To Hang or Not to Hang

Let’s talk closets. Some of you are really organized with your stuff. I have one friend who color codes everything so even in storage his stuff looks nice. His clothes are hung according to the color spectrum and his shoes are lined up neatly across the floor below complimentary colors and patterns. He doesn’t even have closet doors, heck; he doesn’t need them because his closet is a work of art.

Then there’s my best friend’s closet. She tries to get things onto hangers, sometimes facing the same direction, often holding more than one item for the sake of saving space. Of course her closet isn’t filled with all the lovely hues of the rainbow because she figured out long ago that by wearing only black she could save a lot of time getting dressed in the morning. Sometimes things are slung across the foot of the bed, or a chair, or thrown randomly over the rod to get them off the floor.

Now let’s say these two friends decide to live together in a house that has only one closet. They are in love and agree that this is his half and that is hers, and as in the beginning of most things, they laugh at each other’s closet idiosyncrasies. Each secretly believes the other will eventually see the error of their ways and come around to doing things the right way. Umm. Yeah. Not gonna happen.

Something else happens. They begin to take the way the other takes care of their half of the closet like a personal insult, like one is doing something to the other. They forget that this is how their closets have always been, and neither is doing anything any differently than they ever have just to be spiteful. She isn’t disrespecting him by throwing her clothes on the floor, anymore than he’s trying to control her with his color coding. This is how their closets have always been; it has nothing to do with the other person, AT ALL!

These are just closets. Think about it. An orderly closet is no more divine than a messy one; it’s merely an outward reflection of an internal process. Life is way more complicated than closets. Then again, maybe it isn’t.

Never Forgive Again

OMG, you say?

Before you click away, let me explain.

When you say the words, "I forgive you", you're saying you've the right to judge another person and have the ability to wipe away what’s been done. However, karmically, religiously, righteously, cosmically, even comically, it’s just not in your power. That’s up to a power greater than you, one that hasn't made mistakes or hurt anyone else, ever.

According to the books, the religions, and the righteous, you’re supposed to forgive those who’ve caused you harm in order to heal the wounds, so as soon as you realize you’re hurting from something that’s been done to you, you rush to forgive.

I’ve got news for you. You can’t forgive. It’s not your job. You’re not the divine. You’re not god. You’re a soul having a human experience, and in this body you’ve been hurt.

But…but…but…If I don’t forgive I’ll never heal!!!! So you’ve been told. Probably the last thing in the world you want to do is to forgive them, but conditioning tells you that you must. So you say the words: I forgive him, her, them, my parents, friends, boss, whoever. You experience a cathartic moment of peacefulness. If you're like most people, the moment doesn't last.

When you forgive someone you're denying your own experience and causing yourself more harm! You've entered into collusion. You're saying that what they did to you was terrible but it’s okay. It's not really okay though, and you know it. Here comes the shame and guilt. Didn’t you say you’d forgiven them?  Now you beat yourself up for not being strong enough or good enough. You must be bad because you’ve failed at forgiving. You forgive them again. And again. Can you feel that in your gut, the feeling of betrayal to your own self? 

I do agree that we have to do something in order to heal and get on with having a happy life. What I've offered to my clients instead of forgiving is RELEASING. Release whoever has hurt you, for whatever reason. Dig up the details and examine them. Admit all the pain that's been caused. Then leave them to their own karmic experience. It will come. You may or may not be there for it. Trust me, it will happen. It’s physics. What goes up must come down. For every positive there’s a negative.

 

Try this right now and decide for yourself. Think of someone you’ve forgiven. Think of what they did then forgive them again. Say the words out loud "I forgive you".  Check in with your body. Is there anywhere in you that has a twinge? Do you feel nauseous or the need to clear your throat? Are you breathing? Do you feel resentment, or do you feel love? If you feel anything other than love, forgiveness hasn’t happened, and if you haven’t released them then you’re still making impaired life decisions that are influenced by pain and denial.

Now think of the same situation and release them. Let them go, knowing with absolute certainty that you can’t possibly know their entire story or what consequences their actions have, are, or will, cause them. This is the real meaning of letting go. Releasing is letting go. Literally. You might say they are just words. I say words are energy and they matter.

What you'll find is when you release others, you too are released. You can move forward. It's over.

To err is human, to forgive is divine. Last I checked I was still human.

Kite Surfing anyone?

Feeling comfy and settled? Successful but unsatisfied? What secret thing do you want to try but are afraid to risk? If you knew you could not fail, what would you try next?

I'd try kite surfing! I've watched them flying through the air beneath the Golden Gate Bridge, and could almost feel the wind in my hair, the sea spray on my skin, and the adrenalin pumping through my veins, as if I were the one jumping the wake of an enormous passing freighter.

It's entirely possible that what I'm told is correct, that I'm too old, not strong enough, lack the skills and coordination...but so what???

Sometimes we don't pursue a dream because we're "experts" and to try something new would mean someone might see us not being our most perfect self. I think this leads us to leading partial lives of caution.

I know for sure I'm going to try kite surfing soon.

What do you want to try? I want to know because maybe I need to add that to my list too :-)

You're so Brave!

You're braver than you give yourself credit for. I'd bet on that.

Today is a good day to think of all the things you've done and continue to do in the name of honor, love and integrity. You make sacrifices every day for the people you love, and you do so with an open heart (most of the time). And really, they aren't sacrifices if what you're doing comes from that gifting place we all have. It's another story if your actions are coming from anywhere else, and something like that, it's not sustainable. You can do it, but at a cost to your soul and psyche.

The trick isn't to squelch your dreams into oblivion and pretend you never had them. The trick is to find ways of living them AND taking care of those you love. Recognizing that the deal is, we came to this planet with one body, one life to live, and no one gets to live ours as well as their own.

In every moment, there are options, choices, possibilities. Shhh...don't argue, just think. What first comes to mind are all the impossibilities. Okay. Write them down. Empty them out of your head. They are real. So are the possibilities waiting just on the other side of them. We can't hear what's possible til those loud-mouth demanding voices get their moment in the sun. Thank them. Then dismiss them. Now invite in the possibilities.

Today's challenge:

1. Make a list of 20 things you love to do, or used to love to do. Holding hands. SCUBA diving. Gardening. Concerts. Knitting. Getting a massage. Giggling. Playing board games. Kissing.
2. Now think back to the last time you did each thing. Write down the date, or year if that's as close as you can get.
3. Choose 1 and do it. Today. Do this daily from now on.

The challenge is to get creative. If you wrote down SCUBA and aren't currently in Hawaii, listen to the impossibilities. Thank them. Dismiss them. Then, Google "exotic pet store". Go to the store and be with the fish.

If you wrote down Concert or live music. Again, listen to the impossibilities. Thank them. Dismiss them. Then, Google "live music [near your town]". Go. Too far? Jump on YouTube and watch your favorite bands. Turn on Spotify (it's free) and make your own playlist by dragging and dropping songs.

If you come up with something you can't think of an option for, post it here and maybe someone else will have an inspiration to share. Or have a great solution for a challenging dream? Please share that too!

xo, Corey

Are you the you you think you are?

No one has to agree with us about who we are. 

Bravo or Boohoo? 

It’s easy enough to say something like this on paper, but is it possible to live our lives as if other people’s opinions don’t matter? Are you living on the outside the life you dream of on the inside? Does the image of who people think you are mesh with the “who” you know yourself to be? How can you even know? How can they, when everything we perceive is based on our own life experiences?

Who are you?

Are you a composite of what those around you have chosen to see? Are you who you are based on who you’ve spent your time with? Have commercials told you what you lack, or need, and movies and television shown you what friendship and love mean?

I sometimes wonder, do country music songs sing of how love is, or how we wish for love to be?

We notice how our parents and others respond to us, and how they speak to each other, what their words say as well as what their body language broadcasts. We measure ourselves against the background of the music we listen to, our ethnic norms, social class, religion, and education. Even our horoscope adds to the soup that we call “me”.

None of us grows up in a bubble. We are surrounded by millions of silent visual clues that approve or disapprove, a frown, a smile, a sigh, and we respond in ways that conform or rebel. Either way, we come to know “who” we are through the fusion of our input.

The good and the bad news is, you are more than a sum of our parts. You are more than an iPhone filled with apps. You are a unique spark in an infinite cosmos. Corny, I know, but the only way we can be defined by consensus is if we agree and believe that who others say we are, is the “who” we feel ourselves to be.

Dreaming: It's not just for kids

Imagine. Imagine that the dreams you have of your perfect life are actually possible. I mean the dreams that you don’t share. The ones that seem impossible, beyond your reach, or that others would say are irresponsible. Maybe they are new dreams, or maybe they’re ones you’ve pushed away for so long that you’ve mostly forgotten what they are. Maybe you’ve given up on them because you’ve gotten older. Maybe they’re just images that don’t go away.

The image I carried with me, or that carried me along, were of palm trees swaying against a vivid blue sky. Those trees spoke to me, they whispered for me to follow them, like clues on a treasure map. They were promises of relief from the pain and discomfort of living a life that didn’t fit. They were the peripheral vision, the carrot on the stick, the promise of an adventure if I were brave enough to believe in them, and in myself. For me, there was no question. It was do, or die.

What does your heart dream of? I’ve asked hundreds of clients and audiences this question. What I’ve discovered is that most people have forgotten how to dream BIG. Most commonly, the answer is one rung above where they find themselves. An unemployed single mom wants to be an administrative assistant. An abused teen wants to paint houses with a friend’s dad. That’s not dreaming. That’s settling for what you think you barely deserve. 

Don’t get me wrong. Painting houses, or being part of an office, those CAN be dreams, if they truly are dreams! The question is, are they your dreams, or are they simply as far as you can allow yourself to imagine? Who in your life told you one too many times to be realistic, to stop daydreaming, to settle down?

If you could be anything what would you be? The first time I was asked this question I said I wanted to be President of the United States. The other people in the room protested, “Can she do that?” The trainer’s response: “of course she can, so can you.” That set off a chain of responses like a brick of firecrackers on a fuse and there were shouts from around the room of, “I want to be a pilot”, “I want to be a stay at home mom with lots of kids”, “I want to be a bear…”! 

Nothing is impossible. Even being a bear. Think about that. Argue if you must. It’s not the point. It’s not for you or me to decide. It’s not our dream. Nor are we in a position to say it isn’t possible. Who are we to tell anyone something’s impossible? Who are we to have the audacity to say such a thing to ourselves? The word impossible is a self-imposed hurdle, an obstacle of our own choosing.

Are you living into your dreams? Or are your true dreams a secret because you’ve been told they aren’t possible? Is the risk too high? How high? Says who? 

Great success means the risk of great failures. We’d like to think that by avoiding the desire to be our greatest selves, we’re also avoiding the risk of experiencing great pain. That’s one of our greatest myths. Pain happens. No matter what, it happens. So the question is: Are you willing to risk the pain you are already living, for the possibility of experiencing the joy you've so far only imagined?

The Real Lie

I am supposed to be a homeless drug addict. This is the thought I woke up with in April 2009, opening my sleepy eyes to the prospect of announcing my resignation at work, and a Valium sized feeling of anxiety. I’d grown accustomed to taking on monumental tasks and being occupied with too many things to do, and I felt far more comfortable with being overwhelmed than I was with having time on my hands for “hobbies”. Having hobbies just felt like I was cheating, or slacking off.

What did it mean to believe I was supposed to be a homeless drug addict? Whose rules had I broken by changing my life? Why did I feel like I had cheated death, or at the very least, snuck out of my social class when no one was looking? When I looked around me at my friends I saw a group of people who did not share my experiences. Whatever familiarity they had with the conditions under which I had grown up had been gleaned through compassionate, if vicarious, eyes.

My eyes see the seedy underbelly with empathy because no matter where I go, a part of me will always be where I once was. Will I always feel more at ease with people who are in pain and in need of fixing? However hidden, unconscious or muted their desire to change their lives and to escape from the pain and desperation may be, will they, or I, ever feel how it feels to live in the world that people from a less broken world are accustomed too?

My questions came that morning because I realized I had minimized my early experiences, as if they didn't continue to influence my view of the world. I understood that my sense of isolation was less the result of lost innocence, and more the result of my past remaining hidden. I really was being a fraud, not because I didn't belong where I was, but because I had turned away from the person who had helped me to get there. I hadn't stepped over a hidden line of demarcation into a world I had no right to be in, what I had done was step over that line with just the "good" parts of me in tow.

I wasn't really supposed to remain addicted to drugs, or homeless, or continue to allow myself to be abused. I wasn't supposed to remain uneducated, or to know my "place". I also wasn't supposed to pretend that my life had been something it hadn't been, even if my only pretense had been to distance myself from my experiences, to pretend as if those things had happened to someone else.

I'll get to the other side of this.