Balancing and Focusing

I'm well into my second year as an independent, professional, single woman. My goal has been to develop balance and peace in my life... balancing work with family and friends and hobbies, and making the time to meditate twice a day (usually). At a minimum, I plan to never have shingles again. More broadly, though, I aim to have the time to make time -- so that I am not constantly multi-tasking, and when I am speaking with important people in my life, it is obvious that I am speaking with a person who is important to me.

What does that look like? It means I'm not typing while holding a conversation. It means I am present – here – and connected.

I think that is making a difference in my relationships with friends and family.

Of course I am not at 100% efficacy in this new plan, yet. But that is what I am working on (sort of a New Year's resolution...)

And of course, as in every year, I am working to improve my handwriting.

Learnings

L'dor v'dor

(Hebrew: from generation to generation)

(Also one of my favorite prayer songs)

(and not one-directional...)

Recently, life-teachers seem to surround me, and at the front of the line are Jake and Sara. I've written about Jake's motto (Don't be afraid), and about Sara's efforts to live her life mask-free, even (or especially) around her friendships with young men.

And of course, I've mentioned my own experiments in removing my masks and unfolding from the contorted happydance in which I had become too practiced. Those changes in me had domino effects on so many of the pieces of my life, that sometimes I doubted the wisdom of making those changes, and my own ability to abandon my old ways all-together.

So, is it working? Is honest and direct communication effective?

I think sometimes people are off-put by directness, particularly from women. In my teens, several young men confessed being intimidated by something in me. And the man I was dating before I met Dave thought that I could be the perfect wife, if I were just less opinionated and more accommodating (he wanted me to become Catholic and a military Officer's Wife) (no f-ing way).

Anyway, I've been working on me. Not on "improving" me, but on just being me. And on not letting life pass me by. Learning from Sara and Jake, I am just who I am, the same me for everyone I meet. Either that is interesting to another or not. Best to find out up front, rather than change to fit what I think another is looking for. As Jake has said, "There are 6 Billion people on earth; I don't need to be your friend."

I'm here to say, "It works."