Baggage Claim

"The cost of a thing is the amount of what I call life which is required to be exchanged for it, now or in the long run."

"Henry David Thoreau

Yesterday I started packing for an upcoming trip that Tom and I are taking to Europe. I've never under-packed for an excursion, but I most definitely have over-packed. What I am trying to do for this trip is right-pack. Having what I need and not burdened by what I don't. It's an art for sure, and one that I've yet to master. This trip is yet another opportunity to hone my skills. I think the trick is in considering what will be needed to navigate where we're going. How will we spend our time, and in what conditions? By the end of the day, my bag was looking pretty good. With a week and a half to go before leaving on a jet plane, I've got time to toss in a little more or take a little less. 

Life is a trip, and we are constantly packing our bags for what lies ahead. The same principles apply. What will we need to navigate the road ahead? How will we spend our time, and in what conditions? Wherever we're headed, a right-packed suitcase is one that will equip us with what we need but not encumber us with what we don't. 

Lately, one of my favorite questions to ask is "What don't you want to carry with you into your next chapter? Whether I pose that question to clients, family, friends, or to  myself, I am always struck by how quickly people arrive at an answer. Whether they share it with me or not, they can almost always identify something that they know has become a burden. It no longer serves them or maybe never has. Whatever it is, carrying it any further down the road will only wear them out and weigh them down. 

Our bags are our own to pack and to carry.

The contents are ours to choose or to chuck.

What is one thing that you want to leave behind? An old story? An obsolete belief? A depleting relationship? A long held habit? A lingering resentment? Sometimes leaving something behind requires help. Who can help you right-pack your suitcase? With that "thing" no longer taking up space, what might there be room for?

We are on the trip of a lifetime, and whatever we carry in our bag claims a piece of our life. 

This post is written with gratitude for my BFF and partner in crime, Kristine. Don't ever throw out those black shoes!

B.O.U.N.D.A.R.I.E.S

Just this past week I've had at least four different conversations, with four different people,  about four different things, happening in four different sets of circumstances. But they all had one thing in common. In one way or another, every conversation was about boundaries.

Most people call me Molly. But some people call me Mol. Use of my nickname implies connection, trust, respect, intimacy, and love -  sometimes even love at first sight. Anyone can call me Molly but not everyone can call me Mol. Sometime someone I've only just met calls me that, and It is soooo OK. Other times someone that I've known for a long time calls me that and it is sooooo not OK. I know it. I can feel it. One is OK. The other is not. What stands between the two is a boundary. 

Brene' Brown, in an On Being interview with Krista Tippet says "...'boundaries' is like a big gauzy word, but it's a really simple thing. What's OK and what's not OK."

• Is that behavior OK or not OK?
• Is that language OK or not OK?
• Is that request OK or not OK?
• Is that touch OK or not OK?
• Is sharing that information OK or not OK?
• Is that physical proximity OK or not OK?
• Is that topic OK or not OK?
• Is that expectation OK or not OK?
• Is that question OK or not OK?
• Is that sense of familiarity OK or not OK?
• Is dropping the last two letters of my first name Ok or not Ok?

When faced with a situation where boundaries are concerned, ask yourself. Is that OK or not OK? You'll know the answer. You'll feel the answer.

The boundaries we set establish more than what is acceptable and what is not. They signify who we are, and what we stand for. 

 A clear boundary says:

I may be OK. 

You may be OK.

But that is not OK. 

Practical Magic

“Imagination is everything. It is the preview of life’s coming attractions.”

— Albert Einstein

The vision for our home began almost 15 years ago on the back of a cocktail napkin, over a glass of wine. Tom and I sat at a corner table in Paradise Lodge at Mt. Ranier and began imagining what the home we hoped to build might look like. Over time I found pictures in magazines that captured the look I was after, and when the time came, we engaged an architect to turn our cocktail napkin into house plans. Plans in hand, we went about the process of finding the right builder. We talked to three of them. The first one, when we asked him for a bid, said, "I don't do bids." Not our guy. The second one looked at our plans, and said, "Ka-Ching!" Definitely not our guy. Then we met Bob. As we sat around his kitchen table and talked through the drawings and our hopes for our home, he pushed his chair back and said, "If we work together, my goal is that I will want to invite you to our annual Halloween Costume Party when we're done." Bob was our guy. 

When you build a home, there are so many practical and aesthetic decisions to be made. Lighting. Cabinetry. Paint colors. Window trim. Flooring. Appliances. It is hard not consumed by how the home will look, and easy to forget how you want it to feel and what you want to happen there. Don't get me wrong, I had very strong opinions about how I wanted it to look, and Bob quickly caught my vision. When there was a decision to be made about whether to go with plan A or plan B for a particular aspect, I usually wasn't on site to actually see what Bob was talking about. So I would ask him, "Bob, which would I like? A or B?" He always knew the answer. And, he was always right. But the truth is, I spent a lot more time imagining how I wanted our home to feel rather than how it would to look. How did Tom and I want people to feel when they came to visit? What did we want to have happen there when people came together under our roof? What kinds of conversations did we envision happening as family and friends gathered around the outdoor fireplace in the morning for coffee? 

The more I imagined the answers to those questions the more clear they became. Our home would be a place of rest, renewal, and redemption. It would be a place of love, laughter, and listening. It would be a place of grace, healing, and extravagant welcome. Our home would be a shelter from the storms that would blow through the lives of those we love, a place where people could tell their stories and be heard, and share their pain and be seen. I began to imagine  people in front of the fireplace that hadn't yet been built. I saw them sitting in as yet to be purchased Adirondack chairs out in the field as the sun went down. They were gathered around the table we didn't yet own, sharing good food, good wine, and good conversation. 

Everything that happened in my mind's eye now happens under our roof. The place has its own spirit, and the home we affectionately call "the cabin" continues to work its magic. It's like it knows how to care for those inside its walls. If those walls could talk, they would tell the accumulated stories of healing and forgiveness, grief and grace, wonder and wounds, successes and failures, and of love and loss. Truthfully, we stewards of our home more than owners. It doesn't belong to us, it belongs to everyone that comes here, and to the Spirit that turned what was imagined into what is real.

When it comes to building a home, there's more to it than meets the eye. The same is true when it comes to building a life. When we spend time not only doing what it takes to build it, but also imagining what we want it to feel like, and what we want it to offer to the world, the way it can all come together is practically magic.

PS We still go to Bob-the-builder's Halloween Costume party. 

 

 

When you build a home, there are so many decisions to be made, and it can be easy to get consumed by how the home will look, and forget how you want it to feel. Don't get me wrong, I had very strong opinions about how I wanted it to look, and Bob quickly caught my vision. When there was a decision to be made about going with plan A or plan B for a particular aspect, I often wasn't on site to actually see what Bob was talking about. So I would ask him, "Bob, which would I like? A or B?" And he always knew the answer. And, he was always right. But the truth is, I spent a lot more time imagining how I wanted the cabin to feel when we lived there, than how I wanted it to look. How did Tom and I want people to feel when they came to visit? What did we want to have happen there when people came together under our roof? What kinds of conversations did we envision happening as family and friends gathered around the outdoor fireplace in the morning for coffee? 

The more I imagined the answers to those questions the more clear they became. Our home would be a place of rest, renewal, and redemption. It would be a place of love, laughter, and listening. It would be a place of grace, healing, and extravagant welcome. Our home would be a shelter from the storms that would blow through the lives of those we love, a place where people could tell their stories and be heard, and share their pain and be seen. I began to imagine  people in front of the fireplace that hadn't yet been built. I saw them sitting in as yet un-purchased Adirondack chairs out in the field as the sun went down. They were gathered around the table we didn't yet own, sharing good food, good wine, and good conversation. 

Everything that happened in my mind's eye now happens under our roof. The place has it's own spirit, and the cabin continues to work it's magic. It's like it knows how to care for those under its roof, and has accumulated stories of healing and forgiveness, grief and grace, wonder and wounds, successes and failures, and love and loss. Truthfully, I feel like Tom and I are stewards of our home more than owners. It doesn't belong to us, it belongs to everyone that comes here.

When it comes to building a home there's more to it than meets the eye. The same is true when it comes to building a life. When we spend time imagining what we want it to feel like, and what we want our life to offer to the world, the way it can all come together is practically magic.

PS We still go to Bob-the-builder's Halloween Costume party. 

Help Wanted

It's such a simple thing.

Just ask for help. 

But simple is not the same as easy.

Somehow, many of us have come to the conclusion that asking for help is a sign of weakness. We should be able to figure it out for ourselves, and if we can't, we sure as hell don't want anyone to know. The thing is, the longer we wait to ask for the help, the more help we need. The more help we need, the harder it is to ask for help. The harder it is to ask for help, the less likely we are to ask. The less likely we are to ask, the more help we need. V.I.C.I.O.U.S. Cycle. 

As I see it, there are three types of help. 

Level 1: Preventative Care

Help before we need it.  

• Changing the oil in our cars every 3000 miles
• Putting on a life jacket before leaving the dock
• Regular medical and dental check-ups
• Building relationships of trust and respect with colleagues at work. Even the ones who drive us crazy. Especially the ones who drive us crazy
• Enlisting the help of experts at the front end of almost anything... parenting, investing, or becoming a pet owner
• Telling our partner what we need, rather than expecting them to figure it out
• Getting a therapist before a crisis hits 

Level 2: Roadside Assistance

Help when the unexpected occurs.

• Getting our car into the shop when we first hear that weird knocking noise 
• Calling for the coast guard when our boat engine dies
• Making an appointment when we first find that suspicious lump
• Having a conversation with a co-worker to clear the air
• Enlisting someone who can coach us through whatever is going on with our children, our money, or our dog.
• Staying in the conversation with our partner rather than pulling away
• Scheduling a meeting with our therapist, sooner rather than later

Level 3: 911

Help in an emergency

• Dialing 911 when our car is on fire
• Sending a flare up when the boat has capsized
• Dialing 911 when the pain hits our chest
• Meeting with our HR department to stop the bleeding
• Finding an expert help for our children, hire a financial advisor, or send our dog to a trainer
• Investing in couples therapy or an intensive relationship retreat or both
• Calling our therapist. Now.

I don't know about you, but I continue to get by with a little help from my friends...and my mechanic, my dentist, my doctor, my colleagues, my husband. Oh, and my therapist.

Image 108926240 (Shutterstock)

When Smoke Gets In Your Eyes

Normally, the view from our front window is a spectacular vista of Mt. Adams. Even on a cloudy day we can usually see at least an outline of the mountain. Not today. Due to the massive wildfires burning throughout the West, there is so much smoke that it is hard to even imagine our mountain. There's no way around it, the smoke is terrible. As in hell is burning terrible. Everyone is talking about it. Eyes are burning, vision is cloudy, throats are sore, hearts are stressed, lungs are taxed, heads are aching, and spirits are waning.

The pervasive smoke has gotten me thinking about how often our own vision is clouded by the smoke of the fires burning in our own personal forests. We run to put out one fire after another, leaving smoking embers in our wake, never stepping back to ask ourselves what our forests need to be healthy. The thing is, fires are a necessary part of the ecological process that keep timberlands healthy. One way to do that is to ignore the forest until one day a lightening strike or the strike of an arsonist's match sets the whole thing ablaze. When we can't see the forest for the trees, that is often the way it goes. The other option is through something called a prescribed burn, a fire intentionally set to burn away that which is getting in the way of a healthy and sustainable woodland. Rather than resources poured into disaster management, it is an investment in the future. 

The Mt. Adams Community Forest, one year after a prescribed burn overseen by Mt. Adams Resource Stewards.

Our lives are no different. Periodically burning away that which no longer serves us, clutters our landscapes, and consumes precious resources is the only way to create a healthy environment in which we can continue to thrive and grow. 

I'm thinking about what needs to be carefully, and thoughtfully burned away in my life. How about in yours?

The Difference Between Giving In & Giving Up

"It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop."

~ Confucius

Last year I climbed Mt. Adams. Together with my husband Tom and two dear and fearless friends, we made the climb to the top, and I'm not sure I've ever felt stronger in all of my 65 years. We had strategically trained to make it to the summit with hikes of increasing difficulty and elevation, time on treadmills, strength training, (mostly) clean eating, and visualizing ourselves at the top. Standing on what felt like the top of the world, I felt like I was at the top of my game. The strength I felt that day stayed with  me, and I began to imagine more hikes, more backpacking, maybe even a pilgrimage or two. I didn't, however, imagine myself back at the top of the mountain, because we did happen to get lost on the way down, and spent an unexpected night on the mountain. It was like laying in our driveway.  We shivered in the 29 degree temperature under space blankets, watched the Perseid meteor shower, and waited for the day to dawn. It. Was. Epic.

Sometime after the new year I was working out in the gym, determined to keep increasing my strength and stamina for all of the trails and adventures still ahead. Everything was going according to plan until one day when I was attempting to stand up from a cross legged seated position without any assistance. The reason I wanted to do it is because I had read somewhere that NOT being able to do it is one of 10 signs that you might die early. I  had been done it once after all of the training for Mt. Adams, but I wanted to keep the odds in my favor. As I stood up, something happened. I wasn't sure what, but it wasn't good. Over the next few weeks things continued to deteriorate, and I was in constant pain. It hurt to sit. It hurt to walk. It hurt to lay down. It hurt just looking out the window at Mt. Adams, much less imagining ever making it to the top again. 

Working with what I can only describe as my AMAZING care team, it was determined that the ligaments supporting my pelvis were injured and overstretched, and my pelvis had become unstable.  As it turns out, the road to recovery is long, the steps I've had to take are small, and the pace I've had to set is slow. Painstakingly slow. When the pain set in, so did the discouragement, and I began to wonder if I'd ever be able to walk without pain, much less hike again. If I'd be able to push myself at the gym and get the good endorphins of a good workout. More than a few times I wanted to ignore the pain and push harder. More than a few times, I wanted to just give up.

What I finally came to understand is that there is a difference between giving in and giving up. In order to get well, in order to heal and regain my strength, I had to give in to the reality of my situation. The process of healing and regeneration, stability and strength could only happen if I accepted the only road to my recovery. Small steps + Slow pace = Steady progress.

What I didn't have to do was give up on what might be possible. Wrapping my arms around the truth of my injury set me free to begin working with what I had to work with. Once again I was reminded that it is the truth that sets us free. 

I'm not there yet, but I'm getting closer. 

Remember that giving in to what is, doesn't mean giving up to what can be. It is the first step towards what is possible.

Onward and upward.

Maybe even to the top of Mt. Adams again.

Being Available

"It's a transformative experience to simply pause instead of immediately fill up the space. By waiting, we begin to connect with fundamental restlessness as well as fundamental spaciousness." 

-Pema Chodron,  - When Things Fall Apart

Being available matters to me. A lot. That means being available to those I love and care about, to those with whom I cross paths, to those to whom I may be able to offer help and support, to my work, and, to myself. Being available means I have the time and space to listen deeply, respond thoughtfully, and connect meaningfully. Being available means having a sense of spaciousness in my heart and around my time. I want to be the kind of person who is available. Lately, I'm not.

Somehow this year I've let my time get so filled up that I can hardly catch my breath. Lately, I've had more than a few conversations with friends and family that start  like this:

"I know you are really busy right now...

"I haven't wanted to bother you...

"When your schedule eases up...

"I hate to ask you, but...

"When things slow down for you...

I hate being that person. You know, the one that is too busy, too overcommitted, too overwhelmed, too swamped, too stressed, too buried, too..... 

But lately, that's who I've become. It is a challenge to keep up with phone calls, emails, and even texts, whether from those near and dear, or those a bit beyond the inner circle. Time to get together is a rare commodity. The work I want to focus on gets squished into little slivers of time that don't allow for the kind of spacious thinking that work requires. Time to myself feels like a luxury. The practices that fuel my tank, like quiet early morning hours, meditation, exercise, and time with "my people" are in short supply. I feel like I am perpetually running on empty, and those that I want to be available for can feel it too. 

What isn't empty is my calendar. Even though it is filled almost exclusively with people and things I care deeply about, life feels flooded with commitments. I seem to have gotten into the habit of filling a day or an hour if I see that it is open. When someone asks "Can you?" I look at that specific block of time, and if it's empty, I answer, "Why yes I can.", never thinking to look up or down stream before jumping in. 

While yesterday's commitments may be water under the bridge, it's time to lower the floodgates and slow the flow of the days ahead. 

Just because there is empty space on my calendar doesn't mean I have to fill it. 

Just because someone asks doesn't mean I have to say yes. 

Just because I've done it in the past doesn't mean I have to now.

Just because it needs to be done doesn't mean it is mine to do.

Just because I can doesn't mean I have to. 

But if I am available...maybe I will.

For those of you who have felt my lack of availability, please forgive me. You matter more than I can say.

3-2-1

At the conclusion of a workshop, I always give the participants what I like to call a "mandatory-optional" exercise, in which I give them the opportunity to consider what they've discovered during the course of our work together, what they will do with it, and who can help them. 

However.

There is such a tendency for people to leave thinking that they are going to be able to apply everything they've learned. Which they won't.

There is such a tendency to imagine that once back at their work, or in the midst of their families, they will remember everything we've talked about. Which they won't.

There is such a tendency to think that asking for help is a sign of weakness, and even if they know it isn't, they believe that they will be able to manage it all on their own. Which they won't.

They have the best of intentions for putting life back together differently with their new insights and information. They are energized by the thought that doing things differently will acually make a real difference. But without giving some thought to what to do once life outside the workshop doors engulfs them, they are pretty much guaranteed to lose most, if not all, of that newfound information and insight.

Thus, the "mandatory optional" exercise. They are given time to reflect on, identify,  and write down the following:

THREE meaningful things I have learned or discovered today are:

TWO specific action steps I will take are:

ONE person who can help me stay accountable is:

And you know what? They always, always, always know how to answer those questions. 

Now, I know that you and I haven't just spent the day in a workshop together, but I'll bet you can answer those same three questions (posed just a bit differently) for your life right now. Sometime today (maybe even right now before whatever is left of your day gets away from you), give yourself some space to reflect on, identify, and write down your answers to the following questions:

THREE meaningful-essential things (ideas, beliefs, commitments, values,) that I need to remember and stay connected to are:

TWO specific action steps I will take on my own behalf are:

ONE person who can help me stay accountable is:

Trust the answers that show up on your page. Always. Always. Always.

3-2-1 Go!

Autocorrect

"Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom."

~Victor E. Frankl

Recently I received a lovely text from a new reader of BLUSH: Women & Wine. She raved about it, and thanked me for writing it. It was the kind of text that makes your day. Replying back immediately I texted "Thank you from the bottom of my heart..". Thankfully, I took the time to re-read my text before sending it, and realized that it had autocorrected to "Thank you from the bottles of my heart." Not sure if there was some sort of  genie-in-the-bottle magic going on, but after I stopped laughing, I changed it back and sent it. 

That crazy little text exchange got me thinking about the whole idea of autocorrection. Installed on our smart phones, this application is intended to increase efficiency and accuracy. Over time it seems that the app on my phone has gotten to know me and what I am thinking, and it often completes the words before I've had the chance to finish writing them. (Perpetual note to self - always check texts before sending. Especially after a glass of wine.) 

We have an autocorrect application installed on our own inner hardware. It is programmed to autocorrect our thoughts, inner dialogues, and internal responses to external messages, and it does this so quietly and quickly that we don't even notice. Someone asks us a question and we hear it as criticism. We receive a compliment on our appearance, and it gets transposed into self-judgement about our own bodies. A friend shares a hurt or a problem, and we hear that it is our hurt to soothe or problem to fix.

A few recent examples from my own inner text stream:

My husband asks me if I've remembered to leave money for the wonderful woman who cleans our house, and I hear him questioning my management of the situation. 

At the end of a workshop, the client asks me if I'm going to facilitate the upcoming one, and I hear her hoping for someone better to show up the next time.

I hear from a friend how great I look, and I think how grateful I am that spandex leggings hide a multitude of sins.

An adult daughter shares something hard or painful in her life and my thoughts are: A) How can I fix it? B) It must be my fault. C) If I were a better mother, she wouldn't have to deal with this. Or, of course, there is always my personal favorite - D) All of the above.

Left unnoticed, our autocorrect apps receive regular updates that are programmed by our long held but rarely questioned beliefs, and our old stories that we retell but never rewrite. Those beliefs and stories are embedded deeply enough that we don't even see them. We just believe them. It is amazing how quickly our thoughts autocorrect into life-limiting messages of self-judgement, shame, fear, and doubt, and are then transmitted with blazing hi-speed inner-net access.

Time to uninstall the app.

Here is what is working for me, and maybe it will for you too. It all starts with awareness. To get rid of autocorrect I have to quit living in auto-pilot, so I am working to catch myself in the act of sending all too familiar but unexamined messages on my inner web. Catching myself in the act gives me just enough space to catch my breath before hitting the send button. In that space there is an opportunity to send myself life-giving messages of grace, love, courage and truth.

It kind of feels like old-school dial-up. 

Kick The Can

"Start close in,
don’t take
the second step
or the third,
start with the first
thing
close in,
the step
you don’t want to take."

~David Whyte - River Flow: New and Selected Poems

Whenever I work with clients who are in any kind of management or leadership capacity, we often talk about the complexity of working with people. We all agree that whenever things go well, it has everything to do with people, relationships, and communication. We all agree that whenever things go poorly, it has everything to do with people, relationships,  and communication. Whether personally or professionally, we know that people, relationships, and communication make all the difference, and yet, most of our common tendencies, are to put off, avoid, dismiss, reframe, and/or ignore any and all challenging (difficult, scary, emotionally charged, conflictual, confrontational, painful, fill-in-your-own blank) situations. We'll deal with it another day. Hope it will go away. Pretend it isn't there. Leave it to the next person to deal with. Put another way, we play a grown up version of Kick The Can with everything  and everyone we'd rather not deal with, but deep down know that we should. The can gets kicked down the road, we run and hide, and hope whatever "it" is, whoever "they" are, won't seek us out and find us. 

It never works.

Think big picture, and global warming, water shortages, plastic islands in the ocean, and a crumbling infrastructure hit awfully close to home. Shrink it down, and the evidence of cans kicked down the road are as close as our own homes. Unresolved issue and unspoken words, unhealed wounds and unforgotten offenses, unasked forgiveness and untended relationships, underfunded savings accounts and maxed out credit cards, unorganized photos and unanswered phone calls and emails (you know the ones I mean).

It's taken me a long time to learn, but ignoring the issue and avoiding the hard yet sacred work of staying in conversation with and in relationship to the people that are ours to love, the inner work that is ours to do, the issues that are ours to resolve, the wounds that are ours to heal, the conversations that are ours to have, the forgiveness that is ours to ask, and the forgiveness that is ours to extend, only kicks those cans further down our road.

I know which cans are mine, and I'll bet you know which ones are yours.

Which ones would you like to be rid of? 

Which one could you focus on first?

Who can help you open your can and deal what's inside? 

Kicking a can further down the road only means finding a bigger can of worms around the next bend.

PS - I will probably kick organizing my thousands and thousands and thousands of family photos further down the road. I'll just have to go buy a much bigger can first. 

Photo: Tom Pierson