Hurt people...

hurt people. That's one of those things people say to make us feel better when we've been wronged or to make us feel better when we're the one doing the wrong. I do believe it tends to be true. Of course, not everyone who has been hurt, hurts and not everyone who hurts us has been hurt. But we've all been hurt and, frankly, we've all done some hurting of others. The second part of that sentence tends to make us uncomfortable, but it's still true. We are all part villain and part victim. I'm the bad guy in other people's story* and maybe you are the antagonist in mine. We've all done and said things that have done harm. I mean, we can't all be the victim all the time, right? Someone has to be doing the hurting. Someone has to be the one giving the hell.

When someone has done something to me that has created a wound, I do (usually) try to understand why. Is it me? Am I the one who caused the initial hurt that's now being reflected back to me? Is this person simply lashing out at me, because I'm the closest or easiest target? Do they feel safe expressing their anger or sadness or hurt with me, because they trust me to understand and forgive? Or are they just plain mean? Usually, it's not mean, it really is a bad seed someone else planted in them and for whatever reason, they are reaping it all over me or you. Or maybe I am the drama.

When I was in fifth grade, we had a new principal. He was a younger man and, in hindsight, I can easily say he was earnest, serious and desperately wanting to be taken seriously. He was a bit more than necessary. I remember distinctly on a warm day at the beginning of the school year he was giving what I truly believe he thought was a profound and inspiring speech to our class. He walked up and down the rows the entire time he was addressing the students of whom he was now in charge. I remember feeling very snoozy and overly warm and bored out of my mind. I was fighting to keep my eyes open and sweating like, well, a kid in an un-airconditioned class room during late summer. My glasses began to slide down my nose. As the principal walked by, he took his middle finger and pushed my glasses up my nose, the tip of his finger ever-so-slightly tapped against my forehead between my eyebrows.

And something inside me exploded in white hot rage.

It was embarrassing, of course. Girls shouldn't sweat (keep in mind it was the early eighties). It's likely only the classmates sitting to my left and my right saw, if they even did. It wasn't the embarrassment as much as the tap of his finger on the spot of skin at the top of my nose. This man touched me. Now let me be clear, it wasn't something nefarious, it was a simple gesture meant, likely, to be helpful and at worst to assert his authority and make sure I was paying attention to his dutiful droning. But to a little girl like me who was terrified of men, who had been touched in terrible ways, who couldn't tell anyone what was hurting, it was a match dropped in gasoline.

I sat in that chair hearing nothing but the sound of my pulse pounding in my ears, the rest of his bloviation lost on me. All I could think about, all I could feel was that hot, angry, shameful spot at the top of my nose. It felt on fire. And that fire began to spread and grow and it started consuming the part of me that could control my reactions to men. It burned through my desperate need to be nice and liked and made me a heat-seeking missile toward men. 

Interesting isn't? I had endured horrible touching and suffered in silence without so much as a tear. I didn't make a sound at that, but this...this fingertip to my forehead caused me to get very loud, very quickly. A few minutes later, our class went to P.E. and that is where 10 year old hurt Lisa, hurt someone. 

Our P.E. teacher was a man. He was actually an incredibly kind and encouraging man. He had a wife and children. He was doing his job and working with kids who were of varying athletic ability and interest. Yet he showed up week after week to teach. And I was there, week after week, putting him through hell. Now, I realize I was a kid, and, because I'm pretty ashamed of that behavior now, perhaps it wasn't as bad for him as I feel it was. But perhaps it was. Maybe, I did hurt him. The incredibly harsh things that came out of my mouth, the attempts to undermine his authority, the blatant disrespect...I feel almost sick thinking about it now. If I were he, I would have hated me, even though I was a kid.

But if he felt that way, he never let me know. He ignored it for the most part, and when he did address it, he didn't yell, he just told me to go sit down and be quiet. Sometimes, he'd send me in to wash my face and calm down. He never sent me to the Principal. He just kept showing up and doing his job. I'd like to think that maybe I wasn't that bad, but I know I was. It's a big regret of mine. I can tell myself that I was a kid who was betrayed and broken, but I still can't excuse my behavior to myself. 

I was a hurt person who hurt a person, right? No. It's not right. It's really, really not. And yes, I was a kid and he was an adult and yada yada, but it's still wrong. Just because you were hurt doesn't make it excusable to hurt someone else. We still have to be held accountable for our actions. We can't excuse it or ignore it or explain it away, because if everyone who is hurt goes around hurting people, then everyone will keep being hurt and keep hurting and the ride won't ever stop. Hurt people who hurt people are still absolutely wrong for doing so. Full stop.

Adults now use that little saying to allow them to perpetrate all sorts of emotional damage on others. Don't get me wrong, I fully believe in triggers...see above with the finger to the glasses, BUT I believe my triggers are my responsibility to address and monitor and regulate. Grown Lisa knows that the fire that was lit by the simple, innocuous touch was about something deep and terrible. It was about ME not him, but it also wasn't about the teacher who bore the brunt of my rage. 

Let me be clear here, kids who have been harmed are not to blame for the way they process and deal with what happened to them, again, full stop. I do believe we have to start teaching personal responsibility and accountability for behavior at some point, so that the hurt doesn't perpetuate hurt. We have to start somewhere, yes? We cannot dismiss transgressions against others simply because we've been transgressed against. (Forgiveness without boundaries is also unhealthy, but that's for another day.) 

We need to start listening to what people aren't saying out loud, but their behavior is screaming. We need to ask what was created in them that is now creating damage to others. We need to help them find and then heal their villain origin story before they become someone else's. As importantly, we need to not allow them to go unchecked. They can't go around causing explosions without so much as a look back. Hurt people don't get to hurt people without repercussions. They can't or everything and everyone will go up in flames.

I've thought about that teacher a lot lately. He didn't know I was hurting. I'm absolutely positive that if he did, he would have helped. He didn't know, because I couldn't say. All I could do was be mean. All I could do was hurt, because I was hurting. But I'm so very sorry. Adult Lisa is so incredibly sorry for what 10 year old Lisa did and said. So, yes, we should try to understand why someone is lashing out, acting out, and hurting others. We need to gently walk back with them until they find that point where someone caused the hurt that creates more hurt and help them put that fire out before it consumes them and those around them. Even when we are burning, we must choose not burn others, because lighting someone else on fire won't put out the flames of our own hell.

*This is a different story for another blog. If you think you know, you probably don't know the truth.

You've heard said...

comparison is the thief of joy, I'm sure. I wish I'd heard that when I was younger. My lands, the amount of time I spent comparing my hair, clothes, skin, body, accomplishments (or lack thereof), grades, inability to shoot a lay-up or actually do pretty much anything athletic to my peers and my siblings probably, embarrassingly, adds up to years of my life. Now, don't get all weird and start with the "not all comparisons...". You understand what I mean, and if you don't, you're either choosing not to, or this particular porch visit isn't for you. And that's cool. Maybe the next one will be. Because you see, I'm okay with not being everyone's cup of tea, because, to be fair, not everyone is mine.  

I think about what I could have been doing during that time instead of stealing my own joy and I almost roll my eyes out of my own head at myself. I still compare myself to others, but on a much smaller scale than I used to. I do believe with age comes maybe not necessarily wisdom but at least some clarity. I'm not racing anyone except the mean Lisa in my head who wants me to live in a constant state of "you're not enough" or "you're too much". Mean Lisa's voice seems much quieter now. She tends to only cage rattle when someone outside of my own little brain says or does (or doesn't say or doesn't do) something intentional or not that makes me question myself.

Those questions, at their core, are about the validity of my life choices or the space I'm currently occupying. Should I be doing more? Should I have more? But ultimately the question ends up being "Should I be more?" Since Mean Lisa is pretty freaking abusive, she wants to isolate me with these thoughts. She compares even the fact that I'm having those thoughts with others. "I'm sure SHE doesn't toss and turn at night about THAT." "I'm sure they don't second guess things the way YOU do." 

I'd like to be noble and say, "I hope I'm the only one." but, truthfully, I hope I'm not. If comparison is the thief of joy, then companionship is the bearer of hope. I know I'm not in this alone. People I love have talked to me about their own self-doubt, about the Meanie who lives within them. If we're all in the same boat with this, we need a bigger one.

Remember being a teenager and having your entire life ahead of you, and being in some kind of all fired hurry to have it all planned out? My wedding colors were going to be pink and yellow (Egads!), I'd have three kids, write speeches for the President, and have a sunken living room with a sectional (we called them pit groups in the eighties). With the exception of the pit group, none of that happened. Seventeen year old me would have been so disappointed in myself. Now that I think about it, Mean Lisa is 17 year old me. She's also an echo of every mean girl who made fun of my clothes, hair, body, etc. The good news is, those voices are less intrusive now. I can tell them to shut the fresh hell up, and they do. Because we are in control of what we think about ourselves, if we chose to exercise that control.

Now that we know who the thief is and who the bringer of hope is, there's one more meme we need to create. Expectation is the death of contentment. Okay, so I'm of course not talking about expectation of behavior (i.e. don't be a jerk, obvi) or expectation of performance at your job, or expectations of behavior within a relationship or honoring your commitments. I'm talking about the expectations we put on ourselves to have, be and do. "I should have more..." "I should be more..." "I should do more to have more and be more." 

Round and Round it goes, where it stops nobody knows. WHAT it stops is contentment. It's the capacity to stand in the middle of your life and feel peace. It can make us take for granted the things we do have, what we are and what we've done, because we're expecting the next thing. Man is that lesson hard to learn, especially now when all we see is MORE than we are. Cleaner and bigger houses, wide smiles, adorable children, well-trained pets, magazine-worthy decor, perfect marriages...perfect lives. We certainly know all of that is curated for public consumption. I can't count the number of times I've taken a picture of my dogs doing cute things immediately after cleaning up a puddle of pee in my dining room. (MOOSE!) We know it's not the entire picture, yet we try to recreate it just the same.

My older step-daughter knew from a young age that her passion is teaching, and she has worked her cute booty off to make that happen. She's brilliant at it. The kids in her class are incredibly fortunate to have someone so dedicated. Her path wasn't always easy, but it always had a direction. She is thriving. It's a beautiful thing to watch. Just because someone's life seems to be a "natural progression" doesn't mean that it hasn't been hard-fought and without struggles. MPG has consistently persevered and created that progression. I'm constantly amazed by her tenacity. 

My younger step-daughter's path has been a bit less of a straight line. The girl has been all over the place. (Disclaimer: my younger step-daughter knows I'm writing this and whole-heartedly approves of this message. She's looking to encourage with this, just like I am. So for real leave the porch if you can't understand that.) She has tried on several hats while searching for her passion. Let's see... nurse, respiratory therapist, math professor, business major, insurance sales, cosmetologist, and now she's majoring in kinesiology. DID I MISS ANY MAB?

As people who are fully invested in her success, we sometimes want to say (yell?) "DECIDE ALREADY!" My goodness kiddo, pick something and do that. Have, be, do and have, be, do it right now. And I know she's felt that from us. I know she's felt the frustration and displeasure, but what it really is on our part is fear. What if she doesn't ever have what she needs? What if she's never what she is supposed to be? What if she never does what we all expect her to do, which is settle down and ease our worries? Because while we all want joy and contentment for those we love, what we also selfishly want is for them to be sorted out so we don't have to fret about them.

It's not just our expectations of ourselves that can destroy our contentment; it's our expectations of others that can not only kill their contentment but our own. Right? I mean if I'm constantly expecting people to fit into the boxes I've assigned them arbitrarily and even selfishly, how am I ever going to be at peace? If folks aren't being and doing and having what I think they should, how can I know contentment? And how can they when they feel us pressing in on them to settle down and follow the path? We steal our peace and theirs. We are not only our own Meanies but, terribly, theirs as well.

Ugh.

It's so hard to not think that our route on the map is always the best one. We came up with it, so it must be. But our route is ours and someone else won't have the same experience following it. Perhaps there's more traffic for them, or they hit every single red light. Perhaps they enjoy a more scenic route. Or maybe they see the value in taking a more direct way in order to get where they are going because they are ready to be there. Saying "the joy is in the journey" isn't always fair or accurate. For some people it is a joy and they find their haves, bes, and dos along the way, and for others it's being at their destination so they can have, be and do in the place they've been moving toward their whole lives that brings their joy. Neither is wrong. Neither is better. Both are valid. Expecting others to use our map ruins the journey for them because where we are going isn't ever where they are. Each life path is unique and fresh. Realizing that for ourselves and for others actually translates to our being able to see the part of others' journeys that hold joy and helping them when they breakdown or hit traffic.

As usual, all of that has been headed here. The midlife crisis thing is a real deal for some of us. Maybe crisis is a misnomer. Perhaps we should reframe it as a midlife refreshing. This summer I struggled with it. While I am absolutely content in my very joyful marriage (no comparing/no expecting), I found myself wondering if this is all there is professionally. I have several wonderful people in my life who are experiencing this same thing. Empty nest, loss of partners to divorce or death, loss of careers, direction, motivation and on and on. Lots of loss and empty. And man, that is some scary hell. The question, "Now what?" plays on repeat. So does, "It's probably too late for me to do... or be... or have..."

Again, ugh. There are times I've wondered if perhaps I had taken the long and winding road to get to my destination, I wouldn't feel so lost where I'm at. I didn't know what my passion was, so I picked a job. That's a very hard thing to come to terms with. Writing it is weird, because it doesn't feel entirely honest. The truth is, I think I did know what it was, but I was too scared to do it. Or maybe I was so busy expecting to have everything figured out that I didn't take my time to find out what would give me fulfillment and contentment, in other words, to actually figure it out. I think maybe I'm taking baby steps to get and be and have what I've always wanted. It's scary and exciting and refreshing, even if I did wait until mid-life-ish to change course.

Folks like my older step-daughter KNEW her passion and moved heaven and earth to make it happen. My younger step-daughter hasn't always known. Maybe she still doesn't, but she isn't settling. She's still seeking. She's still driving us mad with her twists and turns, but it isn't about us in either case. It's about their individual journeys. It's about them cutting a path, climbing over and under and through to find where they belong. And it's our jobs to worry and care, of course, about those we love but also to encourage and cheer and help them change a tire when they need it. We can point out the obstacles, but we shouldn't be removing them or forcing them to re-route because it's what we want. That obstacle may be steering them in a better, truer direction. Recalculating, make a u-turn, recalculating...I hate when my mapping systems says it, so I shouldn't be saying it about anyone's life.

Here's the fresh in all of this, I am excited about where I am going and what comes next, but let me be clear, I am so incredibly content with where I am. Which is, once again, sitting in my bed in the middle of the night*, dogs and husband snoring softly, hand on my leg, talking a little fresh hell with you.

*DU if you are up reading this, I hope you are content with your cereal choice and it brings you joy. You deserve it.

We've all had...

things in our lives or in the lives of people we love that are just so profoundly overwhelming we almost can't say them aloud. They can be good things or bad things. Like when my husband found out he was going to be a grandfather, he, perhaps unknowingly, whispered the words, "a grandpa" as he let them take hold and settle in and alter who he was. He has a new moniker, a new superlative for the shingle he hangs outside himself that attempts to describe all the things he is: son, brother, uncle, welder, dad, husband...grandpa. It's a beautiful moment when someone opens a welcomed gift life gives them. If you're the one giving that gift, it's even more lovely. It's like holding out your hands and showing them heaven. As life sometimes works, that of course means sometimes the hands open and what we see looks a little more like hell. 

I read a quote the day the hands opened and I found out my niece wasn't going to live. "We are all just walking each other home." -- Ram Dass. I don't even remember where I saw it. If it was you who posted it, thank you. I've run my fingers over that like a smooth stone dozens upon dozens of times since then. And not just about sad things and hard things, but I've come to see that walking each other home happens in the light and the dark.

I see us all headed in a general direction together on a wide expanse of hard-packed dirt road. Along the way, there are forks in that road. Sometimes those forks lead to gentle slopes with spectacular, breath-taking views. Sometimes they are dark and overgrown to almost impassable and you aren't sure where you will end up or if you'll find the way through. Both times we call out to our people, to the ones who walk with us and to the people who've taken those similar paths before us... "Come see this...it's beautiful" or "Come with me...I'm scared. I'm lonely. I'm grieving. I'm broken." 

The truth is, while I firmly believe we are all in this real life production together, we are all very much the main character in our own stories while being the supporting cast in everyone else's. And while we are all on the road together, walking each other home, no one else walks in our footsteps. We are all somewhat alone together. While that may sound disheartening, it shouldn't. Being alone together means that looking to the left or the right, you will find someone there and even if that person is scared, you still have someone to be scared with. Alone together is better than alone, alone.*

Think of it this way, if it's night and the power goes out and you can't see anything but dark, you would find comfort in knowing that one of your someones is in the dark with you. Maybe they aren't afraid of the dark. Maybe they have a better sense of space, a better memory of where things are so they can guide you around the chair leg that could surely break a pinky toe. Maybe they know exactly where the flashlight is. Maybe they will sit in the dark with you for as long as it takes for the light to return. Maybe you are the someone who isn't afraid, who knows how to navigate, who will share their light, who will sit until they can see again. Be that person. Be the sharer of the light. We need to be people who are as willing to help shoulder the burden or shout the good news as easily as we share the gossip and the scandal.

When someone is going through hell, we don't want to say the wrong thing. Maybe because we've had people say the exact wrong thing to us and felt it burn as it went into our ears and swam around our brain and slammed into our heart in a way that fueled the angry part of going through a hard patch. I think we all so much want to be the person who says the thing that heals the wound, and we just as much don't want to be the person who says the thing that makes the cut deeper.

I think back to the times I desperately searched people's faces and words to find the ones that made my hurt or fear or uncertainty lessen... "It is well with your soul. She's in your future now. You will find a way to carry this." Or the words that increased and confirmed my greatest joys... "You were born to do this. You are exactly where you were always meant to be. He's who your dad was talking about when he said you would find the very best man for you." I think back, and I so very much want to wrap those feelings of safety, optimism, hope, comfort, peace around my people, my fellow travelers. I want them to know their good and bad are seen and acknowledged and felt by me, because I want them to know I'm rejoicing when they do and mourning when they are. I want them, the ones sharing the road with me, to feel what I felt from others. That in their aloneness, (because no one else feels your exact joys or sorrows) I'm together with them. I'm either cheering for them or ready to carry with them.

I'm up in the middle of the night talking to you, because I'm thinking about the people who have walked with me. I'm hoping that they know I'm walking with them too, that we are walking with each other. My heart and my mind is heavy tonight, because I have a dear friend who has a family member who isn't well. I've typed and deleted the "not well" several times trying to find a softer way of saying it. Trying to find words that convey the enormity of the situation without dramatizing it. Trying to recognize the weight they carry without dwelling in the unknown. Trying to stand beside her in the certain hope that everything is going to be okay without silencing her need to say the scary things, so she can see them outside of her head and know that the fear isn't always the reality. When I see her, a lump forms in my throat. All the things I want to say, all the things I don't know how to say, all the silly and trite and unhelpful things, the platitudes that don't feel sincere but are the things everyone says when they don't know what the right thing to say is because there is no right thing. All of that sits in my throat. And she knows this because she's swallowed those kind of words for me too because she has never failed to walk toward home with me. I don't want to fail her.

The joys are easier. They are. Cheering, if you really love someone, is so natural it happens without effort. 

Hard stuff is, well, hard. It requires your best effort. If you really love someone, you stay with them through their hard stuff. You show up for it. You don't veer off the path and wait for them at the end. You just don't.* 

I guess the point of all of that is this, even when I am standing here with a lump in my throat that contains all the things I want to say, all the help I want to give, all the things I shouldn't say because they won't help, the point is...I am standing here. I am right here looking at your face and seeing your pain or sadness or fear.

And the moment you take a step, because you will take a step, it's inevitable, I will follow you even into the dark. I'll bring my light. I'll carry it because your hands are full. I'll run along side you even when we can't see where we are going. I'll go because you are. Because that's what love does. Love sometimes travels through hell to walk you home.

*I'm not talking about toxic or abusive relationships here. You know better than to think I am, I hope.

I have a lot of...

feelings, like, all the time, feelings and feelings and FEELINGS. I have feelings about the sunrises and how I feel when I drink coffee in the morning with my husband (always from matching cups, because I would definitely feel something if they didn't match). I have feelings when my stepdaughters and son-in-law have feelings. I have feelings about my dogs, the weather, my shoes, good food (or bad), my friends, my family, my garden.  I have ALL the feelings about ALL the things, apparently. So do you, right? I daresay, even "what fresh hell is this?" has a feeling to it. Or perhaps, it is a feeling unto itself. 

My favorite oldest stepdaughter, MPG, is wonderfully pregnant. Oh my, do I have big, beautiful feelings about that. Next level joy and excitement mixed with constant worry for the little mama and her little one, layered with the absolute knowledge that she and her husband will be outstanding parents to that little girl. And then I have feelings about it being a girl and everything that means in our world. (Don't worry, this blog isn't about that.)

MPG, the expectant mother, is a pre-kindergarten/kindergarten teacher. She helps her classroom of kids express their feelings by using an imaginary bubble of colors. Sometimes their bubble starts getting red, and they need to reset so they can figure out why they are so upset. I like that. Thinking of my emotions outside myself as a color hovering over my head. Wouldn't it be so much easier if that were real? We could see if someone was sad or scared or thrilled instead of trying to guess. So when someone asks you, "Is something wrong? Are you upset?" You can't get away with "No, I'm fine." when you really, really aren't.

For years now, as a person who has lived with depression (and tried to die from it), I've often been aggressively aware of my emotions. I feel the need to assess them almost constantly, to name them, to keep track of how long I've felt whatever I'm feeling. Sometimes, when I've had several days or weeks of apathy, I start feeling about my lack of feeling. Is exhausted an emotion, because, dang, I get so exhausted of my emotions.

As always, I've said all that to say this... sometimes, I feel something because I feel like that is how I'm supposed to feel.  It's not even a conscious choice. It's almost like my brain or heart or whatever is steering the ship at any given moment starts running a formula. A plus B equals C. It must, because that's the expectation. It must because if it doesn't there's something wrong, right? 

That's why much of what we watch is formulaic. I mean, Hallmark makes bank on those Christmas movies because they follow a well-worn path that evokes a consistent set of emotions all leading to the happily-ever-after ending. I'm not knocking it (no Mackenzie, I still won't watch them. Michaela and I will be over here...uh...not watching them.) There is comfort in knowing how you are supposed to feel and when you're supposed to feel it. Things like that give us a break from having to wait to see what happens next in our own lives to know what kind of sentiment to express next. Our real lives don't stay on the well-worn path. They twist and turn and sometimes head straight for a cliff.

Think about this... hometown team comes from behind and wins, you feel....? Survey says?! Elation and pride! They suffer a crushing defeat...heartbreak and pride. 

Now try this one...I'm sitting in my bed at 3 am, writing this blog. My husband is sleeping (trying to) next to me, his hand on my leg. Six and a half years of marriage, and I still love the weight of his hand. It's so dark, I can barely see his face in the light of this computer screen.  A cool breeze comes from the open window, because fall has made an appearance. I can smell the dampness from yesterday's rain. All is still and quiet except the soft snores of our dog curled up at my feet. 

Did you ick or awwww? It's okay. You feel what you feel about it. Unless you don't. Unless you feel what you think you should feel about it. Our emotions have so many layers. They are born from our past and present. What's happening to us at this moment? What from our past colors how we see things now? We can feel indifferent about the hometown team analogy, because we have a lot going on right now that seems more important than sports. Or we can feel that deeply, because we used to love to watch our kid play basketball in junior high, and now she's grown and off making a life for herself, and we miss those feelings of elation and pride or heartbreak and pride that were tied to that part of our lives.

The one about my writing in bed...if you've lost your partner, that could be an absolute gut-punch (I'm sorry if I did that to you.). If you are struggling in your relationship, reading that could just flat out make you furious (red bubble!). You could feel totally grossed out. (I can just HEAR favorite youngest stepdaughter now...ewwww, STOP IT!) Maybe you can relate, so you did the awwww. Or it could be all of that or even none of it. You do you, boo. 

We're almost to the point, I promise. This week I started a new job. My second new job this year. My third job in 32 years. The first job lasted 30. I have big feelings about it. It's scary, it's sad, it's exciting. It's a lot.

My first day at this third new job in my lifetime was Monday. With a week of hindsight, I can say I like it. I'm optimistic that I will love it. It's challenging and different, yet familiar enough to be somewhat comfortable. At the end of the first week, my brain is exhausted, but I feel a sense of pride that this old girl is learning new tricks. Pride isn't something I've given myself an allowance to feel in the past. But this Lisa allows it now. She let's me feel what I'm feeling without as much expectation and judgement. I don't have to feel what the formula says. I get to just be in it.

Want to know the crazy part? I didn't give myself permission to really decide what I feel until just this past Monday. Seriously. The first day of the new job, I had an epiphany of sorts or rather I was given one. That morning, I happened to run into a beautiful soul who reads this blog. Her daughters are longtime friends of mine. When I told her about my new job, she and her husband immediately cheered. They literally cheered. She asked how I was feeling, and I said what I believed was expected, the A plus B equals C answer...excited and nervous. Because the unknown plus change equals excited and nervous, right? That's how someone would write that scene, yes?

When I answered DKD's question with "excited, nervous" she simply said, "I find the older I get, I don't really get nervous about most things anymore." Wait. What? She doesn't WHAT?! She didn't realize how wonderfully profound that statement was. I sat with it for a moment and realized I really wasn't nervous, or rather I was only nervous about figuring out where to park. And I wasn't really nervous about THAT, I just didn't know where to go. That's not nerves, that's a need for information. The people that hired me weren't going to kill and eat me if I made mistakes. They could tell me I wasn't working out for them, but I wouldn't die from it. I've had years of experience, and most people genuinely hope you succeed, especially, I'd think, people who just hired you to do work for them. I felt solidly good about starting this new job. Huh. That's something good new, not scary new.

I wasn't nervous, yet I felt that I should be, because I've always thought that my self-confidence would be seen as arrogance, so it was important to be nervous in order to show humility. That's some kind of algebra or geometry or whatever other math is out there. That's fancy calculator math. It's self-sabotaging math. I thought that my formula A plus B equaled C, when in truth, it equaled nonsense. So how do we get to DKD's level of not-nervousness? Perhaps we start by not putting expectations on other's feelings. We stop believing we need to have an opinion on what someone else's answers to their own equations are. We stop saying things like "They moved on rather quickly, don't you think" or "Did you see what she was wearing? Who does she think she is?" or "He seems a bit full of himself, bragging about that." We let people feel whatever the fresh hell they want to feel, because we don't have to have feelings about other's feelings. Hey, eyes on your own paper.

Maybe in not assigning a faulty formula to others, we can begin to re-write our own emotional spreadsheet. We can actually delete that thing altogether. Instead, we can just be and feel and act in a truly unadulterated, authentic way. 

If someone wouldn't have shown me a new way to emotionally math, I would have convinced myself I truly was nervous, and I would have acted with that nervousness. At worst, that might have caused me to fail before I started, at best, it would have made me miss the goodness I felt walking out to my car in the spot where they told me to park when I simply asked them. I would have missed that very good beginning. 

I certainly wouldn't be sitting in this bed, writing this blog, with my husband's hand still on my leg, my little dog snoring, and the sky even darker, because it's just before the dawn. 

As for me, the bubble above my head is the color of sunrise with a hint of coffee with too much creamer in a blue cup that matches his. It's the color of possible and hopeful and excited with little to no nervous and certainly no hell.

Thank you DKD. I will carry your wisdom in my heart and call up the sound of you cheering me on when I'm truly feeling I need it.

If you would have...

asked me when I was in my twenties what the primary motivating force in the universe is, I would have said love. Easy right? True? Well that's subjective. Now that I have more experience, I'd certainly agree that love can be one's driving force, but as with most things, it might be a little more complicated than that. 

Money motivates, yes? I mean you can't eat love, so you need money; therefore, you work to make money to meet your needs. For some people, that's enough. Meet your needs, take care of your family, save for the future. Cool. Some people need more than just enough money, so they do more things that make them more money, and that's cool, too.

Recognition motivates. Some people are driven by the need to have folks know their names. They need for people to know the good they are doing in the world or about the big life moves they are making. I mean, that's why we all have social media, right? To share things. To be a little bit famous. Other people are motivated by a cause. They do things because of something we see as bigger than us...for the greater good.

So those are all obvious, but now that I'm a bit more self-aware and honest, I realize one of the things that moves people is shame. Sit with that for a second. Think of what you immediately thought of when you read the word shame. I would wager that almost everyone seeing this had an immediate reaction. I did. A highlight (lowlight?) reel of things I've done that are shameful starts to play. Shame has weight. I feel it as I type. It can paralyze you; it can make you into someone you wish you weren't; it can make you do things you wish you hadn't to cover it up; and it can even kill you. Shame changes how you believe others see you, but even more so, it changes how you see yourself.

Shame is often coupled with a secret. We certainly don't want people knowing what makes up the darkest parts of us, the corners of our lives that are scary and dirty. The ones we try not to visit until they start screaming at us in the middle of the night. "Why didn't I?" "Why did I?" "How could I have..." Shame eats at you. Oh you can go long periods of time without it showing itself, but it's always there, waiting. It wears you down, doesn't it?

Sometimes the disgrace is not even caused by us. Being sexually assaulted as a child had absolutely nothing to do with anything 8 year old me had done. I didn't ask for it. I didn't create the monster who did it, yet shame and fear kept me silent for almost two decades. That secret shaped parts of me that are still disfigured and disordered. Even though it's not something I hide anymore, there are things that create panic in me because of that. And my inability to completely overcome that experience causes an entirely new type of humiliation. Other people can build shame in us that should be theirs instead.

Shame makes us believe many untruths about ourselves. We're not worthy of good things. We're unlovable. We're an imposter. Shame makes us believe others see us differently, broken, worthless when the truth is, we see ourselves through the lens of regret. It makes us see ourselves as different, broken, worthless.

Now we know, logically, that's not real. It's a distorted vision of who we are. We can know people who love us deeply; we can express our own self worth when pressed to do so -- I'm kind. I contribute to my community. I care for my family. I work hard. We can even find our sameness to those around us. But that thing that we did/said/had/took/gave is like an itch you can't scratch. You carry on, but you're never truly permanently comfortable.

I think about some of the things I've done and said in my past, and I wonder how anyone could like me, let alone love me. My husband knows things about me no other human does, and that man thinks I painted the sunrises just for him. I have dear friends and family to whom I've said things that make me physically duck and cringe when I think of them. I've been selfish with them. I've been absent when they needed me. Ugh, the way I treated my mom when I was in my thirties...I just can't. And yet, they care for me in a way that makes me feel like some kind of prize. I wonder what I've done to deserve such care, such devotion, such love. I can name things I've done to not be worthy of those things, but why they give them to me anyway eludes me.

Except...perhaps they feel something similar. Perhaps they have had moments where they believed someone couldn't continue to love them. Perhaps they all carry secrets they believe make them unworthy and unlovable. I can't for the life of me think of any. I can hold my oldest dear friend Julie M. up to a light, and I can't see a single flaw. I can sure count mine. Somehow, she is still there. After 46 years of friendship, she would still check the YES box on my note asking if she's my bff. KGC has known me since fourth grade. She carries much of my history. I feel no judgement, only acceptance. No appearance of looking back, just continual forward motion.

My husband, well, he knows everything. Yet he squeezes my hand in the middle of the night. He tells me I'm the good stuff, that I'm his bestest good friend, that he loves me with a love that is more than love. He held the trashcan when I threw up after my hysterectomy. He stood quietly while I railed and screamed and cursed with grief in my backyard. He asked gentle questions about my reactions, so he can help protect me from my own demons. He knows things about me that I almost can't bear to think about. And he's in our bed right now sleeping peacefully knowing who I am and what shameful things I've been capable of in the past, still loving me fiercely and profoundly. He's seen me, really looked deep and seen me, and found me more than worthy.

I say all of that to say this, perhaps I was right in my twenties, about that one thing at least. (Definitely not about the stacked bob haircut or frosted brown lipstick.) Perchance, twentysomething Lisa knew that the supreme motivating force in the universe simply, profoundly is love.

I know I promised our visits would not be all live, laugh, love. This isn't that. This isn't love is blind, love conquers all...blah, blah, blah. This is love sees and knows and ultimately understands. Love knows your shame, it sees all the hell you've created and it picks you up and carries you through it.

Hello...

I haven't been here for a while, because for a long time, I felt I had nothing of merit to say. At first it was because I felt incredibly boring...middle aged/menopausal woman - blah...happily married - yawn...stepmom to two adult children - nothing new to see here. Then it was because I was so terribly, profoundly, deeply grieved, and someone else's grief does begin to exhaust folks who aren't in it with you and even those who are. It also seemed, suddenly to me, the entire world got so brutally LOUD. I didn't want to say something because I felt I had nothing. Nothing interesting, nothing that did more than simply add to the noise.

Here's the thing (because there's always a thing) yes, I know there are many, many, MANY important even life threatening things happening in the world. Of course we should raise our voices and vote our conscious. We should fight injustice, and hold accountable those who abuse their power and privilege to oppress. We should also listen to those who have been running the race and fighting the fight for generations. We should, and I do...but I won't here. Not really. Not overtly. I simply can't. I don't have the answers, and sometimes I don't even know how to ask the questions. I cannot be a voice who speaks without full knowledge or authority. I know reading other's research doesn't equal doing one's own. Hang in, because it's not about this.

I am aware that not using this space to move toward equality and justice and right is born out of privilege. In all honesty, my life doesn't depend on it. It doesn't mean I don't care; it means I don't have to live every second like it does depend on it. That's privilege for anyone who is confused. I will boost other voices I believe can speak to the issues I hold dear on other platforms, but I won't pretend that anything I write will have any real value. I won't insert myself into places where I have no footing, where I'm a distraction. I won't add to the sound without adding to the substance. 

So now that I've hopefully explained what this place is and what I won't do, let's figure out what I will or what I hope to do. I hope to encourage you to look at others through a softer lens, the candlelight filter perhaps. I also want to encourage you to take a gentler look at yourself...to allow grace when needed, forgiveness when earned, love when merited, and joy when possible to yourself first, so you can extend those perfectly lovely things to others in a real way.

Let's not get confused, I'm not all live-love-laugh/coffee o'clock and wine-thirty/boss babe either. First, coffee yum/wine yuck so that would never work. I'm too much of an introvert to boss anyone, and I've lived-loved-laughed in the nineties - I'm not wearing that trend again. Like ever.

Now that I've written my mission statement of sorts, the disclaimer I guess, let's actually do something here, but do let's keep with the theme because every English teacher I've ever had said that's how this is supposed to work. Here we go...finally.

I notice posts/memes/missives floating around about how we used to go to Grandma's house on Sunday and spend time with family doing something called visiting. For those of us who have forgotten what that is due to isolation, ball games, work, laundry, genuine malaise, flat out dislike of people in general or whatever you've been up to, visiting is being in the presence of others, making eye contact, listening and talking, reminiscing, telling jokes and stories, laughing and crying with other people. You remember, like together with people who do not live inside your house. Spending time, which is finite and valuable, not just with each other but on each other.

People my age (ugh - that's just -ugh) remember stopping by someone's house (Don't do it. I mean it. I'll be in my panda nightgown for sure.) or seeing circles of lawn chairs in people's yards, gatherings on porches, the "adults" lingering around the table just talking. Just...visiting. We don't do that, not really. We pontificate, proselytize, and regurgitate* the headlines we read, the "research" we've done, the sound bite we found oh so clever and we "look at this meme -- boy that says it all." No. It doesn't.  (Unless it's that weird white cat thing with its arms spread. That one really does say it all.) We argue and silence and shout over, and yes, sometimes those things are not just necessary but mandatory. But, I believe true and real human interaction that seems to not move a cause or ideology forward is still incredibly necessary. Our souls need it. Lately, those moments of ease of conversation are often the only parts that remind us that we are all people trying to figure it out. Failures and successes, joy and sorrow, fear and bravery...we are all made of stories, experiences, beliefs, hopes, losses. We are all beauty and ashes.

That's what I want to talk about, sitting on my porch with you (not really, not yet, panda nightgown is super comfortable). This place can be my existential porch swing. We'll start here and see where it goes.

I want to know what's planted in your garden - literally and figuratively. I want to hear KP talk about Disney. SDK about Newton Eagle Football. CS about glorious shoes (sole sister for real, pun intended). DG about waterfalls. JM about her freshman. KGC about things that gross me out, man. HBF about her plans for next summer with no travel ball. KL about mid-century modern everything. JGM about her brother.

Add your initials and your thing. I want that. I don't want a headline you read; I want the headline you live.

Welcome back. I hope you sit for a moment and visit. If you don't like the topic, no worries, it'll change shortly. Leave your shoes and your drama at the threshold - they'll be there when you leave. Hopefully, you take with you a little bit of peace and at least a small measure of "oh that was nice". Maybe you'll even lessen some of your burden, because it's been replaced with a different perspective. In other words, leave some of your hell and take some of the fresh.

See you all soon. Don't forget your shoes.

*KMG hates the word p*ke more than I love an alliteration. Respect to her.)

I didn't believe...

 I deserved to be happy. Insert eye roll. I get it, that phrase itself is overused, trite, gag-inducing. But hear me out, perhaps it's really just misunderstood. Maybe what I didn't understand was what "happy" itself meant. Not the dictionary version, but the living it, feeling it version.

Ready for another rather obvious insight? We sabotage our own happy. We do. And I think because of that, we're bringing up the generation behind us to not even know if happy exists for them. We've turned it into an unattainable "unless it's picture perfect, then we all know that's a filter, so it doesn't exist" emotion. We've improperly labeled happy. 

We expect it to be something to attain, something to aspire to instead of something we feel. We confuse happy with stuff and clout and attention and success. That means that there has to be more stuff and clout and attention and success in order to stay happy. There's no enough, and I believe one can't be truly happy if one is constantly having to collect it.

Maybe what we need to look for is contentment. I've always loved that word. To me, it means "enough" in the most beautiful way. It's a state of being where we aren't always searching, where what we have is all we need and if something else comes our way, then that's just gravy. And I love gravy.

We all know people, maybe we are people, who seem to have contentment within their reach...they just need to stretch their fingers a little further. But suddenly, as if hearing a sound behind them so compelling they can't ignore, they make an abrupt turn and walk away from it. It's so frustrating and heartbreaking to watch. Like "Dude, it was right there! Finally. How could you leave it?" I've been that dude.

For me, and undoubtedly for you, it's fear; sometimes it's shame. We don't deserve it, because we've done this and this and this. Now, I know it can be doubt or confusion or insistence on being a martyr, but all of that is still fear or shame. I firmly believe it. 

It becomes a self-fulfilled prophecy. Something feels "right" and "good", and we're afraid of it so we do something to destroy it, which creates shame, shame creates unworthiness, so we stop looking for it. When it finds us...this "happy" or "content" we can't trust it (fear) because we don't deserve it (shame) and on and on.

Some of this is rooted in things that happened to us and some of it comes from things we've done to ourselves. And we did that to ourselves because someone did something to us. Around and around it goes... where it stops...

It can stop, with us. Not all of it. Not all the time. Not happy all day every day but happy every day. We have to figure it out so we can help the kids coming up. We've created a world where joy is unspeakable because it's unattainable not because it's full of glory.

Everything is awful. Isn't it? People are absolutely mean. No one cares about their fellow man. If what you are living is hard, just turn on the tv and see even harder. Families torn apart by hate and anger. Empty seats at tables because of senselessness. Loss and loss and loss. People giving as good as they get, except it isn't good they are giving or getting.

Except... the stories of sweet children making Valentines for the people in nursing home. Organ donors. Couples being married for 70 years. Videos of babies hearing their daddy's voice for the first time. Animals being rescued. Momma's kissing newborns. Mindy's countdown to spring in the midst of her grief for her husband, reminding us that the light does always return. Dancing for mourning, beauty for ashes, laughing through tears, coffee in the morning with your love, pizza with a dear old friend. A baby learning to walk. Laughing until your stomach hurts. Holding hands. Petting a dog. A bird singing (not too loudly and not to early in the morning). The smell of fresh cut grass or drying leaves. Someone finding their voice and speaking their truth and taking their power to move and inspire others. Being secure in your beliefs. Music, art, touching words. The sound of my husband saying "hey baby". The smell of chicken frying. The perfectly round cookies my mom bakes. The smell of the ocean. The quiet of snowfall. Hope. Love. Grace.

Joy unspeakable.

We deserve it. Our kids deserve it. We have to show them. They have to know they are worthy and no matter what they've done, they can have it. In the middle of the storm, you can find a place of peace, you can find the laugh, you can find the sweet, sweet spot where happy is. You won't find it in comparisons to others. You won't be able to see it if you are constantly looking toward what is next...what you have to attain or gain or collect believing that happy is in that thing or job or person. It's right here.

Happy is in finding contentment in the right now. I'm not asking you to find it in everything. This isn't a "happily ever after" story. I'm saying to pick one spot and live on that spot. Hold it and nurture it and watch it grow.

I know it's possible. Want to know how, because I'm doing it. Not always perfectly and not always successfully, but it's happening. Sometimes I'm reaching for it and shame or fear calls my name and I turn away from it. But sometimes, oh beautifully, my fingers close around it and you couldn't take it away under any circumstances.

Want to know another way I can prove it can be done? Read back over the paragraph about all the exceptions. I bet you felt something. I bet one of those things resonated  with you. I bet you thought of at least one thing more. You felt a spark. Give that spark oxygen. Talk to it. Build on it.

We need happy. We need contentment. We have to show our kids that having and doing and getting isn't where it's at. It's in being. It's in living now with what you have while carrying the hope of what will be, letting it motivate us, of course, but not letting us miss what is surrounding us in this moment. Because right now is full of good stuff.

I used to be afraid to have a good day, because a good day made the fall into a bad day worse. The comparison was too stark, too harsh. I wonder how many happy days I missed. Perhaps I spent so many days looking for fresh hell instead of seeing the lovely I deserve.

Not today. I'm not doing that today. I'm going to stand up, walk into the sunroom, see the birds and smile at my husband and just feel it. Just feel the unspeakable joy.

I recognize my place of privilege in writing this. I'm sitting on my couch in my warm home with my WiFi. I'm going to make an early lunch with the things in my well-stocked refrigerator. I'm healthy and so is my family. I am what the world unfairly most rewards with the exception of being a woman. I am unafraid in so many ways that I take it for granted. I recognize taking any of those things away considerably alters my ability to find contentment. Which leaves little room for me to not acknowledge that it is easier for me to find.