Three Truths and One Wish

1 Reply


1. Truth: Self-care doesn’t always look how you’d expect. I don’t know about you, kind and gentle reader, but sometimes I confuse self-care with either total indulgence or complete purity, weekly mani-peds and daily bubble baths or becoming a vegan who meditates two hours every day. I get caught up in either being a pampered princess or a minimalist nun, or some weird mix of the two extremes. In fact, self-care is just that: taking care of yourself, that simple. Some moments that means a whole, organic, meat-free or even entirely raw meal, but other times that means a long morning nap followed by pancakes for lunch, watching sitcoms and staying in your pjs all day.


2. Truth: Self-care requires self-awareness. You have to know and love yourself really well to understand what you need and when, what is a real need and what is an attempt to resist reality, avoid the hard stuff. What you hunger for, what you need and want, is a constantly shifting and evolving set of desires. There won’t be a list you make at one moment of your life that applies to every other moment. Developing a relationship, a friendship, a full on love affair with yourself, a deep down knowing, a wholehearted connection, is what will enable you to provide the very best self-care, and oddly enough is also the most direct path to being able to help others.

3. Truth: I am the one and only constant in my life. I will be separated from all others at some point through changing relationships, geography, and death, but I will never lose myself. Any abandonment or loss of self is simply a momentary confusion, a crisis of faith. That higher, true, core self is always there, that basic goodness that is wise, compassionate, and powerful. It will only die when I do. We will never be separated.

One wish: That we all have a deep, healthy, sane, wholehearted relationship with ourselves. That we have faith in our own capacity for wisdom, compassion, and strength. That our connection to ourselves and others gives us confidence and courage, knowing that we are never alone.

Something Good

1 Reply

basil

1. The Four-Part Breath of Grief on Curvy Yoga. Brutal and beautiful.

2. Jilly Ink. Handwriting at its most brilliant.

3. Why it’s okay to be fully properly and awesomely sad by Susan Piver on Glad Is. She’s amazing, and this is further proof.

When you’re sad, everything touches you. You cry so easily. You feel things intensely, and not just your own struggles, but everyone else’s. There is no barrier. Your heart is so open. Though it may feel quite disorienting, this rawness is actually a very important threshold: When we’re open, we can be touched. When we’re touched, we can respond genuinely. When we’re genuine, we can love and be loved and our real life can actually begin. That is how important sadness is.

4. Every Time I Talk About Depression – Being Brave by Chris Brogan.

5. What I Have to Offer: “What I have to offer is me, what you have to offer is you, and if you offer yourself with authenticity and generosity I will be moved.” ~Charlie Kaufman

6. Life Isn’t Safe from Raam Dev.

7. The World’s Simplest Meditation from Think Simple Now. “If you want to know God, then turn your face toward your friend and don’t look away.” ~Rumi

8. This quote from the Dalai Lama: “Any practice that can give you more courage when you are undergoing a very difficult time and that can provide you with some kind of solace and calmness of mind is a true practice of the dharma.”

9. 8 Simple Living Blogs You Will Enjoy Discovering on Becoming Minimalist. I’m sure I will, once I get time to take a closer look.

10. Rocky Mountain Reflections. I think I want this on in the background all the time. It makes me happy–maybe because it’s one of the only ways I enjoy the Park, from afar (they don’t allow dogs on the trails, so what’s the point?).

11. Aimee Mann’s new album Charmer comes out next week, but you can listen to it in its entirety NOW on NPR’s First Listen!