Category Archives: spiritual

I’ll take 40-something over 20-something any day

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Arthritic pains, hot flashes, stress and wrinkles withstanding, I would not relive my twenties if you paid me.  That creased, hot-to-the-touch skin cloaks me in a sense of comfort that I was never afforded two decades ago.  In those days, I wore a skin that never felt comfortable.  That twenty year old skin never seemed to feel like it fit on the body that was attached to my brain.

Perhaps these wrinkles are the road map of the journey that led me to where I am now.  Each crevasse that is etched into my skin marks a milestone that ensured, not only a lesson learned but, a memory was created.  Like every foolish twenty something, I thought I was invincible.  I didn’t necessarily feel like the world owed me anything but I felt like it was my oyster and it was my destiny to find that pearl.

It took me that span of twenty years to realize that I am the pearl in the oyster of my reality.  The epic search for the jewel encased in a hard shell was actually the search for my true self.  The walls that I had created in my teens and twenties became the shell of my oyster and the pearl was me.  Slowly, over these many years, that pearl has come to represent the confidence I now have in myself in every facet of my life.

Spending time chiseling away at the outer shell of my oyster has allowed me to gradually peer into the real meat of my reality and open the doors of that tomb that was my shell.  I no longer feel the same constraints I did in my twenties and if some remnants of those constraints still remain, I don’t care.  It is only a matter of time before the sand on the beach of my reality wears away the residue of that shell that still threatens to inter my world.

In my forties the world has become my oyster, once again, but in a completely different way.  I know who I am and I finally can admit to what I want.  My obstacle now is not the boundaries of my shell but the only the boundaries of my courage and my imagination.

The Moment

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The solid ground beneath my feet

holds me where I am.

But I feel the pull of gravity,

I’m afraid of sinking in the sand.

My reality keeps me sensible,

holds me to the earth.

And like the blossoms in the springtime,

I stand, waiting for rebirth.

The promise of you comes in whispers,

floating lightly on a breeze,

cascading down a mountainside

hiding, lingering in the trees.

I feel the magnetic pull of you,

I foster a hope that grows.

Yours are the eyes I long to see,

yours is the heart my heart knows.

I feared the path to you impossible,

the roads too hard to pass,

but knowing you are out there

only makes my tenacity last.

Loving couple holdind on the hands and sunset

This solid ground will hold me

until our moment is etched in time,

the moment no distance stretches between us,

the moment you are finally mine.

 (image credit)

I fall at your feet

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falling

I tumble weightlessly through my dreamscape,

I cry out, but no words can be heard.

My arms circle in a frantic pattern.

I fall through layers of emotion.

There seems to be no bottom to this chasm,

no earthly pillow to land upon.

I catch a glimpse of you,

standing with arms outstretched and I fall.

I float freely with no need to cry out,

knowing you will be there to catch me,

to wake me from this nightmare.

Your eyes beckon me to trust.

My body drifts through the haze.

No longer questioning, I gently fall at your feet.

~~

Image Credit: http://richardgeorgedavis.com/free-falling-dream/

You breathe in while I exhale

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You breathe in while I exhale.

Every molecule of our existence

is suspended in a moment of time.

Energy,  moving in an undulating wave,

 is passing between us. 

Intensity burns.

Your breath invades every part of my being.

The air is charged with electricity

and my breath is caught for a moment.

Your eyes reflect mine,

and you see the piece of the puzzle

that has been missing.

you breathein

Our eyes close,

but we see each other more clearly

than we ever have before.

Your touch only confirms what I believe.

Our love existed before we met,

in a time long ago, destined to happen again.

We knew we would meet once more,

we didn’t know when,

but our souls will meet over and over.

You breathe in while I exhale,

because this breath will always belong to us.

 (image credit)

Making sure the next step is the right step

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I have had a small epiphany today.  I call it small because to most it would be a normal occurrence but to me it was evidence of the changing of a tide within myself.

When it comes to life-changing events I have always faced them head on.  I react without much thought, relying only on intuition.  I don’t allow myself to wallow in the horrible circumstance, instead I am always looking for the next logical step.  I give myself pause to reflect after the dust has settled but, during the crisis, I am continually thinking ahead and moving forward, never giving a second thought to the cause but always striving for the solution.

But when it comes to the finer, more minute details of life I tend to fester and over-think the little things.   I replay the scene in my head over and over and, after a multitude of scenarios have been beaten into submission in my over-active imagination, I am eventually able to put the proverbial pencil to paper and draw the logical conclusion.

Until that moment of clarity, my mind is a churning mess.  I analyse, over-analyse, recreate the scene in a way it never happened.  I create dialogues in my head that never occurred and have myself convinced that this miniscule event has become epic in proportion to actual reality.

Personal growth is a journey taken one step at a time and today I took another step.  It was a small thing in the grand scheme of my life but one that I normally would have allowed to gnaw on my subconscious until my brain hurt.  Instead of allowing the situation to spiral out of control in my alternate reality, I diffused the ticking time bomb before the digital clock even began counting down the seconds. The drama was over before it began and I understood what it meant to take the high road.

High-road

(image credit: 5feet20.com)

Perhaps wisdom does really come with age.  Or perhaps I am just tired of spending so much time creating scenarios in my head that never existed in the first place.  Regardless of the reason, I am glad I was able to teeter on the precipice of discomfort and take a step forward that was foreign to me.  That one small step in my day was a giant step on the path of my life.

The truest definition of me

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The Earth enveloped the roots,

held them close in its embrace,

and nourished the growth of new life.

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 We placed our memories,

written in black ink,

and surrounded those roots with our love,

our cherished memories

and our hope for, one day, reuniting with those we have lost.

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 Each new leaf,

green with the promise of perpetuation,

reminds us that life goes on

and that we must find the joy and not the sadness

in the days in which we live.

***

We finally had the chance to place the rocks around my mom’s memorial tree yesterday.  After a lovely, and filling, brunch my family and I gathered around the tree I planted in my mom’s memory and we placed the river rocks etched with words that represented what friends and family remembered about her.  The best part of this moment is that is was not a somber occasion but a time filled with meaningful memories of a wonderful woman.  It was a brief juncture in our day where we could remember the happy times and not be plagued with the sadness and the sense of loss.

I cannot think of a better tribute for Mother’s Day.  My mom would be happy to know that we are able to embrace the multitude of wonderful moments we had in our lives and not focus on the fact that she was not able to be here to help us celebrate.  The power of what she was in lives is more than enough to compensate for the reality that she not physically here.

Her memory and the many lessons she taught will continue to exist within us.   Her love grows with each hug we give our family and our friends and we do her justice by continuing to live each day as if she were still here and covertly guiding our every move.

She would want us to be happy.  She would urge us to sacrifice ourselves for the things we believe in, the things we truly want, and she would tell us to never give up.  I can hear her voice in my head saying “if it’s worth having, it’s worth fighting for”.

I would move the Earth and the Sun to have her here for one more day but I will live each day contented by the fact that she resides in my heart.  Her voice is strong in my ears and her determination flows in my veins.

I am my mother’s daughter and I celebrate the fact that there is no stronger definition of me.

The me that is me

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sunrise-18a

The sun peeks into my room at dawn,

and I greet it with a smile.

The morning brings the songs of life

and I do nothing but listen for a while.

I smile knowing that all is right

as I prepare to greet the day.

I feel like I am where I should be,

sadness and happiness equally weigh.

Every part of my life right now

is exactly what it should be.

I wouldn’t change a single thing

for these moments have brought me to me.

I have loved and lost and cried my tears,

my heart has been broken before.

But mending those breaks only fueled my fire,

left me stronger and wanting more.

 I know what I want, I know what I deserve,

and that I will never second guess.

It may be elusive and difficult to get

but I will never settle for less.

 The sun peeks into my room at dawn,

never knowing what it will see.

But I greet it every day with strength

and the confidence to believe in the me that is me.

 (image credit)

Don’t walk by without sticking your nose in it…

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Too often I find myself seemingly wishing my life away.  Maybe I’m not really wishing it away but I do tend to look forward to things I have coming up instead of enjoying living in the moment.  I always comment on how quickly time seems to be marching on when, really, I have created the staccato drum beat that I am marching to and have quickened my own pace.

Years ago, my parents used to listen to a jazz singer by the name of Cleo Laine.   Although countless hours were spent listening to her sultry songs and three octave range, the only song that I can remember with total clarity is her rendition of “Stop and smell the roses”.   Even now, I can hear the song in the recesses of my memory as the words hover in a balloon above my head.  “The sweetest flowers grow, and then they bloom, but one day they die.”   I need to have that song playing on a recurring track in my head so I can realize the moments that I may be potentially throwing away, the moments that I can never get back, the moments that I missed because I was too focused on what was coming next, the moments that the roses were in bloom.

I wake up every day – I have a few cups of coffee – I go to work – I am living.  But how much living am I really doing in my life?  Am I taking the time to appreciate the things around me or am I merely going through the motions with blinders shielding my eyes and completely negating the real things in life that are happening right in front of me?

It’s time to slow down, to take life as it comes and not wish myself into the rapidly approaching future.  It will be here before I least expect it and all of those moments that I could potentially have been creating memories will have vanished.  It’s not often that I buy myself fresh flowers, but yesterday I purchased a bouquet of flowers in anticipation of the post that I would create.  Those flowers are now displayed on the island in my kitchen and each time I pass by that vase of floral poetry, I pause and take a moment to put my nose deep into those blossoms and breathe deeply.

roses

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As I sat in my living room last night, laptop at my fingertips, dog asleep at my feet, I gazed across my still snow-covered lawn at the beautiful sunset.  The mottled pink clouds scattered across an otherwise clear sky and reminded me to pause and absorb the beauty of the moment.  Soon, that rose-colored sky would disappear and the true night sky would be speckled with a spectacular display of stars.  With a glass of wine in hand and a blanket caressing my shoulders, I took refuge in the warmth of my living room and took the time to enjoy the end of my day.

All too often those moments fade quickly and we are left reflecting on the beauty and emotion of what was, when we should embrace that beauty and those emotions as they occur.  Live in the now.  Stop and put your nose deeply into the petals of those roses and inhale the fragrance.  All too soon, those precious stems will be bare and we will be left with nothing but a memory of a flower that we once had the chance to enjoy.

 

Keeping a piece of you with me

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butterfly

This pendant hangs around my neck,

a talisman of angelic proportion,

to be a gentle reminder of a life that once was.

This simple butterfly

holds the key to my beginning

and serves as a great source of comfort

when I feel like I am falling

into the abysmal chasm of grief.

For this charm holds a piece of you,

of each of you,

and I draw strength knowing that a part of you

will always be with me,

there to give me that sense of your presence

whenever I need it most.

Ashes to ashes

as yours are forever bound to the other.

(image credit)

Gazing into your own eyes isn’t weird, it’s necessary

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For us to be ultimately happy, we need to take the time to understand the person that we truly are, blemishes and all. It is not very often that we allow ourselves that pause to face ourselves and spend a while gazing into our eyes of truth.

mirror

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It takes a great deal of honesty, and some humility, to admit to ourselves the things that are important in our lives and what will make us truly content – to embrace the person that we are and to love everything about ourselves. We are each born with unique qualities and characteristics and understanding what really makes us tick is half the battle. Being able to accept those things and allow ourselves to be satisfied with those traits is the other half of that battle.

Contemplating our own thoughts and feelings is a daunting task. But to really reach into the depths of our souls and seek what is most important to us means we are required to admit to ourselves the truths that we avoid on a daily basis. Sometimes that revelation is uplifting. But sometimes realizing who we are and what we want makes us really understand the distance between our reality and our true bliss.

Before we can be honest with anyone else, we need to be honest with ourself. Mirroring someone else’s happiness will only delay our gratification. If we take the time to really delve into our psyche, to look deeply into what makes us who we are, we will come to terms with what gives us the greatest pleasure in our life. So many people spend so much of their time trying to be something they are not. They only try to present the image they feel others want to see. But they do themselves a grave injustice by not being their genuine self. Maybe our warts are what make us truly special and by ignoring those so-called inferior qualities we lose our individuality.

We are all truly unique but embracing those true parts of ourselves means we have to go face to face with nothing more than our honest perception of who we are to the core. In no realm of our reality should we give the power of that perception to anyone but ourselves. There is no single person on the planet that has the right to tell us who we are or what we can become.

Hold a mirror to your face. Look deep within yourself and be honest enough to admit who you are and what it is that is right for you.  Everyone has warts – some are visible, some are masked. Being introspective will allow you to embrace those warts and realize that the things others see as flaws make you stand apart from every other human on the planet.