Happy Quote

Sundercloud -- Gina Lynette

Sundercloud

If you spend your whole life waiting for the storm, you’ll never enjoy the sunshine.

– Morris West

Blissfully Organized Life

The Life Organizer by Jennifer LoudenA couple of years ago I picked up a book called The Life Organizer: A Woman’s Guide to a Mindful Year by Jennifer Louden. I loved the pretty cover and the full-color pages filled with thoughtful ways to redefine the traditional day planner method of organizing days and weeks into a more organic, soul-flowing method of structuring my life.

The reality was that my time was not my own. I half jokingly told people that I wasn’t allowed to write on my own calendar. The department where I worked expected me to book their meetings first, other department meetings next, and somewhere down the list I was allowed to squeeze in my family’s needs. My needs weren’t even on the radar. Lunch was often a package of crackers on the elevator. How in the world was I going to shift from this hyper-structured, out-of-my-control life to basing my days on “what experience or feeling do I yearn for today?”

It felt like I was standing in the arctic circle longing for a beach vacation. The divide seemed uncrossable.

Fast forward two years.

In this time, I have made some changes. That job is a vague memory. I still work in the same field — working toward an inclusive community where people are beloved and honored for their many assets and supported in those areas where they struggle — but in a very different capacity.

My days are my own.

Sure, I still have schedules to follow — dropping off and picking up children, appointments, meetings, and deadlines — but there is a more organic flow to my days. I work from my home office overlooking nearly 7 acres of trees and grass. I allow margin in my days. There is time to think and read and study and prepare for those deadlines and meetings and appointments.

I am less available but more present.

Thanks, Jennifer, for sending the map to a way of life I didn’t even know was possible.

It is bliss.

Happy Quote

We write to taste life twice — in the moment and in retrospection.

— Anaïs Nin

Stay Busy While I Wander About…

Just in case you find yourself with loads of free time because I am not being the good daily blogger, here is something to keep you busy. It is likely the most addictive and challenging puzzle I have attacked in my life. Oh, and in case you don’t have that kind of free time, you can do simpler Sudoku here.

Don’t say I didn’t warn you. (Yes, I am still stuck at 159. I don’t want to talk about it.)

Life’s Never Dull…

Red CrossI overcame my serious apathy and headed out in the heat to complete workout 34/200. About 20 minutes into my run to nowhere, the guy on the elliptical trainer next to me experienced a grand mal seizure which threw him off of the machine, and rendered him unconscious for a couple of minutes. Everyone acted very quickly, and his dad and an ambulance were there in minutes. Luckily there was a doctor on the treadmill in front of us. (I thought it was only in the movies that a doctor was always hand for such emergencies, but evidently not.) He was able to sort of take over the scene and kept everyone calm.

For my part, I did manage to keep my wits about me long enough to call 911 (The dispatcher argued with me over where my gym is located. Gee, dude, I come here every day. I think I know where it is!) and talk the guy who had the seizure into staying on the floor until the ambulance arrived. He seemed scared and so I talked to him like I do my own kids. I am such a mom. It can be annoying to people who are attempting to exert their independence, but I mother everyone. It comes in handy when something like this happens.

(The preceding is a message brought to you by Gina’s New Mission to Be Self Affirming.)

Oh, and for you who tend toward the fitness-obsessed end of the scale, I did get back on the elliptical trainer for another 50 minutes.

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