Russian Roulette

"Open your eyes, look within.  Are you satisfied with the life you're living?" - Bob Marley

I stood in line tonight at the grocery.  As I idly scanned my Facebook feed from my phone while my groceries were being bagged, the elderly bagger named Louie nudged me and said, “We’ve been having a discussion tonight and I wanted to get your opinion on something.”  I looked up at him intently.  “Shoot.” I stated.  “If someone offered you a billion dollars to play Russian Roulette would you take it?  You’d only have a one in 6 chance of dying. 1 out of 6 bullets.”  Without hesitation I responded, “Not a chance in Hell Louie.  Not a chance in Hell.”  He winked. “Me either kid.  Me either.” And so we went on about our ritual.

For some reason, driving home the conversation stuck with me.  More so because I’m not sure if a few years ago I would’ve answered the question so quickly and with such unabashed confidence in knowing my retort.  A few years ago I was lucky to get through my days without wishing that this life would somehow just vaporize into thin air.  

Every step for many years felt as if I was running in cement.  Going nowhere fast and if something didn’t change I was going to be frozen there, a statue of myself ‘The Girl Who Couldn’t Get Away From Herself’ they would’ve called me.  Repeating the same patterns of behavior over and over again expecting different results.  Yes, the definition of insanity.  I was the poster girl.  I had everything externally, an insane career, piles of friends, jaunting around the world just because but on the inside…I was vacant.  A shadow.  Some sort of lost semblance of something that I was supposed to be but couldn’t find my way to. There had to be more.  I had to be more.  

And then one day, after something insignificant, out of nowhere I decided that I no longer needed to carry these weights.  I could be something different.  Something better.  As long as it took, I would pull myself out of this drowning of the self.  I would find light.  And so I did.

It wasn’t easy.  It required a concentrated effort to unravel myself from myself.  Every time I went to react, I chose to act instead.  I chose to consciously and purposely move instead of chaotically flounder.  What did I want the outcome to be was the penetrating thought with my every word, with my every movement.  If I wanted love, I had to project love.  If I wanted peace, I had to seek it.  If I wanted understanding, I had to understand.  If I wanted something to be beautiful, I had to first believe that I was, in whatever form.  If I wanted forgiveness, I had to forgive myself first and foremost.  

I dusted off the hope chest of myself and went through each shred of paper, photograph, poem, travel, lover, lesson and embraced them all….one by one.  I incorporated the pieces of me into a wholeness of the being that I was now.  I took the 14 year girl in me who had been stopped in her tracks with anguish and held her hand and let her know that she was ok.  I had this now and we were gonna be just fine.  I stared my 30 year old self in the face, hugged her really fucking hard and said, “You will get through this and be far greater than you could ever comprehend.”  And I let her rest.  

I decided to be a little bit more gentle with myself.  To drink less wine.  Absorb more air.  I decided to envision, visualize, believe.  I would whisper as I drove for miles in my car, in the middle of the night, “Wherever you are, the rest of my life, I love you, I’m grateful for you and I’m ready when you are…”  I allowed myself the ability to wait patiently, to flow with the current instead of fighting the tide.  I would get where I needed to go if I could just float.  Just be.

And slowly but surely, it came.  Because slowly but surely I was ready to see it, to embrace it.  To recognize it.

There are a thousand cliches of self help.  But in the end, it’s two words.  Help yourself.  Stop waiting for some lightening to crack from the sky of your being to jolt a change forward.  Be your own electricity.  Stop grunting and start being.  There is no elixir.  There is no magic moment. It’s one foot in front of the other, doing the next right thing.  Being the next right thing.  It’s about being a boomerang.  What you project out will be what comes back.  It’s about releasing yourself of instant gratification and having patience with the process. It’s about having a process.  

I still falter. I am human.  But I would so much rather this, the strangely beautifully confusing moments to be my story than the last moment being that I was stupid enough to lose out on the next chapter because I might be willing to play a stupid game of staring down the barrel of something I might not be able to come back from. 

This is beautiful.  This is life and this is enough.  I am enough.

Thanks for listening.

I Love You Still

Super honored to have a piece of my writing published via Elephant Journal xo

http://www.elephantjournal.com/2014/10/i-love-you-still/

Gimme gimme

I’ve been trying lately to dissect the concept of wanting what we can’t have.  I do believe for many years I subscribed greatly to that.  The thrill of the chase and all.  And then, it stopped one day because I really wanted what I couldn’t have and not because I couldn’t have it, but because I loved it.  I loved him.  And well, then the game wasn’t so fun anymore.  It hurt.  So, I stopped playing.

I believe it’s difficult to appreciate the things, the people in our lives in a way that sort of transcends all of the everyday bullshit.  We are so easily distracted by pretty things and take for granted the simplicity of love.  The real kind of love when someone stays by your side has your back – even when we catch ourselves banging against walls.  The concept of ‘leaving’ is no longer a notion.  There is no greener grass.  There are certainly other ‘things’ but if you can’t find a way to love all that is around you, regardless of the variations and formations it all may take, well, then you’ll just keep searching under rocks and behind shadows forever.  Because eventually, you will come to find, that what you can’t have has nothing to do with anyone else.  It has to do with you.  And if it’s not in your life, then it’s not supposed to be.

I’m not sure why my mind is spinning in circles about this lately.  Perhaps it’s because I’ve broken through something and I no longer feel held or compelled to search anywhere outside of my reality for things far ‘greater’.  The universe gives you gifts.  These gifts come in the form of people.  In the form of moments - even shitty ones.  If you don’t embrace them, you will lose them.  We miss windows all the time because we are too busy looking outside of them, backwards and beyond them as opposed to at them.  We have these chances, and when we become too consumed with what they mean, what they will be, what they will bring us as opposed to looking very simply at what they are - we skew their very purpose.

There is a reason to simplify.  There is a reason to believe that your life is of your making and creation.  There is a reason to love the gifts you’ve been living.  There is a reason to stop fucking bitching and wanting something more.  There is a reason to stop being afraid that this life is exactly all you’ll ever get and be.  Because when you stand in the cold air and you watch your steamy breath and your eyes blink from sunlight….that is enough.  That is all there is.  There is nothing more to want or to have.  There is no ellipsis. 

Anyway, I guess it’s about gratitude and wanting what you have.  Not what you don’t. 

Thanks for listening.

Gracias. Again.

Without gratitude, I don’t believe it’s possible to find true peace. I feel that its taken me 35 years to find true gratitude for my life – as chaotic and often fucked up as it all seems…I am so grateful to be here. To have this so called life of mine.

Today, I laid in the grass with my friends – laughed and talked, watched the babies that are now fast and furiously growing far away from actually being babies anymore…the sun was on our faces, not a cloud in the sky. It was peace. Later, I sat by myself staring at a garden with the earth between my toes and just whispered, “Thank you, thank you thank you thank you….” Gratitude for the existence of sun and breath has literally altered my sense of being this year.

My soul is so much more quiet and calm when I can praise the simple moments.

You see, I made an effort this year to fall in love with myself, my life. To find beauty in the darkest corners and the quietest of hours. I fell in love with my friends (and some new ones too) all over again. Practicing gratitude has empowered me in ways that silly words just can’t remotely articulate. It’s given me this quiet patience and faith. I highly recommend even in the deepest spirals of our own intricate insanities, you embrace the words, “Thank you.”

All of this has allowed the clutter to clear for me. When I drive along the ocean, my mind is no longer filled with caverns of cobwebs but these images of laughter – my life. I am no longer afraid. I am just – well, grateful. I see all of them around me, these people that I have chosen to be the beautiful flowers in the garden of my life…you get what you give. I would like to believe that I have given well to have these beautiful gifts around me. In the very least, I’m trying.

I am here for a reason, and I appreciate that now. Truly. If you can embrace and accept as opposed to fight – it’s enlightening. If you can just allow yourself to be without itching the constant scratches of distractions you can ebb and flow with it. You can just be without constantly doing – if that makes sense? I wasn’t really good at that for a long time. I always believed that being in control would allow me feel in control. That isn’t the case. It has only been since I have allowed myself to lose control and to just succumb to the moments instead of thinking of the next, that I have found the greatest strength. It rocks.

Anyway, - I could go on and on. I won’t. For tonight, I will just say thank you sun, thank you earth, thank you friends, and thank you family. Thank you thank you thank you a thousand times and back again. I get it now.

xo

Gratitude

I haven’t had time to put fingers to keys. Life is rambling on at rapid speed and days turn into months so quickly that I can barely grasp the memory of the moment before I am on to the next.
I’m into this amazing thing lately. It’s called gratitude. I feel like a cheesy fucking Hallmark card sometimes.

When the wind stirs around me, the sun shines on my face and my hair gets caught in my lip gloss I just think….Jesus Christ I am so lucky. To feel this – to see all of this. To be here. I don’t quite believe I have ever actually felt true gratitude the way that I do these days.

And trust me, there are still shit days…but they sort of roll like water off of oily skin and soon enough, I am back to the good. I know that I spent the entire year working to get to this place and I don’t regret a moment. Not even the icky bits. Solitude does have its perks.

I don’t think a lot of people feel much gratitude. I didn’t for a long time. I was always focused on the what wasn’t or isn’t or couldn’t be. Something happened this year. I think I tossed all that bullshit over my shoulder in a fountain wish. Not sure. It just kinda happened. I mean at the end of the day, how can you really take life for granted and not be grateful for it? Right? Obviously it’s always just as bad as it is good but even that’s good too. Right?

I sound so lame even I want to vomit. I’m not saying it’s a snap of a finger thing…but more of a ‘practice’. I know everyone in my world has a hell of a lot more than others in someone else’s world so therein should be enough. Fingers, toes, breath, family, friends, love…all that…- it might seem trivial but it’s a helluva lot more than most. I guess sometimes you just need to think about it a bit.

Maybe it just comes down to just knowing at the end of it you’ll be ok – because after the end of most, you always have been. So, as the book says, ‘Don’t sweat the small stuff’. Shit will always storm – but that’s what toilets are for.

Part me of misses my angst lost writing….but I just can’t bring it. I’m good. I’m happy. Regardless of what is or isn’t going to come. I’m good.

MUAH.

The reality.

“The night wants to kiss you”….so sings Patty Griffin..

And so it is, that the time has come for me to write again. I’ve been wanting and meaning to for a while. Just couldn’t find the moment.

I doubted myself yesterday. I never doubt myself. It was a really wonky fucked up place for me to be. I think I’m over it now. I’m blessed to have a great mentor in my life that keeps me in check. I’m also blessed to have a mind that is stronger than a doubtful spirit and so I’m pretty sure that all is good now.

You see, I am what I am. I am as good as I can be. Beyond that, I can’t do much more. Just breathe, figure it out with each step and do right by myself when and where I can and if the cosmos align, do right by everyone around me as well.

I’m not naïve enough to not be aware of how very blessed that I am. I don’t know many that have the gifts that I have been given. Maybe even the gifts that I have worked my ass off for – regardless, they are beautiful gifts and even if I might not say it, or express it properly, these gifts, these souls in my world are the spirits that guide me. My sanity check(s).

I turn 35 this week. Most of me can’t quite grasp it - as if part of me feels as if I am just starting to live – just starting to figure myself out…to own myself – if that makes any sense. I feel for the first time in awhile that I can be anything. I often times find myself overwhelmed with the insane gorgeousness of my life that I drive and cry and I feel and I tuck it all into this place in my pocket – a story to remember to tell someone some day. But I know it – you know? I know it. And I wasted a lot of years not understanding that – or this…

Life is short right? These days, each day, I find myself trying to find my way but also just really fucking grateful. So grateful. If you know me, personally, and know my life you would understand. I have every and all right to praise it. I have these kick ass amazing souls in my life…every walk, mindset, style, image, belief…they exist in my world and I thrive on them and they complete all of the facets of my mind. These beautiful gifts called my friends. My friends, the family that I have chosen, and my sister, my blood who just gets me and accepts me. It’s priceless. And maybe I’m reminding myself of this by writing because for a few hours last night, I lost that reminder….and we all need it. A reminder of what we are made of.

Remember why you are here, those you touch and those that touch you. Stop wallowing in what isn’t…because that isn’t, isn’t here and if it isn’t here then it isn’t worth much. I guess, in the end, as you weed your garden, that’s what it comes down to. If it’s not there anymore, it doesn’t mean much. No looking back, just around and ahead. Right?

Go forth and prosper. And if possible, find a smidgeon of gratitude for the moments – because they pass. And they build the story of you..so embrace the story.