Saturday, January 17, 2015

The Grief Joy Rollercoaster

This Friday I will be moving to a beautiful new house with a 180 degree view of a lovely canyon.  It's a beautiful modern house, just what I wanted. It's more than I thought I could afford.  It will be a stretch for me, but I decided to jump and grow wings on the way down.  Fingers and budding wings crossed.

With less than a week left, it's mighty inconvenient that I have the flu for the first time in several years.  So much to do, so little time.  Still not enough energy to do anything physical.  When I do, my cough doubles me over and zaps me of all life force.

I thought I must have the flu due to my first time home buyer stress whittling down my immune system. I thought I must not have been handling it as brilliantly as I thought I was.  But yesterday a friend reminded me of that body/mind connection of lung issues.  Lungs represent grief.  I remember being quite conscious of this when my father was battling three different lung ailments in the last years of his life.  It was true for him.  My dad bore the weight of many losses - his own and his friends' and family's.  He was a very sensitive man.   His beautiful blue eyes even when sparkling with joy or excitement would belie the sadness underneath.

We aren't taught in school how to process grief.  That would be a handy class.  I might not have the flu now if I had taken it, because I didn't realize until my friend pointed it out that I too am grieving the loss of my current house, a most magical rental that I have been in for almost 4 years.  A lot of amazing things happened in my life while I was here: I wrote my book, ran the marathon, made a lot of new wonderful friends, started creative projects that will hopefully come to fruition in the next couple years.  It was a fruitful, miracle-making house for me. 

I moved here just a year and a half after my dad passed away. I lived here when I experienced harrowing dramas with my dad's business, where I really grieved his loss, and developed a new relationship with him, where I lived when I spread his ashes finally.  

His portrait is in the center of the house so I see it multiple times a day.  And the house is surrounded by birds and squirrels, both of which my dad taught me about when I was a tiny little girl.  We would pour over his many books on birds when I was little and he would tell me about each one. I wish I had retained any of the knowledge, but the most important thing was that it daddy time where I got to share his passion. 

The birds seem to know change is coming.  They greet me at every entrance and exit a little more dramatically than usual.  And one sits just outside the patio door, perched on the firewood cart, between sessions of banging repeatedly into the window.  No, he's not trying to get in, because the door is wide open.   When not there, he is about 25 feet away outside another window sitting on a table looking into a mirror, at intervals, repeatedly flying into the mirror as if attacking his mirror image.  It's not violent looking.  Here is a snippet, from the end of one of his rounds. Excuse the through-the-screen bad quality!



 
 
This little bird has never exhibited this behavior before this week.  I think he was trying to tell me something about my grief.  As my friends have all reminded me, it's OK to be sad about leaving one magical house for another.  And this place will always have a place in my heart.
 
And now I know one of the first things I will do is plant two trees like the ones just outside the patio door - jacaranda and bottle brush-- in my dad's honor.  The birds and squirrels adore these trees.  That plan even eases the grief a little bit.

 
 

Thursday, January 1, 2015

Stretching Out Into 2015

 

 
 
Today is the day I write my Manifesto 2015.   First step was to check in with my Manifesto 2014, which is conveniently taped under my glass desk so I can see it every single day.  I don't necessarily LOOK AT IT every day, but it's there to remind me from time to time. 
 
While I did not get a publishing deal this year as intended in Item #1, I did a few short weeks ago received excellent notes from a potential publisher, who believes in my book,. So I am busily addressing all of her brilliant suggestions.  That item will go to the top of my Manifesto 2015. 
 
And while I am not done "buying" a house with grace and ease, I'm smack dab in the middle of escrow.  With no competition on my offer in this uber-competitive LA real estate market, I am calling that a win. 
 
All the other items on my Manifesto I did accomplish to varying degrees and will continue to work on in 2015.  One can never open one's heart too much or listen to too much music!
 
In contemplating my new manifesto I looked up the derivation of the word INTENTION and found this:
 
Intention: "purpose," early 13c., from Old French entente, from Latin intentus "a stretching out," in Late Latin "intention, attention," noun use of past participle of intendere "stretch out, lean toward, strain," literally "to stretch out"
 
I love the image of "stretching out."  You don't have to know how you are going to accomplish something to make it happen.  On 1/1/14 I still had no clue - literally none -- as to how I was going to finish a marathon.  I had no idea how I could afford a house on my own in LA. 
 
 
 
Just yesterday, I showed a friend this vision board I created when I started looking for a house in November.  I remember thinking when I created that it was mostly a picture of trees.  I wondered how on earth am I going to afford a view like THAT!  Well, somehow this vision board helped me stretch out, reach out and find it.  I kept it right next to my TV to remind me every single day.  I was showing my friend the photos of my new house next to the photos on this board and even she had to admit how extraordinary it was that my vision board is now fully translated into a 3D reality.
 
The main lesson I got from 2014 was that my timing on when things should happen is not necessarily for my highest good.  I don't necessarily have the widest bird's eye view.  And, very time I stopped trusting, I felt pain.
 
For instance, I fell in love -- mad love -- with a house.  I was the first back-up offer but I didn't get it.  That house was AMAZING and yet this house is far, far, far better!  Thank God I didn't get the first one I fell in love with!  Rejection is God's protection.
 
I didn't get the book published this year, and I was in pain for a good part of the year as I waited and wondered and ran into closed doors, etc.  Now I know this book will be born when it is meant to be born, so that it can help the most people in the optimal way.
 
I don't think I will ever be done with this lesson of trusting that I don't always know what, where, when and how things should happen.  But 2014 was certainly a gift in delivering the lesson on a silver platter -- over and over and over again!
 
So, now as I sit down to draw up my Manifesto 2015, I will stretch into my vision, do all that I can do to make all of my intentions a reality, and then I will stretch several notches more into TRUSTING that all is well, all is perfect, and the timing is nothing short of miraculous -- no matter what I say!
 
Here's to stretching, stretching, stretching into our 2015 dreams!