Word Retreats

{240} lovely lilacs, originally uploaded by jen_maiser.

When I haven't written on this site for a while, when I've allowed it to lie fallow with only a couple of notes here or there, the blog becomes bigger than me.  I'm sure if you have a blog of your own, you can relate.  It becomes less of a casual, day-to-day posting thing and much more of a post-that-you-need-to-conquer-or-else-you-can't-go-on.  You begin to feel guilty for not updating, and begin to feel that you must write something really great in order to make it up to your readers.

I can't promise that, but I can tell you what's been going on in my life where possible.

I've been having a lot of a-ha moments lately, and several of them have come from the amazing people who I read on the Internet.  "Word Retreats," I've been calling them to myself.  The stories or phrases or moments that make me take a deep breath, regroup, and see the world from a slightly new perspective.

Word Retreat #1.  Opt out of the drama.

A couple of weeks ago, I took a super fast trip to Los Angeles.  I had a family obligation on Saturday, and since Sunday was Easter, I stayed in town to have brunch with everyone.  My sister lives over an hour from my mom's house, and we all piled into my grandparents' car to drive up to have brunch with Annie and her boyfriend.

At some point during the trip, I was telling my Aunt about some incident in my life.  "It was a total drama," I told her. 

"You have a lot of that?"  My grandmother, who was sitting next to me in the back seat, asked.

"Drama?  Yes.  A lot,"  I told her.  I'm single, and in my thirties, in the middle of San Francisco.  Between friends and day-to-day life, there tends to be drama, right?

"You know," she said, "the drama is always there.  And you can opt out of it at any point.  You can just let it wash over you.  And you know what?  If you decide that you want it back, the drama will always be there."

Since that day, when she spoke those words I needed to hear, I have really been trying to "opt out of the drama" when possible -- not completely succeeding yet, but at least trying.

Word Retreat #2.  You are a bad ass chick.

This one is years old, but I have been calling on it a lot recently.  There was a moment, about six years ago, when I was having a particularly rough couple days.   My dear friend Molly wrote me a one line e-mail.  It said, "You are a bad ass chick."  For years, I had it pinned to my bulletin board -- a way to remind myself that I was a strong woman who can handle whatever is coming at me.  I don't have it pinned up anymore, but it's ingrained in me.  And it amazes me that the one-line email had such an effect on me.  Not only does it give me strength to remember that I am a bad ass chick, but it reminds me about the power of our words.

Word Retreat #3.  Complicated emotions.

"Here is the truth: I have never had an uncomplicated emotion. 
Love + sorrow + devotion + grief arrive on my doorstep in a single package.
I don't even try to untangle them any more.
Today, I am grateful that I get to feel at all."

When Jennifer Jeffrey wrote this a couple of weeks ago, I let out a huge sigh of relief.  In an email to her later, I wrote, "You have no idea what you did for me by writing this."  Just in those words, in the fact that she admitted to emotional conflict, I felt a sort of permission to be as complicated as I tend to be.

Word Retreat #4.  You are exactly where you need to be.

For about a year and a half, I have had the note pictured here taped to the inside of my bathroom cabinet.  It says "Wherever I am is where I am meant to be."  This morning, I logged into my computer to see the same sort of reminder from the amazing Andrea.  Her post, "A love note to you", was exactly what I needed to hear this morning.

I hope this post finds you all well.  Any word retreats that you've been on lately?