Pulling loose threads.

It’s Friday. Time for a round-up of the week’s Lessons Learned.

Except I am looking back on a murky week. There’s not much I can share with clarity. If there are lessons here, they are not learned – rather still very much in progress. But they center on this:

I let go of something this week. And it turns out that releasing something that represents an identity can bring up all sorts of unexpected weirdness. Or at least an unexpected level and quantity of weirdness. Totally did not see that coming and the space I would need to make for it.

I pulled on a what I thought was a loose thread and ended up unraveling half my sweater.

Which was mostly good. The whole point of the release was to untangle myself from certain threads connecting me to my past.

But as I kept pulling free, I found myself wanting to keep going. To unravel the ill-fitting parts of the sweater knit much more recently. Still good – ultimately – but again: did not anticipate needing to make space for that. It crowded out other planned activities in a way that was discombobulating. And left me feeling naked and vulnerable.

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Funny how you can do your best to follow the instructions yet still end up with something not-quite-right.

Bummer. But it happens. So you figure out where you miscounted or dropped a stitch, and go back to that point and begin again.

That’s really all these Lessons Learned are about: finding those places and beginning again, now knowing what you didn’t know then.

I suppose my sense of murkiness or confusion this week is just me trying to locate that starting point.

And wondering what to wear while I rework this thing – because I need something much more cozy and comforting than half a sweater.

Luckily, I have multiple identities and roles in my life – which means I have other sweaters to choose from. I just have to remember to go to my closet and put a different one on instead of needlessly sitting here shivering, feeling all exposed to the drafts of change, in this half-knit mess.

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Lessons from a tired mind.

It’s Friday. Time for a round-up of the week’s Lessons Learned.

I think I should preface this whole post with an excerpt from the transcript of my mind chatter this week:

Hamster-wheel mind: “Wow! I’m so tired. I wonder why I’m so tired? I shouldn’t be this tired. But, wow, am I tired!”

Compassionate aware mind: “Um, honey? You’re tired because this is your sixteenth day of working in a row. So please let’s just take a nap already.”

So, while I can look back with satisfaction on the accomplishments of my week, they came at a price. And I am reminded for the umteenth time why I have rules about unplugging regularly.

Under these circumstances, it’s unrealistic to expect to be able to sustain the kind of learning I did last week. And to prove it – here’s the one lesson I am able to glean from my week.

Working in this intense way is a roller coaster ride of highs and lows. Highs from the cool, exciting stuff. Lows from crashing from that stuff.

And being on a roller coaster makes it nearly impossible to engage in the maintenance activities that I find to be so stabilizing.  For me, maintenance activities – cleaning and laundry and cooking and dog walking and filing and whatnot – are the complex carbohydrates that keep me from crashing after the sugar highs. Maintenance normalizes things.

It wasn’t so much having such significant tasks on my to-do list that was so exhausting. It was how they squeezed out the seemingly less significant routine stuff that robbed me of small opportunities to recharge.

So, for the umteenth time, I am reminded to not set myself up for this. Way more lead time, honey, way more lead time…

Lessons of Three Sorts

It’s Friday. Time for a round-up of the week’s Lessons Learned.

In the successful-application-of-previous-lessons-learned category:

I’m using a little worksheet that I invented for myself in thinking about how to close my week on Fridays and unplug for the weekend. Love it. It’s just the right amount of structure to help me transition from work-mind to play-mind. It generates all kinds of good stuff – not least: it makes it much easier to write this post.

Systems are just one big experiment. So it’s super cool when you try something new and it works. And because it works, it’s not such a big deal to follow through with doing it more than once. That happened to me several times this week. I decided to make some tweaks based on a few “never again” lessons, and they stuck. Awesome. [Specific examples to follow in a future post because they are that good.]

In the new-lessons-still-in-need-of-a-flotation-device category:

I learned (once again) that it’s really tricky for me to reflect on my experience (i.e., write blog posts) when I am processing other big ideas (i.e., writing course content).

I learned that the endings and beginnings of classes bring up stuff for me.

I learned that I get pretty cranked up (I mean that in the best possible way) during class calls – then don’t know what to do with that energy afterwords.

In the just-plain-positive-lessons category:

I’m learning there is time to do it now.

I’m learning how to do the half-right thing when I can’t do the whole right thing.

I’m learning that I don’t need to keep checking.

I learned that meditating before I work turns anxious but-I-don’t-have-time-for-this energy into grounded, ready energy. There is a significant difference.

I learned I can nap when I need to with Leonie’s help. (Up till now, I’ve found taking a quick nap to be kinda pointless considering it takes me two hours to fall asleep for a half hour. Not any more.)

I learned it’s really hard to stay cranky about something when I am hula hooping.

I learned (once again) that letting go of a should is not only liberating, but incredibly clarifying. Feeling murky? confused? uncomfortable? There’s probably a hurking big should in there somewhere.

I learned I can make necessary changes in my business without fearing drama or disapproval. There is, in fact, a very good chance I will be supported instead.

I learned I’m finally ready to do something I’ve been putting off.

I learned that seeds I planted in the summer grew and ripened and can now be harvested.

I learned I’ve learned a lot this year.

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What did you learn this week?

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Polishing what is already smooth and shiny.

It’s Friday. Time for a round-up of the week’s Lessons Learned.

Except, in honor of Jen Louden’s week of Freedom from Self-Improvement, instead of compiling my usual list, I thought I’d clarify what this weekly post is about. And what it’s not about.

[ I'm a bit late to the party in sharing this event with you - today is the last day - but you can still get in on the fun. Jen is giving away fabulous stuff, plus today you could win a whole year at the Comfort Cafe - which, as I've said before, is what stands between me and crazy burnout. ]

I am not flogging myself with a wet noodle (as they say) here.

The phrase “Lessons Learned” has connotations that maybe aren’t so nice.

First, there is perhaps an association with the notion of “teaching someone a lesson” – defined as: to get even with someone for bad behavior; to punish someone so that they will not behave badly again; to show what should not be done.

As though my Lessons Learned are somehow punitive insights into my shortcomings that I beat myself up with. Which is so not the case.

No, my association with the phrase originates with where I learned it. I was introduced to the expression in a corporate setting. Fortunately, that was a long time ago and my Dilbert-esque connotations have faded and only the kernel of the idea – “stuff that didn’t go so well that we’d rather not repeat” – has stayed with me.

In that context, it wasn’t about “we screwed up” (the “we” was so huge and bureaucratic I don’t know that anyone really could grasp who the “we” was anyway). It was all about improving policies and procedures – systems – so things would go more smoothly and come closer to desired outcomes next time. They were engineers – a practical bunch – and weren’t much concerned with something as unnecessary to a well-functioning system as self-flagellation. And I’m not either.

This is about Doing. Not Being.

My coach once pointed out that we’re not trying to be better (“You can’t be better, you were born perfect.” she said) – this about doing better.

The distinction has made a huge difference for me. It allowed me to uncouple wanting change from my self-worth, from my understanding that what is happening right now is okay and enough and exactly as it should be.

And all the noticing I’m doing about what is happening, all the evaluations I’m making and conclusions I’m drawing from it, are about what I need to do to make it easier to be me.

Not change me. Be me.

The “lessons” are changes I want to make in the environment and circumstances I create for myself, so that being my true self is a cakewalk.

As often as not, it’s about removing what’s getting in the way. A simplification. A paring down. An elimination of unnecessary rules and shoulds.

It’s not so much fixing as a refinement of all that is already going well, of what is working (though I may not always list that stuff, trust me, it’s there).

It’s a polishing of what is already good and sufficient.

Polishing is optional. And yet it’s not.

I really like learning. And I’m not sure I could stop myself even if I wanted to.

It seems to me we are created to learn. It’s one of the basic things we are born to do. Why else are we walking around with these big brains on the top of our bodies?

And we seem to learn best from trial and error, from our so-called “mistakes.”  Our fallibility has been ideally designed.  Our imperfection is perfect.

To try to eliminate it from our being (or our doing) through “self-improvement” – even if it were possible – would rob us of the best way we have of genuinely improving our lives.

Not by being better, but coming to understand what we can do to make it easy to just be who we are.

And sometimes we don’t need to do anything at all.

Please join Jen and me in giving yourself a day off – and enjoy a little freedom from self-improvement today.

Answers. At last.

It’s Friday. Time for a round-up of the week’s Lessons Learned – and what a week it was.

Change is in the air.

For many, fall is the true beginning of a new year. It’s unquestionably a time of transition. From one thing to the next. From endings to beginnings.

For me, that means trying new stuff. The only question is: what changes will stick?

Starting with tweaking my schedule. The light is changing. Classes are starting. The timing and sequence of things needs adjusting. That’s normal. But recently, I’ve been immersing myself in Waverly Fitzgerald’s writing about honoring the seasons and holidays – which I love – and it’s added a whole new dimension to this quarterly task. Oohlala.

I’m so lit up about seeing the connections between all the rhythms and rituals I’ve been seeking and experimenting with lately – the relationships of work and play, fall and spring, waking and resting, doing and being. Answers to old questions I’ve been asking – how? – are appearing. And that’s deeply satisfying.

I’ll have to write a separate post about it. There is so much I want share, but it’s still taking shape and is far more than I can synthesize on a Friday afternoon. Suffice to say, this Time Disciple learned a lot about Time this week. Insight for which I’m deeply grateful.

What epiphanies lit you up this week?

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