Oct

Ouch

Val on October 16th, 2008

Me and Hubby

I’m eating crow today.

The other morning, I had a blow up with my beloved hubby (rest assured I was not calling him beloved the other day).

Of course, I was convinced he was wrong. I’ll tell you more about that later.

For right now, I’ll share with you what I discovered about myself this morning, and what it has to do with the blow up.

I’m a writer. I love writing. I’ve written books, articles, blogs and more is always pouring out of me. Writing is a passion and for me, a way of life. It’s one of my favorite chosen methods of expression.

When I was in the 9th grade in Washington Irving High School in New York, I completed one of my assignments for English class and turned it in. I was pretty proud of my work, I felt I’d done a good job. A few days after I handed in the assignment, Mrs. Freeman, chair of the English Department, sent a note that she wanted to see me.

I got nervous. What does Mrs. Freeman want with me? Worry took over. Oh no, maybe my assignments are not good and she’s going to tongue lash me! Oh no! (You know how doom, gloom and dread can take over…)

I went reluctantly to meet with Mrs. Freeman at my assigned appointment time. She wasn’t there, so I was instructed to sit in her office for a few minutes and wait until she returned. Instead of taking these few minutes to calm my nerves, I chose to use them to stare around her office and use each thing my eye landed upon as another prop in the worry story I was building. Oh no, she’s got a stack of papers on her desk, I wonder if one of them is mine…Am I failing?…Why else would the Chair of the English Department want to see me–I must be doing really bad…Oh no, there’s a red pen, it must be for marking a failing grade on my paper… It was a mental downward spiral, until I was saved from myself when she whisked through the door.

“Hi Mrs. Freeman.”

“Hello Valerie, you’re probably wondering why I asked to meet with you.”

Not really.

During the conversation that ensued, I became delightfully surprised. Mrs. Freeman had been looking at my writing in English class for months and thought it was good. She explained that there was an English Honors program that began in 10th grade and went through to the 12th grade. There were 30 students in the class, each there by invitation only, her invitation. The 30 students were comprised of the top ten English students in 10th, 11th and 12th grades. Most were chosen in the 9th grade.

Because Mrs. Freeman taught the class herself, she met with each prospective student to invite them personally into the Honors program, and to explain beforehand what was required, so that the student would understand the high expectation and choose whether or not to participate.

Is that why she wanted to see me? Whew, I’m so relieved…

I excitedly said YES and prepared to enter the rigorous program in the fall. All went well, so well that my writing, when I was 17, was published in the New York Times in a section titled: Good Writing by Young People.

I was ecstatic to see words I’d penned published in the New York Times!

I guess that seals it; I’m a good writer, even the New York Times said so…

Fast forward to the other day, a mere 30 years later (but who’s counting?), when I get the bright idea to write every day. Not just write in my journal. No, instead, write for publication.

It’s easy for me to write in a journal every day–it stays with me daily, and when I’ve filled it up, it goes on the shelf alongside the rest of the journals I’ve been writing over the past 15 or so years. That’s safe.

Write in a journal, just for me, then put it on a shelf.

There’s no rejection in that, no room for me to feel vulnerable about my work.

If I never put anything out into the world, I’ll never feel the pang of rejection, right?

That line of thinking would have worked by pitting me in procrastination mode, and not living my purpose; except for the divine discontent that crept up from the depth of my soul, reminding me of why I’m here.

“You’re a writer”, the divine discontent whispers. “And writers write.”

Darn.

I guess it’s time to come out of hiding, all the way out. I guess it’s time to write every day, for publication. The words I write will actually have to reach further than my front door. After all, that’s what I know I’m here to do. Share my gifts.

All this comes on the heels of my 47th birthday. It only took me 30 years to come to the realization that writers write, and since I’m a writer, and I feel led to do so at this point in my life, it would be a good idea for me to write every day, for publication.

In light of this realization, the SHOULD in me went to work:

You should have been writing all this time…

You should not have wasted all that time…

You should know better…

Back to the blow up with my hubby. Here’s the line that absolutely got me more riled up than I care to acknowledge, (but after writing about Acknowledgment the other day, I’m willing to practice what I teach).

He said:

You should know better…

That’s right about when I hit the roof. It took me a while to pull myself back down from up there.

Today is another story. Now, several days removed from the comment I found offensive, the benefit of time has settled in and I see things a little differently. This morning, in a powerful conversation, I came to the realization that no one can say anything to me that I hadn’t already proclaimed to myself, over and over.

Here, in the infinite love and wisdom of the universe, was my intimate partner mirroring back at me the conversation I’d been having in my head, so that I could really hear what self-punishment and judgment sounds like.

Sometimes the conversations we have in our heads are so familiar, we don’t examine them. Familiarity steals and hides objectivity.

When we hear someone else saying something that we’ve been internally uttering to ourselves (if not saying to ourselves, feeling within ourselves), the familiarity is washed off, leaving the statement to stand there in its bare nakedness, raw and shocking.

That’s what happened to me the other day. The reason that comment was such a big OUCH for me was because it was the exact same comment and notion I’d been using to mentally beat myself up.

No more.

Now I know that my path is perfect for me, regardless of how long it takes.

Now I know that there’s no right or wrong way to do things, just different choices. I’ll learn something either way.

Now I know I don’t need to waste a moment of my precious life energy, resources or vitality telling myself that I should…I am ready, willing, able and delighted to drop should from my vocabulary, for me and for anyone else I tried to pin it on.

Now I know I can choose again, and again, and, if I don’t like that choice, I can choose again.

And I know that every day is a day for inspired action toward what really matters to me, living the passions that ignite a fire in my soul. It makes no never mind whether that inspired action happens in the form of a tiny baby step, a giant stride or an all out quantum leap. On the journey, we experience them all and they’re all perfect.

Beautiful realization.

Yeah, it was an ouch for a few days.

Now it’s a deep breath in recognition of how loving and wise the Divine One is to serve up lessons in such a way that they reach the core of my being, with a holy precision, cutting through and disintegrating all the unnecessary stuff along the way.