Essays – Page 7 – Modern Creative Life

December 9, 2016

Finding My Creative Soul During the Holidays by Jeanie Croope

Most months of the year, finding time for me to be creative isn’t all that difficult. This is, in part, because I don’t have a day-job. Though I have obligations, as you do, I can generally build a good deal of creativity into my daily life.

And then December arrives.

I love Christmas. I love the parties, the presents, the wrapping, decorating, get-togethers with friends, baking, lights, candles, music, the memories, the magic. It is my holiday and my holiday runs from the day after Thanksgiving until the day the trees come down. (And that may be well into January!)

But with all the making merry, grabbing time to be creative can be a challenge. I’ve had to rethink my definition of creativity and how it applies to me. As I’ve been muddling this for a few weeks, I thought I’d share a few things I’ve come to realize.

First, there is more than one way to be creative. One of my pet peeves is when someone says to me, “You’re so creative. I’m just not. Not at all.”

I don’t believe that for a minute about anyone. The person who might say that to me could be a marvelous cook or a mathematician whose daily work would tie my mind in knots. And while one might say there are rules to both of those, I would say that any discipline has its so-called “rules” but the creative part is when you bend them to the situation. Modifying a recipe. Thinking outside the box on a scientific research experiment. Violating the principles of the color wheel. Would Einstein have discovered the theory of relativity if he didn’t think outside the box?

So my first thought is to think of all you do as a potential venue for your creativity to explode. The way you decorate the tree or hang your garland. The craft you might reluctantly be drawn into could find you reveling in the joy of creating something lovely. Those Christmas cookies — why not try fun-with-frosting instead of just the sugar sprinkles? Or a new recipe you’ve never before prepared?

Second, think of every holiday experience as a potential jumpstart for your creativity. When you attend your community’s tree lighting or drive through the neighborhood looking at lights, don’t leave it at that. Go home and write down five or ten thoughts about the experience. What did it look like or feel like and what does it mean to you. Chances are, you have just written a poem — or something that could be a poem.

And the best part about this one is that you can do it with anything — the family gathering, your best friend’s party, the experience of baking cookies with the kids.

Take those thoughts a step further. Write them on bright paper, cut them out and hang them on a tree, put them in a scrapbook or make a “what’s this?” game from them. (Put the phrases into a pretty box. Players draw a phrase and have to figure out the experience.) Make your own rules! Does anyone really know all the official Scrabble rules?

Seek out a creative play date during the holiday, a time when you give yourself a few hours to engage in a creative activity. It might be an afternoon workshop where you paint Christmas cards or a gathering to make a wreath or holiday ornament. Maybe it’s the cookie exchange, but instead of putting your cookies in plastic bags for others to take home, wrap them up in style!

Each December, I attend a workshop that begins with a a lovely dinner followed by a project like this year’s “ice berry wreath” and “bucket o’ greens.” The group engages in a relatively simple activity that ends up looking great — and is useful. Many garden centers or craft stores host classes where you will leave with decorative holiday project. Look for card-making workshops or Christmas cookie-baking classes.

It’s a double win. Creativity without guilt. Not only do you carve creative time into your holiday, you also do something productive, something to be proud of. When you hear compliments on your wreath or baking you’ll have an extra smile because you had the experience of creating to go along with it.

I think of my friend Susan’s wrapping party. She served up cider and soup, tape and scissors and some paper and ribbons. Everyone brought their gifts and their own packaging and when the evening was over, much of their wrapping work was behind them.

Then there was my family’s Christmas wrapping contest. One gift would be wrapped “creatively” — that was the only “rule.” A poster took on new life as a trumpet. Rolls of old movie film turned into a bow. The year my mother was on a felt gingerbread-man stitching blitz inspired my dad to make a giant gingerman that looked like her small ones, and, leaving a small opening on the side, stuffed it with the earrings he gave her. That gingerbread man tops my kitchen trees forty years later.

Don’t forget the Internet. Thanks to blogs, Pinterest and Instagram you’ll find plenty of inspiring ideas for easy and fast projects, many done with a minimum of expense or time. Some of these projects can be done in the company of others — maybe your grandchild or your best friend. From simple ornament ideas to easy-to-make tags, you’ll find plenty of instructions to get you started. Chances are you even have most of the supplies you’ll need right at home!

Creativity and thoughtfulness can go hand in hand. Consider wrapping something you might give the person standing in the snow on the corner something in a pretty package — and include a thick Sharpie so they can actually make a readable sign.

Our creative souls don’t disappear during the busy season. Sometimes they go into hiding, just waiting to be coaxed out. And when you give yourself permission to let it go, you’ll not only have fun but you may discover new traditions in the process.

Now, I wonder what pile the watercolors are under?

About the Author: Jeanie Croope

After a long career in public broadcasting, Jeanie Croope is now doing all the things she loves — art, photography, writing, cooking, reading wonderful books and discovering a multitude of new creative passions. You can find her blogging about life and all the things she loves at The Marmelade Gypsy.

December 8, 2016

Christmas Magic and the Practice of Omen Days by Briana Saussy

In our family December has a deep stillness about it that can be heard underneath the hustle and bustle. It is a deeply magical time of blood red holly calling to mind all of the ancient Goddesses who were so in love with life that they just kept creating and birthing new creatures, and ivy that calls to mind the strong Gods, surefooted protectors of all that is virginal and wild.

This is the time of year in the Southwest when the trickster tales of Coyote are allowed to be told (being forbidden at other times of the year in many tribes) in the hopes that Coyote’s antics will hurry on the coming of Spring. In much of the Northern Hemisphere, December marks the beginning of the true season of storytelling and in the United Kingdom there are certain tales about faeries that can only be told during this month, once safe distance from Samhain has been attained.

Where I live, in South Central Texas the weather is typically mild and so it is a time for being outside and watching the deer and other creatures as they move across the land.

In Catholic tradition much of the Christmas celebration occurs “out of ordinary time” indicating that this we are now in time beyond time, we are in liminal time. The many festivals marking re-birth the occurred in the ancient world during this time of year support the liminal feeling as do the many stories of Christmas ghosts, perhaps made most famous by Charles Dickens in the Christmas story. Old stories claim that on Christmas eve night just as on Halloween, the spirits of the Dead are given license to walk the land once more. To those of us that honor our Ancestors this makes perfect sense: why wouldn’t our Beloved Dead want to get in on all of the parties, festivities, and delicious foods?!

The Wild Hunt, a mythic procession composed of faeries, elves, and the Dead and led by various mythic male figures (most often the Norse All-Father Odin) is traditionally said to be most active from Halloween through Christmas as well.

Anytime our Beloved Dead are seen as especially active is a good time to perform divination and exercise foresight. Christmas is no exception to that and there is actually a lovely tradition supporting this endeavor known in Brittany and Wales as “Omen Days”, more popularly known to us as the Twelve Days of Christmas. The Twelve Days of Christmas is a bit confusing because they actually begin after the celebration of Christmas on Christmas Day (December 25^th).

The Twelve Days begin on December 26^th and run through January 6^th, commonly known as Twelfth Night. Twelfth Night is also known as the Feast of the Epiphany or simply Epiphany and celebrates the Magi visiting and blessing the infant Jesus. Twelfth Night is also known as the Day of Misrule and in Tudor England was a time when noblemen and women would switch places with their servants for the entire day.

But let us return to the Omen Days and the art of divination.

As we move from the old year into the New Year it is natural to wonder about what the new year will bring. Many tarot readers offer special new year type readings and many astrologers do the same. The happy news is that you can be your own oracle by participating in Omen Days.

The process is simple. Keeping in mind that this is a liminal time when our Ancestors and your Otherworldly allies have better access to you, you simply have to pay attention. On December 26^th the question you hold in your heart should be concerned with the month of January, what will the month of January bring into your life? Another way to phrase this: what do you need to know about your upcoming January? On December 27^th you will ask about February, December 28^th turns your attention to March, and so on and so forth until you reach January 6^th which will give you insight into next December, a year from now.

Once you ask your question, the Celtic traditions say that you wait for a natural omen to appear, some of the omens I have received in the past include: a black cat, a white deer, a fruit ripening out of season, and a feather just to give you an idea of what you might be working with. You can also receive literal signs like “road closed” or “detour route” as omens on these days.

Interpreting signs and omens can feel a bit like treading water at first but my experience is that as long as you record the omens in some way so that you have a record you will be fine. Often when the omen first appears an immediate interpretation comes to mind and you simply know what the significance is for you and your coming year. In other cases like a dream, an omen might take awhile to crack open. Make a note of what it was and what month it is attached to and simply go about doing other things, the answer will reveal itself in time.

I recommend that you DO NOT go to a book of signs and symbols in order to “decode” your omen because a deer can mean many things to many different people but the important information at the moment is what the deer means to you and only you can say what that might be.

My community of sacred seekers has been participating in Omen Days for several years now. Starting on December 26^th we go into our days with eyes and ears open and mouth closed to see what there is to see. I invite you to join us, share your own omens, and see what others are discovering by using the hashtag #omendays in your social media updates.

My holiday wish for you all is that you will allow yourself to peer below the surface glitz of this season into the heart of the very real mystery and magic that it carries. The land is quieter as are we, which means that this is the perfect time to listen deeply.

About the Author: Briana Saussy

Hi, I’m Briana! I am a writer, teacher, and spiritual counselor, and I am part of a growing community of soulful seekers, people who are looking for wholeness, holiness and healing – for better, more rewarding lives.

If you enjoyed learning about Omen Days and would like to learn more about folk magic traditions and practices then please join me for the Remembering Way.

November 30, 2016

There Was a Lot of Blood by Christine Mason Miller

I was in a good mood the day I had an interview scheduled with Kimberly Wilson. I’d had the pleasure of being interviewed by her twice before, had hosted her in my home for an event celebrating the release of one of her books, and I knew we were going to have a great conversation. After running some errands in the morning, I came home and set things up in my studio for our early afternoon Skype session in happy anticipation of the interview.

As I flitted about the house, my brain was all abuzz. Why, I don’t remember. About what, I don’t recall. All I know is that less than an hour before our call, my mind was distracted enough that I got my middle right finger caught between a heavy glass shower door and a tiled bathroom wall at the precise moment I was swinging the door toward me to open it.

I could explain the physics of this mishap, but then I’d just be distracting from the good stuff – the part about the blood. Because the result of this seemingly small bit of inattention was one of harrowing pain and a howl that made my dog run for cover under our bed. It was so shocking and painful I wasn’t even able to cry. All I could do was walk around in circles moaning and hyperventilating. The only thing that jolted me out of my stupor was realizing I needed a paper towel. Immediately.

The cut on my finger wasn’t terribly deep, but there was a lot of blood. Despite being a little woozy, I was still fascinated at how quickly one paper towel after another was transformed from a pristine white landscape to a bright red mess within seconds. When the bleeding finally settled down, I wrapped two more paper towels around my finger, put an ice pack on top and then sat down at my computer to type a one-handed text message to Kimberly. Explaining I’d just smashed my finger with a heavy glass door and was debating a visit to the ER, I told her I might need to postpone our interview. Ever the gracious host, she responded with a, “No problem,” and encouraged me to take care of myself. So I took a deep breath, put down my phone, and sat still for a few minutes.

After watching the birds outside my window cavort in our garden for a bit, I unwrapped my finger and saw that it wasn’t terribly swollen. I could still bend it and move it back and forth, and decided I probably did not require Emergency Room attention. So I sent another text to Kimberly letting her know I was still game for the interview. Within fifteen minutes, I was upstairs in my studio and we were connected on Skype.

Kimberly had suggested this interview because she wanted to discuss Moving Water, my new memoir. The book tells the story of my journey from believing I didn’t belong in a family to the realization that breaking through and dismantling that belief was my soul’s most important work. I finished the book in early 2016, and over the summer had published and given away about a hundred advance copies. Kimberly was one of those readers, which meant the questions she prepared for our interview were related to specific passages of the book.

One of Kimberly’s first questions had to do with the parts of my family history that led to my belief that I wasn’t meant to have a family. On a “normal” day – as in, a day when I didn’t almost break a finger in half – I probably would have talked a little bit about my parent’s divorce, the breakdown of another blended family, and other family estrangements. But on that day I did almost break a finger in half, so even though I had regained enough composure to go through with the interview, my finger was all bandaged up and my insides were still a little wobbly. To put it another way – I was vulnerable, exposed, and raw.

Which is why, I think, I answered Kimberly’s question the way I did – a response that took me completely by surprise and required me to quickly articulate a thought that was being formed in my psyche in that moment. My answer – and I’m paraphrasing here because I haven’t yet heard the final interview – didn’t mention divorce or loss or broken families. Instead, I started talking about the way so many of my stories and memories had been transformed – how, through the act of writing, I’d ended up releasing the versions of them that had inspired me to write about them in the first place.

Are you with me?

I knew writing the book had healed many of my deepest emotional wounds, but it wasn’t until my conversation with Kimberly that I realized writing the book actually altered my cellular memory of them. The pain I experienced during my parent’s divorce was real, but it was pain I didn’t need to carry anymore. It was painful then, but this was now. More to the point – I believed, until I wrote Moving Water, that certain memories and experiences maintained a certain potency throughout my life only because they held my deepest sadness and most significant losses. What I discovered is that they’ve also, all along, contained the mechanism I needed to remove their charge, and to heal.

It was only recently that I made the connection between the bloody mess I had on my hands (literally) just a few minutes before my interview with Kimberly and the fact that this revelation hit me when it did. But now that I’ve connected those two experiences it makes perfect sense. Perhaps in my off-balance, vulnerable state, everything in me softened enough to let a door swing open (maybe even a heavy glass shower door) that would have otherwise remained closed. Maybe the decision to show up for the interview despite feeling messy and clumsy and slightly fragile made it possible for my attachments to certain versions of my own story loosen more than ever before. Maybe when I agreed to show up despite having an ice pack on my finger, I extended an invitation to something deep inside of myself that hadn’t yet found a way to be expressed. Maybe being less “on my game” enabled me to tap into something real, something exquisite, even if it wasn’t possible to formulate what was happening into a tidy soundbite while I was being recorded.

It took more than two years to write Moving Water and it is taking nearly a year to prepare it for its release into the big, wild world. Despite all the work I’ve already done for the book, and all the transformations that have taken place along this journey, its gifts and lessons are still being revealed to me. I am still learning, still healing, still figuring things out. The stories I am being called to tell as I share Moving Water with the world aren’t necessarily the ones I thought I’d be offering, but boy are they good. I can’t wait to see what happens next.

To hear Christine’s interview with Kimberly Wilson, click here.

About the Author: Christine Mason Miller

Christine Mason Miller is an author and artist who has been inspiring others to create a meaningful life since 1995. Signed copies of her memoir, Moving Water, are now available for pre-order at www.christinemasonmiller.com.

November 15, 2016

You Can’t Fix People You Didn’t Break by Melissa Cynova

One of the things that I often hear in my readings is heartache over the behavior of our loved ones. Our partner is cheating or emotionally absent. Our friends are neglecting us. Someone is being too smothery or won’t stop using drugs, or won’t pick up the phone or won’t love us back.

Someone is hurting us.

The first instinct in these situations is to try to fix it. We blame ourselves for our loved one’s indiscretions or their lack of attention. Clearly, we’re not doing enough to earn their love. We tell ourselves, in the words of Ani DiFranco, “Maybe if HE loved me, then I’d love me, too.” and we reach and pull and contort ourselves to feel worthy and ready to receive that love.

And what then? When we don’t get it? What if we lost weight or grew our hair out or stopped swearing all the goddamned time? What happens then? We expect/want/need the person to drop all of the previous broken behavior and come to us whole. After all, we’ve done so much to make them happy.

Why won’t they be happy?

Mostly? Because we can’t fix them and we can’t make anyone love us back. Unless our behavior has caused whatever the disconnect is – we can’t fix it.

If your partner is leaving the relationship, unless you have caused the absence, you can’t make them stay. You probably don’t want to, since that breeds resentment. If your partner has intimacy issues, unless you caused them, you can’t fix that.

Counseling can, but unless they want to go to counseling, you can’t fix that, either.

So what do we do? That’s the hard part. We have a hard conversation, and then we make a hard decision. If your partner is hurting you – in whatever way – it clearly can’t continue. So you have the very hard conversation that says, “This is unacceptable. I need you to stop.” If they don’t, or won’t get help to try to stop, you decide.

You choose living with them and this flaw, or living without them.

If you decide to stick it out in the same conditions, you’ve made a very clear choice to be ok with what’s going on. I know that some circumstances are appalling, but there is always hope. I had a client recently move herself and her children in with a cousin – leaving everything – while her husband was arrested for domestic violence. She made a choice and got out when it was safe and she was able. There are always exceptions.

If you decide to go, then go. Flopping back and forth isn’t going to help in the long run, and it’s just exhausting. The wisdom here is realizing that the only thing you can control is your own behavior, and the only person you can change is yourself.

What if they change, though? In the future? What if they stop doing this thing that you’ve asked and asked them to? Well, let’s worry about that tomorrow.

After they’ve fixed themselves.

Photo by Crossroad Images

About the Author: Melissa Cynova

Melissa Cynova is owner of Little Fox Tarot, and has been reading tarot cards and teaching classes since 1989. She can be found in the St. Louis area, and is available for personal readings, parties and beginner and advanced tarot classes. You can Look for her first book, Kitchen Table Tarot, from Llewellyn Publishing in January 2017.

Melissa lives in St. Louis with her kiddos, her partner, Joe, and two cats, two dogs and her tortoise, Phil.

She is on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. Go ahead and schedule a reading – she already knows you want one.

November 10, 2016

Outlets, Time Limits, and Fellow Travelers: A Few Guidelines for Writing about the Hard Stuff by Andi Cumbo-Floyd

I’ve been at this long, wooden desk for hours. My neck is sore, and I’m chilled by the climate-controlled air in this bunker of a space. My eyes burn from trying to read 19^th-century handwriting. But it’s not my body that hurts the most; it’s my spirit.

After six hours of searching hundreds of documents for tiny mentions of people who were enslaved by other people, I have exactly two pages of notes, and I know exactly six names.

One man named Peter owned two chickens.

I don’t know who they loved, what their favorite food was, or favorite color. I don’t know what they thought about their awful situation or whether or not they imagined they’d ever be free. I know almost nothing, and this reality could break me if I let it. But these people survived profound horror. I cannot let words on pages break me. I won’t.

The research and writing about people who were enslaved in Virginia is not easy work.

It’s soul-tearing, heart-rending labor that zaps me physically and psychologically. But I have learned – in over five years of doing this research as a total labor of love – that I need some guidelines to help me, to keep me from being broken.

Five Things Help Me Keep Going

Outlets. I need places where I can put the pain and stories I immerse myself in. For me, that place is my books. I imagine these people on the page. I try my best to tell their stories. I create new stories that are drawn from the real-life ones, filling in silences and embodying people who, through the violence of history, have been made invisible to many of us.
Time Limits. Through practice, I have learned that I can only do this work – particularly the research – for a few hours a day. I cannot work 40 hours a week on these stories, as much as I’d like to, without doing some real damage to both my spirit and my perspective. I need to limit myself so that I can do good work for the long-haul.
Systems. I have found that systems – for tracking information, for sharing what I find, for filing my notes, for writing from those notes – are crucial for me. They keep me moving ahead when the weight of these stories threatens to crush me. I use careful spreadsheets and timelines, organized photographs and photocopies, and immaculate files of notes to help me keep some distance from the stories, not so I don’t feel but so that my feelings don’t overtake my ability to tell the story.
Escapes. Sometimes, I just have to step away into another world entirely, move out of the antebellum South and move into a place where a man travels in a phone box or where a team of FBI profilers solves crime. I may need to dive into a story of mythical sirens or climb into the pages of a mystery set in a cheese shop. The deeper I am into the work of researching and writing about enslaved people the lighter my reading and watching need to be.
Fellow Travelers. By far, the most important resource I have when this work is so hard and painful is people. My friends who also research slavery, my friends who understand the legacy of racism, my friends who are activists and historians – they are the ones who keep me going. They get it. They know the way stories wrap around us like hugs that squeeze too tight. They know the way elided information can break your heart. They know the way someone saying, “Why can’t we just get over it?” can bring up a rage so fierce it could burn the paper at my fingertips. I need these folks to keep me going, and they need me, too.

I don’t know what you write – stories from trauma, personal struggles, injustice writ large on the lives of people we know – but I expect that at some point in your life you have written or will write about something really difficult. If you do, be wise my friends. Protect yourself with limits and tools, people and escapes that will keep you strong for the journey.

We need your story. And we need you healthy enough to tell it.

About the Author: Andi Cumbo-Floyd

Andi Cumbo-Floyd is a writer, editor, and farmer, who lives on 15 blissful acres at the edge of the Blue Ridge Mountains with her husband, 6 goats, 4 dogs, 4 cats, and 22 chickens. Her books include Steele Secrets, The Slaves Have Names, and Writing Day In and Day Out. The next book in her Steele Secrets Series, Charlotte and the Twelve, is available for pre-order.

Connect with Andi at her website, andilit.com, or via Facebook and Twitter.

October 27, 2016

The Wisdom of Tarot…is You by Theresa Reed

So often we seek answers outside ourselves. We look to gurus, sages, teachers, and other authority figures for guidance on what we should do with our lives. Who am I?

Where should I go? What is my path?

While external sources can provide some answers, ultimately, the answers lie within ourselves. But how can we get there?

There are many ways. Meditation, yoga, prayer, spending time in nature or doing quiet pursuits. When we quiet the chatter, the answers can arise.

Tarot cards can be one more tool to help you access your own inner wisdom and intuition. These 78 cards are rich with universal symbols that depict daily and spiritual life. These symbols are gentle nudges that waken your intuition, and help you to see and understand who you are and what you need to know in order to live your best life.

Here’s how:

You think of a question and pick a card.

Now, turn over the card and gaze at the image. Scan it.

Let your eyes rest on anything that captures your attention. What do the symbols say to you? What might be the message or moral of the card? What might the characters in the cards be conveying to each other – and to you? How does the card make you feel? What story is it trying to tell you about your situation…or yourself?

Start pondering those questions and see what arises.

You might get an “aha” or perhaps just a gentle knowing. Pay attention to what you feel and any thoughts that arise. This process will lead you to the answers…or maybe further inquiry.

That’s how tarot works in a nutshell.

An example – let’s say you’re feeling somewhat confused about your relationship because he won’t commit. You shuffle the cards and pull the Nine of Wands. As you scan the card, your eyes rest on the figure’s face. He looks paranoid, scared. Is this your partner? Perhaps he’s fearful of making a commitment. Maybe he’s been hurt before and is wary of being hurt again. So he’s walled off and trying to protect himself. Or is this you – scared you are wasting your time? Bingo – you realize it’s the latter.

This gives you food for thought. And maybe a plan for action. It might be time to talk with your partner about your fears and see if you can work through this together.

Even if you’ve never read tarot before, it’s not that hard to begin. I recommend starting with the Rider Waite deck.

It’s a classic and most modern decks are based on it. Every deck will come with a little white book with interpretations. Feel free to explore those if you’d like. But better yet, put that to the side and let your own intuition guide you.

Because the answers aren’t found in that little white book. They are already there, within you, waiting.

Tarot on, wise one.

About the Author: Theresa Reed

Theresa Reed (aka “The Tarot Lady”) has been a full-time Tarot card reader for close to 30 years. She is the author of The Tarot Coloring Book (release date: Nov 1, 2016), an illustrated tour through the world of Tarot with coloring sheets for every card in the deck.

In addition to doing private Tarot readings, teaching Tarot classes, and speaking at Tarot conferences, Theresa also runs a popular website—TheTarotLady.com—where she dishes out advice, inspiration and tips for Tarot lovers of all experience levels.

Follow Theresa on Twitter and Instagram for her daily “Six Second Tarot Reading”—plus photos of her extremely handsome cats, TaoZen and Monkey.

October 21, 2016

Where Wisdom Lies by Kolleen Harrison

Someone once told me, “What you once thought was wise, may not be wise at all”.

I was a mother to a precious little two-year-old girl and had another on the way, in a marriage that was destroying me. I was miserable and sad and struggling. I could see the last pieces of what I recognized as “me”, slowly slipping away. I was scared. I felt as if the Earth below me was collapsing along with everything else surrounding me. I felt alone – living half way across the country from any family I had. I felt completely and utterly out of control. I felt totally hopeless and helpless.

I could not see how I was going to get out of the situation I was in. How was I going to raise two little girls on my own without any family or type of support system near by?

How on Earth was I going to be a good mother? How was I going to provide for my children? How was I going to move through the fear that felt like it was paralyzing me? How was I going to be a good model as a woman to my daughters?

So I stayed. I gave birth to a beautiful, healthy baby girl and found myself responsible for the lives of two little ones. I was still miserable, still lost, still filled with fear, still feeling helpless, still hopeless, still spiraling out of control.

I went through my days as if on auto pilot. I did what any mother should be doing. I took care of my daughters, loved on them, fed them, bathed them, laughed with them, held them, read to them. I was physically present with them – they could see me, hear me, touch me, and smell me. However, I wasnʼt emotionally present with them. I was letting fear and misery take over. I was starting to surrender to the fact that this is what my life is going to be like. My thoughts were on repeat. I am going to raise these two precious souls in a loveless, abusive marriage. I am going to do what needs to be done for the sake of my children. I am going to sacrifice my happiness in place of theirs, because that is the wise thing to do. Because that is what I am supposed to do. I am not supposed to get divorced. I am not supposed to leave. I am not supposed to raise my children alone without their dad in the same household. I am not supposed to shuffle my kids back and forth from one house to another. I am not supposed to shatter the image of this perfect little family.

The wise thing is to stay. The wise thing is to keep my family together. The wise thing is to sacrifice wherever necessary. Or so I thought.

Until one night about 13 years ago – a night that forever changed the course of my life and what I “thought” was the wise thing to do.

It was a fairly typical day and night in my home. I was taking care of my daughters while their dad was at work. When 5:30 rolled around and he wasnʼt home, I called him.

No answer. I called again. No answer. I paged him. No response. I called again, and again, and again, and again.

I could feel myself becoming angrier and angrier.

I started to ask myself, How many times are you going to tolerate this? How many times are you going to let him do this to you and the girls? Then the tears came. Then the fear set in. Then the panic. Then the desperate prayers and pleading for answers, for help.

As he opened the door and walked in, I began to yell. “Where have you been?” “Why did you lie to me?” “Why were you driving?” They were questions I had asked countless times before. As I yelled, and he yelled, I caught a glimpse of my sweet three-year-old daughter standing in the kitchen doorway. I watched as her eyes grew bigger and bigger, her head turning to look at him, then turning to look at me, and then back again to him.

Until suddenly, everything stopped. It was as if time stood still as I locked eyes with her, and heard these words spoken through them, Is this what you want your daughters to think love is? Is this what you want your daughters to think marriage is? Is this what you want your daughters to think respect looks like between two people?” “Is this the way you want to raise your children, in a household filled with unrest, uncertainty, verbal and emotional abuse?” “Is this the type of marriage you want to see your daughters enter into?” “Is this what you want to model to them as a woman, a mother?

And just like that, I realized the biggest disservice I could ever do as a mother to my daughters, and clearly the most unwise thing I could do, was stay.

That night I learned an incredibly valuable lesson and gained wisdom that will stay with me for all my days to come. That night I learned sometimes what we once thought was the wise thing, is not the wise thing at all. That night I learned to never discount where, or within whom wisdom may lie. That night I was blessed with invaluable wisdom speaking to me through the eyes of my three-year-old daughter.

About the Author: Kolleen Harrison

Kolleen Harrison is a creative living in the beautiful Central Coast of California. She is the Founder of LOVEwild and Founder/Maker of Mahabba Beads. Her passions lie in nurturing her relationship with God, loving on her happily dysfunctional family, flinging paint in her studio, dancing barefoot, making jewelry (that is so much more than “just jewelry”), and spreading love and kindness wherever and whenever she can. You can find her popping in and out at LOVEwild.org or MahabbaBeads.com

October 18, 2016

Packing Lighter by Jeanie Croope

Japan. February 1999. One of my first memories of the trip Rick and I took to Japan was that of maneuvering my overpacked suitcase on the train, up the steps, down the sidewalks, everywhere. And it became harder as I went along, filling any extra air pockets in that bag with souvenirs from the trip and gifts from our Japanese friends.

Rick was not impressed. That suitcase slowed me down big time. It was horribly clunky and heavy — definitely not an easy thing to haul up steps.

To be perfectly honest, I wasn’t all that impressed, either. While I had no real way of knowing what to pack for two weeks away in a country half around the globe — in the winter, when wearing warm (and bulkier) clothing was more essential — I discovered early on that I had brought far too much and I was paying for it every time we hit a train platform!

That was our first big trip together, taken four years after we started being a couple. Both of us brought more than our share of baggage to the relationship.

For Rick it was negotiating a new life after a marriage he hadn’t wanted to end, seeing his kids only part time, as so many divorced dads did in that time. The 50/50 shared custody was much less common in those days.

For me, it was a history of relationships that were far from perfect and had left some battle scars on the heart along with the deaths of both parents and some dear friends. We were both far from perfect people, survivors of our pasts — but shaky.

You could have told either one of us “that was then, this is now.” We would agree — but it wouldn’t change a thing.

We all evolve in our relationships and if all systems are go, we evolve in a way that makes being together all the better, the reward for the days that didn’t go so well in the past. When we allow ourselves to move forward, to step a bit out of our comfort zones, to be a little less afraid, we open ourselves up to wonderful things. We modify our expectations, we learn from mistakes in the past and celebrate the differences.

It took me a long time to learn to pack lighter for travel. Even on my first trip to France in 2009, I was loaded down. And that was arriving. Just imagine after shopping for two weeks!

It took awhile for both of us to release our personal baggage.But after twenty years together, Rick and I have learned to adjust to most of one another’s quirks and preferences.

We both value our personal space, living two blocks apart but connecting every day. Our living styles are different and there was no reason to force them to combine. This, alone, makes us happy — and the envy of many of our friends!

We’ve learned to respect each other’s interests. I’ll never want to ride my bike across Canada to Vermont as Rick did this summer. And he will never understand all my crafty bits. But we accept them and revel in the things we love and share.

As we began to let go of the things that tied down our hearts, things that were part of the past, we could be free to have a relationship that is enviable, one I had never thought I could have.

I’ve always held onto things, both the tangible and intangible. The warm memories of my childhood and family. Friendships from long ago. I collect. One look at my mostly out-of-control house and you might guess that I have separation anxiety. Marie Kondo’s “tidying” book all but gave me hives. When it comes to art supplies, china and books I border on hoarder status. A trip to the lake doesn’t involve just me, a cat carrier with Lizzie, a small cooler with the weekend’s food, a pair of shorts or jeans, a couple of tops and clean underwear. There are contingency plans — extra books and art supplies, clothing for all weather, a computer.

But in recent years, I’ve been wising up a little bit.

I’ve started to declutter the house (well, I’m starting in the basement so no one can tell but me — but I know!). I’m trying to part with things I no longer use or care about and make newer purchases more carefully. When I went north this summer I decided to focus only on drawing and painting and took only the supplies I would need for that, leaving behind the piles of mixed media bits, yarn and other supplies that I had brought along in previous years, just in case.

There was an added benefit to this — by focusing on one medium instead of doing bits and pieces with several, I actually improved in my art work! It was a bonus.

Rick was right to be frustrated by my overpacking in Japan. And, while he still thinks I bring way too much when we travel, I’ve managed the last few (including three weeks in France in 2012) with a small suitcase that can fit in the carry on rack. And while he’s not sure why I need to pack my pillow, he appreciates that I sleep better that way — which works out nicely for him, too.

I believe with all my heart that we are built as much from memories of the past as we are with all the wonderful things we absorb every day. Those memories can be good or bad and sometimes they are, oddly enough, both. Just as I will always love and mourn my Marmelade Gypsy Rose, the sweet cat for whom my blog was named and who died four years ago, I wrap my heart around his successor, Lizzie Cosette, who is so unlike Gypsy it rattled me for several months. But she is her own Lizzie, not Gypsy 2. I believe Rick will always love his ex-wife a little bit and has come to look at part of the past with a smile, remembering the good times and grateful for the two boys they share, the two young men in whose lives we now all share.

We are packing lighter now. One day, perhaps I can travel with a backpack instead of a carry-on. But for now, I’ll stick with my small suitcase — and pillow. And a heart ready to be filled with all the exciting new experiences that await.

Postscript: Not long after that trip I wrote this poem for Rick in a poetry yearbook I create for him each Valentine’s Day. I’m no Mary Oliver when it comes to poetry — it’s a pretty simple style. But the words say it all.

Packing Light?

Everything I’d ever need

Went with me to Japan.

The bubble wrap,

Books to read.

Umbrella, gifts

And food to eat.

Clothes for warmth

And clothes for dress,

A pillow small and blue.

All was in my suitcase,

All, that is, but you.

And so I lugged it

By my side,

While ribbing I did take.

I’d do it all again, I bet

Although my back did break.

I’d really try to pack it light

So I could make you proud,

And not to have to hear you gripe

Alone or in a crowd!

I’m learning how to pack my bags

Much lighter than before.

I’m leaving fear and history

And anger at the door.

I’m trying hard to keep

My insecurities at bay,

And only pack the good things

I’ll need on any day.

Like courage, humor, spirit.

Faith and peace and joy.

Trust and laughter,

Hopefulness

Are what I could employ.

I’m packing lighter than I did

The other times before.

Now if only I can do so

When I hit the road on tour!

About the Author: Jeanie Croope

October 6, 2016

The Dream Job and Listening to My Inner Wisdom by Rochelle Bilow

All I ever wanted was to work at Bon Appétit.

It’s why, after earning my bachelor’s degree, I enrolled in culinary school. Why I worked as a line cook. Why I moved to a city that didn’t speak to my heart. All this just to get a shot at earning a spot on the magazine’s masthead.

Spoiler alert: I got the job. And in August, I walked away from it with no regrets.

After a stint in 2012 through 2013 working as a farmhand and cook in Central New York, I sold my car, traded in my overalls for pencil skirts, and made my way to NYC. I knew that to make it—to really make it—as a food writer at the national level, I had to live in the epicenter of the industry.

Besides, Bon App’s offices were located in Manhattan.

Bright-eyed and hungry, I found an apartment, settled into an interim editing job for a lifestyle website, and began strategizing. And praying.

I prayed a lot.

It was not all for naught—in early 2014, the position of staff writer for BA became available. I fired off my resume along with an eager (but not too eager, I hoped) cover letter, and prayed some more.

I got the call. I nailed the interview. I nailed the follow-up interview. And the one after that. And then, two weeks after it all started, I got another call: I got the job.

Now I don’t want to toot my own horn but then again, if you don’t toot yours, who will?

I crushed it.

For the next two and a half years, I rocked that job. I was promoted to associate editor, and then to senior associate editor.

Then I was given the keys to BA’s Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook accounts, creating the role of social media manager for the brand. I worked hard and worked long. There wasn’t a night or weekend I didn’t spend hunched over my phone, obsessively monitoring clicks and comments from BA’s readers.

The job was my entire world, which was fitting, because—quite frankly—I didn’t have a life.

It’s not that I didn’t want to nurture friendships, try new activities, or open myself up to the potential of a romantic partner. It’s just that, for two and a half years, while I was working my dream job, I was too depressed to make the effort for a life outside of it.

I have never jived with large cities, but something about New York and me felt deeply, intrinsically rotten. For two and a half years, my spirit was slowly crushed under concrete and broken subways and expensive rent.

For the first two, I didn’t notice. I knew something felt off, but I never stopped working—never came up for air—long enough to be introspective and seek the answer as to why I felt so damn sad and hopeless all the time.

It took a birthday to force my attention to the matter. As I turned 29 (I know, I know—not exactly knocking down the door of the independent living home. But not the spry young co-ed I once was, either), it hit me like a ton of bricks: I was alone, I was unhappy, and beyond a job that impressed strangers on the internet, I didn’t have much.

I wish I could tell you that once that thought crept in, I lit a stick of incense, sat cross-legged next to a candle, and meditated on my unhappiness. That would be nice, but it’d also be a lie. I didn’t meditate on shit; I just understood. I acknowledged, deep in my gut, and with every beat of my heart, what I had known all along: This job was never sustainable, because living in New York was not. It was time to go.

The above allusion to gut and heart are not by accident. We do have the answers to the dilemmas we face.

Meditation is nice, but it’s in listening to my physical body that I find every answer I’ve ever sought. I often place a hand over my heart or on my belly to monitor how my nervous, respiratory, and digestive systems are responding to their surroundings. Try it and you’ll see: When you’re calm and content, placing that hand on your skin feels like being enveloped in a warm hug. But perform the same action in a stressful situation, and you can immediately tell that things aren’t right. Your heartbeat is irregular. Your eyes dart. Your stomach clenches. Your muscles tighten.

To understand what was happening in my soul, I had to listen to my body. Friends have asked if I found it difficult to leave my dream job. From where I stand today, in the middle of my dream life, with my hand on my heart and a grin on my face, I can say with complete honesty: It was the easiest thing I have ever done.

About he Author: Rochelle Bilow

Rochelle Bilow is a writer, yogi, and spiritual seeker based in Syracuse, New York. After leaving her job at Bon Appétit magazine, she moved back to her hometown where she works as the social media at an advertising agency. She is also the author of the romance memoir, The Call of the Farm; connect with Rochelle on Twitter and Instagram at @RochelleBilow

September 20, 2016

True Wise Tales of a (formerly) Broken Heart by Cathleen Delia Mulrooney

The first was in junior high–we wore matching outfits to a Valentine’s Day dance one week and he broke up with me the next. I was home sick with a flu and in my fevered, delirious state the heartbreak felt like ruin. No gift. No lesson. Just I feel something for you…no, wait, I don’t. The End.

Then there was a boy who called me beautiful and talked to me for hours on the phone each night, only to pass by me in our high school hallways like a ghost by day. Another whose popular girlfriend found out he was talking to me in biology class and decided to make me regret ever speaking a word. I was just as heartbroken over her as I was him–I wanted to be her friend, too. I failed. I learned a new kind of pain brokered by the power differential between certain types of girls.

Next came the real one. The first true love. The everything. We spent hours deliriously kissing and hours wildly fighting. Two kids mimicking the broken marriages of our parents and dealing with grown up issues we were ill-equipped to handle. As deep as the love was, I learned that love isn’t always enough–a lesson it took years to fully understand.

By the time I fell for the man I’d marry, there had been other splintering heartbreaks. A New England musician who wrote me love letters long after he left and another girl’s boyfriend who scarred me in a dozen different ways. In those days, I could feel love for the infinite potential of a fragile boy strung out on drugs or a poet I barely knew who called my shoulders white as milk and swore he’d never kiss me or we’d both die from it.

My heart then was a fool and I learned to let it break wide open to hold everyone and everything. Limitless. Boundless. Vicious.

But, when I married, I thought I had found out what love actually was. All that it could be. My fairytale ending. The babies, the house, the growing up together year after year, our late night philosophical ramblings and our barefoot slow dances to Harvest Moon across the warped kitchen floor, our fights and our forgiveness.

One day, as we stood together in our sundrenched kitchen, his wedding band snapped and fell off of his finger. “It’s a sign,” I said ominously. “It’s not,” he said, shaking his head. We both stared at the silver band, no longer a complete circle, no longer whole.

I was right. We separated a year later.

I was given a lesson then in a whole other level of pain no one ever could’ve warned me about. Heartbreak to end all heartbreaks. I won’t say that my divorce made my heart wise. I can’t say that. If anything, it made my heart even more completely lost. If “forever” didn’t exist anyway, my heart decided to pin itself to reckless stories that would only cause more damage–the only thing I understood. A heart, once set to broken, draws in other fractured hearts with a magnetic pull.

I went out with a man who belonged to someone else, a teacher who took me to a prom but couldn’t kiss, a Buddhist I didn’t like but whose philosophies I did, a writer who didn’t want me to talk about my work, a chef who didn’t like my tattoos and asked if I’d consider lasering them off before I met his family. There was one I believed might become my next something, but my brokenheart perspective had a nasty habit of shifting into kaleidoscopic view, seeing only the smooth parts I liked, while shifting the glass to obscure the jagged-edged ones I did not. I spent so much time pressing my eye to the shattered fragments that I overlooked the blood spilling from me. I believed that wounding was all I deserved after all that had happened.

I was still a damn fool.

Then, my mom died of what was ultimately a broken, faulty heart and I realized that my greatest source of love had never been the dates or the crushes or even the real relationships–it had been her all along–and she was gone.

There was no choice but for me to channel all of the love I had left into myself.

I bought myself a silver ring at the same shop where I bought my ex-husband’s years before. I went to the beach and vowed to stay alive and to stay open to love in all its forms. I vowed to make better choices to stop my constant heartbreak. I wrote my vows in the sand and let the waves carry them off. I slid the ring onto my finger and the wisdom of all I’d been through surged in my blood like high tide.

My marriage to self-love was in March, and that June I did meet another someone. He had a faulty, broken heart not unlike my mother’s.

When I eventually let him close to me, I could hear the mechanical ticking of his clockwork heart, keeping time. He’s had many surgeries in his life and and I’ve had many wounds. Our hearts both know something of suffering.

But, I have been wise enough to start to let my past go and to count each moment with him.

I don’t know what the future holds and, yes, he may yet be another hard lesson learned someday, but over the past three years, I have been learning my way around love, not loss. I have been learning to receive, to be heard, to be seen as beautiful and worthy of respect and tenderness.

My heart has been burned and my heart has been broken, but it was the wisdom I earned through self love that led me to a place where I am even able to have this kind of partnership now. This isn’t a fairytale where a hero rides in and saves our lady from her sorrow–it is one where she rescues herself and loves herself first.

The bravehearted partner is definitely a bonus, but the real love story…now and ever after…is the one within.

Cathleen Delia Mulrooney

Restless. Sleepless. Book-lover. Wordsmith. Deep roots. Prodigal heart. Teacher. Guide. Wanderer. Witch. Tea, tarot, hot baths, stitchcraft. Curator of narrative relics, remnants, & curiosities.

Cat is also a freelance writer, editor, and teacher. Her poetry, fiction, essays, interviews, and reviews have appeared in a variety of online and print publications. She has been teaching writing at the college level since 2000, and has facilitated creative writing workshops in elementary schools, high schools, prisons, and private organizations, as well as workshops exclusively for women to write their body and tarot-based narratives.

Through her Queen of Cups Tarot community, she offers private, group, and online tarot readings. Find her online at http://cdeliamulrooney.com and Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/queenofcupstarot/