Research and Ramblings

I took a look at my word of the year for the past few years: 2020 was Patience 2021 was Brave 2022 was Balance  2023 was Forgiveness and I chose Surrender for 2024.  Surrender for a long time meant to me to give up my own will and submit to the will of the higher power (in this case the God of the Bible). The thought of giving up my own will brought up terror and rebellion within my deepest being. I don't like to be controlled or told what to do. I have a long lifetime of not wanting to do what everyone else is doing. I am a type A and a self proclaimed control freak. I want to know everything all of the possibilities and pitfalls and be prepared. I don't want to do what has been done before even if it makes sense, unless there is a very clear and concise manual to follow. I would rather try and fail a million times than take direction. I think for a long time I thought if I were controlled, I would cease to be me. The trouble is, there are SO MANY things out of my control. I ...

Where do I begin? I'm afraid once I get started I will never start. What kind of photo do you use with a post like this? I have so much on my heart. I try to keep a lot of hope in my heart, AND I am trying to believe that people are doing the best they can, but also, there are just so many things I wish would change. I know it is overwhelming the amount of things that are wrong with the world, humanity, the planet, our water, the environment, as well as the things that scare me in my day to day life. Here is my place to just list what is concerning me today. This is by no means an inclusive list - but I don't want to leave this post utterly depressed and not able to function.  People who do not believe they are loved - hurt everything around them. I am both sad for them, and want to try and fix the root cause of this and don't say grow thicker skin - BE NICE to people. BE KIND, even if they are not. Someone has to show the love.  Climate change - hello people, we are a glob...

It is coming...the longest night. I have loved developing a ritual and celebration around Winter Solstice. The call to go inward, the connection with Mother Earth, and the reflection the year. Over the years, I have slowly begun to add in things as solstice approaches.  I look over the year - what stands out - what do I remember - what were the moments that I want to remember and reflect on. I think about what my goals or intentions were for the year. For the past few years I have participated in #13in13 all the way to #23in23. It has been fun to pick some things for me to do, to finish, to push my edges, to explore, and to just find some time to spend on things that I would love to see as part of my day to day life as well as some dream things I hope will happen. This is inspired by Gretchen Rubin and her sister, Elizabeth Craft and their podcast Happier . Truthfully I have always created goals or intentions or even resolutions for the year - I just shifted when I start thinking a...

 Today would have been my father-in-law's 87th birthday. He passed in his sleep on October 21, 2023 and today was his memorial. It was great to hear from people, their memories of him and to hear my husband and brother-in-laws speak about their father. I have not yet experienced losing a parent. From what I hear, it is hard and there is a hole that literally nothing can fill. I have experienced loss - grandparents, great-grandparents, great-great grandparents, people from the church, friends, children of friends, members of the community, but everyone says the loss of a parent is different.  David believed in making the world a better place for EVERYONE. He did this not so much by talking about it, though he did, door to door to make sure people were voting. He did this by getting involved, talking to people and getting them involved, and sometimes that even included doing things himself. Whether it was climate change, assuring all people have running water, homes and electric...

Maybe this is you? You decide to take on a challenge, and you work at it, plans are made, things happen, and eventually you realize you aren't going to master it. Some of you may be thinking, nope, I execute it perfectly every time. Some of you may be thinking, yep, that's me. This can be something simple like I am going to clean kitchen today or something more complex like I am going to lose 10 pounds this month. Just the fact that I labeled cleaning as simple and weight loss as complex says something about my own process. If you told me I had to clean the kitchen today, I would ace it. If you told me I had to lose 10 pounds in December I would laugh (holidays, cookies, treats). For me, I assign things as simple or complex. Sometimes when I set my mind to it, I can complete the challenge. Sometimes, I set my mind to it and my priorities change, or things happen outside of my control, or I shift priorities midway.  My husband will say that I am pretty good and completing challe...

 So, it is the last day of NaNoWriMo and I am at 35,907 words. I will be writing most of today and so I am confident I will end the day at or around 40K. Do you think I am celebrating? That is not how my brain works. I tell myself that the goal was 50K and I did not do it. So I failed. It has taken me awhile to recognize how often I live in a pass/fail right/wrong black/white for me/against me world. I am guessing it has something to do with my religious upbringing and generational patterning. We do not celebrate the ways we accomplished something - anything towards the goal. Instead it is you did not actually meet the mark. So, pass/fail.  So what went wrong this month? That is where my brain goes. What could I have done differently? Well, I started strong and then had some medical weirdness and then traveled for some of the time. I also worked and did all of the usual chores and home tasks. I met in group when I could. My best days of writing ended up being Thursdays and Sat...

 Oh I am happy. Hitting the 20K mark was AMAZING!! I was worried as I started the week ahead then wrote NOTHING on Tuesday. Wednesday I felt behind, and then I reminded myself that I am mostly teaching myself to write daily. To show up to do something I enjoy daily. The novel idea has fallen by the wayside. I feel a lot of feelings about that. I think what I am writing is going to amount to something though and my other win this week was locating an essay I wrote in group during 2020 and then the journal was stolen out of my car. I was more devastated about the journal being gone than anything else that was taken (well that and my friend's birthday stuff was also awful). I had a vague memory of typing it up as I sometimes do, and after much searching decided that it was gone forever. Then, earlier this week I thought to check my email to see if maybe I had emailed it to someone and I had. I was so excited about finding it, it set of a series of words about that essay and subsequent...