Meditation nuggets that have been meaningful for me in this my freshman year of being a meditator.

1.  Impermanence of all things including feelings/reactions.

2.  Focus/notice is different from a) grasping/holding or b) ignoring/denial, in much the same way neutral is different from positive or negative.

3.  Skillful or non-skillful -- helpful way of seeing behavior/responses (rather than good/bad).

4.  Paying attention to something changes my relationship with it.  As in, paying attention to my anxiety lessens its power and provides me the opportunity to consider/reflect on my options, rather than typical knee jerk responses like fear/anger/blame/shame.

5.  Importance of breathing.  Sometimes breathing being the only thing important!

Do I still need that?

I've been thinking lately about the "big concepts" that rule my thinking, you know, the important things I learned as a young adult that defined my behaviors and choices for a long time.

I think that assertiveness is one of those.  My God, I still remember just devouring the whole slew of assertiveness training books in the early 70's.  It made so much sense to me, and gave me so much permission to say NO.

Then there is the whole co-dependent and boundaries topic area.  Working with battered women, then getting involved with ACA (Adult Children of Alcoholics) and just being completely in love with the whole "set your boundaries" idea, that I needed to get my self-worth only from myself and not from others.

Now at this stage of my life, I am considering whether these ideas have combined to not only strengthen me and my self-concept, but also to separate me from others in a way that has actually damaged my relationships, or at the very least affected them in ways that I truly need to examine.  I think maybe I have grown to depend on myself and my internal thoughts, my own interpretations, my need for autonomy, to the extent that I have not nurtured the part of life that promotes true connection with others.

And yes I know it's not either or, but still...I need to look.

We often forget to re-evaluate, to take a look at our patterns and routines, because they come from somewhere, and that was the past.  How do they fit with our present?

Tipping Over

Out of balance tonight at yoga, where of course the meditation was about.....finding balance.  Being off kilter...well that happens....but tonight it was FULL THROTTLE off kilter, and there I was in yoga, being encouraged to consider balance......within the body.....within the mind....within the spirit.  I was thinking, what is the purpose of all this being out of balance?  What can it point me to if I allow myself to really feel it? How freaking uncomfortable it is!  I could barely hold a pose.  I could not find my breath.  I needed water (stepped out and got it).  I felt clumsy.  I could not find acceptance.  I was self-conscious.

I'm very fond of telling myself  "just do the next right thing, take the next right move," when I feel this kind of overpowering negativity. Came home and drank a bottle of water.  It's just going to have to be enough tonight!  

Not perfect yet!

I considered this in yoga class today:  every minute I am doing yoga is a minute I am NOT complaining, irritable, nasty, depressed, gossiping, worried.......and every minute I am doing yoga is a minute I AM focused, listening, strong, experimenting......this is the kind of thought that runs through my mind during yoga class.  You notice I did NOT say that I am COMPLETELY focused....I recall that I even thought to myself....that's a good blog subject....hmmm....perhaps the mind wanders a bit.

Mike Mulligan and Heidi

Driving along, minding my own business, as they say....out in a somewhat rural area, but driving through some road construction, I happened to pass by one of those huge earth moving kind of machines, it was close and completely put me in mind of a tyrannosaurus rex, with its huge mouth open and ferocious.  I immediately thought of Mike Mulligan and his Steam Shovel, a favorite book from childhood.  Now I have no idea if that big machine was a "steam shovel," or if there are even any steam shovels left in this advanced world, but that's where I went with the image.

Mike Mulligan.  I think I always thought it was a "boy's book," because it was urban and about work (don't ask...somehow I made the equation....work=boys)...but we of course had other books -- Blueberries for Sal! (plink!plank!plunk!) Make Way For Ducklings! The Little Engine That Could! All these books, their covers, the wonderful illustrations, even the authors (Watty Piper! What a name!).  And we got those books -- over and over, apparently -- from the library.

What a wonderful place a library is.  I hardly ever go to a library anymore.

Caddie Woodlawn.  Of course, the Little House books.  The Borrowers!  Tom Sawyer (oh that love story with Becky and Tom), Little Women.  And Nancy Drew, Sue Barton, some other nurse series, and even the Hardy Boys every once in awhile....and the greatest story of all time: HEIDI.  I could not get enough of that girl.

I know my mother loved it that I was a reader, and I in turn loved it that my daughter was a ferocious reader.    

I believe my gratitude list tonight will include Mike Mulligan, because he really took me back to a pleasant place today.  THANKS MIKE!!

WhenThe TV Doesn't Work

So really it's the remote that's not working.  Started last night while we were doing our usual veging out.  No channel changing...stuck on HGTV (aaargh!!! Love it or List it!!! aaargh!!)....then one moment of remote-ability which got us to Video on Demand, but that was it.   None of the new batteries we shoved into the back of the remote would get it to work.  Of course it was Saturday night, so we left an e-mail for our cable provider who we know from past experience will bring us a nice new remote.....but not until Monday or (nooo......!!!!) Tuesday.

Now Sunday night is my favorite TV night.  Last week the latest HGTV Star (formerly Design Star) competition started up again.  Also there's 60 Minutes.  In January it'll be Downton Abbey again....I am hopeful our remote will be working then!!  Also, last Saturday night we watched three episodes of House of Cards on Netflix on the TV which was awesome.  So in many ways my weekend schedule is RUINED by the dead remote.


I truly do not consider myself a TV-holic, but it has certainly been instructive today every time I had that impulse to "watch" TV (alot of times it's just background, but I'm sitting there, and it's on....).  But then there was the yoga I did this morning and the half-hour my husband and I both hung out on the couch in the living room (non-TV room), reading this afternoon.  And the forty-five minutes we worked on a couple of garden projects we've just started.  Nice.

Already paying dividends, that broken remote!

You probably already know this, but....

I love my job.  I'm lucky that I don't have to DO ANYTHING TO the people I visit.  I don't have to take their blood pressure, I don't have to ask to see their skin on their butt, I don't have to watch them get up out of a chair and walk across the room.  I get to visit people in their homes and offer a listening ear and an open heart as they talk about whatever they are willing to share about how things are going for them.  So much of what I hear has to do with how they feel in the "health care machine."  So much of what we do as health care providers has pretty much nothing to do with what the patient actually wants or feels.

This week I took a new patient who has no regular family doctor to a "transitional" clinic which sees patients temporarily while they seek a regular provider.  I had to take her, because she is just that impaired and frail that she would never have been able to get there on her own....and she lives one-quarter of a mile from the clinic.

 P.S. the reason she had to go to the clinic AND HURRY UP AND DO IT THIS WEEK is because without a doctor's order, the home care clinicians cannot make any visits -- well, they can't make any BILLABLE visits.

 The questions on the health history forms!!!  "Do you feel safe at home?"  "In your relationships?"  CHECK YES OR NO!!!

How about this.....when you first sit with a patient, during your CONVERSATION with them -- no, not an interview, not a session where you mostly look at the computer screen as you input answers (alot of times incorrectly -- believe me)....how about this....sometime during your conversation, let them know that if something is awry in their lives, in their home, in their relationships or family, you are open to hearing about it and brainstorming with them about what they'd like your help with.  Explain that you know that what goes on in their lives affects their medical condition and whether they feel like taking care of themselves.  Explain that that is why you are checking in with them about this seemingly extraneous topic.

BUT don't put a check box on a history form and call yourself open to hearing about family violence.

OK end of rant one.

Beginning Again....and again

It is never too late to begin again.  If you are having a day where you start out being creative and end up sobbing about all kinds of things....well, that might be a day to post to your blog even though you haven't done any posting for two years.

It was a crazy day in Kathy-land when I decided to make each of my children a scrapbook upon their high school graduations.  My daughter graduated in 2009 and today I finished hers.  Mostly.

When you put together a scrapbook celebrating someone's life up till now, you get continual glimpses of the past, looking through photos and papers and national honor society pins, etc., etc.   You see pictures of yourself looking just a little better and younger on the verge of tears saying goodbye to your daughter at her new college dorm room on her first day on campus.  You look through elementary school yearbooks to make sure you mark her pictures with the correct grade, and you gasp in pain and joy at how adorable and unique she was/is.  You acknowledge that any commentary you write on a scrapbook page is just a tiny representation of the love you feel in your heart and soul for this child, now an adult.

Consider this: despite the troubles my mate and I have caused each other over the years, we didn't do such a bad job raising our two children.  We took them all around America and overseas.  We encouraged their activities and friendships.  We kept them in church and school and provided structure and tradition as well as new ideas.  We loved them fiercely even when we were crabby and depressed and distracted, and we hope against all hope that they know it and can feel it even when they are crabby and depressed and distracted.

Here's to the future!  May it be filled with love and hugs, with tears and comfort.  May we continue to appreciate each other with all our many and varied foibles and oddities.