Presence, Security, Success

Wanting What I Have

September 3, 2022

Here is a little help for the Grumpies, if they have set in and you are feeling a bit hopeless and bleh about things (like I have been lately).

It’s possible your Grumpies showed up because of the heat. It’s supposed to reach 110 degrees Monday in Sacramento, and Death Valley could see the hottest temperature ever recorded on the planet soon. Or maybe our endless Northern California fire season and drought have you down. Or maybe it’s some other comparable weather catastrophe where you live that is making you crabby. Because doesn’t the weather seem to be acting up everywhere?

It could also be the  sudden start to the school year (although unfortunately for some reason the school year starts suddenly every year.) One day it’s summer! The next day? It’s not! What a terrible plan! Wouldn’t it be nice to ease into it a little more? Like two-day school weeks at least for August, and then three days the first week of September, and then finally, a jump to five days after Labor Day?)

All this global stuff is overwhelming. And then there are the Grumpies I get when I spend time on social media and (even though I know better)  compare my life to others. Sure, the lives we curate for social media are generally big, fat fantasies. But still! Some people seem to be getting so much done!  And they love telling the rest of us about it, especially the self-proclaimed “influencers” who annoy me so much but who I still follow (a little) anyway.

Thankfully, I listened to a podcast this week that helped lift some of my Grumpies. It didn’t change the difficult circumstances that we all are living through.  But it shifted my perspective and brought some light to my week. Here’s the question it raised for me:

What if, instead of focusing on all the things I think I want that I don’t have,  I decide (Really. Make a conscious decision) to focus on the things I want that I do have?  How would that be?

Because my life is full of so many blessings, so many gifts. Continue Reading…

Power, Presence

Pee Pee Poo Poo

August 27, 2022

(And other things I read this week.)

 

A picture someone drew for me. So it wasn’t all “pee pee. Poo poo.” There were also rainbows and butterflies.

If you give a group of first and second graders colored chalk at the end of a long school day, because the teacher left playdough for them to work with, but you know that the playdough will most likely end up in people’s hair and then will be turned into balls that get tossed around the classroom and ground into the carpet and since you do not want to give the frazzled custodian extra work, you are grateful that another teacher takes pity on you and loans you a box of beautiful sidewalk chalk. If that happens, then you can rest assured that someone in the group will stealthily write “butt,” “butt,” “butt,” all over the school courtyard when you are not looking, on the day before the fall open house. Someone else will write, “Pee pee poo poo.”

(This is not funny)

(Maybe it is a little funny.)

So then you will take the graffiti writers aside (The second grade equivalent of a graffiti writer, anyway), and you will have a talk about what words are appropriate for the school courtyard on the day before open house. Then you will frantically run into the classroom to search for a bowl, or cups, or anything to fill with water so that they can splash water on the sidewalk and wash away the inappropriate words. You might also hope that the other teachers who have rooms facing the courtyard will be so involved in their lessons that they do not notice the ruckus your first and second graders are causing. Continue Reading…