Coaching: it's gettin' hot in here - thoughts about wishes

I'm glad to know that someone out there was listening a few weeks ago when, standing in the snow I wished loudly that summer would hurry up and get here already. 

It's nice to feel heard.

The weather, as you know if you live anywhere near me (East Coast area) has been absolutely crazy hot. It's been in the upper 80's lower 90's this whole week. Honestly, I'm kind of overjoyed by this weather. It's nice to have sunlight and warmth for a change, for the tree outside of my window to be covered with tiny little buds and berries. To need a fan to blow on my bare legs while I read in the afternoon.

But no one likes a whole post about the weather and so that's why I want to point something else out here too...this post isn't just about weather, this post really is about Granted Wishes.

See, like i said, a few weeks ago when it was bitter and freezing and we were on our third or fourth blizzard and I had to walk through the snow with my jeans on top of leggings tucked into boots with holes in them, tube socks pulled halfway up my legs and three shirts, a sweater and a coat on, I said to myself, "Can't it please just be summer soon? Can't we skip the cold, wet, rainy spring and just jump right into summer? I would love some 90 degree days!"

And look around you, my friends. That's exactly what happened.

Now obviously I'm not suggesting that I have some magical pull with the universe or the weatherverse or any verses-that-be (but maybe i do, you never know!) but what I am saying is this: Wishes are Granted all the time. 

That's the thing of it - people walk around speaking out loud about what they want in life, and they don't stop and realize how often they get it!

A few years ago i taught a class about this, about how the way we communicate and the words we say can (and do) shape our worlds.  People don't understand this, they don't know that the words that they expel into the atmosphere around them become a part of that atmosphere and shape it. Their words are literally creating their realities. This is true because on a very non-new-agey-level, whatever you say when you aren't alone can be heard by other people and we all know that the words we say are often the largest influences on the people around us.

So without going off onto too huge a tangent here (too late?) I want to express this thought: What you say and specifically for the sake of this post what you ask for and what you want in life often comes to you, you just don't stop to realize it or to see it or to appreciate it for what it is when it gets there.

Many people have forgotten how much they would've loved a day like this a few weeks ago. Instead they're complaining about the heat, driving with their AC on already, shutting the blinds and the windows and cranking up the air, complaining that it's too hot to move or to go anywhere.  I want to say to them, "Remember your former self? You from three weeks ago? That individual is kicking you right now for not appreciating this!"

How many women wish for more romance in their lives? And yet when their husbands fill their cars with gas or when they suggest they go out for ice cream after dinner these same women don't stop and realize that their wish is being granted. Sure, it might not always look like exactly what you had in your mind, but what kind of world would that be? Who do you want to be married to? Yourself?

The thing to do here is to pay more attention to the world around you. Look at the ways in which your wishes are being granted.  Are you upset because you never have time to yourself and then all of a sudden your kids' friends invite them over for a few hours? Bam. Wish granted. Don't fill that time with stupid errands or other obligations or by doing whatever you would be doing if the kids were still around - go out there and do whatever you wished you could be doing if you had more time! You are being given this gift, don't waste it.

The point of this is (if i haven't yet beaten this thing to death): we are all being given the things we ask for in life. You just have to learn to open your eyes and open your heart to seeing that.  Do you want more flowers? Stop and notice how often you'll see pictures of flowers, books with flowers on them, commercials about flowers. Play a game with yourself, ask the Universe to show you something totally weird like pink bunnies or keychains with your initials on them or whatever and i promise you that without fail you will be seeing pink bunnies every day (and you'll be sober too! (hopefully!)).

Sure, has it been suggested to me that this could be a case of "what you seek you shall find" and that really all the pink bunnies were there all along? Yes. Definitely. And I don't debate that for a second - that could totally be true. But I ask you this: SO WHAT? Isn't it better to begin to actively look for the things we DO want in life than it is to search for the things we don't? Why not see the happiness, the positivity? Why not find those wishes for ourselves if that's the case. It doesn't really fundamentally matter either way if the Universe is responding to you or if you are just seeing what's already there. Either way your wishes are being granted and even the most cynical person out there hast to admit that there's something a little bit magical in that.

Life: There's something amiss here.

i've been thinking recently and i've come to the conclusion that our culture is focused on the wrong things. 

Try not to say "duh" and roll your eyes at me for just a second. I'm aware that this is a fairly obvious observation.  But please, allow me to explain what specifically I mean...

See, I'm the kind of person who is very obsessed with the "Meaning Of Life" (all in capital glowing letters with an orchestra playing triumphant music in the background). I like to sit around and ponder, I like to fill my time with things that I feel are enhancing to me on either a mental, spiritual, physical or emotional level. I pretty much don't do things if they don't fit one or another of those criteria. 

As you can expect, this has made for a fairly nontraditional lifestyle for me. 

My weird life aside (we'll save the details for another day), I kind of want to talk about the principals that drive these decisions and I'd like to wonder why more people, or really, society on the whole isn't governed in more of this direction. 

Look at how most people spend their time (and this is NOT a criticism, just an observation): Get up, go to work, come home, watch TV, eat, go to sleep. Weekends are for errands and home maintenance and, more often than not, some heavy or at least moderate drinking.  Lather, rinse, repeat. If you have children, work them in around the seams - either drop them off at school/daycare, pick them up and include some baths and maybe some children's movies or hopefully some playtime and that's about it.

But what i want to know is where is the time for the REAL priorities? And why has our culture evolved to the state of existence where this is an absurd question?

Sure, it's one thing if you're the kind of person who LOVES their job and lives for it and who feels fundamentally fulfilled as a person by the work you're doing. Than I definitely think that spending 10 hours a day in commute/at work is not only a valid way to spend your time but a GREAT way to spend it. Unfortunately, of the probaly 1,000 people i know, there is literally only ONE person in my life who fits that criteria.  Most of the other people I know are working/living life like this because they have to, because there is not another option.  Isn't that unfortunate? 

Why do we live in a society where there is really no other choice?  Why is the best option to pick the job that appeals to us the most out of all the other options?  Why are we settling for the least crappy choice? 

I mean honestly, wouldn't it be nice if our culture was more focused on family and enriching activities?  What if it was more like it used to be in the middle ages, where a family ran the household together, where they were all responsible for their livelihood and they made what was needed for themselves and their neighbors and that was enough.  Why is it that suddenly life is focused on being outside of the home, away from the family, becoming a robot in a cubicle and spending all the best years of your life (and hours of your day) by imputing information into the great machine of the Corporation? 

There is no focus on community anymore, instead it's the Global Community.  There is no Neighborhood Unity, no Family Focus.  Time with your children (from BOTH parents) is a luxury.  It's all about these meaningless things - arbitrary steps in a system that is fabricated to give us false senses of meaning: promotions, bonuses, projects, deadlines. Outside of the building that you work in these things don't even exist, they have no universal currency, they mean nothing to anyone else but the people on your Team or in your office complex.  Time spent with family however, THAT is a universal concept that has meaning. Enriching your spirit, that holds real value. Doing something that stirs you on an absolutely fundamental level - that's the stuff that lives have revolved around since the beginning of time...or at least they used to.

What has happened to out culture?  Why do all of these pursuits get shuffled to the back of the line? Why is family time often the last thing on our list yet getting to some gray building on time in the morning is first?  Why does it matter what reports get filed when? How will that ever ultimately stir something within you on any level that's real?  How will that ever be the thing that really truly makes your life not just a series of passed hours but instead a series of Events that have something to do with You. 

Sure, you can inject yourself into your work, you definitely can make a difference in these corporations. I don't want to suggest that you can't or that they don't give you a chance to do that...but I do ask why it's so hard for the people who just don't want that life.  Why does this culture shun the idea of being LESS work-focused and more family/life focused. Why is it taboo to want to LIVE more and work less?

The culture has even tried to take mothering away from us. How many women now choose a career over their family?  And why? Because somehow it is socially unacceptable not to be a career woman.  Somehow it is no longer okay to stay home and raise your children and NOT worry about what your career title it is.  

And even worse, it's now officially way harder financially to be a one-income home. That's the other thing the culture has done to us - made it Necessary for us to work because we cannot be educated members of society if we are unable to repay those debts. 

It just seems unfair to me.  Unfair and skewed.  I have a husband who would love nothing more than to immerse himself in studying history and learning as much as he can about it and i KNOW that if he had the chance to do that he would be enriched and fulfilled beyond all words. He would eventually contribute back to society in great ways through writing or lecturing or other things that would come to him by getting to live this dream.  But is he ever going to be able to do that?  I doubt it.  And why? Because our culture doesn't really make it possible. 

He cannot throw himself into learning and have a family, nor can he do it and go to school.  He can't abandon the workforce at this stage of his life because then he will have to explain himself to potential future employers and the odds are that they wouldn't respect his lapse from the workforce. 

The point is, he cannot live his dream and so he tries to tell himself that he just simply doesn't want to do it. 

But i know that's a lie.  and that breaks my heart. 

I don't understand a society that is designed to put all of it's citizens into little slots where they have to do repetitive tasks over and over again in order to pay their dues and pay back the schooling that they HAD to do to get them there in the first place.  It seems unfair and it seems to me like the priorities are seriously screwed up. 

If I could restructure things, I would. I would have a much more community-oriented culture with the priority on family, on using and taking and creating only what you need and on giving back.  People would work of course but they would do things they liked, they would support one another and they would not need to work forever.  The culture would be focused on finding what is inside people's hearts and souls and helping them achieve those goals. My husband would study and I would write and we would still be able to exist somehow.  Others would get to have their antique shops, their horse farms, their artist studios and everyone would be home in the early afternoon to see their children and their spouses and families would get together on the weekends and just enjoy one another. 

I don't know why that world is so far-fetched. Why is that kind of life so impossible to have?  What has happened to us that imagining all of that is just farcical at this point?  Why do i seem like a naive child when i write this instead of someone who has an innovative perspective?  Because something is wrong here in this culture, that's why. 

And i honestly have no idea how to fix it. 

Life: i do not like the cone of shame

My cat is a cone-head.

I feel badly about this because, honestly, she's depressed. She lazes around more than usual (she is a kitten afterall) and often sits with her cone facing downwards towards the floor, just staring at her little circle of carpet. It's pretty heartbreaking.

At night she climbs onto me and puts her cone on my face, and we breathe on each other and sleep uncomfortably but tangled up because at least she feels better being close to me I think.

I wish that I could explain to her why she has to wear this thing on her head. It's pretty clear that she's ticked off at me for it. Yesterday I took it off for a while so she could have a break and she took off running around the house for two hours. I couldn't catch her. Occasionally she would run by and take a swipe at me or bite at my ankles.

I got her messages loud and clear.

I want to tell her that it's not my fault, but I can't. This shows me just how much I hate when people are mad at me and I can't talk them out of it, lol. She's a cat, she is wearing a plastic cone 24/7 and I'm the one who keeps putting it back on her. Of course she's going to be annoyed, who wouldn't?

I'm just looking forward to Monday when her stitches come out and we can ditch the cone permanently. It will be nice when I don't have to stare into her sad little eyes anymore, or fix her ears that have gotten pushed backwards into the cone.  Her sad little ears, they get all bent up and folded backwards and she looks like a little piglet.

Talk about a guilt-complex, right? I literally just wrote a whole post dedicated to wishing i could explain the cone-head to my cat so she wouldn't still be mad at me, lol. Oh well. I know it's for her own good and I'm starting to suspect that it's for MY own good as well. I think I'm learning something by not being able to convince her that I'm not the bad guy lol. Like maybe I need to just let go and not be such a control freak sometimes?

Nah, that doesn't sound right. lol

Coaching: Patience is hard

Patience.

Patience is something that's hard to come by. At least for me it is.

It feels like our culture doesn't really get the concept of patience.  It's like in America the idea of waiting and non-instant-gratification is annoying, it's something we don't think we should have to do. I know it's cliche but i totally blame TV for this. Things seem to magically just happen on TV. People have wealth and satisfaction and test results all within seconds on the screen.

In real life though, things unfortunately don't work like that.

Real life requires a lot of waiting and working and doing and then waiting some more.

And to be honest, I hate that!

The rock pictured above is on my desk.  I keep it there to remind me obviously that I should Never Give Up and to inspire me to keep going when I want to do exactly that.  It also makes me think of that saying that goes something like, "if things aren't better yet than you haven't reached the end".  I guess what i mean is that I have recently come upon the belief that you can't fail at something if you don't stop trying and giving it your all. Just Never Give Up and you will be okay.

Weight loss and fitness is a good example of this: it's hard to lose weight and to get into shape, anyone can tell you that. It's hard to undergo an entire "Lifestyle Change" (a phrase which seems like just another corny title applied to something to make it sell but which is in fact an incredibly accurate description of what a weight loss and fitness routine is). It's hard but if you are diligent with Health and Fitness and if you eat right and work out then EVENTUALLY it will pay off.  It may take weeks or even months to show any sign of progress (trust me, I recently worked out 5 times a week for three weeks only to see the scale go UP before finally going down 1.2 pounds) but eventually it will show up, it will pay off.

Imagine if I had given up on my fitness routine before I had seen that weight loss? I never would have known that if I had stuck it out, I would have found results.

The same is true of everything we want in life, as long as we are TRYING at it and we don't give up we are at the very least bound to learn incredibly valuable life lessons. We must be adaptable, we must be willing to be open to the information we receive along those paths but at long as we do those things (adapt, try, grow, and wait) eventually fortune will smile upon us and all of the pain of patience will be worth while.

And if our lives were TV shows, all of that stuff I just described would fall to the editing-room floor.

But that's okay because I have the sneaking suspicion that the waiting and trying is what makes it taste extra sweet (or extra healthy if your goal is weight loss lol) at the end.

So I'm trying to take my own advice here, to never give up on myself and my ambitions, to put one foot in front of the other and to be patient and wait for my dreams to come true.

What are you waiting for?

Life: Cupcakes make the world a better place

Sometimes when it's winter and it's cold and it's raining and miserable you just need a little bit of joy in your life to get through it.

On days like that I sit around and plan my eventual move to warm and sunny climates. I literally look up real estate in places like Florida, California and the Caribbean.

I am a big believer in making our own happiness though, and so today I figured that I should take that quite literally:

through baking, of course.

I think that when we make things, no matter what it is that we make we are doing something that is essential in the Universe. The act of creation is a part of us, it is the driving force behind all living things. And on a simplistic level, it makes us feel better to know that we are capable of creating something from a pile of separate components.

today I created cupcakes.

Well, cupcakes and some other things but none of the other things are tangible (they're all words strung into sentences that are living inside my computer...hopefully one day they'll become something tangible though! that's the goal after all)

Cupcakes. Happy little pieces of perfection. They are the best thing to make on a cold, rainy February day when you find yourself wondering if you do in fact have Seasonal Affective Disorder.

and there is something so great about putting the sparkling little sprinkles on top.

So get out there and make something today. Even if it's something totally indulgent like cupcakes. It still counts!

Life: One Year Later

Today marks one year since The Fire that came and burned down the home where I grew up and tried to take my parents and their dogs along with it.

This has been a hard year for me, it's been full of ups and downs. I will never forget that night...when I went to bed and the world was normal and I woke up and an entirely new era had begun.

I don't mean to dramatize things and I know that there is a seductive allure in telling our own stories so much that they become Epic Tales but this really was a big deal in my life. It's everyone's worst nightmare: to hear the phone ring in the middle of the night when no one is pregnant so it can't be good news.

That's what happened to me a year ago. Only my phone didn't ring, Ryan's did. Why? Because I had absentmindedly left mine on silent, something I never do anymore. Leaving your phone on silent all night is a luxury afforded to those who have never gotten calls like this in the middle of sleeping. It's a luxury I miss but I am glad to avoid now.

When Ryan's phone rang at 2:30 in the morning and he saw who was calling he handed it to me to answer. It was my mom and when I said, "Is everything okay" she said "No." and sobbed.

I remember snippets of the call, mostly her saying the words "the house is gone" over and over again and telling me that Heather (my sister) was on her way to pick her up and she would be at Heather's house (which was then across the street from my own house) soon. I remember collapsing to the floor and then, like a frantic bolt of lightening I darted out of our room, out my front door and across the street where I collapsed onto Heather's front steps sobbing in my nightgown in the middle of the freezing February night. All I knew was that my parents were on their way and that our house was gone.

Ryan came out to try and bring me back inside but I couldn't move from there, I had to wait, my mother said she was on her way and I had to see her, to touch her, to know she was truly okay. He  brought clothes out to me and I dressed on the porch and shivered.

When my mother, father and their two little dogs arrived I burst into tears. My mother looked stunned, my father kept shaking his head.  I wrapped my arms around my mom and buried my face in her hair. It smelled like a campfire, a scent that would linger around all of us for weeks to come.

A few hours later, my siblings and I congregated at Heather's house with the exception of my other sister. My brother, Heather, my mother, Ryan and myself set off to make the trek down to our family home to see what was left. I know I went mostly to find out if this was all Really Real or not. I had to see it, I just had to know.

When we turned onto our street I thought that it had begun to snow. I was wrong. Ash fell from the sky like tragic little snowflakes. Ash. Remnants of our old lives falling all around the car, coating the street. I put my hand to the window and stared.

The house was still standing, but it was still completely gone. Charred and collapsed inside, there really was nothing left.

I remember saying "No, no, no, no, no" and falling to my knees in a pile of rubble that was once my mother's desk and bookshelves and a chest I had made that housed all of our family photos. I dug and dug and dug through broken glass and wet pieces of wall just to try and find anything that I could in that pile. There was nothing there.

Smoke still hung in the walls like the ghosts of our memories.



and as we all looked around at the place where we each used to lived, it dawned upon me: this is Really Real.





For weeks afterward, everywhere I went I had the morbid ability to imagine whatever room I was in transformed to it's post-fire skeletal form. I knew what lived underneath of plaster and drywall and I could picture anywhere in ruins. It was terrifying. I felt like the little boy in the Sixth Sense: haunted, stalked by the dead but in my case it was dead rooms and not dead people.

We would make return visits to our house, some things in the attic had survived, some things from the dining room and an old guest bedroom were in tact still. Every time we entered the house, we had to wear masks and don our 'Fire Clothes' - articles of clothing my father kept in the trunk of his car. These were items that we would only wear into the house because that smell never comes off.

It was post-apocalyptic the way we looked. And in many ways, for us, that felt appropriate.

But this isn't all bad news, I promise, it's not.

Over the time that has passed between now and that morning I spent digging on my knees through the ash of my old memories, there has been a lot of growth.

For one thing, we have all learned to cherish every day and one another very much. I never take any moments with my loved ones for granted anymore. Not even a little bit (like a woman at my book club joked the other day, "you never screen mom's calls again!" how true that is). 

For another, we've had the chance to really define for ourselves just what it means to have a Home.

A house is one thing. It's a building where people live.

A Home however...well, a Home is something else entirely. A Home is a magical sort of thing, alive in the same way that memories are. A Home is a place that holds you, it keeps you, it's where you belong, it's where part of you always is, even if the rest of you has moved on.

And over this year I've had to really come to terms with myself about what A Home really means to me and what it means to lose a Home. I've had to learn that I can lose my Home and not lose the parts of myself that used to live there as well.

Sure, some of it is gone. There was a death in our lives after-all, the death of what used to be, of where we used to live. I had to mourn that death, I had to grieve for it and let it take over me and let myself go through all of the pain of having to figure out just what it all meant. I had to write a letter saying Goodbye to my Home and to those photos and moments that are forever lost.

But in doing that I was able to really clarify for myself just exactly how valuable a Home really is, how much meaning and power it has. A Home: the family member i didn't even realize I had until it was gone.

And now I am aware of what a gift it is to even HAVE a Home, to have a family, to have people in my life that make me feel like there is somewhere I belong. I only felt so empty because I once had felt so full. That is a blessing, truly. A gift like that is one that nothing can ever destroy, not even a hungry fire in the middle of a February night.

So I am grateful. I can truly say that now. I am grateful and I am at peace. I understand that what has been has been and that it is important to honor your past, to respect it and to move on when it is gone. I also have learned that it is equally as important to cherish the present, to absolutely revel in it, to roll around in it and wrap it around you like a warm blanket because that is when all of life is happening: right now at this very moment. And not to be all doom-and-gloom but it is very true when they say that no one ever knows what tomorrow may bring. So live and love today for today. Plain and simple.

As for my parents, they are doing well and are so grateful for the outpouring of love and care they have received over this year. Their house has been rebuilt and while it is very different from the old place that used to live within those walls, it is still theirs nonetheless. And every day it moves farther and farther away from being a House and gets closer and closer to becoming a Home again.

Thank you to everyone who has been there for me and for us this year. I am eternally grateful to you. <3

Love,
Rhian

Coaching: How to find a Good Husband

I was thinking last night about marriage and how people expect SO MUCH from their spouse in marriage. It's like in our culture we're taught that our spouse is supposed to fulfill us, to COMPLETE us even...like they are literally the missing part of ourselves.

I think this is a toxic message and it sets up marriages for more of a struggle than they should be. The person we're with isn't meant to be another part of OURSELVES, they are meant to fully be themselves, they are meant to only be who they are. And marriage isn't some experience meant to make us wildly happy all the time, it's meant to be two people, working towards the same goals in life. It is my own job to find my own happiness in the world, just like it is my partner's own job to find and create his own happiness in the world. Imagine what a burden it would be to place all of your potential for happiness into the hands of someone else? I would hate that if someone said, "okay now you have to make me happy for the rest of our lives. go." like what? fend for yourself please, i'm trying to sort out my own damn issues over here.

I know that might sound cynical or detached or mean even but really it's not, it's logical and important to realize. Marriage isn't about completing all of the missing holes in your heart...that's what life coaching and therapy is for. Marriage is about going through the journey of life with someone, having each other's backs, being a family, and walking together towards mutual goals.

There are so many relationships that are doomed because people are trying to make a Husband out of just a Regular Guy who doesn't share the same goals as them.

Think about it, a Husband has very different qualities than a Boyfriend or a Fling or a Date or anything else. A Husband is someone who is on the same level as you, who is more LIKE you than not (in terms of the big picture and mutual goals, not in terms of the small stuff at all). A Husband is someone who shares your values, who wants the same basic things you do (family, education, career goals, whatever it may be overall) and it is someone who supports you, who is able to help you through life, who you are able to figure things out with and work together with.

Sure Blane with the tattoos might have a six pack and long hair and he might be exactly the kind of guy you never thought would be interested in you and so once you've got him you just wanna do any and everything to keep him but you'd be fooling yourself if you think that Blane will ever become Husband material. Especially if you think that you can get him there yourself.

And yet how many people actually MARRY these people who really should have just been Flings or Dates or Rebellious Phases? So many. SO MANY.

And there are so many women out there who are glamorous professionals who are having the hardest time meeting The Right Guy to settle down with and so they remain single into their mid thirties and blow their shot at the family they're scared to admit that they want...and why? because they're unwilling to realize that there is no such thing as The Perfect Person. That it is totally OKAY to marry The Good Guy. The Friend, The Confident. There are so many great Potential Husbands out there that just get overlooked because of this misconception that our spouse is supposed to be this Sex God/Wild/Lady's Man and yet also want to wipe little Bobby's nose and invest in a sensible retirement plan.

No wonder everyone is having such a hard time.

My advice is to know who your flings are, go have flings with them, get it out of your system and then turn around and look at the guy in your office, or the friend you've had since childhood or that guy who always stutters around you and you know that he is just secretly in love with you but he has glasses and tucks his shirts into his jeans so you've written him off. Just look at these people and ask yourself, "Would he be a good HUSBAND" because that is a very different role to play than Boyfriend and honestly, only some guys are cut out for it and can do it well.

I bet that a lot of people would be surprised to find that yes, surrounding them are many, many great Potential Husbands that are just being overlooked. The challenge is to get over your own insecurities and issues, get past the need to have arm candy or to finally feel validated by a "Jock" wanting to date you and deal with all of your OWN issues before you try to find someone to spend your life with. Because it's only fair to be a good Wife to all of those good Husbands out there.