Tag: middle age

Blessed

This morning we are all dispersing. My husband and I are taking our eldest son to the airport (sniff, sniff). My middle sons are going to play a soccer game, and my daughter is headed to her job at a local bank. This is the way of families. We each head out in all different directions, and these different directions get more wild and longer and more disseminated, as our kids grow and move on to their own nuclear lives. Which is why the weeks like we just experienced, all cozied up together (including our beloved family dogs), without any real distractions, to just soak up each other’s stories, and energy, and laughter, and inside jokes, are more precious than gold. It’s like our shared familial love just got a little re-charging. We all got the boost we needed. We all got the reminder that each of us is deeply loved and each of us has a cheering squad, along our own individual paths in life. Today, I am feeling a little melancholy, but mostly deeply blessed. If I am honest, I sometimes get irritated when I see people wearing shirts or necklaces that state, “Blessed.” I think to myself, “You’re not special. Don’t be smug. We are all blessed.” But today, in the warmth of my freshly love-bathed heart, I get it. Those shirts and necklaces are meant to be a reminder to each of us, that we are all deeply blessed. Our lives are filled with blessings. And in the times like this morning, when I am most acutely aware of my greatest blessings, I am humbled and I am in awe, at just how good life can feel and it can be. And I know that this hopeful, beautiful feeling will sustain me, even in the times when my life’s blessings are a little more subtle and hiding behind some of life’s great challenges. But for today, I feel like wearing “Blessed” boldy and proudly. Today, my blessings are glowing to me. And it feels really good and I want this same feeling for everyone.

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

Black Pepper Friday

20 Funny Black Friday Memes That Will Make You LOL

Happy Friday!! Happy Favorite Things Friday!! Happy Black Friday!! Honestly, I have never shopped “in person” on a Black Friday. Usually on Black Friday, I think of things and products that I have been meaning to buy, or that I buy regularly, and then I check on-line to see if there are any steals to be had on these items. I haven’t come across anything amazing so far, but at the age of 50, I already have too much stuff. The incentive to shop a lot (even on-line) on a Black Friday just isn’t there for me anymore. In fact, my favorite thing in the world, is to spend time with my family and my eldest son is flying back to his home tomorrow, so I’m going to keep this post short. No favorites today, I’m sorry! I’m going to savor being with my favorite people today. I hope that are able to do the same. See you tomorrow.

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

Thank You, Thank You!

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

Happy Thanksgiving! I am incredibly grateful for this blog and I am so thankful for each of you, my faithful readers. A blog without readers is just a personal journal, and I already have a few of those. To feel a responsibility and a desire to write this blog every single morning, has been a Godsend for me. This has been particularly evident to me in the last few months, with my son’s epileptic seizures flaring up. They say that the person who saves you, is always you. If that’s the case, then the deepest part of me, who has the inclination to spill out my soul on this blog, is what saved me this fall. Thank you for being there to help me to sort out all of the pieces of my fragile heart during these last few months. Things are definitely looking up. We are making it to the other side of our family’s most frightening experience, and I feel you holding my hand through it all. Thank you for your interest, your kindness, your caring, your attention and your loyalty. I am immensely thankful for you, my readers. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

One of the more popular posts which I have ever written on my blog is trending again. This is the right time for it. Happy Thanksgiving. Here is the post:

Thank Yourself

Ideal Holiday Companion

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(credit: Rex Masters, Twitter)

I’ve been seeing a lot of funny memes on Twitter, making fun of the “inevitable” annoyances and aggravations that can occur when everyone gets together and groups around the table for holiday meals. We’re having a small Thanksgiving this year, being just the six of us in our immediate family. We are used to each other’s quirks and proclivities, so I don’t anticipate any real upsets. Honestly, since my older two boys haven’t been home in a while, I am still walking around with a silly perma-grin on my face, and a giggle always at the top of my throat.

Still, it’s amazing how the random brouhahas can seem to blow up out of nowhere, whenever two or more “adults” are gathered, in the spirit of hope and good cheer. Ghandi said to “be the change” you want to see in the world. Perhaps, it would be easier to start small. “Be the change” you’d like to see around the Thanksgiving table. What would that look like? If I could pick out my ideal holiday dinner companions, they would be kind. They would be fun and funny. They would share the conversation, not dominate it. They would not use the dining room table as a pulpit or a political lectern or a spotlighted stage. They would not employ veiled passive-aggressive statements and judgments. They would savor the moments, and the food and the drink, instead of gorging and rushing to the end. They would be grateful and gracious and peaceful and helpful and pleasant and polite. They would roll with the punches and keep perspective. (So what if something got burnt or something got spilled or the dog ate a crescent roll?) They would be quick with a laugh and a compliment and a hug. They would be self-deprecating, and quick to offer the benefit of the doubt. Instead of trying to make everything a “Hallmark image”, they would look around their table using only the eyes of their souls, in order to see and to experience something far greater than any uncomfortable, staged, fake event. These dinner companions would be nothing short of wonderful and lovely.

Now, finally, at this middle-aged staged of my life, I fully understand and accept that the only person’s behavior which I can control, is my own. I suppose that I have created a good formula above, for whom I would like to see at my holiday functions. What I know, is that I have created a good formula above for who I can aim to be at my holiday functions. It looks like I have my work cut out for me, and this work doesn’t have anything to do with cooking or cleaning and setting tables. This work is all about focusing on keeping my expectations about others in check, and yet also, keeping high aspirations for myself and my own attitude and behaviors.

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

Name ‘Em

“Name your feelings to tame your feelings.” – Holiday Mathis

The holidays are upon us and everything gets amplified at this time. Lights are brighter, food is richer, decorations are more ornate than ever, and there is more of everything coming at us at every angle, and loudly. SALES!! BLACK FRIDAY!! ANOTHER HELPING OF STUFFING!! GUESTS!! PARTIES!! JINGLE BELLS!! LIGHTS AND LIGHTS AND FLASHING LIGHTS!!!

With this amplification of our material lives, often comes the amplification of our interior lives. What has been lying low, deep below the surface, often gets jostled awake by the sensory overload happening all around us. In short, the holidays can be A LOT. They can be a lot of fun, a lot of merriment, a lot of celebration, a lot of excess, a lot of planning, a lot of mess, a lot of memories, and a lot, a lot, a lot of feelings coming to the surface.

Feelings are not good or bad. Our feelings are just our natural compasses to remind us to do course corrections when needed, and to soak in, and to bathe ourselves in our moments of our internal peace and happiness. Feelings just are. But we often try to avoid our feelings at all cost, especially the ones that we deem to be “bad” feelings. Ironically, that just makes our feelings more powerful. Avoided, unobserved, repressed, suppressed, denied feelings end up controlling us, and at worst, hurting us by stagnating in our bodies, which can later cause unrest and disease. But the way to control our feelings, is to face them head on, in a detached matter, and to notice ourselves feeling our feelings. (see quote above – “Name your feelings to tame your feelings.“) Just like we have the ability to notice our thoughts, we can easily notice our feelings. When a feeling arises and catches our attention, we should take a pause and name the feeling. Anger. What does anger feel like in my body? Where does the sensation of anger happen in my body? Happiness. What does happiness feel like in my body? Where does the sensation of happiness happen in my body?

I read a book recently that said we could take this “notice your feelings” activity even a step further. As we feel the sensations of our feelings, we should then feel love for that particular feeling, and love for the power of that particular feeling in our body. Finally we should feel love for ourselves for feeling that particular feeling and all of our feelings. This activity ends up disciplining us to notice and name our feelings, to feel our feelings, and then to alchemize all of our feelings into love and acceptance for ourselves, and for our natural state of constantly shifting feelings. (Credit: Arnold Patent)

When you take this activity seriously and you make a conscious effort to do it, what has become really obvious to me, is just how quickly the feeling moves on. It’s like the feeling is saying, “Okay, thanks! Thanks for feeling me. That’s all I needed. I just wanted to be noticed and acknowledged! Thank you. I’ll be moving on now!” But if you deny or ignore your feelings, they become like indignant children in the middle of a tantrum. Their intensity grows and sometimes they get out of control. They will plant themselves firmly in place and scream, “Don’t you ignore me! LISTEN TO ME!!! FEEL ME!!! I WILL BE FELT!!!! KA-POW!!”

The next time you hear “We Wish You a Merry Christmas”, playing in your local grocery store for the 16th time before Thanksgiving, as someone muscles you out of the way for the last tube of sausage on the shelf, stop. What are you feeling? Where are feeling it? Love the feeling. It’s intense, isn’t it? It’s powerful, isn’t it? Aren’t our bodies amazing messengers? Love your body and yourself, for being so amazing and full of sensation. Now notice how quickly the feeling has passed. (on an aside, if the feeling isn’t passing, you may be ruminating in your thoughts and your judgments. Notice those thoughts and judgments. Are these thoughts and judgments even really true and objective?) At this point, after fully feeling your feeling, you don’t even have the inclination to ram someone with your shopping cart anymore. In fact you may even hum a little bit to “We Wish You a Merry Christmas”, or perhaps even sing it out loud, as you are experiencing your new feeling of holiday cheer. What are you feeling now? Where are you feeling it? Love that new feeling. Most importantly, love yourself for the best gift that you are giving to yourself this holiday season. You are giving yourself the presents of presence. And that is a priceless, serene gift that you and all of us, absolutely deserve.

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

Monday Fun-Day

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credit: Rex Masters, Twitter (@MastersRex)

One of the astrology websites that I like to read (Astrotwins), posed this question yesterday:

“If you could accomplish three things by the end of 2022, what would they be?” A true running marathon will not be on my list. Not in 2022. Not ever. A Netflix marathon is likely to just organically happen, without any intentions involved, especially if a series grabs my attention and my rabid impulsion “to see what happens next” gets to the best of me. Regardless of any kind of marathon, the above question in bold, is a good question to marinate on, at this end time of the year. Our youngest child will be graduating from high school and starting college in 2022. It’s going to be a brand new blank slate for me. I would like to accomplish a healthy, assured beginning, out of the starting gate of The Empty Nest arena. Here’s another good marinater that I read over this weekend:

“To remember who you are, you need to forget who they told you to be.” – Native American

Of course, Mondays aren’t necessarily great deep thought, marination days. The only thing that any of us really need to marinate this week, are our turkeys. Have a magnificent Monday! See you tomorrow.

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

Soul Sunday

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

Before I came to write my post, I was reading about a new docu-series on Hulu that depicts the rise and fall of the edgy fashion company, Von Dutch. The original creator of Von Dutch, who died before the fashion company even had its ride up, had this to say:

“Use any of my stuff you want to,” Howard’s manifesto is quoted in the docuseries. “Nothing is original. Everything is in the subconscious, we just ‘tap’ it sometimes and think we have originated something. Genes make us more or less interested in certain things, but nothing is truly original! Copyright and patents are mostly an ego trip.”

I find this quote really interesting. When we do what each of us does best, we speak of using our “God given talents and gifts.” When we do what we really love to do, we get lost in the moment. Time stands still. We often put our minds and our egos to the side and we let our creations flow out of us. I am not convinced that Howard isn’t on to something here, yet my ego would be bruised if someone took some of “my” own written words, and called them their own. Could it be that we are all just vessels that God/Universe uses to bring about more evolution and creation? I think that this is highly possible, but my big, fat ego keeps telling me to “shut up NOW, and take all of the credit.”

Today, on Sunday, which my regular readers know is devoted to poetry, I’m actually going to share a poem, written by the French poet (or perhaps channelled by the poet), Guillaume Apollinaire, who some consider to be the innovator of French poetry. Here it is:

“Come to the edge,” he said.
“We can’t, we’re afraid!” they responded.
“Come to the edge,” he said.
“We can’t, We will fall!” they responded.
“Come to the edge,” he said.
And so they came.
And he pushed them.
And they flew.”

Enjoy a lovely tranquil Sunday. Write, or maybe just be the poetry you would like to see in the world. Be the vessel. Be the channel. Let the light make it through, so that we all can experience it, and deeply know and understand, from where it came.

Rest Your Wings

Today my eldest son is flying in, to be with us for the week. I’m so excited. He is a successful 25 year-old, living in a big city, doing work that he loves. (I have to stop right here, to state that I accidently typed “doing love that he works”. Freudian slip, perhaps? It got me to thinking that when you are living your passions, that is what you are doing. You are doing love. You are working love.)

Anyway, I have this giddy excitement about seeing my son and I thought about how funny it is, that roles often reverse, in our lives. When our children are little, they are so excited about Mommy and Daddy coming home. Whether coming home from work, or an evening out, or to pick them up at preschool, they are so excited to have Mommy and Daddy home with them. And now, that’s how I now feel about my grown kids. I am so excited to have everyone home for this holiday.

I don’t have too much in common with the real housewife, Kathy Hilton (mother of Paris Hilton and three other adult children), but what we do have in common is that we are both mothers of four children, and we both love the amazing, comforting feeling when all of our children are sleeping under one roof with us. I recently read an interview with Kathy Hilton, and she stated this shared experience, that most of us mothers feel. No matter what our circumstances, living styles, home sizes, etc., we mothers feel our calmest and best when all of our babies are in our nest. Simple nests, gilded nests, every kind of nest feels best when it is filled and feathered with all of our babies.

Inspiration CAN be found EVERYWHERE! | Empty nest quotes, College quotes, Empty nest syndrome

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

The Subtle Art of Friday

Friday Quotes On Pinterest. QuotesGram

Happy Friday, readers! Happy Favorite Things Friday!! What a great Friday we have here, with anticipating Thanksgiving right around the corner. Fortunately, our two older sons will be coming home, so all six of us will be enjoying our holiday together. This makes me feel extremely grateful. In other good news, Ralphie, our Labrador-who-is-quite-unhappily-and-totally-against-his-will-on-a-diet lost 11 pounds in two months. (much better than I did) His diet is clearly working! Ralphie still has about 10 pounds to go, and he still tries sneaking the other fur babies’ food every chance that he gets, but he is looking healthier and trimmer every single day. We are so proud of our Ralphie! While not trimming much off of any of my own body fat, I did trim 17,000 emails out of my inbox yesterday (and that is honestly, an understatement). I never bothered to delete emails for quite some time and then I started getting warnings from Google that I was running out of storage. I hemmed and I hawed but I finally just hit the delete button and I trashed 17,000 emails. Honestly, once I got past my nervousness, it felt incredible liberating and freeing. If only cleaning out my closets and drawers could be this easy!

Yes, I notice that I am quite chatty today. What can I say? It’s my favorite day of the week. Here is what you really came for, my three favorites for this Friday. Please check out more favorites in my previous Friday posts and please share some of your own favorites in my Comments section:

LitezAll COB LED magnifier – I’ve reached the age where magnifiers are easily in my top ten favorite things category, all of the time, and this is the best magnifying glass which I have ever owned. Why is this one so great, you ask? Because it is huge, lightweight, and because it has three bright LED lights that shine on whatever you are trying to see. And what’s even better, it’s cheap. I got mine at Ace Hardware but you can order one from Walmart or Amazon, as well.

n:p beautiful volumizing dry shampoo – Even when my hair is perfectly clean, I use this stuff. I love how full it makes my (honestly, kind of thin and fine) hair seem to be. In the words of my mentee (5th grader), “I want fluffy hair, like yours.” (What can I say? I grew up in the eighties.) Seriously, when you apply this dry shampoo, it sounds like you are taking a blow torch to your head, but the results are terrific (if you like fluffy hair, like mine). And even better, it doesn’t flake, like a lot of dry shampoos have the tendency to do.

The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck by Mark Manson – This book is really good, but it is not for the person who blanches at the f-word. The f-bomb is used in this book, as often as the word “the” is used in my blog. It’s a fun, light read with the key message “to lighten the F%ck up!”. The book was honestly recommended to me by my 17-year-old daughter, who had the book recommended to her, by one of her best friends, who was given the book to read, from her own father. (We love this friend and her family. I think that my daughter’s friend’s father knows that our girls are a tad high-strung and a little over-achieving at times, to the point that it crosses over to slightly unhealthy. At first when my daughter told me about this, I was like, WTF?!?, but after starting to read the book, I was like, “F@ck yeah!”) Here is an excerpt:

“Then, as we grow older and enter middle age, something else begins to change. Our energy level drops. Our identity solidifies. We know who we are and we accept ourselves, including some of the parts we aren’t thrilled about. And in a strange way this is liberating. We no longer need to give a f@ck about everything.”

Happy Friday Friends!! Only give a f@ck about the stuff that matters! Thanksgiving is great time to ponder what really matters to you. See you tomorrow!

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

Walking the Line

“You own everything that happened to you. Tell your stories. If people wanted you to write warmly about them, they should have behaved better.” – Anne Lamott

“The pen is mightier than the sword.“ – Edward Bulwer-Lytton in 1839

Last night we had an interesting, lively dinner conversation. My son and my daughter were talking about the latest music video/film recently released by Taylor Swift. The video is mostly based on Taylor Swift’s song (with a little bit of acting), “All Too Well”, long believed to be about Taylor Swift’s brief romantic relationship with the movie star, Jake Gyllenhaal. The video/song doesn’t paint “Jake” in the best light (if it is truly about him), yet at the same time, from my mature woman’s eyes, it shows some naivety and immaturity on the girl’s (in the video) part, as well. My daughter is a Taylor Swift fan, and my son often proclaims Jake Gyllenhaal to be possibly the best actor of all time, so it made for fun dinner banter. I honestly admire both Swift and Gyllenhaal. I think that they are both incredibly talented, passionate people, and I can see why they may have fallen for each other, even for a few short months. For his part, Gyllenhaal has remained completely “mum” as far as a response to the recently released short film/video.

After going back and forth as to who is “right” in this situation, I brought up a story I read yesterday, about two writers who were in a Facebook writers’ group together. One of the writers gave her kidney to a stranger, just for the altruistic experience, and she brought this fact up, frequently to her writing group. One of the other writers in this same group, never acknowledged the fact that the other writer had given up one of her kidneys. She never said anything about it at all. Later, it turns out that the silent writer had written a “fictional” short story (that won an award) about a narcissistic woman who had given her kidney to a stranger, purely for “the glory of it all.” She wrote lines in the story, which were almost verbatim to lines that were shared in the writers’ Facebook chat, in which they both belonged. There have since been lawsuits and stalking and all sorts of brouhaha with these writers, and their friends, stemming from this unfortunate situation.

Which brings me to this thought: This is the hard line that we walk as writers and creators, correct? Our stories are our own. Our experiences are our own. We own our perspectives on what has happened in our lives. No one can tell us that our perspectives are wrong or false, because what happens in our own lives, and how we perceive these experiences and relationships, is entirely unique to each of us. Jake Gyllenhaal could produce a video and a song about his relationship with Taylor Swift, and it might look entirely different than what Taylor portrayed, and neither one of them is wrong.

As a writer, I understand the power that I wield with my pen. It’s a responsibility that I don’t take lightly. I’m good with words. I can communicate my perspectives in a way that often resonates with people. I constantly weigh how much I share about my life, in written form, on this blog and in other pieces that I write. My relationships with my loved ones are of utmost importance to me. I want to honor my loved ones’ privacy and feelings, as well as I can, while still honoring myself authentically, and honing my craft. It isn’t easy. I have erred in being an over-sharer, and I have erred in keeping too silent. I constantly worry that people whom I am most intimate with, will become too guarded with me, for fears of becoming my next blog post. And yet, writing is an outpouring of one’s creative soul. As a writer, your readers can feel when you are hiding and holding back, especially when they have read enough of “your stuff” to know your essence and your writing style. Honestly, in weighing in on all of this, I have even considered when and if I should destroy all of my private journals. If I am gone, all that is left, is what the people who are reading my journals, perceive of what I wrote. The people who would be reading my journals, would be the people whom I am closest to in my life. When I am gone, all that I want left from any of my important relationships, is the deep knowing that I love “my people” beyond measure, and I always will. That is all that matters to me. My greatest joy in writing, is the creative act of writing itself. Everything that I write, I want whittled down to the only end result that matters. Love. I love to write. I love “my people.” I love trying to find meaning in my life through creating written words that are interesting to read and mostly, for me to write. That is it. That is all she meant. That’s all she wrote.

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