real thing

My thinking is very scattered tonight, so please bear with me if I bounce around.

I realized something about myself tonight as I talked with a friend over dinner. I have never made any long-range plans for my life. I've always just kind of survived, flown-by the seat of my pants and did whatever came down the road to do. Planning and executing this trip to Italy is the most long-range thing I can think of that I have done. Isn't that strange? I'm such an organized person. But I'm always organizing the immediate. It's kind of like something I learned in a management training class today about the difference between managing and leading. Managing takes care of the day to day operations, and Leading is a long-range task, looking toward the goal and vision of the organization. It takes both to make a successful business and I would venture to say the same applies to making a successful life. I have been lacking in being the leader of my own life. I've let life, or fate or circumstances lead me.

And you want to know what's even stranger than that? At 46 years old I'm just recognizing that in myself?! How unaware does that make me? And here's another realization...I think I am so painfully unaware of so many aspects of myself because I don't talk enough. I know that sounds strange. But I am NOT a talker. In any group, I am the one who listens and asks questions about you. But I rarely talk about myself or share what's going on in my own life. I thought it was my way of protecting myself from others, hiding (unconsciously) my issues from the world. But maybe it was my way of hiding my issues from myself too. Without voicing them and talking with others, I keep myself unaware of so much about myself. Now I have a friend I have been able to really open up to, and it is creating this mirror in which I can see myself more clearly. Not sure if that's a good thing, but at least it's an honest thing. At least it's a real thing.

Maybe with a clearer picture of myself, I can see the world more clearly and create a plan to navigate my way through this journey instead of being carried along by the current of circumstances.

live deep

I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad swath and shave close, to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms, and, if it proved to be mean, why then to get the whole and genuine meanness of it, and publish its meanness to the world; or if it were sublime, to know it by experience, and be able to give a true account of it in my next excursion.

-Henry David Thoreau

Do those words strike a chord in your soul, as they do in mine? Do you want to live deep? Or are you content to wade around in the shallow end of the pool, never venturing in far enough to sense the exhilaration that comes with not being able to touch the bottom?

I had an incredible experience this summer. I went down to Florida to camp out for a week at the beach. It was a very spur-of-the-moment vacation and possibly one of the best I've ever had. During the trip, I tried something I'd never done before. I went snorkeling. They took us out on this huge catamaran and we got to snorkel and explore the underwater world for quite some time. I had one very zen moment when I completely relaxed and allowed the rocking of the ocean to move me in perfect rhythm with the swaying seaweed and the undulating fish. It was really quite trance like and lovely. 

But then later I missed an experience and I think I will always regret it. They took us out into the deep water and threw out this line with little buoys attached. Then they told us we could jump in and wait for the dolphins we'd spotted to come closer. But I didn't do it. I was fine near the island, where my feet could touch if need be, but dive in out here in the middle of the ocean where anything could be lurking? I just couldn't do it! My brave friend Jules did though. She was the first one out there and went to the limits of the line. And the dolphins came and swam under her and by her close enough to touch. And then they went and got some of their dolphin friends and brought them back to see the silly looking creatures in the water and swam around all the brave ones. And I stood on the deck and watched, and laughed and clapped. I loved every minute of it. But I missed out on diving into the deep and experiencing it for myself. I don't ever want to do that again. I don't want fear to keep me from experiencing something extraordinary. I don't want fear to keep me from living deep! 

And I don't mean that in just the grand-occasion kind of way, but in the ordinary day in and day out moments of my life. There are always opportunities to risk and experience life more fully. It might be taking the risk to open up to someone and reveal more of myself, or to love someone, or to help someone or to stand up to someone that needs to be stood up to. 

Heaven help me to risk being real and fully present in a world suffocating in synthetics. Help me to live my life deeply and fully with no more regrets!

Countdown

Commencing countdown to 1945. As closely as I can tell, that was just before TV became commercially broadcast in the US. As the hour draws close to pull the plug (cue ominous music) I am realizing more and more just how addicted I am to the thing! I found myself thinking about how I was going to miss House or other characters as if they were real people in my life and not actors in a show. Maybe I've substituted their presence for the company of real live humans in my days. They can be easier to deal with and their drama doesn't affect me, so that has always been a plus in my book. I've always hated drama and done all I could to avoid it, including (i think) becoming a little distant and disconnected from those around me.

Real live humans are messy. But that's life. Messy, dirty and hard at times, but wonderful nonetheless. Here's to being more in the mess and more in the moment, and more connected in real life...drama and all!