My son pulls out of the driveway, flashing two fingers and a grin as he heads back to school for his final semester. The sun’s blinding brilliance does nothing to move the temperature, which stays at a stubborn minus 11. I grow increasingly restless as my mind jumps from the weather and road conditions to the list of things I need to get done—the list of things I can use to distract myself from this terrible knowing that each time my sons leave, my heart divides itself and lives uneasy. Fractured into pride and panic. Motherhood, for all its stretching and expanding, is also a lifetime sentence of farewells. I wasn’t prepared for this part; since the arrival of my oldest more than two decades ago, I am no longer autonomous. I live with the truths and possibilities of them in bones, blood, heartbeat.
Read MoreWelcome, 2024!
Many years ago, as a child and a Catholic, I would give myself the hardest challenges during Lent. I would labor over the most difficult things I could give up (the year without candy, popcorn, or ice cream sticks out as particularly grim) to avoid purgatory or worse. I am no longer a child or Catholic, though I am a fan of both, and my ideas around service, resolutions, and meaningful sacrifice have matured with my hair color. (What? You thought it was still this brown?)
As I turn the page on 2023, I invite you to join me in lightening up, already. I don’t make resolutions anymore, but I do like being intentional about what might really help me be a better human and a stronger part of our community so that I can be of use when it’s my turn.
Read MoreAt my house, certain things must happen when darkness falls:
Counting the combed heads of our twelve laying hens and shutting them securely in their coop for the night, because [fox, racoon, weasel, really big owl that lives in the grove...].
Calling (and sometimes finding and carrying in) our four cats and shutting the pet door behind them, because [coyote, owl, wayward neighbors with guns...]
Closing the garage door because [cold, vermin, possibly petty theft]
These requirements are easily met most of the year, especially in the delicious evenings of late summer, when chores are leisurely, in shirtsleeves and long, warm light. These same activities are not nearly as pleasant in mid-December, when going outside requires layers and our household is still scrambling (since Daylight Savings) to adjust to the sun setting before the workday is done.
Read MoreI admit it. I woke up on the wrong side of the bed today. I did a few healthy things, like drinking decaf and reminding my lab Hector that dogs are indeed superior. I did my mindfulness practice and refrained from turning on the news.
My disposition soured further, however, when I discovered that my inbox seemed overtaken by the gratitude police, prodding me into everything from a gratitude journal to starting a gratitude text string, or writing a heartfelt letter to the three people who have most influenced my life, “with specific detail” about why I was thankful.
The icing on the cake was falling hostage to a chatty colleague in the coffee line (let’s face it, decaf is no match for days like this) who insisted on reciting a litany of things he felt “blessed” by, a phrase that somehow sets off warning bells that I’m about to get told about a bunch of things that the teller has that I don’t.
Naturally, I wanted to vomit. Double espresso, please. …
Read MoreAs a kid, I believed in things. The sure feet of Peanuts, my gentle horse. Santa Claus, God, the heat-emitting charisma of my older cousins, the say-so of my sister and brothers. I believed that following rules, like brushing my teeth and raising my hand and, by-God, being there if I said I’d be there meant that things would unfold in predictable order, in fair proportion to my effort, and on time.
For the most part, this scaffolding imprinted in early life held. I graduated from college with a shiny degree and ideas, friends and family that would encircle me for the rest of my life, and job interviews. I kept on living with my body in the present, my thoughts on the distant horizon, as I relished my freedom to make choices and plans. If A, then B. When this, then that. I kept working toward that perfect future, never realizing that the distance between here and there hadn’t changed.
At some point, I began to notice things, namely the things I wasn’t noticing.
Read MoreThis actually happened in the middle of a talk I was giving on mindfulness in the workplace: someone walked in who reminded me of someone I knew in college, which led me to remember the night we left the football game and stayed up late enough to do the Buckhorn Roll (don’t ask). Which got me thinking about how much it hurts to roll down stairs.
And I was off on a mind-wandering adventure of epic proportions.
Come to think of it, my neck feels kind of cramped. Should I have it looked at? Speaking of doctors, it’s Maura’s birthday. I wonder if I need more doctors. Why do women think the doctors who help us have our babies are God? Well, our kids. I mean, yes, come to think of it, it totally makes a lot of sense…wonder why the boys haven’t called since…let’s see, was it Monday?...
I had a microphone in front of me the whole time, and I hope words related to my actual talk came out of my mouth. I was aware that I sputtered a few sentences, but I have no idea what I said. Awkward. There I was, talking about the benefits of staying present—how it engenders compassion, enhances executive function, improves focus. And I had fallen completely off the wagon. Center stage.
Read MoreIt happened again.
About once a month, the brilliant (and free!) mindfulness meditation app HealthyMinds asks me how I’m doing with my practice (they offer self-guided ‘learning’ and ‘practice’ modules on Awareness, Connection, Insight, and Purpose).
A year in, I’m feeling improvement across most of their survey metrics (Guiding sense of purpose? Almost always. Confidence that most people are doing the best they can? Again, often, etc.) But there’s one benchmark that I honestly cannot budge: “In the past month, how often did you feel overwhelmed by your responsibilities, so that you felt you could never meet them all?”
Answer: Often. (More like, nearly always.)
Read MoreI set my book down on the table when my friend walked into the kitchen. “’Welcoming the Unwelcome,’” she said, taking in the title on the splayed cover. “Why would you want to read a book like that?” She was smiling, but I could tell she wanted an answer. “Who would ever want to welcome the unwelcome?”
It’s a fair question, if somewhat of a trick. No one wants to get stranded in the barrow pit with a flat, be the last person chosen, stranded on the island of loneliness in an unhappy career or relationship. You don’t welcome a bad diagnosis or the crushing weight of bullies. Not even the most enlightened among us would welcome these reminders that we can be reduced to ash at any moment. That we are small.
Read MoreI always thought I was in charge of my mind, but have recently discovered it might be the other way around. A common phrase used in the mindfulness world, Control your breath, I believe to be misleading. Mindfulness isn't about control—it is about realization and awareness. The concept of realization is unique to each individual. The way to get there is by being observant, not manipulative.
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