True friends

I was having a discussion with Not-so-Little #1 yesterday about what being a true friend looks like.  We have had this discussion many, many times over the years.  As I explained my take on it, she seemed to agree with me when I said that a true friend doesn't get mad at you when you make mistakes.  A true friend loves you no matter what.  A true friend doesn't try to beat you down or make you feel like they are better than you because they haven't messed up as much as you have.  A true friend doesn't take advantage of friendship.  And then I said something that stumped her.  I said that there is only 1 person that she needs to be friends with.  I told her that, first and foremost, she needs to be a true friend to herself.

Thats when I lost her.  Thats when she tuned me out.  Her eyes glazed over and she just looked away.  It was like I was looking at myself at her age in the mirror.  I too could not bring myself to be a friend to me.  I too struggled with keeping friends.  Everytime I walked away from another friend it hardened my heart a little more.  I blamed the friend for leaving me, but in reality it was I that was doing the leaving.  I didn't think I deserved to have friends, so I made sure that I didn't have too many.

I often think about the friends that I have walked away from in my life.  Some of them would probably not give me the time of day today.  Some of them would joyfully accept me back into their lives.  I have reconnected with some old friends over the past year, and I believe that the only reason that I was able to do that was because I friended myself.  By loving myself unconditionally it helped me to return that love to friends lost. 

I have also made some very special new friends in the last few years.  Opening up my heart to myself was what I needed to make the kind of friends I have right now.  If you feel good about yourself, you attract people who also feel good about you.  If you don't respect yourself you will attract people that also have no respect for you.  I knew this for years before I was actually able to do anything about it.  People would tell me the same thing I told #1 Little.  And as soon as they said those words, "you have to be a friend to yourself first", my eyes would glaze over and I would look away.  I knew full well that that was not possible.

Its possible today.  Today I am able to love the me that I am.  When the Spirit is allowed to shine and be free, self-love can blossom.  When I stopped listening to the lies in my head and started living my life on my terms I became a conduit for Love.  I finally became a true friend.

Its my hope that Not-so-Little #1 doesn't wait till she's 40 to friend herself.  That is a miserable life to live.  I wish I could say that its so simple.  Just accept yourself and live your life joyfully.  It sounds simple, but its not.  Its not easy if you've got your Spirit hidden.  The good news is, that once you let your Spirit shine even a little bit, it starts to get easier.  You start to experience bits of joy and that leaves you hungry for more. 

I believe that we all hold the key to true friendship within us.  Even the nastiest of people that we encounter in life hold the key.  Just remember that their key is misplaced, not lost, just misplaced.  Extending compassion to those angry people could be just what they need to see a glimmer of their shiny.

Is there someone in your life that needs some compassion?  Is there someone in your life that needs to friend themself? Could you be a conduit of Love for them?

Just my thoughts.

Shine on

I haven't been blogging very regularly for quite some time.  It wasn't that I planned on taking breaks, it just happened that way.  I guess I'm just really trying to honor my Spirit and my Spirit has not felt drawn to this blog.  Over the last few days, however, I have felt a tug at my heart.  I started to miss the time I spent writing down my thoughts here.  It started to feel like there was an emptiness, like I was missing a good friend.

So I came here today, just to see how it would feel to let my thoughts flow.  It instantly felt comforting.  Like it used to feel when I first started letting my Spirit out of captivity.  It has taken me many, many months to get to this point of living freely.  I still struggle with days of not listening. Times when I let my ego try to push that voice I hear away.  My Spirit is stronger than the ego now.  These days its harder to dim my shiny.

I've been through so much emotional & spiritual growth these last few months.  I thank the healing art of Reiki for this growth.  I have progressed in my Reiki study to a Reiki II.  I hesitate to call myself a practitioner, but that is what I am doing.  I am practicing Reiki healing, both hands-on and distance healings.  I have a dream of practicing Reiki either out of my home or in a peaceful healing room in another location.  I have had this dream for some time now, but only recently have I committed to following through with plans to live this dream.

My whole life has been one dream after another, that I have always let go. For the first time in my 40-something years I have a plan and I can see the dream and I'm not letting fear get in my head.  I'm taking action.  I've tried the lets-just-see-where-things-go thing.  This time I'm not just waiting to see what happens.  I'm making things happen.  I'm doing what needs to be done.

I can't afford to rent a space right now, and my home is not ready for a separate healing room yet. In the past, those two things would have stopped me in my tracks.  I would have thrown my hands up and proclaimed that that dream wasn't going to happen either.  Today I am busy making preparations to get a space ready in my home to practice Reiki. My family will have to work with me and be patient while I insist that they are quiet during certain times of the day.  Sacrifices will be made by all of us, but I am not going to let these small blocks keep me from moving forward.

My call to heal came months ago.  I knew that I was a healer. I just didn't know what type of healing I would be called to do.  I listened and I waited and I listened some more.  I found crystals and Reiki.  I am focusing on Reiki, but I use crystals when I feel intuitively that they will benefit me.

I'm not so special.  I believe that we are all healers.  I believe that we all hold the knowledge that we need to heal at any time.  Finding the type of healing that is for us doesn't have to be hard.  You just have to let your Spirit guide you to where you need to be.  You just have to be willing to let your Light shine.  By merely living your joy you are healing.  You're healing yourself, which in turn can lead to the healing of others.  There's no limit on healing.  The more people that do it, the better world we'll have.

So can you get your shine on?  Can you accept your healing ability and share it?  Just so you know, healing can come in the form of a hug, a smile, comforting words or even a good belly laugh.  It doesn't get much easier than that.

If you could pick your very own healing gift what would it be?


Just my thoughts.

On This Day

Recently I started a practice of setting an intention for each day.  Upon arising I head into my living room and have my time of quiet.  My daily intention will usually just come to me.  I don't have to sit and think of it, it just comes in.  I've been sharing these intentions on my Facebook page and I just really wanted to post them here as well.

I have been starting each intention with "Just for today", but this morning those words didn't feel like mine.  There is a reading in the 12-step meeting that I used to attend called "Just for today", so I felt like I was borrowing it.  So I've changed the beginning to "on this day".

I have no idea how long I will continue this practice, but for now it feels right and it has really been helpful in getting my day started on an uplifting and positive note.  My world is a better place when I start the day feeling shiny.

  On This Day

On this day, I will have my eyes open, so that I can see all that is good around me.


I will not let things get complicated. I will let the day unfold, rather than force it to bend my way.


I will make sure that my needs are being met. I will value myself enough to know that self-care is important to being happy, joyous and free.


I can let those around me be who they are. I can remove my expectations and just embrace the differences that make us all the spiritual beings that we are.


On this day, I will allow my truest self to shine. I can look within, instead of towards others, to define who I am.


I will be free of fear, anger & resentment. I will choose to let Love lead me through each moment.


I will live in the moment. No wondering about tomorrow or pondering yesterday. Accepting that I am right where I need to be.


I choose to let change happen. I choose to step back and let life happen the way the Divine has planned. I choose to trust.


On this day, I'm going to be gentle with myself and replace the word "should" with the word "could".

Have a shiny day!!

Just my thoughts.

Seeing the Light after the Dark

It always amazes me how serene and peaceful I feel after a bout of depression.  Well, that's not exactly true.  It didn't used to amaze me, because I never really used to see serenity and peace.  I just felt relief that the sadness had passed and waited for the day that it would return.  Today, however, I see the Light after the Dark.  I see it and I embrace it.  I am in a healing process right now.  My body, mind and spirit are all healing together and it can seem a bit overwhelming at times.

I began practicing Reiki because I was being drawn to some type of healing.  I thought it was because I wanted to play a role in the healing of others.  I am beginning to sense that Reiki found me, because I needed to play a role in the healing of myself. 

I find myself intrigued with all forms of energy healing.  I sometimes spend a bit too much time researching the many types of healing available.  I listen to my intuition and I let my spirit decide which ones I may look into further.  For now, Reiki, is my way to healing.  Even when I resist it because fear is telling me that I can't handle the healing that may have to take place. 

I know that there may very well be some more dark days ahead for me, but I hold on to the belief that on the other side of any pain there will be an abundance of Light & Love waiting for me.  Healing past pain is the only way that I can hold on to my "shiny".  If I want to stay shiny, I may have to face some of the Dark.

Just my thoughts. 

Testing the water

It appears that I have taken an unplanned break from blogging. I didn't intentionally not post anything in over a month, it just happened I guess. My last emotionally charged post threw me for a loop and I slipped into a bit of a depression.  Ok, it was more than a bit, but it was a depression, none the less.  Maybe I'll talk about that depressive episode one of these days, but today is not that day.

I have just recently been feeling a gentle nudge from the Divine to get back here.  To post something.  Anything.  Sharing my thoughts has always been a very healing experience for me. It has always been a way to clear out the clutter that builds in my mind.  So here I sit with a very much cluttered up mind.  I sit here feeling like I've got so much to say, but don't know where to start.  I know that in order to heal I need to bring those thoughts to the surface.

Instead of forcing myself to just pick something, I'll wait.  I'm not in a hurry. Healing takes place at it s own pace, not mine.  Some things are meant to share and some things are meant to be kept private.  Private can be good, as long as it doesn't turn into isolation.

So I'm slowly wading into the blogging waters and letting myself get used to the feel of it again before I jump in head first.  If feels pretty safe to me, but I'll take it slow. 

Just my thoughts.

A story that needs to be told

I have been sitting here for hours trying to figure out how to get the thoughts that are flooding my head out.  I have started and re-started this post several times.  Someone might say that if it is so difficult that maybe I should take that as a sign that I should not post these thoughts, but that is not the case.  I just have to figure out the best way to say what it is that is weighing on my mind.  Its a touchy topic.  Its a deeply personal and private topic.  It is not something that I have shared with many of those close to me.  


I feel compelled to share because I know that there are many people out there who have been through this or something very similar.  Ah, who am I kidding?  I mostly need to share because if I don't I'm not sure I can fully heal.


16 years ago, I was a single mom with 2 Littles to watch over.  I was also quite the drinker.  Not every day, but definitely binged on the weekends that I had no Littles to tend to.  On one of those weekends it was business as usual.  Go to the club with a friend, get good and drunk and then go home and pass out.  That is usually how it ended up.  Until one night when things didn't exactly go as planned.

Here's what I remembered the next day.  I went to the club, I got separated from my friend and then I recalled standing outside after the bars had closed and having a complete stranger ask me if I was ok and if I needed a ride. The next morning I awoke to a severe headache, a large egg on the back of my head and bruises on my neck.

To those of you reading, it is probably very clear that I had been physically and more than likely sexually assaulted.  To me, at the time, I had messed up big time.  I had had sex with someone because I drank too much.  I couldn't explain the bump on my head or the bruises on my neck, but I was pretty sure that I was never going to tell anyone what had happened.  Everyone would know that it was my fault for drinking too much and for leaving with a stranger. Even though I didn't remember leaving with anyone.

So I filed the attack away and went on like business as usual.  Went to work on Monday with a headache and faint bruises on my neck.  I made it 3 days before a fellow employee finally cornered me and asked me why I had been acting so off.  Apparently I wasn't very good at pretending.  She was an angel.  She had been through a date rape experience and she encouraged me to go the doctor and then to the police.

Some of the details of the attack had been coming to me over those 3 days.  I remembered where the attack had taken place and I remembered who the person was.  It was a friend of my friend's boyfriend.  I didn't remember his name, but I knew that I could find him if I needed to.  I kept that information to myself.  I didn't want to find him.  I didn't want him to tell everyone that I had willingly left the bar with him.  I didn't want to get my friend involved.  So I told her that I didn't know who he was.  Just some guy from the bar.

My co-worked told me how I would feel so much better if I reported it.  She said that I would feel more empowered and safe.  She went with me to the police.  I did not feel better.  I felt embarrassed and ashamed.  The police officer was very kind.  He assured me that it was not my fault and that I shouldn't feel bad.  Then he had me take him to the scene of the attack.  All I could do is shake as we walked into that wooded area.  More details came to my mind, but I couldn't share them.  Too disgusted.  He found some evidence and then told me to go right to the ER and get myself checked out.

At the ER it was determined that I had sustained a concussion.  I was not pregnant and I would have to wait for the HIV test to come, but the attacker had used a condom, so I should be thankful for that.  I went home feeling dirty and ashamed again.  I never talked to the police after that.  I couldn't even see that I had been viciously attacked even after I had been told that I had a concussion. In my mind I was still to blame.  I asked for it.  I filed the experience away and every now and then I would bring it up in one of my many stints in the counselors office. I even had been able to embrace the notion that it was not my fault and I thought I had moved on.

But today my thoughts kept turning back to that day 16 years ago.  I found myself getting more and more emotional about it.  I knew that I had some more healing to do.  I recently began the practice of Reiki.  I'm not going to go into what Reiki is right now, because this post is getting long enough.  Simply put, it is an ancient Eastern energy healing technique for the body, mind & spirit.  I knew that I needed some healing in the area of this past trauma, but I had no idea what that meant.

This afternoon, as I performed Reiki, the memories of that night came flooding back.  Things that I had long forgotten and some things that I had no idea I even knew.  I was finally able to understand why I could not remember so many details.  I had been drugged and I had been mislead to believe that this person knew where my friend was and would take me to her.  I had been a victim of a terrible, brutal crime.  I relived all the pain and fear of that night.  For these past 16 years any tears that I shed about that night were tears of shame and guilt.  Today, for the first time, I let the tears fall freely for the pain that I experienced  that night.  I cried silently, so that I would not upset my family, but I didn't hold it in.  I released the experience.  I felt fear, pain (actual physical pain) and anger. I felt vulnerable and small. Nothing I felt tonight has resembled shame or  embarrassment or disgust.

I'm shaken, but I am also healing.  I am finally, after 16 years, feeling all that I should have felt that night.  I am finally seeing what happened as the tragedy that it was.  I feel safe and protected and I know that I am going to be fine.  I am being guided through this healing process from a combination of sources.  Both divine and human.  I am not doing this on my own.  This is bigger than me, but I am stronger because of it.  I am a little freer today and little lighter knowing that I am loved by many and that I will not be judged by this event any longer.

There are people that I know that are going to read this and they will probably going to be taken aback and maybe feel awkward around me, but that is ok.  Healing doesn't just need to happen to those of us who have experienced this.  It needs to happen to those who are affected by it in any manner.  I don't want people to look at me and feel sorry for me, I want them to look at me and think how amazing it is to heal from something so sad.  I have more healing to do, but I know that I am up for the experience.  I am ready to let my spirit shine and be fully free.  That day is coming.

I don't know how long I'll keep this posted.  I may decide tomorrow that I don't want to expose myself to others this way.  For today I will hit the 'publish post' button and I will hope that what I have gone through can be a beacon of light for anyone who may have experienced the same thing and just wants to heal once and for all.

If you have gone through any kind of physical and/or sexual attack, please tell someone.  Allow yourself to heal and to see that you are a beautiful, shining soul who only deserves to be loved and safe.


Just my thoughts.

I became a mother today

I became a mother on this day 22 years ago.  For these past 22 years now, I have loved being a mother and I have hated it.  I have made many mistakes in my mothering, but they were all mistakes that I had to make.  Some people say that being a mother is a job.  The times that I have hated being a mom have been the times that I believed that being a mother was a job.  In my mind, mothering is not a job.  It is not something that I can call in sick from.  It is not something that I will ever receive monetary compensation for.  It is not something that I can, at the end of the day, clock out and walk away from.  That is how I view a job. 

Mothering is a part of who I am.  It is a piece of me that will never be absent from my life.  I will always and forever be a mother.  It is a role that I have been fine tuning all these 22 years.  Am I the perfect mother?  Absolutely not.  Is there a perfect mother?  Absolutely not.  Is being a mother perfect for me?  I believe so. 

I stumbled into motherhood at a time in my life when things were not going well for me.  I was drinking too much and I was not taking any part of my life seriously.  I was not the person that I wanted to be, but had no intentions on changing.  Then I was blessed with a beautiful baby girl.  She filled my lonely heart up with love the second I laid eyes on her.  She was perfect.  Becoming a mother turned my life around.  It would be many years till I was to become the shiny person I feel I am today, but my life definitely changed that April 14th for the better.

On that day, I became important to someone else.  I couldn't think of just myself any longer.  Yes, it was hard being a single mom.  It was hard feeling like I was all alone in the world with this tiny baby.  I doubted myself as a mother, but I never never doubted my love for my precious Little.

The relationship that I have had with my first born has been complicated and fierce at times.  It has also been rewarding and meaningful.  I wish her to be happy and joyful and to love herself as I love her.  I wish her to find her passion and turn it into a way of life.  I wish her to be thoughtful and responsible and to surround herself with the same kind of people.  Most of all, however, I wish her to know that I love her and I will wait patiently as she finds her way through life.

I can no longer financially support her in any way, but I will always emotionally support her.  I have boundaries in place that will not be crossed.  I hold those boundaries solidly in place because I love her and I want to model to her what it means to not allow others to take advantage of us.  I don't want her to take advantage of me and I don't want her to be taken advantage of either.

Being her mother for these last 22 years is something that I would never change.  I don't wish I could do anything over.  Every experience, every ounce of pain and joy I have felt, was exactly what it was supposed to be.

Happy Birthday, Not-so-Little #1.  I hope that you know in your heart that I love you fully and unconditionally.  I hope that you are able to make your life into all that you hope it will be.  Thank you for choosing me as your mother and helping me to begin my journey into motherhood.  I love you!!

Just my thoughts.