Archive for September, 2011

Everybody Has a Verna

My 12-step group has suffered a major loss of one of its old-timers, a grand lady who impacted each person with decades of sober strength and wisdom.

Many of the “younger” group members are really struggling with the grief of her death.

I knew her only a couple of years–since I moved to the area and made the group my new home–but I received multiple blessings of serenity and satisfaction from her.  She exuded a peace that only comes from the comfort of being where she was.   Charla had a way of combining gentle tact with no-nonsense recovery.

She had quite a history of substance abuse–including clinically dying–that only the truly hard-core users can claim but all of us can understand.  Her allure laid in caring not at all whether a recovering person was a gutter bum or a society matron; if that person had a desire to be sober and wanted to sit in a 12-step room, that was all that counted.

I loved her for that belief.

Charla sponsored and mentored many women of all ages and stages in recovery.  While I was not one of those women, I do have the pleasure of seeing her legacy of recovery living on in the lives of her girls, many of whom will be stricken with sorrow for a long time to come.

I can relate to their sorrow because I had a Charla once.  Her name was Verna and she was the Grand Dame of my old home group in Missouri.

Verna and Charla were opposite in their drinking stories.  Where Charla was rough-and-tumble, Verna was a genteel lady.  Both, however, were tough as nails and had hearts as big as the number of newcomers they could hold.

Verna was my grand-sponsor, meaning she sponsored my sponsor. 

She was mother, grandmother, friend and confidante all rolled into one and when she died as so many of us do, of lung-related illness, my world cracked.

My group didn’t know how it would go on without Verna sitting in that chair on the wall, right underneath the Princess phone. I lost count of how long that chair sat empty meeting after meeting out of respect for her memory.

But we did go on, especially after other old-timers reminded us that Verna wouldn’t stand for hero worship.  Yes, she had been around for decades, had touched hundreds of lives, but in the end, she died no better or worse than the rest of us.

It may take a bit for that reality to catch up with these good folks in Texas.  Charla’s passing is too fresh; their grief too raw.  For many–and rightly so–Charla was family and there is little worse than losing a close family member.

I suspect that Charla would agree with Verna that hero worship has no place in 12 step rooms.  Maybe I’ll have the opportunity to help in learning that lesson.

After all, that is the experience, strength and hope that I have to share.  While I don’t have the history with Charla that all my other group members do, I did have my Verna.

Sooner or later, if we stay sober, everybody has a Verna.

Do you?  How did he or she impact your life?

Five Ancient Methods of Self-Protection

This morning’s attitude could go either way.

I could easily carry forward some of yesterday’s emotional exhaustion and run with it to continue to let the pissy people walk through my today.

Or, I can make a decision to do two things:

1) Let the conversations from yesterday stay in the past, and 2) Wear protective armor today.

Remember the scripture about the armor of God? While I don’t normally make it a practice to quote the Big Big Book, as some folks call it, Ephesians 6:11-18 is one of my favorite passages.

I love the first line which speaks about putting on the armor of God. The metaphor gives me a choice and grants me responsibility for whether I put it on. When I do, I am shielded from the slings and arrows of the world outside of me.

Isn’t that a beautiful image?

A shield that protects my inner core–my heart and what I feel, my lungs and what I breathe, my abdomen and how I process all the stuff I take in.

These words give me the option to clothe myself in spiritual fabric so that I may release control of solo-fighting the battles I perceive. With that release, I receive strength. Another one of life’s conundrums.

I like knowing I’m protected–when I choose to be–and like so many other points in my life, all I need do is make a decision.

On this Mindful Monday

I encourage you to take this beautiful vision from Ephesians and let it work for you each day this week. I’ve broken it down into five parts, but you’re always welcome to use them in total all week. There are no rules except the ones you choose to live by!

1. Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil.

2. Stand therefore, having girded your waist with truth, having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and having shod your feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace.

3. Above all, taking the shield of faith with which you will be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked one.

4. And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.

5. Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, being watchful to this end with all perseverance and supplication for all the saints.

I’m reminded that I must be ever vigilant.

My ego–which means Edging God Out–is oh-so-patient. And while the doing-battle imagery may not be politically correct, and I’ve struggled with it in the past, it is a fact (for me) that I’m often at war with my own thoughts, feelings and beliefs.

Go forward this week in strength, my peeps. Blessings to you as you fight your good fights.

B Well & Present,
Beth

Which Person Are You: Black & White or Rainbow-Colored?

Lots of life situations boil down to either/or.

Think about it: when someone asks you if you like Coke or Pepsi, you have an answer.

Same with Mac or PC (if you believe the TV commercials).

Ditto for political parties (although it seems as if ALL Americans are ready to do away with partisan, bi-partisan and all partisans).

Black or white aside, and disregarding all the rigid people we know who never cross a line drawn in the sand (my apologies if you are one of those types, but I kind of doubt it), there is still a lot of gray out there.

Let me ask you a question.

Do you consider yourself a spontaneous person or do you prefer to always have a plan of action to follow?

That’s definitely a gray-area question because there are so many what-if’s attached. So let’s take it a little further and set up a scenario:

It’s Sunday morning and you’re doing one of your most favorite things–hanging out with your java, your newspaper, your sweetie and your dogs. Life is good. You’re setting the kick-back tone for the Sunday. You know that your agenda consists of nothing more than watching some NFL football, taking the dogs for a walk and having a snooze. Sounds like heaven, right?

All at once, your sweetie says, “Hey, did you know that the (fill in the blank) is happening today at 2? At Lee Park?”

“Nope,” you say, never taking your eyes off the arts and entertainment section.

“Well,” she says, “What do you think about going?”

This, right here, is a defining moment, folks.

It’s a moment when allegiances waver. Your mental calendar marked this particular Sunday as the football-dog-walk-nap Sunday. You’re kind of attached to your mental calendar.

On the other hand, it sure seems like something your sweetie wants to do (in two hours). In that defining moment, you look at her and think, then say, “Yes, yes, I believe I do want to go to that thing in the park at 2.”

And you mean it.

Welcome to the world of spontaneity.

It’s my world now and I love it.  It’s not the world of 48 years of my past, but it is definitely my life now.

Here’s why:

I value the here-and-now pleasures of making impromptu decisions today much more than I value the cautious, think-it-through, look-at-the-situation-from-all-angles response mechanism I used to have in my life.

A few years ago when asked the same question, I would have let my “yeah-but” voice talk me out of wanting to go where I was invited.

You know the voice.

“Yeah, but I have a ton of stuff to do today (For whom, especially if it’s the week-end?).”

“Yeah, but I was gonna . . . (What? Read the paper, watch football, take a nap?).”

“Yeah, but what if . . . (I don’t have fun, see someone I know, spill something on my shirt, step in a hole–which I did).”

My yeah-but voice needs to occasionally be told to shut up.

If I wanted safety, predictability and regularity, I could have stayed in my old life–that black and white life.

In fairness, I thought that life was what I wanted because that is the way I was raised–you are supposed to eventually arrive somewhere when you are X years old and at Y stage in life.

Why?

Says who?

Can I do something different?

Can I say that I would rather live for experiences rather than security? None of us knows what the rest of today looks like–why do we assume that we do? It does not have to look like yesterday!

I walked away from a lot of stuff–much of which I miss–when I left my old life. I stepped away from a lot of conventional responsibilities and two years later people in my former life still think I’m crazy.

My response? Hell yes, I’m crazy–crazy in love with the rainbow colors of my life.

How about you? Spontaneous or predictable? Neither is right or wrong, so long as YOU are comfortable that you’re being true to your essence.

THAT is the line in the sand.

Give These 5 Easy Gifts and You’ll Feel Gifted

Has anyone else noticed that things are kind of tense right now?

Weather, politics, personal (and U.S.) finances, relationships, our animals, our jobs, the aging of our parents (and our kids), whether we’re going to earn enough to keep our houses and vehicles and buy food–these are some of the extreme tensions plaguing us.

Is it just me, or is it hard to stay serene and mindful while your feet are planted right in the middle of a whole bunch of crappy tension?  The crappiness might not even involve you directly, but isn’t it incredibly difficult to keep it from sticking as it flys by?

What do you do?

How do you manage to stay centered, focused and sane under those conditions?

I had an idea the other day.  What if we, as a form of coping with the abundance of tension out there, were to:  a) stop bitching about all the things that are tense in the world, and b) learn to get out of ourselves.

I know.  You want to throw something at me.  Sometimes I make my own eyes roll when I say stuff like that.  But hear me out because I think this strategy could really work.

Take a look at these five suggestions (by now, you know the deal:  implement one a day if you like, or tackle them all each day this week) and by the end of the day this Friday, September 23, I defy you to tell me you don’t feel at least a bit better about living in this tense world.

Suggestion #1:  Call Your Friends

Yes, I know, in this day of texting, picking up the phone seems old-fashioned.  Pick a day–or try it each day this week–and phone several friends with whom you haven’t spoken in awhile.  Using the land line is best and if you have a corded phone, you get extra points.

Try really hard to not talk about yourself.  Ask questions about what’s been going on with them and then really listen.  Ask follow-up questions.  Inquire about family members, about their work.  If they want to carry on and get tense, listen without corroborating or chiming in about your own similar circumstances.

Be an attentive friend.

Suggestion #2:  Mail Cards

Again, the point here is to skirt electronics and connect in an old-fashioned way.

My sweetie sends five to 10 cards each week (some people in her life get weekly cards).  She does the usual thank-you and feel-better cards, but mostly she sends notes for no reason. She’ll find a pre-printed pad of Post-its and put them in an envelope.  Or maybe its a tiny tub of lip gloss or a sheet of stickers.

Be a spontaneous communicator.

Suggestion #3:  Send Gift Cards Anonymously

This one is so much fun!!  Go to any major grocery store or pharmacy and you can find rack after rack of cards for any retailer and many services in denominations as low as $5.  These are great pick-ups for your peeps who are down on their luck a bit (think gas cards or restaurants or groceries) or because you just want to do something a little special for someone when they’re not expecting it.

Stick the gift card in an envelope, put the person’s address in both the TO and FROM lines and then drive across town to mail it so it doesn’t come from your postmark.  This is anonymous, people!  Extra points for mailing from another state.

Be an anonymous giver.

Suggestion #4:  Do Something Nice (or several things) For People You Don’t Know

Several years ago, I rose early and walked a big loop around my neighborhood of single dwelling homes.  One day I got the idea to pick up the morning paper from my neighbors’ drives or curbs or wherever it was tossed, and place it by their front door or right next to the garage.

I never once got caught and the thrill-seeker in me had a heck of a good time.

You could do something similar by holding the door for shoppers at a department store for 30 minutes.  Or hanging out in the buggy area of your grocers and having the carts unstuck and ready for the next shopper. Or picking up trash around your apartment complex.

Be a considerate neighbor.

Suggestion #5:  Let People Be

Sometimes one of the best gifts we can give to the people we care most about is the gift of time alone.  Practice dropping your expectations that your evenings and Saturday afternoons will always include your  significant other.  Let them breathe!

My sweetie was having a tough time yesterday and said she was going to go run some errands, stuff we usually do together.  Suddenly, I had the bright idea that she might enjoy the time alone even though I kind of wanted to do a couple of the stops she was making.  So we hopped in separate cars and did our own thing for a couple of hours.

Be a thoughtful, non-expectant sweetie.

All these suggestions have one thing in common:  You/We are paying attention to someone besides ourselves.  In the space of time when we are planning our fun, we’re not watching the news.  We’re not tuned into the stock market.  We are not worried and we are not tense.

So what do you think?  Are you up for the challenge?  Let these suggestions be guides because I would love to hear how they sparked your ideas for creating easy and effortless gifts that ultimately gift yourself.

B Well & Present,
Beth

Remembrance and Redemption

Thanks to my San Diego soul-sister, Cathy for inspiring this Thursday Thread!

Remembrance and Redemption are two words that when linked together create a sweet montage of feelings for me.

Several years ago, my good friends Ralph and Becky gifted this beautiful statue to me as a housewarming present.  It’s called Remembrance and Redemption.

The gift was presented to commemorate the start of life in a brand new dwelling and to acknowledge the journey of the heart—how we are redeemed when we surrender the mistakes of our past by remembering them, forgiving them, and letting them go.

Letting go is sometimes the toughest part, isn’t it? 

Oh but there is such freedom in letting go!

My friend Cathy and I talked last night about how we can use the uglies of our past to transform our present.  Whew, what courage that takes!  Often we discover that when we really look at those dark nooks and crannies—Remembrance—we realize that we’re different today as a result of what happened to us then.

Today, different is good. Different helps us forgive. 

Forgiveness relieves us of the burden of toting all those heavy resentments around.  After being stooped over for so many years, isn’t it fabulous to stand upright and feel REDEEMED?

My life today is 180-degrees different from when the Angel Statue entered my life.  I no longer live in that house—I lost it, in fact.  I no longer live in the relationship that the statue was meant to celebrate—I lost it too when I made the decision to move to Texas.

I thought the house and the relationship were permanent in the fabric of my life.

Now I know that the stuff “out there,” the human stuff we create, is never permanent. 

Today the fabric of my life is elastic as I celebrate the one element that is truly permanent—the impenetrable threads that bind me to my God and provide me the opportunity to live at my Highest Potential.

The Angel Statue now resides in my new home.  I look at her with the same fondness as I experience Remembrance and Redemption today.

The difference between then and now is that most days I walk a little lighter—lifted by her wings—and I love a little deeper—inspired by her grace.

Is there a symbol in your life that inspires you to live better?