Monday, December 27, 2010

Lessons

The best thing I learned about myself this year is that I have endless reserves of anger and rage. This may not sound like a good thing to learn about oneself but I find a strange pleasure in that, alongside the disturbing nature of the discovery. It means that when I need to be angry, when I need to rage to stay alive or to protect that which I value, or when I need that anger to be there to fight for what I believe in, it will be.

I also learned that I can let go of things like resentment. And that I can be patient and loving even when I don't feel like it. I am capable of a lot more than I realized.

I will carry this on with me. Knowledge is power; and self-knowledge even more so. Now that I know that I can let go of resentment, for instance, it's a lot harder for me to hang onto it in the first place. I see the endless pools of rage and anger resentment brings (and even if I think I can utilize that anger, I don't want to live there), and I'm not willing to have that be my default setting.

Sunday, December 19, 2010

Friendship

From Reverb10. How has a friend changed you or your perspective on the world this year? Was this change gradual, or a sudden burst?

Hmm.

I've had my paradigms of life challenged this year. It hasn't always been by friends. In fact, though friends have been the ones introducing me to the paradigm shifters, they haven't directly challenged my perspectives. In part because I isolated myself from my friends this summer. But that's beside the point right now.

S. introduced me to Alex Jones via infowars.com and prisonplanet.com. Even if you don't believe it, it's still interesting. If nothing else it made me realize what I value in life, and what I'm actually willing to fight for and die for and still go down full of faith that I did the right thing.

That was a sudden change.

That was the biggest change. Not the only one.

Perhaps not the biggest change. Another friend, the woman who introduced me to Arbonne, was the indirect cause for me to listen to Keith Kochner speak in Saskatoon. That changed my perspective greatly, made me realize I don't have the limitations I thought I did, that I don't have to live my life the way I have been, that I'm not trapped into anything but that everywhere around me is opportunity.

These changes are ongoing, quick bursts and then long-term work.

Little changes - after all, a 4 inch shift in the ocean floor will cause a tsunami - can be as mind blowing as big ones, after all.

Wednesday, December 15, 2010

5 Minutes to Amnesia

You have 5 Minutes before you will completely lose your memory of 2010. Set an alarm for five minutes and capture the things you most want to remember about 2010.

Here I go.

S. Him this year. His generosity. His love. Just him, in his life, crotchety and funny and sweet and sour.

Z. The dog. Her puppyhood when she was sweet and her current state where she's not. Such a biter. So much work to be done. Sigh.

Saskatoon. Hearing Keith Kochner speak. Having those ideas sink into my soul and remind me of what is important and what is not.

Learning about the way the world is working, the tyranny and oppression and removal of freedoms that is happening every day and nobody gives a shit. Alex Jones has a lot of information about this. It's scary but it's important to know. Even if you don't believe it, it's important to know. The Canadian government just passed a bill so that American troops can come to Canada to maintain order during an emergency. I think Canada gets to define emergency - but maybe not. And either way, we've just signed away some of our sovereignty. Great work, government...and great work, Canadian public, letting that one slide through without a whisper of protest.

The love I've experienced this year. I would want to remember that too. The revelations I've had in churches and at home.

And my five minutes are up.

That went faster than I expected. But I think I remembered the important things.

Tuesday, December 14, 2010

Appreciation

What’s the one thing you have come to appreciate most in the past year? How do you express gratitude for it?

I appreciate S. More than I think he knows. He's been there for me this summer when I know I was extremely hard to live with. Sudden spurts of anger and rage mixed with long periods of what felt like numbness and withdrawal from life.

So he deserves a medal. Or something. Just for loving me through all of that.

I didn't express much gratitude this summer. I wasn't capable of expressing much. At least that's how it felt.

After going to Saskatoon last month, my outlook on life changed. Not overnight, it's an ongoing thing, an awareness of perspective and the important things in life. It has made me easier to live with I think. I hope. And it has made me more aware of expressing gratitude and love towards people I value. I hope it has actually taken action. I know I'm not as stressed. I'm calmer.

I don't think I've actually thanked S. for his wonderfulness this summer though. I think I'm going to do that. Right now.

Action

To quote Reverb10 - When it comes to aspirations, it’s not about ideas. It’s about making ideas happen. What’s your next step?

Well shit.

This is probably what my Arbonne sponsor would like to know too.

Although I'm realizing what my dreams actually are, and defining what I really want, and it changes as I get older and more informed about the world, and more aware of what matters to me.

To answer this I really need to know what my aspirations are. The only repeating aspiration I have is to be a published author. I don't do much to promote this goal of mine. Although writing these every day is a baby step towards that - it keeps me writing every day - and that's something. I am slowly going through the full length novel I wrote two years ago, getting it ready to submit to a publishing house, and that's something too. It's just a lot of baby steps. Little pieces of action, far apart. I'm not sure why I'm not a big action quickly sort of girl. I never have been. But I don't think that's because I couldn't do it. Just for some reason I don't.

And with Arbonne...it's a strange feeling. I wanted to promote in November, to the next level, to share my dreams with some business builders and get the ball rolling. I was half-way there - and then doors began to shut. Gently. But shutting nonetheless. And I got the distinct, strange feeling that November was not my time. That it would be, at some point, my time to make Arbonne my focus. But not right now. I went to an Arbonne meeting and again, got the sense that while I needed to keep my toes in the water, it was not the time to 'hurry hard' at this.

I'm not sure why.

I felt strongly that I needed to start my business at the level I did. I don't regret doing it. I'm glad I started on this venture, and I still have dreams and goals. I just can't get it going right now and for some reason I feel like that's a deliberate thing.

It's strange but I'm going with it. If I can't follow my TUG (the ultimate guide, built into each one of us) then I can't follow anything.

Those are the two main areas I have aspirations in that I feel I need to take action on. One, I feel I need to take more action. The other, I feel I'm doing what I'm supposed to even if it doesn't seem like enough.

What are my next steps? With writing, it's to finish these prompts and get my book ready to send away. I guess I should set a deadline. I will have my manuscript (or a selection of it) in the mail to the publishing house by my next birthday (which is coming up pretty fast here). With Arbonne, it's to keep dipping my toes in, keep pushing here and there to see if there's a spot to find forward momentum, and wait for my gut (hmm, reverse tug and what do you get?) to tell me that it's time to move further, faster, now.

Sunday, December 12, 2010

Integration

I have been increasingly blessed to find that I don't think about my body and mind being separated much anymore.

It still happens.

A few nights ago I had a little fit - I don't know what to call them. I used to get them all the time. Time speeds up and slows down simultaneously. My mouth gets a strange taste in it. My head feels larger and heavier than it should. Things are incredibly loud. I feel like I'm moving very quickly and yet everyone else is so, so slow.

I had a doctor tell me it might be temporal epilepsy. In which case I had a seizure.

That is a mind-body split. It was very strange since I hadn't had one for so long.

I didn't like it one bit.

I used to live my life as though my mind was connected and my body was absent. Lately I've had more moments where I felt my body was more connected than my mind. As if my body was trying to tell me something and my mind was completely oblivious. Or in denial. Or deliberately shutting out information I needed.

Migraines stemming from shutting down when I needed to speak up. Muscles tightening when I refused to acknowledge my stress. Heart beating hard and fast and chest tight when anxiety overwhelmed reason and faith vanished in the face of fear. Breathing being lost in the stress of the summer.

And my brain didn't feel that involved this summer. It was shrouded. Blocked. Fuzzy. Forgetful. Not present. So perhaps that's why my body had to step up, to keep me going, to keep me alive and functioning on some basic level that I had forgotten existed.

More and more my body and mind and heart and soul feel like one cohesive unit.

If that was a consequence of the summer, then I am grateful again that this summer happened.

Saturday, December 11, 2010

11 Things

11 things I don't need. 11 things I'll try to eliminate in 2011.

1. I don't need One World Governance. Individual countries need to keep their freedom.

2. I don't need higher taxes. The economy won't improve unless people have money to spend, after all.

3. I don't need my freedoms being restricted in the name of security.

These three, all I can do about them is to protest the bills being passed that pave the way for these things to happen; and to use my voting power wisely; and to be aware, informed and unafraid. Keep my eyes open. Look for the light.

4. I don't need the procrastination I exude towards my writing. This is probably the easiest, and hardest, to eliminate...just by sitting down and making myself write.

5. I don't need poverty, and I don't need riches. However, I also don't have riches so I can't get rid of that one...and I've been trying to get rid of poverty for a long time. Perhaps I need to reevaluate my definition of poverty.

6. I don't need stress. I am learning to manage the things I find stressful and I am getting better at not internalizing things I don't need to.

7. I don't need meaningless anger. With learning what to internalize and what to shut out, I am getting better at eliminating this one too.

8. I don't need hatred. I am letting go of resentment, and with it goes the hatred and the anger.

9. I don't need censorship. From myself or from others. And this is solved by learning to hear myself, to allow myself to use my true voice, and to fight to be heard.

10. I don't need to be given smurf bites by my dog. This one is going to take some time and training. Possibly professional help.

11. I don't need my furniture to be destroyed by said dog. Again. Professional help may be required.

Friday, December 10, 2010

Wisdom

What was the wisest choice I made this year, and how did it play out?

Good grief, Reverb10. You don't pull any punches, do you?

To answer glibly, and off the top of my head, I have no idea. I won't know until I have the wisdom of hindsight, time passed to show me the long term consequences of the choices I have made this year. It's near impossible to tell which of the choices I made this year was the wisest; and the context often determines what was wise at what time, anyway.

But if asked to actually choose one - going to listen to Keith Kochner speak in Saskatoon. Not only listening to him speak, but taking in what he had to say, and growing, and bringing change into my life because of it. If anyone reading this ever gets a chance to go to an Exchange Event, I would recommend it. There is so much to take in. So much change to put into effect. So much to ponder and let go of and rewrite. So many areas of my life that it applies to. I went because of Arbonne; it's shown me that my true passion in life is to tell stories, and the desire of my heart is to tell stories that change people's lives (hopefully for the better). And to live in Balance. I have yet to figure out how Arbonne, and theatre, and every other choice I've ever made, fits into that.

But I'm no longer freaked out about that process, and I no longer think I need to have all the answers yesterday. This is a journey and I am growing peaceful with that reality. Most days.

I think that's all the wisdom I can put into action in my life right now.

Rocking My Socks Off

When I graduated from Rosebud a lovely woman took all the graduating women to a spa for mani-pedis and massages. The woman who did my pedicure said I had the softest feet she'd ever worked on. She asked if I ever went barefoot.

I told her I wore socks and shoes almost all the time, or socks and slippers. She said that explained it, at least in part.

All that to say, I don't rock my socks off.

I didn't do a lot of parties this year. I'm not sure I did any, actually.

I didn't do a lot of social gatherings either.

The best social gatherings I went to were with people S. worked with. They came over for his birthday. We went to one of their places for another birthday party, and for an end of season party. Outside, or at a local pub, surrounded by people who were full of life and energy when I was not, was a way to fill myself with some of that energy. Music, or the sound of people and doves in the backyard of the house next door; a fire pit, food cooked over the flames or brought by cheery waitresses. Comfy clothes, decent. Pizza on blue couches in a third story apartment that felt way, way higher. Chatter. Talk. Theatre and life mixing. Games. Drinking, alcohol and pop and water with ice crunched between the teeth.

The feeling of acceptance.

Those were moments of connecting to community too. Those were moments that I will remember from 2010.

Beautiful Souls

Another prompt from Reverb10 - Think about what makes you different and what you do that lights people up. Reflect on all the things that make you different & you’ll find they’re what make you beautiful.

I'm a few days behind. I'll catch up on the weekend. Writing is tough...yeah, yeah, I know. I love it. But it's tough to take time for it when I'm gone all day and I want to come home and spend time with S. and the dog and not my computer.

When I thought about this one I didn't know what to write. I don't know what I do that makes people light up. It seems to be a bit random. Little moments of true un-self-awareness, those moments when a person is just truly themselves, no censorship - you know the ones? Where you see someone and get an instant crush on them, as one of my acting teachers once put it. Not a sexual thing - just a moment of seeing their soul. It's beautiful.

And I'm not sure what makes me different. Or rather, I'm not sure I can articulate what makes me different. It's my soul. That can't be articulated.

Tuesday, December 07, 2010

Community

Where have I found community (online or otherwise) in 2010? Where would I like to join, create or connect to more deeply in 2011?

On a side note, I'm enjoying Reverb10. Even if I feel rushed doing it.

I have noticed this year that I started with a feeling of community. Within and outside of the theatre. I had gigs, friends I was working with, confidence and joy. And then that went away and I felt a vacuum of community in my life that led me into depression, or at least damn close to it.

So I've felt a loss of community that was, in retrospect, kind of self inflicted.

I briefly felt a sense of community at a church I went to three times, before it began to push all sorts of buttons for me.

I've felt connected to my neighbours for the first time in two years. Not strongly, like I was used to in Rosebud, but still connected. It's something...but not a community.

I've felt connected to people S. worked with. A bit of community, like a family I was married into. The people I've worked with, in some cases more than others, like a little bit of that too. But not enough to sustain me. And that's not what work is for, after all. Not outside the financial, anyway.

So, to answer the question. I've found community in dribs and drabs, where I could, because I realized I desperately needed it. Mostly offline, much to my surprise now. Although I spent a lot of time on Facebook. Which I guess says something about social media vs. human connection.

I would like to be more connected to my 'old' friends in 2011. I would like to find community in a spiritual sense this coming year, whether in church or in an informal setting. I'd like to plug into the theatre community, in some way, and into the Arbonne one as well.

But mostly with my friends who've been there through thick and thin. And some new ones I'm making now. Relationships are important to me and I want to keep that a priority.

Making

What was the last thing I made? Is there something I want to make but need to clear time for?

The last thing I made, or felt creative about, was a present I wrapped. I didn't make the present - that I bought - but the wrapping process made me feel like a creator which was nice. It's pretty, sitting on my table until I see my friend tomorrow. It's orange. She reminds me of the colour orange. I hope she likes it.

The last thing I actually made, though, was a sock-shoe for the dog. It was not my idea. S. took an old holey sock, cut it apart and measured (roughly) a sock for Z. And then asked me to sew it. So I took orange thread (a colour theme perhaps) and sewed up the sides of the bag for her foot. She didn't much appreciate it but at least her foot can bend where it's supposed to. We'll see if we make any other sock-bag-shoes for her.

And I want to make a summer dress. The pattern is cut out. The material downstairs. It needs to be ironed. Today I noted to myself that I feel like I have no time to do anything. I'm not sure that's true but I know January will be upon me before I've prepared for it and I don't like that. The feeling of panic, being rushed. I need to sort out my time usage. And figure out how to utilize that fricken commute in the evening that goes for 45 minutes when it should be 20. Stupid traffic.

Sunday, December 05, 2010

Letting Go

Again, Reverb10.

What, or whom, did I let go of this year?

In a word. Resentment. I held onto some anger I didn't need. And I let go of that this year.

It was a wonderful, good feeling.

Of all the things to let go of, that was the best one.

Saturday, December 04, 2010

Wonder

This is from Reverb10.

I ponder the question, how did you cultivate a sense of wonder in your life this year? And I think, off the top of my head, that I didn't.

This year was a year of ups and downs for me. Incredible ups. Intense downs.

I started the year with such joy and hope and excitement. I was going to be involved with four theatrical productions, possibly more. I was going to have two shows produced that I had written. I was unemployed but with a sense that things would be okay, I would be provided for and my soul would be fed and I would be okay. My faith was strong. My joy complete.

The first project of the year. Working with friends. Writing a show out of the blue - so three written works produced! - and having a blast, and making money doing what I love. The wonder of that experience just happened. I didn't go out of my way to cultivate it. I just experienced it and revelled in the love of it.

Working with children in a homeless shelter. I wondered, in a different way, at their lives. The fact they would use the microwave on the toy kitchen and not the stove or oven. They would use a toy phone but not talk to each other. Again I didn't cultivate a sense of wonder, and it wasn't a sense of wonder in the way I suspect is meant by the question I am pondering.

Then we started rehearsals for the second theatrical project of the year. A play I wrote. A character I loved. A process that was just fun, just playing with friends. A wonder I felt at the joy and the fun and the play. This wasn't work. It was sheer enjoyment of being alive. It was wonderous. And then the show was cancelled - postponed - cancelled. Three days into rehearsal. Anger warred with disappointment warred with resentment and more anger. Fury. Rage.

The other two shows I was supposed to be a part of were cancelled too. Both my plays now unproduced sitting in drawers where I couldn't see them.

More anger. More rage. Much more resentment.

Depression.

Unemployment again but this time without the sense that I would be provided for. Without a sense of purpose. I felt lost and drifting. Inexplicable anger, misdirected at those I love instead of those people, and forces, I was angry with. No wonder, unless you count wondering why I was so angry and upset and sad and dark. And then it was just numb and apathetic.

We got a puppy, at first a minor distraction and then a reason to get up in the morning because she needed me to. It probably saved me. Even if it also showed me the darkest pools of rage, brought a great fear into myself because how could I be so angry with a little baby, innocent of ill intent, to the edge of hurting her but at least I could stop myself from crossing that line. And I was feeling something again. Even if it wasn't wonder or joy.

A patch of light. Visiting home for a few weeks. Nothing to do but no pressure to do anything. I couldn't find work here, I was a visitor. And then a spot of interest, a chance to take matters into my own hands, Arbonne was a chance to make money and have some aspect of life come back, and so I took it and floundered.

I realized there was no balance. Either all focus was on writing, or acting, or Arbonne, or socializing, or finding work, or playing games. When doing one the others vanished. I realized this was what I actually wanted - balance - all aspects of a whole life showing themselves at once. More than riches or fame or success. Balance would be nice.

I put myself out there. I get work. I wonder at how the pieces are suddenly falling into place for me. What happened? What was I lacking all summer, why is there light now where there was darkness, why hope where there was despair, why joy where there was an endless hole of anger? And the anger is still there, simmering. But it's not at the top anymore. It's progress. Or at least pleasant. I have time with friends. Work with money. Arbonne appointments. Family visits. Love. Auditions. A writing class. A welcoming congregation. Life is full of wonder and joy again.

Life throws some curve balls. I lose my job. Arbonne falls to the background, people say no, they don't want to hear what I'm doing. We can't go home for Christmas. The dog is being a little shit. The church is full of lies. The audition is a bust, writer's block surfaces.

And I hear a man speak about resentment circling down to resistance circling down to revenge. About the foundational stories that provide cracks and leaks and lies in the houses that are our lives. About how to identify those stories and change them and begin to heal. To let go of resentment. To let go of the lies and find our way to Balance. True abundance in every aspect of our lives.

And I let go of resentments I've held since the spring. Since the shows vanished along with my joy. I begin the life-long process of replacing lies with Truth, of reprogramming the voices in my head, of finding Balance with a capital B.

People still say no to Arbonne but for some reason I feel that it's a gentle Not Now from Him. I don't know why but I am okay. Moments of despair instead of weeks of darkness. A chance to speak blessings into the lives of hundreds of people every day, people who may not know what I'm doing but for whom I hope it makes a difference anyway. A Joe Job transformed into a chance for Light to triumph. A dog who is still being a shit but instead of unfathomable anger I find patience and an acknowledgement that she is there to teach me as much as I am there to guide her on the path to Good Dog. Writer's block dissipates. Auditions still a bust but that's okay too. It's about more than that, a bigger picture, a life of joy and abundance instead of panic and lacking.

New friendships grow out of unexpected places. Chances to share a faith that is unconventional at best. To share a joy and a peace and a gratefulness without labels or limitations. Old friendships revitalized once my resistance was thrown away. Joy in the hiccups of an unborn baby.

I am finding my sense of wonder again and for that I am so, so grateful. If that is what the summer was for. For me to appreciate the Light again once I began to find it. Then I am slowly growing grateful for the summer as well.