When It's Time for a Little Push

"We do not need magic to transform our world, we carry all the power we need inside ourselves already. We have the power to imagine better."           ~ J. K. Rowling

There will come a time when our sons and daughters in recovery or even at recovery's brink, might be ready, ready for a bit of incentive to resume the journey upon which they have embarked. There may be certain pathways they must embark upon which to them may seem like roads to impassable next stages on the progression from the jail created by The Addiction. Some may call it being stuck, others, parents and loved ones might revert back to past toxic behaviors, characterizing the temporary pause in our children's progress as laziness, freeloading or even cowardice.

"She was doing so well."

"He was on the road to a normal life."

"What's WRONG with him." 

"Why doesn't she just get on with it."

Unlike the robin fledgling in early spring that will jump from its nest to both explore its surroundings, and test and strengthen its flying muscles and feathers, our sons and daughters may not have this instinct. They have been beaten by too many interruptions in their early lives. They know too much about life yet do not have the experience to handle the freedom that comes with an existence not driven by The Addiction.

They know what to do, but have no idea how to start or what dire results might ensue if they jump the nest. The long range goal may be all they see, not the easier baby steps to get there.

As I said, they know what to do. They may have been beaten down by The Addiction but not anymore. They are an intelligent bunch. The vortex they dove into wasn't a result of stupidity or LACK OF MORAL CHARACTER.

They can handle a nudge, a little bit of "adulting" to move them along those first steps.

We as parents can pick one or two pathway suggestions they might want to take. We have it in us to be gentle with the nudge, but firm. We no longer cajole or shame our children along their way.

But we should be prepared for pushback, the I Know or I will responses that are painfully familiar from our time we spent with our children in the cloud forest, in the muck of The Addiction.

This is when we say, "I love you," and walk away. We've done as much as we can do. As always, it is ultimately up to our children.

Watching our children as they re-embark on their journey can be painful to us but remember not nearly as painful or as frightening as it is to them. A belief that they WILL flourish will help as we watch our fledglings test their wings. They can do this.

And so can we.

. . . keep coming back

"Let us not pray to be sheltered from dangers but to be fearless when facing them." ~ Rabindranath Tagore

Walking the Walk

"The world is changed by your example, not your opinion." ~ Paul Coelho

The 12-Step Serenity Prayer, "God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference," might seem like a call to action while demanding the exact opposite. Even those who have not entered into any 12-Step programs available to the addicted and those otherwise impacted by the disease can get the essence of the message:

Let go, and let God, god (Him/him or Her/her), the Universe, Great Creator or any other higher power  - something explainable only by some sort of faith in something OUTSIDE OF OURSELVES - take over. But how do we do that for ourselves while making our surrender visible to our children?

We walk the walk of those who have learned not to beat their heads against the wall created by The Addiction.

Those of us who have children spiraling through the vortex of addiction, or whose children are in recovery, re-learning the lessons of life missed while spiraling, come to know, eventually, hopefully, that reacting, fixing and confronting do nothing to "save" our children. It also does nothing to "save" ourselves.

We have a long walk or drive - if I may - to our recovery as we show our children a path to theirs through our example of living a life as completely and joyfully as possible. The "hard part" is keeping our hands off the steering wheel while our children navigate the driver's ed of their stumbles through addiction or recovery from the spirals. And we can show them, as we keep them close by in our passenger seats, by how we drive our lives, that road raging through life does nothing to improve anything.

They will see. They will learn. They will stop engaging in the battles with The Addiction and start engaging with LIFE. They will pull themselves out of the muck, the vortex - their "hard part" - and begin that long journey to the light.

We will then begin a journey together, perhaps to different destinations that may be equally the same yet totally independent, to a place where lives are well lived.

Stay the course. Keep your hands off their steering wheels. Walk the walk and we can live the lives we were destined to achieve!

. . . keep coming back

"Find your joy and let it run your life." ~ Cleo Wade

Angels Never Leave Us

"Do not feel lonely. The entire universe is inside you." ~ Rumi

So you're feeling stuck, or maybe simply taking a breather from the journey, or seeking temporary shelter from storms raging all around. We all know, hopefully by now, this is ok. We know our keep moving mantra is important to our well being, to our quest to finding our truest TRUE SELVES. But sometimes when there are multiple roads diverging in the yellow wood, or when we just need to step back, we can take a break, and sometimes we should.

Does that mean our momentum stops?

Not at all.

I have very recently been reminded that the angels we have encountered along our journeys remain in our lives even if we feel we have lost touch.  And those other unexplained encounters and even events experienced as we struggled through the muck and mire of our early skirmishes out of the cloud forest are still providing energy and unexplained direction in even our darkest times of uncertainty and doubt.

Have you felt it? Have there been times when you were not quite sure how to react to an event borne of The Addiction or the remnants of the disease and you decided to simply NOT to, and wondered why you took that counterintuitive path? Have you trusted in your emerging True Self instincts for the first time in what seemed like ages?

Those angels you have encountered, the leftover ripples of power from your previous experiences when YOU said to The Universe, "I am not going to live like this anymore, but I will still love, cherish and pray for my child," that defiant manifesto, are results of your lingering efforts in the early months or years of your journey. The Universe never gives up on us, the Great Creator never ceases to watch over us.

We have created a perpetual motion machine of unlimited possibilities.

Go ahead. Trust me. We can hop back on whenever we're ready. The pathway is still there.

And we are never, never alone!

. . . keep coming back

"Angels are not any extraordinary beings with wings and a halo. They are ordinary people living ordinary lives. But they have special qualities that touch our heart and soul in special ways. They are truly our best friends." ~ Aarti Khurana

Another Lesson Learned From the Running Life

"Slow down and everything you are chasing will come around and catch you." ~ John De Paola

If you haven't figured it out yet I am a runner and I love it. I run even when nobody or nothing is chasing me with a community of "like-minded idiots" as I call the running club I have been a part of for over three years. This group of people of all ages, abilities, backgrounds and ethnicities is quite possibly the most positive collection of souls I have ever met. After all, the newbies who join us each year actually believe they can finish their "goal races" of the 5K, 10K, half marathon, or marathon, or even the ultimate tests of the 50K, or 50 or 100 mile ULTRA races, having never achieved these goals in the past. We are truly a crazy conglomeration of humanity.

It is June and we are all between training. Winter/Spring training ended with races in April through the first weekends of May. Summer/Fall training begins the last Saturday of June. So what is an endorphin-starved person to do? You sign up for a half marathon the second weekend of June, the Race 13.1, to maintain your "fightin' fitness," hoping Mother Nature won't throw a premature jolt of heat and humidity to spoil the party.

The previous year's race had been moved inexplicably from the gentle coolness of a late May schedule to a June date and was a scorcher with temperatures nearing the 90s and accompanying humidity. Nonexistent were the flower-covered fields along the path from previous years. Runners were met with a route more suited to filming a dystopian, post-apocalyptic science fiction movie than a race through picturesque greenways and wildlife preserves. It was memory burned into the minds of the runners who endured the ordeal. There were no fond recollections of this race, which thinned this year's race participant count.

I had run a half marathon in early May in which I PR'd (personal record) so this was going to be a fun run, at a pace where I could enjoy myself and the company of friends along the way. There were a number of us who gathered prior to the race from the running club and we all commiserated about what pace we would go so we could enjoy ourselves.

"At least it's not as hot as last year," I heard someone say.

But it was becoming hot enough!

Just prior to the race our running club team gathered and separated into groups with similar pace goals for the day. Six of us agreed on a pace suitable for enjoying the race on a day that was quickly becoming sunny and almost cloudless, unlike the weather predictions for mostly cloudy and cool-ish conditions. The National Anthem was played and we were off.

Soon it was clear that a few in our group were going to push it a bit harder and they separated from us within the first mile of the 13.1 . Had I not heard a voice of reason next to me from a runner with much more experience, I would probably have joined them.

"Let them go," she said.

And we did.

We ran a smart race. As the heat burned and the elevation of the course increased, decreased and increased again we would slow, walk, increase and decrease our pace. For weeks the weather had been rainy and cool yet somehow humid at the same time - a perfect greenhouse - and Mother Nature greeted us with her full array of flora. We noticed the Black-eyed Susans, the daisies. We slowed to smell the roses, and the honeysuckles, and almost careened into each other on a stretch of the trail covered totally in mud.

We came, we saw, we laughed.

We had a grand time. We finished, together.

It was a life lesson learned.

Sometimes you just have to slow down. You can enjoy the moments without competing. There is enough time for the fast pace, for the "let's go for it" mentality.

Sometimes it's OK to just ... let ... go and enjoy what the Great Creator has laid out.

You can simply Live, Laugh, AND Enjoy!

Try it sometime. At your own pace!

. . . keep coming back

"Nature does not hurry, yet everything is accomplished." ~ Lao Tzu

The Fable of the Portal

"Every exit is an entry somewhere else." ~ Tom Stoppard

The posture had become habitual, an uncomfortable comfort she had grown to accept along a journey that had taken her so far. She had beaten her beasts, slain her worst tendencies, cleared her mind, and soul, partially, from years of self loathing and abuse. She, not anyone else had made the decision not to live THAT life anymore.

Yet what life lay ahead was the uncertainty. She had wasted so many years, missed so many opportunities to learn, fail, succeed, then fail again, she wondered where the next pathway in her life would lead. So there she sat, each day in her room, glued to a screen of games and "adventures", offering a hypnotic respite from having to take that next step to living THAT real life she was meant to live.

This was comfortable, yet a foreboding surrounded her like a shroud.

"What am I so afraid of? she wondered.

She functioned. If you would see her on the avenue, in the grocery or bodega you would not think her to be a captive in her own home. Yet there she would sit, staring at a screen and removed from her world of possibilities.

One day she awakened and something seemed different. She wasn't certain what it was and put this intuition to the side for the time being. Her intuitions had missed the mark over the past few years she thought to herself with a chuckle, Her intuitions had led her down some dark pathways.

This was a weekend, a Saturday, and for once in a long while she was not working - thankfully. It had been a long week. She returned from the nearby convenience store after picking up some this and that, a boxed nitrate-laden breakfast and a few Red Bulls and bottled waters for the day. It was an expeditious expedition to avoid any unnecessary personal contact. She was out and back in less than ten minutes.

When she returned home to her room something was different. She knew she had turned off the television prior to her breakfast run yet could hear a humming drone of the TV speakers signaling an issue with the signal.

"Shit, the Internet must be out again," she complained to no one.

She entered her bedroom and the droning of the speakers immediately got louder. "That's odd," she thought.

And what she saw when sat at her normal place at the end of her bed alarmed her. Instead of a blank screen typical of when the Internet would be interrupted she saw what people used to refer to as "snow", its accompanying white noise but with the odd addition of the humming she had never before heard emanating from the screen. As she stared at the snow she swore she could see forms seemingly dancing, coming and going as temporary images within the specs of white, black and gray.

"Weird."

She arose to get a closer look and as she approached the screen she could feel something tugging at her, pulling her closer to the dancing images.

"This can't be."

She reached out her hand to touch the two-dimensional display and at that instant, everything was gone! And so was she.

"But to where?"

When she was able to she opened her eyes and found herself in a place. There would be no other way to describe where she seemed to be. There was no furniture, landmarks or any points of reference to determine how large or small this place was, big or small, expansive or confined. All she could see was the same black, white and gray snow surrounding her and scattering off her like dry snowflakes in the wintertime. The snow was collecting around her - ominously.

As she turned to determine if there was anything to see beyond the snow she noticed a lightness in the distance through a clearing in the blizzard surrounding her. She moved closer to where the light was emanating and could barely discern a form. She soon realized what she could see was herself, sitting on her bed, controller in hand. In her horror she moved closer to get a better view of this image and was stopped by a clear barrier.

"Had she somehow been transported inside the television?" she wondered.

She peered at herself on the other side of the barrier and her heart sunk. "Is this what my life has come to?" she asked herself aloud.

And she started to cry. Her sadness engulfed her and saturated her body. She felt a tear trickle down her cheek and onto the barrier. Almost immediately the image on the other side changed. She could see herself as she was years ago, "out of it," with no direction, drive or goals, duty-bound to the chemical-of-the-day she had chosen as an escape from life, from everything. She pressed her body closer against the screen and felt the same pull she had felt prior to her transport into the snow. Her recoil was immediate and visceral.

"NO!" she screamed! Never again would she travel that path; go on THAT journey.

The scene changed almost as soon as she had drawn away from the barrier. There were images of family assembled around her, holding her, then the scene moved again to her alone on her bed, crying.

Her life was playing out before her. SHE was the mindless entertainment, the multitude of channels and choices available for viewing.

"Choices," she pondered. Perhaps this is my time, my chance. Perhaps The Universe is not playing a cruel trick on me. Perhaps this is my shot.

She continued to watch as the images moved more quickly now. She saw herself as a little girl, happy, before the dark days. This would not be her choice. She decided going forward was what she wanted, not going back.

"I might not remember the pathways that lead to my downward spiral," she thought.

Then, she saw herself as she had never imagined, surrounded by people clad in colorful, seemingly outlandish attire, some who knew her history it seemed, some who did not. She could see, no, she could feel her past meant nothing to these people. She wasn't certain what the connection was. All she knew a connection was there.

Fearful this image would change, that this would be another opportunity lost she moved closer to the barrier, touching the screen almost to the point of embracing it. Immediately she was joined by two of the dark, gray-black-white forms she had seen before her transportation.

"GO!" said one.

"NOW!" said the other.

She pressed as much of her body that she felt she could against the barrier and in an instant, again, everything was gone.

When she was able to she opened her eyes and found herself back in her bedroom, at the edge of her bed.

"This can't be!" she cried aloud. "What was the point of everything, of all of this? Why this intricate ruse? Who is behind this cruel game being played on me? Don't you see I don't want to live life like this anymore? I've seen what my life can be!" she ended.

As she lay on her bed, tears streaming in rivulets down her face her phone rang. She collected herself as best she could.

"Hello?"

"Hi, my name Alejandra. You don't know me but a mutual friend gave me your name. She thought you might be interested in meeting up with a bunch of us for a bike ride. Would you like to GO?"

"When?" she asked.

"NOW." said the stranger, Alejandra.

"GO, NOW," she remembered the message of the forms in the portal, and smiled.

"Where are we meeting?" she asked.

"Look out your front window," said Alejandra. "Our mutual friend thought it best not to leave anything to chance, or to give you too much time to think about it."

She lifted the blinds and saw at least twenty-five people dressed in outlandish cycling attire.

"This is exactly what I saw through the barrier, she thought.

"Give me a few minutes to get dressed and I'll be right down."

And as she prepared to leave she looked at her television screen that was no longer humming, but the snow remained. She picked up the remote control and just prior to pressing the power button she could see two forms through the screen, her former barrier. They seemed to be waving to her.

"Goodbye my friends," she heard herself say and with that, pushed the button, and began her life, again.

 . . . keep coming back

"Go forth into the busy world and love it. Interest yourself in its life, mingle kindly with its joys and sorrows." ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

Time To Get Your "Sing" On

"Each of us has been blessed with a purpose that makes our heart sing." ~ Madisyn Taylor

We are all focused on our journeys, are we not? We advance, retreat, we choose one path over another depending on our current state of mind or where our attention needs to be at any particular point along our chosen track. Often we can become so fixated on progress we can forget who we really are, who we wanted to be long ago, who we were meant to be.

What does that mean exactly?

The journey is the thing, certainly. We are striving to become more true to our true selves, more real, for ourselves and our children who only want the same. We are a beacon, or can be, showing the way for our fellow parent-travelers and our addicts and addicts in recovery. It's a lot of pressure to be sure, eased by the pilgrimage and our progress along the way.

Can we become too focused? Can we lose sight of the signposts along the way? Are we so concentrated on keeping our heads down we cannot see what The Universe beckons us to explore?

What turns you on? What was it, years ago you relinquished for the immediate crisis-of-the-month precipitated by The Addiction?

Can we start just one more plate spinning in our lives?

The answer is, must be, YES!

When we think about what passions were once there, or even percolating years ago, we should try not to perceive these as wild detours from our chosen pathway, but as side trails leading to undiscovered treasures along the way. We can always keep our main journey pathway close by, in sight, while we unearth joys, talents and dreams for years stifled by our plunges in and out of the The Addiction's vortex with our children. We will discover treasures which can lead to communities of people who like us, simply want to reclaim life's potential joys, positivity and vigor. Joining in communities of human beings who may or may not have been touched by The Addiction we may also find new perspectives on how we might live life to the fullest.

So what is it that you have forgotten? Are you a singer? - you can join a chorale or choir; Have you wanted to run a 5K, half marathon, marathon or perhaps even one of those crazy Ultras (not Mich Ultra)? - join a running club; Have you always had a penchant for writing? - then START WRITING  DAMMIT!

Take that outside path, the nature trail jutting just to the right, or left, off the beaten track. Become the adventure you were meant to be. It's in you. It's in all of us. Take a moment to Seek and See, then take a deep breath and embark on a new journey to your first undiscovered realm the Great Creator always knew you were meant to explore.

Get out there and sing, shine and show up - be your own beacon to your best. You'll be amazed at the places you'll see, what you'll do and where you'll go. It's a chance worth taking to meet a new and exciting YOU!

. . . keep coming back

"Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail." ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

Limericks for St. Paddy's Day

"Next time somebody complains that you have made a mistake, tell him that may be a good thing. Because without imperfection neither you nor I would exist." ~ From Into the Universe by Stephen Hawking, 2010

When I think of what I tried to do
I realized that I had no clue
Now I know the Addiction
Is my son's affliction
And is not on my path to pursue

The mistakes that I made were not rare
And it's not because I didn't care
When you're blinded by fear
You know nothing is clear
But I have my own crosses to bear

A son and his father are one
It's a bond that cannot be undone
But it is no wonder
When it's torn asunder
The split's a non-permanent one

When I was confronted with pain
I fought it again and again
Once I acquiesced,
I can now attest,
My life was no longer a strain

Synchronicity is quite a word
A belief in unknowns is absurd
Though The Universe' aim
Might not always be plain
To seek it is always preferred

The boy was locked in his chains
The girl was in constant constraints
One day they decided
and miraculously Guided
Chose divinely a life more humane

A confident soul can subdue
The buildup of drug residue
Give it time you will see
You will all soon agree
That our children WILL find their own TRUE!

. . . keep coming back

"When you're in a Slump, you're not in for much fun. Un-slumping yourself is not easily done." ~ Dr. Seuss, Oh, The Places You'll Go