Category Archives: identity

Title IX – Lessons learned from a book on knitting

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My roommate bought me a book on knitting for Christmas.  I finally got around to reading it last weekend as I was ensconced in a beautiful cabin next to a lake looking out at the snow falling on the cedar trees. The perfect place to not only read a book on knitting but to actually knit.

If you know me then you know I am the most unlikely knitter.  I majored in math, I like sports, and although I come from a family of creative talented craftspeople, I have never gravitated toward making crafts.  I can do a minimal amount of woodworking and in another life, I used to sew.  I do love to cook but my time and energy has been devoted to what are typically seen as “men’s” pursuits… sports, outdoor activities, fixing things, etc. I have spent most of my lifetime in a world where men held power.  Thus for me, activities traditionally thought of as “men’s” were seen as having more value. That is, until the knitting book…

The author of the book talks about her own resistance to knitting, which is seen as a very female gendered activity. She is a woman about my age, having grown up in the era where we watched our older sisters and mothers burn their bras in protest of unequal rights, where we have watched women struggle to get hired or compensated equally to men, and where we watched men get ostracized because they chose professions or clothing that typically belongs to “women”.  So she, like me, resisted what we saw as “women’s” hobbies, or as my brothers would describe as “skirt work”.  But what I realized is that to devalue certain tasks because they are typically thought of as a female activity is the very epitome of anti-feminism and smacks of the idea that only activities that traditionally belong to men have value.  Hence, I started knitting.

Since I started thinking of this, I have had a couple of discussions with people that have really stuck in my psyche.  Both discussions were regarding female athletes “not being as good as men” or women’s sports (for example snowboarding at the Olympics) being perceived as “boring”.  It made me reflect on Title IX, which as first written, didn’t have anything to do with sports at all but that is what it became known for.

Some history (source Wikipedia):  The first person to introduce Title IX in Congress was its author and chief Senate sponsor, Senator Birch Bayh of Indiana.  Bayh was working on the Equal Rights Amendment and abolishing discriminatory treatment based on gender however was having difficulty getting the bill out of committee.  Since the Higher Education Act was on the floor of the Senate already, Bayh introduced an amendment, Title IX which said:

No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving federal financial assistance…

In his remarks on the Senate floor, Bayh said, “We are all familiar with the stereotype of women as pretty things who go to college to find a husband, go on to graduate school because they want a more interesting husband, and finally marry, have children, and never work again. The desire of many schools not to waste a ‘man’s place’ on a woman stems from such stereotyped notions. But the facts absolutely contradict these myths about the ‘weaker sex’ and it is time to change our operating assumptions….an equal chance to attend the schools of their choice, to develop the skills they want, and to apply those skills with the knowledge that they will have a fair chance to secure the jobs of their choice with equal pay for equal work”. 

Title IX became law on June 23, 1972.  At that time, less than 2% of women participated in athletics. There were several subsequent attempts to exempt revenue sports from the impact of Title IX (Tower Amendment) and it wasn’t until 1988 when the Civil Rights Restoration Act was passed that it was fully implemented. 1988… By then I was 25 years old and had two children.  1988…this isn’t ancient history, in fact, it is barely history at all.

People still don’t get it.   It isn’t about sports.  When I hear the conversation that women aren’t as “athletic” or that women’s sports don’t have the same excitement, it makes my blood boil. I have actually heard someone recently say that “women have their place” and that it isn’t in sports known as “men’s sports”.  When the Seattle Seahawks won the Superbowl and the press reported that it was the first national championship Seattle had won since the Sonics won the national championship for basketball, they totally disregarded the two National Championships the Seattle Storm has won.  And I repeat…this isn’t about sports… it is about respect.  As much as I love my Seahawks, it makes me want to never give my money or time attending or watching another Hawks game without first giving equal time and respect to the Storm.

Regardless whether you are a man or a woman, whether you stay at home or work a job, if you like or hate sports, if you are conservative or liberal, that isn’t what Title IX is about.  It is about choice.  It is about having the choice and freedom to participate in the activity you want to participate in, go to the school you want to attend, have the same chance to get hired for a job you are qualified for, or to stay home and take care of your family regardless of your gender.  Title IX is about equal rights for all people regardless of gender.  It isn’t about wanting to stay home with your family, there is nothing wrong with that and equal rights doesn’t mean losing that. It is about having a choice.

When I was in high school, women made less than 50 cents for every dollar a man did. Now, that is at 72 cents.  Progress right?  Wrong.  That means for a man who is making $20 a hour that is $800 a week, a little over $40,000 a year… for a woman in that same job, it would be $14.40 an hour or $576 a week which is less than $30,000.  That is a big difference.

It would be really easy to get complacent and say “we have come a long way” or “I am happy with my life now”.  I look at my granddaughters and I want better for them. I don’t want to stop fighting until they have the opportunity to make the same pay for the same job, until they can be a NASCAR driver if they want to without being seen as a “pretty token who actually can’t drive”, until they can get Red Bull to build them their own snowboarding park and sponsor them at the same level they sponsor a male snowboarder.  I want them to know a world where people give credence to their accomplishments, not because they are beautiful or because they wear the right clothes, but because of who they ARE.

So today, if you have a choice in your life to marry the person you want to marry, to go to the school you want to attend if you are qualified, or to participate fully in a sport, then take a moment to thank those of us who are in our 50-70’s who fought for you to have that freedom.  Thank those of us that played sports in skirts because we weren’t allowed to wear shorts but we did it anyway. Ask us about what it was like, our generation won’t be around much longer to fight the battle for you. Take time to thank the men and women who believe the world would be better if we didn’t belittle half of our population. And by the way…you are welcome.

And then do us a favor…don’t stop fighting.  Whether you are a man, woman, a career person or a stay-at-home caregiver… don’t stop fighting until we all have the right to live our best life, unrestricted by gender constraints, unbound, free and equal.  That goes for the man who wants to stay home with his kids while his wife works as well as the woman who doesn’t want kids but wants to be an engineer, or a NASCAR driver, or a snowboarder… and for equity’s sake, stop disparaging women in sports or objectifying them.  Treat them as equal human beings. Please. And go to a women’s sporting event, even if you are bored, just to show your support.  Do it to support all those of us who came before… who have sacrificed and fought so that women can earn $0.72 for every dollar a man does.  And don’t stop fighting even after we are gone.

An elimination diet for your soul…

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Have you ever done an elimination diet?  It is an extreme diet that people do when they are having digestion problems or allergies and want to isolate what particular foods are causing their distress.  The dieter takes their nutrition down to the basics for a few weeks and then add in foods one at a time to see what particular foods are contributing to their physical difficulties. It is really hard, but it make so much sense.  How else will they figure out what makes them feel good or bad so they can make adjustments?  It is virtually impossible when you are eating all your regular foods to isolate the combinations that are problematic.  Before people go to that extreme, they start with a food journal, writing down what they ate and how they feel, but when that doesn’t work, it is time for an elimination diet.

Right now with everything I have done in the past year, I feel like I have been on an elimination diet for my soul and I am finally at the place where I get to add stuff back in, slowly and deliberately with one thing being added in at a time.  That way, I get to try it, see how it feels, and decide if it makes me feel good enough to keep in my life. When I got back, I started off too fast, trying to go right back to the life I had.  But as Matt reminded me recently, I am not that person anymore.  So after Jan 1, I have been being a lot more deliberate in my actions and in the relationships I am cultivating.

So what have I added back?

16625_10100900261346063_799026473_nSkiing: I have been doing a lot of skiing by myself and with just a few very close friends.  It has renewed my love for the sound of the snow under my skis, the smell of the mountain air, the breathtaking views,  the solitude when I am alone, and just the whole body sensation of flying down a mountain.  I love to ski. The last couple of years I allowed myself to get too wrapped up in the social aspect of skiing and needed to step away.  It is really a joy to reconnect with the sport I love on its elemental level.

Yesterday, I got my bike ready to ride and I am going to ride either tomorrow or Saturday.  The only thing I love as much as skiing is riding my bike.  I don’t need to go fast, climb better than anyone else, dress in appropriate attire or any of that stuff that cyclists worry about.  Getting caught up in all that made me hate riding my bike.  I just love the feeling of being outdoors, braving the weather, feeling like I am one with the machine that is making me fly along, just pure joy coursing through my body as my heart, lungs and legs make me remember that I am alive.  It makes me feel like I am a 10 year old.  This time, I am going to take the advice of my friend, Cindy and make time for pie at the end of a ride.

Kerry Park view

Kerry Park view

I have been enjoying going to some of the great places that I love in Seattle, happy hours up on the Hill with Tony, going up to Kerry Park for meditation and reflection, riding the ferries, the beauty of rural Snohomish County, the jaw-dropping views of the Cascades and Olympics, cooking in a real kitchen again, sharing laughter and a meal with my roommate and her daughter, building a fire, chopping and stacking wood, and learning how to knit.  These are all things I am keeping.

But it hasn’t been easy.  I have struggled and even messed up a few times. The other day, I bought sheets and a blanket.  Now I own household stuff again.  I have to admit, it was a little traumatizing.  It made me feel tied down.  I made it worse when I then watched “Into the Wild” for the first time and it made me feel REALLY tied down.  I have struggled with trying to work on a grant and a few publications.  But mostly, I have struggled when the people who know me from my former life put pressure on me to be the way I was.  I don’t want to be that person anymore. I don’t want to say yes to everyone and allow people to treat me badly just so that I won’t offend anyone or let anyone down. Because ultimately, when I act that way, all I am doing is letting myself down.  That has meant culling some relationships that aren’t healthy for me which has hurt people because they don’t understand why I am not just like I used to be.  It is hard not having any answers for them of when I will want to do things again, because the honest answer is that I may never want to do some things again.

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Olympics and a Washington State ferry in the Puget Sound

Right now, all I know right now is this, I feel better than I ever remember feeling.  I am making decisions based on strength and on what I really want to do.  My past doesn’t control me, fear doesn’t control me, and my choices are my own.  So I guess, the elimination diet for the soul is working so far.

You’ve got to dance with the one that brung ya…

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You’ve got to dance with the one that brung ya…I have always liked that phrase.  To me, it is a reminder to do what is right even when others would suggest otherwise and to be loyal to those in my life who have helped me get where I am.

The reality of my life is that I got to where I am…a person having great adventures, happy, centered, feeling, and living every moment… because of all the things that have happened to me.  Take away any part and I wouldn’t be me.  I have spent a lot of time bemoaning things especially when I am at low points like when I am scared or lonely… but bemoaning and regrets are not only futile, they take away from my power to be who I think I am and that I want to be.  And that is my goal, to be the person I think I am.

One of the things that got me here is the loss of my marriage to someone who I loved with all my heart which was the catalyst for change, good change that brought me to where I am at this moment.  That path to change started with marriage therapy, it was the first dance that got me here.

I am not a big fan of the mental health care system even though I have several close friends who are therapists and I respect and appreciate what they do.  One of my major concerns is that there is too much power given to the therapist with the assumption that they will act with ethics but no policing of that system unless a client complains.  However there is little client education of boundaries and appropriate behavior so when the therapist crosses a boundary, the client takes it on trust that the therapist knows what they are doing, even if the situation feels icky and uncomfortable.  The trust required in the therapeutic relationship allows therapists to wield enormous psychological influence which, when handled correctly, produces the magic of positive change in people’s lives.  But when handled incorrectly can produce devastating results.  I know because it is what happened to me.

I trusted my marriage therapist with all my heart, way more than I should have ever trusted a service provider. I told him all of my secrets, things that I had never told any living person.  As a result, therapy was very successful for me, although not so much for my marriage.  I sent him daily journals via email, he said it helped make him a better therapist knowing all my thoughts.  I paid him even though he was still in graduate school and shouldn’t have accepted money.  When therapy “ended” when I moved to Seattle, I continued to communicate with him weekly and send him my journals.  A couple of months later, he moved to Seattle where we started riding mountain bikes, kayaking, skiing, I introduced him to my social group, I watched his dog every weekend, took him to dinner, he stored his stuff in my house and even stayed at my house.  In all of this, I paid for everything.   All the while I was still sending him my journals and telling him my problems. In my mind he was still my therapist.

We first crossed the major boundary the night before Thanksgiving in 2007 when we went out drinking and he got hammered. When I drove him home, we stayed up talking until after 3 am.  That started a three year “friendship”.  Multiple times I told him that it didn’t “feel” right, that I couldn’t separate the therapist from the “friend”.  He would assure me that it was all in my head.  And he was right, it was.  In my head, I knew it was wrong.  So I found another therapist to help me figure that out.  She reported him to the licensing board. The state of Washington found that I was an “isolated incident, unlikely to happen again” so he can keep his practice. End of story. Except that it wasn’t.

For me, the loss of this person who had been so instrumental to me, who I had trusted without question, was psychologically and emotionally one of the most devastating ordeals of my life. I almost didn’t make it.  It was with the help of a bunch of people from an online bike forum that I found my voice and my power again. I can never repay what they gave me, freely, without knowing me or expecting anything from me in return.

Needless to say, there have been some huge violations of trust for me from the mental health community. So what I am about to do scares the absolute daylights out of me.  I have realized that, although I have the best life ever, there are a couple of areas that I could work on to make it even better. And I need some help with that.  So I am leaping…I made an appointment and I am going back to therapy.  This time, I am armed with knowledge of what therapy should and should not be. This time, I am going to therapy from a position of strength, not in a moment of weakness. I won’t allow myself to be preyed upon because I am not the same person anymore (thanks Matt for the reminder). It is time I learn how to trust again.

And so I am dancing… with the one that brung me… not the former exploitative therapist, but with the mental health care profession in general. I am taking the risk to be able to have the life I want.  My goal is to be the person that I believe I am.

Going home…

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I am returning home indefinitely.  I am not sure where I am going next or even if I am going anywhere for awhile.  I am ready to be in one place for a time.  I want to work on my fitness, getting in shape for spring cycling and doing some skiing, and I want to work on some research and grant writing.  It is hard to do that from the road.  I have been gone from Seattle and basically homeless since May.  After 6 months, I am ready to have a consistent place to lay my head at night and a routine in my life.  So I am going home to a new place to live and a new attitude for how to live my life.

I have learned so much over the past 6 months. I have learned about people and the world around me, but mostly, I have learned about myself. I have learned where my weak spots are and where my strengths lie. I have learned about the person I want to be and the type of people I want to have in my life.

I return home a very different person than when I left. I am stronger, happier, centered, confident, and ready to take on the next third of my life …or at least, I am ready to take on tomorrow.  During my travels I have felt lonely, depressed, joyful, empowered, scared, loved, accepted, energized, amazed, sad, awed, and just about every emotion there is.  I have overcome every obstacle and pushed myself to do things that I never would have thought I was brave enough to do.  I have looked at some of the most wondrous things on the planet. I have had experiences that are so unique that they almost defy my ability to describe them.  I have experienced a complete sense of wonder about people, the planet, and about myself.

I return home proud of myself and happy with who I am.  In a world where we can be anything we want, the best thing we can choose to be is ourselves.

A few take-aways that I was musing about on my ride from Maine to Boston:

  • Traveling can be stressful and scary.  Traveling by yourself even more so.  Yet at the same time, it seems easier somehow.  I only had myself to deal with, make decisions for, and my happiness was my own responsibility.  I could make decisions on the fly, no consultation with fellow travelers necessary. I made choices and shifted gears at a moments notice.  It made me more spontaneous, carefree, and responsible for how I felt.
  • Traveling by yourself makes you feel vulnerable.  For me, someone who has always liked the opportunity to be in control with everything perfectly planned, this was really very hard.  One of the biggest things I learned is how to live in and accept each present moment and the uncontrollable nature of life.  Because I allowed myself to become vulnerable, the world became more dynamic, less static and life just happened.  What was amazing was that I didn’t fight it, I just rolled and flowed with it.  I was alive in a way that was wonderful and compelling and I want to keep that feeling with me always.  I want to remember it when I mired in research, faculty meetings, and personal drama.
  • People are the same all over the world. Their culture, politics, religion, values, etc might be different, but the basics of humanity are the same.  No matter where you go or who you meet, there is common ground in our humanness if we are willing to set aside all our judgments and just listen to each other with acceptance, tolerance, openness and love.
  • Getting pushed out of my comfort zone was scary, necessary, healthy and will become part of my everyday life.  Facing my fears, one-by-one or sometimes in multiples, is the only way to get beyond them and move forward.  I can’t avoid and pretend they don’t exist or I am mired in my troubles indefinitely.  Fear will never rule my life again. If I give in to fear, it owns me.  I want to be free.

I am sure I will have more in the future…but it is time to board a plane.

Adventure of the day…

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Sorry for being so absent about writing this blog.  I have been distracted by having adventures with a beautiful set of two-and-a half-year-old twins.

I have mentioned that for a long time I was stuck in longing for my old life back.  Even though I kept plodding along seemingly moving forward with my life, my heart was still wrapped in memories of the past. To those looking from the outside, it might seem like that time of longing was wasted, but it wasn’t.  Everything is a process. For me, letting go of my life took a period of grieving and mourning.  It took me a while to go through that process but it was absolutely necessary to be able to actually move on.  Even when I was mired in that process and it seemed like I was stuck, I have come to realize that I didn’t keep standing still and I am proud of that. I made some mistakes, had some successes, and even though my heart was caught up in another time, I kept moving forward regardless. Or maybe, it was just that my friends kept shoving me forward but either way the result has been the same.  Here I am.

P1080687Today, I am packing to leave my son’s house after a lovely visit with my son and his beautiful wife and the two most amazing grandchildren in the whole world (I might have mentioned that before). Although I am sad to be leaving, this time it isn’t the soul-sucking sadness that it has been in the past where I was pining for my life back. This time, it is different. I know that I will wrap these memories up from this visit and all the love they contain and I will keep them close to my heart while I am living the life I am in right now at this moment, confident that I always have the love of my family. And I know that someday soon, Patrick, Heather, Brooklyn, and Charlotte are going to come to visit me in Seattle and we will make a whole host of new memories.

So I am heading to Boston to visit some friends and play tourist in a city that I have loved since I was a teenager in New England.  Then I am heading to Maine to see my family and to do something that I never ever thought I would do.  I am going to go to a party where I will see all my friends from high school that I haven’t seen in 33 years. I have had a few pangs of trepidation, wondering what to heck I am doing that for, but then I realize it is a great story collecting opportunity. And that is what life is, a collection of stories.

You see, high school isn’t for everyone and it certainly wasn’t a great time for me. Having been the victim of an early sexual assault as a pre-teen, I turned to drugs and alcohol at a very young age because I didn’t know how to handle the emotions of what had happened to me.  My parents went through a difficult divorce, my dad remarried, and I just spiraled out of control. So my memories of high school and my friends memories of me aren’t the greatest. I wasn’t a very nice person.  But here is the thing…I am not that girl anymore.

So I get to go back and meet these people again.  I am a new person and so are they.  We get to laugh and enjoy each other’s company.  I will get to hear their stories of how their lives have evolved; stories of love and loss, joy and heartbreak. I want to listen and understand who they are as people. I want to know what touches their soul.  It is an opportunity to make new friends all over again.  So even with my moments of trepidation, I find that I am really looking forward to the opportunity.  I want to see them with new eyes and an open heart and hopefully, they will be able to look at me the same way.

Then, after spending some time with my extraordinary brothers and their families, I am heading back to Seattle to see my beautiful daughter and her amazing partner Ethan and their new puppy.  I am going to visit with my friends and do some skiing and spend Christmas at Tony and Ken’s beautiful home.  I get to ride my bike and talk math education with Keri. I have to say, I am looking forward to being back in Seattle.

Everything is different.  It is like my life is brand new. Every day is an adventure.

The best kind of guide…

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A few years ago, the day after I took my first and only powder skiing lesson and while I was still only a comfortable blue run skier, my friend Matt and I went up to Stevens Pass where, on the first run of the day after a foot of new snow, Matt suggests we go up Seventh Heaven, an ungroomed, black diamond run.  Matt, with his usual encouragement says “Robin, you can totally do this, I will stay right beside you the whole time”.  We get off the chair at the top, Matt straps his boots into his snowboard and he is gone…I got down that mountain by myself solely for the purpose of wringing his neck when I finally got to the bottom.  His response to me, “but you did it, and now you know you can do it again”.  I swear I don’t know why I listen to that kid sometimes.

When Matt suggested I come to Nepal, his words were “come to Nepal, I will be your guide. You just get here, I will take care of the rest”.  Yeah, I still haven’t learned yet.  When I got to Nepal, as typical of the way he “guides” me, he starts off by getting us a bus ride to Pokhara where he asks me, “did you get a hotel room”?  Hmmm…. is this part of the “you’ll take care of everything plan?”.  Typically, it was like that with everything that happened in the two weeks I was there. The kid had no plan at all… or did he?  I joked with him one day and asked exactly what “kind of guide he was” since he pretty left me to figure everything out on my own and to handle all the crises that came up.  His answer: “I am the best kind of guide”.  I am still trying to figure out whether the boy is a brilliant or just an accidental genius.  Either way, once again, it worked.

But it takes coming home to truly realize how far you’ve come.  The greatest gift of travel isn’t the adventure, new countries, languages, foods, customs, etc… or all the things that traveling brings.  Those are all great but are only part of the real gift of travel.  The real gift is returning home, forever changed.  I am very proud of where I am at this moment.

P1080585So where am I? Physically, I recently returned to my son’s home in North Carolina to spend Thanksgiving (American) with my son and my lovely daughter-in-law and the two most amazing grandchildren ever, Brooklyn and Charlotte.

I have been here less than 48 hours and I am already amazed at how I feel. In the past, when I visited my son, who lives in my former marital home, I was always bombarded with memories and thoughts of how life “should have worked out for me”.  I had always expected to be living in this house, happily married to the man I loved, celebrating holidays like Thanksgiving and Christmas with our children and grandchildren coming to visit us. I would ride past the university I went to and used to teach for and just be overwhelmed with missing the friends I had, the job I was great at, the life I loved, all of it.  I would long for my past life back. I hadn’t realized how much that longing was holding me back until now.

The night I cried to Matt in Nepal, something changed in me. Maybe it was the yoga and meditation or maybe it was the stark conditions of the country and pushing myself through physical difficulty and preserving.  red scarfMaybe it was the spiritual nature of hiking up to the World Peace Pagoda or up to the top of Sarankot or maybe it was the awe-inspiring site of looking out at the Himalayas which is a sight I will never forget as long as I live. himalayasMaybe it happened while I as paragliding with vultures or when I fell off the side of the cliff and was hanging by the vegetation and lost my shoes and had to walk back to my hotel barefoot. Maybe it happened through just overcoming obstacles and crises and realizing that I could face any challenge on my own.  Regardless, sometime during that time, something changed.

IMG_3305I knew I felt different when I left Nepal and went to Barcelona, I just didn’t realize how different I was until I came back into the familiar environment in which I spent almost half my life.  The familiarity of that world was in stark contrast to the person I have become. Now, I sit in this house and it glows with the energy and vitality of my grandchildren and the love my son and his wife share.  IMG_3259I got to meet my ex-husband’s lovely and charming girlfriend and watch them interact with my two beautiful granddaughters who love them dearly.  I couldn’t help but feel joy in my heart for all of it, for such a loving and happy family.  It is something I never could have imagined over the darkness of the past 6 years.

I look around this place where I used to live. I have appreciated the beautiful changing seasons, the friendliness of the people, the beauty of the campus and know that I hold no attachment to it other than in appreciation of the memories of all the wonderful times I spent here.  It was a wonderful place to raise two beautiful, well-adjusted children, and where I had the opportunity for an amazing career teaching high school and the start of my college teaching career. It is a place where I had spectacular friends and experiences, and where I loved and laughed and lived over half of my life.

IMG_3318Life is sweet, all of it, the good and the bad.  Because of everything that happened, my beautiful daughter got to finish college, start a great career, and meet her amazing partner Ethan. Everything that happened gave me an opportunity to fall in love with the PNW and all the remarkable treasures that area of the world holds. It gave me the chance to reach down into the most creative part of myself and take risks in my career. It has given me a wealth of new experiences and friends that I never would have otherwise met.

I am more centered, happy, confident, peaceful, and accepting than I have ever been in my whole life. Traveling and returning home has made me that much more aware of how great a gift my life has been.

Namaste

From a friend…

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Greetings from Wichita Falls, TX!

The first time I met Robin was in a bar in Paso Robles, CA. Although I had never met her (we began our friendship online), I felt I knew her well. In the heat of my impending divorce, she became one of my closest pen pals, offering emotional support and advice to get through the turmoil that had replaced what I thought was a very good life. Little did I know that meeting her would change how I live and redefine my personality.

It all started with a sexy black dress. That black dress revealed an artistic truth (her tattoo) I was unaware of. I don’t know what I expected, but the person I met was both exactly who I thought she was and someone completely different than anticipated. With a warm hug, the Internet personality was replaced by a living, breathing individual possessing warmth, depth, and vulnerability. I do not believe she realized this at the time, but she instantly became one of my most cherished friends. We mingled throughout the bar that night, meeting people from various parts who came together for the joy of cycling. What struck me the most was how engaged Robin was in every conversation. She listened to everyone, invested 100% in the subject matter at hand. Robin’s sincerity was new to me. I began to realize that most of the people I knew – colleagues, friends, etc. – just did not possess the emotional investment in others that Robin invests. In a word, I immediately trusted her.

After some great riding, we gathered as a group to celebrate the day’s events. I remember feeling isolated. I am a large guy, a former football player, not exactly the typical cyclist. I felt out of place. Sitting on the steps of the porch, drinking a beer, Robin came over, sat down beside me, and we quickly moved into a deep conversation, relaying our fears, our hurt, and how we planned on moving on. I don’t remember exactly how it happened, but she mentioned her sabbatical, a yearlong event that was to be an awakening, an exploration of the world. As I often do, I offered to help her move out of her apartment, even though I lived 1200 miles away. I really didn’t think she would take me up on the offer. But she did. A few weeks later, I was in Seattle (my favorite city), immersed in Robin’s life…. and her stuff. Between eating great food, seeing her favorites spots, and meeting her wonderful friends and family, we went through all of her possessions, slowly purging all of the things that were a part of a former life. In the end, everything that she owned was in a small corner of a one-bedroom apartment. Her purge was truly impressive.

The purging process was at times very emotional, and other times, funny as hell. (Robin: remember the jean shorts argument?) Most of all, it was courageous. Robin’s courage to change EVERYTHING in her life, to move on from the shackles of a former existence, impressed upon me how much metaphorical baggage we carry. This is not to say there was no fear; she commented many times how she didn’t believe she could do it. Yet, she never wavered from her commitment to see it through. Robin’s belief in herself and her ability to rise above fear should never be underestimated. She once said to me that it isn’t about the absence of fear, but the acceptance of fear, fear that is a natural part of who we are.

As I have moved into a new job, new city, new relationship, a new design for how I plan to live my life, I cannot thank Robin enough for her influence on me and on the lives of others. In reality, she helped save me from myself. I volunteered to help write a blog entry before I actually thought it through. I didn’t think she would hop on board with it so quickly. And while I feel my life is rather mundane in comparison to Robin’s experiences, I thought this would be a great opportunity to explain to her how much her friendship means to me, and that, while absent physically, those who read this blog travel with her in spirit. Robin has lived more in the past year than most do in a lifetime, sharing her experiences and vulnerability without succumbing to the fear, and for that, Robin, I thank you. I am humbled and can only hope I live up to the standard which you have set.

Matt (the other one)

Take bigger steps…

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I had that excellent falconry lesson and paragliding experience the other day.  Then I wrote a blog post about how great I was doing and the lessons I was learning.  Well just like with most lessons learned, it isn’t a linear process.

When I was in Spain, totally at rock bottom emotionally, Matt asked how I was doing and, in the absolute honesty he and I share between us, I said “It is one step forward, three steps back”.  His response was “take bigger steps forward”.  He always knows how the right thing to say to make me feel better and to make me laugh.  Then he said “come to Nepal”.  And as with most of his suggestions, he was right.  Nepal has been good for my soul.  I not only feel better physically, I feel stronger emotionally.  But it hasn’t been without challenges.  Here it is has been two steps forward one step back, so at least I am going forward.

Have you ever noticed how powerful words are?  I think it was in my last blog post that I talked about the tape that plays in my head (and every other human beings also).  That tape is made up of things that have been said to me over the course of my life.  From the initial words our parents used to show disapproval of something we said or did, from social groups of teenagers when identity is forming, to cruel words by a random stranger on the street. All of those words become the social norms that tell us we aren’t good enough, skinny enough, athletic enough, pretty enough, etc.  And even more damaging is when we get to the place where we say those words to ourselves.

Words are the most powerful force that human beings possess.  Because of that power, we should be careful what we do with them, both with other people and ourselves.  Ever since I left Ethiopia, I have had the “failure” tape cued up in my head. One of the personal “laws” I have always lived by, that was instilled in me as a child, is never quitting.  When I give someone my loyalty, I will stay with it until the bitter end, even at the expense of myself.  Enforcing boundaries is a constant struggle for me.  So Ethiopia felt like a failure.  It threw me into depression.  To snap out of it, I rushed off to Spain where I had one failure after another, from cycling to ordering tapas.  I kept trying to get out of my head but was pretty much in a death spiral.

So I came to Nepal at Matt’s suggestion.  I made it here, negotiated travel between two foreign countries on my own, had a successful falconry lesson and paragliding session, and was feeling pretty confident and better than I had in weeks. Things were looking up. Then, two things happened.  One was a comment someone made and the other was that I went to yoga.  The comment came from someone behind me while hiking in a group down an embankment into a riverbed. The path was very slippery.  The person in the back, speaking to the person in front of her about the slippery path said “I would hate to have to try to get a tourist out of here if they got hurt.  Can you imagine something happening to someone like Robin?” Ouch.  That started the not athletic, uncoordinated, old lady tape playing in my head.  And of course, about 2 minutes later I slipped and fell on my ass, unhurt.

Then, I went to yoga.  I used to be pretty good at yoga but it is amazing how much a year off of regular practice will do to you. And the yoga here is very different.  The teacher was great and I left the class happy, centered and ready to face the day.  But before the day was out my own judgment of my performance was in full swing.  Matt was leaving the next day for Shirkot so messaged me to ask me what time I wanted to eat dinner.  By then, I was all in my own head and couldn’t even imagine he would want to hang out with an athletically challenged, ugly, fat old lady.  *CUE DRAMATIC MUSIC*.  Dear heavens, sometimes I have to wonder about myself.

So I meet my friend for dinner.  If you haven’t realized it yet, Matt is good at everything he does.  His lovely girlfriend Amanda and I were trying to think of something he isn’t good at and we couldn’t.  He is amazingly athletic, ridiculously smart, not ugly, funny, compassionate, and has to be the most non-judgmental person I have ever known in my whole life.  During dinner, he said I seemed sad. Since I refuse to be anything but honest with him, by the time we ate dinner, I was crying and had told him how pathetic I was.  I had even regressed all the way to hating traveling and wanting to go home and wanting my life back.  I mean, all the way back to before I moved to Washington.  Matt didn’t judge, didn’t roll his eyes, didn’t even crack a smile at how dramatic I was being.  He just let me get all the poison out.  Then he made me laugh and reminded me about the last existential crisis I had when we went skiing one day last year.

Later that evening, nice and emotionally cleansed, I started thinking about all the adventures we have had together.  From kayaking, skiing, paragliding, rock climbing, hiking, camping, riding on a motorcycle in Nepal (YIKES), wine tasting, and a hundred other things.  We have had epic discussions on life, love, family, education, and just about everything you can think of.  And then it hit me.  In all that time, he has never judged me on how much I weigh, how slow I am at learning something like rolling a boat or tying a knot, or criticized any of my opinions of things even when they didn’t agree with his. He has never been frustrated at how slowly I hike or when I need to take a break.  He has never been embarrassed by my physical appearance.  There was the time Matt wanted to go out for brunch after kayaking but I didn’t have a ponytail holder so tried to beg off and he wouldn’t hear of it.  When my hair dried in the sunshine, it was crazy medusa hair.  He looked up at me and said “your hair is so awesome”.  I looked like Albert Einstein.  He has never been anything but encouraging. Here is this person, athletic, smart, funny…and he just wants to hang out and encourages me. He only gets sad when I won’t try.  So if he doesn’t have the “Robin’s not good enough” tape playing in his head, why do I?

So while he has been gone the past couple of days, I took a page from his book.  I decided I would treat myself like Matt treats me. Yesterday, I hiked up to the Peace Pagoda.  The path was moderate, but I was definitely sweating by the time I reached the top.  I just went at my own pace, I didn’t beat myself up about how fast or slow I was going.  Guidebook says it should take about an hour, I made it in 45 minutes with no pressure.  Today, I got up at dawn and hiked up Sarangkot which is about twice as steep and twice as far.  Again, I didn’t beat myself up, just kept hiking and enjoying the moment.  Made it before the clouds set in, took some great pictures and sat up at the top meditating and then wrote in my journal.  I had planned to take a cab down, but it was too beautiful a day so I hiked back down too.  It made me feel so good that tomorrow, after yoga, I am going to do it again.

So for two days now, whenever the tape even starts with what I can’t do, I tell myself to try…just try.  Maybe I can’t do it, but I will do a little more tomorrow until I can. It doesn’t matter how fast I do it or how well. I just have to try.  I am going reprogram my brain with powerful words that don’t allow for fear-based thinking. I am trying to develop an identity that has no place for emotionally poisoning and physically limiting words.

Note:  Not sure why, either wordpress or the network here, but I am not having any success at uploading photos.  I will try to add some tomorrow.

Like the layers of an onion…

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I am always amazed when life lets me hear exactly what I need to hear exactly at the moment I need and am ready to hear it. I don’t know why that amazes me because it happens all the time.  For me, it happens when I feel like I have reached the bottom.  Maybe that is the only time in my life that I stop struggling and just let go trying to control everything and just allow myself to BE.  That is when I can hear what I need to hear.

It was funny, I had been stressing about filling up the next two weeks in Andalucía for the last two weeks. Nothing I tried to book worked, from my B&B reservations that got cancelled, to my debit card not working to book my train tickets, etc.  If all those frustrating things hadn’t happened, I would still be miserably stressing over how to fill up my days. Because of my frustration, I lamented that to Matt in a message a few days ago and he said, “come to Nepal” and I said, “if I can work the details out I will”. After all the frustration I had in Spain, I thought there was no way in hell I would be able to organize a trip to Nepal in 3 days, I hadn’t even been able to get a hotel room in Granada. Yet amazingly, all the plans just fell into place, like this was exactly what I was supposed to do at this moment.  Funny how that happens.

Now I sit here, all checked in for tomorrow’s early morning flight.  I have to admit, I am looking forward to seeing my friend even just for a couple of days.

I process things in a cyclical fashion, maybe we all do. It is like a spiral, where I go round and round with an issue, thinking I have got it solved, until it rears its head again. Only when I look at it closely, it isn’t quite the same, it is better than it was, just not finished yet. And it keeps spiraling around and around getting tighter and tighter, kind of like being caught in a whirlpool or a black hole, until all of a sudden, it is actually gone and isn’t an issue anymore.  In this case, my struggle has been with the same old thing that I have been whining about for months, maybe years… my attachment to the past and the way life “should” be.

And then, a couple of days ago, this is what someone told me about my “stuckness”:

Start with what is clogging you up, figure out what isn’t relevant to your life or is harmful to your well-being.  If it is still there, there is a reason.  Find it, learn that reason and then find another way to acquire that need and then get rid of what isn’t relevant. When that thing is out of your life, look again at what is holding you back.  Layer by layer, like the layers of an onion, peel away what is in your life by habit that serves you no purpose, refine what is left so you understand what’s their use. In the end it should get very slim.

Remember you are not letting go of the love or the lessons, only the attachment. Some people need to stay in your life, not because of your need but theirs.  Some people need to go, not because you don’t love them but because they aren’t good for you or you for them. Be gentle but strong, lovingly push them away, send them with good wishes and a prayer but walk away. By giving people their freedom and letting go of things you find your own freedom, even though it is the last thing you planned.

Yeah… that did it.  I felt like I had been shot from a proverbial cannon.  What hit me was that is what I have been doing ever since I started this journey when I started giving up all my stuff.  I have been methodically peeling away all the layers.  With each challenge I have faced, I am more and more exposed to the core of what I am.  There is nothing left to hide behind.  I have finally reached the really, really hard internal attachments that I still cling to.  And basically, I am stuck because I don’t really want to face them. I have been blaming the lack of home and physical possessions, but it isn’t the “stuff”… things like money and furniture… where I am stuck is my story and who I believe I am and the disconnect between that and who I want to be.

I knew this would be the hardest part.  And it is. It makes giving up my physical stuff from my apartment look like it was a walk in the park.  Yikes.  I will say it again, because I personally need the reminder, life is exactly as it should be.

The girl who wrote a blog…

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Have you ever climbed stairs?  When I used to work out with my favorite trainer, he loved to make me work out on this stair machine at the gym.  I hated that machine.  I would climb and climb and never go anywhere, I would just be profoundly sweaty in the end, even after just about 3 minutes.  Even though externally I didn’t get anywhere, internally, I gained lot in terms of fitness (thanks Chip). Stairs are hard work. It takes a lot of effort.  Making huge changes like developing a new identity, or even small ones requires steps and those steps feel like climbing a staircase, and it is hard.  I sweat and breathe hard and want to stop and take a break, but just like on that stair machine, if I stop, I go right back down to the bottom.

I read this great blog last night.  It was called Life Divided by Zero. All I could think of is how smart and creative the author is and I wondered, where to hell is she now??  Because none of those words felt consistent with how I am behaving. I have been going down the stairs, or at the very least trying to rest on the step I have gained without going further.

I have realized that I am trying to make a huge change and transition in my life.  There are steps to doing that.  Steps require climbing.  I climbed to the top of step one which was figuring out who I wanted to be and pictured it, visualizing my life as I want it to be.  Then, I made a mistake, I stayed comfortably on that step, magically just waiting for my life to be transformed.  Yeah, it doesn’t work that easily. When I reread the words I had written that “I had to let go of all I am in order to become who I want to be”, it hit me.  I need to climb to the next step.  I know who I want to be and I can visualize it.

Step two, I have to figure out what is holding me back. When I went through my physical stuff last spring, I allowed myself a set amount of space (8 boxes) and then I picked up each thing I owned and asked myself a question: Is this important enough to go in one of those 8 boxes?  From the answer to that question I made three piles: the things I was sure I wanted to keep, the things I was sure I wanted to discard that weren’t working for me anymore, and the things I wasn’t sure of. Then I packed what I wanted to keep, discarded those items that didn’t work, and did a second culling of the “not sure of” pile. It was the hardest thing I have ever done.

Just like when I got rid of my physical stuff, I have to go through my internal self. What are the internal and external barriers to becoming the person I want to be? What am I still clinging to in my old life, why am I clinging to it, what purpose is it still serving me?  I have to examine my internal beliefs, attitudes, self-talk, memories, and all the things that are barriers to moving on.  It isn’t just giving up stuff, it is giving up resting in the dysfunction I have been living with in order to keep from doing the work needed to become who I want to be.

This step is even harder than the step where I gave up all my physical stuff.  This step requires going through all that emotional baggage I carry around with me packed up nice and tight in my internal Sampsonite. I have to open it up, expose it, and go through the mental exercise of examining each piece and separating it those same three piles: those things which work for me, those things which I need to let go of, and those things which I am not certain of.  Then letting go of that which I am sure isn’t working and then going through another cull and really getting to the minutiae of the parts that I am not certain of.

If I want to be the girl with the guts and courage who could write this blog, if I really want to BE her and not just talk about being her, and if I really want the life I have visualized, I have to go through the internal work.  Change only comes with the internal processing to make the internal consistent with the external.  This is gonna suck.