The Brilliance of Resilience

I've been reading a ton about creating a personal altar. I think that this is particularly great idea at this point in my life, because it gives me the opportunity to create a sacred space for meditation, reflection, or just a sense of calmness among some of the general chaos that arises when you're an adult living with your parents, two cats and six chickens (just saying). Last night I set to work and started collecting items. I had some things that I wanted from the old apartment, some things that I'd collected since my transition to my parent's house and some things that seemed to have always been with me no matter where I've gone. I moved my record player and created a space that hopefully will be accessible to be me daily for a brief pause to reflect on the day ahead or the day that has just passed. I also took the plunge and ordered a smudging kit to go with the sage that I'd purchased last weekend and the Palo Santo I ordered this week. Needless to say,...

Alright, so the title of this post is a little harsh, but I'd like to think that there's some humour to my flow, right? I'm writing about something that is the very essence of a love/hate relationship: Facebook. I just rejoined FB after an eight month hiatus and I'm feeling two things. First, joy to see everyone again that I just don't keep in touch with via email or other social media platforms (c'mon ya'll, we know that Twitter is where I figure out what Wil Wheaton is having for lunch). Second, absolute (and I'm working on this one, so don't get sassy) disdain with myself for succumbing to the pratfalls of this particular social media platform. Let's face it, LinkedIn is fine for your work friends, and email is good for your coupons and amazon order tracking numbers, but FB is ideal for keeping in touch with relatives whose phone numbers you've misplaced or never had, and those friends from high school and college that you kind of know, bu...

I've been listening to music a lot lately thanks to having Spotify available to me at work and in the car. I mean, I've always been particularly in love with music in general, but I've been really immersed in my own world recently. It's awesome! Although I haven't taken the plunge and paid for the premium service, I've definitely gotten my money's worth out of the free service. I've hear so many new artists, cool covers and old standards that I've been thinking about for years but haven't taken the time to search and listen previously. Although I consider myself pretty, "with it," I have missed the boat on so many different artists both new and old. I'm having a total blast discovering and rediscovering artists' work. I never really gave Lyle Lovett a chance. I think that I was a little young when he first emerged on the scene, married Julia Roberts after a three-week courtship and caused a sensation because he didn't...

I got a message on Friday that my co-worker's Grandmother had died in an assisted living facility the day after she had taken her children to say goodbye. Her children are relatively young and were taking the impending death of their Great-Grandmother particularly hard, as this is the closest person in their lives that had ever passed away. I thought about this while sitting in my cubicle, feeling powerless to help them understand that their lives would be irrevocably changed. Truthfully, no matter how old you are, when you lose your Grandmother, you lose part of your ability to be a child. These seem like harsh words, but it's really two-fold. While you'll never have that person that loves you like no one else could, you'll start to really relish a lifetime of lessons that she taught you on how to be a courageous and loving person. If Grandmothers are anything in this world, they're the teachers and the storytellers that make people into the loving and compassion...

I reentered the world of Swap Bot recently. Briefly, Swap Bot is a website for people to exchange things like letters, crafts, postcards, art, etc. with others either regionally or internationally. 2011 through 2012 I was incredibly active on this site, spending hundreds of dollars on postage, goodies and stationery to write to tons of penpals and swap partners. Swap Bot lead to other sites and ways to meet people, and in turn, I gained probably around fifteen penpals at one point.  I loved getting to know people through letters all across the globe, but eventually the extra money for postage and the energy to write ran out and the energy for self-improvement and intense therapy kicked in. I'm not sad that I stopped writing to work on myself, but I am sad that I lost connection with a lot of beautiful women that helped me before I really started to work my process to get better. Now that I've been regularly going to therapy and working on myself for over two years now, I fee...

I had this strange experience at work a few weeks ago where I was privy to a very disrespectful situation involving a co-worker lashing out at another co-worker on a weekly conference call. This situation was so distressing to me that I'm still thinking about it and my other co-workers are still talking about it almost daily. Although work etiquette stipulates that you don't speak to people disrespectfully and heatedly at work (at least, my personal work etiquette does), this confrontation went way beyond the bounds of work etiquette to pushing the boundaries of interpersonal etiquette to their total limits. The first thing that I felt was anger for having been exposed to that kind of awkward anger in a professional environment. A total bevy of thoughts like, "hasn't your mother taught you any better," rushed through my head at the speed of sound. Even a week later I continued to be flabbergasted at this person, so much so that I told my boss that I didn't...

I'm pretty effing poor right now. Between the retreat last weekend, the cat's untimely and expensive trip to the vet, being too kind to people and the basic things in life that you have to pay for, I find myself in a situation where I'm going to have to be really careful about money. Like, don't go anywhere out of your way  home from work because you have to make that half-tank of gas in your car last until Friday...kind of poor. (Don't ask me if I'm regretting the aforementioned African Black Soap, though, because I'm not.) I was in bed last night kind of feeling sorry for myself about this situation and two particular things popped into my mind. First, my therapist dropped this bomb on me when I was whining about life not being fair. Life's Not Fair, but it's Still Good. So today I look up a snappy picture for the blog to go with this quote and the internet attributes this quote to Regina Brett. I look her up and her latest book slaps me i...

I'm incredibly excitable these days for numerous reasons that are both silly and serious. My anxiety ebbs and flows with utter ridiculousness. I think that this is probably the kind of feeling that Warren Zevon had when he wrote, "Werewolves of London." I'm not going to act like I know the story of his writing the song, but I can't imagine that he would anticipate that it's in my top 20 favorite songs, easily. I recently got my own copy of, "Excitable Boy," and let me just say that it's good. Yeah, I wanted it because "my" song is on it, because I've recently started collecting vinyl again, and because I was feeling my inner mystical hipster emerging from a cocoon of a seriously confused and bummed divorcee.  It's true y'all. I'm embracing my utter mystically-hipstery tendencies with reckless abandon. I went to Whole Foods. I spent twelve dollars on African Black soap. This is HAPPENING, people.  So, what does...