A poem by Rainer Maria Rilke
Widening circles
I live my life in widening circles
that reach out across the world.
I may not complete this last one
but I will give myself to it.
I circle around God, around the primordial tower.
I’ve been circling for thousands of years
and still I don’t know: am I a falcon,
a storm, or a great song?
We know the winter of Earth as a regular experience. We expect it and prepare for the season though we may not all enjoy the cold and darkness. We have holidays, sweaters, fires, and warm drinks to comfort us along the way. Many of us create a traditional or improvised hearth in our homes to welcome family and friends as additional cheer.
Winter can be felt as more than a seasonal affair for the planet. This post, written for you mid fall, comes alongside reflection on how Jessica and I have allowed a winter in our friendship on more than one occasion. If you’re new to the blog, we are two long time friends who want to connect with you about showing up for life with as much presence and genuine positivity as we can without denying the full scope of our human experience.
We have been away from the blog for some time — a winter, if you a will. When chatting about this and if we wanted to let this space go or continue on, we remembered two distinct winters within our friendship when both of us were going through transitional time periods. When we returned to the friendship it involved a conscious decision to change our expectations around relating through different chapters of life. It also involved a total drop of ego to reach out again after a gap in communication. If you want to restart and/or maintain a friendship (whatever the distance), someone has to take the initiative of reaching out with heartfelt communication to let the other know they’re important to you and that you appreciate having them in your life.
In hindsight Jess and I know that taking big breathers (at one point a year without communication) meant not holding the other to a certain way of being based on what had been. It meant we were allowing decomposition of the old which can be sad, scary, and lonely. We have experienced its potential and beauty though collectively we are not taught to do this intentionally and I can say we were not consciously intentional at the time.
The first winter was in our late teens to early 20s after I had become part of a significant romantic relationship and Jessica had explorations to undertake that were quite different than anything we had been doing together. (Ask her about skydiving sometime.) The second winter was in our mid to late 20s with becoming a mother for me and adjusting to a new life in another part of the country for Jess as she committed to the man that is her husband today. It could seem that these are times when you want to hold a steady connection with your dear friend, but sometimes the opposite is what’s needed most – to let go- to let space do its thing.
Winter is important and necessary. You may even spy small winters within your daily cohabitation with another person and you may witness it with creative projects too. Allowing space for nothingness also allows space for new seeds to grow into new ways of relating, fresh ideas, as well as to appreciate what has changed.
As we work our way back into sharing here with you, we bring along our new ways of being since we last posted. Jessica has spent the time away training as a yoga therapist and is now living in a new location with her family. I have spent the time becoming a certified wellness coach, sound healing facilitator, and teacher of kundalini infused movement and meditation practices. We are looking forward to sharing with you in this next season!
With deep gratitude for you all — Valerie 💫
A long while ago I took an appointment for a hair cut, wash, and blow dry with a stylist that was new to me. He had lived in a few different countries and spoke with a slight french accent over something else I wasn’t quite sure about. He carried a confident delivery of promises about the haircut he was going to give me – no bones about it:
“This will be the best haircut you’ve ever had.”
“You are going to love this!”
“I am highly trained and know all the latest trends.”
I sat quietly in my chair looking over the straight forward shoulder length image ripped out of a magazine (yep, this was before smart phones) thinking I should have found something more exciting, somehow more exotic and difficult to pull off to match his proclamations.
As he worked his whole body became part of the process, swaying back and forth. When he moved to the front to cut in a cheekbone length layer, he asked, “Would you like to see my special technique?”
I wasn’t sure what that meant but gave him the go ahead anyhow. “Okay. I’d like to see that.”
He showed me away from the face first that he would lift up the hair with one hand and swoop through it with the shears in his other hand at an angle to get “just the right swing”. I remember him saying he did this all the time and it was really the way it should be done. He was so convincing. I felt fine to proceed.
A moment later the knuckles of his left hand met with my nose as he swooped by. Thankfully he was a little less animated close to my face and the force of the special technique was more shocking than it was painful. I sat stunned for a moment before I could react to his apologies and inquiry to my wellbeing to let him know I was indeed alright.
This was absolutely embarrassing for him in that moment, but he picked back up quickly and finished the cut. It did turn out to be a nice haircut and a story that I got a ton of laughs out of with a coworker of mine at the time. She happened to be an art teacher with plenty of scissors around and a dry sense of humor. The special technique brought in many smiles for years to come.
The takeaway? Everything that you experience depends on your degree of allowance and your perception of it in the moment as well as in hindsight. Sometimes the thing that is weird or awkward, embarrassing and maybe painful, or challenging for another reason — is also the thing one person or all involved needed to happen to learn something for the future, to make a change, or maybe just for loads of laughs later which truly is the best possible outcome in my book.
“Always follow your own truth in your own time.” — Frank Perry
You are the key to your best expression. No one else can tell you how to do you better or when something is in right timing for you. Align within before seeking outside yourself. Trust that what’s needed, desired, and/ or ready to be understood will arrive in the way that matches your current grooves when encountered.
We often think that smiles are the byproduct of pleasant experiences, humorous events, or happy thoughts. Those things are of course true. A smile can also be an act chosen even in a moment that is less than joyful for the purpose of triggering the release of good feeling stored in the body. It never hurts to turn your frown upside down. You always have the option to call on your presence of mind to guide you to your smile.
HOW LARGE IS YOUR HEART?
from How to Fight by Thich Nhat Hanh
“The practice of inclusiveness is based on the practice of understanding, compassion, and love. With understanding and love you can embrace and accept everything, and everyone, and you don’t have to suffer, because your heart is large. How can we enlarge our heart? Increasing our understanding and compassion makes our heart grow greater. Each of us has to ask the question: is there anything that we can do to help us open the door of our heart and accept the other person? How large is our heart?”
As the moon grows into it’s fullest expression over the next few days, how too can we allow our fullest heart expression? What can you do to make allowance even for what you do not understand? Can you let love work beyond needing reason and comprehension? Imagine the world full of love and bliss, being in a state of your utmost radiance, and connecting in fullness with others. What does that look like? How do you feel? What sorts of things would you do and say? Why not do or say one of those things this week and see how it allows your heart to shine more fully.
“If we see every situation as perfectly designed for our own movement and growth, and we can embrace every situation for where it comes from and where it leads us… neither [disparaging yourself] nor others… recognizing that all unhealthy thoughts, words, and actions are expressions of unmet needs… [you may] remain unfailingly affirmative in relationship to both [yourself] and others.”
Moore, Coaching Psychology Manual
Words from Carl Jung, 20th century analytical psychologist, in support of learning to shift and widen your focus away from what you don’t want toward what you do want to experience:
“The greatest and most important problems of life are all in a certain sense insoluble… They can never be solved, but only outgrown… This “outgrowing,” as I formally called it, on further experience was seen to consist in a new level of consciousness. Some higher or wider interest arose on the person’s horizon, and through this widening of view, the insoluble problem lost its urgency. It was not solved logically in its own terms, but faded out when confronted with a new and stronger life-tendency.”
What new interest could be on the horizon for you?
“Folks are about as happy as they make up their minds to be.” – Abraham Lincoln
Let joy be gathered, briefly held, appreciated, and gently released. Moments are meant to be fleeting but the joy you feel can go with you and create the foundation for noticing with more awareness, conscious savoring, and a deep appreciation for what life offers you today.
How can you give more of your attention to what brings you joy?
What will support and amplify your overall happiness in this day?
“Happiness is a butterfly, which when pursued, is always just beyond your grasp, but which, if you will sit down quietly, may alight upon you.”
— Nathaniel Hawthorne
Presence and Positivity 