A few weeks ago I signed up for a three day workshop with a visiting yoga teacher that I've wanted to study with for years. I could have sworn the session ran from 6am-9am, Thursday-Saturday but after peeling myself out of bed at 5am and dragging myself through the dark, cold morning to the subway I arrived at the studio to find it completely dark. No class.
I hopped back on the subway and made my way downtown to my studio where I had a gorgeous, very long, very lazy practice and caught up with lovely yoga people afterwards. It was a very good morning but when the heck is the workshop? The fees were charged to my account so I know it wasn't a figment of my imagination but there's no mention of the workshop anywhere on schedule. I know what you're thinking, I missed the damn workshop. I suck at the details people. Suck.
Yesterday I confirmed my leave/start dates with my Manager. My current contract ends end of April and my new one begins mid-August, again working 3 days per week. I've literally dreamed of having this exact work schedule which I mentioned to my Manager stating how hard it will be when my 2008-2009 contract ends and I'll be thrust out into the cold, hard world of full time work again.
She was confused, why would I be working somewhere else full time at end of the 2009 school year? I was confused, because I'm working on contract. She was confused, didn't I read the new contract I signed a few weeks ago? They'd turned my contract into an ongoing, permanent position. I get to work 3 days a week, September-April for ever and ever.
Heh. No. I didn't read the contract. I don't even know how much money I make. I don't just suck at the details, I don't even think of them - they're non-issues. Until, of course, they become issues. Like missed workshops or work contracts or paying bills, or remembering where I put my keys after I walked in the door (last sighting was 5 days ago), or replacing my license sticker (expired Nov '07)...lets face it, if the cat didn't meow, he wouldn't get fed.
Back to the work issue, as much as I suck at details I suck even more at commitment and the idea of permanence. It doesn't matter just how closely these hours resemble my dream work hours, the second I heard that they were permanent I had to paste the smile on my face while fighting back panicked claustrophobia. Yeah, I'm embellishing but the fact is, I preferred it much better when I thought my contract ended in April 2009.
Details I haven't missed: I changed my hair from red back to blonde a few weeks ago and today finally found that my fringe was long enough to tuck back into my ponytail. I look like me again for the first time since September. You have no idea how wonderful it feels.
And now I'm off to bed because I refuse to admit I screwed up the workshop dates so thoroughly and I'm up at 5am AGAIN tomorrow for attempt number two at attending the session . Maybe it started on Friday, not Thursday...
Thursday, March 20, 2008
Tuesday, March 18, 2008
soaring to meet reality
I was meeting with a new student today. She'd made the appointment to discuss doing a series of assessments to "find out what I'm good at because I don't even know who I am anymore". She's 19. Are you supposed to know who you are at 19?
It's so distressing, the students I see, the pressure they feel to figure it all out, to know everything, NOW. While other cultures are slowing down, embracing gap years, encouraging students to take time off in between or during schooling we're doing the opposite. Students finish high school at an earlier age, enter the workforce or university sooner and are charged much more for the latter than at any point in history. The first question at any Toronto social event is invariably "What do you do?" or, for students, "What do you want to do?". Not necessarily a bad question but it's the expectation behind it, that they should know what they want to do that stings. There's no room for playful curiosity, for trying something new, for failing, for exploration and for having fun with it all.
This same student kept talking about things she'd dreamed of doing, being an actress in particular, but always followed her dreams with the statement "But I have to be realistic" and a repeated request to do the tests so she could find out what she's good at. As if the tests could know her better than she did.
How did she come to decide that it wasn't her dreams that she was good at? How did she become so lost to herself that she thinks the answer lies in 317 multiple choice questions? How has she come to believe that "being realistic" means letting go of your dreams, defeated? What are we doing to our kids?
Many times when I'm working with students my heart breaks for them but, more often than that, I'm so glad to have the job that I do. A job where I get to present an alternate point of view and introduce the possibility that "being realistic" isn't something you fall down to - it's something you soar up towards.
It's so distressing, the students I see, the pressure they feel to figure it all out, to know everything, NOW. While other cultures are slowing down, embracing gap years, encouraging students to take time off in between or during schooling we're doing the opposite. Students finish high school at an earlier age, enter the workforce or university sooner and are charged much more for the latter than at any point in history. The first question at any Toronto social event is invariably "What do you do?" or, for students, "What do you want to do?". Not necessarily a bad question but it's the expectation behind it, that they should know what they want to do that stings. There's no room for playful curiosity, for trying something new, for failing, for exploration and for having fun with it all.
This same student kept talking about things she'd dreamed of doing, being an actress in particular, but always followed her dreams with the statement "But I have to be realistic" and a repeated request to do the tests so she could find out what she's good at. As if the tests could know her better than she did.
How did she come to decide that it wasn't her dreams that she was good at? How did she become so lost to herself that she thinks the answer lies in 317 multiple choice questions? How has she come to believe that "being realistic" means letting go of your dreams, defeated? What are we doing to our kids?
Many times when I'm working with students my heart breaks for them but, more often than that, I'm so glad to have the job that I do. A job where I get to present an alternate point of view and introduce the possibility that "being realistic" isn't something you fall down to - it's something you soar up towards.
Friday, March 14, 2008
giving someone else's words back
I went to see this movie last night about Sigur Ros, set in Iceland, their home country. Clips of the band playing were interspersed with panoramic shots of Iceland and, inexplicably, I had to fight back tears several times as visions of great plains, waterfalls, the ocean and strange little whitewashed houses filled the screen.
They weren't sad tears, more a pull or a longing of sorts. At several points during the movie and many times since I've thought to myself: "I don't belong here". Not in an immediate sense, at the moment I am very much of and enjoying Toronto, but in a grander sense, I don't belong here forever. I've always known that. Everyone who's known me has always known that.
My contract ends in one month and I've been resisting, resisting, resisting the urge to travel feeling, instead, like I should stay put in Toronto. I've decided several times that that's exactly what I'm going to do, I'm going to stay in Toronto and "invest in life here". That last bit comes from someone else. They're someone else's words that I've tried hard to internalize, to make mine - but they're not. They won't stick.
I've decided to stop struggling and give in to my need to vagabond. I'm going to play overseas this summer and go where the spirit takes me which may well be back home after just 3 weeks or I could be gone 3+ months. Either way, I'm relieved to not be fighting with myself anymore and I'm so excited.
Monday, March 10, 2008
dating
Another date tonight. Another lovely, kind, interesting man. Another reminder of how that inexplicable chemistry, the kind that turns a lovely, kind, interesting man into someone 'special', can be so elusive. Another reminder of how lucky I've been in the past to find it at all. Dating again after such a long absence from the dance has been interesting. It's bolstered my faith in mankind, there are so many very decent men out there, and it's bolstered my faith in myself. I was afraid that I would compare every new person to the boy and find them lacking which hasn't been the case at all. There is no comparing.
The guys I've been out with have been really great. Accomplished, funny, interesting, emotionally mature - they 'get it' - but no one I'd be interested in seeing a second time. At first I was slightly deflated by the reminder of just how hard it is to find someone that feels special but now it just feels kind of nice to be reminded of how many decent people there are out there. I'd forgotten about those awkward "it's not you, it's me" or "you're very nice but..." conversations, God, they suck. How do you explain something that has no words? That there's no chemistry, that they're not your match, that you've always known the second you've set eyes on someone that that "something" was there and you didn't feel that tonight but you really would, actually, like to be friends because they're totally supercool?
Dating again has made me miss the boy in a fond way, reminded me of the instant connection he and I had, and realize just how hard it is going to be to find it again, but it's also helped me see things about that relationship that I hadn't seen before. One of the things that has struck me most is how interested these men are in me; how thoughtful the questions, how focused the attention on the answers, how genuine the intention to get to know me. It's struck me because that wasn't there with the boy. Everything he knew, he knew because I offered it.
Turns out there is some comparing after all.
I remember how surprised the boy was that I liked him. How, at times, I felt that he was almost suspicious of the fact that I loved him, as if I were simply desperate and latching onto an unwitting foreigner because I couldn't find someone in Canada. It's funny. If only he could have known me at home he would have known that I wasn't in love with him because there were no other options, I was in love with him despite the fact that I had other options. I chose him.
I think of him every day. I miss him every day. But it doesn't matter. Life is moving on in an increasingly joyful way and I'm letting myself be carried forward instead of resisting by wishing over things from the past. Of course, I hate that things are over but I hate even more the way that they're over. It's strange knowing someone who used to mean the world to me is out there living a life that doesn't include me, that we don't even talk anymore. It seems childish and ugly, I don't like it but, again, it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter what I want, wish for, like or don't like. There's freedom in that and all of the painful feelings that used to accompany thoughts of him/us are changing, fading. It is what it is.
Broken edges become dulled, raw feelings are soothed by time, the ache of missing fades, sadness melts into acceptance, life rebuilds around the hole left by someone's departure, and faith returns. Sadness, regret, longing, fear, confusion and shock are replaced by happiness, excitement, openness, acceptance and optimism. The change is a slow but sure one. I have trust again that all happens for the best and I know there will be a time when I don't think of the boy at all let alone think of him with sadness.
It's already happening.
The guys I've been out with have been really great. Accomplished, funny, interesting, emotionally mature - they 'get it' - but no one I'd be interested in seeing a second time. At first I was slightly deflated by the reminder of just how hard it is to find someone that feels special but now it just feels kind of nice to be reminded of how many decent people there are out there. I'd forgotten about those awkward "it's not you, it's me" or "you're very nice but..." conversations, God, they suck. How do you explain something that has no words? That there's no chemistry, that they're not your match, that you've always known the second you've set eyes on someone that that "something" was there and you didn't feel that tonight but you really would, actually, like to be friends because they're totally supercool?
Dating again has made me miss the boy in a fond way, reminded me of the instant connection he and I had, and realize just how hard it is going to be to find it again, but it's also helped me see things about that relationship that I hadn't seen before. One of the things that has struck me most is how interested these men are in me; how thoughtful the questions, how focused the attention on the answers, how genuine the intention to get to know me. It's struck me because that wasn't there with the boy. Everything he knew, he knew because I offered it.
Turns out there is some comparing after all.
I remember how surprised the boy was that I liked him. How, at times, I felt that he was almost suspicious of the fact that I loved him, as if I were simply desperate and latching onto an unwitting foreigner because I couldn't find someone in Canada. It's funny. If only he could have known me at home he would have known that I wasn't in love with him because there were no other options, I was in love with him despite the fact that I had other options. I chose him.
I think of him every day. I miss him every day. But it doesn't matter. Life is moving on in an increasingly joyful way and I'm letting myself be carried forward instead of resisting by wishing over things from the past. Of course, I hate that things are over but I hate even more the way that they're over. It's strange knowing someone who used to mean the world to me is out there living a life that doesn't include me, that we don't even talk anymore. It seems childish and ugly, I don't like it but, again, it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter what I want, wish for, like or don't like. There's freedom in that and all of the painful feelings that used to accompany thoughts of him/us are changing, fading. It is what it is.
Broken edges become dulled, raw feelings are soothed by time, the ache of missing fades, sadness melts into acceptance, life rebuilds around the hole left by someone's departure, and faith returns. Sadness, regret, longing, fear, confusion and shock are replaced by happiness, excitement, openness, acceptance and optimism. The change is a slow but sure one. I have trust again that all happens for the best and I know there will be a time when I don't think of the boy at all let alone think of him with sadness.
It's already happening.
Saturday, March 8, 2008
a three hour tour
Some snow yesterday. I went out for a short walk that turned into a three hour, snow-filled tour of High Park with an intermission at my favourite coffeehouse for some warmth, great music and coffee.
Turns out yesterday was just the warm up for today, we're currently being pummeled by yet another snowstorm. I took some pictures while I was out collecting the morning coffee/newswpapers but all they really show is big, white spots - it's snowing quite heavily. I'll try again later but in the meantime, below are some pictures from yesterday's baby snowfall...
Pretty
What you can't see is the number of people ignoring the "Caution, thin ice" signs and walking on the pond in the background
Turns out yesterday was just the warm up for today, we're currently being pummeled by yet another snowstorm. I took some pictures while I was out collecting the morning coffee/newswpapers but all they really show is big, white spots - it's snowing quite heavily. I'll try again later but in the meantime, below are some pictures from yesterday's baby snowfall...
running
Pretty
if you look closely you can see that someone turned this snowman into a snowwoman...
Tinto's on Roncesvalles, my refuge from the storm
enjoying coffee, strange music and people watching
changing shifts
lots of abandoned bikes in snowbanks
What you can't see is the number of people ignoring the "Caution, thin ice" signs and walking on the pond in the backgroundThursday, March 6, 2008
best historical plaque ever
Tonight was bookclub night for the bookclub that never reads. Turns out it was also the night that the bookclub that never reads cancelled the session due to illness, inclement weather (another snowstorm? really?), and low participation (mine, I'd emailed earlier saying I wouldn't be able to make it). I was already on the road so I missed the cancellation and ended up at D's house just in time for dinner. I stayed long enough to have a proper catch up which was so lovely, it's been ages since I've seen everyone, and to offend her husband by noticing that Einstein the dog has become rounder (read: fat).
But none of that is really the point.
The point is that I passed through an older part of the city on my way to D's house and while I was sitting at a stoplight I noticed a historical plaque posted on one of the buildings beside me. The plaque read:
"Independent Order of Oddfellows and Rebekahs"
Yup. That just about sums things up.
But none of that is really the point.
The point is that I passed through an older part of the city on my way to D's house and while I was sitting at a stoplight I noticed a historical plaque posted on one of the buildings beside me. The plaque read:
"Independent Order of Oddfellows and Rebekahs"
Yup. That just about sums things up.
wheeee
This morning during practice I was asked if I'd like to be added to the roster of assistants for Mysore practices :)
I'm number 854 on the assistant list, the one they would call last, but it's part of what I want to be when I grow up and a huge honour to be asked.
Good things are happening.
I'm number 854 on the assistant list, the one they would call last, but it's part of what I want to be when I grow up and a huge honour to be asked.
Good things are happening.
Tuesday, March 4, 2008
mysore
A lot of people have passed through Mysore in the last few months. Those of us who are stuck at home are always hungry for news: what's going on and how was it? Some say very little and some say a lot - about the shala, Mysore, and the people, both locals and visitors. I'm struggling right now with reports from one person in particular because...I don't know really. I think because this person's comments strike me as arrogant and smacking of cultural superiority while, at the same time, being presented from a pseudo-zen/spiritual point of view. And let me say up front, yes, I know, this rant has more to do with me than with them.
Cultural superiority is cultural superiority no matter how many droll comments you couch it in. Stories about "Indians" shared in "aren't they funny" tones are not funny, they're patronizing, disrespectful and arrogant and I think they say more about you and your prejudices than they do about the culture you're immersed in. God knows I've been frustrated while travelling and completely lost my cool on more than one occasion, but I'm thoroughly ashamed of myself afterwards and know damn well that my reaction was about me, not the idosyncrasies, no matter how different they be from home, of the country I'm visiting. That's part of why travelling is so wonderful. It pulls you out of yourself and smacks you in the face with your assumptions, beliefs, biases, judgements - but only if you allow yourself to think that it just might be you as opposed to blaming the culture you're immersed in.
This same person is casting aspersions at the shala (just a money grab), the locals, and the other yogis. It's frustrating to read. I find myself getting angry at what I see as arrogance, mocking of AYRI, Gokulam and the very community they've chosen to immerse themselve in all the while presenting it with an air of being 'above' it all. The shala is what you make it, India is what you make it, life is what you make it - it's all the same.
Mysore can be a hard place to be, like a yogi club med for the lost and confused. The kirtans,colour/totem/birthplace assessments, rolfing, massages, ayurvedic courses, movies, clubbing, dinner parties, swimming in the river or at the Southern Star, dance lessons, philosophy lessons, painting lessons, ashtanga practice...there's a lot to do. Last time I was there I was surprised by how many yogis were having a hard time being still, quiet, myself included. I felt desperately, desperately alone in a crowd of hundreds. I was disappointed at not 'connecting' with anyone and I wondered where, if not there, I was going to find "my tribe". I was disenheartened at the feeling of being a walking wallet. I was afraid that I was spiraling down a rabbit hole of introspective depression that I would never climb out of. I struggled and hated and felt angry and alone. And I learned so. very. much. It was gorgeous.
That's why I go. It's both a reprieve from life and a petrie dish in which I'm brought full up against all of my shit and given the time and sift through what I'm able to handle at that particular point. I know, I know, this in itself is intolerant and judgmental but listening to the most shallow, judgemental, insight-free woman ever twitter on about her journey, her spiritual development, her practice in such a superior way in the same conversation as slights on "Indians" and the yoga community she's fully immersed herself in has irritated me to no end.
And made me want to return more than ever.
Cultural superiority is cultural superiority no matter how many droll comments you couch it in. Stories about "Indians" shared in "aren't they funny" tones are not funny, they're patronizing, disrespectful and arrogant and I think they say more about you and your prejudices than they do about the culture you're immersed in. God knows I've been frustrated while travelling and completely lost my cool on more than one occasion, but I'm thoroughly ashamed of myself afterwards and know damn well that my reaction was about me, not the idosyncrasies, no matter how different they be from home, of the country I'm visiting. That's part of why travelling is so wonderful. It pulls you out of yourself and smacks you in the face with your assumptions, beliefs, biases, judgements - but only if you allow yourself to think that it just might be you as opposed to blaming the culture you're immersed in.
This same person is casting aspersions at the shala (just a money grab), the locals, and the other yogis. It's frustrating to read. I find myself getting angry at what I see as arrogance, mocking of AYRI, Gokulam and the very community they've chosen to immerse themselve in all the while presenting it with an air of being 'above' it all. The shala is what you make it, India is what you make it, life is what you make it - it's all the same.
Mysore can be a hard place to be, like a yogi club med for the lost and confused. The kirtans,colour/totem/birthplace assessments, rolfing, massages, ayurvedic courses, movies, clubbing, dinner parties, swimming in the river or at the Southern Star, dance lessons, philosophy lessons, painting lessons, ashtanga practice...there's a lot to do. Last time I was there I was surprised by how many yogis were having a hard time being still, quiet, myself included. I felt desperately, desperately alone in a crowd of hundreds. I was disappointed at not 'connecting' with anyone and I wondered where, if not there, I was going to find "my tribe". I was disenheartened at the feeling of being a walking wallet. I was afraid that I was spiraling down a rabbit hole of introspective depression that I would never climb out of. I struggled and hated and felt angry and alone. And I learned so. very. much. It was gorgeous.
That's why I go. It's both a reprieve from life and a petrie dish in which I'm brought full up against all of my shit and given the time and sift through what I'm able to handle at that particular point. I know, I know, this in itself is intolerant and judgmental but listening to the most shallow, judgemental, insight-free woman ever twitter on about her journey, her spiritual development, her practice in such a superior way in the same conversation as slights on "Indians" and the yoga community she's fully immersed herself in has irritated me to no end.
And made me want to return more than ever.
Monday, February 25, 2008
my cat, the addict
I just picked up the cat from the guy who was watching him while I was away and he, the cat not the guy, reeks of pot.
I think my little guy has been corrupted, see for yourself:
BEFORE CAT SITTING
AFTER
If you have a lead on a good Narcotics Anonymous group for household pets let me know.
I think my little guy has been corrupted, see for yourself:
BEFORE CAT SITTING
AFTER
If you have a lead on a good Narcotics Anonymous group for household pets let me know.
it's not you, it's me
Two years ago when myself, Mikko and a bunch of others went to Kovalam to practice yoga while the Mysore shala was closed we met a woman that I haven't seen since but who I've kept in touch with through the internet. We don't talk often but emailed back and forth quite a bit after Mikko and I broke up. I confided some of the gory breakup details and she made the proper sympathetic noises which I appreciated until I learned that, while she was sympathizing with me, she was making a play for Mikko at the same time. I didn't feel the same about her after that.
She's currently travelling in India and she uploaded a ton of pictures from Mysore a few days ago which I loved, it was wonderful to see pictures of familiar sights. As I was looking at the pictures I thought I saw a familiar face but figured I must be wrong until I saw another, and another, and another. It was Mikko. In Mysore. With her.
Devastating
Mysore is the city we met in, a place he always referred to as "our roots" and spoke of returning to together. The fact that he's there during the very month he'd convinced me to reconcile, that he's there at another woman's beckoning (someone I'd confided in in particular), that I found out through her pictures, and that he knew I'd find out that shitty way but clearly didn't care - oh so sucky. Sucky but it also screams 'asshole' and I cannot continue to feel sadness over an asshole so in many respects, this has been an epiphany.
It strikes me as cheap to return to 'our city' during the same month he'd asked to come to Toronto to reconcile. It strikes me as weak to run from one adoring woman to another without pausing in between to process what happened and face what comes up. And his behaviour these last few months strikes me as downright mean. None of these things are who I thought he was and it's become harder and harder to resist acknowledging that I was in love with his potential, not him.
I don't want to admit that in part because I thought he was just fantastic and I so don't want to know that he's not actually that person but also because then it's me. Then it means that I loved something that never was, that I deluded myself, that I've been creating misery over an attachment that I dreamed up. It means that all of my sadness, my depression, my anger, my sense of loss is completely unfounded and exists because I've chosen to make that my existence. Come on!! I SO don't want to admit that just as I so don't want to admit that I don't like or respect the person he's shown himself to be. But there it is. Even I can't keep fooling myself into thinking that I can love someone that I don't even like. It's time to let all of this drop.
Epiphany
My journals spanning the last two years have been full of confusion over what I’m supposed to be doing with my life and where I’m supposed to be doing it. I spent much of the last few years feeling lost - lost in purpose and lost to myself. Yesterday as the plane flew over the city I saw the CN Tower, followed Yonge Street up to North York, found the white bridge and used my finger to trace the Humber River along it’s winding path until I reached my house and I had a huge grin on my face the whole time.
I may not know where I belong but I’m not lost. I have no idea where I’m going to end up but I know that I’m here. Now that I’m thinking of myself again as opposed to a mythical ‘us’ I'm realizing how much energy I put into nurturing that relationship at the cost of nurturing myself. I see how desperately lost I got in it all and how afraid I was that I wasn't moving, learning, growing; that I was just stagnating in sadness. I wasn't. I was learning, I was growing, I was facing up to some of my demons, and I've emerged from it with a different understanding of what I can do with this life.
Finding out what someone is not has helped me remember what I am.
She's currently travelling in India and she uploaded a ton of pictures from Mysore a few days ago which I loved, it was wonderful to see pictures of familiar sights. As I was looking at the pictures I thought I saw a familiar face but figured I must be wrong until I saw another, and another, and another. It was Mikko. In Mysore. With her.
Devastating
Mysore is the city we met in, a place he always referred to as "our roots" and spoke of returning to together. The fact that he's there during the very month he'd convinced me to reconcile, that he's there at another woman's beckoning (someone I'd confided in in particular), that I found out through her pictures, and that he knew I'd find out that shitty way but clearly didn't care - oh so sucky. Sucky but it also screams 'asshole' and I cannot continue to feel sadness over an asshole so in many respects, this has been an epiphany.
It strikes me as cheap to return to 'our city' during the same month he'd asked to come to Toronto to reconcile. It strikes me as weak to run from one adoring woman to another without pausing in between to process what happened and face what comes up. And his behaviour these last few months strikes me as downright mean. None of these things are who I thought he was and it's become harder and harder to resist acknowledging that I was in love with his potential, not him.
I don't want to admit that in part because I thought he was just fantastic and I so don't want to know that he's not actually that person but also because then it's me. Then it means that I loved something that never was, that I deluded myself, that I've been creating misery over an attachment that I dreamed up. It means that all of my sadness, my depression, my anger, my sense of loss is completely unfounded and exists because I've chosen to make that my existence. Come on!! I SO don't want to admit that just as I so don't want to admit that I don't like or respect the person he's shown himself to be. But there it is. Even I can't keep fooling myself into thinking that I can love someone that I don't even like. It's time to let all of this drop.
Epiphany
My journals spanning the last two years have been full of confusion over what I’m supposed to be doing with my life and where I’m supposed to be doing it. I spent much of the last few years feeling lost - lost in purpose and lost to myself. Yesterday as the plane flew over the city I saw the CN Tower, followed Yonge Street up to North York, found the white bridge and used my finger to trace the Humber River along it’s winding path until I reached my house and I had a huge grin on my face the whole time.
I may not know where I belong but I’m not lost. I have no idea where I’m going to end up but I know that I’m here. Now that I’m thinking of myself again as opposed to a mythical ‘us’ I'm realizing how much energy I put into nurturing that relationship at the cost of nurturing myself. I see how desperately lost I got in it all and how afraid I was that I wasn't moving, learning, growing; that I was just stagnating in sadness. I wasn't. I was learning, I was growing, I was facing up to some of my demons, and I've emerged from it with a different understanding of what I can do with this life.
Finding out what someone is not has helped me remember what I am.
Thursday, February 21, 2008
insomniac pictures
Maybe it's the crazy full moon eclipse or all the stuff floating around in my mind or the late night hot fudge ice cream sundae snack but I'm completely unable to sleep.
Playing with pictures from the beach today instead of sleeping. Here's a few....
Playing with pictures from the beach today instead of sleeping. Here's a few....
Saturday, February 16, 2008
leaving
Trading Canadian Geese + ice
for pelicans + sun
and snow + stockings
for sand + bare feet
Back next week...
Friday, February 15, 2008
where i work
The entry hall of one of the buildings on campus following yet another snowstorm. The campus was very quiet but the building feels empty at the best of times with its cavernous hallways. Next week I won't be there, I'm trading snow for sand and headed south for the week. Yay for me :)
Thursday, February 14, 2008
SPC2 - blue
I've been wanting to participate in the self-portrait challenge for months. When I saw that the theme this month was 'blue' I figured that would be an easy challenge to begin with. I love blue, it's everywhere in my home, my car, my clothes, my work. I seek it out when I draw, when I write, in what I take pictures of, and in my dreams.
I was wrong, though, it hasn't been an easy challenge because blue is also a state of mind. While I haven't necessarily been feeling blue as of late, the memory of the fall when that's pretty much all I felt is close. Too close. There's a lot on my mind and I find myself walking gingerly through the minefields of memories, fears, and dreams to avoid stirring things up unnecessarily. It feels good to let things settle.
Above everything else blue, for me, is water and I love water. Sitting by it, floating in it, canoeing/kayaking through it - nothing can beat the calming, cooling, meditative effect of being near a river, lake or ocean. This picture was taken in Florida in December. I've posted it before but I chose it to post again because it's a moment where my blue state of mind met the vast blue of the ocean and it was a turning point. This moment is where things changed and I started to leave the fall behind and look forward to the spring.
See more blue-ish pictures over at SPC
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
wah
It's when I write the least that I'm struggling the most. There's a growing reluctance to say anything as I'm keenly aware that I've been saying the same things for months. There's an even bigger frustration that I can't pull myself out of this tailspin.
I've written of feeling like the rug was pulled out from under me taking the lovely life I'd dreamed up with it but I've written less about the aftermath, about the bewilderment of fully being present in my life and finding it lacking. Without the distraction of a relationship and without the expectation that I'd be leaving to build a new life somewhere else, taking a long, hard look at the life I have has been a rude awakening. This is a really great life I've built but it isn't necessarily the right one for me. Kind of like I built the foundations but for the wrong house.
The funny thing is, it's exactly the life I thought I wanted and even that, that I'm quite literally living a life I thought I could only dream of, makes me so very lucky. It's just that now that I'm here I'm longing for a family I don't have, people who aren't here, cityscapes that are not my own, and a different way of earning a living. I'm wondering what I want to be when I grow up, what makes me happy, and dreaming of living somewhere else. I guess that, while I was working to build this life I dreamed up whatever number of years ago, the parameters of what I wanted changed but I was too busy to notice. Now I'm not. Now I'm noticing.
I've been sifting through the vision of the life I thought I was going have, the one I've been grieving, to pull out the pieces I can achieve on my own. There's a core certainty that I'll get there with the same focus and determination that let me create this life but I struggle to retain that certainty. I'm shadowed by an all-pervasive feeling of purposelessness where, the longer I feel caught under its thumb, the less faith I have that I'll ever get out. I go on dates that bore me and serve only as reminders of how hard it's going to be to find someone again and I look at joblistings for overseas jobs that are way beyond my language skills - it's overwhelming and I'm easily buried beneath feelings of sadness, hopelessness, and wishing. Wishing things were different, or easier, or clearer.
It's not lost on me that this isn't about a life, a job, a partner, it's about me. About wondering what my purpose is, the struggle to keep the faith that I'll ever know, and that the answer lies in surrendering to the reality that I'll never know and being happy where I am. I guess I just didn't think I'd be working through all of this at this age or that I'd feel so alone while I was doing it. Even more so, I never expected that I would find it so hard to keep the faith.
I wrote this post a few days ago but didn't publish it because I'm afraid to give the wrong impression. That I'm unhappy, that I'm depressed, that I'm whining. I am those things at times but they aren't me, they're not all I feel, they just seem to be the focus of what I write about because I'm so surprised to be here and I'm working so hard, perhaps too hard, to figure out where I'm going next.
I love that I dreamed a life bigger than I thought I could ever achieve and actually got it and I love that now that I'm here I'm not content to settle. I'm glad that I'm looking, evaluating, dreaming, and even despairing because it's that constant interplay between stretching and reaching that has led me to where I am today. Still, as much as I love that that is a part of who I am, I'm definately not enjoying it at the moment and I'm definitely having trouble keeping the faith which disappoints me to no end.
It's such a strange dichotomy because I know in my heart that I'll achieve whatever dreams I set out for myself, I've never NOT gotten what I wanted/needed, but my mind is so quick to lose the plot. I could spend an entire day laughing but all it takes is one bad moment and my mind runs around like chicken little screaming that the sky is falling in. I never, ever dreamed that it would be so hard to keep that screaming voice at bay and that being in the moment, seeing beauty, laughing would take such conscious, hard effort - I remember a time when it was effortless.
Underneath all of the chicken little screaming I DO know that this too shall pass, that the ebbs will give way to flows and I work to take refuge in the present moment where my fears aren't screaming and my dreams aren't tugging. Right now the present moment means the solace of my office, the sounds of my favourite CD, and a pink-frosted valentine's cupcake. The present moment is a very good place to be.
I've written of feeling like the rug was pulled out from under me taking the lovely life I'd dreamed up with it but I've written less about the aftermath, about the bewilderment of fully being present in my life and finding it lacking. Without the distraction of a relationship and without the expectation that I'd be leaving to build a new life somewhere else, taking a long, hard look at the life I have has been a rude awakening. This is a really great life I've built but it isn't necessarily the right one for me. Kind of like I built the foundations but for the wrong house.
The funny thing is, it's exactly the life I thought I wanted and even that, that I'm quite literally living a life I thought I could only dream of, makes me so very lucky. It's just that now that I'm here I'm longing for a family I don't have, people who aren't here, cityscapes that are not my own, and a different way of earning a living. I'm wondering what I want to be when I grow up, what makes me happy, and dreaming of living somewhere else. I guess that, while I was working to build this life I dreamed up whatever number of years ago, the parameters of what I wanted changed but I was too busy to notice. Now I'm not. Now I'm noticing.
I've been sifting through the vision of the life I thought I was going have, the one I've been grieving, to pull out the pieces I can achieve on my own. There's a core certainty that I'll get there with the same focus and determination that let me create this life but I struggle to retain that certainty. I'm shadowed by an all-pervasive feeling of purposelessness where, the longer I feel caught under its thumb, the less faith I have that I'll ever get out. I go on dates that bore me and serve only as reminders of how hard it's going to be to find someone again and I look at joblistings for overseas jobs that are way beyond my language skills - it's overwhelming and I'm easily buried beneath feelings of sadness, hopelessness, and wishing. Wishing things were different, or easier, or clearer.
It's not lost on me that this isn't about a life, a job, a partner, it's about me. About wondering what my purpose is, the struggle to keep the faith that I'll ever know, and that the answer lies in surrendering to the reality that I'll never know and being happy where I am. I guess I just didn't think I'd be working through all of this at this age or that I'd feel so alone while I was doing it. Even more so, I never expected that I would find it so hard to keep the faith.
I wrote this post a few days ago but didn't publish it because I'm afraid to give the wrong impression. That I'm unhappy, that I'm depressed, that I'm whining. I am those things at times but they aren't me, they're not all I feel, they just seem to be the focus of what I write about because I'm so surprised to be here and I'm working so hard, perhaps too hard, to figure out where I'm going next.
I love that I dreamed a life bigger than I thought I could ever achieve and actually got it and I love that now that I'm here I'm not content to settle. I'm glad that I'm looking, evaluating, dreaming, and even despairing because it's that constant interplay between stretching and reaching that has led me to where I am today. Still, as much as I love that that is a part of who I am, I'm definately not enjoying it at the moment and I'm definitely having trouble keeping the faith which disappoints me to no end.
It's such a strange dichotomy because I know in my heart that I'll achieve whatever dreams I set out for myself, I've never NOT gotten what I wanted/needed, but my mind is so quick to lose the plot. I could spend an entire day laughing but all it takes is one bad moment and my mind runs around like chicken little screaming that the sky is falling in. I never, ever dreamed that it would be so hard to keep that screaming voice at bay and that being in the moment, seeing beauty, laughing would take such conscious, hard effort - I remember a time when it was effortless.
Underneath all of the chicken little screaming I DO know that this too shall pass, that the ebbs will give way to flows and I work to take refuge in the present moment where my fears aren't screaming and my dreams aren't tugging. Right now the present moment means the solace of my office, the sounds of my favourite CD, and a pink-frosted valentine's cupcake. The present moment is a very good place to be.
Sunday, February 10, 2008
Thursday, February 7, 2008
a whole lotta white and a splash of colour
Lots
and lots
and lots
and lots of snow today.
So I bought some of these
and returned to my nest to spend a quiet afternoon
and an even quieter evening
Not pictured is a gorgeously slow yoga practice, the watching of a very silly girl movie, the eating of cups upon cups of bright red raspberries, and a whole lot of time spent lost in daydreams.
It was a good day.
and lots
and lots
and lots of snow today.
So I bought some of these
and returned to my nest to spend a quiet afternoon
and an even quieter evening
Not pictured is a gorgeously slow yoga practice, the watching of a very silly girl movie, the eating of cups upon cups of bright red raspberries, and a whole lot of time spent lost in daydreams.
It was a good day.
Wednesday, February 6, 2008
work today
Or NOT work, as the case may be. The snowstorm (I know, ANOTHER snowstorm) kept the students away and thanks to all the other snowstorms we've had I'm already caught up on casenotes, workshop prep, and my email inbox is clear for the first time in, oh, ever. It's hard to counsel when there's no one to counsel so I not-worked today.
It was a pretty good day.
Outside it continues to snow every bit as heavily as it was when I woke up this morning, tomorrow is going to be beautiful.
Tuesday, February 5, 2008
yog-ahhh
So. Yoga. This morning I had to talk myself out of a temper tantrum during practice; a full on hand slapping, feet kicking, huffily exhaling tantrum. Instead, I took deep, non-huffy inhale and checked in with myself. It reminded me of the calm, rational way a parent checks in with a tantruming child: hands on hips looking down and asking in that overly-calm, soothing tone "Ok. Just what is it that you want?". Turns out, my self wanted to chill the heck out. To suck at poses I can normally do and for that to be ok. So, ok, today my asana practice sucked.
I've been moving into the intermediate (second) series these last few months which involves a lot of backbends. Instead of my chest opening, as I'd assumed would be the case, making some of the primary poses easier the opposite has happened. My back has stiffened up and I quite literally can't get into (bind) some of the twisting poses in the first series. Which causes me NO END of frustration.
I get it. I get that my body is changing. The new poses are developing underused muscles and revealing weak areas that I just worked around before, the result is that I'm stiff and am forced to develop those ignored areas before entering deeply into the poses again. Kind of like my body is using the information gained from the intermediate series to self correct. It reminded me of something someone said after I adjusted them in a class this weekend, they looked up and said that practicing is like giving the body a chance to remember where it wants to be. So true, and this is a good thing, just frustrating. Soooo frustrating.
It kills me to be incompetent at anything but to work for months to learn something only to lose it again - argh. As I moved on from my narrowly averted temper tantrum I thought about what the practice reveals in the body and, beyond that, in life. Today I got something very cool. I got that not binding in my twists doesn't mean I've become incompetent period, it just means that after such a big growth spurt my body needed to pull back and integrate what it's learned before continuing to move forward. And, yes, I got that it's very much the same in life - I got it in many, many different ways loud and clear.
This, my friends, is but one of the many reasons that yoga rocks my world.
"The power needed in yoga is the power to go through effort, difficulty or trouble without getting fatigued, depressed, discouraged or impatient and without breaking off the effort or giving up on one's aim or resolution. A quiet vigilant but undistressed persistence is the best way to get the sadhana (yogaic practice) alone" Sri Aurobindo
I've been moving into the intermediate (second) series these last few months which involves a lot of backbends. Instead of my chest opening, as I'd assumed would be the case, making some of the primary poses easier the opposite has happened. My back has stiffened up and I quite literally can't get into (bind) some of the twisting poses in the first series. Which causes me NO END of frustration.
I get it. I get that my body is changing. The new poses are developing underused muscles and revealing weak areas that I just worked around before, the result is that I'm stiff and am forced to develop those ignored areas before entering deeply into the poses again. Kind of like my body is using the information gained from the intermediate series to self correct. It reminded me of something someone said after I adjusted them in a class this weekend, they looked up and said that practicing is like giving the body a chance to remember where it wants to be. So true, and this is a good thing, just frustrating. Soooo frustrating.
It kills me to be incompetent at anything but to work for months to learn something only to lose it again - argh. As I moved on from my narrowly averted temper tantrum I thought about what the practice reveals in the body and, beyond that, in life. Today I got something very cool. I got that not binding in my twists doesn't mean I've become incompetent period, it just means that after such a big growth spurt my body needed to pull back and integrate what it's learned before continuing to move forward. And, yes, I got that it's very much the same in life - I got it in many, many different ways loud and clear.
This, my friends, is but one of the many reasons that yoga rocks my world.
"The power needed in yoga is the power to go through effort, difficulty or trouble without getting fatigued, depressed, discouraged or impatient and without breaking off the effort or giving up on one's aim or resolution. A quiet vigilant but undistressed persistence is the best way to get the sadhana (yogaic practice) alone" Sri Aurobindo
Saturday, February 2, 2008
instead
I thought today would be different.
Instead of thinking about how I thought I'd be spending the last day of January cleaning in preparation for the boy's arrival, I led my friend through two hours of yoga, pranayama and meditation which was amazing. Amazing for him and amazing for me. It reminded me of how much I wish to do that for my living - very much a new beginning in itself.
That evening, instead of thinking about how I thought I'd spend the last night of January in delicious anticipation of his arrival the next day, I spent the night snowshoeing through unplowed streets to S's house where I sat in the company of 7 others howling in laughter. It was purifying, that laughter, better than any therapy. As if the cobwebs of the last few months had been cleared to welcome a fresh start.
Instead of spending the first day of February thinking about how I thought it would begin with a trip to the airport arrivals, I spent it in a red snowsuit hiking through the forest while the snow continued to fall. Instead of thinking about how I thought the day would include the sound of our stupid, made up language I spent an hour sitting by the river listening to the sound of the water made heavy and slow by the cold. I held out hands filled with birdseed and, as the chickadees landed on my outstretched fingers to feed, I didn't once think of how I thought my hands would be holding the hand of someone else instead of birds and birdseed. Nope. Not once.
And today, instead of thinking about how I thought this would be our first full day together again, our fresh start, I woke up early to make breakfast for everyone, drew a picture that didn't suck with my new ink pens, and hiked through the still-unplowed snow to P's house to lead a group in yoga. I didn't once think of how I thought I'd be teaching yoga somewhere else, with someone else. Uh uh. Not even a little bit.
The tail end of January and the beginning of February have been packed with good things: whispered inspirations, opportunities, a knowing of where I should be, and fresh starts. Instead of spending the weekend thinking about what might have been, I spent it consciously acknowledging the new beginnings that have come my way and I didn't once think about how different these new beginnings are from the new beginning I was expecting just a few weeks ago. Definitely not. No way. Not even the tiniest little bit.
Uh. Uh.
Sigh.
Instead of thinking about how I thought I'd be spending the last day of January cleaning in preparation for the boy's arrival, I led my friend through two hours of yoga, pranayama and meditation which was amazing. Amazing for him and amazing for me. It reminded me of how much I wish to do that for my living - very much a new beginning in itself.
That evening, instead of thinking about how I thought I'd spend the last night of January in delicious anticipation of his arrival the next day, I spent the night snowshoeing through unplowed streets to S's house where I sat in the company of 7 others howling in laughter. It was purifying, that laughter, better than any therapy. As if the cobwebs of the last few months had been cleared to welcome a fresh start.
Instead of spending the first day of February thinking about how I thought it would begin with a trip to the airport arrivals, I spent it in a red snowsuit hiking through the forest while the snow continued to fall. Instead of thinking about how I thought the day would include the sound of our stupid, made up language I spent an hour sitting by the river listening to the sound of the water made heavy and slow by the cold. I held out hands filled with birdseed and, as the chickadees landed on my outstretched fingers to feed, I didn't once think of how I thought my hands would be holding the hand of someone else instead of birds and birdseed. Nope. Not once.
And today, instead of thinking about how I thought this would be our first full day together again, our fresh start, I woke up early to make breakfast for everyone, drew a picture that didn't suck with my new ink pens, and hiked through the still-unplowed snow to P's house to lead a group in yoga. I didn't once think of how I thought I'd be teaching yoga somewhere else, with someone else. Uh uh. Not even a little bit.
The tail end of January and the beginning of February have been packed with good things: whispered inspirations, opportunities, a knowing of where I should be, and fresh starts. Instead of spending the weekend thinking about what might have been, I spent it consciously acknowledging the new beginnings that have come my way and I didn't once think about how different these new beginnings are from the new beginning I was expecting just a few weeks ago. Definitely not. No way. Not even the tiniest little bit.
Uh. Uh.
Sigh.
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