“Being a woman is a terribly difficult task, since it consists principally in dealing with men”. – Joseph Conrad

I spent the morning with two beautiful women … two women that are strong, insightful, aware, independent, loving, and that have rich resumes of life.  It was a gift!!!  Talk and connection over a brunch jointly prepared was so very, very, very rich and joyful.  What a wonderful way to begin a Sunday!  Such a gift!  We all share love and mutual kindness towards each other and the world, and offer each other a place to safely reflect challenges and questions arising as each day passes.  What a wonderful team … tribe of three that support the whole from foundations of independent strength.

I love them both on many levels, and consider it such a gift that I, as a man, am allowed an equal place at their table so that I can learn, understand, and appreciate what the woman experience is … and what their experience is as a separate human on the planet.  I have learned much from these women … much that helps me become a better man and a better human being … and I have grown much because of them … and I will be forever thankful for their support and love as I continue my journey into personal discovery.

“Feeling good about your life, but not expressing a heartfelt ‘thank you,’ is like wrapping a gift for someone and never giving it to them.” – Chip Conley

My life is filled with gifts …

I have arrived at the end of a week … reflection shows me a truth … I feel good … I feel whole … I feel as though my life is running on a course where love and good intentions prevail, and where connection with those I love feed my soul.  The feelings are rich and the examples are many.  And though challenges faced me, my work tribe, and my close friends, I must admit that gifts also showered down on me as this week came to a close.

My team continues to amaze me with their resiliency and ability to weather constant challenges and face each with a sense of adventure rather than anger.  What special people they all are.  Their collaboration and cooperation, and their willingness to adapt remind me of how a team can thrive when bonded by mutual respect and hopefully encouraging leadership. Yes, I do feel very lucky to be part of their tribe.

The tension first sensed with new management quickly continues to be replaced by a sense of partnership working together to inform and succeed.  Fear has been replaced by progress.  The sense of being able to do great things grows.

A preciously close friend shared stories from their heart, and became vulnerable so that healing might occur and I would feel safe doing the same.  Such a wonderful gift.  Another shared with me his health crisis, now under control but reminding me that life can surprise quickly and without warning.  Another gift and a warning to live life fully.

I also rediscovered that when I reflect and think about what touches my passions, I feel uplifted.  And that such reflections feed upon themselves and create even more excitement and ideas that nurture and feed my heart.

These and many other events … when I am honest … create feelings inside me that say “this is a life worth living”.  What a powerful message when it comes from the heart and is felt so deeply and powerfully.  I am a very lucky man … yes, very lucky indeed.

Gratitude for a life … for my daughter …

Another moment where “the glass half full” overpowers “the glass half empty”.  Tonight I am filled with joy and gratitude for my daughter.  Approaching her 18^th birthday, she is a loving, caring, kind person growing into young womanhood.  Her gifts are many and her story unique, and she has traveled her path in a way that amazes me and fills my heart with joy.  Her mother and her live away from me, but I am grateful for what I see is the shared respect, friendship, and love between them.  My heart is peaceful knowing that my daughter lives surrounded by love in her home, and surrounded with even more love when with me.

She is on her path … and like me, will discover who she is over time, making choices that will bring lessons.  What that path will be … how it will look … all lays ahead and has yet to be revealed.  My hope is that she remains open to discovery … remains willing to take risks … remains willing to learn and forgive herself as well as others … and live with joy.

My excitement is great thinking of what I will witness as she travels her journey … knowing that the joy will be balanced by the pain we all face when living a life worth living.  I intend to be there to offer support for healing … and join in when celebrating is due.  It will be a wonderful future … one worth living for … one worth watching.

I love you my daughter … with all my heart.

I am like the land … ever changing … forever given lessons and chances to learn, grow, and evolve …

“Will we treasure all the secrets with life’s changing scenes

Where our hearts were warm with love

So much love

Will the flowers grow again as I open out my hand

Precious time

Time for healing

The beauty of this land”

Clannad – Of This Land

“Find a place inside where there’s joy, and the joy will burn out the pain.” – Joseph Campbell

Loving warmth flows from inside out … then letting go allows it to flow back in …

In the end we all have such few days … making as many days as possible feed our souls seems like a proper way to live life.  I have a tired heart … a heart that is awaken, changing, facing fears, and learning to let go.

Peace warms and soothes a tired heart, even one deep inside a man taught to be strong and resistant to abuse.  How to find such peace?  I discover new ways to move in that direction but more change and challenges come.

But even such strength needs aging and mellowing like a good wine.  Such ”aging” seems only possible through connecting with peaceful space and feelings.  My new path now openly embraces co-creating and collaboration.  Collaboration with the universe and remaining open to the combinations discovered in life … combinations rather than specific singularities or targets in life.  It’s the unanticipated combination of results that offer the most chance for new awareness.  It’s the combining of colors and the resulting collage it produces that moves us in new directions down our path.  Blending peace and love into this collage adds richness and balance … to each day and to my life.   I see more clearly now that in the end, it is how I live each day that truly counts the most.

“Your life is yours to live, no matter how you choose to live it.  When you do not think about how you intend to live it, it lives you.  When you occupy it, step into it consciously, you live it.”  – Gary Zukav

I am blessed ….

My life has been “thick” lately … seemingly filled with challenges that seem negative and require me to reach down deeply and process in order to navigate each situation.  I see the need for balance … lifting away from these more negative challenges and spending time seeing the light and sunshine of my life.  So tonight I focus on the sunshine … on the bright side of my life … on the many blessings I truly have in this life of mine … this wonderful life I have been given … this opportunity to discover and grow into my full potential and live my passion.

When I look, the list of blessings is quite long.  It heals my heart to reflect on such a long list, and among all the blessings on the list I chose for tonight my brother.  He is younger … and growing up I recall we had a dynamic where I was supportive but likely not totally kind.  As we both moved into adulthood we maintained a minimal connection and took different paths.  Later in our adult life a family conflict caused us to separate, and the length and intensity of that separation was far too long and deep.  Family crisis and the death of a parent brought us back together and gave us reason to forgive and renew our natural bond.  And in recent years, the bonding seems to be growing which feels ever so good … rich in many ways … now felt and experienced directly as we move forward into the future.

I see my brother now where before I did not … I see his kindness … I see his strength … I see his sensitively in a world demanding so much of all of us … I see his willingness to do what is needed to continue moving through life, love, and more.  I feel honored to call him brother.  I feel honored to know he is comrade and kin.  I feel honored that I feel his love and can return my love to him.  He is truly a gift … he is truly a blessing … he is truly loved.

“All changes, even the most longed for, have their melancholy; for what we leave behind us is a part of ourselves; we must die to one life before we can enter another.” – Anatole France

I woke up this morning feeling that my life needs to change … change significantly … change soon.  And though my life has been nothing but change for the past year or more, I feel more is now needed.

My beliefs are now challenged because I find myself restrained and blocked.  I am confused … seeking moments of joy but increasingly seeing life as despairing shades of gray.  I resist … finding reasons why things outside me will become barriers … finding reasons why things outside me may damage or hurt.  I feel as though I’ve walked a path that has taken me into a dark corner rather than into the light.

That is how I “feel” in this moment.  But what is the truth?  The truth is not how I feel which in itself is unnerving.  My mind distorts the truth … creates a mournful story meant for an older “me” … a “me” that surrendered his power and wore the label of victim … a “me” that resisted moving forward but preferred to wish things hadn’t happen or had been different.  I resist because I want my father … I want that night he died when I was 5 years old to be different … I want it more than anything in the world … I want it to be different so that I can live a life with him and experience the joy a father brings into a child’s heart.  I have not let go.  It is something that has framed me and restricted me for decades but now comes into focus as I try to understand why I resist while promoting self-change, self-awareness and self-forgiveness.

The truth is that I have grown.  The truth is I have discovered.  The truth is that I see missing pieces of my puzzle still needing to be discovered in order to complete my whole.  Love … self-nurturing … self-forgiveness … life balance and rhythm … work that nurtures rather than depletes … all are some of the pieces I see at or near the top of my list.  Each is a new side journey needing to be fully and richly explored.  Each is a portion of the path I walk.  Each needs to be experienced and processed fully so that I can gain more … more of myself … more of the person I wish to be.  It is “my work” that I know must be done.

I must believe … believe that intentions will create circumstances that will bring answers.  I must believe … believe that events and experiences will provide me clues and tools to better navigate.  I must believe … believe that I will find the patience to keep moving forward, stop resisting, and open myself to what will become whatever destiny I am meant to live.  It is “my work” … comprised of many things including trust, patience, and action.  It is the formula I have recently lost … it is the formula I now once again find.

Falling off the cliff …

Today I fell … I crashed … emotionally, psychologically, and spiritually.  I didn’t see it coming … and its appearance and intensity quickly overwhelmed me.  I somehow stepped off a cliff and fell through space and time losing all balance … feeling fear … fighting to retain my connection with the world I had to move through all day long.  I fought the pain deep inside me … pain in my heart … it hurt so much today … pain from feeling growing despair from sensing my loving spirit slip away and replaced by fear and panic.  The forces were so strong … so intense … so strong … so consuming … like a powerful army over running a group of children.

Each moment of today felt off balance … felt forced … required extreme effort to remain focused and connected.  The entire day was filled with such internal disruption and discourse.  It’s evening now and I seem to be recovering some … but I’ve paid a price.  I am exhausted … and discouraged that such an unanticipated and unknown force might occur so unexpectedly.   How discouraging it is to feel all the balance, joy, and sense of peace suddenly leave me … be beaten back by these violating sensations … force me to battle to gain them back.

Yes, I felt overwhelmed before I knew it and the strength required to defeat them seemed lacking. I have to understand it … know the “why” behind it … I see it is likely that past choices are returning to challenge me. Each challenge demands I retain my personal power … take action from a place of love that represents my best interests. But I am so tired … tired of the fight at times … tired of what seems a fight … a fight to step up to the next challenge, hold my power, and move in strength.

My intention is that I will move with strength … move even though depleted … regain and hold on to my power … design a dance suitable to the violating forces I feel are contributing to what faces me. I must believe I will regain enough strength to protect myself and not lose my personal power … it is my intention.