Facebook

I haven't figured out if this 'social utility' is a godsend or my worse Japanese Anime anti-hero unleashed...BUT what I am grateful for is the ability to reconnect, catch up and refurbish relationships of days gone by. What brilliance.

It's a gorgeous detail in my life's journey because it has reopened roads I thought had fallen apart or closed.

So evil, as my friend Drea calls it, or not...I'm an addict.

Happy trails.

Personal Armour

I've decided this week that I no longer need my personal armour.

That's the flub I carry around on this 5 ft. 3 in. frame that my inner critic believes will keep it safe from 'everyone out there'...at 30-something years old, I've been walking with the wolves 'out there' and am fine. Mostly because, it's not all wolves.

I've spent a long time acquiring and keeping this flub.

I've even had spells of time where I've lost it all. ALL of it. Skeletal me.

It's irrelevant HOW I look to the outside world...people are still drawn to me, I am still drawn to them and relationship's still form. Keeping myself fat isn't going to change any of that, other than the amount of time I'm likely to be able to spend on this earth forging those relationships into life-long magical moments.

I still have sex.

Whether I'm 118 lbs or 180 lbs, and I'm sure (if I were) 280 lbs...although my ability and agility would be compromised at the latter...I'd still be able to be intimate with someone.

SO WHAT THE HELL AM I HOLDING ONTO TO THIS FAT FOR!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!!?

Underneath my loving, warm, amicable, often seemingly outgoing demeanour...is the little me that believes that if I'm fat then I am safe from the hourds of men and women who'll want a piece of my womanhood. There are a number of myths in this statement:

1. Fat people still get laid.

2. Not everyone I meet wants to have sex with me.

3. Even if they did...that's not really a bad thing...it becomes a bad thing IF they act on it.

4. There is no safety in fat. Only a lifetime of health issues, which include: an overtaxed liver, adrenal stress, onset of diabetes, depression, ill-body smells (fat people smell bad...I've yet to meet one that doesn't), nerve malfunction, inability to move freely, poor self-image and oh so many many more things that decrease the longevity and quality of living.

5. I am woman, whether I'm healthy or unhealthy (which is to say, ideal body weight or overweight) so wanting to be anything OTHER than that is ridiculous. I am a woman whether I'm fat or healthy. Better to be a healthy woman, than an unhealthy woman.

So...this past week, I've made the conscious decision that I don't want, nor do I NEED, my body armour anymore. It protects me from NOTHING. In fact, when I sat down and thought about it fully, clearly, fairly, non-judgmentally but rather matter-of-factily, I realized that I've created this pocket of self-delusion about my weight for almost an entire decade. If not longer.

I've blamed having babies for it. NOW I have the convenience of crapped out thyroid readings, weirdo liver readings, waiting to see an Endocrinologist-doctor-person, and a multitude of other health reasons, to NOT take responsibility for the fat person I've created. And, perhaps I do have a crapped out thyroid...chances are, I've created that problem, as quite frankly, I haven't always had this problem. It's 'crept up' on me, so my kind doctor tells me. Years of not loving myself, is more like it.

Nope...scarfing bread/toast/pasta before bed (because it makes me sleep better...apparently I use it as a sedative, which loads of people do) is a really bad idea. I'm not exactly getting a good workout at 10 pm, am I? Even IF I were to have rambunctious sex with my husband, it still wouldn't burn off enough calories...so, those carbohydrates get stored as flub.

I use carbohydrates as a sedative. My blood sugar spikes and then drastically drops (surprise...ok, not really, I'm hypoglycaemic...like soooo many North Americans.) Ummm, that toast knocks me out at night. It's better than valium. Or so I tell myself. Or have done.

(Meditation is a much healthier way of relaxing.)

This isn't all that surprising given my life history. In fact, this is fairly text-book case scenario.

WHAT I've never wanted is to be a statistic or a text-book case. And since I am...I need to shift that paradigm. And, the choice is MINE to make.

I can choose to feel sorry for myself and carry on looking and feeling the way I do (or getting worse) OR I can choose to get off the damned couch, go for a walk, MEAN IT WHEN I SAY I DO YOGA and damned well DO it daily (rather than once in a while), I can be kind to myself, take rests as I need them, choose foods that don't hurt me and understand the relationship I've had with foods that hurt me, AND I can implement these DOABLE changes in moderation.

So, that's what I've decided this week. And, I happen to be the kind of person that once having decided something, can and does stick to it.

I'm committed to my own well-Being. And that means, I give myself permission to no longer need this armour.

I do not need protecting.

I do not need to continue punishing myself (my body) for allowing it to be raped; for allowing it to be abused; for allowing it to be neglected; for allowing it to be bulimic or bullied for sooo very long; for allowing it to starve, and for allowing it to be hurt, over and over and over. I do not need to exert THIS kind of control.

I am allowed to LOVE me.

I am allowed to be WELL.

I am allowed to be HEALTHY.

I am allowed to be STRONG.

I am allowed to be ME, in all of my imperfect incarnations.

I am allowed to REST.

I am allowed to SAY NO.

I am allowed to GIVE freely.

I am allowed to ENGAGE IN LOVE.

I am allowed to HAVE A VOICE.

I am allowed to HAVE A BLOG, so I can SHARE.

And, I am allowed to FEEL SAFE, as I am.

I am allowed to be me.

May each of you love the YOU that you are. May each of you walk without armour. And, may each of you have no need for it.

Conversation with K.

Hello dear K,
It's much easier to be mean to ourselves than to be kind. Up until recently, I was guilty of the not-being-kind-to-myself thing too but encouraging others to be so and do so.

I've learned, late, but learned (so it's ok, I learned when I needed to learn it) that it's ok to be me, as I am. Your plays are starting to celebrate this side of you...and you know what?...it's ok to want/need an audience. A true performer does. However, wishing that you HAD done something ("I should have..."), that you didn't do, couldn't do, weren't ready to do at a time in your life that isn't 'now' is energy that's best spent conspiring HOW you can do something, anything 'now.' There's nothing wrong with a performer wanting an audience. Your examination of yourself about wanting this is important, so well done.

SO...in your heart of hearts...WHAT character do you want to play? WHO do you want to be? WHAT play do you want to do? It's not narcissistic to want to be watched...so let yourself want it.

That actress you went to see last night at Prairie Theatre Exchange, btw, is extremely talented but isn't playing with a full deck. You also don't go through men, like toilet paper, when you are happy. Guess what?....she isn't.

You're tired, exhausted, knackered, I hear you saying...IT'S OK - we need these moments of exhaustion to enable us to reflect because it's all we are capable of doing during these weeks, days, months, times of fatigue.

Tired, is your body telling you it's had enough of you neglecting it, ignoring it and pushing it to its limit. It's hard to listen to that voice as a busy busy mother of two boys, a husband that travels and as a woman trying to figure out what she wants. But it's ok to take the time to rest. Even if it means sitting and doing nothing. I'm allowing myself the indulgence of writing to you at dinner time. The connection we women have is vital to our longevity. Studies show that men don't need it (nor do they seek it), but we do. It's ok to embrace the need for friendship. So, I'm doing both right now. I feel relaxed and am breathing deeply and dribbling away with you. I'd be equally happy doing this over tea with you...but you'd have to agree to no fussing. Let the teabag sit in the cup.

On figuring out what you want: not that this REALLY helps, but you wouldn't believe HOW many women I know who are feeling RIGHT NOW that everything they thought they wanted and have become (by virtue of wanting and choosing) is NOT actually what they want. I'm one of them.

Interesting that ALL of these women have children who have started school in the past two years.

Interesting also, that ALL of these women are highly creative, incredibly intuitive and intelligent.

ON finding the time to be creative....interestingly, serendipitously, I was cleaning out my filing cabinet the other day and came across the "Anita" file...yes, I have files on all of you friends I know (newspaper clippings when I had access to them, play reviews, notes & letters written, postcards from your travels, even some phone messages, etc.)...and this is what she gave me (I'm not sure when, but I read it on a day I needed to...)

To Encourage my friend, F.

"A Woman must be careful to not allow over responsibility or over respectability to steal her necessary creative riffs, and raptures. She must simply put her foot down and say no to half of what she believes she 'should' be doing. ART is not meant to be created in stolen moments only."

From 'Women who run with the Wolves' p. 307 Clarissa Pinkola

That actrees you watched the other night is a well-known selfish woman. Good for her. Good for her art. Good for her audience. She chooses to DO, instead of waiting for 'stolen moments only'....as I have recently let go (resigned) from EVERY committee/group/etc. that I belonged to, that ate up alllllllllll of my time (so that I would feel a sense of purpose and have every second of every day gobbled up?) and had no time for my family (really...you know, quality time) or me. Let me share with you that letting go of ALLLLLLLLLLLLL of that was difficult. Each resignation letter I wrote, filled my gut with insane amounts of GUILT. I acknowledged the guilt, asked myself where it came from, and finished the letter without an answer.

I slept better that weekend than I have in years.

I had NOTHING to do with my time, except...nothing.

I sat still for the whole weekend. I fought the urge to FILL my time with things to do for other people. I allowed myself to feel good about the laundry I did for my girls. I read a book and fought the urge to get up and vacuum (again). I took the girls swimming and forced myself to be in the PRESENT, in the chlorinated indoor pool, so I wasn't constantly saying, "ok girls, we'll have to go soon." I let them tell me when they had had enough...which was 3 hours in the pool. S'alright, we had fun.

A lightness washed over me. At first I thought it was the chlorine. And then, I thought to myself...whoa, I need MORE of THIS feeling in my life.

But it had to start with my choosing to let go.

You know about surrender. You're a Christian. And in Being so, is surrendering...right?

About your work...the ONLY person's approval you really need when you are in that tight little artificially lit space in that school is that of the child you are with...because THAT's why you are there. YOU want to make a difference in this child's life...so you are there. And, you're damned good at it. Small breakthroughs, even if far and in between, are there and they happen...and they happen because you are taking that time to be with that child.

You say your work, that you always felt you wanted to do, is unfulfilling. Do you fully honour each child that's in that space with you when you are together? What's it going to feel like when one of those children becomes an adult and stands up to speak to a group of people and says, "I had a lot of difficulty as a child. No-one thought I could do anything. But I had a teacher, who could teach. Ms. K. worked in the darkest space with us 'slow' kids and she encouraged us, and it was slow, but she did it, and I learned. And that woman turned my life around. She believed in me when no-one else did."...or something like that. Children need angels like you. But only if you can honour them, and your time together when you are IN it together in the moment.

Kids know when they are sitting with people that believe in them.

Ok...enough of my dribblings. You say you hate your body. If you won't believe yourself, can you believe an old friend, who's body is equally flabby and imperfect, who's hair is going grayer by the day, who's got lines under her eyes, droopy titties from nursing two wonderful girls, stretchmarks that line the part of her belly where nice underwear should sit and bikini's can't hide, who's bladder sometimes lets go a teeny bit of pee when she laughs too hard (thank god for panty-liners) and who's teeth are falling out or getting pulled out and are no longer white.

That body houses you. It isn't you. We have a responsibility to care of that body and to nourish it...but we should honour the journey it's taken to bring us to today. Did you ever criticize your mother's body for having you? Or your grandmother? ...oh crikey, I'm nattering on like an old woman. Flabby woman. Aging woman. Totally imperfect woman. But a woman that is loved and is capable of loving...as you are.

Ok...much love to you. I'm just sharing...not preaching...just offering. What do I know?...I'm only an egg. So much to learn yet, and my tits aren't at my waist just yet. But my ankles are thick and I think I might need bifocals.

War Relics

My family went to Ottawa, Canada's National capital, this past weekend.

It happened to be the 90th Anniversary of Canada's 'victory' and involvement in WWI, and the taking of Vimy Ridge (a wholly Canadian war success, apparently.)

Taking my nine year old daughter to the War Museum was, an experience.

We walked room upon room of relics, information plastered all over the walls, images and documentary footage screaming at us in highly stylized reproductions of moments in war-time history. Striking, it was. Overwhelming, it was. Sad, it was. An experience, it was.

The Afghanistan exhibit stood out.

Probably because it's happening now. As I pen this blog, history is in the making. With my next breath, history is being made. That history, they say, belongs to those that win.

How are we winning, when people and entire cultures are dying in this manner?

As it goes, Canada lost 6 more men the very day we were in the exhibit.

There are these posts, throughout the exhibit, where you can pencil your thoughts on questions posed to you, such as:

How do you think Canada responded to the events of September 11, 2001?

What do you think Canada's role in Afghanistan is?

There were more...but I'm drawing a blank right now. Personal commentary though, is a fabulous way to walk through an exhibit, especially when it's happening now. As I said, it's a striking exhibit.

My nine year old daughter walked with me. She wanted to answer these questions too. This meant that discussion about what is happening over there, and why it is exactly we are involved over there, and what it all means.

I am not a war expert.

I am a mother of two girls, living in Canada. I'm a Civil Servant. I'm a girl with a horse. I'm a person with thoughts. I'm an optimist, mostly.

So, when my nine year old asked me, "Why does this have to happen?" HOW was I supposed to answer that?

How would you answer that?

Right or wrong, my response to her was this, "Human Beings aren't walking perfection, so we don't always do things right, and ideas about 'what is right' are different person to person, country to country, nation to nation, war to war, and even during peace-times people disagree about 'what is right'...so, one of your responsibilities as a Human Being is to ask the questions that need to be asked, so that you can learn; so that you can form your own ideas and you can share your knowledge with your friends, your family, your community and your world...so, while I may have my own answer for 'why' this has to happen, it would be my opinion, not yours, nor that man's over there. So, why don't you write that question on the post-it note, and post it. You will have asked the first of many questions that will help you find an answer to this good question."

And she did. She also wrote her name and age on that post-it note.

She said she felt good for asking the question.

She hugged my arm as we walked away and said, "Men can be cruel, huh?"

"They can," I replied, "but their capacity for kindness is much larger."

She asked what 'capacity' means. I added, "It means that it's in each of us to use...each of us is born with a HUGE well of kindness, so we have the ability to be kind, which means we CAN; we can CHOOSE...but often we aren't able to dig into that ability, that capacity, that can-ness, unless we are learning. Just as you're learning right now. Or that child in that picture back there learns what he/she needs to learn in their experience, in their country, in this time." [Here's what I didn't say: Although, part of me wonders what you learn by having both of your legs blown off before you're 10.] "Here you are, in Canada, asking questions."

I praised her for asking the first of many questions.

She asked me what it would be like HERE, if the war was on OUR ground, IN CANADA?

Good question.

I found myself wondering if I've just become so desensitized to this war happening OVER THERE? It's not like we see or experience any real 'shortage' in our current daily lives, other than inflated oil prices at the gas pumps perhaps, from this war that we are involved in, is it?

My answer to her is that our lives would be very very different.

And that's why we go...I hope....because we are eager to learn from history. There is much to learn from eons of War and her Relics.

That's why the exhibit is there. To remind us to ask these questions.

And, it looks like I might have more questions to ask.

Education

Learning.

Is it really relevant where you learn what you need to learn, as long as you're learning it?

I have post-secondary education, but not a Masters, or a PhD, nor am I Doctor so and so....but I have learned much in my short stint on this earth, and continue to do so. Until recently, I thought my using the term "Earth School" was my own, but it turns our Gary Zukav uses it in his highly acclaimed best-selling self-love books "Seat of The Soul" and "Soul Stories"....I've only just read some of Mr. Zukav's work, so "Earth School" is not a phrase I had heard anyone else use. So, thanks Mr. Zukav for bringing the phrase to the minds of millions...it's a good one to know....The "Earth School" is this place that we are, where we are born, where we grow, where we impact and share ourselves (in various ways) with those we encounter, enter into intimate moments with, give birth to, lose and love with.

There is no greater teacher than this Earth we are on, or the moments shared upon it, or the people we share those moments with.

Classroom teaching is one method of learning...being spoon-fed what to read (and indeed HOW to read, HOW to count, HOW to multiply, HOW to deduce; HOW to behave, etc.,) how to go about solving problems, told what to contemplate and hopefully, if you've one or two great teachers, you will have been gently led back to yourself so that you learn the necessary skills you need to learn in order to keep on learning.

Our experiences on Earth, are also great teachers. Every encounter is an opportunity to learn something about yourself, how you affect others and what it is you have to offer this Earth and those inhabiting it.

I don't understand people that think that the acquisition of a piece of paper teaches you about living. Or that somehow OWNING a piece of paper, which means you have completed a set of tasks, a pre-assigned set of readings and have written about those readings, and been TESTED on those readings, and that you've paid for the privilege, means that you (if you own this paper), are somehow better than the person standing next to you; the person you are married to; the person next door; your co-worker; your brother or sister, etc.?

(Having said that...I'd like to know that a Surgeon cutting into me has completed those pre-assigned tasks in order that I am confident that they know WHERE and WHAT they are cutting into when they slice me open...but surgery is an extreme life situation, and is not necessarily about learning about living. Medical School still has a lot to teach doctors about bedside manners.)

I went to University, in Canada, AND I emerged from that experience a different person than when I went into the classroom, the theatre and the labs. But I do not think, nor do I believe that I am a better person than the man who fixes my boat (which, by the way, I do not own or have) with a Grade 8 education. This man, with oil encrusted into the lines of his hands & with nails blackened by the grease he works with daily, has handled the machines, the vessels of transport and leisure, for hundreds (maybe even thousands in his lifetime) of people and...for every boat he works on, he has a human experience with those people that trust him with their water vessel and the lives that they put into it. Perhaps these people have discussed the state of politics in the world today with him, or him with them. Or perhaps he has seen too many oil spills destroying the fish habitat and water quality in the thousands of lakes that surround his livelihood and he's doing something about that in his spare time? IF this man is AWARE of himself and grows in personal ways with each experience he has, with each day that passes....he is a better man than many. I am not, nor is anyone else, a BETTER person than this man because of WHERE I've done my learning. If this man is learning about life, about who he is, about how he effects others and how he may work for the betterment of living, then he is the better man than I. Or vice versa.

When I had my first child, I ran a daycare for a brief stint. A stay-home, unlicensed daycare. I got up at 5:30 am and my first children arrived at 5:45 am. I worked until 6pm, or until the last parents finished having tea with me and rolled on home. I worked, I made a good home for my child and I, and I did so by caring for other people's children. I hated myself for this choice.

At the time, I thought this work was beneath me. I thought I was lessening myself, my status in life, by opting to stay home with my child and raise that child in the ways I thought best. I did not fully understand, at that time, the gift of this time with my child, and with these other children. I was in the Earth School...I was learning to be a mother and, at the time, hyper-critical of myself doing so. It wasn't about money. Most days, I made $200/day and stayed home. I hated myself for staying home...even though, this is what I wanted to do and felt was right. I felt an external pressure, from an undefined source, to be elsewhere.

I only stayed in business about 8 months. The sense that I needed to be OUT in THE REAL WORLD making a REAL LIVING, was too immense for me. I sold my house, moved in with my parents for a while and went OUT to work, my mother looking after my child, the whole time sensing that my sense of SELF was to be had OUT THERE in the workforce.

How wrong I was.

All day, I ached for my child. All day, I pushed paper, answered phones, ran the lives of important men and wasn't with my child. I felt foolish for selling everything we had, only to find out that THIS was not living. I had been so sure that the answer was out there in the business world, waiting for me to find it. I guess it was...but not in the way that I had assumed I would find it.

I had assumed something magical would happen. That, from an external source, something (undefinable) would somehow define me as a worthy person.

Sometimes we learn best what we need, what we truly have, by NOT having it.

The "Earth School" taught me the value of Me; of time with a child, my child; of valuing what mother's do, what I do; of valuing what I do as a mother as a teacher to this child, a life-coach to this child and a mentor to this child. There is no course, no classroom, no degree or diploma in the world that can offer this lesson.

You won't learn about love (whether it's loving yourself or others) in the classroom.

You won't learn about giving in the classroom.

You won't learn about WHO you are, in the classroom.

You won't learn about what you need to do on this Earth, in the classroom.

Not unless you have a teacher that belongs to the "Earth School" and is there, in that classroom, to help you realize your potential, your gift to this world and the love that is in you to give.

Many of our best teachers are right here in our backyards. Your boat mechanic, your plumber, your wife, your child, your grandparents, your neighbour, your friend, or that friend you have yet to meet.

It's important that we not discount the experiences we have with one another. We have much to learn from one another. And so much more to share.

When we wake up to these experiences, even if we don't like how they are coated or how they manifest, we are learning. We learn what we need to learn and that...THAT is learning.