The compulsion to write this blog has gone. There was a need, and I filled it, but some of you notice when I skip a week, so I'll keep writing. Please know that if the posts are not consistent, I'm just off creating a great life.
One recent morning I ducked under our mailbox building to wait out a light rain.
As my dog and I stood watch, the sun returned while the shower continued.
For many minutes, they both existed at the same time.
Misty September rainbows in blue skies.
The misting started well before I was sheltered.
I could have been upset by the rain, angled toward my face, thinking,
I'm caught in the rain!
But they were such teensy droplets and I was already sufficiently joyed out.
Joy.
I was already there. Rain could not ruin.
Two months ago, I started writing a list of 25 things that I want, with only one rule.
Every other thing on the list has to be something I already have.
For example:
I have an amazing client that I contract with,
and I want one more client in the next 6 months.
I have a wonderful apartment,
and I want to buy a house in the next 18 months with a 15-year mortgage.
I am choosing to want the things that I already have, and I am declaring that I want something else.
I want from a place of having, a place of abundance.
I am well-versed in wanting from a place of lack.
I don't have ___ but I wish I did. Never works. This is often used for weight loss.
I don't weigh what I did in college, but I wish I did. Ineffective.
Or Not-Wanting.
It's super-easy, a default, to Not-Want.
When I said, I don't want a boyfriend who is emotionally unavailable,
multiple times, that is exactly what came right to me.
You might have heard this psychological advice:
reframe your wants in a positive way.
Like when making goals on January 1, (and again on January 15,)
frame your goal in a positive way.
I don't want to be overweight this year = I definitely will be overweight this year!
Reframed: I want to weigh 20 pounds less this year.
It has taken me a while to really be okay with stating that I want something.
Without being apologetic or squeaking like a mouse when I ask.
As a pretty new baby, I learned that crying did not bring food or diapers or touch.
Asking for things has never been comfortable.
Wonderful Things came to me and I've been heartily advocated for by others,
which I appreciate. So very much.
I'm asking now--
and my first experiment, my first ask was around employment.
And I got everything on my list.
Amazing.
So I have been very careful not to ask for anything else yet.
I want to be very sure, because I know this works.
In the area of a house, I have saved several addresses of homes that already sold
and were lovely for me. I plan on visiting those neighborhoods.
I'll park my car and walk the sidewalks.
Be available for The Vibe.
For selecting homes for many moves across country, I'd walk the sidewalks,
checking in with how it felt to Be there.
The vibes started at age 22, and were my practical tool
(a practical juju nugget)
in making decisions,
but also I'd have feelings there when something someone said felt 'right.'
Always, that feeling was just below my sternum in the solar plexus. My Vibe.
There's a large nerve ganglia there.
Actually, there are 31 sections along our spines, and each section has a pair of nerve ganglia.
Interesting.
This week, I've got something new to report. A new vibe.
Two fingers below my belly button. There was no feeling in the usual solar plexus, only this new spot.
This is NEWS.
Thirty years, and I'd never felt it anywhere else.
So that happened.
Some of you are concluding that I am a special flavor of nutjob.
I get it.
Unless you have felt what I am describing.
Even if no one on the planet has felt this, it doesn't make mine less true.
Today's Deep Breath: a practical juju nugget, a collective Next Best Decision.
I had a conversation with two dear friends about flowing downstream.
You've probably heard of Flow, a state where you get in a groove with work or art,
and time seems to evaporate and you're super-productive.
This is similar, but not.
Going downstream is a conceptual analogy for life.
I'm in my boat, and I've got my oars, and I'm trying to build or maintain or create
my life.
We usually paddle.
Downstream is the suggestion that the water will take you where you need to go,
if you are facing in the right direction.
Many of us paddle upstream, working so hard, fighting to get where we think we want to go.
Work, work, work.
My analogy for this was always in an empty room,
where I face the wall and keep trying to walk through it,
and get nowhere.
What I needed to do was turn around and open the door and glide right through.
Hitting the wall often meant I was going the wrong way.
Downstream.
No building. Total freedom.
Step outside, the sky, water, lush plant life.
Not man-made.
And the flow of entering the stream and floating in the direction we need to go is
effortless and lovely,
enjoyable.
Imagine
throwing the oars away.
Trust. You will get to where you want to go.
Without fighting or resisting.
Faith. If it's the right path, you'll feel the flow.