monday me.
today. reflection in my office door.
i have this idea. the idea is that i come clean with the truth-y guts of what has been happening to me. to write the equivalent of a naked self-portrait and to chronicle this cracked path to wholeness that i am walking on. and then, each time i sit to begin, it all sounds so mundane. so average. so obvious. like i should already have gotten this by now. i start to judge it. i cringe. i get embarrassed. i shrink. i feel shame. i stop.
and that, right there, is the root of all that has been holding me back.
somewhere deep, and right up at the surface, is a tired old rulebook that suggests i play it cool, suck it up, act unimpressed and hold it in. this is the same rulebook that informed me to tighten my belly and hide my thighs. to temper my enthusiasm and quiet my excitement. to pretend, play along, camouflage. that these, and countless other tactics, are the only way i have made it this far.
now, intellectually, i recognize what is behavior and mechanism. i can identify the stuff that little girls figure out when they want to feel safe, loved, and enough. but knowing, as a thirty-nine-and-a-half year old woman? that is entirely new territory. the kind of territory that makes me cry with relief. suggests freedom and the promised land. joy. hope. presence. potential. redemption. death and rebirth.
why this is happening right now makes perfect sense. i've tapped into my dreams. i've paved a way for myself in the world. shouted from the mountain tops, as far away as africa and india, what it is i want to be when i grow up. what i am now, as a grown up. the ship sailed. the plane took off. and now the inner landscape has some major clearing out to do.
geneen roth's book, women, food, and god, is playing a huge role in naming what it is i am healing. a lifetime of judgement where kindness ought to have been, of numbing precious vulnerability, and of locking up what was always meant to be free. i am on my second reading of this book, the first was almost more than i could bear. a few pages at a time and the truth felt like the burn from a magnifying glass in the sun. now, as the warmth of her words are making their way through on the second round, i feel a pleasure and permission in allowing the wisdom she speaks to become my own.
(and now oprah is onto the book. it's not just me? it is possible that i am normal? that we are all evolving together? oh the compulsion to play it cool and act as if i already knew this stuff is crazy making.)
i am learning to sit with, love, and welcome ALL of my hungers. it's uncomfortable. foreign. and feels a little indulgent. much more so than the most decadent meal. my instinct has always been to fix first, heal second. it has never worked. the cleansing, the fasting, the berating, even the yoga, all were wrapped up in the effort and the waiting to be worthy.
and so this is monday me. the beginning of a regular series of self portraits and truth tellings as i go deeper into a change that is integrating everything from hormones to breakfast to prayer, as i learn to offer kindness toward myself. i have no fucking clue what will show up, other than me. that's the truth. but, i'll be here. what has become blazingly clear is that i can no more move further in my work in the world without simultaneously giving voice to what is unwinding madly within me.
i invite you to share the truthy guts of your monday self. unashamed and gently. we'll have a virtual rulebook burning. i'd like that very much.
one last thing: i'm probably a little late to the party here–but if you haven't already seen the latest talk by elizabeth gilbert that is circulating about, take 20 and go here now.
- good morning. http://t.co/C2jqjKSR
10 hours ago - loved meeting David Eagleman tonight. Fascinating and dynamic thinker and speaker. #Incognito
3 days ago - good morning. http://t.co/mLDr1W1B
11 days ago - good morning! http://t.co/8epidcDB
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17 May, 2010
Lisa, I love you.
Nothing else is coming out right so I will just say that you are heard, seen, and understood. I love you and I am so proud that you are my friend.
xo
17 May, 2010
i feel honoured to read this – you don’t know me and if you look at the glass on that door you will probably see my greasy nose mark – pressed up looking in, i want to learn with you and i feel something unfolding as i read – thankyou
17 May, 2010
guts and glory?
for you: love and compassion… for being monday you.
wouldn’t want to you any other way! xx
17 May, 2010
band-aid: ripped off.
and you are.
love xxx
17 May, 2010
Don’t be afraid. You’ve been waiting your whole life for this.
I’m privileged just to witness anything that surfaces here.
x x x
17 May, 2010
oh bea, you’re right. i have been waiting my whole life for this. and the most marvelous part is that i’m NOT afraid! this integration, the meeting of myself, innards out, and the tossing of the rulebook is exactly what happens next. it all makes sense. now’s the time to just be in it and trust. xx
17 May, 2010
you are love and light and i adore you.
17 May, 2010
I love this post because it is so much like the journey I’m on right now.
Women Food & God had a significant impact on me too, and I think I’m going to need to read through it again too. It caused a major awakening of how I connect with my body and the scared little girl hiding inside. I wrote about it here… http://fumblingforwords.com/2010/05/05/the-secrets-the-body-wants-to-tell-me/ (I think you’d like the other 2 books I mentioned there as well).
Blessings to you.
17 May, 2010
beautiful post lisa! i too loved & connected on a deep level with women, food & God. your post left me much to ponder, i thank you for that.
17 May, 2010
I threw that rule book away late last summer, and watched the big garbage truck drive away with it, and there has been more joy, coupled with knee shaking terror, because truly, if I am really who I am (in front of Everyone), there are going to be some days when my knees are knocking, and my hands are sweaty. There seem to be just as many days when I am Sure that I could do ballet leaps across the floor, and maintain a perfect pirouette en pointe. Acting a part may protect, but it also insulates, and tho I no longer want to be insulated, a little hiding occasionally does my soul and spirit good, these days tho, it’s hiding in the tall grass and not in a closed off room. Ok, how I do go on…. bonfire is blazing, burn baby burn…
xoxo
17 May, 2010
Integrity. It’s a constant practice, so is remembering it… I’ll also share a page from my inner diary. A confession: at the Earth day festival, in the middle of a rant about the irony all around us, I said something about impromptu yoga being done in the middle of the festival (half way making fun and half way envious) you offered to start an impromptu yoga session and I froze up. I played it cool and held it in. Every once in a while I become my thirteen year old self with acne at a school dance afraid to dance. I admire you.
18 May, 2010
Every day I have to bring myself back to kindness. It’s the most revolutionary idea, attitude, action that I’ve ever brought to bear in my life. It’s changing everything and if it was obvious, if I ‘should’ have got this before I was 38 years old, well – I didn’t. But now that I am choosing kindess, I give thanks for friends like you – brave and honest and kind enough to walk this path alongside me.
18 May, 2010
What a call to action! You are so inspiring and have been from the moment we met. Love you xx
18 May, 2010
this has really hit me….just a few nights ago, before going to bed i thought, what have i been looking for through therapy, yoga, meditation, reiki?
there was this little voice that was wispering in my ear…what you were looking is always inside you!!!
thankyou lisa for putting it in beautiful words…
xx
b.
18 May, 2010
such power in gentle words. i’m with you here…tearing out the pages of that rulebook. thank you for sayin’ it.
18 May, 2010
“we’ll have a virtual rulebook burning.” Oh how perfectly freeing that sounds. I’m in.
Thank you for sharing your beautiful insides, Lisa…i’m honored to be a part of you.
Love.
18 May, 2010
i am sitting here nodding and breathing deeply as i take in the beautiful truth of this post. thank you for sharing your truths. yes. thank you.
20 May, 2010
i just love your honesty and love your blog. i discovered you from the wishfull retreat. i am very happy i did. thanks for your inspiration, creativity and authenticity.
20 May, 2010
It doesn’t matter what day of the week it is: You are beautiful.
22 May, 2010
Very nice photo!
23 May, 2010
Wow. Good tears this Sunday morning
You are such a jewel. You
thanks to your post. There’s so much
I want to say here but my mind can’t
configure the words in which to say
them so I will simply say, once again,
Wow.
really, truly are.
23 May, 2010
I am on such a journey myself. I thought I kind of knew who I was, but it was turned upside down. I’m clueless. I think I will join you and have Monday Me on my own blog, and see what comes of it. I am looking forward to seeing where your journey takes you. Thank you for this post.
24 May, 2010
i wrote a speech in college that resembled some of what you write here. when i read it to a room full of young women, i got a room full of blank stares….but a couple of tears. now, they are my tears, because it is indeed much easier to pack all this away & call it mundane.
i say ~ go for allowing it all to madly unwind…as you already are!
24 May, 2010
“my instinct has always been to fix first, heal second. it has never worked.”
Thank you. You’ve put into words what I have felt in my heart.