Flames

"The life we are most devoted to is the life we don’t have" -Karen Mazen Miller

I read this a few weeks ago and it has stuck with me. It resonates in my soul. Often I am asked, "tell me something exciting". I am then forced to search my brain for something I have done that would be considered exciting. More often than not I find nothing.
I find immense pleasure in couponing and meal planning. It is not exciting but it is necessary to keep me in my budget. I find immense pleasure in laundry and the immediate gratification its completion brings. Again...not exciting but necessary. I find pleasure in playing with my son or making my husband smile. Not exciting but completely necessary.

I spend a good deal of my time learning to be a better person. Getting back to who I am. I sit and I think a lot. I monitor my anger all the time. I don't do this because I am a better person, I do it because I will never be anyone else. I hate it when I wake up in a bad mood and take it out on my child, my husband, or a close friend. I don't wake up happy and refreshed but I do make a concious effort every day to watch my actions so that those I love don't suffer because of me.

It took me years to learn and practice with complete honesty the art of sympathetic joy. I am truly happy for people when they get what they have worked for. I am happy when luck appears to be on their side and they have won something. I am no longer jealous because someone I know drives a better car than me or lives in a better house or even appears to have a better life. I do have a problem with someone getting everything they say they wanted but then still not being fulfilled. I am slowly finding peace and happiness within myself but it is hard work.

Every day is a battle. Most days are spent fighting off apathy because the things that used to excite me just don't excite me anymore. I feel suffocated by it and the only thing that seems to alleviate it is finding joy in the simplicity of life. Sometimes I feel like I've lost my passion. I don't like to debate anymore. I don't like to party. I perfer small intimate groups to large ones and I don't like being the center of attention. I don't necessarily have an opinion about everything. These are all things that used to make me, well...me. So I feel a little lost and not quite sure where I fit in sometimes. So I am on a journey to find the spark that ignites the flames of an authentic, passionate life. It's fun and it's frustrating but I know that it will be worth it.

Pema

The following is an excerpt from Pema Chodron's book, The Wisdom of
No Escape:

When people start to meditate or work with any kind of spiritual
discipline, they often think they are going to improve. But
loving-kindness or maitri toward ourselves doesn't mean getting rid of
anything. The point is not to change ourselves. It's about befriending
who we are already. The ground of practice is you or me or whoever you
are right now, just as we are. The idea isn't to get rid of ego but
actually to begin to take an interest in ourselves, to investigate, and
be inquisitive about ourselves.

One of the main discoveries of meditation is seeing how we continually
run away from the present moment, how we avoid being here just as we
are. The magic is willing to be fully awake to that. You do all those
things for which you criticize people you don't like, all the people
you judge. Making friends with yourself is making friends with all those
people, too.

Sitting meditation, working, bathing, eating and other every day things
are all we need to be fully awake, fully alive, fully human. The body,
emotions, and mind that we have now are exactly what we need to be fully
human, fully awake, and fully alive.

Meditation is a process of lightening up, of trusting the basic
goodness of what we have and who we are. Our wisdom is all mixed up
with our neuroses, therefore, it doesn't do any good to try to get rid
of our negative aspects, because in that process, we also get rid of our
basic wonderfulness.

From my other online journal Nov 2005

So I've been thinking about some of the crazy things I did as a kid:

1) I grew up in the country so we had a HUGE backyard. My parents had beach sand hauled in so that we could have a sand pile to play in. My brother and I used to dig holes to China.

2) I climbed up on the clothes line pole one time (this pole is only about 5 ft tall) and I knocked the ladder over on my way up. I proceeded to sit up there for over an hour until I had the courage to jump down. My mom just stared out the window at me and told me that I had gotten myself up there so I had to get myself down.

3) I have always been the kind of person that likes to push the shiny red button. When I was about 4 years old I climbed under my dad's truck when he first got home and grabbed the shiny silver thing under there. Yes, I scalded my hand on the muffler.

4) Same truck...different day. I was playing gymnastics by jumping off the side of the truck and twirling on the way down. Well I judged wrong one time and ending up scraping my chin down the side of the truck. I still have the scar from that one.

5) We were eating foot long hot dogs one time and I choked. My dad had to give me the Heimlich maneuver and everything. Reason I choked? I was taking bites and swallowing them whole in an attempt to see just how big of a bite I could take w/o choking. That worked out well...

6) Every time my parents let me drive the riding lawnmower, I wrecked it. Now we have a 3 acre back yard and I still managed to run into things. I am no longer allowed to drive it.

7) I used to have a hobby horse. One of those ones that they definitely don't make anymore b/c it was suspended on a metal frame by 4 springs. I used to love to build up my momentum and get it going across the floor. I have broken more of these toys than I can remember.

8) I can remember sitting on the floor at the age of 3 watching Captain Kangaroo with a patch over one eye. I can also remember going in for eye surgery and going under the anesthesia.

9) My only fight was in fifth grade. I slapped a girl in the face with a baseball glove b/c she called me a fished eye fool. My guy friends then proceeded to hit her with baseball bats. We all had to spend the next week in detention copying the dictionary.

10) I used to love to fish with my dad. Still do. To this day I prefer to use a cane pole over a rod-n-reel b/c I like the simplicity of the cane pole. Makes me feel like Huckleberry Finn.

Really?

Dear North Carolina weather,

Why was I out all weekend playing in the park with my son while it was almost 60 degrees only to find myself driving to work in the snow today?
Can you please explain?

Thanks!

The power of writing it down

On Feb 8, 2010 I wrote down in my notebook at work that I need to pay $800/month towards my car payment in order to have my car paid off by October 2010. Right now I already try to pay $675/month but was looking to see what I could do without in order to find an extra $125/month. My intention was to go back to that blank page in my notebook and rework my budget when there was a lull at work. There has been no such lull. Nine days after writing down that I need extra money, I got a raise. One that more than covers what I need in order to pay off the car. A raise that I did not ask for, had no idea I was getting, but have totally worked hard for.
So how is this year going for me? Where is "beyond" taking me? It's opening me up to new possibilities. I have never had sales as large as I'm having this year. I'm flying through the books that I want to read. I am becoming a better steward of my money. I have no problem asking for what I need. I am learning to accept with gratitude. I have opened myself up a little more and have shared my thought process with someone I love dearly. I keep thinking that I need to create a "Mondo Beyondo" list. A list so big and outrageous of things I want in this life. A list that couldn't possibly be accomplished but by putting my energy out there, it just might.
I need to take up writing again. I'm not very good at it, but that's ok b/c I'm the only one that ever reads it. I think I'm off right now to start a new journal. I keep feeling like I need to and so I am. Don't believe in the power of writing it down? Well you should.

Frugal Food Challenge-Week 4

Jan 16-22, 2010


Saturday, January 16
Breakfast:
Bacon
eggs
toast with homemade strawberry jam
Lunch:
Birthday party
Dinner:
We ordered pizza b/c I was just too exhausted to do any cooking

January 17, 2010
Breakfast:
Cereal
Lunch:
Fruit and Veggie Corn Dogs from the freezer
Dinner:
"fried" chicken, collards from the freezer, Mac & cheese

January 18, 2010
Dinner:
Smoked sausage and butter beans

January 19, 2010
Dinner:
Ham Breakfast Casserole

January 20, 2010
Dinner:
Crockpot Angel Chicken with pasta

January 21, 2010
Dinner:
Creamy Chicken breasts, corn bread casserole (see below), and Maple Brown Sugar Baby Carrots


January 22, 2010
Dinner:
Mama out

Frugal Food Challenge-Week 3

Jan 9-15, 2010

Saturday, January 9
Breakfast:
Link sausage from the freezer
eggs
instant grits from pantry

Lunch:
random fruit & yogurt from the house
popcorn from pantry

Dinner:
Tex Mex Pasta

January 10, 2010
Breakfast:
Amish Oatmeal

Lunch:
Fruit and Veggie Corn Dogs from the freezer

Dinner:
Dinner with family. I'm bringing Broccoli Casserole

January 11, 2010
Dinner:
Porkchops, rice, broccoli & cheese

January 12, 2010
Dinner:
Farmhouse chicken with green beans

January 13, 2010
Dinner:
Ham & Cheesy noodle casserole with green peas

January 14, 2010
Dinner:
Creamy Chicken breasts, corn bread casserole (see below), and Maple Brown Sugar Baby Carrots

Corn bread casserole:

heat oven to 350degrees

mix in a bowl,
2 eggs(or 3 egg whites)
1 can of reguler sweet corn, strained
1 can of creamed corn, as is
1/2 stick of butter(although i've made it without butter on accident and its still really good), you'll have to melt it first.
4 ounces of sour cream(i get light)
1 box of jiffy cornbread muffin mix.

put all ingredients into a medium sized casserole dish, grease the bottom.

bake in the oven for about 1 hour, stick a toothpick in it, its okay if its a little gooey.
i usually cook it for about an hour to hour and 20 mintues.

January 15, 2010
Dinner:
Mama out, boys on their own

Total spent on groceries $16.40