Tag Archives: awareness

The Gifts We Bring

Posted on by

“Do you know that you are the gift?”, a wise man once asked me.  Hearing these words from my teacher and friend generated a flood of relief within me.  We were on the phone only days before Christmas and I was expressing my desire not to lose myself amidst all the pressure and expectations of the holiday.   Absorbing the meaning of this simple question allowed me to relax, to unwind from my tightly coiled state of nervous anticipation, and to breathe and find the ground beneath me. It also allowed me to move through the days that followed with more grace and ease than I would have previously thought possible.

So today, in my tense, wound-up state of efforting – of trying to manage, strategize, prepare, plan and perfect – I stop and ask myself:  “Maggie, do you know that you are the gift?”  Do you know that even without “doing” anything that you are a gift to those you love, just as you are?

This truth is easy to glimpse, but easier to forget.

Thankfully, I was reminded of this question recently.  I was attending a yoga & writing retreat to help myself remember, well, myself, and to attempt to get grounded before the chaos of Christmas time.   Though I am desperate to remember and honor the truth and the spirit of the holiday season, it is difficult to stay present and not get consumed by outer-focused doing.   Having another tiny human being who demands ALL of my attention ALWAYS doesn’t help.  But it’s hard even without that, honestly.   So it takes planned and intentional moments, like this retreat, to stop and take the time and space to turn inward and get into my body to sit, reflect, write, and remember.

When it came time to write, the prompt came in the form of another poignant and well-timed question, this time from a wise woman (the group’s facilitator):

“What are the gifts that you bring the world – the ones that live inside you?”

This question, like the one so helpful to me years ago, I am receiving as a gift and a healing medicine this holiday season; to remember my own unique and innate gifts as a daily practice.

To say that it is not comfortable for me to claim my gifts confidently, out loud, is an outrageous understatement.  Our culture does not condone this.  It is not in my nature. The mere thought of it makes my skin itch from the inside out all over. And yet.  It feels vitally important somehow to break this unspoken code of conduct and do it — to transmit the gift all the way to anyone else who may want or need to receive it.

And so …

I name some of my own gifts here in the hopes that it might help you remember and celebrate your own inner gifts in this season of gift-giving.

  • I am open.  I am eager to listen compassionately and empathetically, without judgement.  I crave deep, meaningful conversation that brings light to darkened corners and possibly even allows healing to occur.  I can go deep inside the strength and source of myself to reflect back to you what I have heard you say, or what I haven’t heard.
  • I am a writer; always have been and always will be.  My relationship with stories, words, and language has been intensely intimate for as long as I can remember.  My life-long writing practice began with a diary in second grade wherein I expounded on the benefits of learning cursive, passing love notes on the bus, and the injury inflicted by being excluded at recess.  My ability to maintain the practice has ebbed and flowed over the course of my life, but it has been a constant touchstone to return to; a source of comfort and pleasure. Writing has also served as an entrance to self-reflection, healing and transformational work.  I am surprised and grateful for the revelations that occur in me when I stop long enough to reflect and write.
  • Writing is also my work, in one fashion or another.  I think this is so because I am skilled at distilling a story or an idea to its very essence and translating it into the words that best communicate that message; the story most wanting or needing to be told.
  • I can take a walk through the woods and notice things; tiny beautiful things all around me.  I may collect some of them to bring home and display on my hutch, my altar, my table to remind me of the beauty of the natural world when I am indoors, to create an opening to the calm feeling of sacred stillness that exists in me when I am in the forest.
  • I love fiercely and deeply.
  • Somehow, I find deep wells of patience in me even when pushed to my farthest edges by my dear little boy.  I can diffuse a power struggle with a song or by talking in a funny voice or growling like a tiger or by throwing myself into physical play and affection until rewarded by the most delicious peals of laughter. And sometimes I can’t – and I explode – but then apologize later.

Though I am trying to focus on my gifts, I notice how quickly feelings of shame, judgement, and inadequacy come crashing down on me as I think about those moments when I do not have the patience or compassion I wish I had as a momma.  Perhaps because those moments happen more often than I would like to admit.  However, in large part I can see that this most often occurs when my own need is so great that it is banging down the door, kicking and screaming for time to be quiet and alone — to be noticed, explored, and attended to.

So here I am attending to you, dear need, dear me; I will try to give you this gift more often in the coming year.  It feels like a precarious balancing act though, to weigh the needs of all equally.  I am trying to keep the great teeter totter of life, of marriage and motherhood, not at an equilibrium per se … but ever-moving … so that we all get to HAVE FUN.

Up.  Down.  Up.  Down.  Balancing it all may be the greatest work of my life. Today I am at the center, as I breathe and remember my gifts — and that even without doing anything at all — I am still the gift.

And so are you.

The Fitzsimmons 2015 - Clean (15 of 78)

Siren in the Night

Posted on by

I am accustomed to hearing the emergency alert siren in Madison on a regular basis; it happens on the first Wednesday of every month at noon precisely. When I hear the siren begin to wind up into its high-pitch sustained whine, I pause to consider the day and time to confirm that it is only a test. My response to this conclusion is typically a mix of relief (that the sound doesn’t indicate an impending disaster), and slight irritation (that this grating noise is interrupting my day, albeit for only a few minutes).

I am NOT accustomed to being woken from a deep sleep in the middle of the night to hear this emergency siren, as happened earlier this week. At approximately 12:30am on Monday night, I woke to the sound of the siren.   It took my sleepy brain a few moments to register what was happening.   The siren was accompanied by thunderclaps loud enough to send the dog slinking over with her tail between her legs, shaking, and heavy rain – not falling in it’s typical downward trajectory but instead blowing horizontally, thumping against the house – making my bedroom feel like the inside of a car wash. Was this a tornado warning?? My first reaction was to grapple in the darkness for my smart phone to check the radar and verify the cause of the siren (hoping that somehow my technology was smarter than the siren and would indicate that I could go back to sleep). But before I could locate any information, Ken walked into the room and announced the tornado warning.  He’d first heard about it on Facebook, which he’d just happened to be perusing after midnight while unable to sleep – confirming that the news still travels fastest via the smartest technology of all — social media.

A more youthful and childless version of myself – feeling invincible and relying on a belief that surely tornadoes didn’t touch down in the middle of the city – may have thrown a pillow over my head and gone back to sleep.  But the stakes are higher now, and any recklessness I may have felt in the face of danger has been replaced with fierce protective instincts to keep my family and myself safe. Despite these strong instincts, Ken and I did hedge for a few moments weighing the consequences of being swept away in a tornado against waking the baby. While we usually do everything within our power to keep the baby asleep, this seemed like an appropriate exception.

Fortunately Mattie barely stirred when Ken picked him up and minimal rocking and shushing noises kept him asleep for the tiptoed trip through the house and down two flights of stairs into our basement. We settled down to wait out the storm in a nest of blankets from the laundry pile near the washing machine; me rocking and nursing my sleeping boy and Ken watching the radar on his phone.

Even though I still thought the likelihood of the tornado affecting us was small (yes, some of that invincibility still lingers), I felt afraid and imagined a variety of potential grisly outcomes.   But I was also struck by the timeless quality of this scene in the basement (minus the smart phone), and it made me think about all of the other mothers that have huddled over their babies in the darkness while sirens wailed around them. I imagined the fear a mother might feel while under the threat of an air raid or some other kind of enemy attack. Or of the mothers who knew that a tsunami or an earthquake was coming, but had no safe place to take shelter with their babies.

Maybe this was a coping mechanism of my mind – to imagine another scene to take me out of my own. Whatever it was, it instilled feelings of kinship with these mothers to know, if only for a few moments, the fear of a real potentially life-threatening disaster.

Like any mother, I feel tiny flutters of fear for the life of my child on a daily basis; the kind of fear that causes my heart to feel like it has momentarily dropped into my stomach while at the same time I forget how to breathe. This is usually caused by a close call of one variety or another, like when he almost falls from the top of the slide on the playground, almost runs into the street when a car is coming, or almost slips and falls in the bathtub.  I sometimes joke that my day consists of protecting Mattie from one life-threatening event after another, but today I am grateful for the normalcy and relative smallness of these everyday events.

On Monday night, the siren stopped after a short time (10 minutes?) and we knew it was safe to go back to bed, which we did gratefully. The next morning, I read in the paper that the tornado did in fact touch down in the middle of the city, even snapping trees, damaging property, and felling power lines on streets walking distance from my own.   While my mind drifted to the fates of those less fortunate than myself, maybe the fear that I was experiencing (and simultaneously avoiding) was more real than I dared consider.

At noon on the first Wednesday of next month when the emergency warning siren blares, I expect to feel more relief and gratitude than irritation. And perhaps I’ll even think to use it as a moment of ceremony, to remember all of those other mothers who visited me in the basement on Monday night; those who were able to return to bed like me, relieved and grateful that the threat of danger had passed, and those whose lives were lost or forever changed by a siren in the night.

 

Coloring

Posted on by

Coloring has become a serious business at our house as of late. It happens at the kitchen table (where there is a dedicated coloring corner with a special booster seat and a plentiful supply of crayons, colored pencils, and paper), in the tub (with special bathtub crayons), on the sidewalk and the porch (with “chalk-it”)… and sometimes on the walls, floors, and any other hard surface available… but we’re working on this. 🙂

Mattie can stay engaged in this activity for a very long time – as long as someone is willing to follow his direction and draw all of the things he gets so excited to see come to life when crayon hits the paper. This currently consists of a long list of automobiles: buses, airplanes, cars, trucks, garbage trucks, boats, and helicopters; varying only in size (little one or big one) and color (seriously, he can name them all now). Frequently I haven’t finished drawing one blue bus before he’s asking me to draw another one…or a little yellow plane or a pink helicopter…a BIG one! I’ve gotten really good at drawing the things on this list (quickly!), but he’s started to challenge my drawing skills more often now by throwing in other things we’ve seen recently; a rhino, hippo, or giraffe (we went to the zoo) or a beetle, worm, caterpillar, grasshopper, or fish (he loves to visit the creek).

He draws and conducts the creation of this imagined scene with the same fervor. While he is instructing me on what comes next he is also drawing scribbles, circles, dots, and lines; they even sometimes come together looking like automobiles. I am astounded by how quickly his drawing is evolving; it’s only been a couple of months and already there are distinct differences from when he began. This is just one more way in which I am amazed by the speed in which he is transforming before my very eyes.

So yesterday afternoon I sat at the kitchen table coloring with Mattie in this fashion for a very long time. And while I’m sitting there feeling this awe and wonder over my beautiful boy, thrilled both by his delight and being able to simply satisfy his desire to see a world filled with automobiles of all sizes and colors… I start to notice some other feelings creeping in. First, I start to wonder if he is ever going to take a nap today. It’s way past naptime and he’s showing no signs of slowing, so I start to panic at the thought that I might not get any time to myself. I need to do the dishes. And start some laundry. Pick up toys. Pay at least one bill. Start supper. Work in the garden. Call the doctor. Take a shower! Respond to at least one personal email! (I’m getting desperate now…)

Then, as my panic and frustration start to build, another layer arrives. As I’m feeling this longing to move at my own pace, I also begin to think about Ken and how he “gets to” go off to work each day, doing work that is meaningful and that he’s passionate about, while I’m stuck at home taking care of Mattie. (Of course this is meaningful work and I’m passionate about doing it, but this information doesn’t exist in the moment when I’m trapped in the story created by my powerful mind.) In the story, I’m a victim of my own life – sacrificing myself, a martyr to the cause of raising our son, and all my feelings about being thwarted and unable to move at my own pace, NEVER able to finish any task that requires more than 15 minutes of my attention or EVER getting to do anything for myself… get momentarily projected onto my dear husband. (I’m sorry, sweetie.) I know I’m really deep in when absolutes like NEVER start to creep in – this is full-on unreasonable, petulant child, stomping my foot kind of language. Fortunately, it also rings the warning bell and alerts me to the fact that I need to breathe and evaluate what’s actually going on.

So somehow in this moment I found the wherewithal to ask myself… what would I rather be doing?

Yes, there was a long list of tasks in my awareness that needed attention. But would I seriously rather be doing those things? Not really…

And while I might want to go get a massage, read a book, go for a run, go dancing, see my friends, write, and take a trip to Italy and drink wine for a week, those desires will always exist and point more toward me needing to carve out more time to tend to myself. Which I’m working on…

But in the big picture…is there some job that I’d rather be doing that would make me happier than being at home with my son, teaching him about the world and watching him develop and grow more and more into himself?

When honestly exploring that question in this moment in my life, I found that the honest answer was … nope.   This is actually what I want to be doing. In fact, this is what I get to do. I get to spend my days with my beautiful son, coloring and reading books; taking walks; throwing rocks in the creek; hunting for tadpoles, worms, and beetles; splashing in puddles; and running through tall grass with the dog.

It makes me really happy… a lot of the time. And it’s really hard … sometimes. But what job that’s worthwhile isn’t?

"Chalk-it" delight

“Chalk-it” delight!

 

Where I’ve Been & Spring Through Mattie’s Eyes

Posted on by

Whew, I’m back.  I made it through my big work deadline and I’m only just beginning to emerge from the long break from everything that we all needed. We took a much-needed vacation to Florida to reconnect as a family and remember the feeling of sun on our skin and dirt beneath our bare feet.   I thought I would write about it (and many other things) sooner, but I just haven’t had it in me.

My darling boy made it through my concentrated stretch of long work days beautifully (amenable to being with papa and his grandmas most of the time), but literally the day after it was over didn’t want me to leave his sight.  It’s like he knew that we’d gotten through something and he could fall apart and let all his built-up need out.  I’m grateful both that he was so adaptable during this critical time and and then also that his need could emerge fully and be met.  It’s been intense in the aftermath, as I’ve been really present to his built-up need and working to rebuild his trust, proving that I won’t leave him every time I walk out of the room.  Two months later, I think we’re finally on the other side of it and back in balance.

Balance.  Not an easy thing to achieve in any arena.  My life (our lives) feel like an undulating snake body that fills up and empties out, constricts and expands, coils tight and then slithers onward with a life and momentum all it’s own.   Too much of one thing, not enough of another…never enough. (Time, money, sleep…)  But then somehow it all turns out to be…just enough.   And like the snake, we survive.  We survive through the pain and the pleasure, and (hopefully) learn how to linger just a little longer in the moments of freedom and joy and fun, letting go of the suffering we cling to and can’t seem to live without.

(Whew.  Not sure where that last paragraph came from, but I’m trusting it’s arrival…it’s honesty…and it’s relevance to “where I’ve been”.  And moving on…)

A season of travel and exploration, it has been.  Whenever Ken and I reflect on our lives and prioritize the things we want for fulfillment, connection, happiness, (and balance?) we discuss how we can be more fluid with our physical location (jobs etc) and travel more.  So this spring we really committed to making more travel with Mattie a reality, and it’s been a great learning experience for us all.  In addition to our escape to Florida,  we just ventured on a cross-country pilgrimage to Skyline, our home away from home in northern California for my great-aunt’s 76th birthday.  It was a magical adventure (for Mattie especially) filled with throwing rocks in mountain streams, riding in the back of the pickup truck, feeding the horses and learning how to call the cows (Come, bossie!).  In addition to sweet connection with my great-aunties and my cousin, of course.  (More on this journey forthcoming, I hope.)

Maggie, Ken, and Mattie at Skyline

Maggie, Ken, and Mattie at Skyline

And while I’ve been absent from my blog, I did continue my Contemplative Writing practice, and a few weeks ago sat in the sunshine and wrote this bit below, which quite aptly describes where I’ve been in these early days of spring.

********

Spring through Mattie’s Eyes

Oh sweet sunshine, soaking into my skin, my clothes, my hair, coloring the world red behind my closed eyes. How I am tempted to lay down my pen to sit and enjoy you alone, absorb your rays into my being, feeling whatever you stir in me on this afternoon of spring awakening.  You light up the world outside and in; the longer days of light, the first yellow crocuses inspiring delight, causing the frozen states inside to melt a little, soften, as we too have the chance to be born anew.

This morning we walked, Mattie and I, noticing signs of spring everywhere.  Walking at the pace of a toddler allows for noticing and absorbing more of the world than the brisk adult “busy, busy I’m so busy” way of moving through the world.

We crouched down next to the creek in the sunshine, staying in one spot for a long time, noticing. We saw a male and female mallard pair floating lazily through the water, then stopping to bask in the sunshine; robins flitting from ground to tree and back again in search of morsels to eat, I presume; a woodpecker flying back and forth, back and forth eventually settling on the tree closest to us and pecking out it’s unique rhythm again and again (causing us both to smile); a red-winged blackbird rooted on one branch, calling over and over, seemingly announcing the arrival of spring; and a blonde squirrel perched unmoving on a stump for the longest time, seemingly contemplating in the sunshine (just as we were). I named each wild creature for Mattie and he carefully repeated each name, many of them brand new to him.

For the first time he is witnessing the grass and mud emerging from the snow, being revealed for exploring with fingers (and event tasting!), the frozen sheets of ice melting into running water, and new wild creatures moving in and filling our environment with activity and sound; all of it new and amazing and filled with possibility.

I am astounded as I fully recognize my role in this, his earliest education, and how much power I have in determining what he experiences – or not.  And I am inspired to explore how I can continue to use the natural world and play and a variety of different environments to teach my son.  While it feels almost cliché to say, I am also so grateful to have the opportunity to try to see it all through his eyes, to appreciate it with the same intensity, curiosity and admiration – as though it were my first time too.  It feels like a sacred opportunity that I dare not miss – an opportunity to appreciate and admire the world just a little more, opening to all that it awakens. Today the sun and my son melt and awaken my world, without and within.

Mattie Exploring the Trees

Mattie Exploring the Trees

 

Coming To My Senses

Posted on by

Oy.  My brain is tired and full, straining to remember and hold onto all the details that need to be coordinated over the next 3 weeks to submit 20 documents to the federal government on behalf of 8 clients.  I’m writing all day long, telling other people’s stories in the body of application templates — researching, analyzing, calculating, categorizing, strategizing – using my left brain far more than I’d like to.  I feel stressed and overwhelmed, like there’s too much work to be done in not enough time and the pressure is getting to me.

Especially since I’m trying to do it all – to work as much as possible AND be with Mattie as much as possible.   The result is that I feel as though I’m failing at both.  And the shift from being with Mattie most of the time to working most of the time has been tough.  I’m longing for this to be over so that I can return to spending my days with him and clear my mind to allow it to fill again with creative ideas, to play, and to write my own story.

Lately I feel as though all my senses are dulled in this all-consuming singular focus on my work.   I spend each day in our cluttered office: typing, thinking, talking on the phone, making lists, crossing things off lists, and sending email upon email upon email.  Then when I can’t stand it anymore, I get up from my black swivel chair, brush away the accumulated crumbs scattering my desk, and collect my plates & cups from the meals of the day.

I walk down the stairs that are increasingly cluttered with clean folded laundry, dog hair & other random items that (I cringe to admit) currently includes a box of brightly colored wedding thank you cards that were written and never sent — rediscovered nearly 6 years later in a recent cleaning frenzy making room for more Mattie gear.    If you are one of those people who never received their thank you card, please receive this as my formal apology!   Oh, the guilt!

I set aside the guilt, deciding to leave the collection of things in their places for one more day and complete my descent, unlatching the baby gate at the base of the old staircase.  I push open the shiny green curtain in the doorway to the living room & barely have time to set my dirty dishes on the seat of the oak foyer bench before Mattie notices my entrance.

And then I am his.

He reaches for me, needing me.  If I am lucky, I will be greeted by the two sweetest syllables I know, “ma-ma”.  But more likely, once in my arms he will just scramble to lift my shirt, desperate to nurse & reconnect after the long day apart.  We’ll settle into our spot on the worn leather sofa or a stool in the kitchen (if Papa is cooking) and drink each other in, skin to skin. I might sigh, overcome by his beauty, his sweet pudgy, sticky face and big brown eyes locked on mine.  His fingers are now busy exploring – stroking, twisting, and pinching all over.  He may pause nursing periodically to look at me intently and say “up” and “down” (pointing with emphasis), or “woof” or “naaa”.  And with a smile, I’ll confirm, “yes, that’s up, and down”; then look over to our dog “yes, there’s Girl,  she says woof”; and then locate his stuffed plush lamb strewn on the floor; “and yes, there’s your lambie, naaa”.  And he’ll return to nursing contentedly, satisfied that I’ve heard and understood him.

Maybe my senses aren’t totally dulled after all – I’m just saving them for this moment, letting them all slowly flood back in until I’m fully present.  Because this is when I need that awareness most, to engage fully in this intimate conversation between mother & son reunited, rooted in the sensual exploration of one another and the world around us.   This is what I’m living for these days.  This is what’s getting me through.  Yes, it’ll do.