Sacred Life Sunday: Pain

"There is a great deal of pain in life, and perhaps the only pain that can be avoided is the pain of trying to avoid pain."---R. D. Laing

~Photo by LoveHubbie Mark

"A New Earth" Online Group

If you're interested in participating in an online group for Eckhart Tolle's book "A New Earth", contact Kate at Meanderings at katespin at yahoo.com. She calls the blog for our discussion "The New Earth Dialogues". Welcome to all!

Flickers

I love this quote about pain from Jon Kabat-Zinn from his book "Coming to Your Senses". The parts that encourage me are "even for the tiniest moment" and "even if sustained for only a second or two" and "even if you don't know what to do". I like phrases like that. Groping in the dark, it lends some validity to my flickers of peace and enlightenment.

"If you move into pure awareness in the midst of pain, even for the tiniest moment, your relationship with your pain is going to shift right in that very moment. It is impossible for it not to change because the gesture of holding it in awareness, even if sustained for only a second or two, already reveals its larger dimensionality. And that shift in your relationship with the experience gives you more degrees of freedom in your attitude and in your actions in a given situation, whatever it is...even if you don't know what to do."---Jon Kabat-Zinn

Friday Night Fun

No, this isn't about some wild party that LoveHubbie and I went to. It's about what we did this Friday night for fun here at the little house on the ridge in the woods of South Puget Sound.

LoveHubbie came home and made bacon and eggs for dinner. Our surviving hens Trixie and Tallujah made the eggs; Isadora died two weeks ago, I'm sad to say. I can't walk again because of foot problems so he treated me to dinner!

I discovered---via Gayle King on XM Radio---igoogle. Wow! In 30 seconds you can create a home page with tabs organizing your news, gadgets, and widgets. It's very intuitive. Really, really. I picked News, Technology, Books, Medicine, Spirituality, Hawaii, and NPR as my starting tabs. Then I put different gadgets and widgets on them in addition to what was provided. I picked a beach theme. Right in the center I have a little customizable To Do List that says "Breathe" on it. On my home page, I have the weather, the phases of the moon, NPR programs I like that I can listen to whenever, and so much more. Check it out...it's free and you won't be sorry.

Then tonight we watched part of a 60 Minutes show about the mortgage crisis and the Oprah show about Clutter and being fat. I wanted LoveHubbie to understand why the house was looking so different.

Oh, for those of you who like screaming deals, check this out: it's Sierra Trading Post's new Barn Burners feature. It's a huge savings on some item that keeps getting lower in price until it gets sold out. Keep refreshing the screen as the deal changes continually (it seems like every half hour).

Just trivia and fun tonight, nothing serious. I'm going to go to bed early, after treating myself to a fiction book that I have yet to pick out.

Wellness Wednesday: Staying Brave

Staying Brave seems to be my biggest challenge lately. I find myself doing hard things each day that I really can't believe I'm doing...I feel like I'm pushing through sludge to continue to BE BRAVE. Today I had so many challenges I felt completely overwhelmed by the day, and so to procrastinate and relax, I began to get caught up on posts from the last three days:

Kelly, who is continuing to breathe and having amazing successes (this is what I aspire to). Kelly is my Trailblazer!

Annie, who is struggling, but overall succeeding with goals that have eluded her before, and is always real.

Angela, who is facing an operation and is dealing with fear and worry. I can always count on Angela to be unflinchingly honest. She helps me to be honest with myself about my panic over much lesser things.

Jessie, who is anticipating big changes, and moving into them slowly, needing to be patient, but right on the verge of everything!

Each one of you helps me to ground and center and believe that somehow I can meet the challenges of my day. I struggle with believing in myself and with making things hard that are actually easy. I struggle with overwhelm every single day.



This week I:

Had my retinas checked (I do this every two years because of a past retinal detachment) and couldn't use the computer or read for two days. My eyes hurt and I had headaches. My eyes are fine overall, but I'm on the verge of developing a few different types of eye problems (my ophthalmologist says) so I need to up my antioxidants (I say). So I'm worrying about my eyes.

Visited my podiatrist and found out that I now need special orthotics that aren't covered by insurance. As I get over one type of foot pain, I develop another, and still have trouble with basic walking. So I'm worrying about my feet.

I need to buy a Fortune 500 suit for work (somewhere, in a plus size) and find dress shoes somewhere that accommodate orthotics and come in a size 9 E (wide as in duck feet). So I'm worrying about my clothes.

I've had my passport denied and need to come up with all kinds of documentation because of multiple name changes. This could be a week long project of letter writing but I don't have time for it. So I'm worrying about my passport.

Oh, and today I need to write up my contracts for my new job. I've never written a contract before. This is probably the easiest thing, though, of all of the above. But still, I'm worrying about my contracts.

Do you ever feel like life is just pouring in the challenges and before you can figure out one...poof!...there's another one for you to solve?



Instead of all this worrying, I need to breathe. Just breathe. And stay brave. And do one thing at a time. Not rush myself. Not push myself. Not destroy my health with overwork and striving. Just trust the Universe to give me the experiences I need at the time I need them and trust that I will get everything done in good time. That my body can, with rest and nurturing, hold up to the challenges I have before me.

Ok, I'm inspired by you all, and I'll do this today, this Wellness Wednesday.

Sacred Life Sunday: The Effort of Presence

"To be present is far from trivial. It may be the hardest work in the world. And forget about the "may be". It is the hardest work in the world--at least to sustain presence. And the most important. When you do fall into presence, you know it instantly, feel at home instantly. And being home, you can let loose, let go, rest in your being, rest in awareness, in presence itself, in your won good company. "---Jon Kabat-Zinn from "Coming to Our Senses"

"...Scary but revolutionary...effortless, but only if truly applied long enough for the shift to happen."---Kikipotamus the Hobo in a happyluau comment

Bigger Than I Thought

I've been busy these last few days learning some about my new job/business. It ends up that it is bigger than I thought, and will involve me entering the business world instead of staying home all the time cloistered in my forest paradise. I will be going to client's offices to sell myself and my work in order to win a contract. The job will involve negotiations and working with decision makers in organizations. And yes, there will still be lots of work with technical writing here at home. The types of technical documents are ones that I am unfamiliar with, but can learn to do; I'll have to figure these out lickety-split. I will also have to learn the technical jargon for whatever industry I am working with at the time. Travel can be involved if I want it to be. It is a "big" job, and although I am a bit concerned about stress, it is something I think I can manage.

Really everything will be learning for me, from how to present myself in a business environment, to how to be real and authentic (as in, be myself) yet at the same time impersonal and professional, to how to do the actual work, etc. It will be like jumping into a lake and learning to swim. A huge BE BRAVE challenge.

It does feel very right to me and very timely as well. It is such a huge manifestation of what I've been seeing for myself in my 50's, though, bigger than I ever could have imagined.

Yesterday I met with my colleague/mentor for 5 hours. I learned that this business is mine and I will need to develop it; I'm going to be doing less subcontracting and more acquiring of my own contracts. I'm going to have to learn to dress for success, transform my orthopedic shoes into something classy, and stop chewing on my fingernails. I'm going to have to get my hair situation straightened out. LoveHubbie bought me a very nice laptop today; this means that he believes in me too and in my abilities to do this job, which really rocks my world. I spent hours last night and today in bed with a messed up neck, back and hip, but still got a lot done. I needs to do oodles of detailed stuff like get a business bank account, get a post office box, figure out how to write up my client contracts and then write them up, figure out how to keep track of expenses, etc.

My breathing is keeping me calm. I think. Well, at least way, way calmer than I'd normally be.



















I keep telling myself that I can do this. The Universe wouldn't have brought it to me in this way if I couldn't. And I'd have confusion or checks in my spirit that would make me question if this was for me right now. Instead I have clarity, peace, shock, excitement, and fear. It feels like the hugest BE BRAVE challenge the Universe could ever summon up for me.

I am certain I could never even think I could do this without my spiritual foundation from the Tolle books, TWL, and you all. Thank each of you for your support and for helping me believe that I could take on launching forth on such a bold adventure!

Limitless Writing

Well, I have some interesting news about my future plans and listening to my intuition. Last week I drove by my favorite coffee shop and wanted to go in for a latte but really didn't have the time...too much to do back home. In addition, I had nothing to work on and lots of work to do. So I drove by, thinking it would be too much of an indulgence just to stop and then sit and drink my latte without working or reading. However, the feeling that I absolutely should go there and that I'd made a mistake persisted and grew stronger and more urgent. I ended up turning the car around and going back. This is pretty unusual for me.

After I arrived and began settling in I noticed a woman I'd talked with briefly a couple of times before---a casual acquaintance who is also a writer. I could tell she was working and really busy so I just acknowledged her with a greeting and thought that would be the end of our conversation. She asked me if I ever did subcontracting and I said yes. Thus began a conversation that ultimately ended up with me forming a business relationship with her so that we can work together.

Yes, a job! Not a job job, but forming a business and being self-employed doing technical and business writing with my writer acquaintance. She has too much work to handle on her own, plus has aspects of her work which she doesn't enjoy. It just so happens that what she doesn't enjoy I do! I have done some technical writing in the past, especially as a systems analyst, but not formally as a writer. So it's very exciting to me that there is so much to learn---almost never-ending learning (the best kind)---and lots of variety and excellent compensation as well.

I start tomorrow.



With everything going on in my life, I just sense that big changes are on the horizon. I absolutely love listening to my body and the process of starting to feel my feelings. After only a couple of days of doing this with food I feel so much more grounded than I have in the past. I can only imagine what the future holds...



P.S. The name of my business is the title of this post :) I chose it because it needs to be a little conservative for this type of business (working with governmental agencies) and because I don't want to limit the types of writing I do. It's perfect.

Wellness Wednesday: Mindful Meals

Well folks, I've finally done it. One mindful night (last night) with a mindful dinner with LoveHubbie and then no meals or snacking later (because I didn't want any and I listened to my body) and two mindful meals so far today, a last one coming up soon. I've had more mindful meals in the last 24 hours than in my whole remembered life so far! That means no television, no radio, no books, just me and the food. I have been consciously breathing and very cautiously navigating through the day. This feels very miraculous and definitely too-good-to-be-true.

I have been feeling my feelings---they're sort of fleeting and more like glimpses of feelings---which has been weird and uncomfortable and good and enlivening. I expect this to feel awkward and just like this at first---very surreal.

I know that I've just begun the whole process but it's so good to just begin. Lots of work to do, but I have time to do it---the rest of my life. I feel as though my life has an additional dimension that I am just now seeing...that I've been missing...but it feels like a dream, too, as though it could vanish at any point.

It's just really the first day, so all of this is natural.

It's been a Wonderful Wellness Wednesday.

~Picture via Cute Overload

Sacred Life Sunday: Easy Does It

Today I took some time and reread "Transformational Weight Loss" (TWL) by Charles Eisenstein very slowly. Very, very slowly. This time I really paid attention and looked at what I'd absorbed and what I'd forgotten. When I first read TWL back in early December, I was so excited. It resonated with me after years of dieting and reading diet books and following unusual and rigid diet plans. I began to apply the concepts and then promptly forgot so much of what I'd read.

Rereading TWL yet again impressed upon me how revolutionary the concepts are and how vigilantly I'll need to apply them, at least at first. On the one hand, TWL is extremely easy and simple. On the other, it is challenging because it involves major changes in my long-standing beliefs. It is important to me to make the necessary changes now in preparation for the group that starts in February. I want to try out many things that I just read about and then never applied. In rereading TWL, I realized:

1. I did not learn in my body (i.e., get the "body knowledge") about which foods truly feed me and which do not nurture me. I accepted TWL in my mind but didn't apply it in order to have my body learn as well.

2. I wrote the TWL mantras down and then didn't use them. I totally forgot about them. I just blanked on them! Thus, I didn't really apply what I knew at all. I never developed self-trust, but still struggled with "explosions of pent-up desire", perceiving a "gap" that really wasn't there. Today Rick sent me an email that caused me to realize how this "gap" or wall or barrier was self-created.

3. I never really let go of control, thus continued to react to strict control by going out of control.

4. I never paused to check in with myself and thus stayed in out of control mode and never created any new habits.

5. I stayed in thinking mode also, eschewing venturing into feeling mode. I didn't continue to experiment with feeling my feelings. I stayed in my head.

6. I only ever had that one mindful meal which I vlogged about, but never did again, and totally forgot about it (or went unconscious about it) afterwards. All of my meals were accompanied by television. Thoughts of eating alone without television or reading petrified me so I didn't go there.

7. I didn't create a new vision for myself.



TWL is actually a natural process, even an easy process. But I didn't take it that way. First, I made it hard. Then I kept it in my head, never learning any new body knowledge to integrate. Lastly I forgot that I was in my head. And I ended up in a recovery group, at least knowing that something was off, but lost in a fog of remembrances and desires and control and habit.

ARRRGGGHHH!

Well, at least I realized this after only a couple of months and...umm...several pounds (I think we're into the double digits here...). But oddly enough, after rereading the book it seems amusing to me. I've made the mistakes, and I'm hoping to have learned from them. TWL will change everything for me---my entire approach to life---if I apply it! And there is no turning back now for me. I want this so badly I can taste it :)

"Most of all, you don't have to "figure out" what you are going to do. You don't need to find an answer. You don't need to find a way out. Don't go down that road. That is the road of trying hard, of struggle, and ultimately of despair. [Emphasis added.] It is enough just to be there, to be and to feel."---Charles Eisenstein in TWL

I hope think I got it. Finally.

Presence.

Breathing.

Awareness.

Feeling.

Ok, I'm there...

Needs

This is a Rumi quote seen at the beginning of "Transformational Weight Loss" by Charles Eisenstein.

"Every need brings in what's needed. Pain bears its cure like a child."---Rumi

I also wanted to include a link to Rick's provocative post today...where I'm hoping a discussion will continue. Go there! Comment. I want to hear what everyone has to add to this.

Thank You To My People

This video is 2:21. Again, "To My People" refers to those of you who are like-minded, who are of my tribe...

Wellness Wednesday: Patry Francis' Post

Please see Patry Francis' poignant post...it made me really pause and reflect...made me feel so grateful for my health...I'm sending loving energy to Patry and to anyone else who struggles with serious illness today...

Recovery and Transformational Weight Loss

I appreciate so much the feedback that everyone gave me about my vlog from yesterday. Today I spent some time thinking about my recovery from compulsive overeating, transformational weight loss (TWL), recovery groups in general, and following my intuition.

I think that the gym will fit into my plan very well. It's the recovery group that I'm not so sure about. I have read Twelve Step literature extensively over the last week, and I am not sure if it's a good fit . Several things have happened today that have caused me to question whether it will do more harm than good for me. Let me say that I know that it can help many people enormously; I just don't know if I'm a good match for it.

In his comment, Rick wrote:

"...you can use your own spiritual center from which you already draw a great deal of strength, your belief in Transformational Weight Loss, along with the recovery program and heading to the gym, to create the O System!"

This was so helpful, as I was feeling that this was what I really wanted to do, but I was getting resistance from the people in the recovery groups I attended (I went to four different meetings). I found that when you try to self-style things there it can be viewed as a symptom of self-will or of not being teachable. I started to doubt myself, thinking "Who am I, a complete newbie at this, thinking I know more than people who have been in recovery for ten or twenty years?" Today was a wake-up call.

I do feel as though I wasn't drawing upon my spiritual beliefs enough in my previous efforts.

In her comment, Kelly wrote:

"Eisenstein's theory is that if you continue to be totally present and experience the results of your choices, it won't take will power to make the healthy choices. Do you think he's wrong or do you think you haven't spent enough time reprogramming your system?"

I agree with Eisenstein, and had forgotten what he'd said about willpower. I do NOT think I've spent enough time reprogramming my system. I started, but became diverted. Instead, I think I've bought into my feelings of fear of failure, my lack of trust in my ability to succeed at TWL, and my abject terror at the weight gain I've experienced since starting TWL. I haven't really let the process work. Then, when I started at the gym and found out that my weight started with a "2" that was the thing that sent me over the edge. If it could start with a "2" it could be a "3" or "4" or...

Spinning out of control, I'd just gotten the two cortisone shots in my foot with the admonition from my doctor to work to lose the weight to save my feet and preserve my ability to walk for exercise, one of my great loves. So when I went to the recovery groups and heard about having a incurable disease (compulsive overeating) and that it would only worsen if I didn't recover (I pictured myself again lying in bed at several hundred pounds and being bed-bound) and that I needed to make my recovery more important than anything in my life or I'd fail, I think this fed my fear. I couldn't give up TWL because it made too much sense, but I felt like I needed to do a recovery group to be able to...well...ever recover.

I had reservations about certain things. Like saying "Hi, my name is Olivia and I'm a compulsive overeater." Again and again and again. Before I speak in the group while the meeting is going on, before I read...again and again and again. I must say that 5-10 times at each meeting. In addition, I am cautioned to constantly remind myself that I AM a compulsive overeater and that if I forget this ever, ever, ever, even after years of not compulsively overeating, it will be to my detriment and I will fall, my pride and lack of vigilance leading to a terrible episode of binge eating that I might abandon myself to altogether, forever. I don't like this practice, as I believe that it suggests things to my subconscious mind that are very destructive. I know how destructive it is to eat to medicate my feelings, that's for sure, and I know I need to stop, and I know I need help to stop, but I believe that there are more empowering ways for me to do it and to get that help. I'm not sure what they are, but I'm thinking that this way is going to end up with me paying a toll that I don't want to pay.

It really doesn't fit with any part of the Law of Attraction, either.

On the positive side, the recovery program reminds me that I need to rely on my spiritual source more, and this is quite helpful. It also reminds me that I need other people and don't want to do this alone. It is sort of like a church in many ways, but friendly and accepting.

Again, these are just my initial impressions of this recovery program and I know that they do so much good for so many. I am glad to have a chance to reflect on this and to have your input as well. I'm not sure what I'll end up doing, but I do know that I want an O System, and I want it to be healthy and spiritual and transformative and positive...so we'll see.

~Picture by LoveHubbie Mark

To My People

This video is 4:27. "To My People" refers to those of you who are like-minded, who are of my tribe...