A Little Postaday Mind Trickery

Since it's been four days since I've posted here, I suppose I'm no longer a Wordpress Postaday member in good standing. That's okay.  I'm not beating myself up over it.  I knew I'd never be able to keep up with that kind of blogging schedule.  I had a pretty good run at it for a couple of weeks, but in the last few days somehow lost momentum.

The whole daily posting resolution reminded me a little bit of Mr. Federighe (fed-é-reek-e), my fourth grade violin teacher.  Each time he taught us a new piece, we were supposed to go home and practice it 10 times every day.

Can you imagine?  Suwanee River scratched out on the violin 10 times every day?

I don't think any of us ever did that (except for Margaret M., who ended up as principal violist in the Boston Symphony).   I remember making it to six times through on one very rainy Saturday afternoon, before giving up and going back to reading Harriet the Spy.

Many years later, I ran in to Mr. F. once again - I was actually his accompanist for a while, and we shared a tiny office in the junior high school where he was teaching at the time.  He was still telling the junior high students to practice every piece 10 times a day.  "You don't really think they're going to do that, do you?" I asked him.

"Oh of course not," he answered.  "But maybe they'll at least practice it once or twice before they throw in the towel!"

Pretty crafty thinking.

That's kind of what happened to me with the Postaday program.  It tricks me into writing more often than I might otherwise do - and that's just fine.

How about you? Do you have any little mind tricks you play on yourself?

What's the Word?

I get reflective at this time of year, whether it's the inviting specter of a brand new year, the cold days of winter with plenty of time to think, or the impending anniversary of my birth -  which is definitely enough to give anyone pause. This year I've been thinking a lot about what I want to DO.  I've been writing more, and recalling how much pleasure and satisfaction comes from taking a snippet of thought, puzzling it out, and putting it into words.  I've been thinking about expanding some of those snippets into a longer piece of writing (dare I call it a book?), and have been exploring some options in my head.  But I've also been mourning the lack of music in my life right now.  The other day, a Facebook friend posted that "there was a hole in her musical life big enough to drive a truck through."  I feel the sadness behind the flippancy of those words.

So I've been wishing, and hoping, and daydreaming about new ventures.  As often happens, something I read seemed to speak directly to these thoughts.  In Words to the Wise, life coach and Oprah Magazine columnist Martha Beck wrote about the power of words in shaping our goals.  "Stated goals are magical," she says.  "They dictate our attitudes and behavior and where we put our energy."  However, caution is required in conjuring up these dreams.  Sometimes, what we think we want isn't what we really bargained for.  And sometimes, what we really want has been with us all along.

When it comes to successfully naming our dreams, it all comes down to word choice.

"The difference between a dangerous goal and a safe effective one has everything to do with parts of speech,"  Beck asserts.  "Most goal setter use mainly nouns and verbs ("I want my business to succeed," or "I want to have a baby"). This frequently leads to either outright failure or the kind of success that doesn't make people nearly as happy as they expect."

According to Beck, we need to focus on the "quality of experiences we want to have," rather than on a situation we aim to create, and choose the adjectives which best describe that experience.  Here's the process in a nutshell:

Pick your dream, your most outrageous dream.  Imagine the best case scenario of your life when that dream has been fulfilled.  Go into your soul and imagine how you're feeling...fulfilled, energized, important, delighted, valuable, nourished... choose three of those adjectives which best describe your emotions.  Write them down.

Go ahead.  Go daydream for a while and then come back.  I'll wait.

Okay, got your dream words?

Now look at those words and see how they relate to your life right now.  Are there things already happening in your life that make you feel that way?  How can you expand on those areas, creating more happiness in your present life while perhaps drawing yourself closer to your fantasy goal?

If I look at one of my fantasies -  being part of a small, successful chamber music group - and imagine myself rehearsing and performing with three or four really talented musicians who also become my friends, I would expect to feel creative, and proud, and valued.   If those feelings are my goal, if that's what I want to experience more of in my life, how can I come closer to that state of being right now?

It's an interesting way to look at things, isn't it?  It turns the process of stating goals on its ear.

And makes me think about the power of words in a whole new way.

How about you?  What adjectives did you come up with?  Is that experience manifesting itself in your life right now?

Yearning to Harvest

To grow what we need requires a sanctuary of time and attention, a patch of ground secured by some clear, recognizable boundary that can shield us from the endless demands, choices, and responsibilities eroding our day, so we can listen, uncover what is ultimately important, remember what is quietly sacred.  Setting boundaries around what is most valuable, precious, and necessary for us to thrive actually creates a space of freedom and abundance.  Without these self-imposed restrictions on ourselves and others, we my never be truly free to plant, grow, or harvest what we yearn to harvest from the garden of our lives.

Wayne Muller, A Life of Being, Having, and Doing Enough

I'm re-posting this beautiful paragraph from One Rich Life (with humble thanks to Joan for sharing it)  because it seemed to me these words should be spread among us like rich, dark soil is spread over the garden.  Spread, and cultivated, and worked into the ground with our fingers.

At the beginning of this month, I wrote that one of my goals for 2011 was to "just be happy."  As I plod through these long, dark, cold days of winter, I feel about as far from happiness as I've ever felt.  Reading Muller's words, I realize what I need to do is "set boundaries around what is most valuable, precious, and necessary" for me to thrive.

But what does that mean in practical terms?  While part of me longs to "drop out" of the rat race of modern, everyday life, and head for a tiny cottage in the hills, I know that's neither realistic nor emotionally sustainable.   I also know that I allow the outside world to impose itself on me far too much and far too deeply.  Part of setting boundaries for me will always mean learning to shake off the traces of the world's demands to the extent that it's practical, and live contentedly within the sanctuary of my own life and the things that are ultimately important to me.

Mostly I feel like I should have this all figured out by now.  That I should know how to create the kind of balance between work and responsibility and life which will allow me to flourish.  That I'll know how and when to let go of the things that bother me, and stop giving them so much prominence in the garden of my life.

I think, though, that we're all seekers - that the world today makes it harder and harder to find just the right spot in which to put down roots and grow.

How about you?  Are you still seeking the perfect balance for the garden of  your life?  Have you been able to create the boundaries you need in order to thrive and grow?  What's the secret?

Small Comforts

I'm looking for comforters these days, the small things that make the long, burdensome days of winter more bearable. It hasn't been an easy winter for me, as you can probably tell from the rather cynical tenor of my posts lately. Luckily, I'm fairly easily comforted.  And one of the things I count on most for comfort is my morning routine.  My husband gets up first, and starts the coffee brewing.  When I get out of bed, he usually has a steaming hot cup already prepared for me.  We settle into our favorite chairs in the living room and read for about an hour - or long enough to finish the pot of coffee.  Sometimes we'll be joined by one dog (Magic), who likes to jump up next to me in the chair and cuddle.  The other dog (Molly) remains in bed until the last possible moment - which usually means until it's time to leave for a walk.

One of the things I like best about this morning time is watching the sunrise.  When I first get up these winter morns, it's dark and we don't bother opening the blinds.  Usually by the time I've poured our second cups of coffee, I can begin to see the first traces of light.  If the sun is coming up, which is a rare treat this month, I'll pull open the blinds and watch the room become bathed in its rosy glow.

We've fallen into this pattern over the past few years, and its a lovely, peaceful way to start the day.  I enjoy this slower pace, in contrast to all the years when we had to get up and out early for school or work.  It's nice to have a quieter schedule now and a later start to the business of the day.

It's a small comfort, but one that's become necessary to me.

How about you? What small comforts make your days a little easier?

Clueless

Sometimes I feel really clueless. And then sometimes, I just feel old.

Tonight, apparently, are the Golden Globe awards, and I was completely unaware that they were being televised until I signed on to Twitter and saw a kazillion snarky tweets about dresses and hairdo's and sore losers making faces at the monitor.

It isn't that I care so much about the Golden Globe awards, but it just seems as if I should have known they were on.

So, I'm clueless.

But before all that,  one of my friends asked me a question - the name of the computer store on the corner, the one that I walk by every morning when I walk the dogs, the one I actually told this friend about when she asked if I knew of a computer store in the neighborhood.

Do you think I could remember the name of the store?

No.

There was nothing but a huge black spot in my brain where the name of that store used to be.

And that made me feel really old.

As a matter of fact, the very same thing happened to me just a few days ago.  Someone asked to the name of something very familiar, and I could not, for the life of me, recall it.  Now, not only can I not recall the specific name, I can no longer recall who asked me or what they were asking about.

See, I'm not normally the kind of person who has trouble remembering things.  As a matter of fact, when anyone in my family wants to know the name of Aunt Mary's youngest granddaughter's husband and when they got married, they usually ask me.  I'm known as the archiver of useless and trivial information.

So when I lose the name of an ordinary store, a name that I look at each and every day as I walk by, and then look at it again later when I drive by on my way to work, then I feel not only old, but frightened.

I simply cannot start having dark black holes where my memory is supposed to be.

I know I'm getting old (er).  In another two months, I will be --wait, I'm mustering the courage to write this---55 years old.

Gulp.

The unfortunate thing about this whole "aging process" is that it's completely irrevocable and totally out of my control.  Sure, I can exercise regularly, do crossword puzzles, and eat leafy greens until the cows come home, but there is no guarantee that any of that will do me one bit of good.  I could still end up an addlepated mess who can't remember where's she supposed to be at any given moment.  And don't let people tell you that getting older is nothing to worry about, or that life begins when you're 50, or that 60 is the new 40, or any of that other bromidic nonsense the media keeps hurling at us poor baby boomers in their pathetic attempt to make us feel optimistic enough to buy whatever product they're selling.

Getting older is just for the birds, and there's no two ways about it.

Maybe that's why we start forgetting things as we age.  That way we don't remember all the good things about being younger, so we can remain clueless about what we're now missing.