Category Archives: gratitude

03.12.24
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Included with the Upgrade…..

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I’m learning to block the INCOMING shots fired from the field by surrounding my heart with invisible window screening and turning down the interior spotlights so the target is not as easily visible from the outside. That’s how I’m learning to say the word NO, and selectively choosing my path in the cacophony of people-pleasing noise that has been the lifetime fuel for my engine.

I share this Facebook meme today because it hit solidly its target and interpreted as yes….it’s working…I can identify with it…instead of interpreting – ya…why do I feel the need to explain myself…why can’t I just say no, how do I stop the guilt of “should” when I do say no?

This particular meme that traveled its way to me through the Facebook algorithm was very timely and taken personally into my heart with a gratitude confirmation that I have choices…yes, no, maybe or more importantly, I do not owe anyone an excuse or apology for my decisions.

And so it is……

03.10.24
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On this Day after another birthday,

I’m struggling with just doing what I want to do today. I don’t even really know what I want to do today.

I have finally arrived at a place in my life that I don’t have anything I am required to do. I am no longer responsible for keeping my daughters alive on a daily basis, being smothered by the husband’s expectations (which are actually my expectations of what I assume are his expectations), or the rules and beliefs of anyone else outside of myself. I’ve finally realized, mentally, that I really have no control over anything other than my own thoughts in this moment….which, actually is costly rent for the enormous amount of space taken up in my mind’s rental unit.

I’ve been trying to read a book all morning (Verity by Colleen Hoover). But I’ve used the bookmark several times on my kindle in order to: put a load of whites in, take my 15 minute walk around the pond, water the plants, think about why the water continues to drip when the back knob is in the on position on the bidet. Meanwhile every time I would get up for coffee or water, I would see the lap top laying on the other side of the room, knowing I needed to work on cleaning out some very early posts in Ninasusan, jot down some thoughts that are coming to me while reading Verity and endeavor to organize my thoughts about decisions I need to make in May.

At this point, I’m very disappointed in myself that I don’t have more discipline. I “think” what I ‘really think’ is I have expended way more energy on my thoughts of the future and not a single second just ‘being’ while listening to the tinnitus in my ears. Until I realized this fact, I wasn’t even aware my ears were constantly ringing.

And so it is.

01.05.24
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Can anyone name the song playing in my head?

This morning, I told the little white haired lady at the checkout counter that I was always happy to see her face when I pulled into her lane. Her eyes lit up with just enough of a smile on her lips that I knew her heart opened up. After I payed, I looked the obviously stoned sacker in the eye and smiled when he said “Have a good day, Ma’am”. When I responded, I hardly got a headshake but I figured he had enough fears, concerns or pot on board that I got all that he could give me. I was able to shake off the only negative experience I had at the “store” when I walked beside a woman probably 10 years my senior in the aisle and she looked at me and said, why do groceries keep going up in price, pretty soon no one will be able to afford them. My immediate thought was at least you can choose what to buy…our property taxes keep going up and I can’t do anything about it. Then I paused realizing that theoretically I was thinking the very same thing she was saying. 

While in the check out line my granddaughter attempted a FaceTime…I cancelled and texted her mom to say I was at the store. On my way to the car, I wondered how “the store” always refers to the ‘grocery’ store…at least among my family and peers. No one ever says to me oh, which store? Target, Walmart, Best Buy. No…”the store” means the grocery store. 

As I drove the 45 seconds from “the store” to my garage, I forgot the other two very important revelations that popped in and out quickly. Regina and Linda are coming tonight for our WordShine prep meeting and we decided on my house rather than our usual Panera because HE said he would make bread. But I did find Panera cheddar and broccoli soup at “the store” which was a win/win.

I can’t get a childhood song out of my head….the “something” goes in and “something” goes out…maybe around the corner and out of the house….anyone?

Until next time…..

05.24.23
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Like a nice breeze on a spring day..

I’ve been practicing “understanding” and “releasing what doesn’t serve me” for the last 5 years. (This, after 60 years of trying to rationalize my unhappiness, frustration and anger). I, now, recognize that my mind usually grasps for must-know what will happen in the next moment so that I’m safe. Relying on the illusions in past experiences to determine the worthiness of other humans…the judgments, love/hate/right/wrong about people/things while living from my head rather than my heart. I still struggle quieting preconceived notions about how I’m supposed to live and love…right and wrong…acceptable and unacceptable.

What I know in this moment is that I THINK TOO MUCH. I “think” because I “fear”. My expectations, my never ending scenario building, my panic when faced with the unknown seldom comes to fruition….

I have been mentally exhausting myself staying busy…doing, doing, doing…after awhile it turns into resentment, resentment, resentment. But don’t we need to keep “doing” in order to be productive happy humans…or at least to make others happy humans? NO!

I first had a whisper of what was going on a few months ago when I said out loud, I am so sick and tired of living by the calendar. Why do I continue to over commit myself doing things I might enjoy doing if I had time to enjoy them…but instead believing I must stay busy to be valued.

It hit me yesterday as I took my walk amongst the trees, watering the flowers and the garden, sitting on the deck reading with a cool beeeze while the sun warmed my skin. I realized I was doing something…exactly what I wanted to do. My heart was happy, my brain was silent and I understood the beauty of the heart vs the brain. Doing nothing is doing something…attending to myself from my heart instead of my mind/ego feels courageously gentle.

until next time….

07.16.22
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Muting the trigger

A Facebook post by my friend, Tami, woke me up this morning. She is “healing” from back to back years of family deaths including her husband who was her soul mate, her love and Half of Her. Over the last few years she has included her authentic healing thoughts and fears and anger through her blogs and to and with her friends. This morning she posted the song, Dirt Road Anthem by Jason Aldean. It wasn’t a song I knew even though I think it is a decade old. But to make a long story shorter, I YouTubed it and these two lines stuck out to me:

“Memory Lane up in the headlights. It got me reminiscing on the good times”

I have meaningful loving experiences on a day to day basis. Often when I take a memory photo of my experiences, I feel like I am one of the luckiest people I know in spite of the hardships and the mental fears of the future that I continually give energy to as I go into battle with them. But I often look back at my younger years…say my early 20’s or 40’s and have wistful longings for the good ole days.

…..and I know I’m not the only person who lives a good bit of life in my memories….including the hateful ones I have not yet healed from. Tami’s post hit a trigger nerve and brought clear realization that I love to think about those good times but when I have a negative memory pop in, I often immediately go to anger and hatefulness and then realize I’m doing it again and Force myself to STOP thinking about it…but, maybe the answer is to just sit with the emotion for a few moments. (Not the story but how it made me feel). Perhaps then I can mute the trigger.

The good memories…let them come, I love to smile and laugh and remember those who made me feel love and joy!

Namaste

07.12.22
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The illusion of daily drivel

I fully recognize that I am not in a gentle place right now. I’m not doing my morning centering, meditations and I miss that contented 2020 peacefulness. That’s not to say I didn’t have a thin thread of fear running through my head about COVID but I settled in to experience those early months of the virus without the busyness that is overwhelming me now. He and I were content to just “be” in this house together…doing what felt right in the moment. We talked several times about how good it felt not to have a schedule, and not to have commitments. It was the first time I really understood that everything is vibration and energy. In simple terms, I understood the concept of sitting in the center of a room and watching my thoughts play out on screens around me. Those thoughts are not me, they are only visual concepts that change from one moment to another depending on what gets my attention.

So wah wah wah, I’m circling back! I’m releasing commitments and responsibilities that I chose for the wrong reasons. I know I must discern when my attention is drawn to those movie previews in my brain that apparently are causing me to “feel” uncomfortable, unsettled and irritable. I know that by focusing on the negative; by attempting to rationalize everything, I will experience instant karma serving it all back on a platter to me. I am what I think. Knowing I am capable of following my North Star, recognizing my emotions when I feel them….sitting with them until they subside and then with gratitude for the “I AM” soul that is me. There is nothing outside of myself that needs to be concerning or considered as I move forward in peace with my intuition and my knowing.

Namaste

03.03.22
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Changing life one coffee shop at a time

There is often a huge crevice between expectations associated with our choices and Reality… Capital R – Reality. Simply put, I’m in the drive thru of my favorite coffee shop, waiting for my turn to order, I make a snap decision and choose to get a large calorie laden coffee with caffeine, sugar and real whipped cream rather than my usual healthier choice of a regular decaf brew. In that moment of choice, I may set into motion a day of regrets and negative self talk because of the one moment (monumental?) decision. I’m hung up on the little jagged edge in the crevice as the the self talk…the disappointment in my choice…. morphs into the inner voice screaming why did I do it and why do I always make the wrong choice….this negative self talk and self irritation continues on and on even into the next morning as I step on the scale, not knowing that this one little coffee choice may be forgotten, but has become a building block for the next second, day, year, lifetime.

Sounds a little over-dramatic that a cup of coffee could set your life on spin but how many times do we make a choice, a decision that seemed right in the moment, but find out as life happens that it might not have been the best decision…..but…..oh how we fear intentional change…we fear the unknown. Like the wrong career choice, the bad marriage, the wrong investment, the wrong doctor. These “moment” choices can set our life on a trajectory of angst, hardship, anger or mental self abuse? When, actually, in any moment, we can make a different choice. Life doesn’t happen to us…We choose in each moment and each breath! We can step back and ask ourselves….hmmmm, “How is that working for me?” and then make a change, or a different choice by ordering the planned regular decaf brew!

The way we view our life is one drama after another drama or a sitcom after sitcom or an entire How-to HGTV day perhaps seeing other colors to use as our background. The choices and decisions are ours to make. In my life I have lived many stories. I’ve told myself and edited narratives while identifying with each story while also including play by play -free of charge- to anyone who would listen. It’s not an easy habit to break, but I realized that I created the monsters and the beauty of realization is that as soon as I “open my eyes” the monsters disappear. Until I actually believe they are real, they do not belong to me!

Namaste

02.20.22
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Where do I go from here….

I call it working knowledge…all of the encounters, judgements, observations and a lifetime of the resulting lessons that I draw from over this lifetime aid me in traversing through this human experience as I navigate the cube I live in.

I choose the word CUBE here…like ice cube. Throw an ice cube in a glass of warm water…it eventually melts into something else….liquid form…but while in the glass together with other cubes, we trust and rely on each other’s energy to sustain life as an ice cube a little longer. Eventually though, we morph into another form…water….liquid…we have no idea where or how our journey continues… nor do we have any control….in that moment, we are BEING an INFINITE drop of energy….a drop of water.

Namaste

10.18.21
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Recognizing the evolution of friendships

A girlfriend from my early 20’s posted this on Facebook this morning.

As I was responding to her, I was thinking about friendships. Today is the birthday of a friend who no longer circulates with me in the physical world because he passed on 11 years ago. He’s the kind of friend that still visits with me often in my thoughts. I often wish I could “gossip” about something with him or hear his “oh gurl” one more time but I understand how lucky I am that so many things in my present life call him forward in my mind and I know he will always be with me .

I used to have a poster in my “teenage Nina” room that had a picture of a butterfly on it and the words were “if you love something set it free, if it was yours it will return and gently land on your shoulder”. That was my anthem for teenage boyfriends and crushes. It may have been a quasi spiritual knowing even back then….

I dreamed last night about a good friend who moved away. I woke up recognizing that this is what life is about. All of the important personalities moving in and out of my life when my soul needs a charge. I have a tendency to hold onto people. If you’ve been my friend, chances are You will never be free of me…I very seldom burn bridges. But life happens and we move around just as we are supposed to….and then there is that blessed, surprise contact you receive. It feels so good…often I long for everything to go back to the way it was…but the relationship of the souls has changed…we are still grounded in a history of love and trust but it is just different. I’m learning to accept the difference and embrace these dear souls in my life without expectations. The connection is strong, it’s how we choose to engage right here and right now that makes the difference.

namaste

09.23.21
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One of those freakish accidents

Responding to my comment “after 42 years of marriage, maybe he was trying to kill me”, the doctor shuddered with that little nervous giggle and said..ya, that’s the way I would do it…through the ear. hahahah

He was hanging pictures on the wall yesterday afternoon and was using a razor blade knife with a brand new blade to cut marking tape. He laid the knife on the back of the couch for a second. The next second, I bounced down on the couch, the knife tipped off the couch and into my ear. As I reached up to remove it, I realized it wasn’t laying against my ear…the point was IN MY EAR! I swear if I had thought about it at my moment of panic, I would have taken a Stephen King scenario type picture sans the blood. The blood had chosen a different route as it meandered a path through the bony structure of the inside of my ear. I think the tickle brought me back to reality realizing that what I imagined as the most important aspect being a knife sticking vertically in my ear….was now actually something that happened in the past as I realized I was bleeding somewhere “in there”. At his suggestion I stuffed a paper towel in the little hole to stop the blood which worked well..applied some frankincense (my go to healing essential oil) with a Q tip, made an appointment for this morning with the doctor and basically forgot about it because there was really no pain.

Dr appointment: nurse who took me into the room using her calm voice. OMG HOW DID THIS HAPPEN. Doctor enters the room…”shook her hands in front of her in a professional shudder” and said…HOW DID THIS HAPPEN? After the exam, I asked her if she could see it and she said…Oh YA..I can see it. Prognosis…its fine if it gets infected and begins to hurt or seep fluid, call me!

On the way home…seep fluid…WTH does that mean ?