addiction – A Crow's Nest

Bonne Soiree Travellers,

Last weekend I had the oddest feeling inside my body and in the air outdoors…it felt like summer had already been here and gone, when in fact it really hasn’t even arrived yet. I had that feeling of disappointment one has when summer is on it’s way out…Isn’t that peculiar?

I’m going to blame the numerous days of cloudy hungover skies for that sensation. It feels like the weather has created a blank canvas of sorts, or maybe it’s a too much gray canvas.

I feel like many of the dynamic moments of Spring have be drowned out or muted in a way I can’t fully describe….

But on Tuesday night, as I was walking across the terrace, I spied this luscious little fellow…

The first strawberry.

Summer is indeed still coming…

Lemme tell you, in case you don’t know, strawberries that are grown on their own taste so much more wonderful than their store bought counter parts. I think it’s because when you grow them on your own, they get to take their time.

There’s something to be said for letting things grow in their own time.

Especially people.

Don’t you agree?

I think one of the most difficult aspects of being human is the way we struggle with our own pacing. It’s something that defies explanation really as to how we arrive, where we arrive, when we arrive there.

If you are someone who has battled any kind of mental health struggle or familial trauma or addiction or divorce or survived an extraordinary ordeal of any kind, there’s this moment when you think this thought. I arrived at it and I’ve heard many many others express the same sentiment:

Why couldn’t I have figured this out sooner?

I have an idea, would you like to hear it? Here we go…

Do you know who William Shakespeare is? Let’s go with yes for arguments sake… Will once said “All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players: they have their exits and their entrances…” ok, actually Jaques, a character in “As You Like It” recites this whole spiel, but for our purposes, we just need that one little bit to build on…

If you know anything about plays and theatre, let’s say yes again, for arguments sake…then you know that there is a rhyme and reason to scenes and staging and lighting and most importantly, TIMING. The actors don’t just run out on stage all hands in the air like they don’t care, squealing their lines at random intervals. And that is because…

No one gets to say their lines before it’s time.

Read that again.

I’m pretty sure you can’t arrive to your greatest moments of growth any sooner. No one can.

Isn’t that bittersweet?

There are so many moving parts inside us and those who surround us that have to fall into place, just like timing on a stage.

But the questions remain, how does that kind of time work? How does time become right for each of us? Why can’t we force that time forward, faster? Why can’t we arrive at being the person we want to be faster? Why can’t we learn and grow and heal faster?

I know when it’s a strawberry, those that are rushed into fruition are never as delicious…yea, I know, I just punned, sorry not sorry…

And I can’t help but think about how it all begins…A seed.

Ok, in our case, it’s an egg and a squiggly little sperm, but we are going to call it a seed, just for arguments sake.

Because we were a seed. In our parent’s minds, before we were a literal seed in a womb. We were an idea they thought was worth growing. Ideas are a most powerful kind of seed, are they not?

Consider the human existence we currently enjoy…architecture, transportation, medicine, science, fashion, agriculture, and even theatrical plays, these were all ideas that one or more humans felt needed to be planted and nourished.

We are all seeds that grow at different cadences, in different ways and into different humans. But we each need an unspecified amount of time to accomplish this. And we each deserve the opportunity to do that.

I’ve been trying to think about language for teaching this summer and on Instagram. In movement, if you are a consciousness human, and for arguments sake, let’s say you are, you want to use language that embraces everyone. That means every size, age, shape, color, stage of learning, flexibility and strength. The last thing I ever want to do is intimidate someone or make anyone ever feel less than.

Because I believe that the greatest strength of movement is that it has the power to make you feel more than. And it has the power to help you grow.

SO I’ve been thinking about using the analogy of a seed. And the way we all grow differently yet equally beautiful. I can break down any movement to it’s simplest pieces and then grow it from there. I like the idea of growing at your own pace in movement, because we all do. And I like that this idea feels harmonious with the yogic limbs as well.

In summary, strawberries, Shakespeare, theatrical timing, growth, ideas, you and me. All start from a seed.

So, What are you growing?

Greetings Travellers,

How was your Monday?

I was off work today. Truth be told, unless I have travel plans, I’m not good at taking time off work.

I’m extraordinarily bad at it in fact. I have to have an itinerary of things to do or I feel bad… I get listless and sad.

And I end up always feeling like my life isn’t going to turn out well after all.

Seriously, it’s bananas.

I think I’ve always been this way and I’m not fully sure why…something I ponder…in case you may have missed it, I’m a fan of a good pondering.

This evening, I thought I would share a little list of thoughts that might be worth tumbling around in your brain, should you feel like pondering…these are things that have popped into my brain over the past few days.

BUT FIRST, I found Faline lounging like a boss on the front couch this afternoon…it’s the look on her face that always makes me laugh…

And EQUALLY awesome, since I was home today when the tornado test sirens went off, I got to witness Lou howling. There is something about the way she throws her head back, purses her lips and howls that makes my heart swell. I LOVE IT, so then I howled too and she howled with me. And the siren. This went on for let’s say just long enough for me to not appear crazy. I have no idea why I find that so wonderful, but I do…

Now here’s the list, in no particular order…

~Small Ordinary Moments…do you seek them? do you create them? how many of us are watching for them? They mean so much to our health. The ability to satiate your senses in the moment you are in is of utmost importance to our well being. Humans are not meant for all this mental time travel. Ordinary has a power of it’s own making.

~Which led me to this thing that I’ve been thinking about a lot as I’m inching my way into the Gram: Our strength and our stories lie in our imperfections and our scars, if you edit it all out, what’s left of you?

~I appear to have two plantar warts…one is on the ball of my foot, and I think it’s going to kill me from pain. And it’s little. First it was the divorce, then a pandemic, then two injuries, a feisty squirrel, Dave’s suicide, and now I’ve met an adversary that truly scares me…has anyone else made an internal list of all your pain since COVID arrived? Maybe it’s just me, but I feel like all of humanity is getting it’s ass kicked in very personalized ways, am I wrong? NOT a poor me list, but just a shit list of things you’ve had to deal with…am I right?

~Who first said, what doesn’t kill you will make you stronger? And what were the circumstances in which that person came up with that phrase? Was it an act of heroism or a paper cut from hell? I’d like to know…and why do we repeat certain phrases and not others? Is there a committee? How do I get on that committee? Show of hands, who would like to be on that committee???

~How holding onto our emotions can breed resistance. As in, just changing your words from “I am” to “I feel” with consistency and daily practice helps us separate our identity from our emotions. And that’s sort of powerful, isn’t it?

~Working off of that, let’s ponder the peace we can create in of the practice of self-observation, don’t just feel your feels and think your thoughts, but give yourself some space inside to hold them away from you. It’s taken me over two years in therapy to really get ahold of this and I still have to work at it. I’ll work at it my whole life. I have visualization techniques. We are such busy easily distracted creatures and if you can insert several seconds to stop, step back, observe, it’s amazing what you can learn about yourself. And that in turn will help you learn about others. Funny how that works…

~GOING FIRST, someone is always first in line aren’t they? Are you that person, or are you the middle man or last man standing kind of human? What do we learn by going first in conversations, or into the coldness or into the unknown? What is the value in being first and by going first, doesn’t it put other people at ease? I should go first more often, shouldn’t we all?

~Knowledge is knowing lots of stuff and wisdom is understanding how your mind uses it. Mark Manson said this in his last newsletter that I read and am I the only one who wants to really understand how my body works versus believing it’s just like everyone else’s?

~Resilience, which is a word I just love to say and it’s really interesting how some souls seem to be more resilient than others. I would put it to the nature/nurture conversation, but what if it’s something more than that? I had brunch with a good friend yesterday who works with people who have had truly terrifying lives and we were talking about why are some people able to get back up and others can’t?

~Part 2 of that is something that has always intrigued me and that is our dysfunctional coping mechanisms that we pick up from trauma in youth. Where does alcoholism really begin for example, someone in the bloodline starts it, where does that come from, why is that their vice versus all the other choices? Why did I become an anorexic and not a drug addict? Why have I always been repelled by drugs and drinking for the most part? Why was I able to craft this life, why did I seek therapy, why has EMDR worked for me but not for others?

~What are we really? Fully serious, what are we made of beyond the obvious, because not to sound woo woo, but in my deepest movements or silent moments with my dog or gardening, there is some kind of something, isn’t there? Like THE FORCE. And in the above mentioned thoughts, there is more here, in us, I think…and I don’t feel like it’s a God thing, it’s something about our very nature.

~ The fifth limb of yoga is called Aparigraha, and for me, it’s about expectations and our attachment to the end goal versus embracing the journey AND not attaching to thoughts and emotions that constantly swell within our being. Let’s be honest, we can’t attach to anything in this life really, every single thing is temporary. Most of this world lives in a constant state of change, and attaching to things, wanting same same, just causes us to suffer.

~Lastly, I’ve been thinking about how art works and this includes writing. Isn’t all writing an art form? I fully believe each sets of eyes that find my words will understand them differently. Because we each take everything in through our filter. Our filter is our education, our experiences, our beliefs, our sex, our age, our race, our everything, so I can’t help but hope that all other writers and creators feel this way on some level. How could they not, and don’t all our interpretations make it richer and fuller?? Isn’t that how all art works? I know that’s always my hope, that my words speak to you, in your world, in some way as I write their meaning in mine. Art lets us know that we have never been alone.

~Last thought, We can remain extraordinary, even in our darkness. If I get onto that aforementioned committee, you’re gonna be saying those words again, trust me!!

Good night!!