Molting

When a spider molts its exoskeleton, it is vulnerable.  It has to pull its fresh legs very slowly out of its old, hard shells of legs.  If it pulls a leg up too fast, it could tear the leg, leaving it behind in the old exoskeleton.

I know this cool stuff from reading with a six-year-old when I was babysitting earlier this summer.

I started this blog over a year ago when I my spidey senses told me I had outgrown my old exoskeleton.  I had a new, soft one underneath, but I had to ever-so-slowly extract myself from it.  I have had to slowly pull my big ol' sausage thighs out of those painted-on jeans.  So slowly.  Sometime I needed to stop and rest and just hope no predator came by to find me.

So I haven't written since February, because my exoskeleton needed to harden first.  I sure have been working and growing in all that time, though.  It took starting a new blog to come back and post in this one.

I crack me up.  I never guessed that my journey through authentic life life would make me into an arachnid.

Oh what a tangled web we weave,

When first we practise to deceive!

Sir Walter Scott, Marmion, Canto vi. Stanza 17.

Scottish author & novelist (1771 - 1832)

Oh what a tangled web I weave,

When I must of my skeleton take leave!

Me, Em

Vision

I fully and enthusiastically inhabit Life through willing expression of my authentic self. 

I fill the world with joy through creative dynamism, sharing, love, brainstorming, imagination, and artistic presence. 

I sing my song, dance my dance, tell my tale, and celebrate.

There will be more, but I just need to break my silence and put my intention out there.  You are welcome to  tag along and see where I go with this, and it is not my intention to make you wait another 4 months for that.

Happy birthday to me!

"This is the day the LORD has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it."  Psalm 118:24

Some days are easier to rejoice in than others; today is an easy one for me.  I have always enjoyed my birthday.  I love having a day that's about celebrating my very existence.  I don't think it's selfish.  In order to celebrate myself, I have to appreciate life.  To feel truly celebratory for my incarnation, I need a keen awareness of all of reality, and to choose the good despite the bad.  I am overflowing with gratitude, and it is spilling out as joy.

Today I am in a fabulous mood.   I feel loved.  I am enjoying Facebook and email greetings.  My spouse and kids have the day off, and I woke earlier and got out of the house without having to shoo anyone else along.  I am giving myself a mini-retreat at Starbucks before breakfast.  I am cozy in a purple cable-knit sweater for GLAAD spirit day.  I am thinking about but not worrying about 99% and 53% and all that jazz.  I am loving my friends and counting my blessings.  

I haven't been writing in this blog, and I think I know why.  I blog when I feel secure-- and when I have time.  If I am too busy to blog, I might be cramming too much in.  If all of my writing is happening in my journals or emails, then I must not be ready to share it with the world.  When I am feeling good enough to be authentic AND public, I can blog.  Of course, that means only certain things are shared.  I will experiment for the next month by checking in with myself about Giving what I Crave.  If I am up to posting, I will.  If not, I will consider that a gauge of my self-care and see what I can do differently.

Here's another thing: I keep wanting to control the direction of my blog when it's not meant to be a polished product.  I imagine each post as a collage element about myself and my journey, building up slowly, positioning, rearranging, gluing, and then at some point you will start to see the picture and I will be ready to disclose what Give What You Crave is all about.  The deal is, it's the other way around.  There is already a picture, I am just focusing on different bits at a time, and adding to it.  I don't need to structure it because it will structure itself.  Trying to order things has prevented me from showing you the artwork of my life.  Today I am committing to trusting in the infinite organizing power of the universe, and I am sharing today's corner of the collage with you.

A dear person in my life who is also a reader of my blog, told me my blog is different from most kinds she reads.  I like that.  I have seen all kinds of blogs so I feel like there is nothing new.  But I am increasingly aware that everyone has stories and everyone needs to tell their story.  It pleases me to tell my stories, to my family, friends, and anonymous others.  I don't need to do it in order to fabricate a sense of identity or importance, just as I don't need birthday greetings to celebrate life.  But it helps. 

Theme and Variations, Permutations, Combinations

Did you  ever feel like you were working equally hard to belong and to be unique?  To blend in and stand out?  To be normal and special?  To be understood and enigmatic?

I think that some of my friends would be surprised to know that I struggle with these aspects of defining myself.  Some may think I wholeheartedly embraced my quirks; maybe others think I'm not that different, what's the worry?  I have been writing and rewriting my own story for a long time.  About a year ago, my most desperate need was to be authentic, and felt like life wasn't letting me.  As I became braver about sharing, surrounded by many very kind people struggling to be true to themselves, too, I discovered that I can tell my stories over and over in different ways.  Changing the delivery does not makes the story (me) less true.  Withholding certain details from certain people does not erase my reality.  Choosing to perform in certain situations does not make me a fraud. 

Some of that anxiety is still there.  Sometimes, when I want to connect with my friends on Facebook, I stare at that faint question: "What's on your mind?"  I try to catch the thoughts as them go by.  I try to pick one that is clever or amusing, or Important.  The perfectionist editor kicks in again, and won't let me post unless I find the best status.  I get to thinking that if I pick one thought to share all the other thoughts will be jealous.  Did you bring enough candy for everybody?  Then, sometimes, I say, forget it, I won't update my status, I'll just pick a friend to catch up with.  And the same thing happens.  I read some of this and some of that, I consider chatting but can't decide which of the people I love can have my attention at the moment.  Next thing I know, it's bedtime, and I haven't shared a smidgeon of myself.  The lessons here are:

1. The indecision, perfectionism, and identity questions come from the same place:  FEAR
2. I can choose, and choose again, and choose once again, who I am and what I share, and how I make myself matter.  I choose LOVE, not FEAR.
3. A vital choice, time and time again, is to LET GO.  There are so many things I've wanted to do, but thought I couldn't do, because it had already been done.  When I let go of the need to make things happen a certain way, I get to emerge as a creative variation of the universe.
4. If you happen to be one of my Facebook friends, chat me up when you see I'm online because I really need someone to snap me out of it!