A New Year's Puzzle

As we approach New Years, each of us struggles with the same questions, the same decisions, the same dilemmas: to be “less” or to be “more?”  We all do it in some form or another, regardless of circumstance – we define ourselves in quantities, not qualities.

Examples:

I will be LESS overweight.                                             I will MORE fit.

I will be LESS afraid.                                                        I will be MORE bold.

I will be LESS of a procrastinator.                               I will be MORE organized.

I will be LESS stressed.                                                   I will be MORE at peace.

I will be LESS normal.                                                      I will be MORE normal.

 

The end of a year brings with it some sense of evaluation and judgement.  Did we do well this year?  Did we reach our goals?  Did we live up to ourselves?  How did we fail and how did we succeed?  With the emphasis always on our failures.  The New Year always focused on how we can fix what is wrong with us, make us better, make us something…as though we are broken and nothing before.

The New Year is coming and I wish to make changes in my own life…big ones!  Not because I think I am broken or that I am “less than” but because I want a different experience.  Not one that is “more” or “better” or “fixed”…but one that is real and one that feels a bit more like ME. 

That is the question we should be asking ourselves…not WHAT IS RIGHT or WHAT IS WRONG, not WHAT IS NORMAL or WHAT IS WEIRD, not WHAT IS NOW or WHAT IS LATER...we should ask ourselves not WHAT IS YOU but WHAT IS ME?

What is me? 

Who am I?

How do I matter?

How does my puzzle piece fit with yours?

We should all strive to be the puzzle piece that fits with the puzzle.  Because we all fit…somehow.

 

HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ALL MY PUZZLE PIECES! 

 

Something more

She walks with confidence

And never changes her stride

But something unsure

Is there beneath

Her steps.

She's everything

But thinks herself

Nothing and

Though she knows

Better

She won't give

Herself

Permission

To be

More.

 

The Age of Social Media

New technology has rewritten the rules and norms of social communication.  To be someone’s “friend” has so much more meaning than it once did.  To “friend” and “de-friend” someone are terms in our vocabulary that did not recently exist but that now, have significant meaning.  Some may feel that facebook and other social media have trivialized our relationships to their least common denominator, making “friendship” nothing more than knowing someone’s name by some common association or affiliation.  It is true that some times this is the case.  But often times such social media connects you to like-minded people who support and inspire you and thus touch you in significant ways.  This kind of inspiration expands like a community and creates a pocket of consciousness that although planted online, grows in real-life situations.

In my own experience with social media, I have friends whom I’ve never met in the physical world.  I have friends with whom I’ve shared my deepest and darkest secrets.  I have connected to family I’ve only met once or twice as well as family with whom I am intimately close.  I have reconnected with people I have not seen in years.  I have opened up to people I barely know.  I have been able to express things that I would not otherwise be able to express.  For shy, awkwardly social people like me who prefer to write, facebook is a gift from the internet heavens. 

Facebook has allowed us to share our lives in a unique way.  A picture of a sunrise or a poem can connect us at a philosophical level.  A silly joke can connect our senses of humor.  Cute animals can connect our special interests.  News items can connect our intellect.  And the beautiful faces of ourselves and our family just connects us to each other. 

Social media not only connects us to one another through our similarities but it informs us through our differences.  Not all of my facebook friends share my political, spiritual or psychological philosophies.  Sometimes it is hard for me to read a post that I morally or philosophically oppose but I appreciate the diversity of thought among my friends and I remind myself that an open mind is a richer mind.

I am thankful for social media and all that it has to offer. I am thankful for the new friends I have made and for the old friends I’ve kept.  I am thankful for the laughs and the love and the wisdom I have received from others.  I am thankful that I can share myself with the world in a way I never felt comfortable enough to do. 

So next time you feel like you are spending too much time on facebook  or twitter or blogspot or pinterest, just remember that you are merely connecting yourself to the great big world of thought and creativity around you!    Your world can be as big or small as you want it to be.

If there were annual “facebook awards”, they would go to….

Paula Sherman for the best nature pics, Donna Riley Jensen for the creepy Halloween countdown, Amy Peterman for the funniest posts, Trevor Gillette for the most thought-provoking posts, Linda Eastman-Durham for the most misspelled words, Sharon Hoyle Gabrielson and Vicki Kendal-Olsen for the most consecutive posts, Stephanie Eastman-Bushman and Alicia Eastman for the cutest kid pics (bias alert), Jackson Galaxy for the cutest pet pics,  Joe Greene for the most real-life celebrity pics and my mom for the one person I wish was on facebook but who is not. L 

Now go post your thoughts!

Here's to you, Grasshopper

“Don’t wake a sleeping bear” they say –

But sometimes the bear

Wants to be awakened.

__________________________________________

He had coarse skin

And hard yellow nails

He looked older than

He was.

He had a curt tongue and

Steely stare

He trusted no one.

He was cold,

He was tired –

He had regrets,

Unforgiven

 

But I saw something

More…

 

I felt his Soul

At the table,

As he played

Solitaire

 

He wished for nothing

Or so it seemed—

But another drink and

Another day.

But if you dared to

Look in his eyes

Way down deep

In his eyes…

It was there—

All of it

 

This old, coarse

Unforgiving

Stubborn

Son of a bitch

Was the closest

Thing to real

You will ever

Find.

 

 

I wish I could

Sit with him again

And ask all those

Things I wondered...

 

 

And have the guts

To meet his stare

And maybe

Hold his hand.

 

____________________________

For my old friend,

Johnny Russell