Learning By Daring Greatly

While traveling recently, I was reading Daring Greatly by Brene Brown.  She talks about those who dare greatly, those who work through feelings of shame.  She calls them Wholehearted,  the people who live their lives with their whole hearts.  I am not one of them.  I am learning from Brene Brown and others how to live in such a fashion, but I am still far from calling myself Wholehearted. 

We all experience shame, but how we handle it determines if we live large, Wholehearted lives or small, sheltered lives.  Mostly, my life has been small and sheltered.  I seek what I think is safety and security, rather than going for the big prize. 

I know people who live Wholeheartedly and, I thought of them as odd.  They took chances - huge chances - with their finances, their relationships, their experiences and that all seemed foolhearted to me.  Why take chances and risk losing what you have, even if what you have is not that much?  That was me alright, holding tight to what little I had, always afraid that it would be taken from me, I would lose it foolishly, or that it would just disappear.

Brene Brown talks about how shame sabotages joy.  Your life is going well and all you can do is imagine disasters that could rip away all that is good.  You have been given a gift of a few years or months or weeks or days of happiness in most, if not all, areas of your life and instead of basking in the joy of the moment, your mind fills with the dreaded what-if's.  What if I or my spouse loses our job?  What if my spouse or my child or I get sick?  What if I am in a car accident?  What if there is another terroist attack?  What if the stock market crashes?  Oh, no, I will lose everything!  I will be destitute, homeless, alone, in pain, sad.  If I allow myself to feel joy now, or even just feel good, I am tempting fate to shower me with calamities.

Why do some of us think like that?  We are carrying shame around with us, probably since childhood, and with shame comes the "not enough" feelings.  I am not good enough, smart enough, pretty enough.  Because I am not enough, I don't deserve much. Perhaps I have received more good than I deserve and soon it will be payback time.  Whom am I to think I deserve this much happiness, good times, money, love?  There is only so much happiness, good times, money and love in the world and I have surely reached my limit. I thought all these things at one time or another. 

The people I know who live what Brene Brown calls Wholeheartedly, don't think this way, or, at least if they do on occasion think like that, they are able to snap out of it.  They know they deserve joy, happiness, prosperity, success, and love.  They believe that all these are in abundance and the good they receive does not lessen the good that others can have.  And, because they think like this, because they are not living in the shadow of shame, they take chances, they live big, they embrace life. But, that does not always mean they succeed.  No one experiences success 100% of the time. But, when they do fail, they react differently than people in shame, like me, would.

A businessman I know had a successful professional career which gave him financial security and a very comfortable life.  He was happily married, well respected, in good health and enjoying a life that many would envy.  I was shocked when he became a partner in a business venture that seemed risky at best and foolhearted at worst.  To me, his new venture reeked of greediness. Didn't he already have enough?  What more could he want?  Why would he risk what he has for the chance to have more?  My foreboding feelings about the business venture proved to be correct.  The vision he and his partners had was not well developed and the location for their business was a poor choice.  What they thought was enough capital to get their business off the ground came up far short of what was needed to even have the slightest chance of success.  Some of the partners were self-serving and made poor decisions independent of the group.  Soon their venture became a money pit.  After shoveling in more money than they could afford, the partners began to look for ways to dump their business.  Fortunately, a buyer came along and although they were able to recupe some of what they lost, they still came out of the venture with less money than when they started it. 

Had that been me, I would have been consumed with shame.  How could I, a successful business person, make such a terrible business decision?  How could I not see through my less than trustworthy partners?  I failed and I am a failure.  I am embarrassed and ashamed.  What will people think of me?  Will I lose my credibility?  I will never do such a foolhearty thing again. 

Fortunately, the businessman had a healthier opinion of himself than I do of myself.  He saw his failed venture as a lesson.  He learned from his mistakes, shook off the dust of failure and moved forward with even more confidence than before.  He now knew more than he did before his failed partnership, so he was sure his next venture would be successful.  He was not worried about what others thought of him because he knew that they too had tried and failed.  He knew that he was a success even if that particular business venture was not and he knew that he would try again.

With more years and life experiences behind me, I now understand that it was not greediness that motivated him, it was the desire for new adventures and successes.  He liked playing the game.  He liked inventing and creating new businesses.  And, because he was willing and had always been willing to take chances, his failed business was just one blip on a map filled with successes. 

Why has he been able to shake off shame while myself and others have not?  Who knows?  The influence of his parents, the childhood he experienced, his basic personality, his astrological sign, education, good luck?  He did face shame, as we all do, but he knew how to diffuse it. 

Brene Brown teaches that to shake off shame we need to name it and own it.  Accept what happened.  It is what it is.  I cannot go back and change it; all I can do is accept it.  Feel the shame, the pain.  Allow yourself a period of time to experience the feelings, so you can get over them and move past them.  Share your shame with someone you trust.  Tell them your crappy story.  Cry on someone's shoulder, just make sure it is someone who won't allow you to wallow in your shame.  Pick someone who can show empathy and understanding, but who will also encourage you to pick yourself up and dust yourself off.  Telling your story is powerful and freeing.  Figure out what the lesson of your failure is and promise yourself that you won't make the same mistake again and, if you do, oh, well, go through the same process until the lesson is ingrained in you.  Know that your decision was bad, your business or your relationship failed, or that you made a mistake.  You are not bad, you are not a failure, you are not a mistake.  Know that you are good, you are a success, you are worthy. 

That is the difference between the businessman and me.  He never doubted himself, even though he may have doubted his decisions regarding his failed business venture.  And, because he never doubted himself, he was able to walk away from the ruins and build again.  I, on the other hand, would still, ten years later, be beating myself up, regretting what I cannot change and afraid to try again, afraid to live large and dare greatly.

Fortunately, I am no longer the person I was when that knew about that man and his failed business.  I have learned many lessons, some through experience, some through the advice and actions of others, some through reading (Thank you, Brene!).  I am living a little bolder and daring a little more greatly than before, but I can improve.  I am learning that I am more than my mistakes,   I am learning there is enough, more than enough, for that businessman and for you and for me.  I am learning that I have the right to live larger and be more.  I have the right to Manifest Mount Dora.    

Vulnerability Among Friends

I am still on the subject of vulnerability and still praising the work of Brené Brown.  If you missed my recommendations of her books in previous blogs, I will list them again:

Daring Greatly
The Gifts of Imperfection
The Power of Vulnerability

Vulnerability is when we choose to go outside our comfort zone; when we risk failure and ridicule to dare to do something different, to be someone different, to stretch and grow.  Vulnerability is uncomfortable for the one practicing it and often for those observing it.  When we are vulnerable, we bare our souls and open our hearts, and that can be scary, can make us feel nervous and ill-at-ease, but it can also be exhilarating, freeing and life-changing.   When we watch someone else being vulnerable, we squirm, feel awkward, are at a loss for words, or if we do speak, usually say the wrong thing - not something supportive and loving, but words that criticize, judge, ridicule and hurt.

When I chose to leave my husband and create a new life, I was being vulnerable.  When I began a new relationship, I was being vulnerable.  After a long married life of predictability and fear of the unknown, I chose to be vulnerable enough to dare to choose a new life.  I thought my "friends" would be supportive and happy for me.  Some did and those are still my friends today.  Others did not and, eventually, I no longer considered them friends.  Some of them were never really my friends to begin with, as they later proved,  and some were just not ready to accept the changes I was making.

My vulnerability raised issues for them.  Some wanted to make similar changes, but were afraid.  Watching me change, brought their fears to the surface.  Others resented what I was doing - either because they wanted to do the same and could not or would not, or their ideas of what is good and bad behavior raised judgments that what I was doing was wrong.  Some may have just feared change of any kind - even in someone else's life.  Either way, I made them uncomfortable and they did not know what to do with that feeling of unease so they lashed out at me with criticism, judgement and even ridicule.  And, honestly, in the past, I often behaved the same with others who made me uncomfortable with their vulnerability.

Sometimes looking at someone else is like looking in a mirror.  I am miserable and when I look at you I see someone who is miserable and we form a friendship based on our mutual unhappiness.  But, as soon as one of us dares to be vulnerable and go looking for happiness, the other feels betrayed.  The one left behind, let's call her Eva,  may not say these words, but she is thinking them, at some deep level, "How dare you go looking for happiness and leave me behind!"  What follows is fear.  Eva fears that I will find happiness and she never will.  Eva fears that our friendship will never be the same.  Eva fears that I will find happiness, then fall flat on may face, thereby confirming that her fear of happiness is justified - it never lasts and it leads to pain.

At first Eva's fear leads to her expression of all the dire consequences that could arise from my actions.  In the case of my marital separation, I heard, "You are too old to start over", "You will face all kinds of financial problems", "You will miss your home", "You were closer to your husband's family than your own and you will lose them", "You are moving too quickly", "Your problems with just follow you", "You will alienate your friends and family", "You are letting your heart rule your mind", "You will have to start all over", "You are not thinking things through", "You are being silly (stupid, immature)".

Once Eva runs out of warnings and predictions of failure, she resorts to criticism and judgement, as did my friends.  "Marriage is forever", "If you failed at this marriage, you will fail at other relationships", "You should not be in a new relationship if you are not divorced yet", "You are being selfish", "This is wrong", "You are wrong".

And, if Eva fails to change my course using criticism, she then recruits the help of others by gossiping.  Surely, if she tells everyone we know what I have shared with her, and what I may not be ready to share with others, they will agree with her that I am on a dangerous course and jump on her bandwagon to pull me back into the "real world".  That is exactly what happened, especially with my very own "Eva" who was quick to tell everyone where I had gone wrong.  Some she told did join in her chorus of criticism, some were uninterested, and others were insulted by Eva including them in her gossip circle and openly came to me with words of support and encouragement.

When my course of action did not change, even after Eva's gossiping, she resorted to treating me with rudeness, especially around our mutual friends, and then to exclusion - purposefully, leaving me out of activities, lunches, dinners, movies and other group activities.  

I was slow to react.  So much was changing in my life, so fast, that the resulting vulnerability was scaring me a little.  I felt like I needed the comfort of old relationships.  But, soon there was no comfort in those relationships.  The day I realized I was no longer gaining anything from those friendships and, in fact, was being mistreated, I made the choice to move on and leave those relationships in the friendship cemetery.  Doing so was not easy, but it was the right and healthy thing for me to do.

Now, years later, my Eva has made some of the same choices I did.  She opened herself up to her own vulnerability as she made brave and important changes in her life.  We still are not friends and never will be because there is too much distrust from the past, but we are friendlier than we have been in a very long time.

My closest friends now are those that saw and accepted my vulnerability;  who allowed me to change and showered me with support.  But, as time has past, I have forgiven those who were not there for me - those who attacked my vulnerability.  I know that they were uncomfortable and afraid and fear destroys relationships.

Walking Away

I have been thinking about my father a lot recently.  Maybe because of Brene Brown's writing about living an authentic life and dealing with shame and guilt in her book The Gifts of Imperfection and perhaps because someone shared with me their desire to cut a family member out of her life, as I did my father about ten years ago.

My father was a typical mid-20th century husband and father.  He expected to have a stay-at-home wife to raise his children, take care of his needs and provide him with a comfortable home life.  He was open to having several children, as long as he was able to pay for the bills and his wife was willing to take care of them.  I doubt if he, like most men of his time, even thought much about the consequences of having children, other than the cost.  His mind was on his business and children were his wife's concern.

Unfortunately, after the birth of four children and the death of one, his wife, and my mother, checked out of this earthly life at the relatively young age of 39.  I was an infant when she passed and my older sisters were 10 and 7.  Not only was my unprepared father left with three children, one a baby, but those kids were also girls - a fact that seemed to make the situation even harder for him.  His mother came from Chicago and took care of us for about 18 months - long enough for my father to find another wife, my stepmother who passed last year, to raise his kids.  That marriage failed quickly and again he was faced with three daughters to raise without the help of a woman since my grandmother's age prevented her from coming to his rescue a second time.  So, he did the best he could.  His best was not all that good in some ways, but he adequately provided for our physical needs.

My father was not the huggy, warm type of dad.  Not at all like those wonderful widowed TV dads who are wise, generous and loving.  He worked hard - rising at 4 AM to run his business, often working on Saturdays and Sundays.  He was impatient, demanding and unforgiving of mistakes and transgressions.  A glass accidentally dropped and broken was treated the same as if it were hurled purposefully across the room in a fit of anger.  I lost my greatly-needed eyeglasses when I was nine and, as punishment, he refused to buy me new ones.  I spent the next eight years sitting in the front of classrooms, squinting to read the chalkboard and books, and living with almost constant headaches until I went to live with my stepmother and she took me to the optometrist and I soon sported new glasses that allowed me to see so much that I had been missing.

My father had a temper, but he never hit us.  He would yell, he would slam doors, he would subject us to days, weeks and even months of silence for not acting or being who he wished we were.  My two older sisters left home as soon as they graduated high school, leaving me alone to deal with him.  Nothing I did was good enough, right enough or fast enough.  I was an A student, but felt like a failure.  When I was 14 we had a silly argument over who sang a song and he stopped talking to me - for months.  I became depressed; my friends and teachers worried about me.  A guidance counselor intervened and eventually my father allowed me to go live with my stepmother in another state.

At first, I was just relieved and happy to have him out of my life, but since my stepmother forced me to stay in contact with him, I soon fell back into the old pattern of wanting to please him and never being able to do so.  He visited me and I visited him a few times over the next three years.  Then, I ended up moving to the state where he had settled and we even lived in the same town for a couple of years.  He traveled a lot with his business, which allowed us to maintain an almost normal and friendly relationship.  Then I moved 100 miles away to go to college and within a year, I was married.  My husband I moved to another state.  My father visited whenever he was traveling through our city.  Eventually, after he retired, we ended up living in the same state again and for three years, my father resided in a mobile home on the property where my husband and I had built our home.

Living so close together was a bad idea.  Our tenuous relationship strained with the constant contact.  My father routinely invaded our privacy, using the "emergency" house key we gave him to enter our home whenever he wanted, even when we were sleeping .  He was rude and argumentative with my husband and my in-laws.  He told lies about us to my sisters.  My marriage bore the stress of the constant problems he caused.  My father became more and more combative, even speaking badly of us to the people in the small town where we lived.  After three years of escalating conflict, he moved to the state where one of my other sisters lived.

I was so relieved to be rid of him, again, but he was soon inching his way back into my life.  Knowing that he was not welcome, he became nicer and I let my guard down, again.  And, eventually, I would regret it, again.  Over and over that happened.  He quickly ruined his relationship with the daughter that he was living near and moved to another state to actually live with my half-sister.  She was so sure that she and dad could occupy the same house in harmony.  Wrong.  And, then it was back to my state, back to me.  He had no place to go, he would be homeless, or so he led me to believe.  No way he could live with my husband and me after the horrible experience we had with him living next door.  So, I bought him a piece of land and a mobile home a mile away.  Even that was too close.  He started out nice and cooperative and seemingly appreciative of all I was doing for him.  That lasted just long enough for the closing on the property to take place.  Then, his ugly side came out again.  Constant complaints and demands.  Nothing I did was good enough. Soon he was telling lies about me to my sisters and his neighbors.  But, I put up with it for eight long years.

Why?  Why would I allow myself to be treated like that?  I kept hoping that if I did enough for him, he would become the dad I always wanted and needed.  Time was running out.  He was aging.  I only had so much time left to finally get the dad I had always hoped for.  I did more and more for him, especially as his health declined and he no longer drove.  And, still he disrespected and criticized me.  Nothing was enough, I was not enough.  The more I did, the more he berated me, the more he complained, the more he demanded.  As he aged, I felt trapped.  How could I break off my relationship with him if his health was declining?  He needed me.  I could not abandon him.  I resigned to a life of his verbal and emotional abuse.  Until. . .

Who knows what causes that moment - that moment in time when you say, "Enough! No more!"  I stopped to check on him one morning on my way to work.  He began berating me for not buying him a car.  His truck had broken down a couple of years before, but he was already rarely driving due to his health.  I took him grocery shopping, to doctor appointments and anywhere else he needed to go.  Then, he got this idea that he could start driving again and that I should buy him a car.  When I refused, he became angry and for weeks he had argued with me about it.  That morning he started the argument anew, but that time he accused me of abusing him.  He said I was a horrible daughter and that he had called a state agency to report me for elder abuse.  I knew he was lying, as he often did, but, for some unknown reason, at that moment something snapped inside me.  No, that is not the correct description - some slammed shut - like a door closing on our relationship.  Without a word, I walked away.  I never saw him again.  I wrote a letter to him, to the VA Hospital that provided his health care and to my sisters stating that I was no longer responsible for him in any way.  He could continue to live on my property, but I had ceased providing him with transportation or any other aid or services.  I detailed some of the psychological and emotional abuse I had experienced from him and declared myself free from any his manipulation and cruelty.  Three years later I received a call from a deputy sheriff informing me that my father had been found dead in his mobile home and had been deceased for several days.  He died alone.  His life did not have to end that way, but his own actions brought about his lonely demise.

The day I walked away from him was a day of rebirth for me.  It was the beginning of my new life - a life that would take a few years to develop, but a life that was in the birthing process. Taking action to leave that abusive situation opened my mind to clearly seeing and evaluating other relationships and situations in my life.   It would lead to the end of my marriage, the terminations of some "friendships" that were unhealthy, the creation of new relationships and a new life.

I am a person who often suffers from guilt.  But, surprisingly, when I walked away from my father that day, I never suffered any guilt or shame about my decision.  Some people were shocked and judgmental about my decision.  My father was usually funny and charming around people he first met or saw infrequently.  Friends and acquaintances of mine could not understand why I had such problems with him or why I cut him from my life.  They saw a man who was putting on a show - a witty man with great magnetism; I lived with a man who was rarely nice to me unless he needed something from me.  Even the disdain and criticism of these people did not affect me.  I was strong and confident in my decision.  My only regret was that I had not walked away long, long before.

Here is what I learned from my decision to walk away:

• You can never mold someone into the person you want them to be. 
• Abuse does not have to be physical.  Emotional and psychological abuse are just as damaging and may even have effects that last longer.
• Leave an abusive relationship as soon as you can.  
• Anyone can be an abuser - your spouse, your partner, a parent, a sibling, a friend - ANYONE.
• No one deserves abuse.  
• Manipulation is abuse. 
• You can change your life, one step at a time. 
• Don't pay attention to those who criticize or ostracize you for removing an abuser from your life. 
• If your friends do not support your decision to remove an abuser from your life, they are not your friends. 
• If other family members do not support your decision to remove an abuser from your life, feel free to remove them, too.
• NEVER feel guilty for doing what is right and healthy for you.  
• There are supportive, loving people in the world and if you are wasting all your time trying to please an abuser, you are missing the opportunity to have wonderful relationships with those people.  

In a way, my decision to walk away that day led to Manifesting Mount Dora.  Back then, I would never have dreamed I could even think about manifesting something wonderful in my life.  In fact, I could not even imagine having a wonderful life.  Now I do.  All because I walked away.  

Mount Dora Renewal

Three days in Mount Dora have helped to ease the fatigue of three months of long work hours, several illnesses and some painful back issues and many days and evenings of being the caregiver for my two grandchildren.  On Thursday, my man and I and our two dogs headed south on a rainy afternoon.  We were greeted by 20 mph winds and intermittent showers in our favorite town, but nothing drastic enough to keep us inside.  Soon we were visiting Grantham Park on Lake Dora, walking the streets of the “old city” and dining on delicious Cuban food at Copacabana.  Friday and Saturday were filled with many long walks with our dogs, wonderful food and conversations at Copacabana, One Flight Up and Cody’s on 4th.  We shopped - particularly at my favorite boutique, Em’z on Fifth.  We rested and read.  On Sunday, for the first time, we visited the weekly Open Air Market and purchased some fabulous French bread, pastries and biscotti from the booth of A Wish or Two Ago, a French bakery located in Grand Island, some fresh arugula, tomatoes and blueberries, and a hair care product by Wildflower Beauty by Jessica, and I longed to buy some pottery from the Perry Stoneware booth, but decided that needed to wait until another trip.

One of the interesting aspects of our trip was the first time inclusion of our dog Pooh.  I rescued Pooh and her mom Winnie in 2002.  Winnie was about 3 years old and Pooh was around 4 months old.  They were living on the streets near my mom’s home in Tennessee.  Winnie was socialized having obviously been someone’s pet at some time, but Pooh was completely feral.  In spite of her better people skills, Winnie was not a dog to live in a house.  Being within four walls made her anxious and stressful, resulting in excessive panting and pacing, so she and her wild-one daughter spent the next 10 years living in my backyard and sleeping on my back porch.  Winnie became ill in January and left us.  Pooh is still trying to adjust to life without her ever-present mother.  Although Pooh is certainly tame now, she is still easily frightened and becomes nervous in new situations and around unfamiliar people.  Since living alone was not a good idea for the grieving Pooh, we started allowing her in the house with our Pekingese dog and she has slowly adjusted to life with our family and without her mother.  Worried that leaving her alone, without her most trusted people (my man and me) and without her canine companion Chanelito, we risked taking her along on her first ever vacation.  Pooh was nervous and leery of Mount Dora where everything was new and different.  She was overwhelmed and confused by her first sight of a large body of water, Mount Dora.  Walking along the downtown streets, busy with tourists and shoppers, triggered all her fear phobias.  But, slowly she adjusted - a little - with the one exception of her bathroom habits.  At our home, she uses our backyard for her bowel movements and in Mount Dora she was always on a leash or in our cottage, all places that did not seem “right” to her for that bodily function.  For three days we fretted about her lack of a bowel movement, always afraid the call of nature would become too strong when she was in the cottage.  Fortunately, that did not happen and on our last morning there, during my man’s early morning walk with the dogs, she successfully released what had been held inside of too long.  We were all relieved!!

Since mid-December my life has been out-of-synch, out-of-balance, as evident in my consecutive illnesses, back problems and a general feeling of dismay and discord.
Our trip allowed me some downtime to think, to read and to try and figure out what is wrong and why it became so wrong.  I read the book “The Gifts of Imperfection” by Brene Brown who I recently saw on Oprah’s Super Soul Sunday.  Her book is fantastic and I highly recommend it.  I really identified with her studies on the problems of perfectionism and I learned much from her about embracing our imperfections.

I came home from my long weekend feeling a little more rested, with slightly less back pain and with a renewed commitment to getting my life back on track.  First, I spoke to my daughter about her work schedule, insisting that I have Monday through Wednesday evenings free of childcare so I can attend my yoga class, work for some of my evening clients, volunteer at Wild Iris Bookstore and attend the monthly Feminist Open Mic Poetry Readings that I enjoy so much.  I promised myself to better organize my home work space and bedroom, so those areas feel less cluttered, confused and confining.  I recommitted myself to writing more often and I began researching some sort of creative class or activity that I can enjoy with my grandchildren.  And, hardest of all, I made an agreement with The Universe to be more positive and more patient about my Manifesting Mount Dora project.

Tomorrow begins my return to the routine of work, household duties and helping to care for my grandchildren.  Tomorrow begins the juggle of hours and the scheduling of all the things that I need to do while trying to make time for the things I want to do.  Tomorrow and the next day and the next are the test to see if my Mount Dora Renewal will take hold and grow sturdy roots.