I don’t have enough time.

I don’t have the ____ to do that. Money. Guts. Space. House. Clothing. Face. Butt. 

It’s too hot. Too cold.

I can’t do that to my kids. I have to do it for my kids. For my parents, my spouse, my boss too, maybe.

I don’t know why I did that.

I don’t know why I want that.

I don’t really want that that much.

I thought I had to do it.

They told me to do it.

That’s how I was brought up.

It’s too hard.

It isn’t hard enough.

I was trying to protect you.

I was trying to protect myself.

I don’t have the will power.

I’m too nice to do that.

I’m not nice enough.

I’m the only one who can do it.

No one else can handle it.

I’m too old for that.

I’m still too young.

They told me I couldn’t.

I know I’ll get rejected.

I’m too scared.

It works for everyone else, but never for me.

My time has passed.

My time hasn’t come yet.

I still can’t get over it.

I’ll never get over it.

When I lose the weight.

When I stop smoking.

When I have a ring on my finger.

When I have more money.

When my wrinkles are gone.

When I get the guts to leave.

When I end it.

After I begin it again.

Did I mention I don’t have the time?

What excuses did I miss?

You are seeking instant gratification. The “Magic Pill” theory. Quick weight loss, instant love, one month to riches…blah blah blah. Everyone is promising it. They have “the secret” or “the way.” Even better, they can teach you their secrets and their way! Just call this 1-800 number or give your credit card number or take this pill. We want and expect what we want and expect fast, fast, fast. Everyone else has love at first sight, everyone else loses weight fast, everyone else has enough money…and so on. (We “know” this because they tell us…incessantly.) Then, when we don’t get the thing we so want the way we think everyone else is getting it, we wonder. We question. We may be pissed off. We are disappointed.

You are waiting on something external to happen or change before you can feel happy or complete. When the relationship is better…When his busy season at work is over…When my kids are older…When we have a baby together…When I lose the weight…When I stop smoking…When I get my resume together…When the divorce is final…When I move to a different place…When my boss realizes how valuable I am…We “when” and “if” ourselves to death. Meanwhile, we conveniently neglect to remember that we already have all we need to feel happy or complete and that it is all already within us. Because it’s so much easier to want to get it from somewhere else. It’s much easier to not have to deal with all that internal stuff, anyway. And, then, you know what? Sometimes, when the external thing does happen or change, we realize we are still just as hesitant or unhappy or dissatisfied as we were before. That’s like a double disappointment.

You ignore your gut. This is a simple yet not-so-simple one.  You go with the “shoulds” and “supposed tos” and do your level best to ignore the voice inside that is telling you things like “This isn’t right!” and “You don’t need to do this” and “This is a total waste of your time,” or, simply “No!” In our quest to not disappoint others and to be and do the way we think we should or or are supposed to be and do, we follow scripts with names like: “Because This Is The Way It Is Supposed To Be.” These scripts are almost always bombs (not the good kind) because, well, doing things with half a heart and a whole lot of guilt or false sense of duty is a surefire way to end up in a whole lot of disappointment. And the bonus disappointment? The person or people you felt you were doing this “for” usually aren’t so pleased either. Lose-lose.

There is The Day Of, and then there is, inevitably, The Day After.

Sometimes, yesterday was something hard — too long, too much, to stressful, too all over the place.

But there is always The Day After. A chance to fix what didn’t work. To move on from what you can’t change. To let go of whatever you can.

A clean slate. A new sunrise.A different way.A better habit. A bigger smile. A better way.

A new chance. A gift. That comes automatically (until the day it doesn’t).

A chance for something better: A better reaction, a better night’s sleep, a better diet, better choices. A new chance for a new chance: To heal, to love, to breathe in and out with ease.

Today is The Day After Yesterday. Yesterday, I didn’t get it all right. I did too much. I didn’t do enough. I didn’t get to it. I forgot. I remembered. I slipped up. I hated it. I loved it. I wasn’t sure. I made an excuse. I bowed out. I wanted in. I gave. I took it all in, too. 

Tomorrow, today will be The Day After.

Only Today is the Sure Thing. Your “now” is in today. Your breath is in today. Your “yes” is in today, and your “no” is in today. Everything you need (maybe not all you want) is in today.

The Day After is not a sure thing. When you are blessed with it, use it wisely. Make change. Make peace. Make a way. Your way. 

No guarantee.

We know all the comparisons between life and a roller coaster:

Up and down.

Wobbly.

Creaky.

Free-falling.

Anticipation.

Fear.

Ecstacy.

Let’s do it again.

Make it stop.

One more time.

OMG never again.

I think some people are so much better-equipped than others to handle the roller coaster of life. Maybe it is their nature, maybe it is in their genes, maybe both. They enjoy the anticipation, they relish the free-fall, they smile through the slow lagging times.

Me? Not so much. I’m really not all that good at it, especially the part where you’re low down and think: “Is this it?” “Is it over?” “I’m so done with this roller coaster B.S.” I do it, but it doesn’t thrill me or move me to my core. Sometimes I go through the motions.

I always loved the declaration of the cute little grandmother in the great movie “Parenthood:”

You know, it was just so interesting to me that a ride could make me so frightened, so scared, so sick, so excited, and so thrilled all together! Some didn’t like it. They went on the merry-go-round. That just goes around. Nothing. I like the roller coaster. You get more out of it.

I loved the idea of her being a Roller Coaster Girl. But I never felt like one. Maybe some people are better suited to the Merry-Go-Round Life. It’s not as exciting, but it isn’t as jarring either. Maybe the Merry-Go-Round is too easy, though. Too much of a comfort zone. Too much settling.

Guess what? Today, I am just not sure. Today, I don’t know.

What about YOU…are you a willing Roller Coaster Person or are you happy with the Merry-Go-Round?

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I am so psyched to be a new contributor to The Change Life Network (TCLN),

Read my interview about managing and muddling through life’s inevitable transitions here. And be sure to check out some amazing articles on the site, as well as mine monthly.

Ch, ch, ch, ch, ch, changes…

Today I have a long list of work deadlines.

I am feeling doubt and stress about being able to tackle it all in one day. I am unable to really focus, in my usual way, on this blog post. I thought about getting out of it, but the writing plan I am committed to is every weekday, no excuses. So here I am.

The inspiration for this post is the poem “Comes The Dawn.” It was my favorite 20 (!!) years ago in college, and more powerful than ever, for me, even today. I have included the full text of the poem at the end of this post. I am working being more powerful, more proactive, more self-focused (yes, self-focused) when it comes to my own goodbyes.

What are you holding on to?

Hanging on to too, too tightly?

What holds on to you?

We don’t move on until we let go. Until we untangle its too-tight grip from our arm, our side, our heart.

Hanging on to the old, the stale, the no-good and the wrong bogs us down, strangles us, suffocates and mires down.

Goodbye is about saying yes to the unknown. We don’t heal until we open to the unknown.We don’t forgive until we say goodbye to blame.

Goodbye is not scary; the unknown is scary. And, oftentimes, we avoid the unknown.

Goodbyes can be about people, relationships. jobs, ideas, papers, photos, furniture, clothing and hopes. Goodbye is about anything you cling and think, “This time it will be different.” Goodbye is about being worried that what you know is better than what you don’t know. Goodbye is about “maybe” and “what if” and “but.” It is about foregoing the need to control, overcoming the fear of disappointing “them,” shifting your focus back to what matters….yourself.

Healing starts with goodbye. Love starts with goodbye. Nobody, nothing can keep us down or hold us back. Only we can do that to ourselves. Same goes for goodbye. Only we can manage our own goodbyes.

So switch around your expectations, adjust your outlook and put yourself first.

For once. Choose you.

Nobody else will do it for you. Nobody else will say your goodbyes. Nobody else will remind you that there is no “hello” without a “goodbye.”

Start practicing. A Goodbye Practice. It is the most loving, compassionate thing you can do for yourself right now.

Say goodbye. To something. Starting today.

Comes the Dawn
Veronica A. Shoffstall

After a while you learn the subtle difference

Between holding a hand and chaining a soul

And you learn that love doesn’t mean security,

And you begin to learn that kisses aren’t contracts

And presents aren’t promises.

And you begin to accept your defeats

With your head up and your eyes open,

With the grace of an adult, not the grief of a child.

And you learn to build all your roads on today,

Because tomorrow’s ground is too uncertain.

And futures have a way of falling down in mid-flight.

After a while you learn that even sunshine

Burns if you get too much.

So you plant your own garden and decorate

Your own soul, instead of waiting

For someone to bring you flowers

And you learn that you really can endure.
That you really are strong,

And you really do have worth

And you learn and learn and learn.

With every goodbye you learn.

“I was gratified to be able to answer promptly. I said I don’t know” ~ Mark Twain

At some point, I was told I was smart.

So I became a Smart Girl.

Which was cool, and certainly better than a Stupid Girl, but being a Smart Girl means that you have to be, well, smart.

All the time.

Living up to the Smart Girl title was a 24/7/365 job.

Well, at least it was for me. Not because I wasn’t smart – I was, and it was an accurate title. But  I was so Type A and such a perfectionist that I had to be all-smart, all-the time. It became impossible for me to believe that someone else was smarter than I, than they had done better than I on a task or a test. That they knew more about some area than I did, that they could beat me in word games or out-answer me in Trivial Pursuit.

This was my superpower, and no one could out-superpower me.

It didn’t occur to me that I was hardly alone in my smartness.

And, God bless them, the adults who surrounded me as I grew up did lots to contribute to my beliefs of my own smartness. So you can imagine what life has been like as a smart adult who realizes that there are other smart people to be found.

Like, everywhere.

So what did I do with all of this information, this cold splash of reality?

I allowed it to annoy me for a while. It upset me. It derailed me. It worked in cohoots with my ego, convincing me to not try or put myself out there for fear of being outsmarted. It made me question every other belief I had about myself and my abilities.

It was blah blah blah for some time.

Then, I began to use this realization as the gift that it is.

I don’t have to know everything.

I am perfect despite not knowing everything.

It doesn’t matter whether someone else thinks I am smart (or not).

I don’t need to know all the answers.

I don’t have to pretend when I don’t get it at all.

Maybe I’m not even that smart after all. And maybe I don’t even care!

I can say I don’t know.

And If I don’t want to know or I don’t need to know, there is nothing — absolutely nothing! — that says I have to know. And, really, the world at large doesn’t care whether I know. I shouldn’t, either.

What a freakin’ relief.

I. Don’t. Know.

Not everyone is going to want to hear what you have to say.

Not everyone will care about your story,

Not everyone will read your words.

Not everyone will hear you, really hear you, or see you, really see you.

Not everyone will give a damn about any of it.

Not everyone is going to like your truth.

And that is OK.

That shouldn’t deter you, nor should it stop you.

You may even disappoint some of “them.” Actually, you will very likely disappoint some of them. Sometimes more than some. They will let you know that, too. They’ll question it, they’ll question you. Then you will question you, too.

You will probably at some point surprise them with what they think is your new-found independence or free-thinking ways or weird ideas or crazy notions about who you are and what you want. They don’t like to be surprised.

They’ll wonder what happened to the “old” you. The one that was easier for them to swallow. The one that didn’t confuse them. The one who didn’t question. The one who let things lie. The one who sought less and sat back more. The one who kept her mouth shut. The one who kept his big dreams to himself. 

They’ll urge you to drop this nonsense and to stop being so silly. They’ll remind you of how reasonable and practical you “really” are.

They’ll do their best to remind you of who they think you should be.

That is all OK, too.

You’ll feel guilty for “shaking things up.”

You’ll feel scared to rock the boat.

You’ll feel that now is not the time.

You’ll feel you need to think of everyone else before you can have the luxury of dealing with your own truth.

That is all OK, too.

No one but you owns your truth. But others will try to inhabit it.

No one but you can tell your truth. But others will try to shape it.

No one but you shares your truth. But others will try to lump it with so many others.

No one but you knows your truth. And you can share it proudly, boldly, unequivocally.

That is all OK, too.

Now may not be right. Now may be scary.

But…when will “now” come?  When they stop being disappointed and surprised and disrupted? When you are ready and things change and this happens so that can happen so the other things can happen?

When will “now” really be right now?

Just wondering.

It is #2 of the beautiful, brilliant Four Agreements: Don’t Take Anything Personally.

Yet, we do. We so do. 

We make entire movies in our heads about what someone did, or didn’t do, or said, or didn’t say, or meant, or may have meant, or didn’t mean….and so on. We obsess over what they must be thinking or what they really meant. We act as if they are as focused on us as we are focused on us.

But…these movies are fiction, stories. They are not in actuality related in any way to the true story. Not to our truth, and certainly not to others’, either.

Most people, including you and me, are so caught up in their own thoughts and stories and worries and regrets and plans that we have only a teeny-tiny space left in our brain (if that) to devote to things that are not in some way personal to us. That’s not to say that most people don’t care about anything outside themselves, because most do. There just isn’t a ton of space left to actively care as much as we think they do or as much as we care about ourselves.

This isn’t selfish, this is reality.  Focusing on our own selves is a way of self-love, not an act of selfishness.

And, yet, so many of our worries and anxieties and regrets are all about “they” and “them” and their opinion and their role. 

Example: Yesterday, someone I’d known for nearly 20 years defriended me on Facebook. On the surface, I could only assume (Agreement #3: Don’t Make Assumptions) that this person was upset/angry/offended by my post on eating bacon freely and my living in a way that does not jive with her religious beliefs. I am a fiercely strong believer in the “Live and Let Live” approach to life; that doesn’t mean everyone else is, though. 

After my initial surprise by these actions, it was obvious to me almost immediately that this person’s actions had absolutely nothing to do with me. So I tried to use the situation to teach myself a new lesson or two about taking things personally:

• This person’s actions had nothing to do with me.

• This person’s actions were in response to their own internal issues, questions, debates.

• This person’s own internal issues, questions and debates are not my business, not my concern, and not my responsibility.

• And, most importantly, this person’s opinion of me is not important to anyone but this person. Not because it is likely not a positive opinion, but because, ultimately, what someone else thinks of me is none of my business.

I allowed myself to feel compassion for them, and for myself. I also allowed myself to feel the enormous relief that comes with not feeling I need to take on other people’s issues anymore. I can’t fix this or change it or control it. And that is something very relieving to me. It is also something that makes accepting and moving on all the more easy.

I’m grateful for the reminder of the lesson. Lessening the amount of space in my head taken up by the whats and whys and hows of other people will go a long way in strengthening my own what and why and how.

Now, go and enjoy some bacon. Or not. And while you are at it, try not to take anything personally.

When I was a kid, I was not allowed to eat bacon.

No ifs, ands or buts.

Why? Because it was against my religion.

Literally.

And, yet, I saw other friends, whom I knew were of the same religion, eating bacon freely. It didn’t make sense, but I followed the rules. Who knows why they were allowed, why they were free to eat bacon, and I wasn’t. Was more expected of me? Were there different levels of religion? Did God look at me differently? Or did their parents simply not care as much as mine did?

Sure, there were other foods — sausage, ham, shrimp, lobster, for instance — that were also forbidden to me through my religion. But I didn’t want any of them. They looked, smelled and seemed gross to me. To this day, they still do. If others were eating those foods, I ate something else. A burger. Chicken. Pasta. Whatever I ate was fine, and I enjoyed it.

I didn’t feel I was missing out.

But the bacon was different.

Because I wanted to eat the bacon.

As I grew older, I began to eat bacon here and there. I couldn’t resist. It smelled so good. It seemed so crispy. Everyone talked about it so much. So here and there, I’d sneak it in: A friend’s house. A college “breakfast” at 2:00 in the afternoon. On a bagel sandwich. I worried that “someone” would find out and think differently of me.

I loved it. So much. But I felt bad. So bad. Guilty. Obviously, I was doing something wrong. Letting someone down. Letting my parents down. Not representing my religion in the way that it deserved. Not acting like the nice Jewish girl I was always assured I was. And if my Bubby found out I’d eated bacon, she may never be able to look at me in the same way again.

Oy.

So guess what I did? I married someone who also forbade me from eating bacon. Sure, I was an adult now. But I was nothing if not a rule follower. And I respected the person I’d married. If he thought bacon was bad, and my parents had thought bacon was bad, then surely it was bad? And maybe I, too, was bad because I still wanted to have it every once in a while? Yes, it must be me. My problem. My shortcoming. My weakness.

Then we had kids who were also brought up to avoid bacon. Forbidden. Bad. Not acceptable for our family. Years later, the marriage ended. It didn’t occur to me for some time that I was actually free to eat bacon on an as-wanted basis.

I’d actually been able to eat whatever I wanted, at least from age 18 on. But I was scared to eat it. I was scared to admit that what I’d been brought up to believe maybe did not apply to me in every way. That the religion that had been so important to my parents, to the father of my children, to my teachers and community, was not a one-size-fits-all garment. That the strong foundation I thought I’d been given maybe did not actually reflect who I really was inside. That, ultimately, what I’d believed to be law was, in fact, a preference, a choice, a way of life…but not a law.

 Who wants to admit all that? Who can even begin to see and acknowledge all of that?

So, today, I eat bacon freely. I enjoy it. I understand, now, finally, what all the hype is about. Bacon works for me. I no longer feel any guilt around bacon. I do refrain, out of respect for their father, from eating bacon around my kids.

You may have a “bacon” too. I’m not telling you to ingest it or rub it all over you or bathe in it. It may not even be food. It may be something you enjoy, something you crave, something that moves you. It is also something that you’d been taught was bad, shameful maybe, unacceptable for sure. Chances are, as an adult, you are free to have that thing in your life. Chances are also that you are scared, hesitant, maybe even disappointed in yourself for wanting it.

Whatever it is, you are not bad for wanting or enjoying or seeking it out. You are human, and in my humble opinion, the world has more problems than who is eating bacon or its equivalent.

Be free and, if you so desire, eat bacon. Lots of it.

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