Currie's Gratitude 31 July 2013

Such a wondrous invention, touching hearts. To BE able to reach such a place in others, this is such a gift. I know this BEcause so often my own heart has been moved and forever altered by those who and that which touches me.

Somedays it is something small and seemingly insignificant. A word or a sentence that I read in an email or a blog. A lyric that captures the elusive mix of thoughtsandfeelings I have about something. Someone. Some time.

I consider it one of Life’s greatest gifts and privileges that I get to spend my days with Gracie. She is a toucher of hearts, a stirrer of feelings, a giver of Love and JOY. And never does a day go by that is NOT bettered and blessed by her love and tenderness toward me.

To BE a toucher of hearts means to BE open to one’s own heart BEing touched. And sometimes that is NOT tender or BEautiful at all. Sometimes this is the very quality which makes us so unflinchingly vulnerable. To BE moved is to BE open.

Despite the probable possibility of BEing hurt, Now or Later, letting my heart BE touched is always my first choice.

Always.

Perhaps BEcause I’m stronger Now than I’d imagined BEing, more capable of healing myself.

Finally…

I love you, Currie

Currie's Gratitude 30 July 2013

I might NOT have thought this a principle for Life, at least until the past 7 or 8 years. I was much more the hang back and wait to see sort of bean.

On the other hand, it surely does seem I jumped right into a lot of pots of water, thinking them cool and refreshing, NOT realising they were slowly heating up to a boiling point.

So this may make me sound like a lobster, I recognise that. Or a frog. But I am neither. I just took a long while to understand that jumping in is NOT always the wisest course, even though it is truly something I try Now always to BE willing to DO.

For instance… when I first moved to Florida in 2009, I was all about jumping in and didn’t really grasp that I was upsetting the other lily pads by DOing so. I was, as best I recall, tolerated up until a point and then… well NOT so much.

Today I have a different perspective. I think I have learned to discern and differentiate MUCH MORE when such skills are called for. I Now know there are times to jump in and others where pausing and consideration take precedence.

I don’t ALWAYS get it right, but that’s Life BEing Life, eh?! 

I love you, Currie

Currie's Gratitude 29 July 2013

There is another tidbit I’ve heard that is “make strong offers.” It’s sort of the highbrow version of sweeten pots. At least I think of it that way.

To sweeten pots one need only bring that unique something to whatever the “pot/s” are in play. For instance, when Gracie and I go out this morning I could bring a tennis ballie, prepare for an Intracoastal swim, or simply BE willing to walk somewhere we haven’t BEfore or at least in a long enough while.

On the other hand, when I am looking at what will BE with my upcoming move, I can spend a few moments seeing the ease and simplicity I will enJOY. And I DO mean “seeing” as in visualising it in great detail. This is certain to bring sweetness to the “pot” of transience, mobility, and change.

A sweetened pot is like a strong offer in that it doesn’t haggle and intend disagreement where, ultimately, one wears the other down and gets more than was initially proposed. While I am clear that  negotiating and bargaining sometimes are [or can BE] fun, sweetening a pot is simpler, softer, and, well, sweeter.

I intend each morning to BE a pot-sweetener with my Gratitude. I DO this through making art and words dance just for YOU. Yes. REALLY!!! 

I love you, Currie

Currie's Gratitude 28 July 2013

This is surely an idea I’ve latched onto in Life. I have been [and continue to BE] a wanderer. I’ve roamed the many places where I have lived and I always love to take long exploratory rambles wherever I visit. In fact, whenever I remember places I’ve been for short times, what I often recall is where I walked there. And oh the adventures I had whilst DOing so.

I also have a tendency to wander in my World of thoughts. I can take a tiny ponder that appears in my birdbrain and stretch and twist and wind and unravel it. This deLIGHTs me. Makes me happier than many things I’d long thought essential in Life.

As I have explored this morning time of writing and practising Gratitude, I’ve find that oftentimes I don’t BEgin with I am grateful… perhaps BEcause I’ve come to appreciate and marvel at my ordinary everyday Life in advance, so that wherever my thoughts might go, they are empowered by Gratitude from the gate.

BEginning from such a place is a wondrous gift. Much like the endowment of walking with a keen sense of discovery. It makes me certain that wherever my thoughts go they will find the Gratitude that seems to breathe in me.

Wandering far does NOT necessarily mean far away… 

I love you, Currie

Currie's Gratitude 27 July 2013

A funny prompt, perhaps, but I’m grinning. As I was grinning when I woke up, realising the dream I’d had made peace with a person from my Life who I won’t ever get to make peace with BEcause she is gone.

Funny things happen when we sleep or when we splash puddles. I canNOT NOT think of splashing in puddles as the rain was falling when I was teeny tiny with my brother. And whether we were naked or in underpants, I remember the delicious feeling of that rain on my bare skin.

And I remember it every time I get caught in the rain. Even still. Some 57+ years later. How can that NOT make me grin?!

Gracie, of course, loves puddles. She loves to walk through them and deLIGHTs in me walking and splashing in them, too. Her friend who has moved, Ben, had a special puddle spot in a lawn where we walked together [where Gracie and I walk still Today] and he’d lie right down in it. Luxurious was the look on his face.

Nowadays, Gracie loves to tease me and act as if she will DO a rollie-pole in the grassy Bennie-puddle, but she never does. I think she just loves the look on my face when I think she’ll actually DO it.

I love you, Currie

Currie's Gratitude 26 July 2013

This one I’ve been looking forward to writing on. Really. But mayBE you already know that about me. That I relish things like boredom and restlessness and loneliness and DOing things that are a little off the map…

Relishing boredom has been a particular favourite of mine. Perhaps BEcause I allowed myself to BE bored so very often and then, like a prisoner in a deep hole, had to figure my way up and out or simply let the hole swallow me whole!!

I’m pretty good at filling up my Time and Life with things so I won’t have the opportunity to get bored, yet I used to DO this with things that had that sort of Velcro possibility. The one that might get me attached enough to get carried forth?!

Bridge comes to mind [something some of you might remember consumed me for a couple of years]. You see, I always thought [and hoped] playing Bridge would help me to make friends which might then keep me from my restless loneliness those first years I spent alone in Sedona.

But it didn’t play out that way. I had to learn NOT only Bridge, but how to embrace boredom and solitariness and let them energise and inspire me.

Through embracing it, boredom BEcame my Very Good Best Friend. 

I love you, Currie

Currie's Gratitude 25 July 2013

I think we’re all pretty much the same. At our center. When you strip away pretense and posturing. Like a friend said, NOT one of us was born walking. So mayBE this could translate to us BEing bridge builders rather than bridge burners?! I hope so.

When I think of building a bridge I imagine connection. It doesn’t have to BE especially high or wide or even all that strong. It merely needs to connect what ties us, what we have in common, how it is we’re bound to one another, by choice. By design.

I’m building a BEing A Better Listener And Slower To Talk Or Add My Two Cents Bridge. I’m envisioning a wide open mind that isn’t afraid to BE disagreed with or to disagree. It chooses to stay unlocked to make room for ideas and opinions, attitudes and BEliefs, or entirely other sets of conditions from my own.

Now that’s a bridge worthy of crossing.

I’ve NOT been a great bridge builder. I suppose that, by default, makes me a bridge burner, but I don’t really think I’ve been that  either. I think I’ve just decided, more in my heart than mind, that certain bridges are out for me Now.

It’s NOT a happy feeling, it simply is what I sense to BE so.

I love you, Currie

Currie's Gratitude 24 July 2013

I’ve heard the joke about BEing so poor that you can’t afford to pay attention… I don’t find it as funny as I DO thought-provoking. What DOES it cost to BE attentive, to PAY whatever it costs to BE aware, awake, and attuned?!

I’ve NOT been so good at this. I’ve been a half-listening and half-baked participant in many a conversation. I’ve thought MORE about what I am going to say, what I think or feel or BElieve than I’ve thought attentively about what YOU [or he or she or they or even the situation at hand] were saying, DOing, or concerned with.

However, as I learn to navigate Life with little in the way of financial means, I’ve grown rich in the attention I pay. And pay gladly.

I’ve learned to listen to what isn’t spoken. I’ve discovered the jaw-dropping JOY of BEing Present in a moment of confused awakening. And, NOT least, NOT by a longshot, I have learned to pay attention to myself.

Paying attention is, for me, an honour, a privilege, and quite assuredly a blessing. I’ve BEcome a listener and have, little by slow bit, BEcome less of a talker. [that still is a work-in-progress ;~D]

I enJOY paying attention and I DO it gladly. I’m richer Now, by far, in this way.

I love you, Currie

Currie's Gratitude 23 July 2013

When I keep my eyes open, when I keep my heart open, when I keep my mind open, treasures abound. It’s really that simple. Treasures are everywhere, all the time, it is only my closed-offness that prevents me from finding them.

Some of the treasures Life has blessed me with may seem silly. For instance, the clouds that seem to put on plays for me when I am out walking. Or the way Gracie readies herself to run Run RUN round and round the Wee Cottage when we return from our adventures BEyond. Perhaps even the silly kick I get from making my giraffe sculptures.

It’s easy to get too serious and BE sensible; even practical. Yet just by opening up a smidge from all that BEing a grown-up stuff, I’ve discovered wondrous treasures in the ordinariest every dayness of Life.

The thing I often forget about FINDING treasures is that they aren’t meant to hold and keep. They are meant only to deLIGHT, enJOY, and BE wondered at gladly. This is where I always, ALWAYS used to get lost, muddled, and frustrated.

Holding on too tight or even just holding on is NOT how treasure is meant to BE handled. It must BE held loosely, lightly, and lovingly, always with the openness of Letting Go.

Always… ALWAYS.

I love you, Currie

Currie's Gratitude 22 July 2013

I didn’t realise what I was looking for when I BEgan this process of changing how I live. I thought simplicity was sort of making DO without certain things. I thought I did that pretty well, but when I reflect on THEN from NOW, I see how complicated my ideas of simplicity really were.

Seeking simplicity, for me, has taken on an entirely new patina. It isn’t so much about WHAT or HOW MUCH as it is about the feelings inside of me, regardless of things. It is far more about what ONLY I can bring to my moments rather than what I can “GET OUT OF” them.

As I prepare myself for my move from the Wee Cottage and the changes that will bring, I suddenly see simplicity’s light shining on the space where my typical moving angst lived and breathed and had its BEing. [up until NOW]

I embrace all that I don’t and canNOT know about what is to come. I hold close all that I will Let Go in the process. I cherish the field of possibilities, unknowns, and mistakes to BE made by me. If I said this all feels good you’d likely think me odd, yet there it is.

All of this, THIS TIME, feels good, even like a gift and blessing. 

I love you, Currie

Currie's Gratitude 21 July 2013

Some people DO this, you know. They have rousing wondrous celebrations over the things that sadly enough many others of us take for granted. There is much to BE learned from the attitude that Life its most ordinary self is cause for magnificent celebration.

I am one of those people who continues to pick up pennies, even those I see in a puddle in the middle of the road as I am crossing, with the light of course. This is a tiny celebration, yet celebration isn’t really measured and fit to occasions.

I am someone who deLIGHTs in the “coincidences” Life serves. The discoveries of similar paths, some of which, had they crossed 40 or so years BEfore Now would have been all the sweeter. And yet how amazing it is to discover we’d been in the same place at the same time many other times BEfore.

I am a lover of digital time and feel a positive thrill when I see certain times. I’ve shared about this BEfore, though I am NOT sure I said how I celebrate this. I suppose that is due to the near invisibleness of the parade and pomp that run through me in those magical moments.

Celebration is exquisite and at hand, always, if only I, you, we will reach for it. 

I love you, Currie

Currie's Gratitude 20 July 2013

I don’t want this to sound too tooting of my own horn, BEcause it’s NOT meant to BE tooting it at all, but lately I have really quite amazed myself with my capacity to DO things I never really imagined within my grasp.

It’s really fun to discover that I CAN DO something I perhaps considered or wanted to DO at some point or at several points in the past. And what is even more deLIGHTfull than all that is to find out how enJOYable that DOing actually can BE.

I’ve never been the greatest fan of following directions. I’ve cursed them more than utilised them, truth BE told. And yet I recall another time, when I had some furniture from IKEA that I needed to put together to enJOY, and I did it, All By Myself, and was glad. [the directions were actually very simple and large enough to read]

The last couple of days I followed directions again and created this nifty little “zine” called Collaging & Digital Fiddling Giraffes for an upcoming MMSA swap. I was initially bamboozled by it, but there was even a wee video tutorial, and once I’d sorted out the potentially bamboozling, it was smooth sailing!!

Amazing myself this way is delicious. I’m going to keep this ball rolling, rolling, rolling… 

I love you, Currie

Currie's Gratitude 19 July 2013

And once more I discover myself in previously visited territory. The matter of saying “When” is clearly something I spend significant time both in understanding better, little by slowly, and trying to practise, especially in areas where I have NOT done so BEfore.

It may also BE that saying “When” is integral to knowing what is “Enough.” I think, in fact, this is precisely WHY I have landed here so soon again.

I am the person who never wanted the fun time to end. Who tried to squeeze every last droplet out of times I was with people I loved DOing things we loved DOing whilst BEing together. Camp comes to mind. I never EVER, NOT once was eager to return to my Real Life After Camp. I usually spent a good month [mayBE more] enveloped in a sort of grief over that window closing yet again.

Saying “When” isn’t for the faint-hearted. It’s one of those things that really tests a person’s strengths, putting them to tasks that, while seemingly simple, are anything BUT. It’s a matter that requires stores of  that which is more potent than thinking it so. [though I have to say that right-thinking helps with a LOT of “When” saying]

Saying “When” is a process NOT a merely an action. It takes heart. 

I love you, Currie

Currie's Gratitude 18 July 2013

What is compassion anyway?! Try looking the word up and you’re in for a bit of a journey through definition, interpretation, intuition, and explanation.

I prefer a simpler path and think of compassion as feeling things as others may BE feeling them, how I’d BE feeling them, if only in my imagination, were I in the other person’s shoes.

I liken it to empathy, but NOT so much sympathy. Although according to the dictionary both are synonyms for compassion. Oh well…

Having compassion is a thing far less ambiguous. When I DO I know it. For instance when Gracie and I were attacked some months ago by two dogs, my first thought, once the dogs were pulled off us, was how terrible must that have been for the woman whose dogs they are…

I know that might sound indicative of my brain BEing banged-up, but there you are. I am a dog’s person and when that dog does something I feel a level of responsibility that is a natural extension of myself.

Compassion is a LOT more like walking a mile in someone else’s moccasins than pretty much any one word synonym captures. It is how we BE human, perhaps even fundamentally. It is the courage to venture out BEyond myself even for just the tiniest of moments…

I love you, Currie

Currie's Gratitude 17 July 2013

Somedays I really resent the idea of checking in. Of having to account for myself. It feels like I don’t matter, only what I DO or DO NOT DO matters.

But resentment is NOT a luxury I can afford, so I have taken this notion in another direction. I like to check in with myself Now. To let ME know what I’ve been thinkingandfeeling and up to and on about.

Other things I participate in, whether this exchange of Gratitude or an artist challenge online, seem to have taken checking in far far away from that old reporting in idea.

Frankly… it’s nice just knowing anyone’s interested. That they actually care. That in some way, however sized, I really am making some difference.

Probably a LOT of my former perspective on checking in was due to my 3 weirdest years from 13 to 16, jobs where I had to punch in and punch out, and good old-fashioned unhealthy ways of BEing in relationship.

But the thing about pointing at those is that I am NOT taking responsibility for my own attitudes, Then or Now, when I label them thus. So this is why I like to check in with myself. To see what I have going on and what thoughts might I BE operating under the influence of. 

I love you, Currie

Currie's Gratitude 16 July 2013

Sometimes, for no reason at all, lighting candles, even one candle, can change EVERYthing. Ever noticed that?! Something about candles brings Life front and center in the tenderest of ways.

There’s a saying, a quote, about cursing the darkness or lighting a candle. It’s sort of the same idea as Gratitude. Once focused on darkness and wrongness and meanness, it is hard to see anything other than those things. On the other hand, practising Gratitude, BEing deliberate about looking for the things that bring lightness and rightness and kindness is all about the candle’s light.

I find it wondrous and even a little whimsical to sit in the dark by the tiniest light of a candle. It brings me perspective and reminds me, too, that some of my happiest times were spent lit by nothing more or less than sunshine, candles, campfires, and flashlights. I realise that all the rest I’ve grown so accustomed to is unnecessary.

When I wake and BEgin my days, long BEfore the sun is even thinking about rising, I am reminded a little bit of how simple my happiness is Now, again, ensconced as I am in electricity and the light it affords.

When I light a candle, for real or just in my mind, I am warmed by its flickering.

That’s enough…

I love you, Currie

Currie's Gratitude 15 July 2013

This could well BE called a rather silly, even childish principle or instruction. However, I think it is exquisite and wondrously wise.

Remember, for a moment, reach back into your own childhood, your child/ren’s childhood. Blowing bubbles, whether with one of those slippery pink or purplish wands in a wee bottle or on your/their hands in the bath. Magical. Smile-worthy. DeLIGHTfull and excellent.

The idea of bubbles is extravagant. Like a rainbow. Or the way it feels to stand in a sunshower when across the road there is NOT a drop coming down. Like jimmies and nuts and whipped cream on your ice cream. The second hug at bedtime. The voice of a child sounding enthralled with his or her discovery of something you’ve known for seemingly ever and he or she has just happened upon.

Blowing bubbles when you are sad and overcome with discouragement is a pretty good way to come back into the Right Now. Blowing bubbles makes all sorts of pain less. It allows for taking Life and Self with far less seriousness. [a thing I have done MANY studies on, BElieve me…]

As I find my footing again, after a couple of disengagements throughout June’s end and July’s BEginning, I’m thinking often about blown bubbles.

How light they are and take themselves so…

I love you, Currie

Currie's Gratitude 14 July 2013

There was a Very Too Long stretch of time in my Life when laughing was about the rarest thing I did. The only thing rarer than laughter was crying. I suppose just stating this is sufficient. I KNOW it is…

Now, on the other hand [and both feet], I laugh regularly and often and with deLIGHT and great JOY. I have learned that neither laughter nor tears are in any way what I mistakenly thought them to BE back when I thought them to BE something other than what I DO Now.

The thing is, laughter was something I’d tied in to sarcasm and disdain. BEing laughed at OR laughing at. So, too, with tears and crying. These were things that called up BElittling retorts and brought shame and embarrassment front and center.

Laughing often is good for me. I imagine it is for most other beans, too. When I laugh it seems to loosen up my bones and I’m much clearer a channel for feeling good things like Hope and Wonder and even, well, Love.

Laughing often makes me kinder. Gentler. More forgiving. There is a freedom that comes wrapped inside of laughter that I have found nowhere else ever. And that is wondrous. And it has BEcome an essential.

So with reason or none. Laugh Often!! 

I love you, Currie

Currie's Gratitude 13 July 2013

I am sure that to some people this is an obvious sort of no-brainer principle. NOT so for me, well, for as long as it was up until nearing Now. If I start out happy, if I am able to lock onto that attitude from the get-go, Life works so much more easily and I am much more content and even productive.

On the other hand, having to find “Happy” once I’ve landed in the Doldrums is no easy task. NO it is NOT!!!

So perhaps this is the reason for the practises and habits I have been trying on and sorting through these past few years. Like BEginning my days with writing and digital fiddling and then sharing them with YOU, here. Or going to sleep earlier than the 6-year olds who live in the front house, when it is actually still daylight outside!!!

I say this BEcause these are two of the things that set my course for a Life far happier than the one I spent  the vast majority living unhappily. Or trying to find a middle-ish place BEtween unhappy and happy.

When I start happy I feel like I’ve caught the wind. I fly higher. Soar. Bravely dip and turn. I can BE wholly myself in ways I’d never imagined yet ALWAYS yearned for. 

I love you, Currie

Currie's Gratitude 12 July 2013

It would appear at first glance that no more can really BE written about the great relationship that these two words, Let and Go, have with each other. They are and have been my go-to phrase or idea several times each and every day of my Life.

More often than I might like to admit I hang on. Hold back. I will NOT Let Go. I will NOT play through. I will NOT. I will NOT. I will NOT.

Until  I am without choice in the matter. Until, perhaps I am Let Go of. Okay, that’s my dark and dirty secret. Can I tell how many times it has come to THAT, BEfore I have ever seriously considered Letting Go?!

While I am NOT so oblivious anymore. [some things improve with age I suppose] I know when I am BEing stubborn and headstrong and firm for no other [or better] reason than I CAN BE. I have the freedom to choose. Yes. Freedom is NOT always something that serves or protects…

Now, in my Life at this time, I am faced with a peculious aspect of Letting Go that doesn’t fit in any of the tidy little boxes I’ve kept for this purpose. It is like I am Letting Go without reason or only to say I am…

I love you, Currie

Currie's Gratitude 11 July 2013

You surely don’t have to BE a bird or even a plane to fly free, you only have to break or Let Go the lines that tie you and keep you tethered.

Flying free is an attitude and a way of approaching Life without anchors or stays. It sometimes has taken me a LOT of broken ties to discover HOW-TO fly free. And I certainly regret some of those breaks. On the other hand, many of them surprised me when I learned what they were REALLY “costing” me to hold onto.

I have had some experience with flying solo, and while it does share the stage with flying free, the former is a whole other treasure map while the latter isn’t containable in any sort of map one can hold onto. In fact, that is one of the secrets I’ve discovered about flying free. It’s impossible to predict or contain. It is one of those truly It Is What It Is things.

I’ve struggled against the solo flight my Life has been on for nearing 7 years. I’ve wanted to hold onto what was holding me back and keeping me stuck. I’ve been willing to hang tight to the familiar pain rather than lean into the less familiar possibilities for freedom.

There is always a reason for freedom. 

I love you, Currie

Currie's Gratitude 10 July 2013

Yet another prompt I’ve visited on many occasions, I have come to a deeper appreciation of Step Up. It didn’t always mean the same to me. In fact, I always pretty much thought it was more about arrogance than compassion, kindness, or integrity.

To me, Step Up means BEing Present. Taking the time. Even MAKING the time when that is called for. It means that even when I am tempted to hide and glide under the radar, I show up, I DO what is the thing I think is the next Right Thing. Even if I DO it badly. And even when DOing it is the last thing I feel like DOing.

It also means sitting still, funny as that may seem. At least to me. I have developed a habit of reacting and I know that when I am DOing so or well on my way, oftentimes the best way to handle myself is to BE still, sit quietly, and simply let the feelings, however strong they are, play through.

I suppose that’s a little like stepping in my own way, but it works. So far anyway…

Sometimes there is no moving or budging a thing so I determine if there is something I can DO. Or accept that there is NOT.

That’s how I Step Up.

I love you, Currie

Currie's Gratitude 9 July 2013

Seems I’ve written on this prompt more than a few times yet each time I have come to it differently. And this one is no exception.

I actually enJOY BEing quiet. And BEing a quieter human bean. This is one of the great lessons I have learned living here, in the Wee Cottage. BEing quiet, whether by design or without really choosing to BE, I have learned to listen.

I listen to myself. I listen to God. I listen to Gracie. I listen to the Past. I listen for clues and ideas and inspiration. I listen to my own yearning and I listen long, deep, and well.

BEcoming quieter, little bit by slow bit, has changed me into someone I never imagined myself BEing. Now when I rush and push and hurry and overwhelm myself, I pretty much catch on to there BEing too much noise inside my birdbrain. And I quiet it down, or, as is sometimes the case, my body finds a way to hush all that bother.

BE quiet is a bit of a new brilliance. It never seemed to hold much in my esteem until recent years showed its possibilities. And, while I still can BE a chatterbox sometimes, I am also someone who is quiet. Who listens. Who hears.

And I like her. 

I love you, Currie

Currie's Gratitude 8 July 2013

Oftentimes I hear the phrase, I learned it the hard way, and it almost always gives me pause. Yet BEcause I know how I operate, I won’t necessarily think that whoever is saying this is NOT correct. Sometimes I learn something ONLY BY going the longest way round, over, and through, beating up on myself mercilessly all the way.

I try hard to learn with JOY. Always. To embrace my NOT knowing and my bountiful ignorance without judging myself unfairly. [I canNOT say this works, but it is what I intend…]

Recently I came to learn about something I knew zero, zip, zilch about. It was something I might have heard of somewhere along the line, but I wasn’t interested in knowing more about it BEcause, well, BEcause I thought of it ignorantly. I equated my lack of awareness with it BEing BEneath me rather than what it actually is.

As I came to understand it more I BEgan to battle back at my prior attitudes. I suppose you could say I was punishing myself for having them. It was NOT pretty and it is even less so as I Now come back to level ground and pursue its benefits and possibilities for me.

Rather than learning JOYously I’ve BElittled myself. NOT the way I want to play.

I love you, Currie

Currie's Gratitude 7 July 2013

I am 100% in favour of adventures. BIG, Tiny, Inside, or Out in the Wild World ones. BEyond imagining and simple and lovely ones that happen right here and Now close to wherever I call home.

I named the walk Gracie and I take each morning Morning Adventure BEcause for me, and I think for Gracie, too, it is like that. It may well BE the same old loop we have taken for days and months and years Now, yet always it is new and full of discoveries.

For my part, the adventuring I DO is largely in my head. It is a time where things seem to clarify and sort themselves into something which I can understand better. For Gracie it is all about sniffs and rollie-poles and puddles. And people she might lean into and fill with her special love potion.

When we return to the Wee Cottage afterwards, it feels magnificent to have been out there in the little spot of World we call Home For Now. To have seen what we’ve seen and been where we’ve been. It is, as well, Enough.

Adventure is an essential food group I BElieve. It doesn’t require anything more than the desire to make the daily and ordinary things we DO a little bit more infused with it. 

I love you, Currie

Currie's Gratitude 6 July 2013

When I see Life as Play, a natural extension of those very first interactions with others, I have the strong sense that to BE fair is no more complex  than to PLAY fair. To BE kind. To treat others and the rest of all that makes Life the way I want and can expect to BE treated.

Some might call this living by the Golden Rule. Or at least playing by it. I’d agree, but the thing that is different is that I don’t necessarily just try to treat OTHERS as I would like to BE treated, I try to treat all of the rest of Life that way, too.

Playing fair is NOT at all about Getting My Way or Winning. It is all about How I Bring JOY to every encounter with people, places, things, and ideas. It is NOT solely focused on results and outcomes but upon moments and process and thinkingandfeeling.

I intend to BE as fair with myself as I am with YOU. I intend to treat myself with the same ordinary everyday kindness as I DO Gracie. Whatever I reveal or hold back needs to BE no different regarding what I reveal or hold back to/from the World than what I’m willing to face and discover.

Playing fair isn’t complicated at all. 

I love you, Currie

Currie's Gratitude 5 July 2013

This isn’t something that those who play sports need follow, yet even there I think the case can BE made that to play one’s very best each and every time out is enough…

For me, however, don’t compete is a rock-solid rule. A dealbreaker. Sometimes even a mantra. It is so seductive, competing, it works a lot like breathing, yet I choose NOT to DO it. And, whenever I catch myself competing I S.T.O.P. just as soon as possible.

I suppose I learned this lesson early enough in my Life that it really doesn’t “argue with me” too much. I rarely want to make a case for it, and I find it innately repugnant. Still…

Competition appears. I used to find it BEhind the wheel when I was driving, or so it seemed. Someone BEhind me or BEside me needed to BE ahead of me or where I was, and it was exhausting. This is, I think, why I so enJOY walking Now. Competing simply isn’t part of it at all.

The thing about competing is someone wins and someone else loses and it can [and does] bring out the least lovely things in us human DOings, as well other forms of Life.

Somehow Better and Best are valued more than Enough and Good, even Amazing and Wonderful.

I love you, Currie

Currie's Gratitude 4 July 2013

You might think this simple, you who have never moved a gazillion times. You might think this strange, you who have maintained strong ties with family, neighbourhood, and community.

Yet for me, who has moved about 70 gazillion times and lived pretty much my entire Life at greater than a great distance from my scattered family, without neighbourhood or community ties, it is a wise and wondrous directive I’m just BEginning to hear.

A whisper. An encouragement. A marvelous and magnificent thought. What an old YET NOT long forgotten by me friend would deem an idea whose time has come . [and just at the moment I most needed such wisdom…]

Stay close means just that. Stay close. Sometimes, as is the case Now for me, staying close means moving again. It means more letting go, which is fine. I’ve got quite good at that. Quite good indeed.

Stay close and BE Present. For myself, yes, always, and close to another for whom my closeness and nearer presence can really make a difference.

That has been my challenge in looking for what to DO with my Life, Now. To Make a Difference. I don’t need acclaim or renown or even visibility. I need only to Make a Difference. Quietly. Thoughtfully. Daily. In a small way that actually matters. 

I love you, Currie

Currie's Gratitude 3 July 2013

Here’s the thing: this is Life. It’s NOT practise. It’s NOT a rehearsal. It’s NOT for nothing. It’s Life. As someone who has both taken Life totally for granted AND tried more than a few times/ways to escape it, I’m in 100% acceptance Now that this IS indeed the Real Thing.

Given that, what else is there that I need to know, BE, and DO?! This is where Creativity comes in and takes its place. Right up there with brushing my teeth and taking care of Gracie’s needs is MY purpose: Create Everyday. I could say it as Create Every Day, but since July is just a two-worder month, I’m going with Create Everyday. [it’s okay, I know that I am just a little bit odd… laugh freely ;~D]

I did NOT understand the importance, even the necessity of this until recently. I thought it was a luxury. I imagined it something good and nice and fine but I did NOT consider its BEing essential OR my purpose.

Funny how we [okay, I, but I suspect I may have company in this] come to realisations later on than would have been nice to know, but at least they are there, ready to welcome us with open arms and a big old heart!!!

Create. Everyday. And create Every DAY… 

I love you, Currie

Currie's Gratitude 2 July 2013

I don’t precisely mean the accurate and correct true. In fact, I think what I mean is the true in “to thine own self BE true.” I’m thinking it is darned near impossible NOT to BE.

At the same time, though, it’s easy to fool myself. To buy what I am selling. To bend myself to my own will. Even to bully myself.

When I am BEing true I see past that, AND, I include that, if that makes any sort of sense to anyone living outside of my head.

BEing true is staying where my feet are. It is facing Life and NOT running from it. NOT EVEN considering running from it might even BE nearer the true true.

BEing true is a lot more about having faith than it is about embellishing and DOing fancy pants bending of facts and circumstances.

It has taken me a long while to get real with myself about my circumstances. To see myself clearly enough to discern that which IS and IS NOT true. For me. About me. Those kind of trues.

BEing true is NOT easy. It invites distraction and makes avoidance look almost healthy. It is also humbling, which, while always a “good” thing, I find also really uncomfortable, like the shock of ice-cold water over my head. 

I love you, Currie

Currie's Gratitude 1 July 2013

Lots of books have been written, courses taught, and systems developed with Time Management at their core. 

People talk often about Time flying, and one thing that makes me shudder whenever I hear it is someone saying that they were/are “killing” Time.

Still, the thing that amazes me the very most is that Time is indeed really truly something we can MAKE.

I used to love to sleep in, and I always felt like poo when I was up BEfore the sun. I could NOT imagine going to bed BEfore 10 o’clock. 

I had a friend in Sedona who went to bed at 8 and woke up at 4 and I thought she was a little bit odd, yet when I reflect, she always seemed to live on an even keel.

I think what I have wanted with all of me more than anything else is to live on such an even keel. 

Who’d’ve thunk it possible just by FINDing I could Make Time?! 

Rearrange it. 

Let it DO for me what I was apparently incapable of DOing myself.

The things I DO with my days Now boggle my brain. 

By the time I am out the door with Gracie in the morning, I have already accomplished more than I used to manage in, well, in a week!!!

I love you, Currie