Hello dear friends. I have been horrible at writing, so today I am going to start a new series of post that I have been intending to write, but didn't have time to write for the past month. This is series will all have a similar start to the title- "I'm Not Fine." As per my usual, I'm probably going to drop all of them today, and you can binge read or you can pick away at it. I'm like Netflix. 😉
I was sitting in my office on a cold, grey, wet and depressing Friday afternoon in April earlier this year, when I was suddenly hit with an awareness of a deep need to get the F out of the rain and find a sunny beach somewhere. I knew in this moment I was not fine, and I needed to do something, anything to get me to that beach. I remembered one of my best friends lives in Southern California, and I had never just gone to visit her. I decided I should at least look into visiting her. I started looking up airfare to go visit her. It was do able. I texted her and she had just started a new job, but magically we had a weekend that worked for both of us and it was only a week away.
This is not a choice I would usually make. On a whim, at the drop of a hat. Without a real plan. Just go. Just make it happen. But I did. And I did it because for the first time in 9 years, when that Seattle sun deprived April feeling hit me, I recognized it for what it was. I recognized and acknowledged I wasn't fine, and I was willing to act.
Now, as I put all of this together, I also recognized that I have a level of support and privilege that is currently making something like this possible where it previously wouldn't have been. Moving in with my friends has opened all kinds of opportunities to me that I just wouldn't have been able to manage before so I felt incredibly humbled and grateful for that.
Also, I have been using a meditative journal a friend published called "Aligning with Joy" which has helped me become more self aware, and more open to pursuing opportunities that are before me. These changes in my life have hinged greatly on these two things.
Fast forward. April 21 I was sitting on an airplane flying toward my best friend and a beach and I made a decision to read a book that that friend had suggested. "Stop Saying You're Fine" by Mel Robins. When my friend suggested this book, she told me it was life changing and I should read it. I bought it, and then it sat on my table for two or three months. I decided this plane ride was the time to start it. I'm not going to spoil the book. It was life changing and you should read it.
The biggest thing I got from the part of the book I read on that plane ride was that my brain was in fact trying to defeat me and all my great ideas. I looked back over previous months. I had done some pretty incredible things, but every time I had had an amazing, empowering, actually on the ground change things idea my brain would tell me it was stupid. I would push through, make it happen any way, but "the chicken" and "the jerk" as she called them would take over and make me feel pretty horrible for trying. Thanks to a lot of amazing people encouraging my "stupid idea's" and telling me they weren't stupid, I pushed through and didn't give up.
Just gaining the insight from that book about why that kept happening gave me a power to fight it. which has proved to be pretty important. So I landed in LA, and my friend and I went immediately to a mall where I proceeded with my plan at the age of 36, to by my first ever bikini. Which absolutely terrified me, but I knew that was all the more reason to proceed and do it.
We went straight from the mall out to Venice Beach. I changed my clothes in a bathroom, and we walked out toward the water. It took me a few minutes to get brave, and warm enough, but eventually I took off my tee shirt and let my bare midriff experience its first moments of sunshine probably since I was a super little kid. It was scary. I was self conscious. Eventually I started to notice all sorts of body types and builds wondering around midriffs exposed and my confidence built.
The tide started to come in. We took a quick wonder down to the ocean, and then ran back to the car, grabbed our shoes and started to walk the street by the beach. I heard prophets proclaiming- well honestly I have no idea what. I saw artists, and musicians, and cool murals. People on a bike path, on bikes, on roller skates/ blades, skate boards, Segways, scooters.
My favorite moment was when this really cool couple on a tandem beach cruiser bike pumping out the coolest hip hop jams passed all these geeky white guys on Segways. It was hilarious, and I loved it so much.
Later that night my friend and I went to a hot yoga class. The entire Purple Rain album, plus Prince singing Nothing Compares 2 U. I have never sweated so much in my life. It was an experience. My body amazed me, in what it was able to do. My fitness has improved a lot in the past months, but I don't usually do much yoga. I did an OK Job keeping up. I have never sweated that much in my life. I don't like getting sweaty, and I don't usually get very sweaty even when i do manage to break a sweat. Mostly my body just gets really red to cool down. I had buckets dripping off of me in this class and it was such a new feeling. At times, unpleasant, but not as bad as I had thought.
Something about that class, about going through a whole music album, It changed my thinking a bit. A bout the power of our stories. of telling and staying with one whole aspect of something for an uncomfortably long time. The class went faster than I thought it did. When it ended, I was surprised it was already over. I was surprised that it wasn't as hard as I had imagined it would be. And there was a powerful connection that happened with that music.
The next day we went out to Malibu. I was very excited about this because I have been listening to Miley Cyrus' new album a lot, and Malibu is one of my favorite songs on there. On the way out we listened to Snoop Dog, and Tom Petty, trying to get in tune with the right vibe of the place. But the last song we played was Malibu.
"I never came to the beach or stood by the ocean. I never sat by the shore under the sun with my feet in the sand but you brought me here and I'm happy that you did. 'cause now I'm as free as birds catching the wind. I always thought I would sink, so I never swam. I never went boatin', don't get how they are floatin' and sometimes I get so scared of what I can't understand But here I am, next to you the sky is more blue In Malibu... We are just like the waves that flow back and forth. Sometimes I feel like I'm drowning and you're there to save me and I wanna thank you with all of my heart. Its a brand new start, a dream come true. In Malibu."
That song described so much of what I was feeling and experiencing on this trip. Its true, I've never just sat on a beach in the sun enjoying things until this trip. I've been to beaches, a couple of times. but we rushed them. This one I savored. The entire point of the trip was to be on a beach. So I was. And I saw amazing things like two puppies playing, and little fish and crabs in tide pools. And I got brave, and not only did I wear that swim suit in public, and not feel ashamed about myself- twice. I posted a picture of it on social media, because it scared me.
Those two days were about connection, with the world and humans around me. With my best friend. With the beach and the sun. With the food we ate. With music. I did things that scared me, and they were exactly the things I needed. And though I went home and got a little sick from too much sun and too much heat, I still wouldn't change it. They were exactly the two days I needed to start approaching my life differently. More boldly. More honestly. To admit when I am not fine, and take a chance, lean in, and do something about it.
I was sitting in my office on a cold, grey, wet and depressing Friday afternoon in April earlier this year, when I was suddenly hit with an awareness of a deep need to get the F out of the rain and find a sunny beach somewhere. I knew in this moment I was not fine, and I needed to do something, anything to get me to that beach. I remembered one of my best friends lives in Southern California, and I had never just gone to visit her. I decided I should at least look into visiting her. I started looking up airfare to go visit her. It was do able. I texted her and she had just started a new job, but magically we had a weekend that worked for both of us and it was only a week away.
This is not a choice I would usually make. On a whim, at the drop of a hat. Without a real plan. Just go. Just make it happen. But I did. And I did it because for the first time in 9 years, when that Seattle sun deprived April feeling hit me, I recognized it for what it was. I recognized and acknowledged I wasn't fine, and I was willing to act.
Now, as I put all of this together, I also recognized that I have a level of support and privilege that is currently making something like this possible where it previously wouldn't have been. Moving in with my friends has opened all kinds of opportunities to me that I just wouldn't have been able to manage before so I felt incredibly humbled and grateful for that.
Also, I have been using a meditative journal a friend published called "Aligning with Joy" which has helped me become more self aware, and more open to pursuing opportunities that are before me. These changes in my life have hinged greatly on these two things.
Fast forward. April 21 I was sitting on an airplane flying toward my best friend and a beach and I made a decision to read a book that that friend had suggested. "Stop Saying You're Fine" by Mel Robins. When my friend suggested this book, she told me it was life changing and I should read it. I bought it, and then it sat on my table for two or three months. I decided this plane ride was the time to start it. I'm not going to spoil the book. It was life changing and you should read it.
The biggest thing I got from the part of the book I read on that plane ride was that my brain was in fact trying to defeat me and all my great ideas. I looked back over previous months. I had done some pretty incredible things, but every time I had had an amazing, empowering, actually on the ground change things idea my brain would tell me it was stupid. I would push through, make it happen any way, but "the chicken" and "the jerk" as she called them would take over and make me feel pretty horrible for trying. Thanks to a lot of amazing people encouraging my "stupid idea's" and telling me they weren't stupid, I pushed through and didn't give up.
Just gaining the insight from that book about why that kept happening gave me a power to fight it. which has proved to be pretty important. So I landed in LA, and my friend and I went immediately to a mall where I proceeded with my plan at the age of 36, to by my first ever bikini. Which absolutely terrified me, but I knew that was all the more reason to proceed and do it.
We went straight from the mall out to Venice Beach. I changed my clothes in a bathroom, and we walked out toward the water. It took me a few minutes to get brave, and warm enough, but eventually I took off my tee shirt and let my bare midriff experience its first moments of sunshine probably since I was a super little kid. It was scary. I was self conscious. Eventually I started to notice all sorts of body types and builds wondering around midriffs exposed and my confidence built.
The tide started to come in. We took a quick wonder down to the ocean, and then ran back to the car, grabbed our shoes and started to walk the street by the beach. I heard prophets proclaiming- well honestly I have no idea what. I saw artists, and musicians, and cool murals. People on a bike path, on bikes, on roller skates/ blades, skate boards, Segways, scooters.
My favorite moment was when this really cool couple on a tandem beach cruiser bike pumping out the coolest hip hop jams passed all these geeky white guys on Segways. It was hilarious, and I loved it so much.
Later that night my friend and I went to a hot yoga class. The entire Purple Rain album, plus Prince singing Nothing Compares 2 U. I have never sweated so much in my life. It was an experience. My body amazed me, in what it was able to do. My fitness has improved a lot in the past months, but I don't usually do much yoga. I did an OK Job keeping up. I have never sweated that much in my life. I don't like getting sweaty, and I don't usually get very sweaty even when i do manage to break a sweat. Mostly my body just gets really red to cool down. I had buckets dripping off of me in this class and it was such a new feeling. At times, unpleasant, but not as bad as I had thought.
Something about that class, about going through a whole music album, It changed my thinking a bit. A bout the power of our stories. of telling and staying with one whole aspect of something for an uncomfortably long time. The class went faster than I thought it did. When it ended, I was surprised it was already over. I was surprised that it wasn't as hard as I had imagined it would be. And there was a powerful connection that happened with that music.
The next day we went out to Malibu. I was very excited about this because I have been listening to Miley Cyrus' new album a lot, and Malibu is one of my favorite songs on there. On the way out we listened to Snoop Dog, and Tom Petty, trying to get in tune with the right vibe of the place. But the last song we played was Malibu.
"I never came to the beach or stood by the ocean. I never sat by the shore under the sun with my feet in the sand but you brought me here and I'm happy that you did. 'cause now I'm as free as birds catching the wind. I always thought I would sink, so I never swam. I never went boatin', don't get how they are floatin' and sometimes I get so scared of what I can't understand But here I am, next to you the sky is more blue In Malibu... We are just like the waves that flow back and forth. Sometimes I feel like I'm drowning and you're there to save me and I wanna thank you with all of my heart. Its a brand new start, a dream come true. In Malibu."
That song described so much of what I was feeling and experiencing on this trip. Its true, I've never just sat on a beach in the sun enjoying things until this trip. I've been to beaches, a couple of times. but we rushed them. This one I savored. The entire point of the trip was to be on a beach. So I was. And I saw amazing things like two puppies playing, and little fish and crabs in tide pools. And I got brave, and not only did I wear that swim suit in public, and not feel ashamed about myself- twice. I posted a picture of it on social media, because it scared me.
Those two days were about connection, with the world and humans around me. With my best friend. With the beach and the sun. With the food we ate. With music. I did things that scared me, and they were exactly the things I needed. And though I went home and got a little sick from too much sun and too much heat, I still wouldn't change it. They were exactly the two days I needed to start approaching my life differently. More boldly. More honestly. To admit when I am not fine, and take a chance, lean in, and do something about it.
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