Life of Joy

So, this is a big crazy week. Yesterday I cleaned the house from top to bottom, did all the laundry and put it away, cleaned the fridge, bought groceries and marinated and froze protein.

Now I think we can make it through the week, even though it looks like Michael is getting slammed during my busiest time in ages.

Left a flip chart page up on the wall with all my preliminary task categories, and Trent saw it and cracked up about it over breakfast:

Bite-sized and doable
Medium and less scary
Gigantic and terrifying
Weirdly intimidating

Go us!

Posted via LiveJournal app for iPhone.

So, the big meeting went amazingly well.

I put in so many hours of prep that one part of me isn't surprised, but most of me is still, actually, pretty surprised.

After my talk, there were many questions, and only one was difficult. I did OK with that one.

The next day, one of the folks called me and said, "You were really impressive. I felt like standing up and cheering after your talk."

So, good.

I have to say that I owe a debt of gratitude to many, many of you. I asked for a lot of help, and I got it in droves.

I needed that help because even though I am good at the talking part and strong in my passion for transformation and change, there was much I didn't know and much else I needed to provide. And many, many of you helped me, and are still helping me.

Thank you. I will not forget those who helped me. When you have need, I will be there.

Thank you.

******

This morning I woke up with this thought in my head: "I have eight days to make and upload my TED Talk application."

I've had the link for weeks, and divalion sent me a link to the New York page ages ago. I even posted a link on LJ for you.

Here's the crazy secret: I've been too scared to look at it until today.

Wild, huh?

This, more than anything, is why I need people who care around me: I need them to push me over that little edge of fear.

I woke up and told Michael, and he immediately reached for his iPad to look for the link.

We looked at it together and it's not that bad at all.

I even have access to a video of a longer talk I can potentially hack and link to in my application. I should have been on that already...

But we're on it today, now.

Next stop, TED 2013.

Posted via LiveJournal app for iPhone.

( Read more... )

Posted via LiveJournal app for iPhone.

( Read more... )

Posted via LiveJournal app for iPhone.

After deep talks with Michael, I'm realizing that normally, I walk around with energy cords between me and the people closest to me. I imagine them as electrical cords with two plugs: one in me, and one in them. Right now it feels like I've pulled out all the plugs that normally live in other people, and I'm walking around with a bunch of unplugged electrical cords in my hands. They're still plugged into my end, but I'm just holding on to the bundle of disconnected cords as I wander through the world. Weird.

It's hard on Michael.

The thing I don't understand: my radar is still working, at least with some people. If I've disconnected a bunch of my energy cords, where are those messages coming from? Am I also embedded in something more like an energetic spider web, so I can still feel the threads twitch when somebody around me moves?

Something to think about.

Posted via LiveJournal app for iPhone.

OK, passport is here. So where am I going?

Posted via LiveJournal app for iPhone.

This morning I'm feeling inspired by a friend who has really struggled in a couple of areas in his life, but has managed his troubles through great anguish and anger, and recently come to a place of real grace.

He's had many setbacks and explosions, but I've watched him move from great reactivity to gentleness and sanity with others, especially when he is afraid and defensive. That's so hard to do! It's amazingly difficult to stay gentle when you feel threatened.

He has done a good job of looking at the destructiveness that comes from speaking and acting out of fear. Wow.

Watching him, I get a sense of how much his problems have motivated him to push past his old ways of relating. It's very useful to watch someone do this, especially when it's such a struggle for them, because it reminds me that I can do the things that are hard for me as well.

Posted via LiveJournal app for iPhone.

The talk was great. I'll write about it tomorrow. But tonight I was at a funeral directors' Christmas party, and there was a magician entertainer. The magician was very strange, but he had a white rabbit and a white dove.

After the show I went up to talk to him and said, "Your show was really nice. Do you think I could see your rabbit?"

He blinked at me in surprise, laughed, and pulled his rabbit out from behind the back wall of his set. He kept laughing the whole time, so I asked him if everything was OK.

"Sure," he said, "But I kill myself to put on a great magic show and all you want to do is see my rabbit?"

"It was a nice show," I answered, but he was right. I really just wanted to pet the rabbit.

It was soft and sweet, very beautiful and gentle. I petted it for a long time. I've never been close to a magician's rabbit before.

Posted via LiveJournal app for iPhone.

I do my best thinking in and near water and surrounded by/held up by earth. When I can, I like to take a few minutes in the morning and float in the tub in just a little bit of water, so I can absorb and think. All kinds of insights emerge here, and there's something about the soothing nature of the water that eases all my stresses and allows my heart and mind to blossom.

I can't reflect properly unless I am calm.

Maybe that's why I put such a high premium on calming people, things and spaces.

Today's insights: (thinking guided by the the Chinese Element System)

I am doing really well with earth, I'm starting to do better with metal (slowly grasping how to set good, loving boundaries, oh so slowly...) and I am very delighted with air. Love the minds of those around me and all they have to offer.

I'm still pretty confused about fire, and I don't yet get wood at all.

I've been supporting and witnessing for two close friends who have much, much fire and noticing, again, how fire confuses me and sets me off my game a little bit. I understand it and love it as sheer raw movement, as dance, and as pulling through the divinity of the universe. Those things I know and love.

As communication, as passion, as frustration and as anger, it still confuses me. It's like my brain stops and starts, but works in fits, sputtering around and trying to get its bearings.

I still have work to do around this.

I guess that's OK.

Posted via LiveJournal app for iPhone.

Strange dream: I was back in college, and I'd been assigned a room in undergrad housing. When I arrived, my small room was bustling with roommates: all guys. I didn't know any of them, either.

"Wait a minute," I thought. "Isn't this a girl's dorm? Why did I get assigned boys? And why are there so many people crammed into this room?"

To make matters worse, I was on my way to class and couldn't do anything about it. I ended up running off to class with a friend, a girl, who was cracking me up and making me laugh about the craziness of things.

As we arrived at class, I looked over and realized that my friend was actually physically male and I hadn't realized it. S/he was so cool that I had simply overlooked it. So I just shrugged and we went to class.

Weird.

Posted via LiveJournal app for iPhone.