Tag: love

Wednesday’s Whimsies

+ A wise friend recently gave me this tip when it comes to intrusive rumination. She said, “Envision a box or a file in your brain. When the same old worry thought shows up to be “solved” (Ha!) and ruminated on, tell yourself this, ‘I will put this thought in the box and I’ll take this thought back out, only when it serves me’. You will find that you will never need that particular thought again, ever.” (spoiler alert- these types of thoughts never serve you in a good way) I know that this trick sounds silly, but I’ve tried it, and it works. There’s apparently a science to it. First, this tip makes you notice and stop the thought train in its tracks, and second, it tricks the brain into believing that it is still “taking care of things” by keeping the thought “filed” for future use.

+ “We don’t need to save other people. We need to save ourselves from the belief that we need to save other people.” – Cheri Huber I think a lot of women, particularly us mothers, may have a tinge of “savior complex.” I know that I do. It comes from a good place and a noble motivation. Everything I’ve struggled with, I want to “save” the others whom I love, from the work and the angst and the fear and the heartbreak and the frustration and the shame and the doubts, that came from my ordeals. But if I’m honest with myself, some of my favorite traits of myself – resilience, authenticity, creativity, faithfulness, empathy, optimism, foresightedness, etc. were the outcomes of going through some of the toughest situations which I have ever endured. Fire forges steel. Why would I want to rob anyone whom I care about, the chance to meet their absolute best selves? Why would I want to make anyone I care about feel like they weren’t capable and best suited for taking care of themselves and creating their own unique lives, exactly as they see fit? Isn’t it a tad presumptuous and controlling to believe that anyone needs saving, and I am the one (wearing the cape) to do it? Isn’t the project of “me” enough for one lifetime?

+ “We won’t be distracted by comparison, if we’re captivated with purpose.” – Bob Goff

“Avarice never wrote a good novel; hate did not paint The Birth of Venus; nor did envy reveal to us that the squares of the hypotenuse is equal to the sum of the squares of the two sides. Every creation of humankind’s mind that has stood the buffering of time was born of love – love of something or someone.” – Harper Lee

For most of my adult life, I have felt really purposeful about co-creating a healthy marriage and successfully raising a large family. There were trajectories in my husband’s and my heritages that we wanted to keep, and also ones that we desperately wanted to change. My purpose of creating and growing my family to adulthood was born of love – the greatest love that I have ever felt in my life. My love will always be a bedrock for my family, but now that my children are grown, I can focus more on other personal purposes in my life. When I write, I am captivated with purpose. This blog was born of love and it remains full of love. I love the action of writing. I love you, my readers, for validating the blog and it’s existence and the existence of my creations, just by being here and reading and witnessing. The “thought trick” that I wrote about in my first bullet point, is a really good tool to use, to make sure you are staying on the track of living out your life’s purposes. Purpose feels good and natural. It feels captivating and sometimes even feels time-stopping. Purpose is born out of love. Anything else that comes up that isn’t a compliment to your sense of purpose, needs to be put in the proverbial “box/file”. These negative thoughts and the painful emotions that inevitably come with these thoughts are not part of your purpose. The things/thoughts which you deep down know need to be put into that box (distraction, comparison, rumination, avarice, hate, envy) – these things DO NOT SERVE. These things are not born of love, they are not part of your purpose and therefore, they will not survive the buffering of time. Love is eternal. Love is. All else passes away.

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Monday Got Me Good

“How alive your heart to feel such sorrow!” – from Catherine Newman’s bestselling book, Sandwich

So last month, I was out to lunch with two friends and our one friend gave each of us a different book that she had finished reading. She told us to read them and then to swap them. So the other day, my generous book-giving friend mentioned in a casual text to me that our other friend had finished her book. I hadn’t even started mine. So, in a frenzied mix of competiveness and a dutiful sense of consideration, I finished my book, front to back, all on Monday. That book was Sandwich by Catherine Newman, and it was essentially a heart-bearing, brutally honest account of a woman in the exact stage of life me and my friends are in – empty nest, menopause, having the people whom we love on both ends of our lives, slowly and methodically fading out of our lives, in different ways. Being in the “sandwich” stage of life, our adult children are moving out and on, and our elders are slowing, aging and sometimes even passing on. Newman mentioned something about us being at a “fulcrum” stage of our lives. Sandwich was a great, relatable read, mostly in how it touched on the big emotions and the almost feeling of disbelief, which this stage of our lives brings to the table. For me, the book was mainly a reflection of the poignancy of life and the beauty of love and living fully. Here is my favorite excerpt from the book:

“Here’s what foragers know: Most of what grows is neither delicious nor toxic. There’s a whole world between what we call the choice edibles- the hazelnuts and porcini and black raspberries- and say, the destroying angel mushrooms that will shut down all your organ systems after a single nibble. You can eat the grass, the lichen, and the inner bark of most trees, a thousand kinds of leaves. Not that you would, but you could. So much of privileged adulthood seems to take place here, in the space between the soaring highs and the killing disasters. It’s just plain life, beautiful in its familiar subtlety, its decency and dailiness.”

So after finishing the book, I felt a little more fragile than usual. My feelings were closer to the surface and at that moment, I remembered that I had to get six pictures of various stages of my middle son’s life to his future mother-in-law for their upcoming wedding shower. That entailed me and my husband opening up one of two enormous plastic tubs, with dusty lids, in the garage, full of photographs. Photos I haven’t viewed in years. Photos full of my children in baby clothes, and sports uniforms, and prom attire and cuddling with various pets. Photos full of vacations taken, birthdays celebrated, and sweet everyday moments which we were lucky enough to catch on camera, because something deep in us, wanting a sweet token of that simple moment for posterity. The box was full of pictures of people who are still in our lives at all different stages of their lives, and also of people who, for various reasons, are no longer in our lives. There were literally piles and piles of pictures of the life of our family, at every single stage of it. And so yeah, Monday got to me. Monday got me good.

Besides nostaglia, and meloncholy, and wishing that certain things had turned out differently, but also primarily feeling awe and gratefulness for how well most of those “raising the kids” years had gone, I also sensed myself feeling deep compassion for young mother me in all of those pictures. She was much prettier and thinner and obviously more engaged and earnest than I ever gave her credit for being. I was so damn tough on her a lot of the times. I wish I could reach back in time and offer her a glimpse of the grace I feel for her now. I guess the best thing I can do, is offer up that same grace to myself, now, in this meaningful stage of my life, so that when I am elderly and peering through the stacks (or reels) of photos and mementos, I can recognize myself as exactly who I am – a faithful forager, doing my best to enjoy and to savor my “just plain life, beautiful in its familiar subltety, its decency and dailiness.”

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Birthday Reflections

Happy Birthday, USA! I was here for our bicentennial. I was five years old. I clearly remember all of the hoopla and all of the “schlock”. I read yesterday about a professor who created a large curation and collection of 1976 bicentennial “schlock”. (there was even a red/white/blue condom which referenced fireworks) He later donated the collection to one of the Ivy League universities, believing it carries important insight into our American culture. As I was reading the article, it occurred to me that this 250th celebration doesn’t seem quite as “in your face” as the 1976 one did. Now this could be because in 1976 I was a young child and everything seems bigger and more incredible when you are little, but I don’t think that is the reason. This year’s July 4th celebrations (other than in our nation’s capital) seem relatively subdued considering the milestone we have reached. But that’s okay. Because, honestly, we’ve gotten something much better than an overload of tacky red, white and blue crap. In a time period, when everyone is weary of divisiveness and politics and fearmongering, we got hundreds of thousands of visitors from all over the world, many with fresh eyes to our country, having never been here before, being perfectly astounded and amazed by what our people and our country have to offer: enormous portions of food and drink, gorgeous nature that goes on and on, friendly, kind people who want to make you feel welcome, air conditioning everywhere and running strong, sunshine, cultures within cultures, can-do optimism, giant trucks and cars, huge arenas and venues . . . . the list goes on and on and on. I keep watching the reels of excited visitors, as my eyes get misty. I’ve always been proud and utterly grateful to be an American, but this surprising reminder from foreigners of the many, many reasons why we are so lucky to be Americans is the best birthday present the USA could ask for – thank you, World Cup!

It also occurred to me yesterday that I will be lucky to reach the USA’s tricentennial. (I am going to have to cut down on my American large portions, if I even want a shot at it) I probably won’t be around to celebrate it, but America will. I have no doubts and the United States will be stronger, and more clear-visioned and more inspirational to the entire world than it ever has been before.

I follow a writer, who is sort of “new age” named Tam Veilleux. I was honestly a little surprised and totally delighted by how she closed out her most recent newsletter. These are her words (I couldn’t agree more nor say it better myself):

“Lastly, because this hits my heart so loudly: Happy Birthday, America. I’m wildly patriotic by nature. Maybe it’s the long line of family members who served in the military. Maybe it’s my deep appreciation for the revolutionary spirit of those who fought for freedom. Though we still have room to grow, I celebrate all that America is…its greatness and its growing pains. It’s home, and I love it deeply.

If you are an American reader, I hope this week finds you reconnecting with what you love about this country. And if you’re reading from elsewhere in the world, thank you for bearing witness to our growing pains and holding space for us as we continue learning how to become better citizens of Earth.

Sending big love and even bigger fireworks!“

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Gaping

Our only daughter, our youngest of four kids, and the last to leave the nest, takes off in about a couple of weeks, for a fabulous new job opportunity, in a state that is a two-day drive from us, in a whole different time-zone. Lately, my sweet friends and relations have been sending me texts, kindly asking me how I’m doing and how I’m feeling. My pat answer has been, “Doing well, just trying to soak her all in. Smiley emoji. Thumbs up emoji.” Perhaps I should go with the more truthful, modern answer, “I don’t know. It’s complicated.” But, I won’t. I don’t want anyone to try to poke at my carefully created shield. I’m still in “mother-mode.” I’ve got to be my daughter’s cool, calm, collected safety net. I’ve got to be that reassuring presence that tells her (and tells me) that everything is going to be okay. And it will be. I know this from the bottom of my heart, but still . . . How am I feeling about all of this?

I don’t know. It’s complicated. It’s a complicated mash of every feeling under the sun that I’m still trying to keep under the lid of my shield – a shield that protects others from a violent storm of emotion that would only inevitably be followed by that way too uncomfortable cloud of discomfort and cringe which just hangs in the air after any kind of explosion of passionate feelings, and also a shield that protects me from an intensity of feelings that I’m not ready to feel yet. I have so many feelings flying around, under the radar of my carefully crafted shield, that I have even witnessed myself having strong feelings about those feelings, all swirling around, all at the same time. And right along with this massive, swirling cone of conflicting emotions, I have an internal high and mighty judge and jury telling me which of these feelings are “correct” for me to have, and which of these feelings are “wrong” and “shameful.” Honestly, a statement that has always been hard for me to grapple with is “Both things can be true at the same time.” This is a hard concept for me. I like cut and dry. I like logic. I like “truth.” I get annoyed when people use the term “that’s my truth” too much. It seems like a cop-out to me. I like to believe that there are actually a fair amount of factual truths that just can’t be denied. And yet, when it comes to feelings, I’m having to come to terms with the idea that “eight million things can be true at the same time.” And that is the truth. And that’s okay.

How am I feeling about all of this – my youngest now really and truly embarking on her adulthood and moving far away from me, bookended by two of her brothers’ weddings, all in the span of a few short months?

Overwhelmed. Happy. Sad. Nostalgic. Relieved. Excited for them. Excited for me. Excited for my husband. Worried for them. Worried for me. Worried for my husband. Tired. Proud. Impressed with myself. Disappointed in myself. Hopeful. Out of sorts. Organized. Disorganized. Astounded. Needy. Ecstatic. Protective. Patient. Impatient. Grateful. Scared. Small. Big. Guilty. Enough. Not Enough. Supportive. Not wanting to be supportive. Listless. Astounded. Scattered. Lost. Found. Misdirected. Accomplished. Agitated. Confused. Insecure. Exhausted. Lonely. Craving solitude. Reflective. Empathetic. Energized. Fearful. Confident. Faithful. Old. Newly young. Free. Righteous. Curious. Doubtful. Even sometimes angry, and maybe even a little envious of all the new experiences that my children all have ahead of them. Open. Assured. Defensive. Questioning. But mostly, I feel gaping. I feel totally gaping with Love and Vulnerability. Gaping. Yep, I feel absolutely gaping wide.

How am I feeling about all of this change in my life? (shield goes up)

Thank you for asking. I’m good. I’m just trying to soak my daughter all up before she leaves. Smiley emoji. Thumbs up emoji.

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

The Vibration

This is the time of year for commencement speeches. And I’m a sucker for them. I remember years (and years and years) ago, I was on a team of college textbooks salespeople, and we were at a convention with a long schedule of motivational speakers. My boss groaned at the start of every speech. And I pretended to agree, but honestly, I was rapt. I’m always looking for nuggets of wisdom. I’m always looking for the emotional connection of a room full of people resonating with the same ideas and the same values. I love the shared rhythm of nodding heads and hands wiping away tears, sometimes in unison.

My aunt sent me Eric Church’s 2026 commencement speech for UNC and I just finished watching Conan O’Brien’s 2026 commencement for Harvard. They both used their unique talents of music and of comedy to make poignant points in their speeches. They both spoke of the vital need for humility. They both spoke of the reality of how much difference, the other people in any one person’s life make (even the haters), to form anyone’s individual success in life. Two men, from two very different walks of life and probably having many different ideas about life and politics, still spoke mostly of the things that matter the most, to most of us. And it resonated.

Maybe there is a deep universal reason why we so desperately cling to the rituals of life. I just attended the last commencement (at least for a while) of our four children, when our daughter graduated from college this month. I also just attended my eldest son’s wedding. And in both of these situations, I felt the borders of myself getting fuzzy, like I had melted and I was stirred in with everyone else who was attending these events with me. I felt like I melted into a sea of shared pride, hope, awe, and understanding that it is in these stirring moments in life, when we unabashedly let emotion rise to the surface like a wave, that we really all are connected in the ways that are truly crucial to our humanity. People sometimes have a hard time with the concept that everything in this world is really just energy vibrating, and we are all just a small little blip of this vibration. Still, it is in the “big” rituals of our lives that we all seem to naturally step into this same vibration, and that vibration is universally understood. We all feel it. We all know it. It can only be love.

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Formula for a Great Life

“winning = knowing the most love. I know you just threw up a little bit in your mouth but I have to tell you the truth and that is it. If you know how to love people with abandon and you know how to let people love you back, you will have a great life. That’s not my opinion. That’s not fake news. That’s what the research tells us.” – from Kelly Corrigan’s commencement address

I think this is why people love weddings. Love wins at weddings. People are so open about their joy and their happiness and their love for each other at weddings. People more easily put away their differences, their insecurities, their inhibitions and their self-consciousness while celebrating a marriage. People show their love for each other with great abandon at weddings and everyone feels the celebration and the connection. Kelly Corrigan makes a great point, though. Sometimes it is really easy to love others, but it is harder to let other people love you back. But that’s not the meaning and fullness of love. When you don’t let others love you, you are robbing them of sharing their lovingness. Love is not a one-way street. Love is. Love has created everything. Love is all that there really is, and when you live your life, knowing that formula, not just at weddings or other celebratory events, but in every conscious moment of your daily living, you can’t help but have a great life. There is no better feeling, no better way of being than to throw caution to the wind, and to inhabit and to become love, with wild abandon, every single day of your life. If you don’t think that your life is going so great, try adding some love to the mix. Try narrowing down your everyday life to what makes you feel loved, loving and in the essence of love. The formula works and it is available to all of us. It is the natural core of our very being.

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Last Week It Happened

It happened. The first of our four children, our eldest son, got married last week. It was the first marriage of any of our children. If you think that your own wedding was lovely and magical, you can’t even imagine how incredibly magical the marriages of your own children will be! I’m still floating on a cloud. I am still thanking the Powers That Be, for the pure foundation of love our son has found and created with his beautiful bride. I am still thanking the Powers That Be that our whole family has been a witness to their beautiful love and the divine ceremony and celebration that cemented their wonderful union. We are so very blessed and I feel it tingling in every cell of my body.

“A bride is the most beautiful poem ever written…” – Oscar Wilde

“To get the full value of joy you must have somebody to divide it with.” – Mark Twain

“The greatest thing you’ll ever learn is just to love and be loved in return.” – Nat King Cole

I have often told myself, in these most recent years in which our children have grown up into adulthood, that my job now is narrowed down to just love my family. Love them. Love them. Love them. I have already birthed them, fed them, guided them, taught them, scolded them, protected them, prayed for them (this will be ceaseless), sheltered them, prodded them, cheered them, advised them, comforted them, fought for them, and occasionally even apologized to them for my shortcomings, and now, our four amazing adult children are capable to do all of these things for themselves and for each other. I just need to narrow my motherly duties down to Love now. And this is the easiest thing for me to do. It comes naturally. Love them. Love them. Love them. I love my family ceaselessly and I am so grateful for the outward celebration of our love that was experienced, happily and beautifully, just a few short days ago.

“I think that enduring, committed love… is the most noble act anyone can aspire to.” – Nicholas Sparks

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Savoring

Our youngest graduated from college last weekend. Our eldest son gets married next week. This week has been a combination of wrapping up loose ends/taking an exhale/and recharging the batteries. As I have been waking up slowly each morning, I’ve envisioned my bed as a soft, safe charger, much like my iPhone gets charged each night. I’ve insisted on going to bed early and keeping the schedule light this week. The graduation and its celebration went off magically. And I am pleased and I am relieved. I am hoping the same for the upcoming nuptials. I’m honestly relieved that the wedding is finally around the corner. When I’ve mentioned this pining for months now, to anyone in earshot of me, that I really can’t wait for the big events of this year to just be here (we have another son getting married in September), I get a lot of admonishment to not wish my life away, and to just totally savor it all. And this annoys me a lot. This annoys me because I am a savorer. I pride myself in that fact. I savor my life and most of the moments in it, but too much anticipation gets to me every time. And not in a good way. I do not do well with “limbo”. I savored my daughter’s recent graduation AND I am relieved and happy to have it completed successfully. I relish in the surety of a plan that is well executed and is then relegated to being a fond memory. I don’t feel too sad when planned events, vacations, reunions, celebrations, etc. are over because I know that there will always be more (and this is because I am a savorer and I have proof of that in my many, many, many savored memories). Like the quote below says, once you’ve added an experience to your memory bank, it’s yours. It cannot be lost. It’s in your “vault of you.” Your experiences become shapers of you. Maybe that’s why I hate limbo. I keep wanting to pull all of the scattered pieces of myself, past and future, back into myself. It’s like my future self can see ahead and is always yearning to be more and more fully and wholly me.

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Joy Train

Like so much of the rest of the world, I’m in total awe of our amazing Artemis II astronauts. They are everything you like to see in human beings. I adored watching footage of Victor Glover’s hero’s welcome to his neighborhood. I so admire his unapologetic professions of his Christian faith. I loved seeing the excitement Christina Koch’s pup showed when being reunited with her. And today, I watched the speeches that the Artemis II crew made in Houston. I soaked up everything which they had to say, so full of gratitude and love for their families, for each other, and for everyone at NASA who supported their mission. The words that struck me the most though came from Jeremy Hansen and I had to transcribe them and add them to this thought lab which we have going on here at Adulting – Second Half. Here is some of what astronaut, Jeremy Hansen said:

“Joy . . . . I think you saw a lot of joy up there and there was a lot of joy up there . . .We have a term in our crew that we coined a long time ago, “the joy train.” We’re not always on the joy train, this crew, but we are committed to getting back on the joy train as soon as we can and that is a useful life skill for any team trying to get something done.”

And this:

“Love . . . what you saw was group of people who loved contributing, having meaningful contribution and extracting joy out of that . . . And what we’ve been hearing is that this was something special for you to witness. . . .I would suggest to you, we are a mirror reflecting you and if you like what you see, just look a little deeper. This is you.”

The reason why anything resonates in our deepest selves is because we intuitively know that it is a part of us. These astronauts showed bravery, resiliency, sacrifice, contribution, joy, teamwork, gratitude, awe, faith, hope and love and we all reverberated with it. And this is because, as Jeremy Hansen said, the astronauts mirrored the best parts of our own shared humanity. These astronauts mirrored the best parts of ourselves. They’re not in space anymore, but I imagine the Artemis II crew is definitely on the joy train. Let’s join them and let’s stay there as long as we possibly can.

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

And More for Today

This is my second blog post of today. I’m feeling inspired. I’m giving myself permission to write because writing is one of my most favorite activities in this world. A thought came to me that I immediately wrote on my calendar (as I often do throughout the day, as thoughts of what to write about come to me). It was this thought:

“I can’t love you the way that you want me to love you, but I do love you in my own way.”

Is this statement the truth at the center of so many conflicts and hurts? Is this statement what is needed for true forgiveness of all others, and for one’s self? Sometimes we get so caught up in the ways that we want to be loved, that we forget that in the center of any relationship there is love, quietly and steadfastly beating its heart below all of the noise.

I have felt guilt throughout my life for not wanting to be what others want me to be. Sometimes I have conformed to be what others want me to be, only to later seethe in resentment. Guilt is not love. Resentment is not love.

I have felt frustrated and sad and angry when certain people of certain named roles in my life have not conformed into “being” the love which I expected from those roles. Love does not require others to conform into what I want them to be. Love doesn’t have requirements. Love is. Therefore I believe that forgiveness is coming to this statement:

“You can’t love me in the way that I want you to love me, but I know that you do love me in your own way.”

Now this is not to say that forgiveness means staying in relationships that are disappointing or harmful to you. This is not to say that boundaries should be dissolved nor does it say that you don’t need to work on nurturing and healing your healthy relationships with communication and earnest effort. It’s just taking the idea of “Forgiveness is an acceptance of what is” to a new level. It’s acknowledging an underlying love below all of the layers of damage, and pain, and frustrations, and wanting, and resentments, and sadness and failed expectations. It’s a reminder and a reassurance that at the base of all things in life, there is love. Love is always there. It’s just not a love narrowly defined by you nor by me.

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.