It’s been a while since I’ve written.  My apologies.  I’ve been quiet inside myself for a while — I went a on a silent retreat in early March and seemed to have just continued in the silence inside myself.  I treasure these times of silence and didn’t want to push myself to write when really I just felt silent inside.

I find silence to be nourishing to my soul.  It gives me a chance to hear the rumblings beneath the surface of my mind and uncover new insights, places in my life that are calling for my attention as well as helping me to become more present for my life.

This silence doesn’t always mean just an outer silence, but an inner silence — a willingness to be quiet for a while and listen —

In this most recent listening, I found some places in me that were hurting a bit and just needed a little time to be noticed.  I noticed the excitement I’m feeling about a couple of projects I’m working on (Provence Retreat for Women & an audio series, Reclaim Your Life).  And, I found myself delighting in the simple pleasures of life ~ my family, my dog, & my breath free of seasonal allergies

Huxley

If you gave yourself just a bit of inner and outer silence, I wonder might you discover.  What’s calling for attention in your life?  Consider practicing a bit of silence and see what you discover.

So far today, I have so many good things.  Nonetheless, I’ll hold it to reporting on 3 good things.  But first…

Yesterday, as I contemplated 3 good things, I found myself relishing remembering the good things.  And then I felt this creeping feeling that I needed to add a new post articulating my 3 good things.  That didn’t feel so good.  Thinking that I should DO something was seriously taking me out of BEing.  So, I let go of the “you should post” injunction I’d given myself. I just let go, dropped it and relaxed back into remembering.

I’m almost 50 (this coming Thursday if you must know).  Anyway, I’ve spent a good many of those years addressing and mending the intrapsychic damage of that one simple word, “should.”  And, there I was thinking I “should” post and finding myself entering a kind of dampening emotional cloud.  Lost was that feeling of sparkling aliveness I felt when relishing my good things – which is kind of the point…learning to relish the good things.

Amazing that one word can steal your joy.

On to good things:

1.  Huxley said hello to a strange dog without growling or acting aggressive.  Though Huxley is an awesome dog, he has a very bad habit of aggressively greeting other dogs.  I’ve had him about a month…he’s got a couple of issues.

2.  I had a most relaxing walk in the Maryville College woods with David, Addy and Huxley.

3.  David is cooking dinner.

Today is the beginning of Lent.  Yayyyy!  Lent is one of my all time favorite spiritual holidays.  This might sound strange as I am neither Catholic or Episcopalian.  But I LOVE the practice of time limited renunciation.

40 days of fasting.  Gotta love it.  Well, I love my take on Lent.  Here’s how it works in my head; give up something with the understanding that this “giving up” is purifying you…cleansing you from the inside so that you are more able to attune yourself to the magnificence of the TRUTH of who you are.  What’s not to love?

This year, I’ve talked my father into playing Lent with me (is that too irreverent, playing Lent?).  So he and I are giving up driving over the speed limit.  Yayyy!  He’s also neither Catholic or Episcopalian.  He doesn’t even lean in the spiritual direction, but he does like to play.  So we are playing Lent together.

I know most people give up something like meat, cigarettes, chocolate.  I think those are all great.  The last couple of years, I’ve been enjoying giving up things that are not ingestible, like driving fast.

Here are a couple of really great things that I’ve heard people talk about giving up this year:

Disappointment

Regret

Shame

Feeling Inadequate

Blame

Don’t you wanna play?  What do you want to give up?

Here's my 78 year old father jumping on top of the Zugspitz.