Shadow Dance

"Your shadow is not always dark... you just have to let her play too, let her out into the light so she can dance."

Leaning In

Love it will not betray you, dismay or enslave you, it will set you free
Mumford and Sons

The words above have been singing in my mind lately.

When my relationship with Che ended I scoffed at those words.

“Oh yeah? That’s BS. I am dismayed, enslaved and betrayed and in no way do I feel free in this moment”

But slowly I began to see the truth

Relationship is not Love
Relationship is two souls doing their best to share love
But it is not love itself

Love can only be received from the divine and poured out when our cup overfills
The overflow is relationship
But Love is the unconditional infinite energy that surpasses all understanding

And the other thing I know now without a doubt

When we allow that love into our deepest darkest neediest angry dark places, everything changes

I see inside of me a precious infant girl

As I have talked about before, I have been working on loving her for a long time now

A great part of me felt she was a mistake and had no purpose being here 
(even though my logical mind disagreed)

But as I thought back to the moments that I held Roland and Hayden in my arms for the first time.

The memory of the sheer joy and love and responsibility at meeting these tiny souls overwhelmed me.

If I close my eyes and take a breath I can see my own infant self resting in my arms

That same joy and love and responsibility fills me

The loneliness and desperation from this shift in my life has allowed me to dig deep enough to find her

And by grace I have found a way to allow divine love in like I have never allowed it before.

Some days I succeed and others… well I’m human

I know through lots of experience now that I have to release all the stuff that blocks the love

Anger, resentment, jealousy, judgment those things are energy that get trapped in our bodies

But with work they can be released

The shift is not easy. It takes every ounce of bravery and courage that I have inside of me

It is so much easier to just be angry or hurt or full of shame

But I believe that infant girl deserves better than that.

She deserves to have someone fight for her and guide her along the path

She deserves to experience love and connection with both spirit and other souls

We are a work in progress, no doubt and will be till we take our last breath

We are full of paradox and hypocrisy. Love and Fear, Trust and Jealousy, Joy and Sadness

We all are

During a breakup it’s so much easier to get through, if you can just be angry and look at 
only the negatives of the person you are choosing to walk away from.

It is so easy to choose distraction and self pity.

The harder road is to see the person fully, the healthy and unhealthy, the quirks, the things that make your heart leap, the good times and the hard times and to stay with the ache of the loss.

I see it all. I am grateful for it all because everything led me right here to this moment.

I have made lists of everything our relationship allowed me to believe about myself and everything I allowed myself to experience because I was in it.

Those things don't disappear now that the relationship is changed. I will hold onto them with gratitude.

I know the heart ache was worth every moment of bliss and connection I felt leading up to it.

I remember moments of pure “cup overflowing” connection. Two souls locked together in a moment outside of time.

Looking back I want more of that connection. I crave it. My heart longs to see and be seen again. But then a new energy floods my body and I realize I am simply grateful I had that experience. If it comes again, awesome, if not I will continue to be grateful for it. It was enough.

I feel a strange mixture of relief and missing him. I feel like part of my heart is still with him and his gracious shadow follows me wherever I go.

The push and pull is tedious and intense. The only way I know through is to keep coming back to myself

To keep seeking connection with the love that surrounds me and fills me and ALLOW it in

I let go of hurry and distraction and rest in this moment.
This very moment with a lonely heart crying out in gratitude 

Everything is occurring in its perfect time.

I am learning about letting go of what’s real

Letting go of the imagined
Letting go of dreams held on pedestals
Letting go of wanting more
And allowing myself to notice what I already have.

Today I decided it's time to try out some new ways of doing things to see if they bring more peace through this transition.

I’ll give them a week and check in to see what is working and what can be left behind.

• Get up 15 minutes before I need to wake the boys to meditate, connect with the divine and be in silence.
• Keep my phone out of my hands when I’m in bed. No facebooking, instagramming, mindless games or internet surfing before I go to bed or when I first wake up. They lower my energy and take me away from myself.
• Cook and enjoy delicious meals. Savor each bite.
• Flow with the tide of emotions and allow them all. I have learned that if I take just a few minutes to find a quiet place and allow the intense ones to come up, they only last about 90 seconds. But if I hold them in they sit simmering all day or explode in BAD ways.
• List at least 3 things I’m grateful for in my Day One app. I have been doing this for a few months now and it is so so good.
• Write, Read and Listen to Audio Books – fill my mind with positive, encouraging and helpful ideas instead of allowing my monkey mind to go wild. But also take time each day to write out whatever needs to be said.
• Look for opportunities to give. Put flowers on a heartbroken girls door. Pay for the coffee of the person in line behind me. Send a care package to a dear friend who's life is also in deep transition, send a real hand-written letter to a friend, smile at my office mates, say thank you to the cleaning lady in the gym.. little things that make a big difference
• Reach out for connection - but in a healthy way. Similar to drinking alcohol. If  I "need it" then nope, take time to reconnect with myself first. But otherwise go out and connect!

Savoring the Strawberries

“There is a story of a woman running away from tigers. She runs and runs and the tigers are getting closer and closer. When she comes to the edge of a cliff, she sees some vines there, so she climbs down and holds on to the vines. Looking down, she sees that there are tigers below her as well. She then notices that a mouse is gnawing away at the vine to which she is clinging. She also sees a beautiful little bunch of strawberries close to her, growing out of a clump of grass. She looks up and she looks down. She looks at the mouse. Then she just takes a strawberry, puts it in her mouth, and enjoys it thoroughly. Tigers above, tigers below. This is actually the predicament that we are always in, in terms of our birth and death. Each moment is just what it is. It might be the only moment of our life; it might be the only strawberry we’ll ever eat. We could get depressed about it, or we could finally appreciate it and delight in the preciousness of every single moment of our life.” Pema Chodron

I think we all know the adage “nothing ever goes away until it has taught us what we need to know”.

Well I’m living it this week.

Medical stuff has reappeared that I had hoped to never deal with again.

But for whatever reason that’s not the case and I’m using the pain to dig a little deeper and work through fear and trust on another level.

I’m owning that this sucks big time but I’m also owning that my life is still really REALLY GOOD and full of blessings.

I’m enjoying the strawberries on the vine and opening my eyes to blessings.

Here are a few I jotted down last night and today.

The A/C at my rental condo only needed freon and not replaced

Watching Ro write in the invention journal Che gave him

Laying my head on Che's chest after a long talk and feeling closer to
him than ever. He has such a beautiful soul.

Doctors and technology that keep simple medical issues from growing into larger life threatening issues

Lidocaine rocks

Paints and canvas full of possibility

My camera and lenses

A soft comfy bed with smooth sheets and a perfect weighted comforter

The tomato and pepper plants are budding outside

The covered back porch is beginning to feel like my nest

The sound of silence and nature as my mind focuses on the evolving canvas before me

Color - glorious color

A job that pays well and gives me paid time off work for days just like this.

A piece of art that finally feels "right" and brings me comfort when I think about or look at it. 

Hayden's smile and desire to spend time with me in the kitchen.

A fan over my bed that blows a gentle breeze across my skin

A body and spirit that refuse to give in to darkness. That fight and stretch and arch towards the light

Sunshine through the sun roof on the drive into work

Not running out of gas when I very easily could have

A doctor in my office building so I don’t have to take off work.

Friends that see pain on my face and stop in the check on me.

A sense of peace deep inside the pain that says “you won’t always feel like this”

Words and Images that bring hope and laughter

Hope and Choice.. always

The Power of a Smile

The power of a smile is incredible.

Today as I walked into the office I passed a group of people walking the other direction.

One of the men looked at me, saw the sadness on my face and gave me the biggest smile. His face lit up and his eyes seemed to say "chin up, it's a beautiful day". I see smiles from men often. But I can usually sense a different motivation for their attention. This was just pure joy he was emitting.

I immediately thought of the lesson the universe, God, whatever I'm calling it these days, has been trying to teach me. A few weeks ago I got a message from that higher place that said "when you can't see hope, when you've lost faith, look for the smiles and smile yourself. Smiling is having faith and hope that the light always wins over the dark. It's courageous to smile"

As I walked past the man this morning I wondered if God himself had jumped into his body and put that smile on his face. 

It's a simple thing but I'm choosing to see it as a sign that something good out there really does have my back. 

Thank you God for the night

Can I really trust you?

God

Universe

Angels

Unconditional Love

Higher Power

The Thing that Has My Back 

( Or THUMB..the cute nickname I declared for you this weekend)

I have called on you many times before.

As a sweet little strawberry blonde I asked where you were the day daddy left.

You showed up behind the couch where I was hiding, listening to them argue over the stereo and wondering what was going to happen. But you didn't look like YOU. You called yourself Angelica and you had the smoothest chocolate skin I had ever seen. You cradled me and wiped my tears and told me I was gonna be ok....sweet child.

I remember going to you many times back then. You had a house around the corner and I would wander in and curl up in your lap in that old creaking rocking chair. You would show me your pocket watch locket with a picture of an angel inside. You would hum sweet songs and rub my hair. You smelled like chocolate chip cookies and felt like an easy chair.

You stayed with me as her through the darkest nights of my childhood. Covering my eyes, holding my hand through the pain. But what I never understood was why you didn't stop the bad things from happening. Why you didn't take me back to daddy. Why you didn't stop those people from doing what they did. You stayed by my side but you didn't stop them. 

I'm kinda pissed about that. 

I get it, in my head. We all have our battle scars and if we choose to, they are the fuel for our inner light. They spark the fire of our courage and perseverance. I know I would not be who I am today had I not lived through those experiences and many years later fought to find the will to live with their memory. 

But when I hear people say "the universe has got your back. You can trust that you are loved and taken care of" 

I shutter inside.

Because though I see the lessons and understand that without trials we would not grow, I do not feel cared for or nurtured. 

No, I feel pushed along in a chain of events called life. I am thankful for free will and choice and the power to love through it all, but I don't feel comfort.

And I want it desperately.

This past weekend I took a trip to Sedona with Che to backpack and hike. The first day we decided to hike up the non trail side of cathedral rock. We didn't realize how far we had to go and left unprepared for the journey. Heat, lack of water and a rougher climb than we expected sent me into panic. I was afraid to go up or down. Kicking myself for getting into the predicament. Che felt the same way but we had to work together to decide what to do.

At one point we ran across this painted rock. Tears welled in my eyes as I read the message. "Thank you God for the night". 

It struck me cold. Expecting a cute or simple message to have been left instead. But to see gratitude for the night ?? Wtf?

This is the crux of my lack of faith. On bright days I am full of hope and love. But when the stress of life overwhelms me and the night of my doubt returns and all I can sense is danger I am transported back to that little girl inside my soul.

It is not enough that God stood by and held my hand. I wanted protection. Not a smile. I wanted comfort not silence. How can I rest my back into a God that allowed such brutality to such an innocent child. 

And I am fully aware that I am not alone in this paradoxical love/free will system. In fact I have seen and experienced far less evil than most. That knowledge only intensifies the lack of comfort I feel.

My salve to this pain has been control and naivity. But that is not the answer. My heart longs for comfort and neither of those band aids will provide it.

Tonight my heart hurts. I am surrounded by information pointing to danger and uncertainty. Removing naive views and attempting to let go of control leaves me grasping for any lines of faith. 

My head tells me to numb out, drink till I can't think anymore but a small quiet voice asked me to get out that rock I found on the mountain and light a candle instead. It whispered to me to take two cards from the guardian angel deck. It whispered to "be still and know".

I close my eyes and feel my body connect to the ground. I am supported. But I am scared. Terrified of a misstep that will send me into a free fall. 

I can see it, feel it, the wind rushing, the g forces, feet flying, and then darkness. Complete darkness and isolation. I never want to return to that place.

My cards read "intention" and "soul mate". 

Maybe just maybe I think that thing that has my back is trying to tell me something. Do I dare trust it? Can I survive the pain if I do and I get hurt again?

A fire of courage burns and says yes. A great big giant Yes. 

It says the point of the cards is to set the intention. Instead of allowing the thoughts and feelings of falling to certain death to fill my consciousness, I must create a juicy vision of what the ideal outcome could be instead. And maybe all that shit I've talked and studied about manifestation will really be true. And I will create the future where I am at peace. Where I press against the universe and feel it press back. Where I am safe and comforted no matter the circumstance.

The seed of hope is tiny but like that little poppy seed that I nurtured and turned into a beautiful woman, I plan to do the same with this one.

Focus and love. Caring for my hope and faith. Day by day. I will nurture them and maybe just maybe I will say

"Thank you God for the night"

Boxes

"Only people who are capable of loving strongly can also suffer great sorrow, but this same necessity of loving serves to counteract their grief and heals them." Leo Tolstoy

I have this image in my mind of every lost thing in my life. At each one, I took the feelings and placed them in a box. Wrapped it with beautiful paper and a big red ribbon and placed it on a shelf in the back room of my mind.

Seeing the shelves full of lovely packages brought pride and not sorrow. "Look what I've been through and survived!"

One foot in front of the other I'd say "Nothing can stop me"

But things are changing. The shelves are full and shifting under the weight. Each loss, no matter the size, causes an avalanche. The feelings are busting out of their delicately wrapped packages and saying "not so fast sweetheart"

They are demanding to be heard, felt, experienced. Thinking my way through it is an act of futility. Like an onion each layer must be peeled, each box unwrapped and savored. For in each one lies anger, fear, hurt, and passion.

I know love, forgiveness, courage and time will get me through. But I've made such a mess of things and the gravity of dealing with all those unraveling boxes makes me want to curl up in bed and never turn on the lights. Can't I just lock the door on them or better yet put all those little boxes into one giant "I don't give a fuck" box and throw it in a deep hole never to be found.

That sounds so tempting, and then I see the light dim in my children's eyes as they watch their mother's own light diminish.

That causes more shame and yet another box for the shelf.

What to do.. What to do...

Yoda's Right

"Fear is the path to the dark side.

Fear leads to anger.

Anger leads to hate.

Hate leads to suffering."

Yoda

thanks for reminding me of this one Che. I forgot how much I love Yoda.

So I’m humbly climbing back into my life again after a week or so of big emotions and even bigger lessons.

Looking back, the mountain I climbed with tears in my eyes and fury in my heart looks more like a bump in the road.

It’s crazy how that works.

But the fact of the matter is, I am who I am for lots of reasons and I hurdled that bump to the best of my ability at the time.

I hurt a lot of people in the process (including myself) but I also learned a lot from those mistakes.

Things like:

Don’t read facebook when you’re going through a huge life struggle. It will just make you more depressed. No one tells the 100% truth of their lives on there and all of those spiritual and zen quotes are often taken out of context and end up being more confusing than helpful when you’re really stressed out. Stress brings on black and white thinking and that zen stuff is more about the gray and finding the truth for yourself.

I remember reading through a few of them and feeling so confused.

Do I accept that I can’t handle this and just accept myself right now, or try to be grateful for this experience or push myself to find more strength? The truth was that I needed to do a little bit of all of it.

And the real truth is that there is no “right or wrong” when it comes down to it. We do the best we can given the skills and love we have in our hearts in every moment. If we screw up, the best thing to do is forgive ourselves, learn from it and move on.

I do have to admit that posting a SOS on my page and hearing from friends far away that they were sending me love and light helped… a lot. So facebook isn’t completely evil.



The other thing I learned is just how sensitive my body and consequently my mind and spirit are to chemicals. Taking medications that I’m not use to, spiked a chemical imbalance that created anxiety and angst inside of me that was way higher than my status quo. At the time I didn’t realize it and so I ended up overreacting to many of the situations I found myself in.

I also learned that my kids are not babies any more. I simply did not have the ability to “take care” of them the way I have in the past. They had to fend for themselves more and they did just fine. This was a huge thing for me because I should have been doing this a long time ago. I have to teach them to take care of themselves if they are ever going to be able to leave the nest.

Another gift that I received, although uncomfortable, was the gift of hearing the truth about how I react in these situations from Che. While I have always seen myself as a soul looking for deep connection, especially in the midst of stress, I see now that my natural reaction is to actually hide. I isolate and draw my light inside of myself and end up pulling it from everyone around me as a result. Staying present in the midst of pain is very difficult for me. This is a biggie and I’m thankful for the gift of that honest reflection.

I could sit and play coulda shoulda woulda all day about how I handled things and how I would do things different next time. But the point is, it’s over and done. The boys remember our experience as a fun trip. And while some painful conversations occurred, a lot of healthy conversations also took place. I learned that I really am a pretty tough cookie and that I do have the ability to snap out of the funk and just be in a good mood if I choose to do so.

There are a few moments speckled in all of that mess that I have been replaying in my mind while patting myself on the back. Like when we pulled over for Che to get a few pictures of Timmy at the sculpture park. It was cold. I was in pain and tired. But Hayden decided he wanted to get out too and even offered to let Che take some pics of him. I took a deep breath and got out and followed them through the park. We got some really great shots together that I will cherish forever and we had a lot of fun. If I had stayed in the car I would have missed out on seeing my baby blooming into this new boy exploding with joy and energy.

I have learned that there are really only two core emotions. Fear and Love and I even had someone tell me the other day that fear is just another form of love. I don’t get that yet, but maybe it will make sense one day. But the point is that I think we have a choice daily to choose which emotions we let rule us. I love myself enough to forgive myself for letting fear rule me for so long. And for the rest of my days I will strive to continue to make my life a vessel of love and light instead.

True Beauty

A friend posted this image on Facebook the other day.

Her name is Lizzie Miller and she is known as

the woman on p.194 of the September 2009 Glamour magazine.

The reaction to this posting was off the charts.

Over and over I saw

“that looks like me!”

“We need more images like this”

I could feel a virtual deep sigh of relief.

The shame drifting away

as women were reminded

that they were normal and beautiful.

I think the majority of people don’t feel 'good enough' today.

Brene' Brown has done tons of research on the issue and it’s true.

We are living in a society of deep shame.

The diet and health industry (both physical and mental) is booming like never before.

Viewing these comments and questions raised

made me dig a little deeper

into my own judgments and beliefs

about being healthy and beautiful.

I haven’t really talked about it much on here,

but over the last two years

I have lost close to 80 pounds.

I am still processing both the physical and emotional transformation.

My journey to health began towards the beginning of my divorce.

I knew I had to get on my feet and find my inner strength

if I was going to survive that life change.

I had abused my body most of my life

with shifting swings of sugar and junk food binges

followed by starvation and obsessive exercise.

In high school I lost a massive amount of weight

by tracking every single bite that entered my mouth

but I was completely OCD about it

and even started trying controlling and manipulating

the food intake of the people around me.

The pounds slowly crept on

as I went through college and early marriage.

But they reached their all time high during my deep depression

in my twenties and thirties.

I eventually started working on the deeper issues

(shame, guilt, fear)

causing my obesity and decided it was time to stop hiding and take care of myself.

I witnessed several friends

find joy in running by starting out with the numerous couchTo5k programs.

I decided to give it a try.

 On my first run I had something that I consider miraculous happen.

 A tiny white butterfly came along and joined me on the run.

 I took this as a sign that I needed to follow the running journey

 and see where it would lead me.

 To this day I still have what Che refers to as “my minions” join me on the path.

Two years later I can say it was one of the best choices I ever made.

 I have now finished a 5k, 10k, 15k and Half Marathon.

 Along the way I have learned how to listen to my body.

 To push it to its limits,

 to take care of it when it needs rest,

 to feed it and fuel it with healthy food,

 and how to listen to it deeply.

 I have found joy in all kinds of exercise 

and truly enjoy eating healthy energy rich foods.

But I still struggle with body image.

 Losing this much weight has caused a lot of excess skin I can’t stand.

 Many days when I look in the mirror

 I still see myself at close to 200 pounds

 ( I am only 5’ 2”). 

I constantly work to turn off the negative statements when I see myself in a mirror.

Part of it is driven by what I see.

 I believe our brains are wired to see beauty in symmetry and youth. 

 We are also given a societal view of beauty 

that is distorted and only given to a few who win the genetic lottery card. 

But I believe very deeply that beauty comes from within.

 When we believe we are beautiful,

 we feel beautiful

 and we radiate beauty.

 There is something about confidence that covers all physical flaws.

I think that is what people see when they look at the model on pg. 194.

 She is glowing with self-confidence.

 She is comfortable in her not so perfect skin.

 I truly believe if we saw more images like the one above 

in the print around us it would help us all 

see the beauty in our imperfections and own our own light.

I remember the first time I saw myself as physically beautiful.

 As most know, my guy is gifted with the ability

 to capture the beauty of women in such a way 

that we can see ourselves like never before.

 When we first started dating I was crazy camera shy.

 I had a moment of confidence one day

 and asked him to take some pictures of me.

 When I saw the images I spoke the words he has heard so many times before

 “that doesn’t look like me” 

and

“you made me look like a piece of art”.

 It took my breath away 

and it propelled my confidence to keep improving my body to where I wanted it to be.

I am beyond thankful for him

 and am constantly awe struck by the images he captures.

 Many of my friends don’t understand how I can be so open

 to dating someone who specializes in erotic photography. 

 They wonder how I can trust him

 and actually encourage him to go on photo shoots with naked women. 

The answer is that I KNOW HIM.

 It is his gift and I have no reason to not trust him.

 When my internal wheels start spinning

 and I begin to doubt or question,

 it is always my own insecurity rising to the surface.

 Living this journey has allowed me to do some deep work 

with that insecurity and the outcome has been incredible healing.

Along the way my own love of photography has expanded into working with people.

 I finally feel ready to take on the challenge of capturing the beauty of humanity.

 I believe beauty is in the real stuff…

 ALL emotions, shapes, sizes, curves and lines.

 Macro and micro I want to explore the light of the soul 

and what it means to be human.

 I call this series of my work, INTROSPECTIVES and I can’t get enough.

The more I am able shoot,

 the more I ponder these questions surrounding beauty.

 I find my eye looking for that symmetry and smoothness

 and the urge to reach for the liquify and cloning tools within photoshop creeps up.

It makes me wonder what I should focus on.

I know part of the problem with the image above is the position she is sitting in.

 If she was laid out on her back, arms reaching overhead, that tummy roll would disappear.

But what is more important?

Which image would capture her beauty?

Does the pose or acne or cellulite matter?

All I know is that when I see an image of myself

 that shows sagging skin or stretch marks,

 acne or a bad angle of my face, 

I cover my eyes and race for the delete button.

 I know other people feel the same way

 and that’s why we as photographers don’t share every image.

 We only show the “good ones”.

I honestly don’t know the answer to these questions,

 but I hope they become clear in time.

 For now I will continue to capture the beauty that surrounds me wherever I find it.