Curse You Brene Brown!

Editor's Note: I debated sharing this post, I actually had a semi-sleepless night about it.  Ironically, Brene Brown covers this topic in her book "Daring Greatly" about perfectionism being the enemy of good.  But, my goal when I write a blog is that one person gets something out of it, so I'm hoping it does some good.  And I'm hopeful that Sheila, Ariel, Marlene, Bonnie and Abbe realize I'm joking.  But then again, I put you all in the same company as Brene Brown and Mr. Rogers, so that's not so bad.

And while we’re at it, curse you Sheila Ewers.  And Ariel Jaillett.  And Marlene Topping.  And Bonnie Pugh and Abbe Straw for that matter.  And practically any yoga teacher, inspirational writer, theologian, or therapist I know.  Curse you all….

OK, now that I have that out of my system, let’s get to the heart of the matter.

As I’ve grown older, and much, much wiser, I’ve discovered that certain of the “truths” I’ve been taught all my life, weren’t necessarily the truth. 

“Your greatest investment is your house”

“The highest compliment you can pay me is to say I work hard every day”

“You must find a church home”

Over time, I’ve found that on a certain level, these aren’t necessarily true, maybe at one point in time they were, but at various points, they’ve failed the litmus test of being the basic tenets of life to live by.

As I’ve come to discover the truth or untruth about these premises of life, I got excited to realize that there was another one that I could shoot a hole in, and I had planned to write a blog post about how it may be cited universally, but it’s really not true either.  It is:

“You can’t really love someone else unless you really love yourself first”

There are many variations to this quote, this happens to be one from one of my heroes, Mr. Rogers, so I guess I have to say curse you Mr. Rogers too.  At this point, I may be going to Hell.

“It’s a sad man my friend who’s living in his own skin, and can’t stand the company”

This one became vitally important to me because, like the line above I quote so often from Bruce Springsteen, I really don’t love myself, and I truly believe I love others.  But, so many really smart people seem to be saying that’s not possible, and I became excited when I started realizing so many of the hard and fast rules I lived my life by were not really correct, this could be one too!  I can love others without loving myself, all the smart people I read and know and respect are wrong.

Yeah, you can imagine how this went….

It all started innocently enough, we were on a yoga retreat that Sheila led and organized, and at one point, Sheila talked about this, and that’s when it first hit me, maybe this is all wrong.  Now, if you know Sheila, and if you know how much I respect her, you’d know this was quite the leap for me.  But that’s when it first hit me to challenge this and tell everyone why we don’t have to love ourselves to love others.

Then, I saw a post from Ariel Jaillett, who is so wise beyond her years, and it looked like this:

I commented to Ariel that I planned a blog post disputing this, I didn’t agree with it, I didn’t agree with Brene Brown, Sheila, anyone, I can love others and not love myself. 

“I’m with Sheila and Brene Brown.  You may think you love others but when you discover self love it’s like adding color to black and white pictures”

Ouch.  That one came from Marlene Topping.  I have no idea if this is an original quote from Marlene, or one she repeated, but it really hit home, there was something about the imagery, and it made me take a step back.

And then it continued to get worse.  Bonnie Pugh and Abbe Straw were leading a course at our yoga studio on Brene Brown’s book “The Gifts of Imperfection”.  I love Brene Brown, I had already read “Daring Greatly”, which moved me a great deal, and Laurel had already read “The Gifts of Imperfection” and spoke highly of it.  (Side note: anytime I read a book after Laurel reads it, she highlights, underlines, puts comments in the margin, so I know where all the important parts are).

Early in “The Gifts of Imperfection”, Brene Brown discusses the whole concept of loving oneself to be able to truly love others.  It was a sobering moment for me as she beautifully shot holes into everything I was trying to prove.  There were many great comments, but the one I found most compelling came from a woman she quoted, Renae Cobb, who said:

“Certainly, the people we love inspire us to heights of love and compassion that we might have never achieved otherwise, but to really scale those heights, we often have to go to the depths of who we are, light/shadow, good/evil, loving/destructive, and figure out our own stuff in order to love them better.”

Check and mate. 

I decided to give it one last shot, as Princess Leia once said, “Help me Obi-Wan, you’re my only hope!” I spoke to Hailey, and while I anticipated the answer she would give me, I had to at least take one last shot at vindicating myself.  Hailey is my Obi-wan, she can always seem to say the right things to me.  But, yes, she confirmed what all the other smart people were saying.

We talked, and she gave me some of the old tools she had given me to try, with some new variations, and she gave me new tools to work on.  As usual, she was able to help me figure out how to move forward rather than spinning in circles.  She may not have given me the answer I wanted, but she gave me new-found hope to work through this struggle.

As I described to her, the funny thing is I think I’m frustrated the most because I feel like I’m so close to breaking the chains and moving to a whole new level.  I’m pulling on them, I’m stretching them, I can hear them weakening, but I just can’t break them, and that’s what’s so frustrating.  I feel like I’m so close, but I can’t figure out how to get there, and that makes it all the more irritating, it’s almost in my grasp, but it could still be a million miles away, it doesn’t matter, and as noted, makes it all the more demoralizing.

I took some time and went back through my blog posts to gain some perspective, and it’s amazing to me the pattern of what I’ve written, in some senses, what little real change there’s been over the years, and a recurring theme that pervades so much of what I’ve written, and simply doesn't change.

“I’m dying alive”

“I’ve been trying to get down to the heart of the matter…I think it’s about forgiveness”

“I abandoned my family.  I didn’t take care of my family”

I’ve spent my life, judging myself, beating myself up, not loving myself, and I’m really getting tired.  As I’ve said to Laurel, if I’m not going to truly live, I should just drive my car into Alum Creek Lake.  I’ve just been reading “The Little Prince” (thanks to Sheila), and there’s the one person the Little Prince meets on his journey, a drunkard, and he drinks to forget, he wants to forget he’s ashamed, and he’s ashamed because he drinks.  In a sense, that’s the way I feel, it’s an endless recurring nightmare, a hamster wheel that I can’t seem to get off of. 

As noted though, my frustration lies in the fact that I’m so close to breaking these chains.  I have grown to use so many valuable resources to help me navigate this, Hailey, yoga, yoga teachers, great writers, theologians, unbelievable friends and family in my life, and of course Laurel, who has been the one to encourage me and inspire me to get me to do the activities that I’m doing.  And I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention God, God put these people in my life, He gave me the tools to figure it out. 

I believe though, it’s up to me now.  Just like the story of the drowning man who shoos away people trying to save him, waiting for God to answer his prayers, and ultimately drowns, I can’t wait for God to swoop down and intervene, He’s given me everything I need to overcome this, I’m the one who has

to turn inward, take it inward and find that inner light that is so desperately trying to come out.

So as I vacillate on the continuum between driving my car into Alum Creek Lake and breaking the chains that hold me back, I keep wondering, what will get me off of this endless hamster wheel?  Self love will never come until I find forgiveness.  One has to come before the other, and that has to come from me.

As I’ve shared in the past, Dave Carr has inspired me to choose a word for the new year rather than New Year’s resolutions.  My word for 2021 was faith, and that one really led me to greater heights in my spiritual journey.  My word for 2022 is going to be forgiveness.  I need to make this intentional, to put in the time, and the work, to take the final steps needed.  I need to really invest in some of the tools and ideas Hailey has given me to break through, to reach a new level.  It’s time to break the chains.

Oh, and by the way, no need to worry, I won’t drive my car into Alum Creek Lake.  As Laurel has told me, Little Bit would miss me too much.

Faith

 “Tell me all your thoughts on God
'Cause I'd really like to meet her
And ask her why we're who we are” Dishwalla

I recently went back and re-read one of Dave Carr’s latest blog posts, “To The Next Person Who Sits At This Desk….” As I’ve often said, Dave is who I’d like to be when I grow up, and as I read his blog, I realized that many of the actions I intentionally do are what I’ve consciously or unconsciously learned from him.  Being fully present, face to face meetings rather than e-mails, handwritten notes, I practice these, and I learned them from Dave.  Plagiarism is the greatest form of flattery.

Another that I’ve learned and practice is not doing New Year’s Resolutions, but choosing a word to focus on for the year.  This year I chose “Faith”.  The reason was simple.  With the pandemic, it became harder to practice faith in a community in 2020.  Through 2020, I experienced a great deal of disappointment from a couple of the religious institutions I had grown to love.  I grew disenchanted with what Christianity had become as we continue to move further away from Jesus Christ and what He taught.  And I read the Bible.

OK, you may find the last sentence a little odd, and I did too.  With the pandemic, I expanded my morning readings with the intent of reading the entire Bible in a year’s time.  I’ve read various parts over the years, but I hadn’t read the entire book before.  I started with and finished the New Testament, and then worked my way through the Old Testament.  I popcorned around to various books, starting with ones I was most interested in.  

I eventually had to stop before I got too depressed.  I had always believed that the Bible was “God-breathed”, written by man, but inspired by God.  While I know I’m probably in the minority, I found many sections of the Old Testament to be at best, filled with meaningless minutiae and at worst, very disturbing and hate-filled.  For the life of me, if this is inspired by God, I have no earthly idea why.  While there are many parts of the Bible that are filled with beauty and words to live our lives by, and I do my best to do that, there are some parts that leave me completely dumbfounded.

As we moved from Georgia to Ohio, as I embarked on a new year, with my core foundations rocked, the Church, the Bible, where does that leave my faith?  

Have you found a church home?

Each time we moved throughout our married lives, Laurel and I always set out to find a church home very quickly once we settled in.  Maybe it was because we weren’t moving with children this time, but we saw no such need to rush.  As time wore on, we saw no need at all.  Through my entire adult life, I had lived with the hard and fast rule that you have to have a church home.  I saw something recently where someone said, “You need the church and the church needs you”.  Why?

I had started reading Rolf Gates’ “Meditations on Intention and Being” in 2020.  Rolf is a yoga teacher, but no offense to yoga teachers, that falls far short of describing him.  His writing and wisdom is astounding.  After I finished “Meditations on Intention and Being”, I moved on to “Meditations from the Mat”, and my feelings continued.  I mixed in Nadia Bolz-Weber’s “Accidental Saints”, Rachel Held Evans’ “Inspired”, Glennon Doyle’s “Love Warrior”, Brene Brown’s “Daring Greatly” and I felt myself growing more and more.  Very respectfully speaking, I was gaining as much insight and inspiration as I did reading the New Testament or some of the prophets from the Old Testament.

I had started doing yoga about four years ago with Laurel, but I was spotty, I traveled a lot, so I only went maybe one or two days a week.  Since we’ve moved, and I travel a great deal less, I’m able to go to yoga usually four times a week.  It’s hard to describe, and I think you really have to experience it, but you can get such a sense of community and belonging in a yoga studio.  Just like with anything in life, I’m sure there are some exceptions, but for the most part, you have unconditional acceptance in a yoga studio, no matter who you are or what you look like.  

“Each one of us is merely a small instrument.  When you look at the inner workings of electrical things, often you see small and big wires, new and old, cheap and expensive, lined up.  Until the current passes through them, there will be no light.  That wire is you and me.  The current is God.  We have the power to let the current pass through us, use us, produce the light of the world.  Or we can refuse to be used and allow darkness to spread.”  Mother Teresa

As the year progressed, I was inspired to get two new tattoos of Scripture.  A few years ago, I got Micah 6:8 and Joshua 24:15.  I had thought at the time, this day would come, and it finally did.  In this case, I moved to the New Testament, I think my Bible reading inspired me, but to a greater extent, the world we live in inspired me.  I find that when I tattoo these verses on my arms, I also tattoo them on my heart, and I try to live by them each day.  I chose:

Matthew 22:39 – “And the second greatest commandment is love your neighbor as yourself”

I chose this one for a few reasons.  I remember years ago watching a sermon by Andy Stanley, and he spoke of the greatest commandment, which is “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind”.  He said, “You know what, don’t worry about this one, God is God, and He’s OK if you don’t follow this one, but you need to love your neighbor.  But that’s not so easy, because your neighbor is everybody, not just the neighbors that you like.”  He then went on to point out all of the people you may really not like, but you need to love them.  It was compelling to me, and really highlights where we are going horribly wrong.  We have lost our ability or desire to love our neighbor, we would prefer to build up our walls, and keep our neighbors out.  I need to change that in myself.

1 John 3:18 – “Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth”

I think too many of us are allowing darkness to spread and aren’t willing to take action because of the consequences.  As noted, we like our walls, we want to separate from those who are different from us without realizing we are all so similar.  I need to be more willing to stand up, speak up, take action to produce light rather than darkness.  This became more evident to me these last few years as we faced the rebounding of racism in this country.  It never really went away, but it came back with a vengeance.

"Many religious folks insist on answers that are always true.  We love closure, resolution and clarity while thinking that we are people of “faith”.  How strange that the very word “faith” has come to mean its exact opposite." Richard Rohr

More and more, I’ve found that people need certainty, they need proof of God’s existence, proof of Jesus Christ being the Son of God.  They need proof that Noah really built an ark.  That Jonah really was in the belly of a whale.

I’ve grown less inclined to need that proof.  To be honest, I believe that a lot of the stories in the Bible are just that, stories.  I believe there are a lot of strange things in the Bible.  But that’s OK, I don’t necessarily have to have an answer for why the Bible is what it is.  

I believe in many ways the Church has lost its way, I believe we have lost our way, and the teachings of Jesus have been lost to us.  I also believe there are many really good people serving the church and attending churches, and it’s not my place to determine which ones of them are right or wrong, good or bad.  I just know, at least for the moment, the church isn’t the right place for me, and that’s not the church’s fault, it’s not my fault, it just is.

Have I lost my faith?  Oh my God, no.  Actually, I would tend to believe that over the past year, my faith, and particularly my spirituality, have grown immensely.  I fully believe in God, I am a devoted follower of Jesus Christ, and I feel the Holy Spirit in my life all the time.  

I also believe there is more to the story.  I remember one of my favorite quotes from another of my dear friends, Jim Dyer, “If that’s the way you believe God is, then we don’t worship the same God”.  OK, I probably butchered it, but his point is that if we are worshiping a God of exclusion, we aren’t worshiping the same God.  If I really read and believe in what Jesus said and did, I have a hard time believing that those who we choose to be on the other side of the wall, take your pick, homosexuals, Muslims, people who are pro-choice, are excluded from the Kingdom of Heaven.

And, to take it a step further, I’m growing more and more to believe what Laurel often says, the Kingdom of Heaven is here right now, it’s up to us to create it here on earth.  That gets back to the light.  We can choose to be an instrument of light, or we can let the darkness overtake everything.  I can find Jesus each day as I go to work, go to yoga, walk the neighborhood.  I can feel the Holy Spirit surround me and talk to me when I go on my morning runs.  I can allow the current to pass through me to spread the light of God.  I have faith.

Practicing Gratitude

 “It seems that gratitude without practice may be a little like faith without works – it’s not alive” Brene Brown from “The Gifts of Imperfection”

I shared in a blog post almost a year ago about our very difficult move from Georgia to Ohio and the various obstacles we encountered.  The move went for the most part about as badly as it could have gone.  We suffered a great deal of mishaps along the way.  Sadly, even once we got into our new house, it didn’t get much better.  We faced so many delays and problems getting furniture, as everyone is dealing with these days, and it made it impossible to make our house into a home.  It took 6-9 months to finally get everything we wanted or needed, and over the last few months, we’re finally settling in.

While I wish I could say that the business or work side of the move went much better, sadly, it didn’t.  We had a great business plan to develop our Columbus facility, moving into a new building, moving a production line from Georgia, winning a major customer in the aerospace industry, gaining our AS9100 certification, growing the business, making this facility into the hub for Aerospace business, the Americas hub for Force measurement, we had grand plans for development and growth.

So I set off as I often do, as Don Quixote to conquer my windmills with my trusted partner Sancho by my side.   It didn’t take long for me to morph into Bilbo Baggins, and unfortunately it became “An Unexpected Journey”.  Yes, I love to mix my metaphors…

We set out to find a new, bigger, better building to rent.  As many know, the real estate industry is painful these days, and we couldn’t find adequate space to rent.  We decided we would buy a building.  We found two different buildings to buy, and in each case, even though we were assured the owner wanted to sell, when we made an offer, we were told, “these buildings aren’t for sale”.  Well, how about we build a new building?  As you can imagine, land is hard to come by, building costs are astronomical, nothing seemed to be coming together.

As we struggled through the building process, the pandemic wasn’t very kind to us either.  Business just didn’t bounce back the way we hoped or needed it to.  The large Aerospace customer delayed us yet again, we couldn’t move the production line from Georgia because we obviously didn’t have a building to move it to.

While I’m sure this wasn’t the truth, nothing seemed to be going right.  Each day was a new adventure into Murphy’s Law. 

But then, it all began to turn.  We found some property, and even though it was more than we needed, we bought it, we signed a contract to have a building built, and we will have a new home, finally, midway through 2022.

We achieved AS9100 within eight months or so, which is unheard of.  We had anticipated a minimum of 18 months, but through some very strong leadership from our team (not me), we made it happen. 

And that large Aerospace customer?  They are back, and wanting to sign a contract before the end of the year.  OK, I’ll believe that one when I see it, but I will not give up on this one, we’ve put too much time and effort into it.

The picture above is from the Groundbreaking for the new building.  While one could look at this as the end of a journey, in reality, it’s the beginning of a new journey.  While I could now portray Laurel and me as Sam Gamgee and Frodo, I think I’d better stop while I’m ahead, not sure she would like being Sam, although I’m not so sure she would like being Sancho either.  But, as usual, I digress.

After a very long introduction, the point of all of this rambling.  It’s easy to lose sight of gratitude when things aren’t going quite how we would like them.  And it’s easy to bitch about your work, your company, the people you work for.  I know I’ve done it at times in my close to 40 years of work, and I know plenty of people have bitched about me over the years.  It’s easy to do.  It’s much harder to practice gratitude, and though it’s hard, it’s so worth it.  As that day happened, November 2, when we broke ground, I thought about:

An owner who has a vision and also cares about his people – There is no doubt Mr. Wiegand is one of the smartest people I’ve ever met, and he also seems to have a vision for where the world is going, and where our company needs to be based on where the world is going.  But he has also done many incredibly kind acts for his employees.  I can’t imagine ever finding this type of leadership in a publicly traded company, and I also have to believe it’s rare in a privately held company.  He is truly unique.

Leadership that has a vision and a plan – Between the leadership in Germany and the leadership in Georgia, they developed a plan, a vision, and they stuck with the plan, and expanded the plan when it was necessary.  While it didn’t always seem like the right decision based on short term problems or issues, they stuck with it and carried it through even with all of the adversity.  They were very supportive and I really appreciate all of the support they gave me, even when I was questioning it myself.  I’m not ashamed to admit, when I talked to Todd Gardner before the groundbreaking, I got teary-eyed thanking him for all the support he and the leadership team had given us.

A great support system – I worked with the group in Georgia for 12 years.  I knew how good they were, I really believe we have a great team there.  Sure, we have our bumps and bruises along the way, but on the whole, it’s a very good, hard-working team.  You can really find that out when you need help.  And there were plenty of times I needed help.  I like to joke that if everyone woke up each morning and asked themselves, what can I do to make Steve McCullough’s life better today, the world would be a much better place.  I asked a lot, I received a lot, and in many cases, they did make my life better that day.

The people in Columbus – This group.  The dream of fighting a new windmill came to me on a visit to Columbus in early 2020.  I was there for a Kaizen event, and there was just something about the people there.  They are such an eclectic group, such a menagerie of personalities, I just really took to them quickly.  The picture below is of the team standing in front of Lake WIKA.

While the transition hasn’t been easy, nothing had seemed to go right, my feelings for this small band of people never changed, other than my feelings probably grew stronger.  There’s only a bit more than 30 of us, but it’s such a good group of people, a kind group, an incredibly hard-working team.  Just like with your children, no group you ever work with is your favorite, and they are all your favorite.  For the most part, particularly with the pandemic, many of us can work remotely at least a couple days a week.  Unless I’m going to be on virtual meetings all day, I always go to work.  I just love to be around them, they are just so much fun, they make my day.

A wife who will chase windmills with me and more – As noted, Laurel is always willing to accompany me when I am looking for the next windmill.  But it’s much more than that.  As noted, the search for windmills became an Unexpected Journey, and I’ll be honest, I was losing a bit of energy at times.  During a low period (not the low period, since there were so many), she laid into me, and gave me the ass-kicking she apparently thought I needed, and said, “You need to fight for this!  These people deserve this.  You need to do this for them!” 

Now, truth be told, I’ve never quit in my life, and I don’t imagine I ever will.  The picture here is what

is hanging in my office, I’ll never give up.  But, apparently, she felt or saw my energy waning, and I probably did need that reminder of why we were here.

“Don’t ask what the world needs.  Ask what makes you come alive, and go do it.  Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.” Brene Brown

Practicing gratitude.  No, it’s not easy.  It’s so much easier to bitch and complain.  Sometimes, it feels so good to do it too.  Practicing gratitude is hard work.  But when you do it, you feel so good, and so much better than when you complain.  You begin to realize all that you can be grateful for, and all that has been done for you.  November 2 was a great day because of the ceremony and what it meant.  But it was a greater day for me because I took the time to remember all the people who made it possible and why we were doing this.  Yes, it made me come alive.

Taste and See

"Instead of standing on the shore and proving to ourselves that the ocean cannot carry us, let us venture on its waters just to see" Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

Laurel and I are coming up on our 39^th year of marriage, and I’m embarrassed to say that we’ve taken very few vacations together.  Over the years, we took our four children on many visits to grandparents, we did do a Disney trip once with them, but as a couple, we’ve gone on very few.

There was the first one, Virginia Beach, when the girls were little, we went to France when the boys were little, and about five years ago, we went to Niagara Falls.  We had planned to go to France on a yoga retreat last year, and then, well, COVID hit, and that didn’t happen. 

As we were gearing up for the rescheduled trip to France, we started running into some barriers along the way.  We attempted to renew Laurel’s passport, in plenty of time for the trip, and then the State Department greatly extended their wait times after we sent the renewal in.  As many times as we tried to contact them, by phone, e-mail, whatever means, we couldn’t get an answer from anyone.  Eventually, even with the website saying Laurel’s passport was in unknown status, it miraculously arrived. 

As we prepared for the trip, Laurel and I both had trepidation that maybe we shouldn’t be doing this, or maybe something was telling us we shouldn’t go on this trip.  With the COVID numbers rising again, we didn’t know if it was a good idea or not.  To make matters worse, our one son Patrick is getting married the weekend after we are supposed to get back, and if we test positive, we may miss the wedding.  That would be a disaster.

What gnawed at me was the memory from our 25^th anniversary, when I had booked a trip to England and Ireland, only to cancel the trip right before we were supposed to go because of some important work meetings.  I was having those same feelings since this is budget season at work, but I couldn’t bear doing this again to Laurel.  I really wanted to make this work.

The day finally arrived, and we were off.  After a few flights, a long drive, we arrived at just an incredible chateau in the Bourgogne region of France.  We were greeted by our hosts, Sheila Ewers, our yoga teacher, and Mike Ewers.  As we settled in, I started having a mini-panic attack, we shouldn’t have done this.  I shouldn’t be taking a vacation.  I should be working.

You see, I’ve been raised to work.  At one point, my Dad worked 17 years without a single day off, no vacation, no sick day.  While I’ve improved over the years, I don’t vacation well.  I struggle separating from those things that I’m “supposed to do”.  Those rules to live by were coming back to the surface. 

I came for the yoga….

While I wanted to provide a great vacation for Laurel, I came for yoga.  Since Laurel introduced me to  yoga four years ago, my love for the total experience of yoga has grown and grown.  I love the combination of the physical, emotional, spiritual and mental growth I get from my yoga practice.

Before we moved from Georgia, Laurel and I practiced at John’s Creek Yoga.  I have a special appreciation for anyone who teaches, I taught for seven years as an adjunct professor at Georgia Gwinnett College, and while I always appreciated teachers for what they do, my respect grew even larger after that experience.  I am truly amazed at what yoga teachers do, to me, there has to be so much that goes into teaching yoga, the preparation, the theming, planning the movements, adjusting for the size or demographics of the class, I have to believe it’s very difficult. 

And then, there’s Sheila Ewers.  I guess one of the biggest reasons I have such respect for Sheila is that she uses and quotes literature so often.  I was an English major in college, and I tend to always gravitate to those who study and quote literature.  But it’s way more than that.  Sheila never “phones it in”.  Her classes are very creative.  The movement is fluid, you travel to new places, in some cases, you’ve never been to where you are going, you don’t anticipate where you are going, and it’s a beautiful journey.  More importantly, she themes extremely well, and she sets the stage at the beginning of class, continues the theme throughout, and pulls  it all together in the end. 

At our yoga retreat, Sheila didn’t disappoint.  Sheila weaved a beautiful tapestry of metaphors into our yoga practice.  In many classes, Sheila pulled in some of the greats of French literature, she used “The Little Prince”, Victor Hugo, Pierre Chardin.  She also used some of our adventures during the week, and themed off of those experiences.  Each yoga class was incredible, completely different each time, and a new journey to savor. 

And there was so much more…. 

I experienced such a sensory overload during the week, each day brought a new experience, a new adventure, so much to take in, it was overwhelming.  The countryside was magical, there were vineyards everywhere, there were castles, churches, fields, hills, valleys, it was truly a magical setting. 

At one point, in yoga, Sheila raised an awareness of the senses we were experiencing.  As I look back, I taste and see:

• The breathtaking balloon ride, the sound of the flame filling our balloon, the silence shortly afterward, followed by listening to the dogs, cows and other farm animals far below.  The sight of the group of cows, lined up together, curious to see who in the hell was in their pasture with that big balloon? 
• The wine tastings, the smell of the different wines, the tastes, the wine cellars that had been in existence for hundreds of years, still providing a sanctuary for the various vintages.  I have never tasted wines this amazing in my life, and really, I probably never will again. 
• The flowers, the colors, the smells, there was such an array of vibrant and beautiful plants that we saw in the country and at the markets. 
• The cold, crisp, clear air first on the balloon ride and then on the bike trip.  On the bike ride, I actually got a splitting headache from breathing in that cold, crisp air, it felt so good, and then it felt so bad. 
• The taste of real food.  Since I got diagnosed with Crohn’s Disease about two years ago, I’ve eaten very sparsely, blandly, safely.  Sheila arranged for our chefs to cook “special” meals for me, no  butter, no creams.  For the first time in two years, I was eating real food.  The mixture of joy and thankfulness was wonderful. 
• The markets, seeing people shop for fresh fruits, vegetables, bread, meats, it was such an experience to see the vibrancy, the hustle and bustle of a Sunday morning marketplace. 
• The song of the local people speaking their melodic language.  I’ve traveled to somewhere between 10-15 countries around the world, and I’m not sure anyone can make words sound so lovely. 

TTFN 

As many of you know, I’m a huge fan of Winnie the Pooh (hence the name of my blog post).  Just like in the Hundred Acre Wood, we had our cast of characters on the yoga retreat.  I, of course, am Eeyore, and will always be Eeyore.  The misconception is and can be that I’m not having a good time because I’m Eeyore.  The truth be known, I love to be able to just be me, and be accepted for just being me. 

 On our yoga retreat, we had our share of  various other characters from the Hundred Acre Wood.  I’ll only reveal one thing about any of them, I found someone who had been born the same day, same year, as me, in the general vicinity, we were both born in western Pennsylvania.  That was truly amazing.  The only other thing I’ll reveal is that we did have some Tiggers, and I’m not so sure about the real Eeyore, but this Eeyore loves to be around Tiggers, they give me so much joy to watch and listen to. 

Thank you for bringing me here…. 

As some of you know, I’m a huge fan of Rolf Gates and read him every morning.  One of my favorite Rolf Gates days of reading talked about gratitude and being thankful.  So I start and end every yoga practice by saying to myself as Rolf suggests, “thank you for bringing me here”.  In those moments, I’m speaking to God, and I’m speaking to Laurel.  Without them, I would have never found yoga, and I wouldn’t be who I’ve become over the last few years.  Of course, I’m still a work in progress, but I’ve come a long way. 

But this thank you is broader.  There are so many people I want to thank.  As noted, vacations aren’t easy for me, and I could have fallen back, easily, into my normal routine of spending more time working than vacationing.  In fact, that was part of my plan going in.  But I didn’t, and that has less to do with me, than the place, the people, the experiences.  I truly enjoyed myself this week, and I’m so thankful for that.  I also stepped way out of my comfort zone.  I ate real food, which was huge for me, I went up in a hot air balloon, and I’m scared to death of heights, and I rode a bike for the first time in over forty years.  I stepped way out of my comfort zone, and miraculously, I didn’t die.  Yes, I’m kidding.  

In so many ways, I didn’t want this, I wanted it for Laurel, but I didn’t want it for myself, I didn’t deserve this.  But I needed it, and I loved it.  Thank you for bringing me here.

Ta-ta for now

The Voices

 “Does everyone have voices in their head?”

“What do you think?”

The voices.  The voices can be so powerful.  I remember a few years ago, I was traveling for work in Brazil, and I couldn’t get a hold of Laurel.  As background, we had some text exchanges around our one dog Daisy, too many treats, and Daisy throwing up the night before.  The voices started:

“Laurel blames you for Daisy throwing up”

“Daisy is sick and had to go to the vet”

“Daisy is dead and Laurel doesn’t want to tell you”

“Laurel has been kidnapped”

“Laurel is dead”

Spoiler alert, none of these happened.  Yes, the voices are powerful.  I unfortunately had many instances like this when I was traveling a great deal, not sure if it was the lack of sleep, being away from home or what, but these stories were way too frequent.  Since I’ve been traveling less, these situations have lessened, but I’m pretty sure they will never quite go away. 

As many of you know, I’ve really come to enjoy yoga.  OK, that may be an understatement.  I enjoy yoga, yoga studios, yoga teachers, other yoga students, books about yoga….  I think you get my point, I’m hopeful it hasn’t become an obsession, but quite frankly, when Laurel introduced me to yoga four years ago, it started slowly, but eventually, I’ve grown to really love it and love what it’s done for me.

Having said all that, I’m still not the most graceful or beautiful yogi.  I have horrible flexibility, my strength isn’t great, I can’t balance to save my life, and I have the grace of a giraffe.  But, it really doesn’t bother me.  One of our teachers, Brooke, is always so supportive and positive, she’ll say in class when we’re doing a balancing pose, “You guys look awesome!  You look so great!”  I always laugh because I’m pretty sure she’s either not looking at me, or she’s just being incredibly nice.  I never really watch anyone in yoga, and I really don’t worry a whole lot about how I look, I’m virtually positive I don’t look great, but I’m OK with that.

Recently, I’ve been really working on Balancing Half Moon.  I could never do it, and it kind of bugged me that I couldn’t because, I just thought, I should be able to do this.  My issue is that you have to balance on one leg, and my quads are very tight and weak, so it’s difficult for me.  With Laurel’s help and coaching, I started to be able to do it.  Not great, but I was able to balance on my leg with one hand on a block.  I was really excited to be able to finally do this, at least my version.

“How much of what is happening in your head has to do with what’s happening in life, right here?” Baron Baptiste from “Perfectly Imperfect”

On Labor Day, we had an outdoor yoga class at a park.  I love outdoor yoga because I love the outdoors, and also because strangely, I can balance a lot better on an uneven surface compared to a flat surface.  It was a wonderful experience, we had a great time.  Then, the studio posted pictures of  the class, and I was devastated.  The picture was Balancing Half Moon, and as I looked at the picture, I saw three lovely roses, and one really ugly thorn.  Now to be fair, the three around me all are teachers, and their poses were beautiful.  Kim, Nicole and Laurel all had these beautiful variations of Balancing Half Moon, and there I was looking, well, like a really awkward giraffe.

And the voices started…

“You look awful”

“You should be embarrassed”

“What are you doing out there?”

“You should quit yoga”

I kept telling myself what I always tell myself, I’m a work in progress, I’m doing the best I can, and I may not look that great, but I’m on my mat, I’m working at it.  But the voices are powerful, and they were taking over.  On a walk the one day with Laurel, I started crying, and tried to explain to her what was going on.  I love yoga, I don’t want to quit, but I hate the way I look, I hate looking like an awkward old man, it’s embarrassing.  She, as I would expect, gave me the logical answer very similar to the logical answer I was giving myself, but I tried to explain to her, the voices are powerful.

It also took me to a bit of a different direction, but also pretty painful.  I don’t know about everyone else, but when I see a picture of myself, I really don’t have too much reaction.  I know I’m not the best looking guy in the world, and quite honestly, I think I’m looking more and more like Doc from “Back

to the Future” each day, but it really doesn’t bother me.  I started thinking about people I know, mostly women, who refuse to have their picture taken, and refuse to post pictures of themselves on Facebook or anywhere else, and I wondered, what are the voices in their heads telling them about how they look?  It hurt to think that while I hated to see what I looked like in a yoga pose, there are people that just in general hate what they look like, and the voices are telling them, they are ugly, or overweight, or whatever. 

I had a recent conversation with one of the wonderful young ladies I used to work with in Lawrenceville with WIKA.  She was telling me about her son at college, and the voices that are telling him all of those negative things that they sometimes say.  I could easily relate to what he is going through, it’s not easy when you are young, working through those social situations at college, trying to maintain your grades, and have those voices telling you all the things you aren’t good at.  It’s also extremely difficult to be a mother and not being able to do much to help, other than offer those positive comments to try to overcome those negative voices in his head.

While the voices may be powerful, I’ve grown and developed in my ability to deal with them.  The quote above from Baron Baptiste is from one of the chapters titled “The Cosmic Joke”, where he describes that so much of what we believe isn’t real but fabricated in our head.  It’s helped me realize, I’m not alone, there are others who create a new reality like I do.  Another way is this week I’ve been watching a video I found of Hillsong United singing “Break Every Chain” and hearing:

“There’s a power in the name of Jesus to break every chain”

Each morning, when I plank, I’ve been watching and listening to this song, and I hear that phrase over and over telling me about the power of the name of Jesus.  I do firmly believe that Jesus is much more powerful than any of the voices in my head that tell me I’m not good enough.  The voices will always be there, but I’ve been able to deal with them much better through prayer, through song, through reading, through therapy, and yes, through yoga. 

Going back to the comments from the beginning, that was an exchange the other night between Sarah, my therapist, and me.  I asked Sarah that question, and as is typical of a therapist, she turned it around on me (therapists are really sneaky that way).  I’m guessing everyone has some sort of voices in their head.  I’m guessing some are different than others.  I’m guessing some are really strong and persistent while others are those slow, subtle comments that are like a faucet dripping, eventually wearing you down. 

The other day in yoga, Amber started our class with little note cards she put in front of each of us.  The cards had many different messages like:

“You are worthy!”

“You have a light, it’s meant to shine!”

“You are loved!”

This is the one I got:

My hope and prayer is that many people have voices in their heads telling them messages like this.  I hope that when they look in a mirror, they see the light that they are to the world, they know they are loved, they see someone who is worthy.  I’m really hopeful that many out there don’t have those voices that tell them all the things they can’t do in life, but they have voices that tell them how amazing they are, how unique they are and how the world is a better place because of them being in it.

As Laurel and I drove home from that class, I talked again about the voices and what they were telling me.  Again, she reiterated the logical answer, and I said my typical response to the voices, I told her I’d just tell them:

“I’m baptized, so fuck off!”

She told me, maybe you should tell them:

“Brooke says I look great, so fuck off!”

Kindness, Simple Kindness

 “This is a sermon about kindness, simple kindness.  It’s a sermon about the opportunities that we have, all of us, …to treat other people with gentleness, meekness, tenderness, mercy, and kindness.  Sometimes we do; sometimes we don’t, but you know what I’m talking about.  I’m talking about kindness, simple kindness.”  Dr. Thomas Long, from the sermon, “Be Kind, Be Kind, Be Kind”

I first heard this sermon in I’m guessing the late 80’s or early 90’s.  Dr. Long came to Westminster Presbyterian Church in Dayton, Ohio as a guest minister one Sunday, and this sermon probably captured me more than any other sermon I ever heard in my life. 

When I say “first heard”, there is a reason for that.  This sermon moved me so much that I got a copy of it from the church on cassette (yes, I know, many years ago, and I’m that old), and I’d listen to it in my car on my drives to and from work.  I can’t even recall how many times I listened to this sermon, but it was countless times, and I can still hear it and see Dr. Long preaching it.  I can’t remember if the tape finally broke, or I got rid of my car and no longer had a cassette deck, but eventually, I didn’t have the opportunity to listen to it anymore.  Thankfully, there is the internet these days, and I found a copy of it on a website.

There are so many reasons why this sermon touched me, but I think one of the biggest reasons why was Dr. Long gave so many vivid examples of people who needed our kindness:

• The woman running the cash register at the local grocery store who’s had a really long day.
• The guy at work who is constantly complaining and spreading negativity throughout the organization.
• The lonely neighbor who just needs someone to listen to them.
• The homeless man who is looking for some spare change as you are leaving Starbucks.

We come across these people every day, and we can choose to be kind, or we can pass them over and move on to what is more important in our lives.  For the most part, it’s easy to ignore these people, and not give them a moment’s notice.  It’s easy to ignore them, unless you see them in the light of God.  As Dr. Long further states:

“To put it bluntly, in the Bible, kindness is an act of civil disobedience.  It’s a refusal to treat people according to the customs and the mores and the traditions of the status quo of the world around us and an insistence on seeing them and treating them in light of who they will become in God’s future”

I recently saw one of those Facebook posts, and I always wonder, is this real or just a fabrication?  It was one of those stories where a person had reached the end of their rope, and they had planned on committing suicide that day.  They worked in customer service, and someone was so friendly, so kind to them, that they changed their mind, and they didn’t commit suicide.  That person obviously had changed their life forever.  While the story may be a fabrication, I still believe it provides a teaching moment.

My experience wasn’t quite the same, not quite that dramatic, but in that moment, it definitely meant a lot to me.  As I shared in my latest blog post, I had a deep plunge recently, and I was pretty down.  No, I wasn’t suicidal, but I certainly had my share of irrational thoughts running through my head.  It just so happened that I had an interaction with a colleague at work, and it made an incredible difference for me.  She had various kind words for me, but she also shared a couple of meme’s or sayings that really touched me. 

Now the one was funny, as you can see:

It made me laugh, and it also for some reason made me think of one of my favorite quotes and words to live by from Nadia Bolz-Weber:

“I’m baptized, so fuck off”

I’m starting to believe I need to rename my blog site since I use this quote so often anymore, but as usual, I digress.  While I don’t have as many issues with people getting down on me for not being perfect, I have plenty of voices inside of my head telling me what a screw-up I am.  So I did enjoy this picture and the sentiment of it.

The one I really enjoyed was this one:

It reminded me so much of an excerpt from Glennon Doyle’s “Love Warrior”:

"We think our job as humans is to avoid pain, our job as parents is to protect our children from pain, and our job as friends is to fix each other's pain.  Maybe that's why we all feel like failures so often - because we all have the wrong job description for love."

And more recently, I read the following from Rolf Gates:

“We are in a hurry to escape the pain we have been in and are still contending with, but our haste is self-defeating.  Do not walk so fast.  The pain you wish to escape is everywhere.  Do not walk so fast.  The grace you seek is everywhere.”

We have this concept of life that we should only embrace the good, the favorable, the enjoyable.  But we also have to embrace the painful, the dark, the fears.  Too many times I’ve let those irrational, devastating thoughts take over and push me further and further down.  I’ve learned, with some success, I need to just let them be, let them simmer, let them bounce around in my head, until it’s time for them to go away and be replaced with something more pleasant.  Key phrase, some success.

In the end though, it comes back to kindness, simple kindness.  Maybe, just maybe, this interaction with a colleague helped me embrace the pain I was going through and not let it take over until I could move to a better place.  Have you experienced this kind of kindness?  Have you made someone’s day with a kind word?  Has someone made your day with a kind word?  In the end, it’s just not that hard, and it can make all of the difference.  No, you may not keep someone from committing suicide, but maybe you’ll be the one voice of love and compassion for someone among all of the negative voices they hear each day.  

Dr. Long closed his sermon with these words from Henry James:

“There are only three things important in human life: be kind, be kind, be kind.”

The Big Lie

 “Let go of the frustration and the judgment, and work with your unruly mind as you would a child or a puppy.  It is very important that you come to know this unruliness in yourself and that you be willing to embrace it, not judge it.”  Rolf Gates

About a month ago, I saw a post from Sheila Ewers where she described, well she described so much.  As Laurel and I always say, Sheila never says anything that hasn’t been well thought out and is very meaningful.  She described many things but what captured me the most was:

“Perfectionism is the antithesis of love. It fools us into believing that we are not worthy of love unless we hide our flaws and crouch behind a facade.”

I’ve lived my life beating the shit out of myself for failures, real or perceived, and not being able to accept that I’m not perfect, I’ve hurt people, I’ve hurt those I’ve loved, and I live in shame for what I’ve done.  I came to the conclusion when I read what Sheila wrote that if I’m not willing to truly live my life, to accept myself for who or what I am, then I might as well die.  OK, please don’t take that wrong, it’s meant to be more of a positive statement.

I then finished Glennon Doyle’s book “Love Warrior”, and I read the one part where Glennon reached her own epiphany, which was:

“We think our job as humans is to avoid pain, our job as parents is to protect our children from pain, and our job as friends is to fix each other’s pain.  Maybe that’s why we all feel like failures so often – because we all have the wrong job description for love.”

She went on to describe that what people need is someone to sit quietly with them when they are feeling pain, to stand with them through the pain.  Our jobs aren’t to take away the pain, but to provide comfort.  We all need to feel and go through pain, it’s natural, it’s a part of growing.  If we try to take away each other’s pain, it stunts growth, it isn’t right, it isn’t fair, it doesn’t help.  

As I read this, I came to the stunning realization, an epiphany, that I’ve had this all wrong my entire life, and I felt like such a failure.  I can’t take away people’s pain, and I have no right to.  I’m not God, and I shouldn’t try to play God.  I cried when I read this because I was so wrong for so long, and I couldn’t believe that I never saw how ridiculous this was.

Recently, I was working with my new therapist in Ohio, Sarah, and as usual, I was doing my stream of consciousness, bouncing around from one thought wisp to the next, new revelations, and I finally stopped suddenly, and said, “am I OK?”

Now, I haven’t been with Sarah for very long, and I do feel badly for her, I often think that my therapists will want to quit or have to see their own therapist because of me.  But Sarah has been able to deal with me so far.  Sarah quickly said, “Yes!  You’re OK.”

Last week I had a business trip to Georgia, and I was able to work in a visit to Hailey, who had been my therapist for 18 months, but we hadn’t seen each other for several months.  We reviewed where I was, what was going on, and we discussed my long-standing inability to deal with shame in my life.  What was interesting to me was how what Hailey said to me weaved perfectly in with what Sarah had been telling me.  Everything was coming together perfectly.

Afterward, I reached out to Hailey by e-mail, and I said the same thing to her that I said to Sarah, “am I OK?”  I followed it up with:

“Who would have thought we’d be talking such nonsense!  Thanks to you, I can look at myself, and with my shame, depression, irrational thoughts, and I can say ‘am I OK?’  And I can relatively confidently say, ‘Yes, I think I’m OK’  You’ve helped me gain an acceptance of myself and who I am, and helped me develop tools to get through the difficult times.  For everything going on in my head, I feel fairly good about myself.”

Everything was coming together, the tapestry was weaving together beautifully, all of the pieces were fitting perfectly into the little puzzle I had created.  

And then it all fell apart.  As long and hard as I’ve worked toward this moment, it all unraveled in such a short period of time.

It started simply or with a simple mistake.  I lost my credit card.  Mistakes happen, but I don’t make these kind of mistakes.  I was devastated.  I tried to remember or figure out how it happened, but it really didn’t matter.  I was able to cancel the card, no charges were incurred, I just had to deal with all the issues of getting a new card, dealing with payments automatically charged to the card, etc.  But I had a really hard time accepting that I made such a mistake.  I started questioning my cognitive abilities, maybe I was getting old, and my mind was going.

Then I came home, and I was ecstatic to see Laurel, anytime I’m away from her, I miss her, I can’t wait to see her, I can’t wait to talk to her, listen to her, just be with her.  I didn’t feel the same zeal coming from her, and that was painful for me.  To be fair to Laurel, I was needy due to my mishap with my credit card, I was already down, and I set her or us up with unrealistic expectations.  Still, I was really hurt, and I plummeted.

I spent the next several days immersed in irrationality.  I thought many thoughts.  I imagined many things.  My mind went to all of the worst possibilities and scenarios.  I’ll leave it at that because my irrationality can go in many painful and difficult directions, and no one should have to see what alternative life I can create in such a short period of time.

And the most devastating part of all?  I realized that my breakthrough, my recent awaking and growth, was a big fat lie.  It didn’t take much, and I plummeted back down to the depths that I had allowed to be my prison before.  But this was worse than before because I had soared higher than I had been in such a long time, so the fall was that much further and harder.  I thought I had been able to “embrace, not judge, my unruliness” but I was wrong.  All of the reading, counseling, people who have been great role models, all of the tools I have, and these “little” issues or problems sent me downward.

Still, through it all, there is hope.  I recently spent a weekend with my small group from my former church, and we talked about a lot of things.  One of the things we discussed was hope.  I pulled out one of my favorite sermons from one of my favorite ministers, Sandy McConnel, who was on the retreat.  The sermon was “A Rose in Winter” which he preached way back on December 8, 1996.  Yes, I still have it along with many other of Sandy’s sermons.  As Sandy puts it, hope is faith pointed toward the future, the bird that feels the light and sings when the dawn is still dark, hope is a rose in winter.  

While I may have tumbled, and tumbled badly, I know where I can get to, and I know what I’ve read, the counseling that I’ve received, the role models I have in my life are right.  I can conquer the demons, the irrational thoughts, I can embrace, not judge the unruliness that runs through my head.  And when all else fails, I can use the immortal words of Nadia Bolz-Weber, and I can tell those voices or irrational thoughts:

I’m baptized.  So fuck off.