Thank You For The Sh_tty Lesson

A quick note to say how much I appreciate each and every one of you.

Some of you have been connected since my days teaching at the Learning Annex where my first product was a cassette tape that I duplicated, a cover/case that I hand-glued onto a piece of paper then printed from my computer. The second product was a set of stapled together pages with a card stock cover about how to write a press release.

In some ways I’ve come a long a way and in others not so much.

Right now, I don’t have a lot to say. I’m in one of those periods where words aren’t flowing. Not in my writing group, not in my business.

Last week, as we sat together in sink-in couches, the autumn leaves falling,  pumpkins everywhere, rain pounding the roof, sipping hot tea, we talked a little about the process and in my frustration I said, “I don’t feel like my writing is worth anything. It’s not adding up. It doesn’t have a purpose – a blog post, a book, an article. I’m not working toward a project.”

Fall pumpkin

Tina said it’s kind of like yoga. You go. You do poses. You don’t progress. Then one day you can do a pose that used to be hard—maybe for a few seconds. There is an opening. Andrea mentioned that it’s like meditation. You don’t think it’s having an effect, then eventually something shifts. Maybe a bit of anxiety lifts. Laurie said, It’s about using the muscle. Keeping in the flow. Continuing to allow the messy. To invite it, actually.

And I get all that. But in the midst of it it still feels like a big waste of time, even though I know it isn’t.

It’s one of those sh_tty lessons.

I’m thankful for so those lessons, not in a spring-up happy kind of way. I’m thankful for so many things, and this group of women is one of them. Of course my sweetie. Who appreciates and loves me daily. After writing group, when I’d written about him, Tina said, “So there really are good men in the world?”

Yes.

This writing muscle is really about practicing being free.

Free from the need to produce. Free from the desire to acquire. Free from forcing meaning into tasks. Free from needing to create something good. Free from being perfect. Free from embarrassment or shame. Free from not making enough money or being thin enough, or desirable or sexy enough.

To your freedom. Whatever that means to you.

And being thankful for the sh-tty lessons along the way.

Thanking you.

Want to give something that doesn’t cost a penny? I do this daily. All you have to do is click to help animals and/or people. Go here.

My best (male) friend and me who I got to hang out with last weekend in San Francisco. Who I don’t get to see enough since he lives in Los Angeles. We’ve been friends for 40 year now. Grateful for the way he makes me feel — excited to live, full of joy and that my life has a place in this world that means something.

I made this for you.  Some good sh_tty lessons.