-This is a post I began writing at least a year ago... Not sure why I didn't post it then but here it is now-
When presented with a problem or challenge others face, I've been telling people a lot lately that they're choosing to have that problem or not...they sometimes feel misunderstood which is not the desired effect. I realize that when a person hears that they're choosing to feel a certain way about something – it can seem that I'm saying “it's all in your mind” or suggesting that they can somehow change the circumstances or whatever with some mystical mind powers or something. Well, it may be mind powers, but I wouldn't say it was mystical by any means.
The process I'm learning that is helping me overcome so many roadblocks and therefore helping me accomplish so much is as follows:
When I recognize that I'm faced with a challenge or a problem that occurs over and over again, I realize that there is a choice in the matter. I realize there is something I'm thinking or doing that is keeping me there. I cannot wish or even pray it away, but I right then and there can decide that no matter what arises or what reservations I must have, I'm 100% committed to overcoming it. Nothing is worth the pain of the mistake that I feel. Connecting the pain of the mistake to the mistake is very important. I remind myself I've overcome many difficult things and that anything can be overcome. We're only given what we can handle in a particular moment – we just have to commit to get through that moment.
Then I remember that it all starts in my mind and heart. “it's only a thought, and a thought can be changed” is the phrase that comes to mind. So if I feel a certain way about something, it is because I have told myself some story about some information – almost never all the information needed to create such a story. The brain doesn't like unanswered questions, and inevitably has to filter due to the huge amount of stimuli coming in at it all the time. So we sometimes naturally fill in the holes.
Anyway, the thing that often keeps us from changing is a belief or a thought that we adopted along the way, usually a suckers choice. Something that says we can't do something because of xy or z. Examples are: falsehood: I can't write in my journal tonight because I'm too tired. The Truth: I can write in my journal tonight, but if I do I will lose sleep because now it is very late. I suppose that tomorrow I can write in my journal before I spend free time on the computer, so that I will have enough time for both, and get to sleep earlier.
So the falsehood would keep a person in the same pattern because it's framed as if a victim to the time today, when in truth, better planning most of the time is all that is needed to change the situation. The Truth not only recognizes responsibility, but line upon line it leads a person to devising a strategy to change. This comes because you are putting forth the FAITH required to believe that you have a brain smart enough to find a solution to the problem. It also requires COURAGE and HUMILITY to face your mistake – your human condition. This requires LOVE and PATIENCE for yourself, and remembering you are still an infant spiritually, and we are after all, here on this earth to learn.
Sunday, March 6, 2011
Pink Motorcycle?... maybe after the kids move away
WARNING: Lots of generalized statements here about gender differences. PLEASE there are always exceptions... just noting the general differences - or even just what we believe is different. In all honesty I believe we are actually more alike that we all think or care to admit.
Today we were rolling down the freeway on our way back from a very cool 5-year old's birthday party, when I noticed a biker riding in one of the lanes next to us. It was not your usual biker, she was decked out in pink, from her helmet to the pink and white detail on her iron horse. It was all girl... on a typically manly contraption.
Surprisingly, this bothered me. Hubs and I got in a discussion about it, and I discovered my feelings as I spoke. Now if there is anyone who is into breaking tradition or ignoring the rules of cultural practice, it's me. I can be very traditional, but on the other hand, I resent assumed expectations to the MAX. For the most part, the traditions I participate in are those I've researched, thought through very well and decide I fully agree and they are what I want. I do them because I believe in them. Almost nothing else has my total commitment.
So, a woman riding a motorcycle, what's wrong with that? Well, nothing really, and to be perfectly honest there's always been a small part of me that wanted a motorcycle. I love trying new things, adrenaline rushes and breaking free of the mold, proving stereotypes wrong, even taking risks and part of me has always been that way. My dad likes to tell me about the time I was 2 or 3 years old and chubby. I set out to conquer the tallest sand dunes I could find and slide down them... but then, I grew up, and I got pregnant.
Anyone who's gone through it knows that pregnancy changes your body and mind. These days I get my thrills listening to programs like "Science Friday" on NPR. One of my favorite shows they've aired talked about the changes that take place in the mother's brain beginning in pregnancy and ending about 6 months postpartum. I LOVED this because it confirmed my suspicions... the brain actually rearranges to become more maternal!! Woo Hoo... (So mamas - your NOT going crazy forgetting everything... AND baby really is borrowing some of those grey cells in your noggin. Actually you're not getting them back, thank goodness for EFA laden foods).
ANYWAY as I was saying... the brain changes. Of course one of the changes we all notice is mom becomes more emotional, more sensitive. This really bothered me at the time. Now I really needed people to take me seriously - and how were they going to if I was crying all the time?? Crying while watching 101 Dalmations?? REALLY?? (true story) NOW I believe that emotionally, physiologically, we kind of go back to an earlier state - our callus shell starts peeling off and we become more as we were like children again. And it makes sense - our children have no filter for the first years, and it gradually develops until around the age of 7 when they begin to develop a sense of identity and moral compass. We are their filter. Everything they see or hear passes through us first. We wouldn't be very good filters if we were so far removed from our child's feelings that we lost all sense of what they can handle - I say.
Well, I digress.
As I said, a woman riding a motorcycle is not inherently wrong. The idea of me riding a motorcycle around town feels wrong to me now because: I changed. My role and view of myself shifted from thrill-seeking, trying to squeeze every adventure out of life mode, to safety and protection mode. I feel like me riding around on a motorcycle would be dangerous - maybe even irresponsible for the increased risk it would pose to myself and therefore my family. I have kids to take care of and I want to be around to raise 'em! Even the Goliath, and other extreme roller coasters I used to CRAVE are out of site anymore. The idea of turning in all directions without warning just doesn't hold the same appeal. (I wonder if it ever will again - maybe after the kids have moved away I'll be the old lady in the front roller-coaster car!) But for now...the once irrelevant ferris wheel has caught my eye...
Someone might say: 'well that's cool she's riding a motorcycle because she's doing what she wants to do - something different from most women...' For many women this may work - there was a time it would've worked for me. Not anymore. When we deny or try to change our feminine nature, (in this case, my maternal instinct which says the best place for me to travel is in a vehicle with a seatbelt, top and sides) we are the ultimate oppressors of our sex. Let me say that again. When we try to be something we're not to fit in or for any other reason - we deny our feminine nature and devalue it. We become our own enemy. We lose peace. When we devalue the things that most women generally tend to value - things that aren't so "cool", like feelings and sensitivity for example. To be taken "seriously". To not be "soft" and "weak". Actually - I'm talking about the stereotypical view of masculinity - which I think is skewed as well... for despite popular belief - MEN HAVE FEELINGS TOO! All of them.
Okay, I admit it, it's true. I am becoming like the older ladies in the neighborhood that were "oh so nice and sweet", maybe seemed a bit daft and naive, weak, YES (NO! -shudder-) I am becoming them! But if I don't, who will be the standard for gentleness in the world? For virtue? My pride and need to appear strong are not worth the cost, and strength can look differently than we think it needs to. Beauty is strength. Gentleness is strength. It takes a LOT more strength and discipline for me to speak respectfully and think clearly than it does for me to just yell at my family when my emotions would like to take me for a ride. I don't always succeed... sometimes I succumb to this belief that aggression is strength and appropriate. But I fight it, every day because I believe in Charity, gentleness and LOVE and I believe that I will overcome.
Today we were rolling down the freeway on our way back from a very cool 5-year old's birthday party, when I noticed a biker riding in one of the lanes next to us. It was not your usual biker, she was decked out in pink, from her helmet to the pink and white detail on her iron horse. It was all girl... on a typically manly contraption.
Surprisingly, this bothered me. Hubs and I got in a discussion about it, and I discovered my feelings as I spoke. Now if there is anyone who is into breaking tradition or ignoring the rules of cultural practice, it's me. I can be very traditional, but on the other hand, I resent assumed expectations to the MAX. For the most part, the traditions I participate in are those I've researched, thought through very well and decide I fully agree and they are what I want. I do them because I believe in them. Almost nothing else has my total commitment.
So, a woman riding a motorcycle, what's wrong with that? Well, nothing really, and to be perfectly honest there's always been a small part of me that wanted a motorcycle. I love trying new things, adrenaline rushes and breaking free of the mold, proving stereotypes wrong, even taking risks and part of me has always been that way. My dad likes to tell me about the time I was 2 or 3 years old and chubby. I set out to conquer the tallest sand dunes I could find and slide down them... but then, I grew up, and I got pregnant.
Anyone who's gone through it knows that pregnancy changes your body and mind. These days I get my thrills listening to programs like "Science Friday" on NPR. One of my favorite shows they've aired talked about the changes that take place in the mother's brain beginning in pregnancy and ending about 6 months postpartum. I LOVED this because it confirmed my suspicions... the brain actually rearranges to become more maternal!! Woo Hoo... (So mamas - your NOT going crazy forgetting everything... AND baby really is borrowing some of those grey cells in your noggin. Actually you're not getting them back, thank goodness for EFA laden foods).
ANYWAY as I was saying... the brain changes. Of course one of the changes we all notice is mom becomes more emotional, more sensitive. This really bothered me at the time. Now I really needed people to take me seriously - and how were they going to if I was crying all the time?? Crying while watching 101 Dalmations?? REALLY?? (true story) NOW I believe that emotionally, physiologically, we kind of go back to an earlier state - our callus shell starts peeling off and we become more as we were like children again. And it makes sense - our children have no filter for the first years, and it gradually develops until around the age of 7 when they begin to develop a sense of identity and moral compass. We are their filter. Everything they see or hear passes through us first. We wouldn't be very good filters if we were so far removed from our child's feelings that we lost all sense of what they can handle - I say.
Well, I digress.
Someone might say: 'well that's cool she's riding a motorcycle because she's doing what she wants to do - something different from most women...' For many women this may work - there was a time it would've worked for me. Not anymore. When we deny or try to change our feminine nature, (in this case, my maternal instinct which says the best place for me to travel is in a vehicle with a seatbelt, top and sides) we are the ultimate oppressors of our sex. Let me say that again. When we try to be something we're not to fit in or for any other reason - we deny our feminine nature and devalue it. We become our own enemy. We lose peace. When we devalue the things that most women generally tend to value - things that aren't so "cool", like feelings and sensitivity for example. To be taken "seriously". To not be "soft" and "weak". Actually - I'm talking about the stereotypical view of masculinity - which I think is skewed as well... for despite popular belief - MEN HAVE FEELINGS TOO! All of them.
Okay, I admit it, it's true. I am becoming like the older ladies in the neighborhood that were "oh so nice and sweet", maybe seemed a bit daft and naive, weak, YES (NO! -shudder-) I am becoming them! But if I don't, who will be the standard for gentleness in the world? For virtue? My pride and need to appear strong are not worth the cost, and strength can look differently than we think it needs to. Beauty is strength. Gentleness is strength. It takes a LOT more strength and discipline for me to speak respectfully and think clearly than it does for me to just yell at my family when my emotions would like to take me for a ride. I don't always succeed... sometimes I succumb to this belief that aggression is strength and appropriate. But I fight it, every day because I believe in Charity, gentleness and LOVE and I believe that I will overcome.
"Mothers who know are nurturers. This is their special assignment and role under the plan of happiness. To nurture means to cultivate, care for, and make grow..."
~JULIE B. BECK "Mothers Who Know," , (October 7, 2007)
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