Multislacking (or why I love Twitter)

Here's what I asked Twitter today - If I procrastinate on more than one thing at a time, do I get extra points? My favorite answer was from @SquiggleJay - she said "Multislacking". I immediately started following her because that's awesome. (She says she probably heard that term somewhere so I don't know who coined it. If you know who coined it, tell them thanks from me!)

Anyway, a new competitive sport is born. Seriously, I think I could turn Multislacking into a national pastime rivaling baseball. (Mainly because I think baseball is boring unless you're in the bleachers at Wrigley drinking bad beer). I can't tell you how many people are into this sport and probably don't even know it yet.

Fact is, I'm a serial committer - meaning that I commit to a lot of things but I have a problem with follow through because I'm also a Multislacker. I am so good at procrastinating that I can procrastinate on several things at once. And the more things I commit myself to do, the more things I can procrastinate at any given time. I would totally win the Stanley Cup of Multislacking if we had one.

I'm a little concerned that this sport may not be very healthy. It's kind of like rugby only it probably doesn't involve serious physical injury. It could involve incurring financial penalties and a significant rise in the divorce rate. But that didn't stop horse racing did it?

There are just so many things that need to be done that I really dislike doing. And many of them would otherwise interfere with things I love, like long mid-week lunches with friends and movie watching. What's a girl to do?

As much as I'd love to stay at the top of my game, greats in all sports have to scale back or retire at some point. I think it's time for me to break out the kitchen timer and go back to my modified Flylady program that worked for me in the past. The basic premise is that you can do anything for 15 minutes. Pick a project, set a timer and go for it. Flylady has lots of other strategies for recovering Multislackers, too.

I struggle with this because I really don't want to change my essential nature - spontaneous, passionate, fun-loving, creative. And, like other creatives, I fear that any kind of structure will kill my buzz. I think that all my years being a lawyer and trying to live a life that didn't fit makes me extra sensitive to this issue. But I also know that I have to be a grown up and we all have to spend some time doing stuff that isn't fun just because it's a part of life. And also learning to delay gratification is a good thing. Sometimes. (And for a REALLY funny take on this, you have to read Hyperbole and a Half).

Yesterday was a 24-hour procrastination fest. (But I do feel rejuvenated today so maybe that's the silver lining). One of the things I procrastinated on was the Consciousness Cleanse. I kind of did Days 8 and 9 but didn't really have anything interesting to write about them. Like some of the first few days, there just wasn't anything new there for me. Day 8 was the Power of Liberation. (Been there, done that. Liberated from my job and my marriage. Can't get much more liberated . . .). Day 9 was the Power of Responsibility which is where you take responsibility for taking care of yourself. I guess it's relevant to what's going on with me right now. My struggle between needing to be an adult and not wanting to act like a grown up. I'm feeling like this consciousness cleanse might have been more useful to me a year ago.

So today is Day 10 - The Power of Humility. I guess calling myself the Queen of the Multislackers on Twitter this morning wasn't very humble. Sorry. Actually, this day is about realizing that it takes a village. Not only to raise kids. But to really take care of ourselves. We're so afraid to be vulnerable, to admit we don't know everything, that we put up a wall that cuts us off from connection to other people. We need to let our defenses down and let other people in so they can support us on our journey. I clearly used to have that problem, not sure I do anymore. Just in case this isn't already abundantly clear - I hereby admit that I don't know everything and I need all the help I can get. And we already know how much I crave connection. So I think I have this day covered.

Now I am off to an Abundance Meditation workshop led by my friend Debbie Taitel who is awesome. She's part of the growing clan that is supporting me on my journey. Go read her blog and follow her on Twitter @spiritlightmuse.

It's about connection! Now what?

I know I'm supposed to be writing about the Consciousness Cleanse that I'm doing and I'm two days behind but I'll get to it, maybe later today. Maybe not. But in the meantime I just had an epiphany walking home from the grocery store listening to Amazing by One EskimO. (Which is really an amazing song. Seriously.) The epiphany is this: It's about connecting to other people! That's it.

For some of you, this may not seem like an earth-shattering epiphany but for me it was and this is why. I'm really independent. Have been since I was a kid [insert sob story about divorced parents, blah, blah]. I had to do a lot of things on my own so I got used to being alone. And sometimes I actually do need to be alone in order to recharge. But really, deep down in places I don't talk about at parties (well, maybe I do), I'm a people person. I need to be around other people. Actually, it's more than that - I need to connect with other people. So it isn't enough to just go out and walk around the city surrounded by other human beings. I need to connect on a personal level.

This is related to my recent realization that I'm afraid that I'll spend the rest of my life alone. It's not that I can't live by myself or go out to dinner alone. It's not that I'm afraid of supporting myself (although if anyone wants to apply for the job of Sugar Daddy, the position is wide open). I'm just figuring out that I have a deep-seated need to share my life - my day-to-day existence - with other people.

It isn't necessarily that I need to get married again or even have a serious romantic relationship - although that would be great. But without a "partner" of some sort, it means I have to work harder to get that connection I need. That's probably one of the reasons I waited so long to get divorced. An unhealthy connection is still a connection. Having someone to come home to, even if all you want to do is avoid them, is still easier (I didn't say better) than having to do the work of finding someone else to spend time with (or ignore, I guess). I never said it was a good reason to put off getting divorced . . .

I would probably be really happy living in a commune. Assuming the other people living there didn't annoy me too much with New Age music and assuming I wouldn't get kicked out for wanting to keep my one pair of Jimmy Choo's. But if I could find the right tribe of people to live with, I'd be great.

The wonderful thing about my new career path of being a massage/Reiki therapist is that when I am working, I can't help but connect with people. Being a healer allows me to use my hands, heart, mind and spirit to work. Being a lawyer - I used my mind (and my hands if you count drafting boring documents using my hands). When I was working at a company, I was in meetings all the time. Most people hate meetings. I hated some of them - when they were pointless and boring. But mainly, I loved that part of my job and now I know why. It was the part of my job that involved connecting to other people. Helping them get stuff done. Helping them work through issues. That's what I love to do.

But right now I'm spending a lot of time alone, writing and trying to set up an online business. So how do I deal with it? Two words: Facebook and Twitter. Isn't the Internet wonderful? On Facebook, I've reconnected with all kinds of new and old friends, near and far. I connect with all kinds of people - sometimes on a deeper level than some in-person relationships - on the Internet. Just a few of my relatively new Internet friends are Gina, Miss Mandie, LaVonne, Peggie, Jesse, Kevin and Tony. These are real people who could totally call me up if they were in Chicago and I would drop everything to meet them for coffee. I might even consider donating a kidney if one of them needed it. Or maybe just offer to edit their eBooks. But I've never met them "in real life" and it doesn't matter. They're just as much friends as many of my other "real life" friends are. Which is why I spend way, way more time on Twitter and Facebook than I really should.

The really important thing this epiphany does is shine the light on the things I do when I get lonely. And I get lonely a lot these days when I don't have custody of my kids and I haven't made the effort to get together with friends. What I end up doing when I'm lonely is eating crap and messing around on the Internet. And it never seems to fill me up because "you can never get enough of the things you don't need." (I don't know who coined this phrase but it's a good one). The point is - as much as I love my tortilla chips, if I'm eating them to assuage the loneliness, I'll never stop eating them. I will never be able to get enough because they will never get rid of the loneliness. The only thing that gets rid of the loneliness is connecting. What do I do when it's late at night, none of my friends are on Twitter or Facebook and I start feeling the need for connection now that I know I shouldn't grab the chips (or start playing computer games)?

I don't know. I guess we'll see tonight. (I really, really wish I had a good answer for this - maybe someday soon I will).

Wherein I tell you that it's ok to be a Badass Bitch and show you how Glinda the Good Witch can help you feel powerful

I've made it through six days of my Consciousness Cleanse, can you believe it? I've actually stuck with it for almost a week. Amazing. I know. Day 6 is The Gift of Surrender where we stop resisting our emotions and . . . yes, "surrender" to them. Although I haven't written directly about this, I have written about letting go and being ok with not being happy all the time. So, yeah. I get that it's important to acknowledge and accept ALL of our feelings - good and bad. And feel all of our feelings. Bad feelings don't go away when you ignore them. In fact, they stick around because you ignore them. Because "what you resist, persists." Whether you like it or not.

So let's all quit pretending to be Little Mary Sunshine all the time and let our Badass Bitch have the floor every once in awhile. It's healthy. (Maybe not for the people around you on Badass Bitch Day but if you can't score a little "alone" time when she shows up, Little Mary Sunshine will make nice later. Don't sweat it.) In all seriousness, stop feeling like you have to be happy all the time. Stop denying your dark side. It's ok.

Ok, I said I was going to blog about doing the Cleanse and now that I've gotten that out of the way, I want to talk about something else. I want to tell you about Glinda the Good Witch and how helpful she can be in helping you get free of unhealthy attachments to people and events.

Is there a person in your life who triggers strong negative emotions in you time and again? Is there an event from the past that, whenever you think about it, causes major heartburn? Do you feel powerless to stop your painful reaction to those people and events? With the help of Glinda, you can stop the painful reactions. Or at least diminish the pain.

There is a scene in the Wizard of Oz when Dorothy is with Glinda in Munchkinland. The Wicked Witch pops in and threatens Dorothy. Glinda laughs and says "You have no power here. Be gone. Before someone drops a house on you, too." I've tried to find video of this scene because how she says this and the way she laughs is important. Glinda says this line with perfect authority and just a little bit of smug dismissiveness. The Wicked Witch has no choice but to slink off - and without the ruby slippers, too.

This may seem totally weird but I swear it works. Here's what I want you to do. The next time you're with a crazy-making person and he or she starts to do the stuff that drives you insane, I want you to either picture Glinda saying this line to that person or silently say the line yourself. If it's a past event, whenever you start reliving it, have Glinda say the line or you can even say it out loud. (I've tried saying it out loud but the problem is that I can't seem to get the laugh right and it kind of ruins it. So usually I just have Glinda say it.)

The fact is that these people and events only have power over us because we let them. As hard as it sometimes is to see, we really do have a choice in how we react to the actions of other people. Glinda helps us remember that the only person with power over our emotions is us. No one else has any power in our head unless we give it to them. If you've given some of that power away, Glinda helps you regain it.

Try it and let me know how it goes for you. Once you start, you'll find so many places that this can be used to help you stop feeling controlled by situations. Using this trick doesn't mean you'll stop feeling angry at your ex when he does that thing he does that always pisses you off but he does it anyway and probably on purpose because he knows it pisses you off. You may still be angry but it won't eat you up for three days after you see him. And you might even get to the point where it just doesn't bother you anymore. Because he will not have that power over you anymore.

Trust me. This will work. In fact, I'm beginning to think that the sillier and more fun something is, the more powerful its magic. And I find that really exciting.

My body is a temple, blah, blah, blah. Pass the chips.

We're on Day 5 of the Consciousness Cleanse and today's focus is reverence for our bodies. We're asked to write a letter of apology to our bodies, keeping in mind the question: "If you knew your body was the Holy container of the Divine, what do you need to say you're sorry for?"

*Sigh* I'm not sure what to think about this issue. On the one hand, I totally owe my body an apology. For lots and lots of things. I have not been very nice to it over the years. But I'm having a weird reaction to the idea of apologizing to my body. To a certain extent, my body is me. I guess I could apologize to myself for a life time of bad eating habits and my refusal to get over my well-known addiction to Hint of Lime Tostitos. (They are the crack cocaine of food. Captain Crunch with Crunchberries is the primo weed. And using the word "primo" probably dates me more than my crow's feet do. But I digress. )

This reminds me of one of my favorite quotes from C.S. Lewis that pops up on Twitter all the time: You do not have a soul. You are a soul. You have a body.

So, my soul is the Divine and my body is the container for my soul. I've known that for a long time. And yet I still often treat my body like a landfill. And I guess I should be hunkering down to write that apology to my divine soul but it just feels . . . weird. I have no problem with recognizing that I only get one go around in this body and if I don't take care of it, my go around could be cut short.

Maybe this is giving me trouble because it's not new to me. There's no revelation for me in today's Cleanse. It's kind of "same old, same old" - my body is a temple, blah, blah, blah. Pass the chips. I'm just not that into it.

I'm exaggerating of course. I do try to take care of myself most of the time. I'm doing non-sucky yoga regularly. I quit smoking and got off anti-depressants. I'm learning to meditate without having to beat my ADD brain into submission. I'm taking better care of my body because it makes sense. Because if I don't, I won't be able to walk my life's path of being a healer. And if I don't, I'm not setting a good example for my kids. The idea that my body is a container for my soul just doesn't do it for me. It doesn't motivate me in the least. I'm not sure why not but there it is.

I'm still working on the outer goal (getting paperwork done) and the inner goal (feeling peaceful) that started with Day 1 of the Cleanse. Today I got some stuff done towards getting my work area more organized. Right now it actually looks worse than it did when I started but I know I've made progress (packed two boxes of books for storage and set aside a bunch of books to sell to the used book store). Oh, and the books I'm selling? They're all self-help books about PMS and PMDD and peri-menopause. I got them because someone told me I had a problem with my hormones. I didn't have a problem with my hormones. I had a problem with the someone. So the books (along with the someone) are outta here. As far as feeling peaceful . . . that's been a little more difficult. Driving in rush hour traffic during the storm of the century didn't really help. But sitting on a friend's porch after the storm and watching the fireflies flicker? Now that felt peaceful.

Technical difficulties make me sad

I thought I'd spiffy up my template but in the process, I seem to have lost all my hyperlinks - including the link to the comments. I'm praying to the technology gods tonight that I will be able to fix this problem because I loooove comments. And I'm very sad that I can't get any right now. So hopefully comments will be up and running again soon.

In the meantime, you can send me mini comment love on Twitter if you're so inclined (@slackermomspeak).

Thanks for your patience :)

And now the problems are fixed! Thank you to the anonymous person on the Blogger Help forums who is also up in the middle of the night and took the time to fix my blog. You are most awesome.

Let the comment rumpus begin!! (Or something like that.)

The power of forgiveness and releasing resentment

Today's Consciousness Cleanse is about forgiveness. Debbie Ford says that forgiveness involves "releasing the invisible ties to those who have left you, betrayed you, disappointed you or hurt you" and that if you don't "cut the cords of resentment you continue to be imprisoned by" those people and situations you've presumably been trying to get away from. Hmm, that sounds familiar. I wrote recently about being connected energetically to old, unhealthy relationships and how important it is to cut those cords in order to be truly free. My post was mainly about ex-spouses/lovers but the same principle applies to all old relationships where you were hurt in some way.

One place where this kind of forgiveness and detachment might be useful is with our parents. In some ways, it's easy to detach from an old relationship with someone who isn't around us anymore - like an ex-spouse. Out of sight, out of mind does work in many cases. But what if you still have a relationship with someone who has hurt you or disappointed you? Unless you had really exceptional parents they probably did both at one time or another. No matter how much you love your Mom and Dad, you may find that you're carrying some sort of resentment towards them for something. Unless you release that resentment it has a negative effect on you. It poisons you, your relationship with your parents and maybe even your relationship with your own kids or spouse.

For the longest time, my Mom could get a rise out of me for what seemed like the littlest things. She would make some random comment and I would fly off the handle and get angry. She'd get defensive, I'd get angrier and our relationship suffered. I didn't realize until fairly recently that I was holding a tremendous amount of resentment towards her for things I thought I had long forgotten. But the truth was that although I may have (for the most part) forgotten things, I hadn't forgiven her. That's why I would jump to anger with seemingly little provocation.

Some of the things I was still pissed about were really small. Like the fact that she "wasn't available" to come with me to buy a prom dress until my step-mom offered to go with me. Then she was suddenly available. Seriously, I was still pissed about that 25 years later. Some of the things were pretty big like the fact that when she and my Dad got divorced she moved out of the house while my brothers and I were away at summer camp. Even though we knew she was leaving, it was pretty crappy of her to do it that way. It took me over 20 years to realize that I was angry about it and another 10 or so years to have the courage to actually tell her that I was angry about it. Looking back I feel silly for having held onto that resentment for so long. It was poison for me and everyone around me. And there was no reason for it. When I finally told my Mom that I was upset about those things - big and small - she apologized. I know she was doing the best she could at the time. I still think what she did was wrong. But I forgive her. No amount of telling myself that I shouldn't be angry for what happened so long ago could ever set me free. It wasn't until I accepted the fact that I was angry and truly forgave her that I could be free of the resentment and its effect on my life.

You may be in a situation where you can't talk to the person who has hurt you. Your parents may have passed away. It may be dangerous to talk to an abusive ex. The Cleanse for today recommends that we write a letter detailing all of the pain and hurt we've experienced and in the letter ask our highest selves for release from the prison of resentment. I think that's a great idea for situations where you can't actually confront the person who has hurt you.

If you're not comfortable writing things down or it just doesn't work for you, you can achieve the release another way. Try sitting quietly, with one hand on your heart and one hand on your lower abdomen. Tell yourself your story of hurt and pain as if you were telling a good friend. You can do it out loud or silently, whatever you're comfortable with. I don't think you have to dig deep into the details unless you want to and feel ok doing so. Talk about why you were hurt or disappointed. Don't let your internal critic tell you that your feelings aren't valid! Your internal critic is an idiot - never forget that. Don't judge your feelings - it won't make them go away and it won't help you heal anyway. When you're done with your story, tell yourself "I'm sorry you were so hurt. But it's ok. It's over now. You can let it go. You don't need to carry the hurt anymore." Or you can simply say "I accept that [this thing] happened. I accept and acknowledge my hurt and anger. I now release all resentment, anger and hurt feelings from [this thing]."

Remember that you can forgive someone without telling them (or yourself) that what they did was ok. Forgiveness is the simple act of letting go of the anger and hurt and sadness that is attached to whatever or whoever hurt you. For really big stuff, you may need to do this exercise more than once or twice. There's no magic pill to make these toxic feelings go away - there's only acceptance and release. And however long it takes you to get there is perfectly fine. The important thing is to keep working at it a little at a time.

My Mom recently said to me (right after I signed up for massage school), "You know there's probably lots more jobs for lawyers than there are for massage therapists." That's the kind of thing that would have sent me into a tizzy before. Partly because she was totally and completely wrong. But really because she wasn't supporting me in my attempt to make a happier life for myself. She was being selfish because she liked saying "My daughter, the lawyer" and didn't want to have a daughter who was "just" a massage therapist. She was the one with money issues, not me. And on and on. But none of that came up for me in the moment. Instead, I smiled and hugged her and said "I know you're worried about my financial well-being and I love you for that. But I don't want you to worry. I just want you to be happy for me."

That's when I knew that the resentment was gone for good.

My consciousness is getting cleaner by the day . . .

So yesterday (or was it the day before?) was Day 2 of the Consciousness Cleanse. Now that I'm not working at a 9 to 5 job, I sometimes find it hard to keep track of what day it is. Especially when the kids are out of school.

My flakiness aside, I did Day 2 but found it surprisingly difficult. Day 2 is the day of self-awareness. We're counseled to "invoke the agent of change called self-awareness" and begin to "digest" some toxic stuff or something. I have to be honest. That's the kind of self-help mumbo jumbo that turns me off. I get it - we can't begin to change unless we know who we are and what we want to change. Right? If you know you want to get to Point B, you need good directions. But the directions will be different depending on whether you're on Point A, Point C or Point Z. And that's where self-awareness comes in.

Day 2 also involves changing our perspective on our lives and the decisions we've made along the way. We're supposed to pretend that our lives are movies that we're watching without judgment. And once we stop judging things to be good or bad we can, presumably, release the emotional attachments to those events that are holding us back. See - I can totally talk the talk. I read this stuff, I can explain it to other people in words that (I think) sound pretty good and I really do understand what these exercises are supposed to accomplish. But it doesn't seem to work for me.

There's really only one thing I regret in my life and that's the fact that I wasted a lot of energy in my late 20s/early 30s worrying about the future. Two things in particular - getting the right job/career and finding a husband - a father for the children I wanted so desperately to have before it was "too late." But I don't judge myself poorly for that. I think. I bought into the cultural party line that was, and is, so powerful. I wasn't alone. I feel kind of sorry for younger me in fact. She missed out on a lot of amazing adventures because she wasn't focused enough in the "now." She made decisions she thought she had to make in order to have the future she thought she wanted. She was somewhat delusional. All the other stuff - the little and big things I would have done differently - it all comes from excessive worrying about the future.

So Day 2, for me, didn't really lead to any epiphanies because I'm already fairly self-aware. I already know what things limit me and I'm working on changing those things. In fact, I think my problem with getting paperwork done stems from living too much in the "now." I'm not thinking enough about the future and the work that needs to be done today in order to have a more peaceful and happy tomorrow. So I guess I just didn't get much out of Day 2. I did make a little more progress on my paperwork monster (a little, tiny bit) and I reminded myself - several times - of the Reiki principles to try to keep myself in a peaceful mood. So it wasn't a complete bust.

On to Day 3 which is the Gift of Release. This is where we take the limiting and toxic beliefs and behaviors and release them so that we can move forward. One of the concepts Ford talks about is that all the negative things that happened to us and all the negative self-talk, release toxins into our psyche. By the way, that's the same principle that Don Miguel Ruiz talks about in Toltec wisdom book (also known as The Four Agreements). (I highly recommend this book, by the way. My friend, the fabulous Judah Kurtz at Judah Buddha, recommends it to all his clients. If I had money, I would be a client but I don't so I just take advantage of his good advice as a friend!)

The Four Agreements resonates more with me because although the book is totally woo woo, the agreements themselves are very down to earth and easy to follow. I won't go into all of them (that's a post for another day) but the one that's relevant to today's Cleanse is "Be impeccable with your word." I think most people read that initially as meaning "don't lie." And it does mean that. But it really means to be very careful about what you say. Speak with integrity. Say only what you mean. Do not speak poorly about yourself (even in your head). Don't gossip or be mean to others. "Use the power of your word in the direction of truth and love." I don't know about you but I think that the world would be a much better place if more people did just that.

So I'm already working on being nicer to myself (and everyone around me). I already know that the only thing standing between me and the life I want to live is fear. I have a daily wrestling match with fear. I stopped keeping score awhile ago because you know how much I hate keeping track of details like that. Fear is pretty strong and he's had the best of me for a long time. But the daily wrestling is making me stronger and I'm gaining ground. Haven't found his Achilles heal yet but I'll keep trying. Now I'm going to do some more paperwork stuff - baby steps. And then I'm going to do some yoga to help me feel more peaceful.

Now I'm curious about you. What are your self-limiting beliefs? What can you do today to start getting out of your own way?