At the moment, I am alone.
Gratefully home alone in a clean cottage.
A home magically provided when needed.
So very grateful,
So very grateful,
I am.
And I give thanks for this time alone.
This time to simply BE.
For in simply being, I am shown all that life is.
The joy.
The sorrow.
The fear.
The love.
With love ever present.
The foundation.
The roof.
The contents.
Ever present even in the fear.
Or in the sadness
And joy.
LOVE is always there.
And on this day, I give thanks for YOU.
For the part we’ve played in each others’ lives.
For nothing is an accident.
Or coincidence.
But rather each bumping into
and seemingly chance smile,
is a nod from the Divine.
A reminder that we are
LOVED.
That we
ARE
love.
And with this
virtual
bump,
I send
all the love
that I am
to
YOU!!!
x
x
x
o
x
o
x
:
)
Happy
Happy
Thanksgiving!
In yesterday’s paper, the editorial cartoon by Rob Rogers shows Bruce Jenner on a box of Wheaties. The real Bruce Jenner. The Bruce Jenner that he, or rather she, is today.
“If we celebrated the courage it takes to be your true self . . .”
Yes. If we celebrated everyone who chose to be authentic, the faces on the cover of Wheaties would most likely be as varied as the rainbow.
It takes courage to be real, authentic. The word courage comes from Old French, which comes from Latin: cor “heart.“
It takes living from one’s heart to be courageous.
But in our world, we’re actually conditioned to be someone other than ourselves.
Who do you think you are? You can’t be a ____________, you don’t have the brains, education, connections. Your skin’s the wrong color. You’re stupid. Fat. Ugly.
Each one of us has been told that we’re somehow lacking. Whether from our parents, spouses, teachers, or the media, we’ve each gotten the message that we should be someone other than ourself.
And we’ve bought into it. Literally. We buy all the many things we’re told we need to buy to be: _________________ (fill-in-the-blank).
I’m here to tell you that it’s not true. That it’s a lie.
You are already perfect as you are. You alreadyhave within yourself everything you need to be who you came here to be.
Take a breath. A DEEP breath. Connect with your inner-self.
It’s time to be YOUR self. It’s time to be that brand of YOU that no one else can copy. Trademark. Patent.
How do I do that? How do I remember who I’ve come here to be?
First of all, simply BE yourself. That’s who you’ve come here to be – YOU.
Secondly, be still. Be quiet. Unplug.
Make space for yourself everyday to simply sit in the presence of who you are. You may begin to hear little whispers. You may hear the lion’s roar. Or you may simply hear silence. It will be exactly how it needs to be for you.
Today, I challenge you. Be YOUR self. Be brave enough to let the light within you shine forth. I promise you; the world will thank you. : ))))
Also, last week after a 15+ month hiatus, I posted a pep talk. The topic? Be YOUR self. : ) When I saw Rob Rogers’ editorial cartoon yesterday, I thought, “OMG! That would be perfect for the blog glob post for Sj’s Pep Talk: Be YOUR Self!” I wrote to Mr. Rogers last night, and he quickly replied with a YES! Thank you so very, very much Rob!
In closing, Dear Friends, whether I’ve met you in person, in Spirit, or through the internet, please know that I love you and see you for who you truly are.
Recently I experienced Ann Randolph’s performance of her most hilarious and inspiring one-woman play, LOVELAND. Afterwards, she invited the audience to stay and write. Ann is also a most dynamic teacher and encourager. She travels the country leading writing workshops. Improvisational acting and various movement activities are used to get everyone’s creative juices flowing. Another teaching technique of Ann’s is to give the participants a “prompt” which they are then to write about for 12 minutes. If you can’t think of what to write at any point during the 12 minutes, you’re to write “What to say, what to say, what to say” until something comes. The idea is to not edit yourself but rather to allow ideas to flow freely.
On this particular evening, after her most outstanding performance of LOVELAND (yup, hated it! Not. : ), she led a short meditation for those who chose to stay (around 15 to 20 people), asking us to think about a time of grief. I closed my eyes and focused on her guidance; nothing came, nothing came, nothing came.
Then she said, “Go.” And suddenly I knew what I was going to write about.
The prompt? A moment in time when we felt grief. And here’s what came (with some slight after-the-fact editing):
What I remember most about this moment is the grass under my feet, toes, and legs. It was damp and a bit sticky just having recently mowed. As I thought of him standing by my side, watching me, I wept.
Then I remembered him opening a coconut, leaving a trail of husks in his wake until he sat down chewing and slurping, coconut water running down his spotted tongue. I simply watched and laughed, enjoying his excitement, his pleasure at opening that coconut and watching me watch him — savoring the moment, the grass, the breeze, the smell. The smell of coconut all over his face running down his noes to his toes.
I remember. I remember. I remember.
And then I realized how I’d been waiting. How I’d been holding my breath waiting for him to turn. To change. To rise up and become a boy. My boy. My little boy. But it never happened. It never happened. And yet I loved him. Adored him. Cherished him as we sat together and watched the sunset. I placed his body on his bed and carried him to the rock wall just steps away from the van. Careful. Careful. Easy. Not to drop him. Not to slip. But to gently set him down so together we could watch the sun set — a fire-ball on the horizon laced with the gentle lap, lap, lap of the waves.
Sigh.
What to say? What to say?
This time with him as he was dying was a gift, and yet I didn’t realize then that he was also giving me a second gift. Cracking my heart wide open, so I could begin to see life for what it really was. Is. The gift it IS to be alive, to breath. The gift that it is now and forevermore. For life doesn’t end with death but simply transforms into another.
So, Fido, to you I give thanks. And always, I give my love, my appreciation that you chose me to be your *caretaker into death. To be there with you, for you, so that we could each cherish the moment as we sat together in silence and watched the tomatoes grow until their plump red bodies were juicy enough to bite into. Fido Tomatoes, I called them. Magical tomatoes born in grief and yet comforting all the same as the juice dripped down my chin, and the taste brought me back to that mid-summer day sitting together in the sun, dirt on my fingers, seeds in my hands, and you watching with complete focus, as these magical seeds spoke of hope and life continued.
Fido Tomatoes on the Vine
*Fido’s Papa, Tony, was also his caretaker, but when writing this, I was thinking of the time Fido and I spent alone.
I found this picture on Wikipedia under the page on Consciousness. When I copied the image in order to include it in this post, I noticed that its title features the word Bewusstsein, the German word for consciousness. Interesting. Germans are thinkers; they’ve long been known as thinkers. Hmm, I can hear some of you non-Germans groaning at that statement while remembering a particular period of the 20th Century when Germans weren’t considered to be thinking but rather reacting. Despite that sad and horrible time, I think it’s true that Germans tend to be deep thinkers. So many intellectual topics have their roots, or at least their fingers, in the German thought process.
“Okay,” you ask, “What’s on your mind today Sj?”
Consciousness. Today I’m poking around in the playground of Consciousness or Bewusstsein. When I pry apart that German word, I find that it has two pieces: an adjective (Bewusst) and a verb (sein). Bewusst can be translated into either “conscious” or “aware.” Sein is that ubiquitous verb “to be.” Literally “to be conscious or aware.”
Okay, to be conscious is to be aware.
Wikipedia’s definition also uses the word aware: “Consciousness is the quality or state of being aware of an external object or something within oneself.”
The Apple dictionary in my computer breaks the definition down even further into three parts:
1) the state of being awake and aware of one’s surroundings : she failed to regain consciousness and died two days later.
2) the awareness or perception of something by a person : her acute consciousness of Mike’s presence.
3) the fact of awareness by the mind of itself and the world : consciousness emerges from the operations of the brain.
The third definition is the one that I’m tossing around in my sandbox today, “the fact of awareness by the mind of itself and the world.”
The mind is conscious or aware of itself. It’s a “fact.” Is it?
“Hello Sj, how are you today?”
“Fine thank you. And you?”
“I’m well. Have you noticed that we’re not alone?”
The mind’s also aware or conscious of the world.
“Hello world!”
“The fact of awareness by the mind of itself and the world.”
Is it possible for a person to be aware that they’re NOT aware?
I love that question.
Is it possible for a person to be aware that they’re NOT aware?
Here it is again with a slight tweak.
Is it possible for a person to become aware that they’re NOT aware?
I’d love to hear from you! Feedback. Comments. What do YOU think?
The following YouTube video also addresses this topic, albeit in a completely different way: BUT it’s no longer available when I took a look-see a few years later.
Take a short break from your daily routine, pretty please with a cherry on top : ), and give it a look-see.
And then, I would love to HEAR from you. What are Your thoughts? Your ideas? Your ponderings and bemusements?
You can comment here on my blog glob post OR at my YouTube channel below this video clip.
Let’s start a dialogue to see what you and others think. This isn’t a pop quiz, and there are no wrong answers. If it’s what you think, it’s what you think.
Let’s all keep an OPEN mind and see where this takes us.
It starts simply by taking a moment, a breath, to stop, look, and listen.
What do YOU do when you’re a Grump? After it’s landed on your head and oozed down into your heart making a mess of the joy that was there just moments before?
Five-years ago, a case of the Grumps landed on my Dad. Sitting in a wheelchair unable to walk (just a few weeks after he’d won a 3-hour match in a national tennis tournament), my Dad was thinking, “What the?”
Slumped over in his chair, he brewed.
And stewed.
A Grump.
Feeling sorry for himself.
Seeing no way out.
And then, something c h a n g e d.
I saw it with my own four-eyes.
Somewhere within himself he found the strength to sit-up.
To cast out one kind word.
And then another.
And another.
Soon a fountain of encouragement sprang forth from his personal spring of goodness.
“You can do it!”
“Try again!”
“That’s it!”
Encouraging words flew across the rec hall landing first on a middle-aged woman who’d been paralyzed in a car accident.
Next, they found root in a young man who’d broken his neck in a fall.
One-by-one, I saw the change.
One-by-one, I saw the effects of my father’s words.
“Way to go!”
“That was a solid hit!”
“Good job!”
As this group of spinal cord injured people played volleyball, magic began to happen.
M A G I C.
Sj with her father, November 2008
And it started with my Dad.
The Grump.
Somehow he’d found something to grab onto.
A something that he could stand on.
A something that took him to the other side.
A bridge of sorts manifested itself when he looked within.
When he thought of others.
When he took his eyes off his own sorrow and reached out a helping hand,
in the form of encouraging words.
“You can do it!”
“Try again!”
“That’s it!”
From the depths of despair and self-pity, my Dad found a bridge to the other side.
How fitting that a man, who built bridges during World War II to replace those that the Germans blew up, would find a bridge WITHIN himself. A man who served his nation as a Lieutenant Colonel in the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
In his final days, my Dad built a bridge to the other side. A bridge that enabled him to help others even as he helped himself.
A different sort of mettle appeared right when he needed it most.
Patricia Neal visited her eponymous rehabilitation center Fall 2008
I just participated in a really inspiring writing workshop called Karma Free Writing.
For the closing, we were invited to post a video of us reading something we’d written (for the workshop or previously). What came to me instead, are the words to the five minute video shown below. The photos I selected from thousands of photos I’ve taken during my travels, as well as ones my husband and I have taken during our daily life.
When I lay on my bed (and this could be anywhere in the world), one of my favorite things to do is give thanks.
I may pass in and out of “wakefulness,” dozing now and then, and still, what I return to is Thank You.
Thank you to my parents for allowing me to be born through them. Thank you to my sisters for being such good friends and watching over me. Thank you to my husband for the joy of sharing my life with him. Thank you to Fido, our firstborn, for allowing us to experience a playful, ball throwing life. A life which also included a death, his death. That experience I recognize now as a tap on the door of my heart. A waking up to all that matters. Life itself. And death which is such a part of life too. And his kid sister, Rocket Girl, who he led us to when he visited me once while in dream-state.
Thank you.
Life. The greatest gift of all.
Life. All that really matters.
And thank you to You, my friends on this planet. For I recognize in each one of you a Divinity, a Perfectness. For you are a child of creation. For you are Life itself.
And with that gift of life, which we each here are experiencing comes the responsibility (I think) of appreciation. Appreciation of simply being alive. Breathing. Being. Living.
And now, as I return to my day, I once again give thanks.
* * *
I just felt that there are those who may read this and think, “Who is this willy-nilly silly gal who gives thanks for everything? How corny she is!”
To them I say, “Yes, I love corn. Because from corn we get so many wonderful things!”
Cobs once served a purpose we thankfully no longer need. : )
And I’m not talking about the making of mattresses.
And corn just tastes sooo good!
Yes, I love corn.
Yes, I love silly.
Yes, I love life.
And I have this f e e l i n g, YOU do too. : )
Hugs to you all,
-Sj out
p.s. And thanks D’Anne and John for the i n c r e d i b l y fluffy and delish pastries!!!
Pickles are funny to me. Well, at least the word is. It’s goofy. It’s fun to say.
“Hey Pickle! How are you doing?”
“What’s the deal, Pickle?”
“Pickle you later!”
What does that even mean?
I have no idea. It’s just fun to say.
Pickle.
Pickle, pickle, pickle.
I’m in NYC. In Brooklyn. In the most amazing home, (I LOVE home exchange! Mahalo Ria!!!) and I’ve signed up to take a 5-day intensive course in stand-up comedy at the American Comedy Institute. And I’m terrified. Yes, terrified.
Then why am I doing it?
‘Cause. The most rewarding things I’ve done in life were also the most scary.Going on my first plane ride at 14 with no one I knew to a country where I couldn’t speak the language. Scary.
Taking a job as a maid in a country where all I could really say was, “Ein Bier, bitte.” Scary.
Taking a job on a cruise ship where my main role was leading aerobics, and I’d only done that once in the class that I’d just taken because I’d actually gotten the job. Scary.
It’s a long list. I’ll stop. You get the picture.
Throughout my life I’ve made many, many leaps and next week I’m jumping off yet another cliff. Will I land on my feet or with egg on my face?
My husband says all good stand-up comedians talk about their flops. I reckon it’s a rite of passage, a part of the process. Irrrreegardless, I’m jumping. Maybe I’ll be holding my nose and it won’t be pretty, but I promise you I will jump.
And if I do flop? Land on my belly instead of my feet?
Well, there are always pickles.
And from the look of the Heinz pickle bookmarks, it’s time for an update.
Last night I attended Mars, Pennsylvania’s 104th Annual High School Commencement. The speeches by the students were particularly good. A surprise? I suppose. I hadn’t been to a high school graduation in years. When I graduated, I probably was too busy thinking about the sleepover later that night at a friend’s lake house, or what I was going to do that summer, or how my Dad was (he’d recently had a biopsy performed on his chest; it was benign : ). So I have no idea what my friends said when they spoke years ago. (Sorry Mary and Marti!)
But last night I remember.
Adam Golden gave a playful talk making 13-oral twitter feeds of advice for his fellow graduates. He mentioned that there were 40,000 high school graduation ceremonies taking place around the country. “Is that true?” I wondered. So I googled it and found that it’s right, more or less. According to this ed.gov site, the exact number is 37,100. But I imagine there are other schools around the country that are essentially off-the-grid. Okay, 40,000 secondary schools; I’ll take that Adam Golden.
Think about it. 40,000 schools with students donning cap and gown (or at least holding some type of a ceremony). 40,000 schools setting up chairs, microphones, and diplomas. Across the country, families are gathering (or not : ( to honor their special child. I googled further and found that the high school graduation rate is the highest it’s been in 3-decades.
So what does it mean? What does it matter that 40,000 schools are holding graduation ceremonies?
Completing high school is an important rite of passage in our culture. So much so, that if someone doesn’t graduate, they’re considered a deviant. A flunky. A failure before they’ve even started.
Last month during the Walk for ASL, we had the honor of attending a Shabbat service at Congregation B’nai B’rith. Part of the Friday night service focused on their congregation’s high school graduates. Wow. Those kids were amazing (based on the answers they gave to questions posed by the Rabbi and their general zest for life). I left the service feeling honored to have been given a glimpse of our future.
The same thing happened last night.
I left the Mars High School auditorium buzzing with the graduates’ excitement. Excitement for the future. Excitement for the unknown. Excitement to start their life.
The face in the crowd? My niece, Katie. She’s heading to Auburn this Fall and will be continuing her studies, her journey, her life. Godspeed Katie!
And in September, my husband and I will visit our foster son in Cambodia who is also graduating from high school.
A face in the crowd.
Someone you know. Or not. But regardless, Someone.
A Someone with a dream. A Someone who deserves a chance. A smile. A hug. You name it.
