I really loved this segment today on The Today Show with author Lysa Terkeurst. What resonated most for me was DON”T DELAY THE “NO”. It’s uncomfortable to say “no”…don’t I know it! It is a good reminder that the delay can actually make a situation more uncomfortable and stressful and not better.
If you can find two minutes this video is chock full of great advice and nice reminders!
http://www.today.com/klgandhoda/easy-guiltless-ways-say-no-when-you-need-1D80407298
Darcie xo
On Thanksgiving morning my kitchen was buzzing and the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade was on the TV in the background. I mentioned to my son that the parade brought back memories of when I was in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade as a dancing flower with the Ernie and Bert float back in the early 90’s. I replayed the entire day for him including how I was a “rock star” for the day getting my picture taken by kids and adults alike in my green tights, leaf hands, flower pot shoes and metallic flower pedals surrounding my face. I was a sight! I will never forget the feeling of awe that came over me as we danced around Columbus Circle and onto Fifth Avenue seeing thousands of people on the streets and hanging out of windows waving and cheering at our Ernie and Bert float. I felt so alive! It was awesome! That was a special moment and now it is gone. I stood there in my kitchen thinking about all the amazing things I have done in my lifetime. Images flooding back like… – Going to the London Olympics – Seeing the last Police concert ever before they broke up – Attending the Super Bowl – My teenage crush telling me he loved me – The first time I held my son – Dinner with Francis Ford Coppola and Baryshnikov – Meeting President Clinton – Experiencing the Berlin Wall before it came down – Climbing the Eiffel Tower – Being backstage at the Oprah Winfrey Show – Being onstage with the Red Hot Chile Peppers – Watching a NASCAR race from Jimmie Johnson’s toolbox in pit road All sorts of special experiences flashed before my eyes as if I was (so I have been told) dying – quick in one blink of an eye. These sweet memories were then replaced in the next blink with a small voice saying, “What do I have to look forward to? I have a sinking feeling all the good stuff is behind me.” One moment I am regaling the details of my flower costume and dancing my little float routine in the middle of the kitchen for my son and saying, “You might want to add being in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade to your bucket list”. And the next moment…one breath, one blink, flashing back, questioning… My son notice my expression change a little, like I wasn’t there, and asked, “What’s up, Mom?”. I snapped out of it and immediately sent those thoughts back into a corner of my mind that doesn’t get visited very often and said, “Oh nothing, sweetie. Do you want me to make more pancakes?” and that was that. Small moment, big questions. xo Darcie
I don’t know if it is the time of year and that Halloween is approaching but pretty much everyone I know (including myself) is gripped with fear. Friends, coworkers, clients, people I barely know…all telling their stories of fear. I was going to say that some of them are small and others are big but in reality fear is fear – one size fits all. What is small to me might be massive to someone else. If you are afraid of it, you are afraid of it. Whether it is a fear that someone will find out you don’t keep a perfect house (so you can’t leave dishes in the kitchen sink ever) or being diagnosed with cancer, it is all exactly the same thing…fear. So as I have observed this mounting heap of fear around me and realized everyone is having their own Halloween Fright Fest this article from Elizabeth Gilbert magically dropped into my inbox. I think I am supposed to share it with all of you. Your Fear Is The Most Boring Thing About You
Enjoy and let’s hope that Freddy Krueger turns out to be scarier than our own fears this Halloween.
Darcie xo
Yes, it has been months since I have written anything. A lot of life has been going on. My pal Beth, who is my partner in crime, (and editor so you will now see many more grammatical errors and typos!) had to exit from the project. You will hear from her again but right now she has some things that need to be taken care of offline. I think I felt lost and a loss of identity. So I didn’t know how to start over without her. But isn’t that what I am doing at this time in my life anyway? Starting over, changing course, taking the road less traveled? It sounds good in theory but in practice…hmmm…a little more difficult.
I went to this very cool “retreat” called Soul Camp a few weeks ago (I have never felt so out of place and at home at the same time!) and it has literally rekindle my fire and given me permission to do and be who I AM.
So I wanted to give a shout out to my Soul Camp Mates and let everyone know I am going to be writing and letting my gut/my soul lead the way with this blog. It will still be all about Being 40…at least for 3 1/2 more years but I’m not sure what shape and form that will take. Stay tuned…
xo
Darcie
With lent upon us I have been reading articles and hearing from my clients and friends about what they are going to give up.
Lent usually comes down to giving up one of the following:
– Sweets of some sort
– Salty snacks
– Alcohol
Well, I want to propose something UNIQUE and DIFFERENT…what do you say, are you in?!? Are you at least curious? Then keep reading.
Here goes it.
For the next 46 days let’s all give up sitting on the sofa and watching tv.
WHAT?!
Yes, I recently had an “ah ha” moment. I wondered if there was a linchpin habit that I could modify that could potentially make a big difference…and I became curious about the SOFA and TV combo.
– This magical combo is how I zone out.
– This is where I drink too many glasses of wine.
– This is where I lounge and eat bags of chips and sneak cookies I buy for my son’s school lunch…while drinking that wine I mentioned earlier.
– This is where I watch shows I don’t even like half the time.
– This is where I lose hours upon hours of my life.
– This is the combo that makes me lifeless and completely unmotivated.
THE RULES FOR THE NEXT 46 DAYS
Don’t worry you can still sit and watch TV you just have to try a different combo. I tested out a few this week and the difference was remarkable
– I sat at the kitchen table and watched TV.
– I sat on the floor in my family room and watched TV.
– I sat on the sofa with the TV off and read.
None of these combinations produced the same affects. I didn’t sit for hours and hours watching stupid shows. I folded laundry, got work done, went to the gym, hugged my kid, called friends….it worked! Holy cow!
So I wanted to share this idea with everyone in the blogosphere in hopes that it might resonate with some of you. Let me know if you decide to take on the Sofa/TV combo for lent and how it goes. My guess is that it will have more of an impact than you might expect. I’m not sayin’…I’m just sayin’….
Darcie xx
I read an article this weekend in the New York Times called “What You Learn in Your 40s.” It was interesting, perhaps trying a little too hard to be clever or maybe I’m just not that easily impressed anymore. The author referred to our 40s as something researchers call the “rush hour of life.” I can see that. I thought I was busy when I had little ones and then I thought I was busy with a full time job and kids in school and now…
Rush hour is an ironic misnomer. There is no rushing during rush hour traffic. There is a lot of standing still, a lot of waiting. A lot of frustration and wishing you were somewhere else. I don’t want to wish away my 40s. I don’t want to wish I was 30 or wish I had done this or done that better.
I’m 45 and I know I won’t live forever. My eight-year-old won’t always have these sticky soft hands to rest on my face as she tells me she is going to live with us forever. So I pay attention. I hold onto that moment as long as I can. I can take a step back. I can say no to the energy sucks. I can be present in the moment.
It might be rush hour, but I want to look around. Maybe I’ll get off at the next exit and take the scenic route. I don’t want to be just busy. I’m not rushing–time is too precious.
I am not graceful. I took three years of dance classes as a child from a beautiful old German ballerina at the Fine Arts Center in Colorado Springs. She pronounced my name Bess and she was full of grace in body and spirit. At age ten, when it was obvious I was a duck and not a swan, she took me aside and said, “My dear Bess. You are a lovely girl, but you are not a dancer.”
I didn’t feel injured. In fact, I felt lovely and grateful that an adult had been honest with me (something I experienced very rarely growing up).
Experiencing gratitude continues to be the grace-filled moments in my life. And I continue to experience gratitude at odd moments. Recently I was cleaning my house and was suddenly overwhelmed with a feeling of gratitude. I felt grateful for having three girls who put wadded up socks under the bed. I was grateful to have a house to clean and a life so busy that the dust accumulates. I felt a moment of deep, abiding gratitude as I cleaned my stove that I have a family to cook for, share meals with, and practice gratitude and honesty with every day.
Later in the week after my grateful cleaning day, I received this email from Darcie:
For those that know me well you know how important I think it is to be grateful. It changes everything in a matter of seconds – you cannot be grateful and angry at the same time…it is literally impossible. I find it quite easy to go down the dark hole of fear and sadness and the one super simple thing I know that works to pull me out is gratitude.
So, when you have a moment please take the time to read the attached article. I promise it will be worth your while.
http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2014/02/18/martin-seligman-gratitude-visit-three-blessings/
I’m still not very graceful. I am quick to anger and quick to judge, stumbling down those dark holes of fear all the time. But practicing gratitude and honesty make me feel lighter on my feet, almost graceful.
Continuing on with Darcie’s theme, I’ve been thinking about the shelf life of some of my long held beliefs about myself and the world. Like Darcie’s paprika, a few things about my life may have expired a while ago.
I was talking to a fellow teacher recently and we were discussing how the famous dad of one of our students dresses like a teenager. I said to my younger colleague that 40s are a weird time when your perception of yourself is probably no longer accurate. Yep, she responded, I know exactly what you mean. What’s the shelf life of how we dress? Has mine expired??
If my perception of my appearance is out of date, maybe it’s time to go through the cluttered medicine cabinet of my mind and toss a few other things away. If I shouldn’t dress like a teenager, maybe it’s time to chunk in the garbage some of my insecurities that I’ve been holding onto since seventh grade.
What’s the shelf life for sadness or anger or shame? It might be time to clean house.
I decided I wanted to share the email below that I recently sent to my closest girlfriends. Fast forward, yes, the cleaning has continued and I am still not sure what it means but I am just staying open…stay tuned.
Email Subject Line: Cleaning
– I cleaned my home office.
– I cleaned the jewelry drawer and makeup drawers in my bathroom.
– I cleaned the ugly spice cabinet (in which I found spices that expired in 2006!).
– I cleaned the vitamin cabinet this morning as Ryan was getting ready for school…I am going to clean the basement next. I can’t stop thinking about getting down there to clean.
So why am I sharing this with you all? Well, each of you knows me well and has supported my growth over the years.
I just know that for some unknown reason when I was looking at what I wanted for my new years resolutions this year the first thing I thought of was “I want to clean a drawer every week”. I thought that was weird. It was so weird it didn’t even make the final “real” list…but here I am doing it anyway…compelled to clean! (and as a reminder if you have forgotten, I don’t like to clean anything ever ever)
Since I believe (as you all know) how you do anything is how you do everything – my feeling is that this year is about cleaning up and clearing out. In the physical world it is that jar of paprika that expired in 2006 and in the spiritual/inner world it could be thoughts about myself or what I am capable of that just don’t serve me any longer … and probably expired back in 2006 as well.
I am cleaning with no judgement or speed. I have been looking at each thing and putting it in a keep or trash pile. I am even taking the time to recycle washing out bottles and putting them in the recycling bin.
Not sure what this all means but will keep you all posted.
Thanks for being on my team. xxx Darcie
ps. Beth, this looks like my ramblings turned into a potential blog post…lol
I went to visit my sister who just had a baby this past week out in California. She is 41 and this is her second. I give her a lot of credit. She looks radiant and tired all at the same time. I realized as I was holding this newborn that this is probably the last time I will have a baby in my arms until I am a GRANDMOTHER. Seriously that is the first time I thought about being old enough to have grandkids. How did that happen??!? When did that happen?
What a weird time in our lives…to be thinking about grandchildren while some of us are still thinking about having our own children.
Funny thing happened on Facebook…a “friend” on facebook that I went to high school with changed her profile pic. It was a picture of her with a baby. The funny part is that I had no idea if it was her child or her grandchild. I even went so far as to click on the photo and try to look at the comments. They didn’t help at all…they were all like “Oh, isn’t he adorable!” I think everyone was just as unsure as I was.
So, Ladies…I guess the point of the story is first the realization that we are in a weird place here in our 40’s – still able to have those little babies but also potentially heading into the grandma stage of our lives. And second, PLEASE now that we are in our 40‘s be VERY VERY clear when you are posting photos on Facebook, for all our sake to help save a ton of confusion…. 🙂
xx
Darcie
Being 40 