late-afternoon gratitude

i am grateful for:

1) my new taxman. and that i made an appointment and went and it’s done. hallelujah.

2) meeting a deadline

3) people liking my huffington post piece, “10 things i learned at yoga teacher training”

4) people liking the first thing i’ve really enjoyed writing in a long, long time. and noticing that, huh, people tend to most like the stuff that was most fun to write. noted.

5) b. for teaching me a new trick–when you see the mailperson you can ask if they have packages for you instead of getting the slip to go to the scary post-office and panicking that you will never get it.

6) my absurdly geeky joy at receiving the “visceral manipulation handbook” in the mail. it’s all about how to massage the organs through the skin for greater health. i had a bodyworker in maui do it to me a lot and i loved it. “oh, your liver’s a little swollen and stuck to your ribs, which is bringing your shoulders down.” or “let’s getting a little more natural flow going in the rhythm of your colon.” squeee! so excited to read and practice.

7) this revelation i had in yoga today about my headaches, which have been fast and furious. at first i was like, omg, i’m going to have to leave this class or it’s just going to spike into a migraine. then i realized i can actually control that. so i said, “headache, no. this is not an appropriate time for you. you will not be welcome here. leave.” and then i realized it was partly a matter of running my energy, grounding my energy, away from my head. I imagined lying on the earth and channeling all the excess heat in my body into the loamy moist soil. i just kept opening passage ways, exits, for the heat energy to leave and imagined again and again the headache energy traveling down my legs, arms, out my ears, out my pores. and i then realized: headaches are not in the head. they are a whole-body phenomenon. i can control them by opening all of my channels and redirecting the energy. and THEN i realized, as i started to feel more empowered, how headaches come and i slip into a habituated victim/patient mode, where i get to feel helpless and ashamed and “why me,” yadda. and i was like, huh, i do that in other areas too. and then i realized i was getting all tangled in my head again and started letting go of the heat again. it didn’t get rid of it, but it did start what i’m hoping is a new process of empowered self-healing. woot.

8) hugz

9) the dead trees getting clipped and taken away

10) fall! so exciting, fall. full of sparkly promise. i think i say that every september, but, well, it’s true.

11) having new to-do list freelancing buddies

12) in grappling with some slight recent weight gain (inhale, exhale, that’s weirdly scary to write–i’m supposed to be past that or not notice or overly care or it makes it more real if i write it down), i am flipping my fracking lid. just mountains of cultural conditioning, psychological wiring, and growing up way dysmorphic all come to a frothy head when i’m too scared to even try on my jeans. but i have noticed two good things: 1) i actually LIKE my body a little teeny bit fuller. i feel more grounded and nourished. 2) my body feels more competent in some ways in yoga. smarter, somehow. i think this is mainly from the teacher training, but i also think i needed a little bit extra. but not, you know, permanently (nails being nibbled). i think it is possible to be nourished and slender and healthy and full all at once. right? i am trying to think of my body like the moon.

13) leftover cold thai food

14) “mennonite in a little black dress” hilarious!

15) naps

16) pears

17) d. doing so well during chemo. uhg, i wish that wasn’t a sentence that existed, but it is and she looks like pema chodron and still cracks jokes and is so strong and has so much amazing support and it is incredibly inspiring and an honor to rub her feet.

18) love

19) being seen even though it makes me want to hop under my invisibility cloak sometimes. but being seen is good. very, very good. healing.