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Tatiana
It’s late, I’m sleepy but I had a ball. Tonight I got a chance to kick back and relax with friends. I’d forgotten how good nights like this were for my soul.
Last night I watched part one of Oprah’s farewell celebration. As her celebrity guests recounted her accolades over her 25 years with The Oprah Winfrey Show, they also shared some amazing work being done in her name by corporations like Target. I won’t spoil it if you haven’t seen the episode yet. What struck me as I watched, was how one woman did so much by just doing something.
I’m not sure Oprah saw her 25th anniversary celebration in her future when she went on her first meetings about hosting the show. I’d venture a guess that it was a gradual evolution of the woman we see today. I think sometimes people get caught up in the “how” of making a difference. They know they want to make a change in their personal lives or in the world, but they get paralyzed in the process of executing the action steps.
I know of what I speak, because I used to live in action step paralysis land. I resided there as recently as yesterday. What I fail to realize when I get caught up in my fears and insecurities, is that I am blocking someone else’s blessings. I believe each of us was put on this planet for a purpose. I realize that if I just do something, something in pursuit of my passion and my vision – I might align with someone who is desperately looking for me and the work that I do.
In the clips that were played back, a little boy was desperately asking for something. Thank goodness he got what he was asking for…lots of it. The thing is that Oprah didn’t give it to the boy. By virtue of her being who she is and doing the work she does, this little boy got just what he wanted and needed.
Sometimes it’s not about what we do, sometimes it’s what others do because of the impact we have on them.
So even if you can only do a little bit, do something.
Great weekend. A weekend jam-packed with a little bit of everything – sports, a circus and amusement park. Everything but housework. That darn set of tasks that seems to always elude me. I will start the weekend behind the eight ball, playing catch up. It’s not a great way to start things off, but it sure was fun while it lasted.
The best part about all of the activities was watching my daughter cycle through every emotion she has: anticipation, joy, frustration, anger, fear and love. I should have more weekend’s like this. Ones that are all about having fun and creating lasting experiences. The opportunity I get is to support her as she experiences ups and downs.
Yesterday we went to her first circus. My little cutie was dancing and having a great time. Wide eyed with amazement seeing the tigers, elephants, clowns and aerialists. In one of the acts a 12-year-old girl climbed up a pole 100 feet in the air. I didn’t expect my daughter to be scared. I’m not sure why, but I just didn’t. I was even more shocked when she started crying and saying that she wanted the little girl’s mother to be up on the pole with her.
12-year-old circus performer 100 feet up
In one beautiful and touching moment, my daughter was more concerned about another child’s well-being than her own. He fear was pure and she was open to being comforted. As grown ups, sometimes we build up layers of armor to protect against life’s injuries. It can be rare that someone is there to scoop us up and tell us everything will be ok.
I’m thankful that this weekend I got a chance to be there for my baby. I wasn’t too tired to connect or too preoccupied to notice…
but now I’m exhausted and will slip off to sleep.
Sometimes my friends ask how they can find themselves or become more positive. When that happens, I end up asking them what they would do if they had a magic pill. This pill, once taken, would allow them to wake up to a perfect world. Not a really nice or really good world, but a perfect world. The kind of world where you have no debt and never will, all of your family and friends are taken care of, you are passionate about your life, you jump out of bed thrilled to start tearing up the day, as a matter of fact you don’t even want to go to bed because life is just too perfect.
Every time I have done this, the response is the same. They start telling me stuff that would make their lives a little bit better. We don’t seem to be hardwired to think about having a perfect life. Maybe that’s because it’s not practical or maybe it’s because deep down inside we don’t believe we can have what we want. I’ll admit, it is hard to get started with this exercise. When I first contemplated it I did the same thing as my friends.
I now contemplate this question often. It allows me to have a vision for my life. According to The Law of Attraction, what you focus on is what you attract. If that’s the case I want to channel all the goodness and abundance that I can. My perfect world looks like one where there is world peace, an end to hunger and homelessness. A world where children are safe from violence, where all people are safe from violence and where we all are equal . Yeah…I know, I know…that’s Utopia. What’s wrong with that?
My perfect world also includes a beautiful home for my family (one that has been rehabbed from an existing structure and that is energy-efficient, energy producing if possible). I would travel the world – visiting one new international destination each year (for a period of no less than a month). I’d piggy back home with my family and friends who hail from Morocco, Australia, Argentina, Africa, Haiti, France and many other places so I could explore their homeland as they do, not as a tourist. I’d make sure that my travels included trips to places like New Zealand, India, Tahiti, Switzerland, Russia, Belize and many other destinations. My passport would be packed to the brim.
My job would be my passion. I would be stunned that people offered me money to do what I loved. It would inspire and motivate people to make positive changes in their lives. My family would be healthy and empowered. We would work to make a positive impact on our local and global communities. I would have deep, lasting and meaningful relationships with the people in my life. I would be humble, grateful and a life long learner. I would be more loving, less prideful, more risk taking and I would throw myself into life full speed ahead. I wouldn’t waste a second doing anything that didn’t leave this world a better place than it was when I came into it.
Finally, I’d have an amazing man in my life. He’d be mature, grounded, intelligent, handsome, love to travel and salsa dance. He’d be my kindred spirit – one who is gentle and passionate about life with an enormous capacity to love. The list could go on and on, but instead I’ll just turn to making sure I am all of those things too (thanks Marlene for that wisdom) so we’ll be able to connect when he enters my world.
I can’t travel the world right this second, but by putting it out into the Universe I believe that I have set things in motion to make that a reality. Same with every other utterance, thought or line that I write. My life is not perfect, it may never be, but I know what I want it to look like. Knowing what I want allows me to see it and accept it when it materializes.
I’m ready to leave behind the stuff I don’t want in exchange for the stuff that will get me one step closer to a perfect world.
The goal was to finish, not finish first or last – just finish. I am so grateful to say that I completed my first 5K this morning. In the rankings I was dead last (727 of 727) – there were a handful of people who finished after me but the organizers were already taking the equipment down. I’m going to work really hard to forget about being last as it doesn’t even matter.
What matters is that prior to today I had only jogged 1.5 miles. Today I jogged 3.125 miles (thanks Kevin for the mileage clarification). That is my personal best. It took me 1:02:34. I need to remind myself that means I jogged for over 1 hour without stopping. I wanted to be faster, but what matters is that I did it! I finished! I have failed at so many other things…but not at this. It was pretty magnificent having my little one waiting for me with a medal at the finish line. Her words were the best, “Mommy, in my heart you finished first.”
I won’t lie and say that this was easy. Pushing myself 30 minutes longer than I’d ever been in one day was huge, but I had a ton of support. I want to thank Todd Lange at Running Mate Media for a terrific training program called 5K101 which prepared me for today’s race, my training partners Chipo & Kern Jolibois who encouraged me to get started, supported me along the way and were right there with me at the finish line, the Smith family for friendship, music and loads of encouragement and my family and friends who have been cheering me on via social media sites.
I didn’t expect the outpouring of support from the other runners. It was the one thing that had me close to sobbing during the race. Most of the runners were on their way back when I was still heading down to the halfway point. The were calling out encouragement and cheering for me to keep going. Instead of being embarrassed at being slow I was uplifted. It was a humbling and beautiful experience. Today I became a part of the running community.
My training partners have thrown down a challenge of 10 – 5k’s this year…so this is just the beautiful and exhausting beginning. Now it’s time to take a much-needed and well-earned nap.
I’m so supposed to be sleeping! My training partner will have my head when she realizes I’m not in bed. Tomorrow is the day! My first 5K. My cold is ebbing and my anticipation is rising. I’m waiting for my ipod to synch with a mishmash of music, hastily thrown together at the last minute. Nothing went as planned today, but it was fun.
I got home late, threw a load of laundry in, half unpacked our bags and got my racing gear together. I was supposed to wipe an sd card clean so I could get pictures but what are you gonna do. There are only so many hours in the day! I guess the nice part is that I don’t have a lot of time to freak out either. Tomorrow will be what it will be.
I finished my 8 week 5K101 training program yesterday. That’s a HUGE accomplishment. I’ve already won! So what’s left? Of course to win again. Winning looks like getting up, going to the race and doing the best that I can. That’s my plan and I’m sticking to it!
If you are reading this and thinking you wish you could, but know that you can’t…you can. Just give it a shot. Be it racing, taking a class, asking a guy out – whatever. Somewhere inside I made a choice to try something new and tonight I am on the eve of the first race of my life. I’ve been at that choosing point many other times and decided against moving forward. I’m not sure what was different this time around, I’m just glad it was.
And I’ll be thrilled for you when you step out and try your something new.
(Please excuse any typos – no time!)
As a divorcee, I find that weddings can be a mixed bag. You are usually attending because you know that bride or groom and hopefully have some fondness for them. It’s been about four years since my marriage ended. I remember the first few weddings I attended after the break up being pretty difficult to handle. I was happy for the couple, but all I could think about was the failure of my marriage.
It can be hard to celebrate someone’s happiness when you are in the midst of despair. One constant in life is that people will keep falling in love and some are going to get married (thankfully). Tonight I didn’t notice any of the sadness or negative reflections about my previous life. I was so squarely focused on my happiness for my friend. She’s a beautiful woman who deserves a tremendous love story. That’s my wish for her and her new husband.
For me? I was happy that I wasn’t going into it in man searching mode. You know, where you think…maybe I’ll meet someone nice here. Tonight I wanted to have a good time, and I did. I connected with old friends, danced a bunch and faced down an obscene amount of delicious food. The love story was a beautiful one. What more could you ask for?
As I type this I think of the ending scene in the movie My Best Friend’s Wedding where George tells Jules, “…Life goes on.’ Maybe there won’t be marriage. Maybe there won’t be sex. But by God, there will be dancing!”
…and so there was.
I pulled into my mom’s place sick and tired. There is absolutely nothing like having one mom ready to swoop down and take care of everything. In my case, I have two here. My head is woozy from the concoction she made me and my skin is tingling from the combination of the Vicks VapoRub and Haitian oil. Not only am I breathing well for the first time today…and burning, but I also have no little one making demands on my frail and sickly body (totally being a drama queen here).
My little one was beyond happy to scamper off with Grandma and play with all of her newly acquired goodies. My mom is selfless. It doesn’t matter what she’s got going on, she lives to make sure her kids are happy. There are times I scoffed at this, but tonight I realize what a blessing it is. When I am feeling low, sick, tired or ready to give up my mom is there. My Aunt is right behind her offering her support and sometimes in front of her.
I realize not everyone has this support system available, and even though they are out-of-state – when I come here I can shut it down. I don’t have to be all-powerful single mom or uber-entrepreneur. I don’t even have to be that shoulder to cry on. Tonight there is no place I’d rather be than in my mother’s arms recuperating and charging my batteries for the battles that lay ahead.
Thank you Mom and Auntie. I will never be able to say it enough and you will never know how much I appreciate you. I can’t forget to thank my Uncle who also holds it down for me when I come up to visit. There is nothing like family, if you are blessed to have one. If not… make one where you stand.
