creativity – Jenn Sheridan

Which way do I lean?

“The days are long, but the years are short.” ~ Gretchen Rubin

“The secret of life is enjoying the passage of time.” ~ James Taylor

With Spider Boy’s first year of preschool coming to a close next week, I’ve been looking back over this past calendar year a lot lately, my first year as a “stay at home mom.” This year has been a lot of things. Intense. Emotional. Chaotic. Playful. Stressful. Fun. Messy. Diverse. Routine. Challenging. Exhausting. Beneficial. And ultimately, Priceless. My boys will turn 2 and 4 this summer. No longer babies and yet still so very young. Every time one of them climbs up in my lap, or reaches up to hold my hand, or snuggles down in bed with me, I feel such deep gratitude for this time with them. They are growing so fast, physically and mentally and emotionally, and each day is a new adventure with them, a new opportunity for me to see them for who they are, to create a safe space for them to explore, to expand my perspective as I see things through their eyes, to learn from them as much as I am teaching them.

It is not easy. I am “on” 24/7, even in my sleep. My buttons get pushed pretty much constantly. I have been punched, head-butted, kicked, slapped, and elbowed, not always accidentally. I have changed more diapers than I could possibly count. The constant never-ending drone of meal planning, grocery shopping, cooking, dishes, and laundry is often overwhelming. There is no such thing as “just running in” anywhere. I am almost never alone.

I benefit greatly from having gone back to work after the birth of both of my boys. I know what it is like to come home after your child has already gone to sleep. I know the grief of having all too many of your child’s “firsts” happen with other people. I know that weekends are there just so you can catch up on laundry and grocery shopping and other chores. But I have also experienced the simple pleasures of “water cooler” conversations and lunches out with co-workers. And I know how good it feels to do work that you truly feel good at, and to even receive external validation for the good work that you do. Having had both experiences really helps me to appreciate the pros and cons of both choices, if indeed it is truly a binary choice. There are aspects of my work life that I miss (the people, more than anything else), but I’ve lived through it and know how miserable I was trying to balance raising a family with working outside the home, especially after the birth of my second son. On a good day, I felt like I was mediocre at everything I did; on a bad day, I felt like I was failing miserably, not even treading water, drowning in the overwhelm.

Like many women I know, I received news of Sheryl Sandberg’s Lean In with mixed feelings. While I really appreciated that she wanted to address the issue of women not rising into leadership roles in government and large businesses, I felt she really did those of us who have thoughtfully and consciously made different decisions a disservice. Long before I became a mother, I really struggled with the idea that I needed to give up so much of my time and energy in order to build someone else’s pyramid, as Daniel Quinn would phrase it. My life has always been multi-faceted; I’ve joked about being a “jack of all trades, master of none,” but truly, I just have a wide variety of skills and interests, and I don’t think there is a “job” that exists that could encapsulate enough of them for me to feel fulfilled. I’ve always needed my time outside of the workplace to round things out, to take classes and be involved in my spiritual community and write and be in nature and much much more. When I left my for-pay job, yes, it was so that I could spend time with my children, but it was also so I could consciously create the well-rounded life that I wanted to live, and be the best example for my children I could be of someone who lives life fully.

One of the things that I feel most thrilled about with this “new” life that I am creating is that there is no longer a clear delineation between what is “work” and what isn’t. My life is my work. Whether I am repotting the organic tomatoes that I grew from seed, tucking my toddler in for his nap, stirring the batter for a batch of zucchini bread, creating a flyer for an upcoming workshop that I’m helping to facilitate, preparing for a board meeting at my son’s preschool, or sitting down to grab a few minutes for quiet meditation, it is all my work. I have never felt more fulfilled.

This is what I feel Sheryl Sandberg and so many others have missed. It seems to me that having a conversation about gender in the workplace is “so last millennium.” Whether you are a man or a woman, whether you’re an empty-nester or new parent or opting not to have children, shouldn’t the encouragement be to live life more fully? To find what it is that you’re passionate about and do that? And if it doesn’t fit inside someone else’s box, to create your own box? I would love to see these influential people talking about how to spend less time at the office and more time exploring this amazing planet we live on, beginning with your own backyard. This isn’t about commitment or ambition or even work-life balance. This is about recognizing that it is all your life, and it is worth making sure that it is one that is being truly LIVED. So which way do I lean? I am leaning in . . . towards life! Namaste.

Do you really mean it?

You know that feeling when life grants you a wish, and everything feels like it’s falling into place for a while? It’s such a delicious feeling, with joy and love and a sense of fulfillment blossoming in your heart. It’s like you have the ultimate green thumb, and everything you touch flourishes. I don’t know about you, but for me, I always have this sense of relief, like I’ve finally gotten it, like I’ve arrived. Ah, such sweetness.

And then the next week, or day, or hour even, Something Happens. It might be small–a stubbed toe–or perhaps seem ginormous and overwhelming–a broken leg or, ahem, a pinched nerve. It might appear that life is throwing a curve ball–a reorg at the office–or perhaps it looks like a thrown game–a layoff or a car accident. Whatever it is, it feels completely out of the blue, completely at odds with the sweetness, completely disorienting.

You might think that these situations were created from completely different places, from drastically different energies. One is obviously creative while the other is obviously destructive, yes? Total mixed messages, right? Probably not. In my experience, 9 times out of 10–at least!– they are two sides of the same coin, the exact same delicious, creative energies just showing up in different ways.

This is what I call the Do-You-Really-Mean-Its. You’ve set your intention, aligned with your source, manifested your desires, and it is wonderful. But do you really mean it? Are you already beginning to slip back into old patterns of self-doubt, or perhaps making excuses for why you can’t really do all of those things you were all excited to tackle just yesterday? Or maybe it’s you who have been sending out the mixed messages, setting an intention one day and its opposite the next? And so, in order to clarify what it is you really are looking for in this life, the universe gives you a slightly different reflection of what it is you’ve been desiring.

You might be thinking, “Slightly different? Seriously? But I just got laid off!!” Well yes, to the infinite nature of the universe, that *is* slightly different. You asked for work that was in greater alignment with your spirit, right? Well, step the first was to release the old work that was no longer a match for you. (I’ve always loved being laid off for exactly this reason, so grateful to have the space necessary for me to let go of the old and embrace the new.)

This week my challenge has been to learn how to embrace the pinched nerve in my back. At first I was filled with despair–hadn’t I *just* been writing about how I was moving away from the overwhelm of physical pain? Way to knock the wind out of my sails! But then I remembered to take a deep breath and look this experience straight in the eye, and I saw it for what it really was, a Do-You-Really-Mean-It. I’d been in ostrich-mode for a year and a half, sending out a strong intention of wanting to hole up and avoid life. What better way to do that than to be forced to lie in bed for a few days? The universe was asking me which intention was the real one–to live life vibrantly, fully, and out loud? Or to be an ostrich? When I got that, I was able to answer with a resounding, “Yes, Please! I am ready to be truly LIVING again!” with a little, “Hey, next time, can you find a gentler way to ask?” thrown in for good measure.

Trust me, it ain’t always easy dealing with the Do-You-Really-Mean-Its. In fact, they are almost always challenging. But they are also great opportunities to send out “rockets of desire,” as Abraham would say, truly clarifying your intention within you and for all that vast power of the universe at the same time. This pinched nerve has been my opportunity to shake off my inner ostrich in places I didn’t even realize it was still lingering, and to surrender to the flow of life, allowing the true priorities to make themselves known (did you know that I was one of them? go figure!) in the process. Namaste.

Ostrich-ization

I have a confession to make, something that has been weighing on me for quite some time. I am a bit of a . . . well, no, more than a bit. I am a full-blown, head-in-the-sand OSTRICH. Phew, I said it. What a load off! Wait, what’s that? What does it mean to be an ostrich? Well, it means that when I start to feel overwhelmed with life, I tend to hole up, putting my head in the proverbial sand and allowing myself to look at only what I must to get through the day, the week, or even, I’m embarrassed to admit, the year. Well, that’s not so bad, you might think. Focus is a good survival skill. And yes, in small amounts, it is a truly necessary skill, especially when you have a lot of balls in the air in this busy, busy life. But escapism and avoidance? They cut you off from your source, from love and joy and laughter, and ultimately from living.

The irony here is that ostriching is just about as opposite to my life philosophy as you can get and still be me. See, I am a big believer in self-awareness, consciously looking at myself and where I am and seeing what is keeping me from accomplishing my goals and attaining my dreams. I have invested a lot of time and energy (and I mean A LOT) in personal growth exercises, classes, retreats, etc. over the years, and, as a result, I have, well, grown a lot over the years because of it. I’ve weeded my mental and emotional gardens, exposing and excising all those hidden roots for the dandelion-like issues that always seem to find fertile soil to grow in. I believe in doing a little spring cleaning several times a year, not just in my physical space, but mentally and emotionally to keep exposing any missed roots that might be clogging up my flow. I believe in looking directly at what scares me, looking that fear directly in the face and calling it out for what it is. I believe in feeling the fear and doing it anyway, especially because I know that whatever I feel fear about is life’s way of nudging me towards my next area of self-growth.

So when I pulled my head out of the sand last week, I was astonished to discover that in many respects, I’d been hiding in that fear-based sand for over a year and a half. I’d gotten overwhelmed when my second baby was born (oh yes, that baby who is now 20 months old) and I’d managed to compartmentalize my brain so that things I couldn’t deal with went into a segment that was pretty much a black box, taking stuff in but not allowing things out, so I had fewer things to look at and deal with at any given moment. It is a very effective short-term strategy, but an absolutely abysmal long-term one that can cause mental, emotional, spiritual, and even physical anguish.

I received an email from a friend recently with a story that eloquently describes what happened to me during this time of ostriching:

“A young lady confidently walked around the room while leading and explaining stress management to an audience with a raised glass of water. Everyone knew she was going to ask the ultimate question, ‘half empty or half full?’ She fooled them all: ‘How heavy is this glass of water?’ she inquired with a smile. Answers called out ranged from 8 oz to 20 oz.

She replied, ‘The absolute weight doesn’t matter. It depends on how long I hold it. If I hold it for a minute, that’s not a problem. If I hold it for an hour, I’ll have an ache in my right arm. If I hold it for a day, you’ll have to call an ambulance. In each case it’s the same weight, but the longer I hold it, the heavier it becomes.'”

Those “weights” that I stashed away for another day may have started out light as a feather, but by the time I realized I could not carry them anymore, each one weighed a thousand pounds. The longer I carried such heavy weights, the more I ostracized myself from my source. At different times throughout that year and a half I was filled with anxiety, struggled with depression, experienced physical pain throughout my body (migraines; back and knee pain), struggled with finances, and lived in a mental fog that I couldn’t seem to clear myself of. Every time I found myself in such anguish, I would be baffled by it. I was working hard at creating the life I had been wanting to live, enabling many of my life’s dreams to begin to be fulfilled, but at the end of the day I still felt somewhat numb, only halfway able to experience the joy that came along with it.

And so last week I gave myself the great gift of de-ostrich-izing myself. I lifted my head from the sand and shined a light on what was hiding inside that black box inside my head. I put down all of those thousand-pound weights and restored them to their feathery lightness. I took care of some long overdue tasks, and crossed about a gazillion things off of my to-do list in a flurry of clarity and lightness and energy that I hadn’t felt in a long, long time. The result? In addition to all of the little tangible benefits of “getting stuff done,” I’ve had a return of my ME-ness. I feel more authentic, more at peace, more capable of taking on the world when I need to, and more capable of asking for help when I need to. I am returning to my practice, rewarding myself with my meditation time in the mornings, and sleeping better at night. The creative juices are flowing again and I have ideas bubbling up all over the places, just begging to be birthed out into the world. The numbness is fading, and my deep gratitude for this life I am creating and living is present without my having to work at it.

As I write this, I feel once again the deep sense of relief I experienced last week, along with a renewed sense of awe that I allowed it to go for so long. But I’ve found that’s what happens when you ostracize (or ostrich-ize!) yourself from life — you can no longer hear the messages that life is trying so hard to send you. And so, here I go again, doing my internal spring cleaning, clearing out the weeds in my internal garden, planting new seeds that I hope will shine light when the dark places try to re-emerge, grateful for this opportunity to continue to grow, and grateful for this awareness that has once again pushed me out of my comfort zone and back out into the world to share my stories along this crazy journey called life, my own personal journey of learning to fly. Namaste.