february's daily 💡 a ❤️ 🔥 challenges, part 2

february is past it’s half way mark and it’s time to complete the light a heart fire challenges. whether you’ve participated daily, sporadically, or not at all, i invite you to stretch yourself and your capacity for love of self and other each day for the rest of the month. each challenge is intended to be undertaken in ten minutes with little to no preparation. if you can, however, increase your engagement to 15 minutes, you’ll get even more out of each activity. if you’d like to post about your experience, consider adding the #lightaheartfire tag to your post.

day 16:  give your body a break. find a quiet place where you can either stretch or simply lie down and rest. begin by taking deep breaths in through your nose and out through your mouth and see if you can let go of significant amounts of tension from your body. if stretching, lengthen each movement for maximal release. if resting, try tensing each muscle group from the feet up toward the head in 3 second intervals, followed by focusing your attention on the warmth and “heavy” feeling that results after tensing. from a place of relaxation, thank your body for it’s work in carrying you through each day.

day 17:  affirm yourself today. take two of your ten minutes to identify several traits or abilities that you value in yourself. these might be things like your intellect, your relational predisposition, or your skill in a particular area. try to keep your insights “right sized,” neither inflating them nor engaging in false humility. once you have identified several things that you appreciate/value about yourself, work them into affirmations which are simple statements of validation. for instance, if you value your ability to extend hospitality, an affirmation might be: “i am a person who welcomes people boldly.” write these down and say them to yourself. now take two to five minutes identifying a trait or ability you’d like to grow more deeply into. form this insight into an affirmation, write it down. for example, if you’d like to grow in your ability to be more organized you might create the affirmation: “i am becoming a person who is more organized.” repeat this affirmation to yourself several times and commit to using it in the coming days.

day 18:  affirm someone else today. identify a person in your life who could benefit from some affirmation. using the skills you applied yesterday, identify traits and/or abilities that you see and value in that person. take a few minutes to write these down. use positive statements that affirm these insights. for example, “i see you as a generous person” or “i recognize a strong tendency toward graciousness in you” or “you are kind.” once you have several statements prepared, share them with the person either in writing or voice to voice. 

day 19:  give yourself a gift today. find a way to lavish generosity on yourself. think past the automatic “go to’s” such as food or time or money expenditures. those are fine if they are not your typical ways of gifting yourself. if they are, however, try to find other, creative, ways to give yourself a gift. give yourself time to read a pleasure book, apply a richly scented lotion, take a ten minute nap or stare into space. if food is the gift, eat it mindfully, noticing fully how it tastes and smells. if purchasing something, have it gift wrapped or, at the minimum, receive it from yourself as you would a gift from someone who is expressing care and love toward you.

day 20:  find someone or something to extend active care toward today. be creative in your thinking. this may be a plant that you have neglected which could use repotting, treatment of the soil, or pruning. it could be an animal at your local shelter or pet store that could use 10 minutes of your petting and care. perhaps it is your neighbor whose driveway you might shovel or sweep or an aunt who would be tickled by a phone call or letter in her mailbox. whatever you choose, pay attention to how it feels to be active with your loving kindness.

day 21:  be silly for 10 minutes today. engage an activity that makes you smile or laugh. preferable, engage something that is not screen based. yes, youtube is hilarious, but there are other, more embodied forms of fun to be had. blow bubbles with bubble gum. play hop scotch. turn up your favorite dance music and dance til you sweat. write a goofy note to someone and leave it on their desk or doorstep and doorbell ditch. paint your nails a whacky color. eat dessert as a meal. have a stare off with a friend or play “if you love me honey, won’t you please please smile.” try, as much as you can, to be fully present to fun and light heartedness as you spend this time and energy.

day 22:  give someone a valuable coupon whose redemption will stretch you. we all have people in our lives who “put up with” our proclivities. these are the people that we live, work, or volunteer with. they are our neighbors, our faith communities, our co workers, our roommates, or our families. identify someone who you can give a valuable coupon to, make one, and deliver it either digitally, through the mail, or vocally. some examples might be: “i will wash the dishes in the office sink,” “i will cover call for you for a day,” “i will let you win the argument,” “i will honor your choice of movie/restaurant/free time activity,” “i will forego my desire to be ‘right’,”  “i won’t complain when you suggest i attend a meeting i don’t want to attend,” or more. determine to respond lovingly when the coupon is redeemed.

day 23:  give your mind a break. find a quiet place to spend ten minutes in quiet, restful alertness. set your timer for ten minutes. take a few deep breaths, noticing how the air feels entering and leaving your body. it may help to breathe in through the nose and out through the mouth. try to let your attention stay with the simple act of breathing. when thoughts enter, see if you can let them float by, watching them as they go and then drawing your attention back to your breath. if they are important, they will return. don’t stress if most of your time is spent watching the thoughts float by. instead, be glad if you can draw your attention back to a sense of calm a time or two. if you’d like to explore this more, the mindfulness meditations found here can be very helpful.

day 24:  extend loving kindness to someone who you radically disagree with. as on day 12, identify a person that you can find very little common ground with. this might be a person that you know in your day to day life or one that you may never meet personally. once you have identified this person, spend ten full minutes wishing them well. if you are a God person, pray for them. if not, expend energy meditating on goodness and kindness toward them. find qualities of their humanity that you can honor even if it is difficult and send them loving thoughts and wishes in your mind. notice what it feels like to be generous with well wishes even when the recipient is someone who is difficult for you to appreciate or respect.

day 25:  love yourself richly. on a piece of paper write the words things i love about myself. spend ten minutes identifying qualities about your self that you appreciate and value. don’t keep track of things that you do, instead focusing on finding the words that express who you are. your mind will likely easily identify actions that you take or roles that you fill. try to move past these to ways that you are. for example, do not write down “i am an amazing accountant” but do write down “i am thorough and careful about details.” do not write down “i take good care of people” but do write down “i am caring.” try to focus on who you are, not what you do. sit back and try to take in a real love for who you are apart from the actions and roles you take on.

day 26:  thank someone who you consider a loving person. take time today to write a note of gratitude to someone who you find to express love well. this can be a person that you know or a person that you admire but haven’t met. use creative means to get this communique to the person. beyond just thanking this person for their example, express your care and deep good wishes for them as well.

day 27:  attend to your physical heart today. do something that gets it beating. don’t over do but don’t play it too safe either. walk just a few steps faster or farther. jump rope until you feel your heart beat. if you have a stethoscope, listen to your heart or feel it in your pulse. consider, with intention, the miracle that is your physical body with all of its integrated systems. think of the way in which your blood flows and your heart pumps it. use the awareness of your physical heart as a jumping off point for gratitude toward your body for being the conduit for all of your efforts toward giving and receiving love.

day 28:  express care, love, or (at a minimum) tolerance for a part of yourself that you dislike or wish were different. we often try to beat ourselves and/or our bodies into submission. we wish that things about ourselves were different so we either ignore or punish them. today, identify something about yourself that you don’t particularly like or welcome. it might be a body part, a habit, a personality trait, or an emotional or cognitive state. work to understand it’s place in your life and invite it into open communication with you. try to care for it. if it hurts you, ask it what it needs to quiet down or to diminish.  be gentle with your self today.

day 29:  do an examen. on a piece of paper make two columns. title one column “things that gave me energy/expanded my heart” and the other “things that depleted energy/diminished my heart.” take a couple of minutes to look over your february calendar, recording activities or incidents in each column. with a few minutes remaining, look over these lists, identifying themes and patterns. determine how you might plan the coming months in such a way as to advance the expanding of your heart. make some notes about how to do this and place them where you will bump up against them in the coming months.

february's daily 💡 a ❤️ 🔥 challenges

welcome february’s light a heart fire challenges!

a few weeks ago a dear friend gave me the generous gift of a few days at her unbelievably stunning beach home. i used the time for some much needed solitude and writing, sitting at a wall of windows looking out over the oregon surf. when the sun set a fire in the fireplace was all i wanted. trouble was, i’d never learned to build a fire and i had no kindling with which to work. after a flurry of texts from my friend, the viewing of multiple youtube videos about fire starting, and several failed attempts, i finally reverted to “presto logs.” over my 3 night stay i came to learn that using these logs strategically, placing them on top of “real wood” that would catch the flame over time, made for a beautiful, long lasting fire. 

february is a hard month for many. on the heels of multiple holidays and in the midst of the damp and dragging winter, the frilly hearts of valentines day leave many cold. making things worse, in the u.s. we face the ramp up to an election season that is sure to fill the airwaves of the internet and the hallways of our offices and homes with contention and name calling. 

it’s time to take the month back. time to do whatever we can with whatever we have to build a fire in our own hearts and let the warmth spill out to those around us. to that end i offer some simple, humble ideas of how to use what you have to build larger flames of love and compassion. just like i used presto logs to build a “real” fire, the suggestions here utilize creative invention and techniques to help stoke the love that’s already aflame within you (c’mon...you know it’s in there!).

below you will find 16 challenges, on february 16 13 more challenges will be offered to get you to the end of the month. they are written to be under-taken, one a day, for the month of february but can be used in whatever way works best for you. each challenge requires at least 10 minutes but most can be expanded if you’d like. some will involve setting an intention of sort in the 10 minutes and then acting out the action throughout the day. the only supplies you will need (on some days) are a writing tool and paper. if you want to get fancy you might like to have a white board marker or washable marker and a few notecards or paper you’d write a special note on. don’t stress over these things. just use what you have. the whole goal is to expand your heart, grow your compassion for your self and others, and kindle the fire of love in all its forms...a great place to start is in employing a “good enough is good enough” attitude about the entire enterprise.

if you want to post comments or photos about the heart fire you’re stoking on instagram, mark them with #lightaheartfire and/or tag me (instagram: @drdoreendmtwitter: @doreendodgenmfacebook: doreen dodgen-magee, psy.d.) if you’d like. 

the challenges:

february 1:  write a love note to your mind and/or brain. thank it for the ways that it has served you. ask it what it needs to be more healthy while at the same time expressing compassion for it’s limitations.

february 2:  use your digital super powers to do research on non-profits or ministries that are doing loving things in the world around topics/people groups/causes that you care about. read some stories of how they express care. find inspiration in the wild and bold ways that they take risks to show love actively. let your mind wander about how you might stretch yourself in the coming days to love a bit more boldly specifically in the areas that call out to you.

february 3:  make a list of activities of experiences that make you feel alive. list at least 20 of these, making sure that the list is diverse. some items should require planning (e.g: go to a movie) and some should be able to be carried out spontaneously (e.g: apply a therapeutic muscle rub or aromatherapy lotion), some should cost (e.g: eat at a restaurant i love) and some should be free (e.g: spend an hour in the library reading magazines i would never buy myself). post this list where you can see it and commit to utilizing it several times a week.

february 4:  give something away today. if possible, make it something you own but don’t use but that you know that someone else might love and be blessed by. it could be a coat to someone sleeping outside or a home decor item you know your friend has eyed. it might be a treat you bought yourself or a book you’ve loved that someone else might enjoy. if you can’t think of something you already own, make or purchase something (small...it’s not the price or size that matters). notice how it feels to give something of yourself to someone else.

february 5:  write a love note to your emotions. ask forgiveness for the ways you misuse or ignore them. thank them for the ways that they educate you. express empathy for those among them that are often experienced as being too much or too strong and ask them what they need to be able to quiet down or feel attended to.

february 6:  honor someone with words. tell them you love them by brainstorming the character traits and other facets of their personality that you appreciate. don’t think too hard and don’t omit silly thoughts. write them down, doodle around them if you want, then either give them the piece of paper, take a photo of it and text it to them, or call them and tell them voice to voice the things about them that you love.

february 7:  come up with a mantra or meaningful phrase that you can repeat to yourself when you feel discouraged, lonely, or low. one flavor of such statement might be: “feelings are a state of my being, not traits of my being. i will respect them and i will also move through them.” another flavor might be: “i have what it takes.” and, yet another might be: “drop and give me 30. i am strong and WILL get through this.” quotes from others might also work. some of my favorite are: “you can never go down the drain.” mr. rogers “I have not given you a spirit of timidity but, rather, one of power, love, and self control” the bible and “it’s always darkest before the dawn. the sun WILL come up tomorrow.” you get the drift. practice this phrase, write it a bunch of times, commit it to memory so that you are ready to be compassionate with yourself the next time you might lean toward self loathing or defensive poor behavior toward self or others.

february 8:  with a white board marker or a washable marker, write the an expression of love, compassion, or care on the mirror that you most look at yourself in. either write it big enough that it takes up the entire mirror or specifically placed so that it covers the space where your face or body rest on it. some ideas: “love,” “you matter,” “you are important,” “show compassion toward object in this mirror.” stand in front of this mirror and gaze at yourself for the rest of the 10 minutes. practice shifting your attention from your own image to the word you have written and practice taking in the affirmation to your core.

february 9:  practice sending loving kindness to the world. take a 10 minute walk around your block or in the neighborhood you live, work, or go to school in. with each step look up and around, noticing the sites and sounds around you. in your mind and with your emotions engaged as much as possible, imagine yourself actively wishing for or sending care, love, and grace to all the living things you are seeing. these may be people, animals, or plants. you may even encounter businesses or corporate presences. to each of these, practice reaching into the love that you have within you and scattering handfuls of it about you as you walk. (this sounds crazy but is a deeply powerful experience if you give it the space to be. you are basically being a presence of love in the space where you walk.)

february 10:  write a love note to your body. thank it for all the ways it serves you. find ways of being compassionate with the parts of it you dislike. express empathy for its pains and limitations.

february 11:  greet people that you meet with intentional welcome and grace. spend a few minutes right now setting the intention to make eye contact with as many people as you can today, smiling and greeting them with a warm welcome. even if you say nothing you can communicate a great deal of love and warmth with eye contact and a smile. go from this intention setting time into the world and see how much warmth you can share throughout the day.

february 12:  write a note of respect to someone that you radically disagree with. at the end of this exercise you can toss it, save it to read when you feel particularly frustrated with this person, or deliver it to the person. for now, however, just try to find at least one thing that you can agree with this person about and three things that you respect about them in particular. write these down in list form if you just can’t make a narrative work. 

february 13:  learn to soothe yourself. take a few minutes to think about a time in your life when you have been or felt hurt. imagine as many details as you can about this time and the feelings that it birthed. now turn your attention to being your present day self and reach back to the hurt self and offer it soothing and comfort. how do you best receive comfort and care? lean into this as you give it to the pre-existing hurts of the past.

february 14:  get grounded. take your shoes off and stand somewhere where you can feel the earth beneath your feet. if it’s too cold or wet outside, step into your bathtub or sit on your counter and put your feet in the sink and let just enough water fill the bowl to let your feet feel it. focus on how it feels for your feet to touch the earth or elements. breathe in love and grace while also imagining the very ground where you stand sending sturdiness and groundedness to your being. literally breath in fresh air through your nose and take in solid rootedness from the ground. let yourself be loved in this way today.

february 15:  light a candle (or, if you don’t have access to one in your embodied space, you can light one online here). while gazing at the candle imagine a people group or part of nature that is hurting. it might be an entire country or a specific family that you know personally. it might be a place or an animal species that is facing hardship. using the candle light as a focusing spot, pray for or meditate on send love to this hurting entity. if you are a God person, hold this hurt before the Light of God. if not, send love toward and to it. let your heart connect with the hurt of your identified group or object, feeling the pain it feels. 

february 16:  surprise someone with appreciation. leave a note of gratitude for the server or dishwasher in your coffee cup when you leave your table at the cafe. use sidewalk chalk to make a welcome mat outside of someone’s car door in a parking lot. use your washable or whiteboard marker to write “you’re brilliant” on someone’s car window or the mirror in your office bathroom. leave a note on your roommate’s pillow or sneak one into your office mate’s bag. do whatever simple thing you can to make someone’s day. if you can make this spontaneous, even better. don’t plan too much. just commit to doing this today and let the right opportunity present itself.

name calling (in honor of martin luther king jr day)

I caution everyone who reads this to be careful what you wish for. This, of course, is not original to me. People say it all the time with varying levels of sincerity and differing intonations. I say it, today, from my own experience of having wished, for the last year, for something that has brought me to a place of tenderness that is surprising even to me. Let me explain. For the last year I have dedicated myself to deepening my contemplative experience in order to feed a hoped-for growth in my ability to greet the world with non judgmental awareness and radical acceptance. There are many motivators of this quest for me. Some are deeply personal and others professional. Some are related to my faith and spirituality and others simply to my humanity. I fail often in my efforts. In fact, for every inch of forward movement toward these goals I face ways in which I am entirely failing. Sometimes it can be discouraging. 

There are a few outward markers of mu journey. I try to write, now, with capital letters because I have come to know that it makes reading easier for people who are dyslexic. My language has (mostly) changed to (hopefully) reflect my attempts to listen better and not let my bias’ render me deaf. Mostly, however, the reality of what I’ve wished for has changed me deeply inside. This is not without cost. I’ve had to ask for a lot of forgiveness for things I’ve said or done in the past. I’ve also had to ask for a lot of grace as I try to learn and catch up and listen. I’ve developed a keen ability to bite my tongue and excuse myself to catch a breath before responding and, possibly more than anything else, I’ve become incredibly sensitive to name calling and stereotyping. Everywhere I look I see these behaviors in spades. In mass media, on Facebook, in tweets, from pulpits and street corners and stages. Certainly in presidential debates. Name calling and stereotyping are some of our best skills as Americans, it seems. 

Recently, a friend recounted an encounter he had with a person who launched a conversation with “I don’t know why poor people don’t...” My friend was perplexed and disappointed. Lumping a massive demographic into a title like “poor people” and then stereotyping their choices doesn’t leave much space for empathic connection. And yet we do it every. single. day. over. and. over. and. over. “How can those stupid liberals...?” “Why don’t those entitled millennials...” 

A billboard near my house says, “If you know the answer, ask bigger questions.” I had a gazillion questions I would have liked to have posed to the person my friend was talking with. Do you mean poor in relation to money? Are there other forms of poverty in your world view? Can you direct me to some sources that inform your claims about this group of humans? Do you know anyone personally who is part of this group you are speculating about? Can you help me understand where you’re coming from?

Whenever we refer to people in terms of their association with a named group we reduce them to whatever our own knowledge or stereotype of that group is. I know about this because I’ve lived from this space. Like so many of us, I emerged from my childhood with some deeply destructive and horribly divisive beliefs about several groups of people that weren’t like me. These beliefs lead to fear which caused me to stay away from meaningful interactions that would have the power to break through my lump them and judge them mentality. As I moved through life and pushed past my fear I began to find my way to the complicated reality that my own privilege and bias’ had prevented me from seeing the inaccuracies of my assumptions. In the more recent past I have come to see the many ways that I do this even today. I assume that my values are the most important ones and judge others accordingly. I am attached to my own world views and find it easy to write off those that disagree as ill-informed, poorly intentioned, or worse. These are the patterns I am wishing to change and this wish is deeply reforming me. While it is incredibly disruptive to consider people and their ideas in an open-hearted, respect- worthy, and love-read way, I believe that the disruption is worth it. Seeing others (especially those others that I most disagree with or who are least like me) for the beautiful and vulnerable souls that they are makes for a messy, deep, meaningful, rich existence. 

In the fall I had the distinct privilege of spending a day in Ferguson, Missouri with my friend Chris. Chris grew up in Ferguson and returned to nearby St Louis after college. He is a person whom I love and also one I admire. He works for justice and peace even when it is costly and uncomfortable. Chris has spent the last year investing a huge bulk of his time in his community, working to raise awareness of the injustices and oppression faced by the black community there. As we walked through the city I was deeply undone by the reality of the racial and economic divides I witnessed and by the utter care he communicated for everyone we encountered (and we met up with people from all sides of the issues). As a gay, white man raised in the Southern Baptist tradition he has every reason in the world to feel entitled to judge and rail. To lump and judge. To name call and react. He, himself, has been stereotyped. He has been called names and been judged and responded to as a member of a “group.” Instead, he simply pushes forward, committed to loving and to working for others to be freed from the oppression they experience at the hands of those who have conveniently compartmentalized them out of their awareness. The way he loves is by asking bigger questions and by pushing into uncomfortable spaces. 

Later, Chris encouraged me to visit Creative Reaction Lab's IMPTXDESIGN, an interactive exhibit in St. Louis where the themes of oppression, segregation, violence, stereotypes, and fear were explored. Creative Reaction Lab is a non profit whose mission is cultivating creative leadership to improve the human experience. In one particularly powerful installation, cookie cutter people forms filled a blackboard. Instructions were given to use chalk to demarkate your own person, listing first “3 ways in which you are stereotyped” followed by “3 things that are true about you.” The stories told in those images and words were profound. While all kinds of assertions filled the fist set of lines the second set was filled with emotional realities. Fear, sadness, insecurity, confidence, wishes, dreams, and more. The stereotypes shut down awareness and the truths opened them up.

I am inspired by this. It’s the opposite of name calling. When we reduce someone to a simple name or assumption about them (often prescribed in impulsive or less-than-thought-through ways), it is frighteningly easy to turn and walk away from them. We call them a name, declare that status as “other” than ourselves, and run. “I’m not like them.” “People like that are all alike.” “Those (fill in the name of the group) are all (fill in the name calling).” When they are so easily dismissed, we are so profoundly let off the hook of doing the hard work of making the world a more connected and, therefore, peaceful place.

The easiest way to live is one wherein our assumptions rule our sense of truth. We assume that everyone is well treated. That everyone has the same opportunities and simply stewards them well or not. That all people have access to the same resources that we do financially, socially, emotionally, and more. It’s simple if we imagine that racial bias doesn’t exist, that privilege applies to all regardless of skin color, political or religious ideation, or sexual orientation, and that every person receives fair treatment in all circumstances, no matter what. The world seems equally simple when we imagine that all members of certain groups are exactly the same. It’s easier to relate to others based on who we stereotype them to be than to see them as the real and complex individuals that they are, facing all manner of difficulties that we have never even considered. From this perch we can decide whether they are all in or all out. ‘Nuf said.

The other day I happened upon a difficult and painful story from a major, trusted news outlet. It was an incredibly well presented assemblage of stories about how Muslim parents talk with their children about hatred and extremism. It was deep and rich and thought provoking (click here to read it). It set off in me a deep (and inconvenient) sadness for all parents who have to find ways of talking about the many horrific complexities that exist in our world with children who deserve peaceful communities and spacious love. I found myself wishing that everyone on earth would read this piece and mull on it, letting it break through any stereotypes it could for the purpose of greater respect of the complexity of life. This article cut through the kinds of stereotypes which end up keeping us from having to think and stretch, from needing to work at respecting others for the full global siblings that they are to us. Name calling, and the compartmentalizing it leads to, keeps us from every having to think past our selves and stretch into healthier co-existence. Exposing ourselves to new truths about those we have compartmentalized does the opposite.

To grow into the mature people we wish to be we may need to risk the uncomfortable spaces of not being so sure. It may sound ridiculous, but it’s important that we face that not all blondes are dumb. Not all skiers hate snow boarders. Not all engineers are recluses. Not all gun owners are ill informed. Not all police officers use unneccessary force. Not all Christians are loving nor are all Muslims violent. There is no such thing as a “female” or “male” brain. All families whose stories include divorce are not “broken.” The person you consider overweight is likely not lazy. Some artists are not flighty. A person’s affiliation with a political party does not define their intellect, faith, or integrity. In reality, no person can be reduced to their identification with a group or the names we are tempted to assign to them. When we allow space for these truths, and all the others like them, we can no longer live from an “I am right/good” and “They are wrong/bad” mentality. Instead, we open the door to a wider consideration of our shared humanity with the very people we are tempted to reduce to names and/or stereotyped groups. It’s harder to dismiss someone out of hand when we actually stop and realize that, underneath our assumptions about them, lies a person with a beating heart, a complexity or spirit, and a mother. A person who, ultimately, needs love and connection and grace.

On a day where we, in America, honor the life of Martin Luther King, Jr., what might it be like for us to commit to moving past name calling?  To stop judging others and to, instead, start asking more questions? I came across a tweet once that stated “Would the day be different if I said, ‘Look, Here comes an Image Bearer’ about every person I meet?” Said another way: How might our day be different if we said, “Look, YOU are a person, worthy of respect! We are both humans in need of connection and grace” to every person that we meet? What if, instead of assuming we have the answers, we ask bigger questions. Big enough questions to grow us and our chances for getting past our judgments and moving toward peace-leaning openness with our local and global neighbors.

When you hear yourself saying “Such and such is an idiot!” “So and so is clueless!” “All ‘people that are part of X community’ are completely ridiculous!” or “There is no space for those people at my table!” take a moment and ask yourself the following questions:

What has this person said or done that stirred a response in me?

What leads to the intensity of this response in me? What is my history with this topic or person?

What are my stereotypes about this person and the categories or groups of people to which he or she belongs?

What have I done to ascertain whether my stereotypes or ideas about this person are accurate and/or inaccurate? Have these efforts to understand been undertaken with an openness or a pre existing certainty that I am right?

How might I respond to this person or speak about them in ways that resist name calling and stereotyping? If I feel a strong leading to engage this person, how can I do so in such a way that i maintain respectful treatment of both myself and them?

in a (wal)nut shell

i was part way through a long walk this evening when i passed a walnut shell. it was a perfect half, clean cut where the seam had been and hollowed out pristinely. i was instantly taken back to my childhood when my mom would take me to the hobby store and let me choose tiny trinkets to put in walnut shell halves. i’d build little worlds (hearts and cupids drowning in elmer’s glue for valentine’s day, deer and tiny trees amongst moss for winter, chicks and eggs in grass for spring...you get the idea) in the nut shells then attach ribbons to the outside and tie them above so we could hang them off hooks in the house. my favorite walnut shell world consisted of a blue satin fabric scrap, tucked tightly in the shell and holding a teeny tiny naked baby. i gave it to one of our family friends at her baby shower and felt proud every year when she hung it on her christmas tree.

the hardest part of making these creations was fastening the ribbon so the shell world would hang right side up. when i didn’t master this element, the tiny universes became utterly precarious. sometimes, if i hadn’t attached things well enough, we’d find deer and chicks and cupids lying on the floor below. when this happened, i’d find myself worrying about the baby.

for some reason, as i walked by that shell tonight, the thought hit me that we all feel as though life is precarious from time to time. no matter the size or toughness or gender or whatever other identifier of the human, everyone faces the fears and realities of falling at times. we don’t always feel securely attached, grounded, or certain of our standing. life is challenging and we are aware of the instability of our places upon the earth.

yes, there are soft surroundings and safe landings. yes, there is beauty in the actual precariousness that is life. yes, there are things we can do to make sure that we are growing in healthy, attached, secure ways. there are Higher Powers and Love that hold us tight no matter what. these things are not, however, what i want to point us to today.

what i want to direct us to is the fragility that we all face as humans. regardless of our awareness or expression of it, there are times when each of us feels afraid, untethered, and vulnerable. like that baby in the walnut shell hanging on my friend’s tree, we face times where we know that all it would take is one person to brush the branch in the wrong way and it’s game over. while it’s important not to treat our selves or others more gingerly than is called for, there are times when nothing relieving and grace giving than naming the precarious nature of the branches that we all sit upon.

i received a beautiful etsy order * today. the artist threw in a gift to compensate for the double shipping i had unwittingly paid. “be courageous and be kind” is the message hand scripted on the card. receiving this felt like further reinforcement of the message the walnut shell reminded me of. it takes courage to be kind. to be bossy, certain, right-every-time, or indifferent in relation to others is easy. it takes bravery, however, to extend open interest to another, to own that we have absolutely no idea what kinds of difficulties others have faced, and that the burdens others bear may be completely invisible to us. kindness says, “because we are human i know that we are both ‘sitting in a walnut shell and hanging by a string,’ so to speak. due to this precarious reality, i will do my best to treat both my self and your self with care. we may not agree or sit together with ease, but we each have a place and that place is held best when we are all right side up and intact, with no one having fallen, left alone on the ground.”

as we live into a year of politics and self promotion, virtual landscapes offering real relationship and social networks that can harbor love or interpersonal violence may we keep close at heart the shared fragility of our neighbors and friends. may we relate to all out of mutual respect, remembering to be courageous and, mostly, be kind.

* check out the prints i ordered here, here, and the card she included here. thanks, laura, from youdolldesigns!

resolutions (need a re-set)

i don’t know about you, but i am tired of hearing about resolutions. maybe it’s because of how i’m made and trained, but all i hear when someone says, “my new years resolution this year...” is “i’ve set my mind to something likely unattainable and i’ll beat myself into submission until somewhere around january 15 where i’ll ‘go off the rails,’ hate myself for a day or two, and then resume life as it is right now.” it’s not that i’m spiteful or cruel. i don’t tend toward the sarcastic or cynical and i am, most certainly, not fatalistic. i do, however, know a thing or two about my self and other selves as well. for the bulk of us humans, resolutions are a late december, end-of-the-year mashup of hopeful optimism and fingers-crossed fatalism.

by definition, to set a resolution means to make a firm decision to do or not do something. with resolutions, the dualism of absolute success or certain failure is the base of all action. resolutions, as frequently set, imply that full compliance is good (meaning success) and any deviance is bad (meaning failure). in this kind of set up even a small “failure” ruins the entire pursuit. things are all good or all bad, period. there is little room for deep learning, for failing and getting back up, for authentic transformation, or for lasting change. instead, there is only room for white knuckled determination and gutting it out.

there are certain habits that require this kind of all or nothing behavior. addictions (to substances, to behaviors (constant attachment to devices, social networks, games, porn), and even to people (abusive or dismissive ones) usually require an absolute turning-away-from without ever looking back. in these cases, firm and resolute abstinence by sheer act of will and the help of a loving and strong community are required. to the individuals setting forth on this kind of resolution today, i applaud you. if i were physically present with you i would bring you soft blankets, kleenex, loads of nourishing food, comforting music, and ask you how i could celebrate and cheer you on. this kind of change is fueled by tears and determination and is never ever easy. it is always always rewarding. you inspire me...all of you who are setting out on this kind of transformation.

to the rest of humanity, who are resolving to change behaviors that are stubborn but possibly not to the addiction level, a “re-set” may be more realistic and healthy than a “resolution.” where resolutions require a sort of all or none, on or off the wagon, type of action, to re-set offers the opportunity for long term, integrated, gracious change. re-setting means to set again or differently. it means embracing the difficulty of change and getting back to norms that will sustain us. it means that we know that the changes we desire to make will be difficult. that sometimes we won’t even desire to change them at all. that in our attempts to stay true to our december 31st commitment, we may falter. mostly, re-setting means that we have an ongoing opportunity to pause and begin again rather than throw the whole pursuit out the minute we step off track.

to re-set effectively we must consider the difference between habits and norms. habits evolve with time and repitition and come to support us in our lives. whether healthy or not, they come to be a meaningful and active part of our daily living. when we resolve to change them over night without realistic planning and flexibility we often overlook the real ways that they have come to help us function. perhaps we have an unhealthy relationship with food or possessions or money or time. simply resolving to engage/spend/hoard these resources differently beginning tomorrow will not be enough to make lasting change. no amount of gutting it out can support lifestyle changes when the behaviors that are targeted have served significant functions in one’s life.

let’s use food as an example since it is such a commonly chosen resolution focus. if we have come to use food as a solution for soothing or boredom, as a filler for human relationship, or as a means of feeling a sense of control in our lives, simply resolving to use it in a different way will not be enough to support us making real and lasting change. in this scenario food has become a very reliable and integrated part of our functioning. just like a structural beam supports a bridge, food helps us stay steady. simply deciding to take that support away is not enough. if one were to simply take away the support beam of a bridge it would suffer structural change that would likely render it unsafe. the same is true with our supporting behaviors.

the tricky thing about habits is that they come to provide this massive support largely outside of our conscious or intentional choosing.

an alternative to living according to our habits is living inline with intentionally chosen normative values. i often call these “norms.” when we make conscious choices to live according to values that we believe in, we have a greater chance of living from healthy norms. if we value health we might set up specific normative behaviors for our sleep, eating, physical activity, and more. if we value connection we might organize our sleep, physical activity, and use of time differently. regardless, when we live with norms as the “ground” of our daily patterns, we can see our behaviors as the truly complicated entities that they are. they are not things that can be simply or easily changed. instead, they are actions that grow out of thoughts, feelings, and unconscious drives. making firm decisions is rarely enough to change these for the long run, especially as these behaviors/habits/patterns have come to be support structures in our day to day lives.

as we face into a new year, how might it look to re-set our ways of thinking and the ground from which our behaviors grow rather than simply resolving to succeed or fail at a new endeavor? if we want to change a behavior we might do best to take a good, long look at what that behavior has come to mean to our daily functioning. we might be best served by understanding how it has come to help us live day to day. from this place we can more fully appreciate what we are asking of ourselves and more accurately understand what we might need to put in place to support us in its absence. this kind of gracious reality testing will help us to grieve what we are giving up and embrace a healthier path. until we bid a realistic good bye to that which hurts or hinders us there is no room for something new.

setting resolutions based on habits might look like this:

i don’t like the way i look. the way i look holds me back in life i want to change the way i look so that my life will be different. i will stop eating sugar and fats and will run 5 miles a day. everything will be better when i’m thinner. ready. go.

re-setting our norms might look like this:

i don’t like the way my body looks or feels. i spend more time and energy thinking this than being able to feel confident and healthy, freeing me to spend mental time and energy on something that means even more to me. i want to value health and myself more. given that i want to align my eating and movement with the value of health. what changes can i make in incremental ways to move me toward this value? how can i encourage and support myself as i give up ways of eating and moving that have come to be habits? do the new behaviors i hope to set as norms reflect my values? how will i re-set when i make choices that don’t line up with my values? what new supports can i put in place to replace the habitual ones i have constructed?

as we all step into a new year:

may we be courageous enough to uncover the habits that hurt us and brave enough to live boldly in accordance with values that we choose.

may we embrace our own efforts and the efforts of others to live with intention, providing grace when we mis-step. may we courageously step back onto the path, living in the middle of the all or none pursuits we set up for ourselves.

may we find deep meaning and purpose and enliven and enrich the pursuit of them in our own lives and the lives of others.

for fun, if you need some ways of tapping into your values and the norms that they might direct you toward today, here are some suggestions for exploration:

make a values/norms mind map (of sorts). on a sheet of paper randomly write the relationships, roles, things, and values (for a list of values, click here) that come to mind as the most important to you. don’t stress this, just let them come. if you really need inspiration, look (quickly) through your photos from the last year. what are recurring images and themes (e.g. nature, people, certain places or people) or take a quick look at your calendar and notice where you spent your time and energy. once these have been listed randomly around the page, surround each word/phrase with some kind of border (a circle, square, cloud, etc). draw lines from each border out to list the different ways in which these values play out. for example, if the value is “generosity” the lines out might be connected to the words “financial giving,” “hospitality in my home,” “volunteering time at...” and so on. if the value is “creativity” the lines out might be connected to the words “flexibility about how i solve problems,” “playing music/making art/taking an improv class,” and “taking creative risks by...”  with a new color of writing instrument go back over each value bubble and add in lines of things you could do in the coming months to support this value in your behavior and daily living. make sure and include some “stretch assignments,” meaning things that would grow this area of your being.

answer the following questions.  
if i were a resolution making person, what would mine be this year OR what are the behaviors in my life that i just don’t like? 
what do these behaviors/resolutions tell me about myself (e.g. if my behavior is “always being late” this might tell me about myself that i don’t consider time appropriately, don’t know how to transition well, or may need to work on boundaries. if the behavior is drinking too much it might tell me that i rely on substances to alter my state calm/excitement more than on my own self)? how do these insights synch or conflict with my values? 
what is it that i value most (for a list of values, click here) and do these core values show up in my daily living? 
if yes, how?
if no, how might i add norms that would reinforce these core values?

make a soul collage. even if tempted to, you don’t need to buy anything or have any fancy art supplies to do this activity. gather a magazine or catalogue out of your recycle bin or even an old book you will never ever read again. get some scissors and tape or glue. go through the magazine and cut out images and words that speak to you. don’t think too much about it. on a piece of paper (any piece will do) assemble the images in any way you’d like. when finished sit back and look at what spoke to you. what do you learn about yourself? what values begin to emerge as you gaze at the collage? are there important values missing? if so, how could you grow these?

do a walk to nowhere. the walk to nowhere is a contemplative/meditative experience that can be especially powerful for individuals who are “body smart” or who learn through doing. it is a symbolic representation of what it is like to move through life, walking boldly toward our goals and then stumbling backward only to re-direct (re-set) and move forward again. you need a little bit of clear space to do this activity and some quiet lyric free music might aid the process. begin by letting a few norms you’d like to set rise to the surface of your mind. once they are in your consciousness think about what it would feel like to live life walking straight toward these norms and what it will be like to face the obstacles of doing so. with this in mind begin to walk in a circle, taking 4 bold steps forward. after the fourth step, gently move your body backward with 4 slight steps, then repeat the 4 bold steps forward. let yourself get into this rhythm, walking in a circle, 4 steps forward then 4 steps backward, seeing what it feels like to continue to move forward even though backward steps are part of the journey.