Journey of a blogger

Once upon a time I had a blog. It was a friendly little blog that was happy being just the way it was with no great aspirations of one day growing up and hangin’ with the big blogs.  I did what I wanted on that blog – wrote what I wanted, posted pictures that made me feel good, spilled random lists that flowed from my scattered brain  – because I wasn’t too concerned about who showed up or how popular it became.

I started that blog nearly 6 years ago, when I was preparing for my first trip to Africa.  Because the trip was so full of excitement, yet carried some old cultural and religious baggage that I wanted to deal with, I thought a blog might be a good way of working through some of that, as well as documenting parts of the trip for future walks down memory lane.

At first, I told no one of the blog, but then I discovered my sister and sister-in-law had secretly started blogs of their own, so we bravely shared URLs and started commenting. Soon some close personal friends started blogging, and before long, strangers started showing up for one reason or another. It was all very lovely and cosy and soon I felt like I had a nice little community of supportive friends surrounding me in cyberspace.  The odd time weird things happened (like someone claiming one of my readers was a fraud), but those were pretty rare, since my blog wasn’t really drawing much attention to itself.

About six months ago, my life started feeling really restless, stuff at my day job started falling apart bit by bit, and it occurred to me that maybe I should revive my old dream of becoming a serious writer. Maybe I should start putting myself out there in cyberspace as some kind of “expert” with wisdom to share that people would eventually want to pay me to share. Maybe I should try to build a more “serious” blog.

So, with great love and care, I created a new space (this space). It was all very exciting and gave me so much joy and pleasure to be creating something new and to have something positive to get energy from when other things in my life were feeling more like energy-sucking black holes.

People started showing up in larger numbers than they’d ever shown up at my other humble little blog, I got interviewed on a radio station, some people started linking to me,  and it was quite thrilling… at first.

But then, sadly, a few things started happening that began to taint that initial excitement.

1. It was beginning to feel like work to create an engaging, interesting space. I didn’t need more work – I was already up to my eyeballs in work. I needed pleasure and recreation, not strategy, marketing, and planning. Not that there’s anything intrinsically wrong with those things, it’s just that I’ve already got plenty of that stuff in my day job.
2. I began to miss my old blog and my old friends because I had little time to spend with them anymore. At the new place, I felt like I was trying too hard to attract “readers” rather than “friends” and what I really needed was friends.
3. Before I knew it, partly because I’d had a few too many discouragements at work and was feeling vulnerable, I began to let myself wrap my self-worth in the numbers game.  When the numbers dropped (and, sadly, the highest stats were on my very first day – I never went back up to that number), I wondered why I wasn’t as interesting as the other blogs that were drawing big numbers.
4. I was pouring too much energy into this new entity (and Twitter), and other things in my life were suffering – my family, my day job, my home, and the freelance writing and workshops I used to do occasionally (and get paid for now and then).
5. In my efforts to follow this “dream”, I was reading way too many “10 easy steps to making a living as a blogger” or “10 easy steps to a more fulfilled, successful YOU!” and though some of them inspired me at first, in the end, they mostly depressed me. Self help stuff has a way of doing that to me. I can only take it in small doses.
6. Partly because of the self help “follow your dream” stuff, I was allowing myself to paint a more bleak picture of my day job than was fair.  It’s a job I was once quite passionate about, and though there have been some rough spots, it didn’t deserve to be pushed into a corner and ignored so much. I’m working for justice for people who are hungry, after all – it’s a really GOOD job. For various reasons, I need to stay in this job for the time being, so I just HAVE to find a way of committing myself to it, or I’m cheating the people I serve and whose stories I get the privilege of sharing.  (Ironically, I had to give myself the same talking to I once gave a staff member when she’d developed a bad attitude.)

So, after a few tears shed on top of my growing pile of laundry, I just quit. Cold turkey. I walked away from all of my online spaces. I re-engaged in real life. I read more books, I poured more energy into my job, and I tried to be more present for my family. I refused to care if I was committing “blog suicide” or “Twitter suicide” by my walking away, I just knew that silence was what I needed for awhile.

Yes I missed it, and many times I caught myself thinking “oh – that would make a great blog post”, but overall, it’s been such a good thing to take a break and focus on my priorities.  Even though I still eventually want to make a career change, my job is giving me pleasure and passion again. I have some fun things to look forward to (a couple of workshops to facilitate), I’ve had some really wonderful lunch conversations with friends, I’m worrying less about other people’s opinion of me, and – more than anything – I’ve found some contentment again.

I’m ready to gradually re-insert myself into cyberspace, but it will be a scaled back version, at least for now.  I’ll be setting aside the new site (for now, anyway – we’ll let the future take care of itself), and just finding contentment in my little unassuming blog in my corner of cyberspace where I can play to my heart’s content, show off my kids, wrestle with a few demons now and then, dance in the rain if it feels right, share fun stories about the wonderful adventures I get to go on from time to time, and just be the authentic me that I feel like putting out into cyberspace whenever I feel like it.

I’ll leave the big blogs, the marketing strategies, the SEOs, the self-promotion, the strategic networking, and the numbers games to someone else. (If that’s you – no judgement meant, just make sure you’re still having fun and being authentic!)

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The gifts we give ourselves – Reflections from Karla Penner

I didn’t know Karla before she visited my house for the launch party for this site, but she’d been reading my blog and knew enough about me to know that she’d be interested in hanging out with me for an evening.  I’m so glad she did, because it didn’t take long to recognize that Karla is indeed a kindred spirit. When we held a sharing circle that night, Karla said something profound about how she’d realized that the most important gift she needed to give right now was a gift to herself.  Since I know that many of us are in similar situations, I asked her to write something about it, and she did…

I spent my growing-up years in a wonderful Mennonite community.  It’s the kind of place where neighbors bake you fresh buns, meals are delivered if you’re in need, farmers help each other get the last of the crops off the field, and participation in the life of the community is expected.  Service of all types was not necessarily seen as a “gift” but as an obligation – your “christian act of worship” if you will.  It’s within this context that my earliest thoughts on “what am I giving away” were formed.

The little girl from the idealistic, hard-working Mennonite community grew up.  I spent time overseas, moved to the big city, went to University and got a degree, was married and had babies.  And all the while I never stopped giving.  “It’s what you do, after all.  You give until it hurts, and then give a little more.”  People’s requests were not considered and weighed – they were agreed to immediately and acted upon with diligence.  Opportunities to give time and energy in church were accepted without contemplation.  “This is what God requires of me” I thought.  Parenting was the most unrelenting of all in its demands of my gifts.   I grew weary, downcast, and frustrated with my reality, but put my game-face on and continued to give my gifts away because it was the right thing to do.

It didn’t take long until weariness grew into depression.  It’s hard to give yourself away when you’re anxious, agitated, exhausted and unstable.   Amidst the “sure, I’ll do that” and the “what time do you need me to be there?” heard from inside my house were the irrational, loud, and angry words directed at my little girls.  Guiltridden sobs were my companion as I laid my head on the pillow at night.  I wasn’t interested in helping people anymore.  My gifts seemed unworthy and defiled.  I knew I needed help.  But good, giving Mennonite girls don’t ask for help, do they?   They are supposed to be the ones giving it away.

Finally, I was able to seek help.  Medication took the edge off my agitation and depression and I was able to regain the tools to parent my daughters without excessive anger, guilt, or shame.   I discovered the power of the word “no” and began to see the value of self-preservation.  I discovered that the only requirements God had of me were to love Him and love others.  I helped when I could and put many of my “giving skills” on the shelf for a much-needed rest.

It’s taken a long time, but I’m finally learning that the best gift I can give away is the freedom to sometimes not give away anything at all.

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Beauty in the shadows – Making peace with my dark side

It all started with a map.

I love maps. This was one of those old fashioned sepia-toned maps that I’d used as inspiration for my treasure hunt. I cut a piece of it and glued it to my art journal.  On one corner of the map, I stuck a photo of a woman in a safari hat looking like she was keen for adventure. It all fit so well – an explorer seeking adventure on a map of the world.  I wasn’t sure what to do next, but the beginning made me happy. I saw myself emerging on the page.

Grabbing a paintbrush and some paint, I started painting over the map. First there were light, translucent circles, but soon they became big, dark swirls. Angry looking swirls. Like a series of ugly hurricanes moving into the shorelines of hundreds of vulnerable islands on the sepia map. One of the swirls encircled the explorer woman.  She clung to her corner of the page, lost and alone in the darkness.  I don’t know where the swirls came from or why they showed up looking so dark and angry, nearly obliterating the map. I just let it happen.

I stared at it for awhile, disappointed that what started out as an exploration into the traveler in me had turned ugly. I didn’t know what to do next so I left it alone.  I considered tearing it up and starting again.

The next few days, I’d occasionally glance at that page in my journal, not sure what to do with it. It didn’t feel right to tear it out, but it looked unfinished and ugly and it made me feel unsettled when I looked at it.

I abandoned the art journal in my studio and put it out of my mind.

Sometime during the course of that week, I realized that an old familiar feeling that had been my companion for the past 6 months was beginning to occupy my every waking moment. Again.  I’d been here before – so many times. Restlessness. Dissatisfaction with the status quo. An unsettling addiction to change and revolution. A deep and burning need to wander to new things and new places.

It’s mostly in my work that I feel the restlessness crop up every few years, but it can also overtake other areas of my life.  I have boxes full of unfinished art and craft projects that I’ve abandoned whenever I got bored.  I could give you a tour of my bookshelf and point out all the passions I’d poured over in various phases of my life and eventually lost interest in. I could show you stacks of photos of all the countries, cities, parks, beaches and out-of the way paths that have given space to my wandering feet.  I have a history of changing jobs every three years. I just don’t know how to settle down. It’s not that I don’t know contentment – it’s just that it never lasts.

Once again this same restlessness was consuming me and this time, it was making me angry. Why couldn’t I settle down like other people?  Why did my passion have to shift every few years like a temperamental wind? Why couldn’t I just keep enjoying this job that I’d loved so much in the first few years? Why couldn’t I just focus on one interest and pursue excellence in it rather than getting bored before I was proficient?  Why did I keep wanting more, more, MORE? Why was I so damn fickle?

I felt like I was wrestling with my own dark shadow and I wasn’t winning.

The frustration started affecting me physically. I was exhausted and even though I slept fairly well at night, I never felt rested.  My head started to ache, and my concentration nearly vanished.

I took a sick day, hoping a little rest would help me get past this malaise.  But I couldn’t sleep, even when everyone else had left and the house was quiet.

Finally I went down to the studio and sat staring at the abandoned art journal. I flipped it open to the swirling map.  Something clicked in me and instantly I recognized what was on the page. These angry swirls represented my own dissatisfaction with the restless wanderer in me.  Even though I love the fact that I’m a world traveler, and often refer to myself as a “happy wanderer” (hence the happiness when I first started the page), there’s a part of me that feels deeply flawed because of this inability to find contentment with the status quo for any length of time. It was causing an ugly hurricane of emotions in my soul.

I sat there in silence for awhile and just let myself feel the conflicting emotions.  Happy and sad, angry and excited, passionate and bored.  It all swirled in me like those restless hurricanes.

Then suddenly, something changed. Like a gentle breeze, peace came and the storm settled. In the breeze I heard the Spirit whisper “you are called to be a wanderer. Your restlessness is your beauty.”

I was getting it all wrong! This was a gift, not a flaw. This restlessness in me was the work of the Artist, not an ugly mistake. I wasn’t supposed to deny it or try bury it beneath layers of resistance – I was supposed to embrace it and follow it!

I picked up a paintbrush and dipped it in white paint. Over the angry swirls I wrote the words that came to me. “You are called to be a wanderer.” “There are answers in the eye of the storm.” And “Excavate. Explore. Navigate. Initiate.”  At the centre of each hurricane, I painted a tiny dot of light. In the centre of the woman’s heart, I painted a tiny, happy white swirl.

Finally it was finished and it was okay. I was okay.

I started the next page of my journal – this time with bright yellow paint and a fun photo of a girl reaching for a cookie jar. The next photo represented a dream I have – a place where I’ve wandered and want to take other people to some day (that story is for another post). I painted hands reaching out for this second “cookie jar”. The only word that showed up this time was “Reach!”

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Some thoughts on Art from our resident artist, Maddie

Perhaps I’ll just retire and let Maddie take over the blog. Or maybe I’ll just have a monthly “Art with Maddie” segment.

(After we recorded this, she suggested I send the video to “that guy who painted the Mona Lisa”. I informed her that he was dead, but assured her there would probably be other artists who would watch it and appreciate it as much as he would.)

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“Live your truth and follow your instincts” – Reflections by Christine Mason Miller

Christine Mason Miller (photo by Denise Andrade http://deniseandrade.com/)

One day in the early Spring of this year, when this website was busy getting born in my brain, I came across Christine Mason Miller’s story of how she was leaving copies of her book, Ordinary Sparkling Moments, in little brown paper packages in random places in different parts of the world as gifts for anyone who happened to wander by (100 Books Project). Not only did I fantasize about stumbling across one of those books, but I also became intrigued with the whole concept of anonymous gift-giving. Christine had been inspired by the book The Gift: How the Creative Spirit Transforms the World, and I wasted no time ordering my own copy. The book served as an important catalyst for my own thinking around personal gifts and how and why we share them.

I’m very excited that Christine agreed to be my special guest today!

By way of introduction, Christine, tell us something fun about yourself.

My name is Christine and I’m a Brady Bunch fanatic!  Living in Los Angeles I see celebrities all the time, and the only one I’ve made a complete fool of myself with was Florence Henderson – aka Mrs. Brady.  Me + champagne + any Brady in real life = Me blabbing on like a crazy superfan!

What are the gifts you are sharing (or learning to share) with the world?

More than any particular kind of art or writing, the gift I am trying to share with the world is the gift of knowing that the answers to our most meaningful questions can be found within our own lives.  I would say an extension of that is that I am trying to convey this message with as much beauty as possible.  I try to do this by sharing my own stories – which includes being honest about all the messy, stumbling ways I have found my own answers.  In a nutshell, I am sharing my truth.

How did you discover that you had these gifts?

The turning point came during the hardest year of my life, when I made my highest priority in life to live by the truth.  Although that was a conscious choice at a specific point in my life, the way I have come to share this gift as an artist and a writer has been a slow evolution, one that I know is going to continue to shift and grow over time.

Why do you think it is important to share these gifts?

I believe that facing, calling out and living by what is true is what grants us the most freedom to live our most meaningful lives.  I also know that there are many layers of truth in any given situation, and the more we dig to uncover the barest essence of what is true the more we discover our own values, passions, fears and strengths.

What have been the stumbling blocks or obstacles in your path to discovering and/or sharing your gifts?

I would say my ego and fear have been the deadly combo.  As far as my ego is concerned, I try to be aware of when it is getting in the way and when it is driving my choices, thoughts and actions (not always the easiest task, but I try).  When my fears start making noise, I try to let them carry on however they want, sometimes literally saying out loud, “Do what you need to do and have at it, but right now I need to work”.  In other words, letting them cackle and bang drums and taunt me, but sticking to my task at hand.

Tell me a story about how the sharing of the gifts had a transformative impact on you or the person/people you shared them with.

I recently had a conversation with someone who wanted to know how I – and other entrepreneurial friends of mine – had built my online presence and business.  After talking about the connections I had with different bloggers and artists and how we all supported one another’s ventures, I explained that the most important thing we have all done to get where we are is to ask for what we need.  Any art show, retreat, or business we created came about because we put our idea out to our community and asked for support, help and participation.  That was the simple truth, and I could see in her eyes she was relieved to know it wasn’t anything more complicated than that.  There was no magic formula or “expert” who we all turned to, all we did was tell the truth of what we needed.

What advice do you have for other people who are learning about their own gifts?

Follow your instincts.
Follow your instincts.
Follow your instincts.

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