Last night I watched a movie with a nebulous ending. Do you like movies like these? Usually I get frustrated with vague endings. I want to know what happened. I feel like throwing something at the TV. It’s like I watched the whole entire movie, for what? When the credits start scrolling, I’m screaming, “What?! Wait, noooo! That can’t be the ending!” I feel duped. I watched the movie to lose myself in it. I don’t want to have to expend the energy to use my own imagination to decide what is happening next. That’s too much work, plus it’s not my project to finish. Coming up with your own ending to a movie is like finishing someone else’s painting, or sculpture, or knitting project. It just doesn’t feel right. On extremely rare occasions, I do feel like fuzzy endings are absolutely apropos. They make you think, “Oh, how clever!” They make you giggle a little inside, at yourself and at the situation. Gilda Radner once called this “delicious ambiguity.” But usually these frustrating, open-ended movie endings much more often make you think, “Oh, how incredibly annoying! Thank you for ruining two hours of my life!”
I think that we like movies and projects and books that perfectly tie up all the loose ends into a precious, neat little bow, because real life falls more along the lines of unclear, uncertain and unsure. Real life is more like a messy, tangled ball of yarn. But our minds don’t like to believe the fact of life’s unsurety. If the stories we tell ourselves have satisfying conclusions, than we think that this somehow guarantees these kinds of conclusions for ourselves, in our own lives. We like the illusion of control. We cling to it.
The movie I saw last night reminded me of a treacherous time in my own life when I felt as scared and unsure as what to do as the main character must have felt as she was sitting helplessly in the back of the car, headed to a hellish place, perhaps. At that real moment in my own life, I was nauseated with fear, as I was feeling my heartbeat pounding in my chest. My mind became frozen, stuck in a terrifying reel of envisioning what could easily end up being my horrific, ominous, futile fate. But then I let my intuition take over, and I felt my own shaky legs, as if on their own volition, backing up the narrow, dark stairway and then I did the next right thing that probably saved my life . . . .
Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.
Do you remember the days of being your parents’ remote? I do. Sigh.
I’ve been pondering a lot about the process of elimination. I have been thinking about how progress usually has a lot of mishaps along the way. It’s rarely smooth sailing.
My youngest son has epilepsy. The way you find a medication that will work for epilepsy, is purely by a process of elimination. You start with one medication, and you keep going with it, until you seize, or the side effects become unbearable. Then, you move on to the next medicine, and you start all over again. I imagine it is the same for many disorders and diseases. It’s never a simple process. It can be daunting and frustrating and disappointing.
In that light, I started thinking about how judgmental we are about ourselves on our own journeys in life, and also how judgmental we can be about others, and even about the generations who came before us. However, the reality is, most of the answers which we learn about anything in life, never become crystal clear until we test them out, right? You learn not to touch a hot stove because you experienced being burnt once or twice. You learn from your experiences, far more than you learn from any lectures. Your experiences give you an extremely visceral memory, to help to keep you on track.
I recently watched Squid Game. It’s a brutal, but fascinating watch. (SPOILER ALERT) One of the games that the contestants play is crossing a bridge, made of glass tiles which all look the same to the naked, untrained eye. Half of the tiles are reinforced glass that can hold a person’s weight, and half of the tiles are made of glass that will shatter, causing the contestant to fall to his or her untimely death. The first contestant to cross the bridge, quickly does the math. There are 18 steps to be made, in order to cross the bridge safely and intact. The first contestant has a 1/262,144 chance of crossing the bridge safely. All of the other contestants who follow the first contestant, get better and better odds, as the game goes along. The later contestants have absolutely benefited from the mistakes made by those who came before them.
Do not crucify yourself for the mistakes you make in life. Learn from them, and try to help others to not make the same mistakes that you have made. This is the main reason why we study history. History has a tendency to repeat itself, until we finally learn the lessons and take a new path. Do not be too stubborn to not learn from your own mistakes. Do not be too proud to learn from others, and their experiences. Be open to learn the lessons of those who have gone before us. At the same time, try to be compassionate when others make mistakes, realizing that people are not always “doing life”, with the same starting odds. We all make mistakes.
Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.
Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.
Sundays are devoted to poetry on the blog. Here are what other people have said about poetry:
+”Poetry is the one place where people can speak their original human mind. It is the outlet for people to say in public, what is known in private.” – Alan Ginsberg
+”Poetry is the mother tongue of the human race.” -Johann Georg Hamann
+”I consider myself a poet first and a musician second. I live like a poet and I’ll die like a poet.” – Bob Dylan
Here is my poem for today: (How about you? Do you have a poem to share today, even if just with yourself?)
Little Thing
Yesterday we got you.
You are tiny.
The smallest we have ever had.
We laughed. You are dwarfed in your space.
But you’re beautiful. You’re powerful.
You’ll make us focus on what matters most.
You’ll make us whittle it all down,
To the fondest, most meaningful memories of our lives.
“They’re just not you, Kid.” – @TheNostalgicCo, Twitter
The other day, I wrote a long, heartfelt email to an author about the difference her book (which is now out-of-print) made to me recently. The author is now in her late seventies, but still has an active website. To say that I was surprised by her response, would be an understatement.
“Who are you? Are you a real person? Are you some kind of telemarketer? Anyway, thanks. Maybe I’ll activate my book back up on Amazon.”
That’s all she wrote.
I understand that today’s society puts up a lot of roadblocks, in order for us to be able to trust each other. I also understand that this author is aging and may be going through mental challenges caused by her aging process. In short, I understand that her response has everything to do with her, and nothing to do with me. And my disappointment in her response, is all on me. My expectations are not credos for her to meet.
Along these same lines, my friend’s daughter was recently going through some real angst with some mean girls, in her freshman dorm in college. It was shocking the level of immaturity and cruelty that college-aged women still stoop to, especially in this day and age of careful, cancel culture. Actually, maybe it isn’t shocking. We mothers all agreed that we all know 50-year-old women who still behave like petty Betty, mean girls. And these vipers tend to raise mini-me mean girls, and the cycle continues on and on.
“They’re just not you, Kid.”
They all can’t be you. Only you can be you. Only you can raise yourself to the highest potential of your own best self. How others choose to respond to your growing and to your expanding and to your leveling up, is their business, their problem, their stuff. It has nothing to do with you. You be you. You surround yourself with those people who get you, respect you, honor you, and love you. You surround yourself with people who are for you, not against you. Send the rest on their merry way.
“They’re just not you, Kid.”
You are special stuff.
Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.
Happy Friday!!! Happy Best Day of the Week!!! Typically, on Fridays (when I am in a good, happy mood) I share three favorites of mine: movies, songs, websites, products, books, pet stuff, etc. Today I am in a good mood. I choose to be in a good mood. I choose to pick the thoughts that support my good mood. From experience, I can tell you that my mood is usually a choice. Today, I choose to feel good. Now in reality, my regular readers know that I am a big proponent of feeling your feelings. I am a big proponent of being real and authentic. I also understand that sometimes, our dark emotions are caused by messed up chemicals in our bodies, which is out of our control, and may need some serious intervention. And of course, we all know that repressed feelings are not good for our bodies or for our psyches. Still, in my experience, in many cases, you can choose to move past your darkness. I’ve earned the right to say this. We’ve been going through hell with my youngest son’s epilepsy the last few months and I have definitely let myself feel the pain, but I have also crawled back to the light. It feels better in the light. Today, I choose to bask in the light.
In a text chat earlier this morning, a friend reminded us of another matter-of-fact, practical friend’s wise words of advice, “It’s only a big deal, if you make it a big deal.” Be choosy about what you make to be the big deals in your life, friends. Not everything has to be a big wave. Help yourself to give yourself some smooth sailing.
My favorites today, are all in video form. I was introduced to two new songs this week, which really moved me. They went into my playlist. See if they speak to your ears. My final favorite for this week, is a link to a video series by a young man who is a travel vlogger, named Drew Binksy. Drew has visited all 197 countries in the world, in the span of ten years and he has made some amazing videos about his adventures. In his latest video, he talks about his eight biggest “takeaways” from this experience. Here are my favorite two insights of his:
+ “The world is safer than you think and 99.9% of people are good people.”
+ “Food is the ultimate connector because everyone needs to eat.”
Choose to have a great day today friends. It’s a precious day in your life. Feel the feels, but then let them go. Here are the links to my favorites for today:
Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.
When my middle son was a little guy, hedging his bets, he said to me, “You know, Mom, I still believe in Santa Claus, but flying reindeer, come on! I don’t believe in flying reindeer. I just don’t.”
After watching this video this morning, I kind of do. I kind of do believe in flying reindeer.
I saw this quote on Twitter today, too:
“Life is so subtle sometimes that you barely notice walking through the doors you once prayed would open.” – @meh_thinks
Isn’t this the truth? Look around you, just sitting where you are right now, and look at all of the things and comforts and relationships and friendships and conveniences and answered prayers that you, at one time in your life, fervently hoped and prayed would come into your life. As soon as we get these answered wishes and desires, we quickly start focusing on what we are still lacking, don’t we? Our center of attention always goes to our next wants, making all of our answered prayers seem so easy to take for granted, as if they were always there for the taking, in our lives. Desires are good. Hope is good. These are the attributes which lead to more invention and creation in life. But still, so is appreciation and gratefulness for all that we have already been given. Desire and hope are most potent when they are blended with big dollops of awe and thankfulness and recognition of our constant flow of blessings. Life is like a stealth butler at a luxury hotel or at a Disney resort. It makes sure that all of our needs are being met, quietly and magically, so as to not interrupt or disturb us, as we sometimes walk around impatiently and in a huff and with an air of entitlement, wondering, aghast, why we should have to wait in line for our next big adventure. The audacity!
Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.
What is the perfect age? “Well, it’s the age where I finally understand my freedom, and I finally understand that I am free to create, and it’s the age that I am at my most beautiful.” And we say, by whose standards? In other words, who gets to decide the perfect age? And we say, rather than determining what the perfect age is, why not decide what the perfect state of being is—and then discover that you can find the perfect state of being at any age. – Esther Hicks
“All my days I have longed equally to travel the right road and to take my own errant path.” – Norwegian-Danish novelist Sigrid Undset, who won the Noble Prize for Literature
December is my birthday month and despite all of the distractions of the holidays, I have always liked having a December birthday. One, I like being a Sagittarius. I think that we are a real fun, interesting bunch. Two, all of this personal life reflection that seems to come around one’s birthday, is a perfect way to reflectively end one year, and to expectantly and excitedly start a new one.
Many of my elders and many older movie stars who have been interviewed, often say that despite their changing bodies and their evolving appearances that comes with aging, they have always felt like the same person inside, no matter what age they are, at any particular time. And that is because, at the deepest most eternal level of any of us, our forever souls are changeless and ageless. If you move past the crusty old body surface (which changes with aging), and you get past the personality and ego layers (which often have the tendency to change with experience and growth), you finally get to the peaceful center of anybody (which is eternal and never changes). And that tranquil, undisturbed center, which is in of all of us, is just lovingly and curiously and agelessly staying aware, without judgment, as it is experiencing life as a human being.
In short, there is nothing outside of us to search for in this life. “The perfect state of being” exists in all of us, and at any age, if you are willing to dig deep down past all of the other “stuff” – the layers of body and personality and ego. Our “perfect state of being” was always there and it will always be there. Birthday parties are amusing to our “perfect state of being”. Our “perfect state of being” likes to notice the sensations of excitement and anticipation that comes with birthdays and parties and celebrations, but in reality, our “perfect state of being/souls” are ageless and timeless and at perfect peace at all times.
Forgive me, readers. I do have a tendency to get deep around my birthday. Deep thinking and writing about my deep thinking is one of my greatest joys in life. Doing the things that I love to do, is when I feel most connected to the deepest, most centered part of myself. Staying connected to my “perfect state of being” makes me feel connected to eternity. How many candles do you put on a cake for an eternal soul?
“We know more about the surface of the sun than the deep earth,” says Rich Muller of the Lab’s Physics Division, a professor of physics at UC Berkeley.
Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.
I figured that we could all use some holiday cheer:
My daughter asked me how to begin her letter to Santa Claus so I suggested she start with, “Hear me out …” (@Dad_At_Law Twitter)
credit: Rex Masters, Twitter
Happy Hanukkah to my Jewish readers!!!
****I know that a lot of you are worried about me and my family, but we are doing okay. A good night’s sleep does wonders. One Day at a Time. It’s the only way to live. You savor and experience your life more that way. Don’t worry. Be happy.****
When you raise a big family (we have four kids), you do a lot of dishes and laundry and driving and PTA forms. You do a lot of juggling of schedules and cars in the driveway. There is a steady hum of noise in the house, always. You are constantly cleaning up messes.
When your big family grows up and moves out, you honestly sometimes forget what raising the big family was like. And then they come home for the holidays, and you are swiftly reminded. As you are doing yet another load of laundry and the dishwasher is running yet again and your husband is vacuuming for the third time in one day, and you have to yell out over all of the noise for someone to move their car so that another car can get out of the garage, and you are trying to remember where everyone is and where everyone is supposed to be, you take a pause and you smile to yourself. You are reminded that you made it through 12 years of high schoolers, relatively unscathed. You are reminded that you helped to give a good, solid start to four wonderful people who are already making a difference in this world. You pat yourself on the back with sheepish pride. And although you realize that you certainly don’t have the energy to do it all again, you are incredibly happy that at one time in your life, you did have the energy to raise a big family. You realize that your big family helped to make your heart grow big, and a big heart is full of love and love is the stuff that sustains you, and that thought is what carries you through the final folding of towels and sheets, from the recent reunion of your big, beautiful brood.
Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.
Yesterday morning, right after I published my blog, I took my dogs outside. My phone rang and I saw that it was our middle son calling. I knew what he was going to say before I even said “hello.” He and my youngest son had gone to a local park to play in a pick-up soccer game. My youngest son had an epileptic seizure on the field, in the middle of the game. I am grateful that my middle son was with my youngest son during this time. My middle son is a student in medical school and he, like the rest of our family, has witnessed many of his little brother’s seizures. In fact, my middle son witnessed my youngest son having his first major seizure, when my middle son was driving them both to their high school, many years ago. He attributes that experience as one of the major reasons why he decided to go into medicine. My middle son knows what to do when a seizure happens. He took good care of his brother, as always. The local EMT crew came. They know us by name now. They took good care of my son, as always. Luckily, since they were on the grass, and his brother was with him, my youngest son wasn’t greatly hurt, just some sore muscles and a scratched up face from some pebbles in the grass. He came home to recover from his seizure. He came home to my waiting arms.
My regular readers know that we have been going through hell this fall with my son’s epilepsy. His seizures are currently not being well-controlled by medicine. In September and October, my son suffered at least one major seizure a week, landing him in the hospital three times. He is currently taking five different anti-seizure medications, as doctors scour for a medication combo and a dosage, that works to keep the seizures controlled. We were cautiously optimistic that we had finally found that holy grail of medications, because this November, our son was almost one-month seizure free. Yesterday ended that streak.
I feel horrible today. I felt horrible yesterday. I feel deflated, dejected and scared out of my mind. But, honestly, I felt wonderful throughout our Thanksgiving break with our family. I felt pretty good the week before Thanksgiving break. I even felt pretty good the week before the week before Thanksgiving break. I sometimes cautioned myself that “I was setting myself up for a big fall,” with all of my hopeful optimism, but I didn’t care. It felt so good to feel good again.
During Thanksgiving break, our family, all six of us, had a great time together. We cooked, we shopped, we went to the movies, we even went boating. My youngest son went to the gym with his brothers, and golfing with his buddies who were home for Thanksgiving break. I won’t pretend that I didn’t have nervous moments. I won’t pretend that I stopped being hyper-aware of any strange noises in the house. I won’t pretend that I didn’t keep my son on a strict medication schedule. But I relaxed, I laughed, I savored. I had so much fun. I felt so much joy.
And today I feel so, so sad, but during the rest of November, I mostly felt ease and comfort and relief, because I let myself feel those better feelings. If I had stayed miserable and fearful and depressed and angry, all of November, yesterday’s seizure would have still happened. Despite what we erroneously believe, worry doesn’t stop any negative experiences from happening. Worry doesn’t help anything at all, and we all know this, but I got a very clear example of this fact, taught to me with this lucid life experience. I am thankful that I let myself enjoy a nice, and hopeful month, because I would have still felt so, so sad today, even if I had fretted and worried and been miserable for the whole month of November.
I say to you this: if you are in a budding new relationship that you are enjoying, savor it. Experience this relationship fully and excitedly, without fretting if and when it is going to end. If you have lost a lot of weight, be proud of yourself. Delight in your triumph. Don’t spend time worrying if you are going to gain all of the weight back. If things are going well in your job, with your family, with your friends, with your health, with your bank account, with your life, soak it all in. Enjoy the good! Facts are, upsetting, negative things happen in life sometimes. That’s just the way of life. No one is immune. Save feeling lousy for those times. Save it up, and rightfully feel miserable when you are in the middle of a rough patch. But don’t let those awful feelings seep into your good times. Let your bad times, make your good times feel that much more amazing and glorious and precious. You are strong enough to handle adversity, and wise enough to know that by feeling happiness in the good times, you are giving yourself something to look forward to, when you are in the middle of experiencing your hard times. Give yourself the gift of savoring life in the moment.
Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.
“Everyone’s a poet – no exceptions.” – Jack Hirschman, prolific American poet
Welcome to Soul Sunday. My regular readers know that Sundays are devoted to poetry. And believe it or not, Sundays are quite a popular day on the blog. The secret’s out of the bag. You really like poetry. You really do. Today is the perfect day for you to write a poem. You are a poet. You are an artist. Just do it. Create. Here is my poem for the day:
“The Invested Rescuers”
When you are in a scary, deep, dark pit,
And beautiful angels help to pull you out,
With their lovely golden corded rope,
Because the angels are so loving and concerned,
about you, they forget that they have pulled you out.
And so they continue to call down to you,
desperately looking for you, at the bottom of the ugly pit,
not realizing that you are now standing calmly behind them,
on the firm, solid ground, relieved to feel the hope
of the sun’s brightest rays, and feeling so warm and thankful for
the angels who cared enough to lovingly pull you out of the dark.
Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.
