Full Version: A Time to Find Out Its Okay to Just BE
As I watch the snow drift silently past my window, early winter having set in without warning, apparently - I find myself caught in a very strange conundrum.
I have felt the winter changes of menopause and its signal that the end of this mortal toil is approaching,warning me to slow down and enjoy the gentle curve just about to straighten ahead. A part of me is wondering how to deal with that and a part of me is terrified of it. Not of the end, not of death or what lies beyond, but rather, what lies fallow within me now. Perhaps, what has always been there but I had forgotten it somehow. I have been a hard driving type A in my own small and rather unimportant way. I don't have a college degree, never made enough money to actually live on and didn't succeed in putting my name in lights anywhere on this spinning globe. In that, I feel distinct self disappointment. I never amounted to much. Here I am, fifty years old and never amounted to "much."
Then this other part of me chimes in and demands that I consider what "much" is. I didn't take much either. I didn't' demand much from life. I never asked for riches or a grand house, fabulous clothes, alot of friends or a nice new car. I never demanded it and never had it. What did I have? I had the privilege of staying home and raising my two children in the safety of the knowledge nobody else was doing it. It was me. I could hold them, love them, teach them...guide them and by GOD, why didn't I do more of that? Why did I spend that time with my head full of young dreams for myself? Dreams I would never completely fulfill. Why did I dream it away when I could have lived those days so much fuller? "Much." There was much more I could have done with and for my children. But I hated my husband in those years. I hated his anger and abusive temper. I hated his selfishness. I hated his disrespect for me and our children. I think I dreamt away so many of those years because it was easier than being fully cognizant of the circumstances I chose to remain within.
From the outside, I appeared the bad guy. The nagging, critical wife. That was my modus operandi. I was nagging and critical in public because I wasn't anything "much" in private except a household servant and sex object. That's how it felt to me but I know that perspective is also deeply slanted by pain. He wanted to be more than his behaviors but I couldn't accept those two men in one body. The one who was cruel and the one who wanted to please me. The way it ended up, I just wanted to get through the job of raising my kids as well as I could manage it and keep my sanity at the same time. I cried everyday....or nearly everyday. I had a cruel, abusive, insecure, bullying husband at home who acted like he couldn't do enough to please me in public. It made me feel insane. Nobody believed me who saw me from that polite distance everybody but family sees you from. But I would not leave him. I wanted to with all my heart and when I finally made up my mind to do it....it was too late. You see, I had a promise. I was left with a promise that he would surely change. Oh, yes - he surely did when age made its demands upon him. He went from that hard driving, type A "I MUST SUCCEED AT ALL COSTS" bullying male to a soft version of himself. Soft, in every way! The change was so dramatic everybody noticed it, not just me. But why did it come after the kids were grown and left home? Why didn't it happen when they really could have used a caring, guiding father? I cannot make that go away. It just IS.
It IS like I AM. Here I am, watching the snow drifting past newly turned pale olive and orange leaves with crimson tips. It is perfectly clear these trees weren't expecting winter so suddenly. Neither was I. A part of my soul is still so very green even as my mortality turns pale olive with orange and crimson tips. I wrinkle as the leaves wrinkle in the cold. I cannot stop the leaves and I cannot stop me from these changes. The outside changes are a little more subtle (to others, not me) than the inside changes. These are the truly surprising ones. As it turns out, I don't know how to be a non type A person. I don't know how to let all the details casually slip away so I can focus on just that one thing I am doing at this moment. But I have to. The details will no longer remain within my grasp; either in my head or my hands. They keep slipping away. It appears to me, that all I have is this one moment and this one day and there may be nothing else. All that is behind is fading away and all that is ahead remains a distant, blank page...unknown for the greater part.
When I consider that I no longer have ANY hard driving goals, no great passions and no driving pursuits, I feel utterly lost. Yet, here I sit typing immovably implanted in my place and time just as those trees outside my window. They are collecting snow on their branches and its rather pretty. It is softly, quietly pretty the way the white snow accumulates over the top of those crimson tipped, pale olive leafed branches. The snow of wisdom is accumulating over my body and soul in a similar fashion. I hope to God it is as softly attractive as what I see out there before me today. The snow of white hair and eyelashes...the snow of forgetfulness over the hard driving goals I once held so dear. When it is finally done snowing and winter has set in, what will there be left of the young me?
What am I beyond my goals and pursuits? What am I beyond my dreams of accomplishment? When age and wisdom simultaneously overtake youth and ambition, what remains? At fifty, I still fear I am a growing disappointment to my parents. They had such dreams for me. Dreams they felt would never be within their own reaches. Is that where my own dreams sprang from? Did they bubble up from their mutual well of low self-esteem before I was born? When I look inside, well, may I? I am so afraid of it now. What do I really see? What do I really want? I want peace. Yes. I want hope. Yes. I want joy. Yes. I want to be important and needed and respected and honored. I want to be regarded as a source of wisdom and healing. What else? I want enthusiasm for ME. I want to feel enthusiasm and enjoyment in ME. IN being ME. In my life as it is NOW. Where does that come from? How do I find it?
It seems I am re-writing the script for my life. I am rewriting it without any clue how to form the words that will make sense to me and make me feel important, valuable...no, invaluable. What is the importance of ME? Where is the starting place, the wellspring of self esteem? My mother mentors say it is in the knowledge that God loves you and you are His child. I acknowledge freely that and I am happy in that knowledge. But what about ME? Me, myself, I? All alone, aside from anything or anyone else...what is my value to ME? How do I evaluate my own importance? Am I capable of such a task? Where would I begin such an evaluation? Based upon the things I've done? The people I may have helped? The animals I've cared for? The flowers I've tended? The things I've said or left unsaid? The answer must be extremely simple because I've completely overlooked it. It is surely one of those details that I've lost the ability to hold onto. May I rejoice in the fact that I just AM? Can I be content that I am? Is it enough to exist? To have existed? To go on existing?
What if I exist just to enjoy existing? May I do that? Can I let myself just enjoy my existence without adding goals and accomplishments onto it? What if finding joy in just living were enough? Could I make that my goal and live in the contentment of that accomplishment? With the right mindset, it is doable. In fact, it's far more doable than most of my dreams of youth and all of the unheralded goals I've accomplished so far. Is this the winter of the human soul? The final stage before making the grand or not so grand exit? What is so very familiar about this premise is that it is the very stage all children naturally exist in...until they grow up. Children do not think about their existence, They also accept their importance without deeper contemplation. They content themselves in just living. They manage miracles with the seemingly mundane. They can make a day out of gathering stones and turning them into whatever their little hearts imagine. They spend hours chasing bugs and butterflies and skipping stones across water. They gather sticks and bones and they never worry about their next meal or whether they will sleep that night. What if I forgot about and left behind all the hard driving goals and ideas of success I grew up with and embraced the wonder of the mundane world around me? What if I thought a great more about the way food tasted than how fast I could get it down? What if I could lay in bed and instead of planning tomorrows list of chores (goals) I just went to sleep and dreamt of sweet things?
Perhaps the reason grandparents are much better parents than parents is because they have left adulthood behind to embrace the beauty of childhood again. They can relate to children better. They are no longer ashamed of childish things and silly behavior. I believe that is where I am headed. But oh, the distinct shrinking pains of leaving behind the adult world of great dreams and goals; of intentionally abandoning that incessant need to be heard and seen amongst the throng of my peers for the mystical beauty of the mundane world. What if this part of life is all about rediscovering the mundane world that we have so long ignored by choosing to embrace the grand privilege of simply existing well?
Menopause for me is God's way of telling me to slow down, reflect and finally start to enjoy the blessing he has bestowed upon me instead of constantly striving for more. Menopause=enough, at least for me. I want to start living for the beauty in life. I want to make friends who will remember me and miss me when I'm gone. I can look back on the last 43 years and say it was hard but it got me where I am today. I want to look back after the next 43 years and think "this was fun".
QUOTE (frozentundra @ Oct 12 2009, 02:06 PM) 
As I watch the snow drift silently past my window, early winter having set in without warning, apparently - I find myself caught in a very strange conundrum.
I have felt the winter changes of menopause and its signal that the end of this mortal toil is approaching,warning me to slow down and enjoy the gentle curve just about to straighten ahead. A part of me is wondering how to deal with that and a part of me is terrified of it. Not of the end, not of death or what lies beyond, but rather, what lies fallow within me now. Perhaps, what has always been there but I had forgotten it somehow. I have been a hard driving type A in my own small and rather unimportant way. I don't have a college degree, never made enough money to actually live on and didn't succeed in putting my name in lights anywhere on this spinning globe. In that, I feel distinct self disappointment. I never amounted to much. Here I am, fifty years old and never amounted to "much."
Then this other part of me chimes in and demands that I consider what "much" is. I didn't take much either. I didn't' demand much from life. I never asked for riches or a grand house, fabulous clothes, alot of friends or a nice new car. I never demanded it and never had it. What did I have? I had the privilege of staying home and raising my two children in the safety of the knowledge nobody else was doing it. It was me. I could hold them, love them, teach them...guide them and by GOD, why didn't I do more of that? Why did I spend that time with my head full of young dreams for myself? Dreams I would never completely fulfill. Why did I dream it away when I could have lived those days so much fuller? "Much." There was much more I could have done with and for my children. But I hated my husband in those years. I hated his anger and abusive temper. I hated his selfishness. I hated his disrespect for me and our children. I think I dreamt away so many of those years because it was easier than being fully cognizant of the circumstances I chose to remain within.
From the outside, I appeared the bad guy. The nagging, critical wife. That was my modus operandi. I was nagging and critical in public because I wasn't anything "much" in private except a household servant and sex object. That's how it felt to me but I know that perspective is also deeply slanted by pain. He wanted to be more than his behaviors but I couldn't accept those two men in one body. The one who was cruel and the one who wanted to please me. The way it ended up, I just wanted to get through the job of raising my kids as well as I could manage it and keep my sanity at the same time. I cried everyday....or nearly everyday. I had a cruel, abusive, insecure, bullying husband at home who acted like he couldn't do enough to please me in public. It made me feel insane. Nobody believed me who saw me from that polite distance everybody but family sees you from. But I would not leave him. I wanted to with all my heart and when I finally made up my mind to do it....it was too late. You see, I had a promise. I was left with a promise that he would surely change. Oh, yes - he surely did when age made its demands upon him. He went from that hard driving, type A "I MUST SUCCEED AT ALL COSTS" bullying male to a soft version of himself. Soft, in every way! The change was so dramatic everybody noticed it, not just me. But why did it come after the kids were grown and left home? Why didn't it happen when they really could have used a caring, guiding father? I cannot make that go away. It just IS.
It IS like I AM. Here I am, watching the snow drifting past newly turned pale olive and orange leaves with crimson tips. It is perfectly clear these trees weren't expecting winter so suddenly. Neither was I. A part of my soul is still so very green even as my mortality turns pale olive with orange and crimson tips. I wrinkle as the leaves wrinkle in the cold. I cannot stop the leaves and I cannot stop me from these changes. The outside changes are a little more subtle (to others, not me) than the inside changes. These are the truly surprising ones. As it turns out, I don't know how to be a non type A person. I don't know how to let all the details casually slip away so I can focus on just that one thing I am doing at this moment. But I have to. The details will no longer remain within my grasp; either in my head or my hands. They keep slipping away. It appears to me, that all I have is this one moment and this one day and there may be nothing else. All that is behind is fading away and all that is ahead remains a distant, blank page...unknown for the greater part.
When I consider that I no longer have ANY hard driving goals, no great passions and no driving pursuits, I feel utterly lost. Yet, here I sit typing immovably implanted in my place and time just as those trees outside my window. They are collecting snow on their branches and its rather pretty. It is softly, quietly pretty the way the white snow accumulates over the top of those crimson tipped, pale olive leafed branches. The snow of wisdom is accumulating over my body and soul in a similar fashion. I hope to God it is as softly attractive as what I see out there before me today. The snow of white hair and eyelashes...the snow of forgetfulness over the hard driving goals I once held so dear. When it is finally done snowing and winter has set in, what will there be left of the young me?
What am I beyond my goals and pursuits? What am I beyond my dreams of accomplishment? When age and wisdom simultaneously overtake youth and ambition, what remains? At fifty, I still fear I am a growing disappointment to my parents. They had such dreams for me. Dreams they felt would never be within their own reaches. Is that where my own dreams sprang from? Did they bubble up from their mutual well of low self-esteem before I was born? When I look inside, well, may I? I am so afraid of it now. What do I really see? What do I really want? I want peace. Yes. I want hope. Yes. I want joy. Yes. I want to be important and needed and respected and honored. I want to be regarded as a source of wisdom and healing. What else? I want enthusiasm for ME. I want to feel enthusiasm and enjoyment in ME. IN being ME. In my life as it is NOW. Where does that come from? How do I find it?
It seems I am re-writing the script for my life. I am rewriting it without any clue how to form the words that will make sense to me and make me feel important, valuable...no, invaluable. What is the importance of ME? Where is the starting place, the wellspring of self esteem? My mother mentors say it is in the knowledge that God loves you and you are His child. I acknowledge freely that and I am happy in that knowledge. But what about ME? Me, myself, I? All alone, aside from anything or anyone else...what is my value to ME? How do I evaluate my own importance? Am I capable of such a task? Where would I begin such an evaluation? Based upon the things I've done? The people I may have helped? The animals I've cared for? The flowers I've tended? The things I've said or left unsaid? The answer must be extremely simple because I've completely overlooked it. It is surely one of those details that I've lost the ability to hold onto. May I rejoice in the fact that I just AM? Can I be content that I am? Is it enough to exist? To have existed? To go on existing?
What if I exist just to enjoy existing? May I do that? Can I let myself just enjoy my existence without adding goals and accomplishments onto it? What if finding joy in just living were enough? Could I make that my goal and live in the contentment of that accomplishment? With the right mindset, it is doable. In fact, it's far more doable than most of my dreams of youth and all of the unheralded goals I've accomplished so far. Is this the winter of the human soul? The final stage before making the grand or not so grand exit? What is so very familiar about this premise is that it is the very stage all children naturally exist in...until they grow up. Children do not think about their existence, They also accept their importance without deeper contemplation. They content themselves in just living. They manage miracles with the seemingly mundane. They can make a day out of gathering stones and turning them into whatever their little hearts imagine. They spend hours chasing bugs and butterflies and skipping stones across water. They gather sticks and bones and they never worry about their next meal or whether they will sleep that night. What if I forgot about and left behind all the hard driving goals and ideas of success I grew up with and embraced the wonder of the mundane world around me? What if I thought a great more about the way food tasted than how fast I could get it down? What if I could lay in bed and instead of planning tomorrows list of chores (goals) I just went to sleep and dreamt of sweet things?
Perhaps the reason grandparents are much better parents than parents is because they have left adulthood behind to embrace the beauty of childhood again. They can relate to children better. They are no longer ashamed of childish things and silly behavior. I believe that is where I am headed. But oh, the distinct shrinking pains of leaving behind the adult world of great dreams and goals; of intentionally abandoning that incessant need to be heard and seen amongst the throng of my peers for the mystical beauty of the mundane world. What if this part of life is all about rediscovering the mundane world that we have so long ignored by choosing to embrace the grand privilege of simply existing well?
I have felt the winter changes of menopause and its signal that the end of this mortal toil is approaching,warning me to slow down and enjoy the gentle curve just about to straighten ahead. A part of me is wondering how to deal with that and a part of me is terrified of it. Not of the end, not of death or what lies beyond, but rather, what lies fallow within me now. Perhaps, what has always been there but I had forgotten it somehow. I have been a hard driving type A in my own small and rather unimportant way. I don't have a college degree, never made enough money to actually live on and didn't succeed in putting my name in lights anywhere on this spinning globe. In that, I feel distinct self disappointment. I never amounted to much. Here I am, fifty years old and never amounted to "much."
Then this other part of me chimes in and demands that I consider what "much" is. I didn't take much either. I didn't' demand much from life. I never asked for riches or a grand house, fabulous clothes, alot of friends or a nice new car. I never demanded it and never had it. What did I have? I had the privilege of staying home and raising my two children in the safety of the knowledge nobody else was doing it. It was me. I could hold them, love them, teach them...guide them and by GOD, why didn't I do more of that? Why did I spend that time with my head full of young dreams for myself? Dreams I would never completely fulfill. Why did I dream it away when I could have lived those days so much fuller? "Much." There was much more I could have done with and for my children. But I hated my husband in those years. I hated his anger and abusive temper. I hated his selfishness. I hated his disrespect for me and our children. I think I dreamt away so many of those years because it was easier than being fully cognizant of the circumstances I chose to remain within.
From the outside, I appeared the bad guy. The nagging, critical wife. That was my modus operandi. I was nagging and critical in public because I wasn't anything "much" in private except a household servant and sex object. That's how it felt to me but I know that perspective is also deeply slanted by pain. He wanted to be more than his behaviors but I couldn't accept those two men in one body. The one who was cruel and the one who wanted to please me. The way it ended up, I just wanted to get through the job of raising my kids as well as I could manage it and keep my sanity at the same time. I cried everyday....or nearly everyday. I had a cruel, abusive, insecure, bullying husband at home who acted like he couldn't do enough to please me in public. It made me feel insane. Nobody believed me who saw me from that polite distance everybody but family sees you from. But I would not leave him. I wanted to with all my heart and when I finally made up my mind to do it....it was too late. You see, I had a promise. I was left with a promise that he would surely change. Oh, yes - he surely did when age made its demands upon him. He went from that hard driving, type A "I MUST SUCCEED AT ALL COSTS" bullying male to a soft version of himself. Soft, in every way! The change was so dramatic everybody noticed it, not just me. But why did it come after the kids were grown and left home? Why didn't it happen when they really could have used a caring, guiding father? I cannot make that go away. It just IS.
It IS like I AM. Here I am, watching the snow drifting past newly turned pale olive and orange leaves with crimson tips. It is perfectly clear these trees weren't expecting winter so suddenly. Neither was I. A part of my soul is still so very green even as my mortality turns pale olive with orange and crimson tips. I wrinkle as the leaves wrinkle in the cold. I cannot stop the leaves and I cannot stop me from these changes. The outside changes are a little more subtle (to others, not me) than the inside changes. These are the truly surprising ones. As it turns out, I don't know how to be a non type A person. I don't know how to let all the details casually slip away so I can focus on just that one thing I am doing at this moment. But I have to. The details will no longer remain within my grasp; either in my head or my hands. They keep slipping away. It appears to me, that all I have is this one moment and this one day and there may be nothing else. All that is behind is fading away and all that is ahead remains a distant, blank page...unknown for the greater part.
When I consider that I no longer have ANY hard driving goals, no great passions and no driving pursuits, I feel utterly lost. Yet, here I sit typing immovably implanted in my place and time just as those trees outside my window. They are collecting snow on their branches and its rather pretty. It is softly, quietly pretty the way the white snow accumulates over the top of those crimson tipped, pale olive leafed branches. The snow of wisdom is accumulating over my body and soul in a similar fashion. I hope to God it is as softly attractive as what I see out there before me today. The snow of white hair and eyelashes...the snow of forgetfulness over the hard driving goals I once held so dear. When it is finally done snowing and winter has set in, what will there be left of the young me?
What am I beyond my goals and pursuits? What am I beyond my dreams of accomplishment? When age and wisdom simultaneously overtake youth and ambition, what remains? At fifty, I still fear I am a growing disappointment to my parents. They had such dreams for me. Dreams they felt would never be within their own reaches. Is that where my own dreams sprang from? Did they bubble up from their mutual well of low self-esteem before I was born? When I look inside, well, may I? I am so afraid of it now. What do I really see? What do I really want? I want peace. Yes. I want hope. Yes. I want joy. Yes. I want to be important and needed and respected and honored. I want to be regarded as a source of wisdom and healing. What else? I want enthusiasm for ME. I want to feel enthusiasm and enjoyment in ME. IN being ME. In my life as it is NOW. Where does that come from? How do I find it?
It seems I am re-writing the script for my life. I am rewriting it without any clue how to form the words that will make sense to me and make me feel important, valuable...no, invaluable. What is the importance of ME? Where is the starting place, the wellspring of self esteem? My mother mentors say it is in the knowledge that God loves you and you are His child. I acknowledge freely that and I am happy in that knowledge. But what about ME? Me, myself, I? All alone, aside from anything or anyone else...what is my value to ME? How do I evaluate my own importance? Am I capable of such a task? Where would I begin such an evaluation? Based upon the things I've done? The people I may have helped? The animals I've cared for? The flowers I've tended? The things I've said or left unsaid? The answer must be extremely simple because I've completely overlooked it. It is surely one of those details that I've lost the ability to hold onto. May I rejoice in the fact that I just AM? Can I be content that I am? Is it enough to exist? To have existed? To go on existing?
What if I exist just to enjoy existing? May I do that? Can I let myself just enjoy my existence without adding goals and accomplishments onto it? What if finding joy in just living were enough? Could I make that my goal and live in the contentment of that accomplishment? With the right mindset, it is doable. In fact, it's far more doable than most of my dreams of youth and all of the unheralded goals I've accomplished so far. Is this the winter of the human soul? The final stage before making the grand or not so grand exit? What is so very familiar about this premise is that it is the very stage all children naturally exist in...until they grow up. Children do not think about their existence, They also accept their importance without deeper contemplation. They content themselves in just living. They manage miracles with the seemingly mundane. They can make a day out of gathering stones and turning them into whatever their little hearts imagine. They spend hours chasing bugs and butterflies and skipping stones across water. They gather sticks and bones and they never worry about their next meal or whether they will sleep that night. What if I forgot about and left behind all the hard driving goals and ideas of success I grew up with and embraced the wonder of the mundane world around me? What if I thought a great more about the way food tasted than how fast I could get it down? What if I could lay in bed and instead of planning tomorrows list of chores (goals) I just went to sleep and dreamt of sweet things?
Perhaps the reason grandparents are much better parents than parents is because they have left adulthood behind to embrace the beauty of childhood again. They can relate to children better. They are no longer ashamed of childish things and silly behavior. I believe that is where I am headed. But oh, the distinct shrinking pains of leaving behind the adult world of great dreams and goals; of intentionally abandoning that incessant need to be heard and seen amongst the throng of my peers for the mystical beauty of the mundane world. What if this part of life is all about rediscovering the mundane world that we have so long ignored by choosing to embrace the grand privilege of simply existing well?
Your words really touched me, very beautifully written. It is such a process isn't it? This reclaiming of ourselves, the redefinition of who we are today and who we want to be in the future. The letting go of what we didn't do and the honoring of what we have done. The expectations we put on ourselves that we find we have no interest in anymore. Saying good bye to what might have been but never was. Acceptance. I especially liked the paragraph about how kids experience their lives, how they live in the moment. Find joy in the simple things. I had a rather sad childhood in many ways, but, I still remember many moments of just being in the moment. I lost a lot of my childhood and the innocence that should have been mine but wasn't. I had to grow up quickly, which has made me less carefree as an adult. I would love to have a more childlike perception of the world right now. I am not ready to think about mortality, though it is slapping me in the face. The past in the past and I'm working so hard to be in the moment instead of living in the land of "what if" and "OMG" which equates to fear in my world. I want to let go of fear and embrace joy. If I can accomplish that then I will feel the internal peace and well being I crave. That is the journey I am on now. I hope you find your joy too. Take care, Mich
F T......what a beautiful well written piece......it is almost exactly what I also think.....I wish that time would slow down so I can 'begin' my life....sometimes I feel that it just hasn't got going. I also wish for more things, more joys, and yet more peace in my life too...or maybe it's just plain old contentment.
I am also fast approaching fifty, but feel like I have not really 'achieved' anything....the last 9 years - since I turned 40 - have been such a great disappointment.....so very different from my 30's.
So, I too am pondering my life and what I want out of it now....I do know that I want some joy and laughter back in my life and most importantly, peace.
as you said Mich.....I want to let go of fear and embrace joy.
hugs girls...peace be with you!
Caz
I am also fast approaching fifty, but feel like I have not really 'achieved' anything....the last 9 years - since I turned 40 - have been such a great disappointment.....so very different from my 30's.
So, I too am pondering my life and what I want out of it now....I do know that I want some joy and laughter back in my life and most importantly, peace.
as you said Mich.....I want to let go of fear and embrace joy.
hugs girls...peace be with you!
Caz
Hi there,
What a magnificent insight.......I feel what you say......
I have learnt to "give in"......without relinquishing
To give in.......without losing power
To truly accept what IS......despite the hardship
Some days are easier than others.......
My mortality........questioned at 31.......did not have the wisdom of years to process
Such grief at the losing of my "womanhood", my fertility, my virility......just when I had considered having a baby to the man I love......it was taken.
And we grieved.......but I am lucky......I have a son from a previous relationship and he is 14.......but I gave my man a choice to leave......to see if he could find someone to have his own baby with.......I was very afraid.
But he did not want to be with anyone else........so he raises my son as his own......and is loving and kind.......he is my soul mate......
So yes, it is time to BE.......for without BEING......there is no growth.....
Thank you, thank you, thank you.......you brave and wonderful woman......
Michah
What a magnificent insight.......I feel what you say......
I have learnt to "give in"......without relinquishing
To give in.......without losing power
To truly accept what IS......despite the hardship
Some days are easier than others.......
My mortality........questioned at 31.......did not have the wisdom of years to process
Such grief at the losing of my "womanhood", my fertility, my virility......just when I had considered having a baby to the man I love......it was taken.
And we grieved.......but I am lucky......I have a son from a previous relationship and he is 14.......but I gave my man a choice to leave......to see if he could find someone to have his own baby with.......I was very afraid.
But he did not want to be with anyone else........so he raises my son as his own......and is loving and kind.......he is my soul mate......
So yes, it is time to BE.......for without BEING......there is no growth.....
Thank you, thank you, thank you.......you brave and wonderful woman......
Michah
I appreciate your lovely comments and further insights.
As I was contemplating all of this in prayer early this morning, I realized that the wholeness (happiness) of our existence is entirely dependent upon unity. Our purpose is to be unified in love and love means mutual respect. Since perfect love casts out all fear, we are meant to be unified in perfect love. This was Jesus' prayer, that the Father would make us ONE even as they are ONE...in the same love.
Have you ever noticed how "safe" you feel among certain people? Perhaps your parents. Perhaps in the arms of a beloved spouse. Perhaps in the midst of your siblings or among your dearest friends. You always feels "safe" or whole in the presence of those you KNOW love you so much they would NEVER intentionally hurt you. Your safety lies in the completeness of their love. Home is where you are loved most. Your children's security lies in the completeness of your love for them. But if you use them as tools in a war between you and a spouse or lover, they have NO security. If you fight with your spouse in front of them, they have no security. That is because you didn't love them enough to make them feel absolutely safe and loved in your presence. Anger and outrage steal the security away from love. When you feel your own needs have been so transgressed you must strike out at the one who hurt you before your children, you have breached the security of love.
I did that. My husband did that. We fought like raging animals in front of our kids....just as our parents had done. We transgressed and destroyed the security of our children by not making our love a safe place for them. You can say, "well, that's the real world and they have to grow up and realize that anyway!" They don't have to realize it IN YOUR HOME. It's a choice. You can repeat the mistakes of your parents or you can choose to stop them. Is taking yourself out of a situation in which you know you will have to defend your rights better than staying? Can you back down to an out of control spouse until the kids are grown and gone? What will they have learned from that? I think the answer is that there has to be a mutual decision between parents as to where the lines of battle are drawn. The disagreements can be managed away from them. Even if one spouse is a raging maniac, he or she can control that rage until a safer location to vent it is found...like at a counseling session or in a secured cell of a police station.
Safety is about security and security is about providing a safe, loving environment that you choose not to invade as much as possible with your own wounded humanity. That is what real love does. It chooses to put aside its own wounds and disappointments to keep from wounding another. No, real love does even more than that. It chooses to help and thus, heal, the wounded around them but not at the expense of your own needs. For if you do not meet your own needs, you will have nothing to help those around you with. Youth and strength may insist upon ignoring ones own needs in preference of everyone or more often, everything else around them. You cannot manage that in middle age well and in old age you will fail utterly.
My mother says this life is a testing grounds. We are being tested, more for our own sakes than anyone else's. I think it is a deep refining process also. I have always thought of this life as a school or perhaps, a series of schools. Each school seems progressively more difficult than the next as we go along (at least to me.) I get very weary of school and I want recess. I want the summer off. I want a long, warm, happy sabbatical. Especially here in menoland. I want to curl up somewhere safe in the sun like an old dog and go to sleep and just sleep away all the unhappiness and wake up a child again. That is, a child of a parent who loves me so perfectly I will never feel anything but "safe." I think perhaps, that is the reality and purpose of heaven.
If you want to bring purpose to the latter part of your life, go out and get involved in loving people somehow. Make your presence felt through a better love than you have perhaps experienced yourself. Let other people feel the safest place they can be is in your company. Now that, my friends, will be a grand accomplishment indeed! Hint: you might begin with your OWN family by choosing forgiveness and reconciliation.
As I was contemplating all of this in prayer early this morning, I realized that the wholeness (happiness) of our existence is entirely dependent upon unity. Our purpose is to be unified in love and love means mutual respect. Since perfect love casts out all fear, we are meant to be unified in perfect love. This was Jesus' prayer, that the Father would make us ONE even as they are ONE...in the same love.
Have you ever noticed how "safe" you feel among certain people? Perhaps your parents. Perhaps in the arms of a beloved spouse. Perhaps in the midst of your siblings or among your dearest friends. You always feels "safe" or whole in the presence of those you KNOW love you so much they would NEVER intentionally hurt you. Your safety lies in the completeness of their love. Home is where you are loved most. Your children's security lies in the completeness of your love for them. But if you use them as tools in a war between you and a spouse or lover, they have NO security. If you fight with your spouse in front of them, they have no security. That is because you didn't love them enough to make them feel absolutely safe and loved in your presence. Anger and outrage steal the security away from love. When you feel your own needs have been so transgressed you must strike out at the one who hurt you before your children, you have breached the security of love.
I did that. My husband did that. We fought like raging animals in front of our kids....just as our parents had done. We transgressed and destroyed the security of our children by not making our love a safe place for them. You can say, "well, that's the real world and they have to grow up and realize that anyway!" They don't have to realize it IN YOUR HOME. It's a choice. You can repeat the mistakes of your parents or you can choose to stop them. Is taking yourself out of a situation in which you know you will have to defend your rights better than staying? Can you back down to an out of control spouse until the kids are grown and gone? What will they have learned from that? I think the answer is that there has to be a mutual decision between parents as to where the lines of battle are drawn. The disagreements can be managed away from them. Even if one spouse is a raging maniac, he or she can control that rage until a safer location to vent it is found...like at a counseling session or in a secured cell of a police station.
Safety is about security and security is about providing a safe, loving environment that you choose not to invade as much as possible with your own wounded humanity. That is what real love does. It chooses to put aside its own wounds and disappointments to keep from wounding another. No, real love does even more than that. It chooses to help and thus, heal, the wounded around them but not at the expense of your own needs. For if you do not meet your own needs, you will have nothing to help those around you with. Youth and strength may insist upon ignoring ones own needs in preference of everyone or more often, everything else around them. You cannot manage that in middle age well and in old age you will fail utterly.
My mother says this life is a testing grounds. We are being tested, more for our own sakes than anyone else's. I think it is a deep refining process also. I have always thought of this life as a school or perhaps, a series of schools. Each school seems progressively more difficult than the next as we go along (at least to me.) I get very weary of school and I want recess. I want the summer off. I want a long, warm, happy sabbatical. Especially here in menoland. I want to curl up somewhere safe in the sun like an old dog and go to sleep and just sleep away all the unhappiness and wake up a child again. That is, a child of a parent who loves me so perfectly I will never feel anything but "safe." I think perhaps, that is the reality and purpose of heaven.
If you want to bring purpose to the latter part of your life, go out and get involved in loving people somehow. Make your presence felt through a better love than you have perhaps experienced yourself. Let other people feel the safest place they can be is in your company. Now that, my friends, will be a grand accomplishment indeed! Hint: you might begin with your OWN family by choosing forgiveness and reconciliation.
QUOTE (frozentundra @ Oct 13 2009, 09:33 AM)
I appreciate your lovely comments and further insights.
As I was contemplating all of this in prayer early this morning, I realized that the wholeness (happiness) of our existence is entirely dependent upon unity. Our purpose is to be unified in love and love means mutual respect. Since perfect love casts out all fear, we are meant to be unified in perfect love. This was Jesus' prayer, that the Father would make us ONE even as they are ONE...in the same love.
Have you ever noticed how "safe" you feel among certain people? Perhaps your parents. Perhaps in the arms of a beloved spouse. Perhaps in the midst of your siblings or among your dearest friends. You always feels "safe" or whole in the presence of those you KNOW love you so much they would NEVER intentionally hurt you. Your safety lies in the completeness of their love. Home is where you are loved most. Your children's security lies in the completeness of your love for them. But if you use them as tools in a war between you and a spouse or lover, they have NO security. If you fight with your spouse in front of them, they have no security. That is because you didn't love them enough to make them feel absolutely safe and loved in your presence. Anger and outrage steal the security away from love. When you feel your own needs have been so transgressed you must strike out at the one who hurt you before your children, you have breached the security of love.
I did that. My husband did that. We fought like raging animals in front of our kids....just as our parents had done. We transgressed and destroyed the security of our children by not making our love a safe place for them. You can say, "well, that's the real world and they have to grow up and realize that anyway!" They don't have to realize it IN YOUR HOME. It's a choice. You can repeat the mistakes of your parents or you can choose to stop them. Is taking yourself out of a situation in which you know you will have to defend your rights better than staying? Can you back down to an out of control spouse until the kids are grown and gone? What will they have learned from that? I think the answer is that there has to be a mutual decision between parents as to where the lines of battle are drawn. The disagreements can be managed away from them. Even if one spouse is a raging maniac, he or she can control that rage until a safer location to vent it is found...like at a counseling session or in a secured cell of a police station.
Safety is about security and security is about providing a safe, loving environment that you choose not to invade as much as possible with your own wounded humanity. That is what real love does. It chooses to put aside its own wounds and disappointments to keep from wounding another. No, real love does even more than that. It chooses to help and thus, heal, the wounded around them but not at the expense of your own needs. For if you do not meet your own needs, you will have nothing to help those around you with. Youth and strength may insist upon ignoring ones own needs in preference of everyone or more often, everything else around them. You cannot manage that in middle age well and in old age you will fail utterly.
My mother says this life is a testing grounds. We are being tested, more for our own sakes than anyone else's. I think it is a deep refining process also. I have always thought of this life as a school or perhaps, a series of schools. Each school seems progressively more difficult than the next as we go along (at least to me.) I get very weary of school and I want recess. I want the summer off. I want a long, warm, happy sabbatical. Especially here in menoland. I want to curl up somewhere safe in the sun like an old dog and go to sleep and just sleep away all the unhappiness and wake up a child again. That is, a child of a parent who loves me so perfectly I will never feel anything but "safe." I think perhaps, that is the reality and purpose of heaven.
If you want to bring purpose to the latter part of your life, go out and get involved in loving people somehow. Make your presence felt through a better love than you have perhaps experienced yourself. Let other people feel the safest place they can be is in your company. Now that, my friends, will be a grand accomplishment indeed! Hint: you might begin with your OWN family by choosing forgiveness and reconciliation.
As I was contemplating all of this in prayer early this morning, I realized that the wholeness (happiness) of our existence is entirely dependent upon unity. Our purpose is to be unified in love and love means mutual respect. Since perfect love casts out all fear, we are meant to be unified in perfect love. This was Jesus' prayer, that the Father would make us ONE even as they are ONE...in the same love.
Have you ever noticed how "safe" you feel among certain people? Perhaps your parents. Perhaps in the arms of a beloved spouse. Perhaps in the midst of your siblings or among your dearest friends. You always feels "safe" or whole in the presence of those you KNOW love you so much they would NEVER intentionally hurt you. Your safety lies in the completeness of their love. Home is where you are loved most. Your children's security lies in the completeness of your love for them. But if you use them as tools in a war between you and a spouse or lover, they have NO security. If you fight with your spouse in front of them, they have no security. That is because you didn't love them enough to make them feel absolutely safe and loved in your presence. Anger and outrage steal the security away from love. When you feel your own needs have been so transgressed you must strike out at the one who hurt you before your children, you have breached the security of love.
I did that. My husband did that. We fought like raging animals in front of our kids....just as our parents had done. We transgressed and destroyed the security of our children by not making our love a safe place for them. You can say, "well, that's the real world and they have to grow up and realize that anyway!" They don't have to realize it IN YOUR HOME. It's a choice. You can repeat the mistakes of your parents or you can choose to stop them. Is taking yourself out of a situation in which you know you will have to defend your rights better than staying? Can you back down to an out of control spouse until the kids are grown and gone? What will they have learned from that? I think the answer is that there has to be a mutual decision between parents as to where the lines of battle are drawn. The disagreements can be managed away from them. Even if one spouse is a raging maniac, he or she can control that rage until a safer location to vent it is found...like at a counseling session or in a secured cell of a police station.
Safety is about security and security is about providing a safe, loving environment that you choose not to invade as much as possible with your own wounded humanity. That is what real love does. It chooses to put aside its own wounds and disappointments to keep from wounding another. No, real love does even more than that. It chooses to help and thus, heal, the wounded around them but not at the expense of your own needs. For if you do not meet your own needs, you will have nothing to help those around you with. Youth and strength may insist upon ignoring ones own needs in preference of everyone or more often, everything else around them. You cannot manage that in middle age well and in old age you will fail utterly.
My mother says this life is a testing grounds. We are being tested, more for our own sakes than anyone else's. I think it is a deep refining process also. I have always thought of this life as a school or perhaps, a series of schools. Each school seems progressively more difficult than the next as we go along (at least to me.) I get very weary of school and I want recess. I want the summer off. I want a long, warm, happy sabbatical. Especially here in menoland. I want to curl up somewhere safe in the sun like an old dog and go to sleep and just sleep away all the unhappiness and wake up a child again. That is, a child of a parent who loves me so perfectly I will never feel anything but "safe." I think perhaps, that is the reality and purpose of heaven.
If you want to bring purpose to the latter part of your life, go out and get involved in loving people somehow. Make your presence felt through a better love than you have perhaps experienced yourself. Let other people feel the safest place they can be is in your company. Now that, my friends, will be a grand accomplishment indeed! Hint: you might begin with your OWN family by choosing forgiveness and reconciliation.
Another very eloquent post. You should be writing a book of prose regarding this transition we are going through. Your words and your insights are truly touching and poignant. Your words resonate with me and I know they do with many others. Just beautiful and so so so right. Thank you for sharing your wisdom and words with us. ((((hugs)))) Mich
I agree, this is all beautifully written, Tundra.
You speak for so many of us in the mid-life transition, facing regrets, confusion, a mixed history of joy and struggles, and an uncertain future. And we do wonder now if the whole point is to just BE.
Yesterday I noticed behind our garage in a shady spot, this little grove of tiny purply flowers. I have no idea what they are, or why they chose that un-sunny, bad-soil area. Yet there they are, waving their little blossoms in the wind for all to see!
Perhaps our lives are about as essential as those of the little purple blossoms. In God's eyes, maybe we are the equal - just part of the bigger whole, the essence of Oneness. I think of all the wee flowers that grow in the woods behind our home; surely no human eye ever sees the majority of them before they drop their petals.
I love the Biblical quote in which Jesus is instructing His Apostles: Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these... Perhaps we are similarly simply meant to quietly "blossom," bear our fruit, and then go.
Our Type-A efforts and the misguided ramblings of our youths came out of our histories, our schooling, the ideas we developed about what would make us happy. We had our successes and our failures. And yet, short of food, water, and a roof over one's head... and good friends and loving family, what have we ever really needed??? My mom passed away suddenly in April, and in the process of cleaning out her home, I see that all our physical things are just part of our "stage sets."
The detritus of our lives, that will be discarded, passed down, forgotten, or cherished by someone in whole new ways.
Your philosophy, FT, is actually closely aligned to Buddhist ideas. I've been taking meditation classes and lessons in Buddhism, and you could actually have taught some of them.
Such a time of soul-searching, huh?
(((HUGS))) and thank you for your amazing post!
JJ
You speak for so many of us in the mid-life transition, facing regrets, confusion, a mixed history of joy and struggles, and an uncertain future. And we do wonder now if the whole point is to just BE.
Yesterday I noticed behind our garage in a shady spot, this little grove of tiny purply flowers. I have no idea what they are, or why they chose that un-sunny, bad-soil area. Yet there they are, waving their little blossoms in the wind for all to see!
Perhaps our lives are about as essential as those of the little purple blossoms. In God's eyes, maybe we are the equal - just part of the bigger whole, the essence of Oneness. I think of all the wee flowers that grow in the woods behind our home; surely no human eye ever sees the majority of them before they drop their petals.
I love the Biblical quote in which Jesus is instructing His Apostles: Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these... Perhaps we are similarly simply meant to quietly "blossom," bear our fruit, and then go.
Our Type-A efforts and the misguided ramblings of our youths came out of our histories, our schooling, the ideas we developed about what would make us happy. We had our successes and our failures. And yet, short of food, water, and a roof over one's head... and good friends and loving family, what have we ever really needed??? My mom passed away suddenly in April, and in the process of cleaning out her home, I see that all our physical things are just part of our "stage sets."
The detritus of our lives, that will be discarded, passed down, forgotten, or cherished by someone in whole new ways. Your philosophy, FT, is actually closely aligned to Buddhist ideas. I've been taking meditation classes and lessons in Buddhism, and you could actually have taught some of them.
Such a time of soul-searching, huh?
(((HUGS))) and thank you for your amazing post!
JJ
It's amazing how many women are sharing these feelings right now. I suppose its the baby boomer generation but I wrote a longtime friend and sent her the first piece I wrote here. She is in her sixties now and well past the pause. She related to most of what I had written and stated she feels as if she has seen the best of her life already, as if so much has passed her by. She too, dreams great dreams but now doesn't believe in them anymore. Ladies, she is a pretty well known author in our circle; a speaker, leader in various groups and travels worldwide in the many endeavors in which she is requested. By modern standards, she is a relatively young woman. As I contemplated her response, a much deeper voice welled up from within me. It began to speak in its own fashion. It grew stronger throughout the day and this is what I believe I heard....
I cannot accept a world without challenges, a life without passion or a future without pursuits. While I absolutely need and will even demand, perhaps too much alone time....I cannot stop being what I really am. I am passionate about the things I feel anything about. For those passions to fade, others must surface. There is no milquetoast inner landscape within my own soul! I have struggled valiantly to fully accept the idea that there is no need to dream big dreams anymore or feel earth shattering emotions. All of that is past as this mortal body passes. I know that I know that I absolutely cannot be contented with a pudding life. Everything within me screams, "I WOULD RATHER DIE!" Death appears to hold a greater opportunity for many midlifers than life itself. It is as poignantly disturbing as that. What many consider non existence is rather, a very different existence. One they simply cannot now contemplate fully.
The movie, "Astronaut Farmer" was playing while I worked on jewelry today and as I watched, that voice within me began to rise up and shout. It was shouting, "YES, YES, YES!" to a man with impossible dreams who would not give up. Then, suddenly I realized something I had somehow forgotten at this stage of life. We were all made in the image of our Father and He is the greatest DREAMER of all!!! Not only did He dream up this vast complex of mortal living and life, He sustains it every millisecond of every day. When I consider the galaxies, the stars, the wonders we cannot see and all the wonders we can - see, feel, smell, taste and learn about in this reachable realm....I realize I am like my Father. I want to dream unlimited dreams and believe in them. I want to reach for them and although this mortal body would wither and weaken with age, I cannot give up believing in big dreams. Why is it impossible for me to dream about writing a novel or you to dream about being a beautician or a teacher at 50? Why???
Don't tell me, TOO OLD. TOO OLD is dead. Dead is not what we are. We may tire more easily and want to give up. We can STILL go to sleep and pull out the best of what tomorrow offers. If tomorrow will not allow, then the next day or the one after that. There is bound to be one good day in every week or month, or year. If Brigadoon lives one day a year then that's what I will do, if one day is what I have within reach. But we all have more than one day a year, don't we? I love the musical movie Mama Mia. I love the messages within it and yet they make me cry. I think I saw it four times at the theatre and have it here at home. When Meryl Streep sits with her adult daughter in her lap singing of how fast that child grew up, you know you bawled like a baby! So did I. When the two young lovers embrace on the beach, you remember your own youth and how exotically private it felt then. Now everyone and his doctor has seen all of you that can be seen and some that cannot without instruments. The mystery of that wore off long ago but wasn't it grand? What can make you feel new again? Young again? Full of life again?
Remember when they all marched down to the water and JUMPED IN? We need to JUMP BACK INTO LIFE with THEM!
Only one thing I know that makes life worth living and that is; passion. Passion is the deepest form of love there is for it is invincible. The only thing that will cause passion to fade or die is the choice to give it up. That's the great thing about it. You can CHOOSE ANYTHING to be passionate about. It could be church on Sunday. It could be a dinner date with your children. It could be going to a movie with just your spouse. It could be a vacation. It could be something you cooked. It could be visiting someone in the nursing home. (Someone you will love and inevitably let go far too quickly.) It could be your dog or cat. Passion is whatever you choose to love completely and defend with all your heart. Passion feeds life into your mortal body for your soul is a wellspring of love. "Out of your innermost being will flow rivers of living water!" God gave it to us to share. He doesn't meter it out a little here and there. It is like seed, He spreads it profusely and you may grow whatever you like in it.
Without passion we are only living, not ALIVE. So I tell you with all my heart, don't let go of your dreams unless they no longer fuel your life passion. Dream bigger dreams than you dreamt before not smaller ones that seem within reach. You are older and wiser but you are not dead to this life or the one to come. Use the energy that once fueled your reproductive system to fuel your dreams and go ahead, create goals. Without them, we lose hope. Our Father has a dream for us, a plan, and it is plan to give us hope and a terrific future. It is a big plan, with so much space within it that all of our dreams will fit inside it. Perhaps, like all good parents, His plan is to embrace the good plans of His children and encourage their growth and accomplishment. Don't give up your dreams and goals because your mortal bodies are growing old.
I had this dream last year where I was attending my own funeral. I saw the internment where everybody was gathered outside while the empty casket sat over the hole it was intended to be laid into. There was a small group of people gathered in the chairs before that hole and I was seated in the front row in one of them. The woman next to me wondered why I was not in the casket. In fact, everyone there wondered why I was not in the casket. One man kept encouraging me to get inside it so they could get on with the burial. But I refused. So he climbed inside it to show me how it was done but regardless of encouragement, I would NOT. I REFUSED to climb into that casket! I was not frightened by this dream but angry. Maybe you are angry, too. Are you being encouraged to climb into the casket before your time is up?
I tell you, don't limp quietly into the sunset even if it is the safest route home. Take the narrow road, the rocky one that beckons you. It may be harder and you may find it exhausting and discouraging at times, but don't look back. Look ahead. Dream bigger dreams than you feel you have a right to. If you haven't conceived of building a universe then you aren't even close to the parameters your Father set. Maybe you need to build a universe around you in terms of loving relationships. Maybe the universe you need to build is within you, one of self confidence and peace. You decide where to setup shop and if that means going back to school at sixty. Get up and go! If it means running that marathon with your Depends on, go for it! I don't honestly know what your dream is but I am not going to let mine die! I am going to dream bigger dreams than before and go to bed dreaming (I have the time now!) If I think its not doable or too scary or just plain ridiculous, I will ask my Dad and see what He has to say about it. I suggest you do the same.
I cannot accept a world without challenges, a life without passion or a future without pursuits. While I absolutely need and will even demand, perhaps too much alone time....I cannot stop being what I really am. I am passionate about the things I feel anything about. For those passions to fade, others must surface. There is no milquetoast inner landscape within my own soul! I have struggled valiantly to fully accept the idea that there is no need to dream big dreams anymore or feel earth shattering emotions. All of that is past as this mortal body passes. I know that I know that I absolutely cannot be contented with a pudding life. Everything within me screams, "I WOULD RATHER DIE!" Death appears to hold a greater opportunity for many midlifers than life itself. It is as poignantly disturbing as that. What many consider non existence is rather, a very different existence. One they simply cannot now contemplate fully.
The movie, "Astronaut Farmer" was playing while I worked on jewelry today and as I watched, that voice within me began to rise up and shout. It was shouting, "YES, YES, YES!" to a man with impossible dreams who would not give up. Then, suddenly I realized something I had somehow forgotten at this stage of life. We were all made in the image of our Father and He is the greatest DREAMER of all!!! Not only did He dream up this vast complex of mortal living and life, He sustains it every millisecond of every day. When I consider the galaxies, the stars, the wonders we cannot see and all the wonders we can - see, feel, smell, taste and learn about in this reachable realm....I realize I am like my Father. I want to dream unlimited dreams and believe in them. I want to reach for them and although this mortal body would wither and weaken with age, I cannot give up believing in big dreams. Why is it impossible for me to dream about writing a novel or you to dream about being a beautician or a teacher at 50? Why???
Don't tell me, TOO OLD. TOO OLD is dead. Dead is not what we are. We may tire more easily and want to give up. We can STILL go to sleep and pull out the best of what tomorrow offers. If tomorrow will not allow, then the next day or the one after that. There is bound to be one good day in every week or month, or year. If Brigadoon lives one day a year then that's what I will do, if one day is what I have within reach. But we all have more than one day a year, don't we? I love the musical movie Mama Mia. I love the messages within it and yet they make me cry. I think I saw it four times at the theatre and have it here at home. When Meryl Streep sits with her adult daughter in her lap singing of how fast that child grew up, you know you bawled like a baby! So did I. When the two young lovers embrace on the beach, you remember your own youth and how exotically private it felt then. Now everyone and his doctor has seen all of you that can be seen and some that cannot without instruments. The mystery of that wore off long ago but wasn't it grand? What can make you feel new again? Young again? Full of life again?
Remember when they all marched down to the water and JUMPED IN? We need to JUMP BACK INTO LIFE with THEM!
Only one thing I know that makes life worth living and that is; passion. Passion is the deepest form of love there is for it is invincible. The only thing that will cause passion to fade or die is the choice to give it up. That's the great thing about it. You can CHOOSE ANYTHING to be passionate about. It could be church on Sunday. It could be a dinner date with your children. It could be going to a movie with just your spouse. It could be a vacation. It could be something you cooked. It could be visiting someone in the nursing home. (Someone you will love and inevitably let go far too quickly.) It could be your dog or cat. Passion is whatever you choose to love completely and defend with all your heart. Passion feeds life into your mortal body for your soul is a wellspring of love. "Out of your innermost being will flow rivers of living water!" God gave it to us to share. He doesn't meter it out a little here and there. It is like seed, He spreads it profusely and you may grow whatever you like in it.
Without passion we are only living, not ALIVE. So I tell you with all my heart, don't let go of your dreams unless they no longer fuel your life passion. Dream bigger dreams than you dreamt before not smaller ones that seem within reach. You are older and wiser but you are not dead to this life or the one to come. Use the energy that once fueled your reproductive system to fuel your dreams and go ahead, create goals. Without them, we lose hope. Our Father has a dream for us, a plan, and it is plan to give us hope and a terrific future. It is a big plan, with so much space within it that all of our dreams will fit inside it. Perhaps, like all good parents, His plan is to embrace the good plans of His children and encourage their growth and accomplishment. Don't give up your dreams and goals because your mortal bodies are growing old.
I had this dream last year where I was attending my own funeral. I saw the internment where everybody was gathered outside while the empty casket sat over the hole it was intended to be laid into. There was a small group of people gathered in the chairs before that hole and I was seated in the front row in one of them. The woman next to me wondered why I was not in the casket. In fact, everyone there wondered why I was not in the casket. One man kept encouraging me to get inside it so they could get on with the burial. But I refused. So he climbed inside it to show me how it was done but regardless of encouragement, I would NOT. I REFUSED to climb into that casket! I was not frightened by this dream but angry. Maybe you are angry, too. Are you being encouraged to climb into the casket before your time is up?
I tell you, don't limp quietly into the sunset even if it is the safest route home. Take the narrow road, the rocky one that beckons you. It may be harder and you may find it exhausting and discouraging at times, but don't look back. Look ahead. Dream bigger dreams than you feel you have a right to. If you haven't conceived of building a universe then you aren't even close to the parameters your Father set. Maybe you need to build a universe around you in terms of loving relationships. Maybe the universe you need to build is within you, one of self confidence and peace. You decide where to setup shop and if that means going back to school at sixty. Get up and go! If it means running that marathon with your Depends on, go for it! I don't honestly know what your dream is but I am not going to let mine die! I am going to dream bigger dreams than before and go to bed dreaming (I have the time now!) If I think its not doable or too scary or just plain ridiculous, I will ask my Dad and see what He has to say about it. I suggest you do the same.
Dear Frozentundra,
I am also a type A personality, I don't usually wax poetic either, but your words are very encouraging to me. Feelings are not something that a type A is usually in touch with, we would rather be doing things, busy with all the productive things to fill the day with, otherwise we feel down and depressed. THEN comes menopause, and ALL of a sudden we can't be productive like we used to be......simultaneously everything is different. It hampers our dreams, it short circuts our thoughts, it kills our moods to do things. Dreams, yes they will inspire, motivate and move us forword, you are right on the money!
There are SO many regrets too, my marriage being the biggest trial and teacher in my life. I have traveled a hard road and am STILL here, but....I am realizing that through the defeats, I have come back stronger, wiser and better. AND, I might add, that some people will NEVER change, no matter what, they are who they are. In my younger days, in my dreamy mind, I would conceive of the day that my husband would be a newer and better person and all would be well. But, like you stated, they just get older and perhaps mellow with age, but the problems and the root are still there to deal with. I know that God gives us insight, mine was to change myself, it was to take love to a deeper level of sacrifice and courage to be my own person.
Thank you for sharing, you write beautifully.
Juliann
I am also a type A personality, I don't usually wax poetic either, but your words are very encouraging to me. Feelings are not something that a type A is usually in touch with, we would rather be doing things, busy with all the productive things to fill the day with, otherwise we feel down and depressed. THEN comes menopause, and ALL of a sudden we can't be productive like we used to be......simultaneously everything is different. It hampers our dreams, it short circuts our thoughts, it kills our moods to do things. Dreams, yes they will inspire, motivate and move us forword, you are right on the money!
There are SO many regrets too, my marriage being the biggest trial and teacher in my life. I have traveled a hard road and am STILL here, but....I am realizing that through the defeats, I have come back stronger, wiser and better. AND, I might add, that some people will NEVER change, no matter what, they are who they are. In my younger days, in my dreamy mind, I would conceive of the day that my husband would be a newer and better person and all would be well. But, like you stated, they just get older and perhaps mellow with age, but the problems and the root are still there to deal with. I know that God gives us insight, mine was to change myself, it was to take love to a deeper level of sacrifice and courage to be my own person.
Thank you for sharing, you write beautifully.
Juliann
Frozen tundra...BRAVO! BRAVO! It wasn't until reading this last post by you that I realized I was slowly giving up and just accepting. Not to happy with that. I know there is more out there that my Papa wants me to do..of course it might help if I actually ASKED huh?
Frozentundra:
Thank you for sharing such beautiful insights. Your posts brought tears to my eyes as some of these things resonate within me as well. Keep writing....perhaps you have already found your passion!
Dee
Thank you for sharing such beautiful insights. Your posts brought tears to my eyes as some of these things resonate within me as well. Keep writing....perhaps you have already found your passion!
Dee
Your words have encouraged my heart......thank you
I am reminded of one of my favorite quotes by Helen Keller....
I long to accomplisgh a great and noble task, but it is my chief duty to accomplish small tasks as if they were great and noble....
I am reminded of one of my favorite quotes by Helen Keller....
I long to accomplisgh a great and noble task, but it is my chief duty to accomplish small tasks as if they were great and noble....
Beautiful insight in this time of turmoil we are going through we loose sight of everything arond us,I say often to myself I am never alone God is with me, The lord is my savior I have no fear. we must remember that through all this turmoil God will never give us more than we can handle. God grant me the serenity to accept the things I can not change courage to change the things I can And the wisdom to know the difference. We all most turn to what comforts us durring this time. You really touched me today, Thank you,
does any body else my age (50) find that it seemed like
just yesterday you turned 30 ? its like 20yrs have come
and gone so fast, maybe cause we are so busy at this time of ours
lives !!! idk? but i hope the next 20 slows down !!!
but i got a feeling its just gonna speed up !!! god please give me the knowledge to appreciate the time you,ve given me
and stop and smell the roses as the ole saying goes !!!!
just yesterday you turned 30 ? its like 20yrs have come
and gone so fast, maybe cause we are so busy at this time of ours
lives !!! idk? but i hope the next 20 slows down !!!
but i got a feeling its just gonna speed up !!! god please give me the knowledge to appreciate the time you,ve given me
and stop and smell the roses as the ole saying goes !!!!
QUOTE (nc53215 @ Oct 15 2009, 07:01 PM)
does any body else my age (50) find that it seemed like
just yesterday you turned 30 ? its like 20yrs have come
and gone so fast, maybe cause we are so busy at this time of ours
lives !!! idk? but i hope the next 20 slows down !!!
but i got a feeling its just gonna speed up !!! god please give me the knowledge to appreciate the time you,ve given me
and stop and smell the roses as the ole saying goes !!!!
just yesterday you turned 30 ? its like 20yrs have come
and gone so fast, maybe cause we are so busy at this time of ours
lives !!! idk? but i hope the next 20 slows down !!!
but i got a feeling its just gonna speed up !!! god please give me the knowledge to appreciate the time you,ve given me
and stop and smell the roses as the ole saying goes !!!!
Absolutely!! 50 was a defining birthday for me, it's also when all of this peri meno stuff started in earnest. I'm trying so hard to relish the day I am in but sometimes head wins over heart. A weird ache or pain can take my focus off the sunny day, my sweet son or my wonderful hubby, other family and friends. It just makes me sad (this week has been especially rougher than it has been for several months). Anyways, I am with you hopefully 20 years will not speed by as fast as the last 20 years.
QUOTE (Juliann @ Oct 13 2009, 09:20 PM)
Dear Frozentundra,
I am also a type A personality, I don't usually wax poetic either, but your words are very encouraging to me. Feelings are not something that a type A is usually in touch with, we would rather be doing things, busy with all the productive things to fill the day with, otherwise we feel down and depressed. THEN comes menopause, and ALL of a sudden we can't be productive like we used to be......simultaneously everything is different. It hampers our dreams, it short circuts our thoughts, it kills our moods to do things. Dreams, yes they will inspire, motivate and move us forword, you are right on the money!
There are SO many regrets too, my marriage being the biggest trial and teacher in my life. I have traveled a hard road and am STILL here, but....I am realizing that through the defeats, I have come back stronger, wiser and better. AND, I might add, that some people will NEVER change, no matter what, they are who they are. In my younger days, in my dreamy mind, I would conceive of the day that my husband would be a newer and better person and all would be well. But, like you stated, they just get older and perhaps mellow with age, but the problems and the root are still there to deal with. I know that God gives us insight, mine was to change myself, it was to take love to a deeper level of sacrifice and courage to be my own person.
Thank you for sharing, you write beautifully.
Juliann
I am also a type A personality, I don't usually wax poetic either, but your words are very encouraging to me. Feelings are not something that a type A is usually in touch with, we would rather be doing things, busy with all the productive things to fill the day with, otherwise we feel down and depressed. THEN comes menopause, and ALL of a sudden we can't be productive like we used to be......simultaneously everything is different. It hampers our dreams, it short circuts our thoughts, it kills our moods to do things. Dreams, yes they will inspire, motivate and move us forword, you are right on the money!
There are SO many regrets too, my marriage being the biggest trial and teacher in my life. I have traveled a hard road and am STILL here, but....I am realizing that through the defeats, I have come back stronger, wiser and better. AND, I might add, that some people will NEVER change, no matter what, they are who they are. In my younger days, in my dreamy mind, I would conceive of the day that my husband would be a newer and better person and all would be well. But, like you stated, they just get older and perhaps mellow with age, but the problems and the root are still there to deal with. I know that God gives us insight, mine was to change myself, it was to take love to a deeper level of sacrifice and courage to be my own person.
Thank you for sharing, you write beautifully.
Juliann
I really like your post Juliann, I resonate with most of it and I too will change myself and find that deeper love and find the courage to go forth and live life like I always dreamed about....God Bless You!
Caz x
Reading your posts and realizing this is the same boat, maybe differing oars...
I have been exhilarated for the past 24 hours. How? No energy boost I assure you. I barely slept last night. I decided to let the child inside of me free. The natural energy we have is childlike, curious, exploring, easily intrigued and full of great beauty. That child must find beauty in every single day. At least, my child must. I just let her out of the "SAD" room where she has been contained. Not by circumstances, in truth, by fear and by anger. Anger over the changes, fear over where they will lead. I want to keep her out. She knows the way. This child inside. She knows the way. I don't know how but she knows. She deserves to live outside the cage I've put her in.
Maybe she will stumble and bumble into the wrong things occasionally but she has to lead the way, this child inside. For without her, I cannot even dream of a future. There is no existence without her childish enthusiasm and hopeful outlook. When you cage your dreams, when you put them aside, you cage her with them. I see that now. She knows which dreams need to be called "finished" and which ones should be abandoned. But she won't spend a moment looking back on them in regret. She has too much ahead. There is so much beauty left to find, so many exciting things waiting to be discovered, so many doors to open yet and sunrises to view. There remain several raindrops that require balancing at the tip of your finger, snowflakes to be caught on the tongue and land on your eyelashes blurring things for a cold, sweet moment. There are sunsets to watch, scintillating storms abrew from which she never runs, only watches from a practiced distance. There are ballgames, childrens costumes, events large and small...mostly small but she knows how to make them ever so much larger by adding her own special touch. There are lost dogs to find, flowers awaiting gathering, apples on trees to make pies from and fruit to can the best jams ever from. There are fairs to enter and gardens to grow.
Oh, there are so many things yet to see and do; some that are just so wonderful, they should really be done more than once. Kisses to receive, hugs to give...compliments to savor, arguments to resolve. There are moments of undeniable worth and peculiar beauty that no words will ever adequately portray. There are overlooked things she wants to try for the very first time, like just maybe skiing or diving. Perhaps actually jumping into that pile of leaves or creating some weird sand art figure. There are refrigerators awaiting appropriate magnets, scrapbooks to fill, long walks to take, smiles to be found in the most unexpected places...friends just aching to be made. There are parents to let go of gently. There are relationships that need healing and wounds that need bandaging. There are sweet naps to take in a favorite chair in front of the TV or fireplace. There are rooms to rearrange, furniture and clothes to pick out and garage sales to hold or visit!
She is just as proud to watch a child, friend, sibling or spouse receive an award as she would be herself. Maybe more so because she is that kind of person. She has beaches to comb, butterflies to silently watch wing their way in choppy flight about her head and grass to delight her bare feet in. There are trees to climb and she is terribly proud when her older body can still find a perch on a branch. There is endless beauty to be discovered, to explore and to embrace. She is after all, only as old as the child within.
She is YOU. The little girl inside....and it is high time to let her lead the way. This adult caretaker person needs to take a step back and only interfere when she knows there is genuine danger in the pathway....sometimes, not even then. Though discretion may be the better part of valor, valor must reign supreme for progress to occur. This little girl needs to breathe again and to run...and to play. You've worked long and hard enough, woman, so now it is time to allow that child within to make each day into her own personal playground...and share it with others who've forgotten they are truly children inside.
You go, GIRL!
I have been exhilarated for the past 24 hours. How? No energy boost I assure you. I barely slept last night. I decided to let the child inside of me free. The natural energy we have is childlike, curious, exploring, easily intrigued and full of great beauty. That child must find beauty in every single day. At least, my child must. I just let her out of the "SAD" room where she has been contained. Not by circumstances, in truth, by fear and by anger. Anger over the changes, fear over where they will lead. I want to keep her out. She knows the way. This child inside. She knows the way. I don't know how but she knows. She deserves to live outside the cage I've put her in.
Maybe she will stumble and bumble into the wrong things occasionally but she has to lead the way, this child inside. For without her, I cannot even dream of a future. There is no existence without her childish enthusiasm and hopeful outlook. When you cage your dreams, when you put them aside, you cage her with them. I see that now. She knows which dreams need to be called "finished" and which ones should be abandoned. But she won't spend a moment looking back on them in regret. She has too much ahead. There is so much beauty left to find, so many exciting things waiting to be discovered, so many doors to open yet and sunrises to view. There remain several raindrops that require balancing at the tip of your finger, snowflakes to be caught on the tongue and land on your eyelashes blurring things for a cold, sweet moment. There are sunsets to watch, scintillating storms abrew from which she never runs, only watches from a practiced distance. There are ballgames, childrens costumes, events large and small...mostly small but she knows how to make them ever so much larger by adding her own special touch. There are lost dogs to find, flowers awaiting gathering, apples on trees to make pies from and fruit to can the best jams ever from. There are fairs to enter and gardens to grow.
Oh, there are so many things yet to see and do; some that are just so wonderful, they should really be done more than once. Kisses to receive, hugs to give...compliments to savor, arguments to resolve. There are moments of undeniable worth and peculiar beauty that no words will ever adequately portray. There are overlooked things she wants to try for the very first time, like just maybe skiing or diving. Perhaps actually jumping into that pile of leaves or creating some weird sand art figure. There are refrigerators awaiting appropriate magnets, scrapbooks to fill, long walks to take, smiles to be found in the most unexpected places...friends just aching to be made. There are parents to let go of gently. There are relationships that need healing and wounds that need bandaging. There are sweet naps to take in a favorite chair in front of the TV or fireplace. There are rooms to rearrange, furniture and clothes to pick out and garage sales to hold or visit!
She is just as proud to watch a child, friend, sibling or spouse receive an award as she would be herself. Maybe more so because she is that kind of person. She has beaches to comb, butterflies to silently watch wing their way in choppy flight about her head and grass to delight her bare feet in. There are trees to climb and she is terribly proud when her older body can still find a perch on a branch. There is endless beauty to be discovered, to explore and to embrace. She is after all, only as old as the child within.
She is YOU. The little girl inside....and it is high time to let her lead the way. This adult caretaker person needs to take a step back and only interfere when she knows there is genuine danger in the pathway....sometimes, not even then. Though discretion may be the better part of valor, valor must reign supreme for progress to occur. This little girl needs to breathe again and to run...and to play. You've worked long and hard enough, woman, so now it is time to allow that child within to make each day into her own personal playground...and share it with others who've forgotten they are truly children inside.
You go, GIRL!
Frozentundra - you speak the language of menopause for me. Your words are my thoughts, feelings and experiences. Bless you and yours. I feel not so alone coming here. I am not the only island in a sea of chaos.
Sincerely,
Suzanne
Sincerely,
Suzanne
The world is precisely how we see it.
"As a man believes in his heart, so is he."
If we choose to see this world through old eyes it all seems mundane and tiresome,
but if we choose to see this world through young eyes, it is all fresh and exciting.
Any child can teach you how to see the world anew. I suspect that God gives the world children so that we remember how to be young for it is not the soul that ages but the body alone.
"...and a little child will lead them."
"If you do not humble yourself and become like a little child, you will in no wise enter into the Kingdom of Heaven."
"As a man believes in his heart, so is he."
If we choose to see this world through old eyes it all seems mundane and tiresome,
but if we choose to see this world through young eyes, it is all fresh and exciting.
Any child can teach you how to see the world anew. I suspect that God gives the world children so that we remember how to be young for it is not the soul that ages but the body alone.
"...and a little child will lead them."
"If you do not humble yourself and become like a little child, you will in no wise enter into the Kingdom of Heaven."
Frozentundra, I have an idea; write a book. That will fill your time and perhaps fill the void you are feeling in the winter of your life. You certainly have the knack for writing. That is the gift you can give others.
QUOTE (Happ1 @ Oct 20 2009, 07:53 PM)
Frozentundra, I have an idea; write a book. That will fill your time and perhaps fill the void you are feeling in the winter of your life. You certainly have the knack for writing. That is the gift you can give others.
Thanks for your concern.
One question - would you buy a copy if I did?
Every topic on this board could be condensed into a book if not an article. What would we call this misterpiece? (if this is MENopause, we can write a MISTERpiece.)
How Much Do I Hate Getting Old? Let Me Pretend I can Still COUNT the Ways...
My Life, In Shambles and YOURS, too, IF we Hang Out Together Awhile
Midlife Recitals: Symptom Rehearsals ALL
Beautiful Young Women Annoy Me; BUT I STILL Want to Be Them!
Today's Random Symptom and How I Survived It
Should I Blame God, the Kids or My Husband?
Take Away the Wrinkles and Gray Hair, I'd Still Be Frickin' Old
Six Easy Lessons In Useless Traffic Cursing and Other Midlife Rits of Fage
How My Children Turned on Me in Midlife (My Irrational Behavior Had NOTHING To Do With It!)
Everyone Dies, That's Just The Way it Goes..but I'm Still Scared Silly About It
Exercise and Proper Eating Do Not Prevent Midlife Crisis, Menopause or Death; Just Do it Anyway!
Soy and Yoga Your Way toward the Illusions of Better Health and Greater Happiness
Forestall Midlife Anxiety: POWERSURGE instead of REGRESSING into Your Unhappy Childhood or Marriage Once Again!
Easy Ways To Turn Midlife Disappointment and Frustration Into Success: Go Write A Bestseller!
I Return Victorious Having Finally Triumphed Over Menopause! (Oops, Maybe Not!)
Why Dogs Really are Really Woman's Best Friend, After All
I Don't Feel Old, I Don't Feel Old, I Don't Feel Old
Can Pantyliners Truly Be Disguised In Pantyhose with A Killer Girdle On?
Well, there it is.....just pick your favorite title and I'm off to the races.... (if all of you are allowed to entertain yourselves here, why can't I?)
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