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Yesterday, you looked in the mirror, and, instead of your inherent greatness, you saw flaws.  You saw things you wanted to change and not everything that made you powerfully, wonderfully, uniquely you.

Last night, in a deep conversation with your friends, you had a powerful thought, the kind of thought that would have changed the whole conversation, maybe would have changed you, but you doubted yourself and so you swallowed it inside of you.  Tucking it away, forcing it out of your mind, so that great big belief would not threaten your status quo in its hunger to get out.

This morning, you walked to class and compared your body to someone else’s.  Your body, a body that has worked so hard for you, that has allowed you to experience every good thing you have known, a body that has kept you going through all the hard stuff, through all the difficulties that have been thrown at you.

And then you walked into our shared space, a space that I hope will become a sanctuary to you, a place that I hope will quiet your inner critic enough so you can see the fabric of which you are made, you can recognize your worth, you can embrace the idea that you are just fine as you physically are right at this moment- not just because that is true, which it is- but because you come to understand that what the world most needs from you is not your trappings but your longings made manifest. 

If you yearn for art to be inspiring or children to feel loved or food to be breathtaking or houses to have souls or communities to have gardens or technology to be accessible or music to have your unique viewpoint or patients to have soulful care or records to be broken or whatever else it might be that speaks to your soul, I want that for you, too, and I want our space and time together, our journey, to be one that supports your recognition of your worth, sparks your awareness that the world needs you and your unique solutions and galvanizes you to embrace what you have to offer.

Today, you will tell me your name, your major, your graduation year, your hometown, the last great book you read, and why you chose to take this class.  You will say you needed Body Image class for your Women’s and Gender Studies minor, for your art major, for your public health concentration, because it fit into your schedule, and, maybe, just maybe, if you can muster the courage to say these words, because you knew when you saw those two words on the course guide that you wanted desperately to have a different relationship with your body and your soul.

And here is what I can promise you.  I will do everything I can to see you, to hear you, to understand you, to help you to understand yourself, to empower you to see your greatness, to inspire you to understand that while you are lovely because you are uniquely you that it is more than just your loveliness we need—that we need your fire, your passion, your purpose.  I will remind you that our bodies are ever changing and so to build a foundation of our worth on what we physically have to offer right this minute is to invite disruption over and over again.  And I will implore you to understand that your soul will always lead you right, will always let you blossom, will always let you shine.

On the day you last walk out of our sanctuary, I hope that you leave this space with your eyes up, ready to recognize and greet those who approach you not just because you know that other souls should be seen but also because you understand that to hide your soul from us is to deny the world of one of its greatest gifts- you.

I hope that you will be able to meet your eyes in the mirror and see purpose and clarity and passion and self-acceptance staring back, that you will treat your body like a guest of honor to your life because it has served you so well so far and you want to continue on that journey, and, ultimately, that you will not hesitate to give the world everything that you uniquely and powerfully have to offer. 

Welcome.  I am so glad you are here.  I am honored to walk alongside you.  I cannot wait to see where we are going.  Let’s get started.

It will come as no surprise to you that the keeper of a master to do list and the completer of a weekly review gets things done.  If you ask people from moments across my whole life what defines me, on the list between “woefully accident prone” and “cannot carry a tune but nevertheless sings with gusto” would be “she takes care of business.”

TCB.  They might as well be my initials.

And, yet, what I am realizing more and more is that the me who takes care of business isn’t my favorite me.  I am proud of what I have done, of course.  And I am even grateful that I can look at a project and know what needs to be done and then knock it out item by item before the deadline.  But having to be that person over and over again—the person who prioritizes the doing to help a team or even myself individually exceed intentions– doesn’t really allow me to always show up the way that I want to show up.

Here is who I most like being:

the mom who will play whatever silly game Happy dreams up for however long he wishes to play it and then doesn’t stress about the time and, instead, moves peacefully into the kitchen to prepare dinner (all without looking at my cell phone to see what emails have come in since it’s not work time anyway).

the friend who always has time to make a meal when a friend is under the weather and then drive it to her, even if she lives 30 minutes away (as so many of my friends do since I am a small town girl and they are city girls).

the daughter who not only calls her parents every day but has the hour to let her mom go down memory lane.

the community activist who has time to call every single girl in Circle de Luz regularly to check-in on her and the time to thank every single volunteer every time (even if I am not at the event) profusely and personally.

the townsperson who with her little boy makes from scratch scones and chocolate chip cookies for the helpers in our community and then delivers them.

the creative who reads or grabs her watercolors over surfing the internet mindlessly with those small pockets of time that present themselves.

To be fair, these things happen now because, after all, they reflect the person I most love being.  But the truth is that, for me, they don’t happen enough.

When I think about what I most want out of my life at this point, I want it to move slower, for it to be a force for distilling as it becomes more and more apparent to me that my experience of time is at warp speed.  If I cannot literally slow time down, then I want to slow me down.  I want to linger.  And slowing me down starts by giving me less to do.

I don’t want to scratch one more thing off my to do list today at the expense of enjoying one more hug, a longer conversation in the driveway as I cross paths with our beloved neighbors, moving my body for my mental, emotional, and physical health, sitting on the porch with BF sipping lemonade at the end of the day, playing a frenetic smack talking round of Uno with my big and little boys before bedtime.

I want to wake up and not feel such an urgency about the emails I got overnight and instead go do my workout just as I had planned rather than bagging it because I cannot bear the thought of someone waiting a few more hours to hear back from me.

I want to end my work day and say “that was enough.  Well done.”  And then glide into the other roles that I have the honor of living—daughter, friend, mother, partner, community member, more- with grace and patience and-that all important word- presence.

I want to relax about the doing and really get into the being.

At the beginning of 2014, I choose Thrive as my word for the year.  Over the course of the year, I have learned so much about what thriving looks like to me and, at its root, it means that I am fulfilled in my being, that having the opportunity to be present is what allows me to overflow with feelings of joy, satisfaction, passion, and consciousness.  That breathing space is my fountain.  That I shine greatest when my flame can be deep and not broad.

In really looking at my professional and personal habits over the last few weeks, I can see where I make it harder for myself to be present because I am demanding productivity and I am even more aware of what habits I practice that keep me on the productivity hamster wheel.  So I am working on practicing different behaviors, not over-engaging in stuff that isn’t mine, not letting anxiety beat out presence, not letting getting things done be more important than being.  And just like embracing self-acceptance, embracing presence is about a choice.  I am choosing to behave differently.  Over and over again, as I navigate the tension between productivity and presence, I will remind myself that I have made a different choice.

This summer has been such a gift to me in being more present, in not sweating that master to do list, in remembering that I always get done what I need to get done and I am not going to start disappointing myself or others now so maybe I can just relax a little.  If my twenties were about giving up beauty and my thirties were about giving up perfect, then I want my forties to be about giving up production, letting go of the fury to always be making something happen.  Because here is what I know:  the most miraculous things that have happened in my life all started with just showing up, being, listening and feeling.

Here’s to experiencing life rather than always orchestrating it.

Every Friday, I reflect on the week that has just passed by doing a little sensory exercise.  This practice is a gentle, easy way to tune into how we are doing, what we are experiencing, and what we are grateful for while more acutely tuning into our senses.  It’s a whole heart exercise with plenty of bodily input, if you will.  Because this practice has been so good for me, I want to encourage you to do it, too.  Building some gentle reflection into our weeks is a nice way to stay grounded while maintaining some big picture perspective.  So please join me in this week’s Friday Reflections (with each sense as your inspiration, consider how experiencing it impacted your week).

feeling ::  really blessed to work with the amazing women who run Circle de Luz.  We had our board retreat and leadership meeting for the new school year this past weekend and I am honored to be on this team and so excited for the new school year with our girls.

wishing ::  for a lovely weekend as we have lots of celebrations to enjoy.  That means there will be cake and ice cream and laughter.  What more could a girl wish for?

What about you?  What were your sensational experiences this week?  Please share!

This post was inspired by Teacher Goes Back to School who was inspired by Pink of Perfection’s Five Sense Friday.