How to follow your soul.

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Just last night, I shared with my art journal students that I can’t figure out why yellow is such an integral part of my pages. I’d estimate that 60% of the pages are prominently yellow. I don’t yet know why this is the case, especially since I’ve known purple and blue and red as favorite colors. And now it’s so yellow.

I used this example to help my students see that we will often find ourselves drawn to forms of expression that we can’t quite figure out. It’s important to pay attention to what we’re doing in our art journals when no one else is looking. When no one else’s expectations come on us. These are signs and roadmarkers to where we really want to be.

We often travel through life using someone else’s map. We do what we think we’re “supposed” to do. This is ok. This is what it means to be a responsible adult, right? But responsible adults also know their own unique role in society. They are self-aware and show up for the task they have been born to do.

And sometimes, what we’re born to do and what we’re “supposed” to do are in conflict.

Through art journaling, I have the opportunity to hold a mirror-like page before my students, and ever so subtly ask them, “What do you see?”

Most of them are a bit surprised, and even pleased, with what’s on the page. But we work hard to create an environment of free and unfiltered self expression in the class. I encourage them not to question themselves in their paint choices, word choices, image choices. Why is this important? Because, when we open ourselves up to true expression, we will find that our hearts speak louder than a whisper. They speak clearly. We just need to give them a place to speak. And when we really stop and listen, we will hear things that our souls have been trying to say for so long. We will know ourselves more deeply than before, and we’ll do a much better job of following and caring for our own souls.

Remembering…

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11

The fire roared and crackled and spat and warmed, soothing me as I thought hard about the last pages. I don’t want it to end, this journey I’ve walked with Sabrina Ward Harrison through her “The True and the Questions.”

My hands and heart are frozen in her last chapter, the one that turns my face to the family that birthed me and then gently tilts my head forward to the family that Drew and I are hoping to create. These pages are soft like cotton on my tender heart, bare for all the wishes and wants that suspend me between two families.

Remembering what it was. Hoping for what it could be. Holding neither.

Staring into the fire, I see the sand fly off the heels of my dad’s 80′s flip-flops and onto the endless trail that would take us to the tea-colored water of the Ohoopee river. This river so shallow and so slow and so perfect for summer Saturdays.

I see myself holding onto the front of his wheeled egg gatherer that crawled down the center of each long and slender chicken house.

I see the sunken stump holes in our woods, filled with straw and leaves—he said the Devil lived down there.

I see the two of us laughing outside the packed and noisy house where I snuck out and we toasted the quiet. Laughing at what I just did. The secret we had that nobody would ever believe. I see us making a memory that I should’ve written down for everyone and no one. The memory I should’ve written down for me.

Replaying memories from childhood to present left the biggest stump hole in my heart. A hole where a moment once stood. A grand moment. A moment worth writing. The moments had passed—uprooted and burned by the years, floating light as smoke rising from that fire. I couldn’t hold on to them.

I should’ve written it all down when it was still a part of me.

Steward your story.

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24

I’m working on telling a significant part of my story. And, in writing out certain moments and dialogs, I’ve found myself wishing I’d lived them differently. Wishing for more wit. For more color. For more bravery.

In reflecting and writing about this period of my life, I’m keenly aware of how I’m choosing to live out the rest of it—the todays and tomorrows of my story. I’m starting to live my “now” with a bit more wit and color and bravery. I can’t rewrite the past, but I can have a serious say in how today and tomorrow will be written.

I don’t know if you’ve ever taken a hard look at pivotal moments of your life, but it’s a great exercise is self awareness. I’d recommend it to anyone.

Because, at the end of those tough chapters, when the plot has reached its resolution, you will see that your “ever after” really is more happy than you thought.

If you were asked to write about a pivotal, life-changing season of your life, which one would you choose?

Snapshot 01122012 : An honest look at an honest moment.

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14

I rolled out of bed two hours late, knowing I was not going to get it done today. “You are a failure of a human being.”

Those words flew through my brain faster than I could stop them. Ouch. What a low blow, self. I could hear the announcers calling the shot: “Mean-Mandy is picking a fight with herself and it looks like she’s winning.”

Alright, where are my boxing gloves? And where’s the coffee?

He was in the kitchen, all kind-eyed and studying my face. My inner fight had actually been going for a few days now. He was even the victim of a sucker-punch or two. I didn’t want to say the wrong things anymore, so I planned to behave myself during our Family Devotion Time.

Coffee warm, I let the couch hold me up beside him. We talked. We read Buechner’s words about guilt, and my mind wandered through the INTJ personality description that says we expect too much out of other people.

Maybe sometimes I expect too much of myself as well.

I tuck my toes under his leg and I tell him that I’m frustrated. No, I’m not frustrated, I’m just not able to think straight today and I don’t like this because I planned on doing some serious writing and I can’t make my brain move in a straight line for more than three minutes so there’s no way I can spend a handful of hours chipping away at those 4,000 words.

I’d already faced a sad day this week. And a tired day. And a frustrated day. Now I’m in a muddy day and I didn’t plan for this and I’m having a hard time sleeping and I’m trying to work with myself but I’m supposed to be writing.

“You don’t have to write.” He reminds me, “Not today. You can work on your process. You have a process for down days and frustrating days, and now you can make a process for muddy-brain days.”

I groan. If things moved faster in my head, I’d launch into all the reasons why I don’t want to do this.

“Everybody has limitations.”

His careful words made me want to cry.

His advice: “Do things that don’t require much mental exercise. No intense writing sessions. Instead, try walking on the beach for some Vitamin D, or paint journals, or have some time with friends, or do some house-work, or some photography. Do the things you want to do but can’t do because you want to spend your time writing. Today you get to do those things and it can be a great day and you can get stuff done!”

So I wrote this post two hours later as an update on how things are going. Except I refused to tell you how little I’d accomplished in those past two hours. Instead, I thought real hard about forgetting the to-do list or the clock on the wall. I gave myself permission to wander through this muddy-brain day and as an exercise in self-exploration.

And I reminded myself that when I was little, my favorite thing to do was play in the puddles and make mud pies.

What batters you?

Quote

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“Let This Darkness Be a Bell Tower”
by Rainer Maria Rilke

Quiet friend who has come so far,
feel how your breathing makes more space around you.
Let this darkness be a bell tower
and you the bell. As you ring,

what batters you becomes your strength.
Move back and forth into the change.
What is it like, such intensity of pain?
If the drink is bitter, turn yourself to wine.

In this uncontainable night,
be the mystery at the crossroads of your senses,
the meaning discovered there.

And if the world has ceased to hear you,
say to the silent earth: I flow.
To the rushing water, speak: I am.

Who are you sitting with?

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9

I’ve been sitting with Ann Voskamp and Mary Oliver for quite some time. And I’ve recently had a moment with Emerson. And I’m still slowly strolling along with Madeleine L’Engle.

I read their words slowly and deliberately, letting the warmth of their words roll down into my soul. No gulping or gorging. Just sipping.

Our time is honorable, like a Japanese tea ceremony. I have to carefully place the settings. I have to clear and quiet my mental space, make room for their words. Make room for their revelations. Make room for their light.

I take their words in slowly, savoring the moment. I sit with them and interact with their words and honor their words by giving them the proper space and time.

When tea is made with water drawn from the depths of mind

Whose bottom is beyond measure,

We really have what is called cha-no-yu.

Toyotomi Hideyoshi

I think that’s how we are to take in the greats. Sip by sip.

Who are you sitting with? Whose words are like tea drawn from the depths of the mind?

Adoption Update: While We Wait

Posted on
15

I went to a baby shower on Sunday. Most of you who know me well will know that I haven’t done much of that in the past few years. I’ve had my “excuses.” This time was different. This time I feel on the cusp of motherhood, just without all the cravings and crazy hormones. And I’m not sure when I’ll become a mom. Or to what age child(ren). Or to what gender.

So we don’t paint any kids rooms. And we don’t buy kiddie-clothes. And we aren’t showered with gifts every-other Saturday for months.

Watching her open all those presents caused a bit of a panic attack for me. And I know y’all wanna rush down to the comment box and say “oh mandy, y’all will be fine” but lemme explain. :)

Although we have one more step in finalizing our application papers, I’ve got this feeling that it could happen quickly. I don’t mean “quickly” as in the next few weeks. But quickly as in the next few months. Pre-summer?

Maybe?

Good grief, hopefully…

And, while my ready-to-pop friend is opening an hour’s worth of gifts, I’m comparing. (And I know that’s the one thing that women aren’t supposed to do—compare themselves with other women. But I was at a baby shower, for crying out loud.)

If the adoption process goes as it may, we’ll have about a month—maybe six weeks—from when we hear about the kids until we bring them into our home. If we are spending weekends getting to know them, when in the heck am I going to have a half-dozen showers? That was my panic point right there: Knowing there’s a wonderful community of people that are sitting on go and ready to help us bring these kids into our homes, but not knowing how we can cram the “getting ready” part of it into just a few weeks.

Thankfully I had a wing-man at the party, and as we drove home afterwards she reminded me that we won’t be able to make the adoption public until just before they are moving in. See, as it works with the state, you sort of “date” the kids and if everybody likes everybody, they move in. So the “yay we’re adopting these kids!” moment comes just before we bring ‘em in. By which time we’ll already have beds and books and maybe even bikes. (eee!!!!!)

Oh and then there’s the other possibility, which is the newborn at the hospital who needs a home and we have a few days/hours notice.

Either way, I ain’t got nine months to figure this out. And I ain’t got no “What to Expect when You’re Expecting” manual to read, either.

So what do we do? We paint our living room tomorrow. And call it “nesting.”

I mean, seriously, what else can we do? Wait.

Thank you so much for reading attentively. Now I unleash you to leave those “oh Mandy, y’all are going to be fine” comments below. I could use a few today, because I’ve got two hours to get this house ready for our last home visit. The one where we need to have our knives out of reach and our poisons put away. Oh and she’ll look for a fire extinguisher and carbon monoxide detector, neither of which we have at this current moment.

Ah. Time to wake Drew up.