#252: Side by Side

Someone recently asked me what I learned about humans in the last year. Maybe my response wasn’t something I necessarily “learned,” but it was something I more so felt about people and our existence side by side one another. 

I said how, despite us needing to stay physically apart the last eight months, and having to tighten up a mask and go out of our way to ensure we don’t cross paths with someone, ironically I’ve actually somehow felt a huge sense of togetherness. Not just in fighting this pandemic, but in getting through the little challenges and finding ways to help one another make life a bit brighter. Together. 

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Amanda PosaAmanda PosaComment
#250: You Can Drive My Car

I was about 25 when I first heard about the idea of reciprocity. It seemed like a great idea from the cosmic lens — a spiritual, communal, light side version of “quid pro quo”. There was this Pilates training I hoped to do. I was earlier on in my career, and had much more time than money. The studio owner offered me the chance to join the training, and pay for it by working shifts managing the front desk for a number of months. It felt great to have another way to consider trading with someone else. Of course, the barter system only works in certain places and circumstances these days, but it was a relief to have a way to move forward that was out of the expected “ordinary”.

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Corey LoftusCorey LoftusComment
#249: The Art of Showing Up

I remember hearing a few years ago about a virtual doctor being the one to deliver the news to a patient that there was nothing they could do to further her treatment and she would most likely not live until the end of the week (he was correct). The family was quite upset about this. One of my favorite Christian writers and pastors has a big tattoo of Mary Magdalene on her, and she calls her “The Patron Saint of Showing Up.”

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Lauren CulbertsonLauren CulbertsonComment
#247: The Way the Cards Fell

Over a proud 7-year stretch from my 20s into my 30s, NYC was my home. Nicknaming myself a "Midwestern Brooklynite" (to the alarm of many family members) I plunged into growing, learning, and bumping along these tough new boroughs of life.

I really had no intention to call Wisconsin home again. To me, it equated to "moving backward". And once you experience the kind of growth NYC gifts you (and/or shoves in your face) - who wants that?

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Jayme MarkusJayme MarkusComment
#246: Grateful-Themed Anti Pet Peeves ROUND #4

We have always cherished having dinner together as a family and now we try to make dinner something special every night by cooking something we have never done before or ordering out from a restaurant that we’d never tried before, or from a place that we all really love. So every evening at home is now something special!!! - Michiel Plakman

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Amanda PosaAnti Pet PeevesComment
#245: Grateful-Themed Anti Pet Peeves ROUND #3

I will say that I'm intensely grateful for Zoom (and other such technologies) and the people who make them keep working. We all hate being on Zoom every day so much—me no less than anyone else!—but without it, we'd really be in trouble. Not so much on the business end—we WOULD be in trouble there, no doubt, but we'd also find other ways of being and we'd figure out how to move forward—but on the personal end. Not seeing my nieces and nephews grow up would be really, really, really hard. So even though I can't stand our new Zoom lifestyle, I'm still grateful for it and the folks who make it possible. - Flourish Klink

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Amanda PosaComment
#242: Visceral Fall

When I sat down to write, I kept thinking about how visceral this season has felt. How urgent, how moving.. There was arresting beauty, and deep foreboding, and it struck me that those combined experiences ARE autumn itself, so maybe the idea is to seep into it and experience what nature is showing me.

In addition, this wasn’t a usual autumn, as I observed it. The wild animals surrounding our house were acting 100% wacky. When the neighbors sign went up I thought, hmmm, we are all experiencing this season together, and it feels different, together. I took my lead from these oddly behaving animals and started to observe more. This is what came out.

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Brynne ThompsonBrynne ThompsonComment
#241: A Day Well Spent, A Life Well Lived

I’ve been wearing some form of movement tracker, and then smart watch, for the past five years. I’ll admit, at first it was fun to “get my steps in.” Now I think I probably use the timer more often than anything else. (My morning French Press — Hey Siri, 4 minute timer...) I still aim to close my rings every day, but it’s more the fear of failure rather than fun to finish. But if these metrics don’t spark joy, and make me WANT to achieve them, which ones would? What are my own methods for knowing I’m content, happy, and fulfilled? If I could change what 3 things my watch was measuring, I think I might use: movement, sleep, and laughter.

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Brynne ThompsonBrynne ThompsonComment
#239: Thoughts on Democracy As We Enter Election Week

People had told me the lines in Manhattan to vote early were long, but I never expected to see a line this long. It wound around a city block two times, but the tail end stretched across two more. As I got in the line, a poll volunteer told me it could be a four hour wait.

I considered leaving and trying another time - really early one morning right when they opened. But I had a hunch this line was going to be long no matter what. Also to my surprise, no one else was getting out of line, or walking away once they heard how long the wait would be. People just kinda said, “oh gosh, okay” and accepted the future for their next few hours.

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Lauren CulbertsonLauren CulbertsonComment
#237: The Luxury of Boredom

It’s finally been happening lately. Something I haven’t felt for a long time. Maybe not since I was a kid. I know other people have been experiencing it, so this feeling does still exist, somewhere, just not in my experience recently. But there I was, raking the tenth pile of leaves as my kids blew bubbles in the yard when it hit me. This week I felt bored. A couple times, even! And it was wonderful.

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Corey LoftusCorey LoftusComment
#236: Rim to Rim: Random Acts of Kindness and Running as "We"

Running is a big part of my life and I Iove to race. I was especially looking forward to it this year since I had just joined a team in New York city, but COVID caused my plans to change - suddenly the five races I had scheduled and was training for this year were cancelled.

Then Steve called - what do you think about running across the Grand Canyon with a small group of people instead?

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Lauren CulbertsonLauren CulbertsonComment
#235: Nature's Answers

 Back in college, whenever I was most overloaded with coursework, it was no question where I’d go to tackle it. Most of my friends would head straight to the library. Instead, when I was swamped, I went to the swamp. 

 On many stress-induced occasions, I loaded up my backpack, picked up an iced-coffee, and headed to this very spot on campus. There was a table beside a small pond surrounded by cabbage palms, live oaks, and the sounds of lively warblers and murmuring toads.

My fellow students used to turn to me and ask, “How do you not get totally distracted there?”   

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Amanda PosaAmanda PosaComment
#234: "How Are You?"

Some years ago a friend of mine from Denmark (then a recent arrival in the US) asked me, "Why do people ask, how are you, when they don't really want to know?" Ah ha! There was something I had been clearly missing in my day to day transaction. "Hello, how are you?" has become for many people, part of the standard greeting and is usually met with, "Good, fine, ok". Try answering the question with, "Exceptional, outstanding, excellent" and see what type of response you get? Back to my Danish friend. She went on to explain that most people in Denmark would never ask, "How are you?" because they don't want to know how you are doing, and if they did ask, they would wait and listen to the whole story behind why you felt a certain way. Insightful. 

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Joe BruzzeseJoe BruzzeseComment
#233: Renouncing Privacy

“For the sake of others you renounce your privacy…” - Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche 

 

I reread this idea above recently. It stopped me in my tracks.

 

“Why in the world, again, would I renounce my privacy? To help others? Huh?”

 

 

When I think of privacy, I don’t think about medical records or my “data.” I think of my mind and all that runs through it.

Way back when, I was terrified of sharing many of my thoughts.

All the doubts and fears and reactions and anxieties and sadness and hurt and processes and insecurities and mistakes...oh.  

My failures. When I was wrong. When I was responsible for hurting someone. When I was mean…or envious… 

Or when I knew it was right to say, “I’m sorry” and deeply mean it but…I couldn’t.

I think I was trained to hide all of this stuff because, surely, it would make me far less attractive to other humans…

I wanted the “privacy” to all THAT stuff in my mind.

If people thought I was…perfect…and didn’t see my shortcomings…all would be great, right?

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Pip CoburnPip CoburnComment