Self Love

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The House That Built Me

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The House That Built Me

I'm sitting on the cold terra cotta tile floor. My finger tracing grey squares of gritty grout. The sun's warmth opens all the white lilies that line the deck, not strong enough, even on the sultriest of days, to bring this floor to even a corpse-like temperature. Its cold seeps through my jeans now and I laugh through tears. Thinking of how many times I've cursed that cold tile. Sucking the life force out of my feet for the past five winters. And even so, how I remained barefoot most of the year.

This beautiful floor. The hardness of it is highlighted by our quiet echoed conversation. Its unwillingness to bend or comfort. It had a job to do and it didn't get caught up in softening a blow to a foot or to a head. It was unconcerned with offering warmth or pliability. 

It held this house together. And it kept us suspended and supported in this place.

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The #1 Gift You Should Never Accept

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The #1 Gift You Should Never Accept

Doing the same thing over and over expecting different results. Einstein defined this as insanity.

I define this as...

The holidays.

Trying to create the Pinterest-perfect-Rockwellian holiday, we hurry and worry. We compare and despair. It's as if we've turned the holidays into a competitive sport. Social media being the judge and jury. And the harder we train, and the tougher our game. The worse we feel.

We hold ourselves to the standard of being thin, happy, rich, gracious, grateful, cheerful, merry and bright, while the kids must all get along, and the cards need to be sent on time, and the dog needs to stop eating the ornaments off the tree (or maybe that's just at my house). Which makes us highly susceptible to receiving gifts that we should never accept in the first place.

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Five Things I Thought I'd Never Be Thankful For

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Five Things I Thought I'd Never Be Thankful For

race yourself.

This isn't going to be a typical Thanksgiving post full of positivity-lite and generic gratitude.

Ironic, because I find myself in a place in my life where I have never been more happy. Or more grateful. And I could easily write a piece on how beautiful my life is and how thankful I am for that. To which you could roll your eyes. Or burn with jealousy. Or give me a standing ovation.

And I honestly don't think it would do either of us any good.

So, I thought about what I'd really like to share with you. What gratitude really means to me. And what giving thanks actually looks like in my life.

It's easy to be thankful for the "good stuff." A loving and kind man. Healthy kids. Career success. Strong body. Great friends. Beautiful home. 

It's easy to be thankful for the "simple stuff." A hot cup of coffee. Warm fuzzy socks. The song of the black bird outside my window. Amazon Prime. 

Poetry In The Woods

Poetry In The Woods

For everything, there is a season. A brief moment that is dedicated to a specific essence and place in your life. 

Contemplative alertness will unveil the properties of this particular season. It will reveal the depth to which a place and time has relevance to not only this moment but to those moments that are waiting just past the horizon for you. 

This past weekend, I had the privilege to step fully out of my scattered, highly-scheduled, responsibility of the early-autumn back-to-school scuffle and into the stillness of the woods of the Pacific Northwest.

A pilgrimage of respite. 

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We're Not In Kansas Anymore

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We're Not In Kansas Anymore

You probably know by now that I kinda pride myself on my fierce sense of self-reliance.

My ability to depend on no one.

And no thing.

Asking for help is a withered and atrophied muscle. Long ago forgotten.

My productivity. My accomplishments. My ability to get things done. My fearlessness. My willingness to take risks. Power through.

To be self sufficient.

Autonomous.

These attributes not only make me feel like a badass, but they also help me hold a slight sense of superiority over other mere mortals.

Last week, with typical sense of sovereignty, I packed myself up to go to Wanderlust(you're welcome) to hike myself to the top of a mountain (8200 feet) to camp (by myself) for the duration of the festival.

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A Love Like That

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A Love Like That

I live in one of the most beautiful places on earth. A little piece of heaven surrounded by ranches, farms and ocean in the middle of the California coast line.

This morning, I took advantage of an unusually-blank weekday morning and jumped in my car to go to one my favorite running trails about 20 minutes from my house.

Mornings can be utterly gorgeous in this valley. For the short time that California is green - it’s almost arrogant with its vibrancy. Showing off for the sky.

But not today.

Nope. Just grey. Subdued. 

Rounding the bend into the valley, to the left you can see all the way into wine country. And the hills beyond. To the right, you look up the valley to the ocean. Beyond the ranches.

And today there was a single horse in the middle of the field.

Surrounded by vultures. In an equidistant circle.

There had be at least 30 of them. Sitting there. Ring-around-the-rosie all facing the horse.

My heart sank. Something is wrong.

I got to my trail but couldn’t shake the thought of that horse and those vultures.

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How To Be Extraordinary

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How To Be Extraordinary

I have a question that I'd love for you to answer.

Try not to read ahead quite yet.

I want you to articulate your own answer to this.

What makes a person extraordinary?

Pause. Don't read on. Answer the question first.

Really think about it. Think about the people who you think are amazing or extraordinary.

What is it that makes up that extraordinary-ness?

What is your definition of a truly amazing human being? 

I posted this question in Rowdyville (read their answers below) - and have been contemplating my own answer all week.

And what I found was there is actually a very simple 2-step concept that sets apart Mother Teresa. Martin Luther King. Oprah. Or any other amazing person that you know.

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Dropping Busy

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Dropping Busy

Many of us become obsessed with 'doing' because we believe this defines who we are.

We 'do' all these things to try to prove that we aren't replaceable.

That we matter.

That we are important.

And not invisible.

But all this doing is clouding the real essence of who we are. We're actually losing ourselves in all the busy-ness - which ends up making us feel even more replaceable, more invisible.

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Gotta Love The Thing You Hate

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You can’t hate your bank account into being rich. You can’t criticize your body into being thin. You can’t resent your career into success. And you can’t bitch your relationship into true everlasting love.

But people try to do this every day. People like you. People like me.

We focus on things we don’t like. And we think that this focus is what facilitates change. As if hating something enough will make it disappear.

This hate, resent, criticizing and bitching that we practice creates a tremendous amount of un-needed suffering for us. It makes our lives more complicated. It creates an incredible emotional burden. And it has zero payoff. This strategy is a guaranteed fail. 

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My Body Knows

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My Body Knows

My heart knows...

what it wants. It knows that love is really the only option. It knows why I am here and what my life is about.

My legs know...

how to walk. How to dance. How to run and jump. My legs know how to take me anywhere I want to go.

My feet know...

that I love the warm. The sun. The sand. They know when I've stood too long in the same place and when it's time to move. They know how many miles they have walked.