Attitude Adjustment

I hate December.  To be fair, some years are better than others, but so far, this is not one of them.  Winter is not my season.  It's cold.  It's dark.  It's slippery.  I drink gallons of water, but my skin still dries out.  I use super-duper-heavy-duty-can't-get-any-stronger cream, but my heels and finger tips crack.  I put on lip balm and lotion at least once an hour.  I become the queen of static.  I fry the display on the thermostat when I forget and touch it before I touch some metal to get rid of the shock.  

There are too many things to do in December.  Parties.  Shows.  Recitals.  Concerts.  College recommendation letters.  College audition recordings.  Shopping for Christmas presents.  Planning for January events.  Basically, I just want to crawl in bed between my flannel sheets and under my four heavy blankets,  and just stay there until Spring.

I've decided that I don't want to hate December or winter anymore, so every day, I am going to find something to like, or something that brings me a little inspiration or peace.  Plus, I'm going to post about it.  My updates may show up here, or on Facebook, or on one of my other blogs, but I'm committing to changing my attitude, at least for a few minutes a day.  I can do this.

Today, I shared the FB post of an author I adore, Anne Lamott.

Vulnerability

I've been thinking a lot about vulnerability lately.

I teach about vulnerability in voice lessons.  Singing is about taking chances.   Kids have issues with performing sometimes because singing is so intimate.  I'm not saying that playing for a piano or flute recital won't scare you, but if you make a mistake while playing an instrument, you can always blame it on the instrument.  "This piano is stiffer than the one I'm used to playing on" or "The key stuck".  At the very least, you have an instrument to hide behind.  But not with singing.  It's you on that stage with nothing between you and the audience.  Even if there is an problem with instrument (your voice), it is still part of you, and therefore YOU had a problem.  And in our current world, particularly in the arts, anything less than perfection is failure.

Vulnerability is essential to singing. Singing, real singing, is about baring your soul for the world to see. It's trusting them to see the beauty through the flaws.  It's trusting them to know that sometime the beauty is the flaw.  It's trusting yourself enough to let the beauty created by the poets and composers carry the performance, and not getting caught up in what the listeners think about you.

A few weeks ago, a friend made a reference to these videos in a Facebook conversation.  I've done quite a bit of reading about vulnerability and shame, so I thought, "That's nice.  I'll come back to that later."  After multiple friends shared these videos, I decided that maybe the universe was trying to tell me something.  One watching was not enough.  Next time, I'm sitting down with a paper and pencil and taking notes.  Yes, the videos are that good.  





My third recent encounter with vulnerability was reading the book The God Who Weeps.  In a few days, my book review will be up on my new book blog.  One chapter is specifically about God's vulnerability.  God feels our pain and sorrows and frustrations.  God chooses to love us, and because of that love he opens himself to sympathy and empathy, and weeps with us.

When I was a child, I was taught that we could become as God.  If we lived this life well, we would eventually become gods and goddesses ourselves.  To be honest, this has always bothered me.  My heart weeps for this world, and this world is not my creation and these people are not my spirit children.    I invest a lot in my students and it is hard for me to see them struggle.  I don't really want to watch billions of my children hate and kill each other.  I just don't think I could live with that kind of vulnerability.  I think I would have to be a god like so many people today have decided that our God is:  one who sets things in motion, but then turns his back, unwilling or perhaps unable to do anything about it.  I would have to separate myself to prevent the pain.

I am extremely empathic and sympathetic.  I've built walls, not just to protect the core of me from the outside world, but to protect me from being overwhelmed by the pain and suffering.  Over the last several year, I have become much more open to letting the world see the real me.  On that level, I think I'm getting good at vulnerability.  The walls that protect me from the pain and suffering of the world aren't solid brick.  They have doors and windows that I can open to let it in at the small doses I can handle.  At this point, I don't know if I am supposed to be learning to open the doors and windows wider and more often, or if I am supposed to take down the wall completely.  What I do know is that love and connection can't get in or out through the brick walls.  Moving through the open windows and doors (and maybe even taking down the wall) is the only way that compassion can work.  And I believe in empathy and compassion, so maybe it's time to explore more vulnerability.

A Change in the Pattern

Several months ago I wrote this post about what had become a pattern in my life--I push myself too hard and then my body rebels as its only option for getting what it needs.  A new pattern is beginning to emerge.  My body decided that it doesn't need to sacrifice itself any longer.  It has recruited all things electrical and electronic to get me to take care of myself.

First, my car battery died--four times.  As I waited for someone to come jump start the car and as I sat at the shop waiting to see what was wrong with it, I had some wonderful opportunities.  I saw snow softly falling and then the sun coming out at its brightest.  I felt the sun against my skin as I did tai chi and qigong in my driveway.  I read a wonderfully inspirational book as I sat at the car shop. And I took time to breath and enjoy the every day beauty around me.

Second, my phone freaked out and totally froze up.  I didn't have time to fix it right away, so I just let people know to email or message me on FB instead of calling or sending texts.  Unplugging from my phone for a couple of days was wonderful.  I did get it fixed, but I value the time that I had for other things because I wasn't constantly checking my phone.

Third, my smoke alarm/CO detector keeps beeping at 30 second intervals to tell me that there is a malfunction.  No, it's not telling me there is a problem, it's telling me that it isn't working well.  Maintenance was out and did something to it on Saturday, so I'm hoping I won't have the weekly beeping anymore.  Seriously, 3 weeks in a row(the events were almost exactly a week apart) the thing would beep and I would go take it down, take out the battery, put the battery back in, and put the thing back up. I was just about to say that this was the one electric/electronic event of the last few weeks that I couldn't see a benefit to, but then I remembered that one time while I was there, I got to meet my neighbor.  My furnace room is actually under my stairs and accessed through a door right by the door to his apartment.  I've seen him before and probably waved a time or two, but we hadn't really met.  So it was nice to meet and have a short chat with him.

Fourth,  my internet has been so slow and temperamental.  I think it's probably an internet provider issue, rather than really one of these energy related events, but whatever the cause, it gave me a chance to do a little reading while I waited for things to load.

I'm happy that my body no longer feels it necessary to remind me to slow down.  Now I just have to start listening the first time energy fields/electronics tell me there is an issue.

Perfect Authentic Cadences, Closing Movements, and Life

I'm the kind of person that takes extreme satisfaction in finishing something.  And I hate to begin if I won't be able to find a satisfying resolution.

When I'm working on a new song, I like to start at the end and work backwards so that I can always feel like I have a strong ending.  And if the song ends with a Perfect Authentic Cadence, life is even better.  Admit it, nothing feels as good as ending (a song or a practice session) on a strong V I with the tonic in the highest voice.  OK, maybe it's just me.

I had a little epiphany this morning as I was driving to work.  Last Monday we started a new group of students in the Sun 41 class that I am the teaching assistant for.  We spend about a third or half of class doing exercises that serve both as warm-ups and instruction in the principles of tai chi.  They we teach a new section and polish and refine what we know.  After working the new group through the first few movements, the teacher showed them closing movement (which is really easy to do) and said that wherever you stop while doing the form you can add this to end it.  And this morning, I thought of how I need to find a closing movement that allows me to let go and do something else in real life even if I haven't finished the form or found my PAC.

As an all-or-nothing personality,  I've had to work very hard to do things in little chunks.  Right now, with my health issues and my schedule, I have to be able to do a little at a time and be satisfied with that.  There is no other option.  But it is so hard.  It's hard not to beat myself up when I can't finish a project right away.  And it's hard to listen to my body when it says it's had enough, but my brain wants to keep going.  So, I'm now on a search for a form of PAC or closing movement to use in everyday life.    Maybe I'll just start with singing a nice Sol Do or doing the actual Sun closing movement.

Homing

I'm in a book group that is currently reading Clarissa Pinkola Estés amazing book, Women Who Run with Wolves:  Myths and Stories of the Wild Woman Archetype.  Chapter 9, "Homing:  Returning to Oneself" is my favorite chapter so far.  Maybe because this chapter itself felt so much like coming home.  It was a new way of looking at the old and familiar, and it was a much needed reminder.

Estés begins each chapter with a myth, fairy tale, or story and then takes it apart, exploring the deeper meanings that it holds.  I knew I would love this chapter because it begins with selkies, and I have had a fascination with those stories for years.

(While searching for a free picture of a selkie that I could add to this blog, I found this beautiful digital painting by Elizabeth Sherry.  To me, it perfectly captures the longing for home, the sea.)

(Here is a stunning picture I found of a seal.  Now I really need to quit looking for something free I can put here and just write.)

In her introduction to her literary version of the story, Estés says,

"The story tells about where we truly come from, what we are made of, and how we must all, on a regular basis, use our instincts to find our way back home."

Estés gives examples of how we lose our pelts.

"The soul-skin vanishes when we fail to pay attention to what we are really doing, and particularly its cost to us."  (page 286)
"The issue is not about these energic cash withdrawals themselves, for these are an important part of life's give and take.  But it is being overdrawn that causes the loss of the skin, and the paling and dulling of one's most acute instincts.  It is lack of further deposits of energy, knowledge, acknowledgment, ideas, and excitement that causes a woman to feel she is psychically dying. (page 288).

We lose our pelts when we give continually, but have no season of replenishment.  We lose our pelts when we do what we think we should do rather than trusting the voice within in us telling us what we need to do.  We lose our pelts when we hold back instead of taking the steps that will move use forward.  We lose our pelts when we isolate ourselves from our soul-selves.

"So, in a hunger for soul, our own ego-self steals the pelt." (page293)

I love her discussion of the ego and the soul-world.  It is too long to copy here, but read through pages 291-293.  It made me wonder if perhaps her description of this struggle between ego and soul is what Mormons mean when they talk about the natural man.  This makes much more sense to me than how I have previously interpreted that scripture.

On page 306, Estés lists numerous ways we can return home, recharge.  In church, we may talk of filling our lamps.  I really think we are talking about the same things here, just using different terminology.  What is home?  It's not just what happens after we endure all the mess of this life.  It is a place that we can go to here and now to give use strength for what happens in this life.

"Home is a sustained mood or sense that allows us to experience feelings not necessarily sustained in the mundane world:  wonder, vision, peace, freedom from worry, freedom from demands, freedom from constant clacking."

Some of us may need to return home more often, or stay longer in order to cope with our daily lives.  And by daily, intentional return to home, we also bring a little of that world back with us.

Like the selkie kept from the sea for seven years, if I do not feed my soul by returning to my home, I too will become weak, crippled, and blind.

Discussion questions:

In what ways do you lose your pelt?

What is the voice that calls you back to the sea?

How do you return home?


My answers:
The most common way I lose my pelt is by trying to live according to other people's ideas of what I should do.  Too often, I stay too long on the land because that is what other people expect of me.

I don't listen very well, so often I miss those gentle calls in the night asking me to return to the sea.  Instead, I don't often go to the sea until an illness or injury drags me there.

I know where home is.  I know how to get there.  Beauty (nature, art, music), simplicity, reading, writing, and quiet are the keys for me.  A nature walk, or closing my eyes to listen to the sound of a favorite song, or listening to my own breathing can take me there.  I'm one of those people that has to go home often, which means I need to make more time both for the long spa day approach and for the quick little escapes.

Options

Sometimes when it seems that nothing else could possibly go wrong, you have little ah-ha! moments.  Last week, I spent one evening in Urgent Care getting a leg injury from the week before checked out.  The next day, I day I developed laryngitis, and by the day after that I had no voice at all.  I had lots of reasons to be down and depressed, but I wasn't.  I'll admit I was slightly concerned, but my worries led down a different path this time.

Anytime a singer or voice teacher loses her voice, there is cause for concern.  And the suddenness of the onset had me worried a little, but I was pretty sure I knew what had happened, and a quick call to the doctor's office confirmed it.  The asthma meds I was taking because of the cold I had at the beginning of the month had caused the laryngitis.  One more drug to add to the list of things that I can't take.  After discontinuing the use of that medication, my voice started to come back and although it's not at 100% yet, I'm sure it soon will be.

But in those moments when my brain was asking, "What if it never comes back?" I didn't have my usual response.  I am a voice teacher.  That's what I do.  It's who I am.  It's what I spent years training for.  If I can't teach, basically the only other things I am qualified for are minimum wage jobs.  And in the past, that fear of not being able to teach and sing has sometimes been overwhelming.  But this time, it was different.  Singing and teaching are things I love, but they are not all of me.  It is not my entire identity.  And there are other career options that I could see myself re-training for.

The world is a lot less scary when you don't feel trapped.  Possibilities and options give hope through the tough times, and I'm so glad I could see them this time.

The good news is that I can still teach and I can still sing.  The good news is that I now also know that even if I couldn't do those things, I would still be OK and other doors would open for me.  AB told me that years ago.  I believed him.  I saw it in his life.  But now I know it is true in mine.  I wish I could call him and tell him that I finally get it.

The pattern

I wrote most of this post a few days ago, but didn't actually get around to posting it.  And now I know why.  Because there was another part of the pattern that I hadn't included, and I didn't realize it was part of the pattern until today.  My body has one other thing it does to get my attention--I trip and/or fall causing injuries that slow me down.

But I'm getting ahead of myself.  Here is the original post:

The pattern

I've been through this cycle enough times to know exactly how it will go, so why do I keep getting caught in it? First, I get a little stressed because I have overcommitted myself.  My body gives me a gentle warning to back off.  Sometimes it comes in the form of more pain and tension.  Sometimes the warning is fatigue.  Sometimes it is brain fog.  

When I don't listen and I don't slow down, my body starts creating combinations of brain fog, pain, and fatigue, hoping to get me to rest.  But, my life is intense, and I don't always listen.  Plus I've always had that personality that can keep pushing through a difficult situation.  I'm determined (or as some people may say, stubborn).  I don't give up easily.  And neither does my body.  

When the gentle, and not so gentle reminders are ignored, my body does the only thing left in it's arsenal.  It declares, "If you don't choose to rest, I will force you to rest."  Then it sends my immune system on vacation and leaves my open to whatever virus is most prominent at the time.  If I'm lucky, it's just a cold, and I can cut back on activities to get some needed rest and recuperation, but I can still get through work.  If I've really annoyed my body, it opens the door to things that involve vomiting, diarrhea, and general body aches that you know won't kill you, but you wish they would.  Then I just have to stay in bed until it's all over and my body decides to forgive me.  

So if I know about this pattern, why do I keep letting it happen?  

I'm starting to learn that I can't really do everything I think I can.  I'm fully capable of doing any of the projects I'm involved in, but I just don't have the energy to do all of them.  So I've decided to back off.  People say that you shouldn't make major life decisions when you are going through a rough time. But I believe that that is when you make the most honest decisions.  When I am in a great mood and have lots of energy, I think I am capable of conquering the world.  But really, I live more of my time in the sick/tired mode, so it makes sense to set up my life for what I can accomplish on my worst days.  

So starting today, I am breaking my pattern.  I'm lightening my load.  And I'm committing to slow down whenever I get the early warning signs, rather than waiting until I am so far gone that I have to stay in bed.  I'm also committing to better energy management, using the energy I have wisely, and taking the time to recharge.