Seeing and Being Me

I haven't been here for a very long time.  As I sit here writing this, I feel a ton of resistance. Uncertainty. Writing feels foreign to me. Like I've never done it before. Why am I writing this? Who am I talking to? Am I even visible to people? Being invisible has been my super power. If things ever got tough, I could make myself invisible in the wink of an eye. Poof! I'm gone. I can retreat deep within the caves of my soul and just hide there.

Sometimes it feels safe there. Safe from the watchful eyes and harsh judgement of others. Safe from people looking at me in disgust. Safe from being reminded that I just don't fit in. That I weigh too much. That my hair is too gray. That I can't take care of my kids, my home or my husband.

Other times it feels confining and scary. Like I'm being held prisoner. Trying to find the way out, but not being able to see through the darkness. And I would stay in the darkness until I felt brave enough to attempt to feel my way out.

In both cases I would always reappear, ready to take on the world. Renewed and refreshed. Until the next time I needed to be invisible. Its a vicious cycle. One that needed to be broken. In both cases the only one I was really hiding from was myself.  It was my watchful eyes and harsh judgement that I needed to escape from. I was the only one holding myself captive in scary dark places. I was the one who made it possible to be invisible.

Why? Why would anyone want to be invisible? I'm sure that there is all kinds of psychology behind why a person would want to be invisible and why they let their own self-loathing push them into hiding. And the Virgo in me wants to research that and learn all about it and then file it away into my organized file of "Things I Will Just Forget". Honestly, though, I don't care. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter because it doesn't apply to me anymore. I have relinquished my invisibility powers. *Poof* 

Did I consciously do this? No. I had no idea that I was going to wake up one day and "see" myself as worthy of being visible. I had no idea that one act on my part would catapult me fully into my whole self.

Something as simple as cutting my hair. Well, shaving my head, to be specific. I suppose its not everyday that a woman shaves her head, but it was a simple act. I did it with a friend, who was doing it because of chemotherapy. It didn't feel like a big deal for me. It was just something I could do with a friend who wasn't getting a choice about it. 

I had no idea that my life would change forever. That my spirit would light up and I would feel a sense of freedom from the chains that I used to bind myself with. To be honest, I do think that my soul knew that I hid behind my hair. I have entertained the idea of shaving my head in the past, but quickly dismissed it as crazy. Certain that I would be cast out by my family and friends. So instead, I let it grow longer. And longer. I determined that my long locks were symbolic of the Wild Woman inside of me that was going to make her way out.... someday.

So here she is. Demanding that I drop the invisibility shit. Demanding that I drop regrets and fears and self-limiting thoughts. I still have gray hair. I am still overweight. I'm still not a perfect mother, wife or housekeeper. Those things no longer define who I am. Without regret, fear and feeling worthless, those parts of me are just parts of me. Parts of the whole package. 

And I think this whole package is pretty amazing. And happy. And joyous. And free.  Ready to be seen. Ready to be me.

The Unknowing

The unknowing may bring you to your knees.

Leaving you lying there enclosed in pain.

Deep pain that no amount of Love or kind words can heal.

The Unknowing blasts through our fortress of patience and acceptance.

Leaving a path of destruction that can only be mended by walking through it.

Under the rubble lays Hope, Love and our Divine.

The Divine is there patiently waiting to greet us.

Ready to wrap us up in a blanket of Trust and Strength and Divine Love.

Ready to hold us close as we weep.

Ready to take the punches when we’re mad as hell.

Ready to assure us that Hope walks alongside our heavy heart.

The unknowing may bring me to my knees.

My Divine supports me on the way.  

I write this today for a dear friend who is facing this Unknowing.  I hope she finds her way through the rubble.  

I'm a Doodler!!

For as long as I can remember, I have had an aversion to creating anything with my hands.  Not just a typical aversion.  I would have actual anxiety attacks over having to use these two hands to "make" something.  If it was writing, I could do it.  But add crayons, pens, paints, needles to the mix and I was not going to have anything to do with it.  I come from a family of creative souls.  Whether it be painting, drawing, writing or singing, my siblings and mother could do some amazing things with creativity.  Then there was me.  I don't know where this block came from.  It doesn't matter.  I know that I created it and held on tight for my entire life.

A little over a month ago, my good friend and artist, Dawn-Marie deLara (you can find her amazing work here) heard me say that I could not doodle. I admitted to this block that I have had my entire life.  How when I would try to create something it usually ended with me in tears or absolutely angry.  I was a creative mess.  So she challenged me to just sit down and doodle.  For 30 days.  Just doodle and see what comes out.  

I think I may have just laughed at the suggestion, but it did spark my curiosity.  Could I do it?  Could I actually sit down and doodle and not be filled with self-hate and disgust? I pondered for a couple of days.  As I pondered, my Little #5 gently coaxed me to do it.  She was finishing up an art lesson with my amazing artist friend and heard the challenge.  Little #5 is an amazing doodler, as is her oldest sister.  They had the doodle gene that I was sure was missing from me.

Then my pondering just dissolved and I was sitting down one morning doodling! What the hell!! How did that happen? I have no idea.  There have been others in my life who have encouraged me to explore my creative side.  Encouraging me to doodle or draw or just color in a coloring book.  All on deaf ears.  Because I whole heartedly believe that you're not ready until you're ready.  Not a minute sooner.

I guess I was ready because what happened next is nothing short of a miracle.  I made that first doodle and I felt so alive.  I was bursting with energy.  I felt like a little kid.  I wanted to do more.  Out of that excitement and deep desire to share I created 30 Days of Doodle.  It was to be my space to display my doodles to anyone who cared.  Mostly it was my space to showcase my doodles to me.  I wasn't nervous about posting my doodles.  I honestly have no more creative blocks.  I have no embarrassment about people seeing my work.  

My 1st doodle

As a matter of fact, I'll share all of them here.  30 Days of Doodle is for anyone who just needs to play and explore with their inner creativity.  We all have it.  Yours isn't going to look like mine.  My doodles are just that.  Mine.  But I would love to see other doodles there.  My 30 days ended today.  

My 30th doodle

My doodling doesn't end today.  Doodling has become a part of my daily flow now.   It has become a daily practice. Similar to someones meditation or another persons Morning Pages.  I get out of bed each morning eager to see how the days doodle with turn out.  Some I have struggled with.  Most have just flowed from my hand with no thought to where there are going. 

I don't know that I will continue to post every doodle, but I will continue to share those that feel that they need to be shared.  Today I can say with pride, "I am a doodler!"

I hear you knocking at my door

I hear you knocking at my door. Gently tapping. Trying to coax me to open up and let you in. I sit in silence and wait for you to go.

I hear you knocking at my door. Urgently knocking. Begging me to let you in. I sit in silence and wonder if I should let you in.

I hear you knocking at my door. Pounding loudly. Screaming at me to open the door. I sit in silence. Shaken and unsure. I know what happens when the door opens. It happens every time.

You come in and get settled. You keep me a prisoner in my own home. You seduce me with false assurances of safety. You encourage me with lies, to distance myself from all those I love. You make me miserable.

Every. Time.

I hear you knocking at my door. Pounding loudly. Screaming at me to open the door. I sit in silence. Shaken yet strong.

I hear you knocking at my door. Urgently knocking. Begging me to let you in. I sit in silence. Hopeful that you will move on.

I hear you knocking at my door. Gently tapping. Trying to coax me to open up and let you in. I sit in silence as you take leave.

I sit in silence. Safe.

This time….

I dedicate this to all of you out there who have ever dealt with depression, SAD, anxiety, anger, resentment, fear or whatever that "thing" is that turns your world upside down.  May we all see the day when we can just sit in silence and wait for the knocking to stop.

I Love You

"I love you." Three of the scariest words to say.  At least they always have been for me.  Maybe not scary, but definitely left me feeling awkward.  Even with my family.  I would say them out of a sense of duty.  Mostly uttering them only after they were said to me.

I'm not ready to have a big ole Love fest yet, but I feel so much more at ease with these three words these days.  I feel comfortable using them.  I say them to my Littles (the ones still living with me) and Mr. Man everyday.  Yes, every day.  I have done that for months.  Not years, months.  I came to the conclusion, on my own, that if I were to "feel the Love" more, I had to "be the Love" more.  So I set a goal to tell everyone I saw that I loved them.

Yeah, that didn't pan out.  I put myself in the shoes of a 13-year-old boy whose friend's mom just told him she loved him, and decided that that would not be a good idea.  So I chose to declare my love for my immediate family.  I have to admit that it felt awkward.  There were many days where I had to go into a child's room after they were in bed to tell them I loved them, because I almost forgot.  Now it comes naturally and I say it more than once a day.

And now I feel like I need to carry this out to extended family and friends.  I feel a need to open my heart wider and experience more of this thing called Love.  Do I share my Love with people who are not used to it?  Do I risk the chance of making them feel uncomfortable?  I don't want to be the reason for someone's discomfort.  Or do I?

My children have been telling me they love me for ever.  It made me feel uncomfortable at times.  I didn't feel uncomfortable because they loved me, but because I would have to say those three words back.  I would have to open up my heart a crack to eek out those words.  But thanks to my children and numerous other people in my life, I don't feel so uncomfortable now.

I have always known that I have Love in my heart.  It was the actual "feeling" that seemed to be foreign to me.  My last post was about anger.  I am very familiar with anger.  And since I have determined that I could let anger go, I have also determined that I can let Love in.  I can let the seed of Love blossom in my heart.

I get to chose how fast it grows.  I get to let it grow like weeds or let it slowly come to the surface.  It is all up to me.  I have been through a transformation over the last few months.  One that has been uncomfortable and anxiety inducing.  Anger and fear were winning.  I acknowledged that and said "No more!"

Love is the way.  Love is what is left standing when anger and fear are dissolved.  I have enough Love in my heart for everyone in my life.  Yes, everyone.  Even the people who are frightened by my beliefs. Even the people who refuse to speak to me. Even the people who will never Love me back.  I get to chose where my Love goes.

I can "feel" Love today.  I feel it in my heart.  It feels amazing to know that I am Love.  I was born filled with Love and I will have a never ending supply of Love for ever and ever and ever.  No one or no thing can ever take that away from me.  And no one or no thing can ever take it away from you.  You are Love, too.

I Love You!!

(Hey! That didn't even feel awkward.)

Anger be gone!!

I've been carrying a ton of anger around with me these days.  I'm angry at people, institutions and political parties.  Just to name a few.  And all I have learned from all this anger is that I always feel like a victim.  I feel fear daily.  I will be happy as can be and then see something on my computer or the tv or a lawn sign and suddenly I'm pissed as hell.  

I feel it in my whole body.  I grind my teeth, get a headache, get a pain in the center of my stomach, have back spasms.  My mind spins with how much wrong is in this world.  I get completely lost in my anger and fear.  

Doesn't that sound like a fun place to be?

I think, that with this election coming up, there are a lot of people out there that are feeling something similar to what I feel.  Day after day....  I just want to say something about that. 

It sucks to be stuck in anger and fear, but it really sucks when there are thousands of other people out there suffering from the same thing.  And all of that collective anger and fear just keeps the suckiness swirling around waiting for the next person to fall into it.  

So I have an idea.  Lets let the anger go.  What a novel idea, right?  Just let it go.... where?  Believe me, I have just as many snarky comments going through my mind as you do right now.  Bear with me as I talk to myself for awhile.

~~~~~~~~~~

 A person can't just let their anger go.  

Why not?  

Because you can't just let go of something that you feel so passionately about.

You feel passionately about anger?

No! I feel passionately about all the wrong going on in the world and it makes me angry.  I hate seeing all of the division and lack of acceptance and bullying.

So you can't feel passion without anger?  You can't feel passion without fear turning you into an anxious mess who talks to herself?

I guess not.  

Do you feel passionately about Love and Joy and Acceptance?

Yes. Of course I do!

So those things fill you up with anger?

No.  Why would they do that?

Well, you said that you can't feel passion without anger.  I'm just trying to be clear on where you stand.

(Silent pause)

So you can feel passion, free of anger, with all the things that you believe make your world a wonderful place?  But YOU let the crappy stuff affect you so negatively that it is making you ill?  

(More silent pausing)

So what if you just release this anger and fear, but keep the passion.  Why can't you be passionate without anger and fear?

If I don't get angry then I become apathetic.  If I just live my life happily it looks like I don't care about what is going on around me.  Then I have let those people, institutions and political parties win.  

You have let them win already.  Whenever someone/something makes you feel this kind of fear, they have won control over you.  Isn't that what you always tell your Littles about bullies?

Yes.  Yes it is.  Crap! I have been letting these things/people win. 

~~~~~~~~~~

Ok.  I'm done talking to myself now.  I think I get it.  I can still feel passionate about the injustice and fear mongering and intolerance that I see going on around me.  I just don't have to let it into my heart and soul.  I can hold a space of Love to surround all this crap.  And if more people can do that, things could change.  I can feel deeply passionate about something and not let it turn me into an angry, fearful mess.

Just so were're clear here.  I'm not saying that we should not feel anger.  Anger can be a great catalyst for change.  What I'm saying is that I don't have to automatically let that anger turn into paralyzing fear.  If someone were to come up to me and start a conversation about how marriage should be between one man and one woman, I would not walk away from that conversation.  I would very much explain that I think that that is a crock of shit.  (Oops!  There's that paralyzing fear again.)  I would very much explain that I believe that we all deserve to Love and marry whomever we choose as our life partner.  

This is not going to be easy.  I'm sure that I will still feel my anger in my body.  I mean, honestly, it takes me awhile to break old habits.  But I'm going to be diligent about this.  I deserve to be free of intense anger and fear.  My family and friends, and dare I say the whole world, deserve to be free of my intense anger and fear.

So who's with me here?  Who's ready to let anger be gone?  Let's spread Love around freely instead of fear.  

Mothering my way

I have recently been dealing with doubts about my ability to mother properly.  Wishing I could start over and do things differently, but realizing that I probably wouldn't do things differently.  Feeling like a lazy, selfish mother who doesn't like being bothered by the needs of others.  Well, I remembered something today.  I remembered the struggles that Baby Little had to deal with when she came into this world.  I remembered how she was a "failure to thrive" baby and how the doctors told me, "This baby will never be able to nurse."  I remembered the months and months of perseverance, where I tried EVERYTHING to make nursing work for her.  How I was bound and determined to prove those doctors wrong.  (I still snicker to myself when I think of how the doctors were wrong and she nursed till she was 4.)  I remembered the months and months of crying and the miles of pacing I did with her. All this reminded me that I am not a lazy mother.  When the going gets tough, I step up and do what needs to be done.

I don't have to do everything and be everything for my children.  My undying love for them will carry them and lead them to be loving and caring as well.  I may not be a playful parent, but they know that my lack of playfulness has nothing to do with them.  It is just who I am.  I may not be the most affectionate parent, but they know that when they need me I am ready with open arms.

I acknowledge that my criticisms about my parenting have come from me.  There is no one in my life that has voiced an opinion on my parenting skills.  I am my worst critic.  I let go of all of the expectations that I brought into this life with me regarding mothering.  I am seeing myself as a mother today.  I am intelligent and caring enough to know what my children need.  I am confident and strong enough to know when society is blowing smoke in my face about what a "good" mother looks like.

I'm a mom everyday.  Have been for 24 years, 1 month and 4 days.  I think I've got this one.