughts

Thoughts BEcome Things. 

I know this to BE true.

Thinking BEcomes BEing. 

I know this to BE true.

Thinking GOOD Thoughts BEgets a Life I want. 

I BElieve this is true.

Thinking BAD Thoughts BEgets a Life I DO NOT want. 

Hmmmmmmm...

This is an interesting exercise. 

Stop a thought. 

Catch it. 

Look at it. 

Closely.

What happens?!

Life's Lessons #15 BE Restful

I really try to live my day in a special way on Sundays. 

And NOT for any other reason than BEcause I know how healing a day of rest, reflection, and really BEing Present in the moment is for me.

So on this Sunday, a BEautimous day here in Arizona, I am resting. 

Taking time to BE and letting DOing find me tomorrow. 

Or mayBE the day after that.

BE Restful. And enJOY the gift.

Life's Lessons #14 BE a Connector

There is something that occurred to me recently, about telephones, about an oft apparent assumption that we BE available, 24/7/365. I may BE taking this to an extreme, but it's one of those things that makes me want to break glass.

Now that we have the technology that can keep us connected all the time and everywhere, practically, rather than choose to utilise it we expect that everyone else is playing by this same rule. [assumption?!] We are put off when our calls go to voicemail. When someone doesn't have texting capability. When an email [which we KNOW shows up on another's iPhone] goes unresponded to, whole stories are woven of this...

I've been round and round the block about my telephone connection since my move back to AZ. I am so determined to live within my means that I have been working this way and that to NOT need to BE on my brother's cell phone plan. To BE able to have ONE number which I can turn off when I am asleep. Or meditating. Or painting. Or, yes, even writing.

I have had no less than 5 different telephone numbers since the end of September. And you know what?! I don't DO the phone much. I don't have email access or texting capability on my cell phone. And I don't want that to change. REALLY.

What I know is true for me is that just BEcause I can receive a call or a voicemail, I don't NEED those things to BE in effect 24/7/365. What I want is to BE connected. To BE able to connect. To BE reachable and to respond when, for some reason, say sleep, walking Gracie, or writing, I canNOT answer a phone call.

I am NOT ranting here. I am just saying what is true for me. I fully endorse everyone's ability to choose what they prefer. 

And while I really DO NOT always understand how my calls don't get answered or even returned when I have spent time with whoever I am calling and KNOW they have that phone with them 24/7/365... I make room for their freedom to choose.

Writing, here, for instance, I suppose is a little like making a call, or BEing a Connector. But it does NOT depend upon anyone reading or responding for me to BE a Connector.

MayBE I am rambling. It's possible. I DO that sometimes. 

Life's Lessons #13 BE Ordinary

Most days I want to make a difference. I want to DO what I CAN DO and I especially want to DO what ONLY I CAN DO. 

It is NOT the stuff of legends that makes the sort of difference I want to make. It is the Oh So Ordinary, Of Course, and WHY NOT stuff I'm talking about.

Today Gracie and I are going to walk around one of our walking loops and I will pick up every poop that is sitting there freezing and hard on the rocks. If this sounds a bit TMI or even just plain yucky, so BE it. 

Every single time I am out walking I see un-picked-up poops. I've listened to the noise BEtween my ears long enough. I am going to DO something about it, something that DOES NOT have anything to DO with complaining or rolling my eyes.

It is easy to BE self-righteous. Doesn't take much at all to BE indignant. And it's far nicer to BE the person who ALWAYS picks up her dog's poop than to BE the one who couldn't bend to DO so, who had no bag, or simply didn't see.

It is easy to judge and make up a story. And I much prefer BEing the sort of someone who always has bags and the intention to clean up after Gracie. 

But there are other people who don't see things the way I see them. I know this BEcause oftentimes I canNOT find one single other person who sees what I see the way I see it.

I don't mind that I am NOT well-known or recognised or even a little tiny bit famous. I prefer to BE ordinary. I prefer to inhabit my Life out of the spotlight. I actually enJOY BEing someone who would go out with the intention to pick up all those poops she's walked past, shaking her head, one too many times Now.

Sometimes I wish to BE extraordinary. 

But given the choice, I'd choose BEing Ordinary. 

Every. Single. Time.

Life's Lessons #12 BE Heart-FULL

Many times people have asked why I capitalise certain words or letters in a word. I have given satisfactory answers to them, I think, but I have been thinking about it more lately.

I think I DO this largely BEcause it is how I reach out to others. I sometimes spell BE be when I am writing to someone who I wouldn't expect to "get me" but that, I think is very telling.

With some, and that would include anyone reading me here or on my other blogs, people, generally, to whom I send emails or even real mail, and always myself, in my writing practise, I don't worry nor care. I already feel that you, they, and I "get me" and so I just operate as though there were nothing at all strange about my spellings and wordings.

This morning I read an interesting letter that the poet, Ted Hughes, wrote to his son. It was indeed a "dense" read, yet worthy of the time it asked of me to read it. I enJOY reading the running along unconcerned with paragraphing and punctuating sometimes, like a marathon runner likes a good sprint Now and Then.

There was so much juice in that essay/letter. It really made me sit up and blink more than a few times. To recognise oneself in another's words is unnerving and exhilarating. I read it again. And then once more. I'll go back to it. I'll likely print it out, too, and sit with the words on paper. Sometimes I need that sense of touch. Sometimes NOT, but sometimes, YES, I need it.

These are all things that fall into BEing "Heart-FULL" for me. When I write it that way, it is like I am meeting your eyes. You "get it" that Heart-FULL is somewhere BEyond where we all are most comfortable going. But together, for me with YOU, anyway, it is NOT scary in the least.

At the letter's end, Hughes writes: 

And the only thing people regret is that they didn’t live boldly enough, that they didn’t invest enough heart, didn’t love enough. Nothing else really counts at all.

This is something I am stirring inside as 2013 winds itself down. Investing my heart, loving, and taking the chance that I won't BE understood, that people won't "get me." 

It doesn't really matter, I'm discovering, what other people think of me [or that they think of me at all]. All that "counts" is that I BE Heart-FULL and open to the possibility of really loving Life in the moments I'm given.

Life's Lessons #11 BE Resilient

adjective: resilient

1. 1.

   (of a substance or object) able to recoil or spring back into shape after bending, stretching, or being compressed.

   synonyms:

   flexible, pliable, supple;

2. 
   
3. I am someone who tries to remember to bounce back. To get up when I fall down. To keep going if I need to stop and rest awhile.

1. I am someone who tries to BE flexible. To laugh with myself when I get too serious. To bend without breaking and roll with the winds.

1. I am someone who tries NOT to forget that Life is full of seasons. Sometimes the season du jour is prickly or bogs me down. The point of the thing is to BE carried but NOT swept away by Life.

1. I am someone who tries taking Life a breath and a day at a time. Sometimes this is nearly impossible, simply too itchy NOT to scratch. Nonetheless that's the deal I've made and I respect myself enough [finally] to keep my agreements, especially with myself.

These are some random thoughts about BEing Resilient. I've been struggling a bit more than I'd like with my mood lately. I have been quick to take offense and I am pulling banana after banana out of my trunk just to slip and fall on peel after peel.

Sometimes Life is just more uphill than level. Sometimes it goes too fast and others so slow it is like watching paint dry. However, my part is always to BE Resilient, NOT to let everything unravel over some momentary inconvenience.

1. 
   

Life's Lessons #10 BE Able To Change

I'm well aware that Life is Change. It is also opportunities and possibilities. And it is, I suppose, but a dream as the song says.

Yet the BIGGEST single thing is that Life is Change. Change is also Life. 

Day by day by day I DO many of the same things. I write. I share Gratitude. I make art. I listen to other people and their ideas, perspectives, and insights. And all of this, every single thing and all of them rolled up into a big bundle are evidence of Change.

I change my thinking when I hear things that I didn't think about that way, but which I think are quite brilliant when they are presented to me. For instance, a TED talk I heard yesterday gave me an entirely new perspective on something I thought I had set my mind about.

I change my feelings or I let my feelings change when I am able to tell someone, out loud, that I am Right This Minute feeling X, Y, or Z. In sharing the bubble of whatever's got me spinning I come to a stillness. I don't remember this UNTIL I DO it. Again. And again.

I change my actions and my BEhaviours when I notice that I am getting any sort of a result that doesn't work for me. It helps to KNOW this is the key to making a change and NOT just a kick in the backside for the heck of it.

Somedays I really DO want to have things all sewn up and tidy. I want things settled and clear. 

BUT...

Just as soon as I fall in love with that idea I KNOW I am heading for a Change or three.

So today I am remembering that in this entire year up until Right This Minute I have been both a Changer and Changed. I have had everything sewn up and then ripped and scattered to the winds. And I have thought and felt and acted and BEhaved in ways that I NEVER imagined I would. [or could]