Updating the Miles

So far, so good.

I'm at 44 miles.  #milesformilitary

You can find the post Here

I've walked, run, and most recently ... biked.  Wowsa!  I got the stationary hummmmmmin' today!!

It's all good.  And it's all to honor my son and our military.

Seriously, it's the very littlest least I can do.

Won't you consider joining me?  Add your miles to mine.  We can do this -

for them.

Courage. Kindness. Friendship. Character. These are the qualities that define us as human beings, and propel us, on occasion, to greatness.  

-R.J. Palacio, WONDER

Hope and More Hope

I write in my head all the time.  Not so much on the blog.  Sorry about that.

Truth is, I'm not sure this is the format for me.  I'm not sure what I want to write or where I want to write.  When I can write is also an issue.  Not much spare time 'round these parts.

Still.

I hear voices in my head - and surprisingly they're mine.  And since they don't seem to go away, they'll be needing some expression along the way - either here or in some new place like here.

I've been keeping a daybook again.  Maybe it's there I will find my writer's voice again.

Thinking about ...

How to define goals so they're achievable.
How to use time well.
Smiling more.  Complaining less.
The word:  ENJOY
Signs of spring and rebirth and hope.
Grief in its many forms.
Learning. Creating.  Especially creating.
Rest.
What I'm eating - and what I should be eating.
Weakness.  Plural.
Spirit.

And more hope.  There's hope in this minute and hope for the one to follow.


I'll try to be around more.  Thanks for checking in.

Miles for Our Military

When I ran a marathon several years ago, it was helpful and motivating to dedicate each mile of the 26.2 as I ran it.  I ran miles for my children, my mother, my students, and so on.

As I ran this morning, I thought about the connection between a marathon and a military deployment - which almost certainly feels like a marathon for everyone involved.

My son is scheduled to return in May.  I've committed to running 100 miles (or more) before his return.  I dedicate each and every mile to him and other troops deployed so far from home.

If you need a little motivation, if you'd like to do something to support the marathon mission of our troops and their deployment, or if you'd like a really good reason to get yourself in shape, won't you join me?  Run, walk, swim, bike ... let's count those miles and let our troops know we're behind them!

Connect with me in comments or tweet me your miles @1hopefulyear  I'll keep a total tally and post the miles we've collectively logged in honor of our military.  I'll also make sure the right folks get the messaged.

Let's log some Miles for Our Military!

Joy Robbers

Ever been sailing along, life smooth as silky summer water, and hit a sudden storm of insecurity?

Just happened to me.

Twin joy robbers - criticism and self-doubt - slapped me upside the head last week and it still stings.  The criticism was swift, but unexpected, and knocked me to the ground.  Self-doubt and disappointment soon followed.  For a few days, everything I thought I knew about myself hovered like a question mark over my self-image. 

Perhaps I shouldn't allow the judgement of others to rob me of my joy, but it sometimes does.
Perhaps I shouldn't allow a quick critical moment to steal days away from my self-confidence, but that's sometimes how it feels to be me. 

What to do?
How to slap a patch on your ego and sail on?

This time around I studied my response and recovery time.  Here's what I learned:

Sit with it a bit.  While the initial fight or flight response is instinctive, resist the urge to go out and make it all better or run away and hide.  Sit with it.  Be patient.

Reflect.  After the initial shock's worn off, you'll be better prepared to reflect both on the message and the messenger.  I asked myself:  What am I supposed to learn from this?

Allow time to heal.  Stingers like these a sharp at first but eventually fade.

Remenber.  You are not the sum of one person's opinion.  But consider the parts and pieces of you from their point of view.  The eye of another beholder can be a powerful tool in your belt.

 

Ask.  How much significance is one drop in your waterfall?

Barbara

Up-ing the Down

It's so hard to feel hopeful some days. Maybe we know the source of the happy leak and maybe we don't, but either some knowledge or none does little to fix the funk or up the down.  It takes effort.  Roll up the sleeves and grab the shovel WORK.  Push, pull, yank, and tug.  Petulant - sometimes even kicking and screaming - we need to find our way out of ourselves long enough to get out in the open air, look around, and see life ain't so bad after all. 

So ... how to go about up-ing the down?

Move. Any kind of movement works.  Make the bed.  Go  for a walk.  Sweep the floor.  Move you and you'll move your mood.

Listen.  A little music interrupts the spinning cycle of your own thoughts.  Start slow and work your way up in tempo and groove.  Hum.  Sing.  Dance.  (See above.)

Smell.  A little olfactory disruption works wonders.  Light a scented candle. Brew a pot of coffee or sip some peppermint tea.  My go to:  bake a batch of chocolate chip cookies.  Ahhhh.  Comfort on a cookie sheet.

Do.  Completing just one procrastinated or dreaded task bosses a mood around.  Get busy.  Busy people won't wallow. 

Create. Make something where once was nothing.  Cook.  Paint.  Write.  Build.  Plant.  Sketch.  The verbs of new hope.


Organize.  Order the chaos.  File the bills.  Dejunk the drawer.  Empty the inbox.

Read.  Go somewhere entirely different from where you are in a matter of minutes.

Clean.  Shine is hope's spotlight.  Hard not to be hopeful when the laundry's folded and the floors are swept.

Give.  Of yourself.  Your time.  Your attention.  Who needs you?  Be the hope.

Help.  What can you do to up someone else's down?

Pray.  God knows what you need and when you need it.  Have faith.  Your hope will be restored.

What makes hope so hard to hold on to?

Hope's a slippery thing to hold onto.  Reach up to wipe one of life's tears from your eye, and hope fumbles from your hand, bounces on the floor, and rolls under the couch.  Hidden there among the dust bunnies and a few runaway M&Ms, you'll need to look for it, sometimes stretching as far as your hand can reach before you're able to wrap your fingers around it again.

What makes hope so hard to hang onto?


Criticism pops hope's balloon - sometimes startling so - and we are unprepared for its aftermath. How shaky we feel minutes, hours, and even days later.  Once firm ground doesn't feel quite so solid.  Confidence wavers. Doubt rises.  And hope's drifted away.

Criticism destructs.  Hope constructs.  And it's hard to rebuild sometimes.  We stack each block of advice we've ever heard about overcoming criticism, but the ego's still a little shaky.  Consider the source.  Learn and move on.  Surround yourself with nourishing people.  We know all that, but criticism - even just implied criticism -  moves right into the ground floor of our consciousness, an unwelcome squatter crowding out all the good stuff we know to be true about ourselves.  No compliment ever seems to build us as high as criticism knocks us down. 

Disappointment.  Another hope-foe.  Disappointment in ourselves, in others, even in hope itself, disappointment wraps around us and smothers us.  If we are to remain hope-full, we have to believe in second chances.  We have to allow ourselves some do-overs.  We seek out new beginnings and fresh starts.  Disappointment can devastate, but it can also motivate.  A multi-feathered phoenix from the ashes, hope can rise again in a new day, new year, new job, or a new relationship.  We are hopers for happy endings.  All's well that ends well.  A place where everything old is renewed again.

Worry.  Large, small, and even nagging niggling little worries are hope's party crashers.  Often showing up late to the show and when we're at our most vulnerable, worry is the great what-if.  We what-if all night long, tossing and turning and churning up worst-case scenario after worst-case scenario.  Hope's never awake at 2 a.m., but worry's an insomniac and wants a little company.  Prayers and deep-breathing and faith and sometimes sheer tenacity can overcome worry.  Life's greatest waste of time, worry lives simultaneously in our past, present, and future.  In the morning, hope has to lift the shades, push back the curtains, and open a window to the light and fresh air of the here and now. 

Regret.  All the once upon a time beginnings we didn't quite see through to the end.  All our should haves but did nots.   The might have beens but were nots. Regret is a rusty wheel refusing to spin and move us forward.  A detailed list of failures, people we could have been, decisions we made and wish we hadn't, regret challenges hope by pointing its crooked old finger back to where we have been, while hope stubbornly looks ahead to where we want to go next.

Hope dares to be happy.  Hope is the better and born-again reincarnation of criticism, disappointment, worry, and regret.  Refusing to abandon us, hope waits like a forgotten five dollar bill in last year's coat, and we delight in its discovery and smile a bit at our unexpected good fortune. Hope helps us do the next day, whether we want to or not,  with a faint whisper of encouragement, "I know you can." 

Photo Source

Enough Said

I've been living the New Year for just shy of two weeks now.  New resolutions can be found in every print and social media source around.  I'm just not that into it.  I'm just not.  I'm naturally self-reflective every damn day and honestly, it gets even more exhausting at the starting line of a new year when everything I'm not but want to be is thrust into life's social spotlight for the world to see.

As an educator, I evaluate my performance day to day and sometimes even period to period.  I'm forever and always trying to do it - this entrusted teaching of children - better, faster, stronger, smarter.  The combination of my perfectionist personality and today's diverse and often expressed opinions about the state of learning in our country has me like a frustrated dog chasing its own tail.  I feel flustered, confused, and overall underachieving ... which bewilders and saddens me given how hard I work.

The buzz words are many.  Engagement.  Assessment.  Technology.  Common Core.  Testing.  Testing.  And more testing.  And on and on and on.  My students aren't reading enough ... or they're not reading slowly enough, or deeply enough, or reading text of sufficient complexity.  They're not writing enough or in the most important formats.  I'm not integrating technology to the level I should so my students are producers rather than consumers.  We don't have a blog - yet - and so our opportunities for authentic audience are few.

And on and on and on.

And that's just my professional self.

The me of me isn't thin enough, healthy enough, and my face wears too many wrinkles.  I need to do more.  I need to do less.  I need to do more with less.  I need to save more, plan more, and stay active.  By anyone's standards, I'm not organized enough, and many's the night the dinner dishes stay in the sink until morning.  My best conversations with my young adult sons are by text, so clearly I'm a face-to-face parenting failure.

I never feel I am enough.  In any aspect of my life.

So I say enough is enough. 

I want to pay more attention to how I feel rather than what I do - or don't do.  I'm done with multi-tasking, to-do lists, and trying to do more in less time.  I want to guide my life by my own internal compass, and quiet the incessant background chatter long enough to hear myself think.  Because I'm smart, strong, capable, sensitive, sincere, and hard-working.  I believe in me.

And I'm enough.

Barbara