Wonders what my children will think of me in 20 years?
What will they remember?
They definitely won't remember anything of being a toddler, but what?
What will I do in their childhood that they will remember? Good or bad?
Thursday, September 30, 2010
Time Passing
Are you one of those lucky people with a hypersnesitive awareness of time's speed? Elizabeth Gilbert in Eat Pray Love, discusses it on page 153. I have this hypersensitive awareness of time, I always think my four year old is one day away from being an adult. And he is, I remember being four and now I'm an adult. My grandma told me, told me don't wish their life away. I try not to, but I struggle if my son isn't a baby life is over, next thing you know we are all dead. I really struggle after family reunions and other such things, so its so fun, but before you know it its over, so I wonder why we ever leave our house anyway?
If it all ends so quickly why even attempt. I know my mom struggles with my discouraging outlook, but I can't help it is the way my brain thinks. At least I don't let it take captive, I do go on vacation, I do go spend time with family and friends. But I'm prone to negative realism, I just can't help it.
If it all ends so quickly why even attempt. I know my mom struggles with my discouraging outlook, but I can't help it is the way my brain thinks. At least I don't let it take captive, I do go on vacation, I do go spend time with family and friends. But I'm prone to negative realism, I just can't help it.
Toys and Guilt?
Did you know toys bring me great guilt in life? I could go on and on about all the reasons, but I'll just pick a few for this post.
Tricycles! My number one guilt. When my son was two, he had a plastic riding toy, but not a tricycle with pedals. My mother offered to buy him a respectable bike, but I told her no. I didn't need help, I was picking and choosing what we bought. I had more self control in those days.
Fast forward two years, and my neighbor taught my son to pedal his bike, because we had no success with him. All this I know emotional blame on his lack of tricycle. I should have remedied the situation at some point, but he just seemed too old to now buy a trike. So I bought my daughter a trike before she probably needed one. But then crazies of crazies I bought a pink barbie one instead of a unisex Deigo one. I don't know what I was thinking. So now my son rides a pink barbie one. And speaking of crazies of crazies this won't even the thing he complains to his therapist some day, it will be something I didn't even know was wrong. The barbie trike is a a coveted toy, one of my son's friends always asks me to bring it out so he can ride it. (In retrospect I don't think his lack of pedaling has anything to do without a trike.)
Anyway, so as you can see toys can make an emotional wreck. For a while I kept telling me husband we just need these toys, then we'll be set. I thought my son need one of each pretend. Then I realized that was crazy and my rentals couldn't house such madness. But the one thing I feel guilty about other than tricycles is music toys. My son wants a xylophone desperately, and he has always wanted a little trikes drum, but it is so expensive, $20? Anyway, I guess I should suck it up and buy them someday, before its too late.
Tricycles! My number one guilt. When my son was two, he had a plastic riding toy, but not a tricycle with pedals. My mother offered to buy him a respectable bike, but I told her no. I didn't need help, I was picking and choosing what we bought. I had more self control in those days.
Fast forward two years, and my neighbor taught my son to pedal his bike, because we had no success with him. All this I know emotional blame on his lack of tricycle. I should have remedied the situation at some point, but he just seemed too old to now buy a trike. So I bought my daughter a trike before she probably needed one. But then crazies of crazies I bought a pink barbie one instead of a unisex Deigo one. I don't know what I was thinking. So now my son rides a pink barbie one. And speaking of crazies of crazies this won't even the thing he complains to his therapist some day, it will be something I didn't even know was wrong. The barbie trike is a a coveted toy, one of my son's friends always asks me to bring it out so he can ride it. (In retrospect I don't think his lack of pedaling has anything to do without a trike.)
Anyway, so as you can see toys can make an emotional wreck. For a while I kept telling me husband we just need these toys, then we'll be set. I thought my son need one of each pretend. Then I realized that was crazy and my rentals couldn't house such madness. But the one thing I feel guilty about other than tricycles is music toys. My son wants a xylophone desperately, and he has always wanted a little trikes drum, but it is so expensive, $20? Anyway, I guess I should suck it up and buy them someday, before its too late.
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
Quotes
Quotes from Eat Pray Love, by Elizabeth Gilbert.
"To find the balance you want," Ketut spoke through his translator, "this is what you must become. You must keep your feet grounded so firmly on the earth that it's like you have four legs, instead of two. That way you can stay in the world. But you must stop looking at the world through your head. You must look through your heart instead. That way you know God." p.27
"Moreover, I couldn't stop thinking about what my sister had said to me once, as she was breastfeeding her first born: Having a baby is like getting a tattoo on your face. You really need to be certain it's what you want before you commit." p.10
"True wisdom gives the only possible answer at any given moment, and that night, going back to be bed was the only possible answer. Go back to bed, said this omniscient interior voice, because you don't need to know the final answer right now, at three o'clock in the morning on a Thursday in November. ...Go back to bed so that, when the tempest comes, you'll be strong enough to deal with it." p. 16
"The great Sufi poet and philosopher Rumi once advised his students to write down the three things they most wanted in life. If any item on the list clashes with any other item, Rumi warned, you are destined for unhappiness. Better to live a life of single -pointed focus, he taught. p.29
"Depression and Loneliness track me down after about ten days in Italy. ... They come upon me all silent and menacing like Pinkerton Detectives, and they flank me-- Depression on my left, Loneliness on my right. They don't need to show me their badges. I know these guys very well. We've been playing a cat-and-mouse games for years now. Though I admit that I am surprised to meet them in this elegant Italian garden at dusk. ... Then they frisk me. They empty my pockets of any job I had been carrying there. Depression even confiscates my identity; but he always does that. Then loneliness starts interrogating me, which I dread because it always goes on for hours. He's polite but relentless, and he always trips me up eventually." p. 46-47
"There were a few years there, lost in borderless despair, when I used to experience all the world's sadness as my own. Everything sad leaked through me and left damp traces behind." p.101
"But I felt a glimmer of happiness when I started studying Italian, and when you sense a faint potentiality for happiness after such dark times you must grab onto the ankles of that happiness and not let go until it drags you face first out of the dirt-- this is not selfishness but obligation. You were given life; it is your duty (and also your entitlement as a human being) to find something beautiful within life, no matter how slight." p.115
"There's a reason they call God a presence-- because God is right here, right now. In the present is the only place to find Him, and now is the only time." p. 132
"...remembering something my Guru once said--- that you should never give yourself a chance to fall apart because, when you do, it becomes a tendency and it happens over and over again. You must practice staying strong instead." p.137
"All I seem to do is argue with myself when I try to meditate."
"That's just your ego, trying to make sure it stays in charge. This is what your edo does. It keeps you feeling separate, keeps you with a sense of duality, tries to convince you that you're flawed and broken and alone instead of whole." p.140
"Ham-sa.
In Sanskrit it means "I am That."
The Yogis say that Ham-sa is the most natural mantra, the one we are all given by God before birth. It is the sound of our own breath. Ham on the inhale, sa on the exhale." p.141
"I am That. I am divine, I am with God, I am an expression of God, I am not separate, I am not alone, I am not this limited illusion of an individual. " p.141-142
"Sean said, "Da-- this meditation stuff, it's crucial for teaching serenity. It can really save your life. It teaches you how to quiet your mind." His father turned to him and said kindly, "I have a quiet mind already," p. 154
"My prayers are becoming more deliberate and specific. It has occurred to me that it's not much use to send prayers out to the universe that are lazy." p. 176
"So now I take the time every morning to search myself for specificity about what I am truly asking for." p.177
"He said, "Groceries, you need to learn how to select your thoughts just the same way you select what clothes you're gonna wear every day. This is a power you can cultivate. If you want to control things in your life so bad, work on the mind. That's the only thing you should be trying to control. Drop everything else but that. Because if you can't learn to master your thinking, you're in deep trouble forever." p. 178
"To meditate, only you must smile. Smile with face, smile with mind, and good energy will come to you and clean away dirty energy. Even smile in your liver." p.231
"he says, by mediating every night before sleep and by pulling the healthy energy of the universe into his core." p. 242 Ketut 9th generation medicine man
"So what can we do about the craziness of the world?"
"Nothing." Ketut laughed, but with a dose of kindness. "This is nature of world. This is destiny. Worry about your craziness only-- make you in peace."... "Purpose of meditation is only happiness and peace-- very easy." p. 251
"I keep remembering one of my Guru's teaching about happiness. She says that people universally tend to think that happiness is a stroke of luck, something that will maybe descend upon you like fine weather if you're fortunate enough. But that's not how happiness works. happiness is the consequence of personal effor. You fight for it, strive for it, insist upon it, .... You have to participate relentlessly in the manifestations of your won blessings. And once you have achieved a state of happiness, you must never become lax about maintaining it..." p. 260
"For some reason, I feel the same way about you that I felt about my kids when they were small--that is wasn't their job to love me, it was my job to love them." p.311
"Yet what keeps me from dissolving right now into a complete fairy0tale shimmer is this solid truth, a truth which has veritably built my bones over the last few years--I was not rescued by a prince; I was the administrator of my own rescue." p329
"To find the balance you want," Ketut spoke through his translator, "this is what you must become. You must keep your feet grounded so firmly on the earth that it's like you have four legs, instead of two. That way you can stay in the world. But you must stop looking at the world through your head. You must look through your heart instead. That way you know God." p.27
"Moreover, I couldn't stop thinking about what my sister had said to me once, as she was breastfeeding her first born: Having a baby is like getting a tattoo on your face. You really need to be certain it's what you want before you commit." p.10
"True wisdom gives the only possible answer at any given moment, and that night, going back to be bed was the only possible answer. Go back to bed, said this omniscient interior voice, because you don't need to know the final answer right now, at three o'clock in the morning on a Thursday in November. ...Go back to bed so that, when the tempest comes, you'll be strong enough to deal with it." p. 16
"The great Sufi poet and philosopher Rumi once advised his students to write down the three things they most wanted in life. If any item on the list clashes with any other item, Rumi warned, you are destined for unhappiness. Better to live a life of single -pointed focus, he taught. p.29
"Depression and Loneliness track me down after about ten days in Italy. ... They come upon me all silent and menacing like Pinkerton Detectives, and they flank me-- Depression on my left, Loneliness on my right. They don't need to show me their badges. I know these guys very well. We've been playing a cat-and-mouse games for years now. Though I admit that I am surprised to meet them in this elegant Italian garden at dusk. ... Then they frisk me. They empty my pockets of any job I had been carrying there. Depression even confiscates my identity; but he always does that. Then loneliness starts interrogating me, which I dread because it always goes on for hours. He's polite but relentless, and he always trips me up eventually." p. 46-47
"There were a few years there, lost in borderless despair, when I used to experience all the world's sadness as my own. Everything sad leaked through me and left damp traces behind." p.101
"But I felt a glimmer of happiness when I started studying Italian, and when you sense a faint potentiality for happiness after such dark times you must grab onto the ankles of that happiness and not let go until it drags you face first out of the dirt-- this is not selfishness but obligation. You were given life; it is your duty (and also your entitlement as a human being) to find something beautiful within life, no matter how slight." p.115
"There's a reason they call God a presence-- because God is right here, right now. In the present is the only place to find Him, and now is the only time." p. 132
"...remembering something my Guru once said--- that you should never give yourself a chance to fall apart because, when you do, it becomes a tendency and it happens over and over again. You must practice staying strong instead." p.137
"All I seem to do is argue with myself when I try to meditate."
"That's just your ego, trying to make sure it stays in charge. This is what your edo does. It keeps you feeling separate, keeps you with a sense of duality, tries to convince you that you're flawed and broken and alone instead of whole." p.140
"Ham-sa.
In Sanskrit it means "I am That."
The Yogis say that Ham-sa is the most natural mantra, the one we are all given by God before birth. It is the sound of our own breath. Ham on the inhale, sa on the exhale." p.141
"I am That. I am divine, I am with God, I am an expression of God, I am not separate, I am not alone, I am not this limited illusion of an individual. " p.141-142
"Sean said, "Da-- this meditation stuff, it's crucial for teaching serenity. It can really save your life. It teaches you how to quiet your mind." His father turned to him and said kindly, "I have a quiet mind already," p. 154
"My prayers are becoming more deliberate and specific. It has occurred to me that it's not much use to send prayers out to the universe that are lazy." p. 176
"So now I take the time every morning to search myself for specificity about what I am truly asking for." p.177
"He said, "Groceries, you need to learn how to select your thoughts just the same way you select what clothes you're gonna wear every day. This is a power you can cultivate. If you want to control things in your life so bad, work on the mind. That's the only thing you should be trying to control. Drop everything else but that. Because if you can't learn to master your thinking, you're in deep trouble forever." p. 178
"To meditate, only you must smile. Smile with face, smile with mind, and good energy will come to you and clean away dirty energy. Even smile in your liver." p.231
"he says, by mediating every night before sleep and by pulling the healthy energy of the universe into his core." p. 242 Ketut 9th generation medicine man
"So what can we do about the craziness of the world?"
"Nothing." Ketut laughed, but with a dose of kindness. "This is nature of world. This is destiny. Worry about your craziness only-- make you in peace."... "Purpose of meditation is only happiness and peace-- very easy." p. 251
"I keep remembering one of my Guru's teaching about happiness. She says that people universally tend to think that happiness is a stroke of luck, something that will maybe descend upon you like fine weather if you're fortunate enough. But that's not how happiness works. happiness is the consequence of personal effor. You fight for it, strive for it, insist upon it, .... You have to participate relentlessly in the manifestations of your won blessings. And once you have achieved a state of happiness, you must never become lax about maintaining it..." p. 260
"For some reason, I feel the same way about you that I felt about my kids when they were small--that is wasn't their job to love me, it was my job to love them." p.311
"Yet what keeps me from dissolving right now into a complete fairy0tale shimmer is this solid truth, a truth which has veritably built my bones over the last few years--I was not rescued by a prince; I was the administrator of my own rescue." p329
Long Book Review
I read Committed: A Skeptic Makes Peace with Marriage last fall, and really appreciated the read. She reference Eat Pray Love once or twice, but I never had any interest at all in reading it. Mostly because I try to be a prudish mormon girl and didn't have any desire to read the last third, the love section. But then the movie came out, and I knew eventually I would watch the movie, so I wanted to experience the plot in Elizabeth Gilbert's voice not Julia Roberts.
Now that I have read the book, I will say I throughly enjoyed the book. But in all honestly I can not recommend the book to anyone, because the third section of the book. Most of the book is perfectly fine, but there was a few paragraphs/pages that I skipped because honestly I don't care.
But the rest of the book, was perfect for me, a read I needed. During Eat, she goes through a minor history of her divorce and the depression she experienced through it. Oh I needed that section. The MBA was quickly wearing on me, too many classes this semester (one extra), it wasn't even cold, it wasn't even dark, and I wasn't even experiencing the hormonal drop of weaning my young, but I was already starting to sit on the couch and stare at the wall. I occasionally wondered will my children survive on hot dogs and eggs for dinner all winter long. Oh goodness winter hasn't even started I should still be happy. I told my husband I think I'm getting depressed. His response was simple just like him, "Don't" My first thought was you don't understand, you aren't like me, you aren't... whatever the emotion was running through my brain. But then I remembered he did, he does, he's not me, but he doesn't complicate things like me. So I stopped, I didn't just like he said. If I've picked myself up by the heals before, what was stopping me now? Because it came quicker, because it came in a different season, because why.. so I did. I got up, I painfully cooked dinner, I painfully cleaned the house, I painfully interacted with my kids, I painfully didn't yell at my kids or husband, I not so painfully got back where I should be with my religious devotion and amazing things happened. All of the sudden things weren't so painful, I wasn't pretending, and although there was painful parts of life I was more than enduring. Not to say everyone's experience is the same as mine, or the same circumstances as mine, or the same results. Just this is my story. In the word's of Gilbert's Texan friend, this isn't my first rodeo. So just like Brent told me don't, I know how to tame the bull if I'm willing to put in the effort.
The next section was pray were she goes and studies yoga in India. Now I haven't put anything into practice yet, but boy did I need the section. I need to start mediating again, I need to continue to exercise, the summer got a little busy. Did I mention I need to mediate? The main reason I have a second child was because I was mediating before bed most nights. I needed that grounding, that solace, that strength to heal my body from the emotional trauma of childbirth. Really it got me relaxed, and at peace, and then the pregnancy hit, which was anything but mediating, then a colic infant came which made the pregnancy not look so bad. If you count practicing for Lamaze I did mediate while pregnant, but come one, my life needs some grounding, some solace some, these are my thoughts, emotions, I can take control. I should be in control, not the elements.
And overall my overriding thought was thank goodness, I did not marry a man who wanted to "fix me", fix my problems, solve my problems. I never got the impression while we were friends or dating that he wanted to solve all my problems and I think that would have been an immediate red flag in my life. But once we got married, when I jumped into one of my rodeos, (lets just say the adversary wasn't so pleased with my constant church attendance and other such things). I was feeling the world tower over me, and I wondered why isn't my husband saving me? Why isn't he fixing me? Why isn't he making me better? When I clearly got the thought, it isn't your husband's job to fix you. There is only one person in the history of the world who job it is to be the Savior. And that was one of the best things that happened in my marriage. But I often feel so blessed that my husband didn't try to help me. Not that I think that people who try to step in and help are wrong, its just people can only show you the water they can't make you drink. I'm grateful I didn't marry a man that tries to pry my mouth open and pour water in. He actually told me before we ever date that he is not that type of person.
Anyway, more than half of the third section was too, more mediation conversation and such. But I started to get bored, like I do in all memoirs, they just don't end as quickly and neatly as fiction they drag. But I need to finish, to be accomplished so I did.
Now that I have read the book, I will say I throughly enjoyed the book. But in all honestly I can not recommend the book to anyone, because the third section of the book. Most of the book is perfectly fine, but there was a few paragraphs/pages that I skipped because honestly I don't care.
But the rest of the book, was perfect for me, a read I needed. During Eat, she goes through a minor history of her divorce and the depression she experienced through it. Oh I needed that section. The MBA was quickly wearing on me, too many classes this semester (one extra), it wasn't even cold, it wasn't even dark, and I wasn't even experiencing the hormonal drop of weaning my young, but I was already starting to sit on the couch and stare at the wall. I occasionally wondered will my children survive on hot dogs and eggs for dinner all winter long. Oh goodness winter hasn't even started I should still be happy. I told my husband I think I'm getting depressed. His response was simple just like him, "Don't" My first thought was you don't understand, you aren't like me, you aren't... whatever the emotion was running through my brain. But then I remembered he did, he does, he's not me, but he doesn't complicate things like me. So I stopped, I didn't just like he said. If I've picked myself up by the heals before, what was stopping me now? Because it came quicker, because it came in a different season, because why.. so I did. I got up, I painfully cooked dinner, I painfully cleaned the house, I painfully interacted with my kids, I painfully didn't yell at my kids or husband, I not so painfully got back where I should be with my religious devotion and amazing things happened. All of the sudden things weren't so painful, I wasn't pretending, and although there was painful parts of life I was more than enduring. Not to say everyone's experience is the same as mine, or the same circumstances as mine, or the same results. Just this is my story. In the word's of Gilbert's Texan friend, this isn't my first rodeo. So just like Brent told me don't, I know how to tame the bull if I'm willing to put in the effort.
The next section was pray were she goes and studies yoga in India. Now I haven't put anything into practice yet, but boy did I need the section. I need to start mediating again, I need to continue to exercise, the summer got a little busy. Did I mention I need to mediate? The main reason I have a second child was because I was mediating before bed most nights. I needed that grounding, that solace, that strength to heal my body from the emotional trauma of childbirth. Really it got me relaxed, and at peace, and then the pregnancy hit, which was anything but mediating, then a colic infant came which made the pregnancy not look so bad. If you count practicing for Lamaze I did mediate while pregnant, but come one, my life needs some grounding, some solace some, these are my thoughts, emotions, I can take control. I should be in control, not the elements.
And overall my overriding thought was thank goodness, I did not marry a man who wanted to "fix me", fix my problems, solve my problems. I never got the impression while we were friends or dating that he wanted to solve all my problems and I think that would have been an immediate red flag in my life. But once we got married, when I jumped into one of my rodeos, (lets just say the adversary wasn't so pleased with my constant church attendance and other such things). I was feeling the world tower over me, and I wondered why isn't my husband saving me? Why isn't he fixing me? Why isn't he making me better? When I clearly got the thought, it isn't your husband's job to fix you. There is only one person in the history of the world who job it is to be the Savior. And that was one of the best things that happened in my marriage. But I often feel so blessed that my husband didn't try to help me. Not that I think that people who try to step in and help are wrong, its just people can only show you the water they can't make you drink. I'm grateful I didn't marry a man that tries to pry my mouth open and pour water in. He actually told me before we ever date that he is not that type of person.
Anyway, more than half of the third section was too, more mediation conversation and such. But I started to get bored, like I do in all memoirs, they just don't end as quickly and neatly as fiction they drag. But I need to finish, to be accomplished so I did.
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
My Golden Birthday
Ok, so Blogger is really retarded and the post originally had pictures that worked, I don't know what happened, but I re-uploaded them.
I turned 26 on the 26th. I had never heard of this phrase of golden birthday until I was in activity days as a leader the first time, but none the less here I am. I was super exhausted and look so in these pictures. I look terrible! My birthday was sunday, and we did the Primary Program that morning, so that is my excuse, its a lot of work to take care of the 4-7 year olds of the ward for three hours. I usually need a nap after only two. My son gave his first talk in sacrament meeting, and did a steller job. Apparently Brent, Uncle Daniel, and Aunt Brittany, heard hushed awes all around after he finished. But back to the birthday, the only reason I inculded this shot was because J is holding a picture of me, that he drew. I'm sitting at the table, and the marks for the table look suprisingly like my hair in this shot, so I had to include it.
I turned 26 on the 26th. I had never heard of this phrase of golden birthday until I was in activity days as a leader the first time, but none the less here I am. I was super exhausted and look so in these pictures. I look terrible! My birthday was sunday, and we did the Primary Program that morning, so that is my excuse, its a lot of work to take care of the 4-7 year olds of the ward for three hours. I usually need a nap after only two. My son gave his first talk in sacrament meeting, and did a steller job. Apparently Brent, Uncle Daniel, and Aunt Brittany, heard hushed awes all around after he finished. But back to the birthday, the only reason I inculded this shot was because J is holding a picture of me, that he drew. I'm sitting at the table, and the marks for the table look suprisingly like my hair in this shot, so I had to include it.
One last thought. My brother's birthday is in August, my birthday is in the end of September. He always got a swim birthday party. I never did, the pool always got cold one or two weeks too early. (Why we never did my birthday party two weeks early is beyond me or my mom.) But this year, thanks to a super hot Indian Summer, and a heated pool I got to swim on my birthday with my family. Ok, not really, because we don't swim on sunday, but I swam on Saturday with them. And well that is the first saturday of my birthday week in my life that I have been swimming. It was trilling, life complete-ing, and you know what even with water up to 80, and it hot outside, I complained I was too cold.
Monday, September 27, 2010
Perspective
In the recent Modern Family episode, Claire starts crying because her kids are growing up, and they are selling the old station wagon they drove when her kids were little. Here is an awesome quote. "Claire: Look at them: A minute ago they were babies, and now their driving, and soon we'll all be dead."
I relate a lot to Claire, although my husband is nothing like Phil.
I relate a lot to Claire, although my husband is nothing like Phil.
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