This Is It

Over an early morning cup of coffee, my dear friend and I were talking about how much time people (ourselves included) spend working on it. We talked about all the its in our lives. All the things we’ve worked on in order to get better, do better, be better. We’ve worked on ourselves, our relationships, our work, and everything in between, and we worked on whatever it was as if it were a destination. A place to arrive and finally be done with it.

And then we got it.

This is it.

This is it.

This is it.

This is it.

Always has been. Always will be.

Washing Windows

Once a year we get our windows washed, and the before and after is noticeable. We’re good about scheduling a trusted professional once a year to tackle the task, but the upkeep in between, which is up to us, tends to slip right off our radar screen. The truth of the matter is, it wouldn’t take much effort to maintain our windows, keeping them clean and clear to enjoy the beautiful view. A little spritz of windex here, a swipe of a paper towel there, and just like that, the smudges, spatters, bird-strikes, and spots would disappear.

The same holds true for the lens through which we look out at the world. Tending to the things which cloud our vision is easier when we do it in real time, rather than waiting for stuff to build up. When we notice that we are looking at life through the window of an old story, negative self-talk, or a toxic thought, we can do what needs to be done to address it, giving us clear glass through which to see.

Looking out through our windows today, the view hasn’t changed, but the glass through which we see it has.

Home Ownership

There is a big difference between a house and a home. A house is a structure. A framework within which we live, and what can be seen on the exterior says little about what goes on in the interior. From the outside, a house doesn’t give away much about what happens inside the home, and like many things, it’s what’s on the inside that counts. Having sold a house a time or two (five to be more precise), I know that location matters. Some neighborhoods are more desirable than others depending on our preferences, and most of us tend to buy into the best area that we can afford. When putting a house on the market, in order to distinguish ours from others that are similar, sellers are encouraged to create street appeal for potential buyers, and to stage the inside so that they can see themselves living within its walls. But location, street appeal and staging do not a home make.

Or a life for that matter.

When I set out to write a book a few years ago, I did it because it was the next right thing to do. I was compelled to write BLUSH: Women & Wine not to become rich and famous, but to discover why I had come to depend upon wine as a coping mechanism to soften the blows of my own life, and to invite my readers to embark on their own exploration with me. Yet the temptation was there, and sometimes still is, to make the book and my work look good out in the world, rather than using the book and my work to do good out in the world. I am often more easily enticed to sign up for another course to learn how to create a more successful platform instead of standing on the platform that I have and telling the story to those ready to hear it.

It can be easy to get caught up striving to situate ourselves in the right place, be seen with the right people, and surrounded by the right stuff. We develop an image that will appeal to those we seek to impress, and stage our lives to appear accomplished and successful. There is nothing wrong with working to cast ourselves and what we have to offer in the best light, but that is exterior window dressing to the real work of shining a light inside the walls of our life. The work of coming to know ourselves and our vocation, of cultivating our gifts and honing our craft. For only when we do that will we find ourselves at home in our own life, and it is only from there that we are able to step out into the world and offer what is uniquely ours to give.

When it comes to real estate it might be about location, location, location, but when it comes to real life, it is about vocation, vocation, vocation.

The Garage Day 2

When it comes to cleaning, clearing, and organizing a garage, like many things in life, it’s different strokes for different folks. I’m a tosser, he’s a saver, and with those two facts in play, as you can imagine, this project could stir up a little emotional stuff for the two of us. However, if we’ve learned anything in our 25 years together, it is that while we couldn’t be much more different, our commitment to one another is the same. So this morning, before setting one foot in the garage, we sat down with our coffee, and along with my sister and her husband who are here to help, had a conversation about what we wanted to be true at the end of this daunting project. Yes, by the end of the week we want to have made major progress. Yes, by the end of the week we want to have hauled away as many truck loads as possible. Yes, by the end of the week we want to have created a much more organized and clean space in which to start using the garage for the purpose it was originally built. And, yes, and most importantly, by the end of the week the four of us want to have all laughed together, had fun together, and be even more grateful for one another.

When it comes to cleaning, clearing, and organizing a garage, like many things in life, the project isn’t the real project. What matters in the end is how we conducted ourselves in the midst of the project. What matters in the end is how we related to one another in the midst of the project. What matters in the end is whether or not we are better people, both individually and collectively, because of the project. That can only happen when we realize that the project isn’t the real project. It is just a vehicle to become even more of the authentic and wholehearted people we are called to be.

Stay tuned.

The Garage

So we have this garage. It’s a big, beautiful, well-built garage. It was specifically built to have room for two cars, ample storage space, a garbage and recycling station, a workshop to die for, and an upstairs bunkhouse for overflow guests, complete with a full bathroom, and mini-kitchen. It was planned for all of those, has room for all of those, but has none of those, because there isn’t room for any of those. It is filled to the brim with, well, we’re not sure what, but we’re about to find out.

Tomorrow is the first day of Garage Resurrection Week. We’ve set aside the time specifically and intentionally to rid it of any and everything that isn’t needed, wanted, or has past its usefulness, so that we can bring back to life the purpose for which it was built.

A garage is such a metaphor for life. A garage becomes filled with things that get in the way of why it was built in the first place, and a life gets filled with things that get in the way of why we are here in the first place.

It boils down to this…What to keep? What to toss? What to pass on?

Wish us luck.

In The Image Of...

Somewhere along the way, most of us forget who we are, who we have been from the beginning, and who we are meant to be forever. It’s time we remembered. Because only in remembering who we are and living into our fullness, can we love, help, and heal the world that is within our reach, the errand upon which we all have been sent.

In case, like me, sometimes you forget too, let’s remember together.

We are all created in the image of God. Every single one of us.

Every.

Single.

One.

Of.

Us.

That sounds really good, right? I think so too. But what does in the image of God really mean?

Today, a question, posed by the Reverend Jacquie Lewis compels me to think more deeply about that, and I hope it will compel you too. Standing tall at the podium, speaking to the thousands of us gathered here in Albuquerque and around the world via webcast, she took a deep breath, and with fierce passion in her heart and tears in her eyes, asked: 

Why are we willing to settle for such a puny God? A God who is unimaginative, stingy, exclusionary, transactional, and punitive?  

Today, in Albuquerque, here is the answer that comes to mind. An answer I hope to spend the rest of my time living into with all of my heart, and all of my soul, and all of my mind.

We are all created in the image of a magnificent, creative, imaginative, abundant, inclusive, relational, and restorative God. Every single one of us.

Every.

Single.

One.

Of.

Us.

We are created in the image of the God who invites all, welcomes all, recognizes all, reconciles all, and who pours out amazing grace to all from a cup that forever runneth over.

Amen. 

The Step To Take

Start close in,
don’t take the second step
or the third,
start with the first
thing
close in,
the step you don’t want to take.

David Whyte

(Excerpted from River Flow: New & Selected Poems )

Today in conversation with another coach, we were reflecting on next steps, and how to pursue what is calling us, right from where we are. In the midst of what is, how do we step closer to what could be? It is easy to get focused on the far horizon, and miss the fertile ground squarely beneath our feet. Wherever we want to go, where we are is the place to start.

Sharing a bit of silence, David Whyte’s poem, Start Close In came to mind, and I introduced the words quoted above to our conversation. Instantly a next step came to mind. One that was close in. A step that wasn’t the first choice, but the right choice.

Wherever we are, there is a next step. One that is close in, and while it may not be the one we want to take, it is the step that will lead us deeper into the life we are called to live.

What is the step you don’t want to take?

The one close in?

Take that one.

With gratitude to DC

Holy Fires

For me to be a saint means to be myself (Thomas Merton)…We owe it to the God who created us, to ourselves, to the people we love, and to all with whom we share this troubled planet, to become “saints”. How else can we run and complete the errand upon which God sent us here?

The Road Back To You by Ian Morgan Cron & Suzanne Stabile

Sometimes someone speaks truth into our lives in a way that changes us. In a way that reminds us of who we are and why we are here.

Recently that happened to me.

Twice.

The first, when a new friend, one I met just last week at Rancho La Puerta, stopped me mid-sentence and said, “Molly, you are a holy fire.” It simultaneously gave me shivers and a lump in my throat then, and gives me the same now as I see her words in print. I knew what she said to be true, in that kind of quiet, deep knowing that happens in such moments.

The second, when my dearest friend of almost 45 years told me that in all of our times of working together, she’s never seen me as she is seeing me now. That I am “at the top of my game”. Again, I knew her words to be true, but at 65 years of age, the top of my game isn’t about building my brand, or establishing myself as a well-known expert, rather, it is about offering my work in service to others. Perhaps that is what being at the top of our game is meant to mean at any age.

I hesitate to even write about this, as it sounds high and mighty, and like I think I’m all that. Quite the opposite. Rather than high and mighty, I feel low, as in grounded on the earth, and small, as in a tiny reflection of what happens whenever we live our lives from the center of our being. Yes, I’ve honed my craft and refined my skills, but I can stake no claim to that holy blaze, other than that I’ve learned to stoke the fire that was laid for me from the beginning. And being at the top of my game? It doesn’t mean showing off…it means showing up.

We are each meant to be a holy fire, and called to be at the top of our game. Let’s remind one another of who we are, by speaking truth that will help us complete the errand upon which we’ve each been sent.

Written with deep gratitude

Mission Accomplished

Everywhere I look people are going through hard things, and I am as well. These experiences are part of what it means to be human, and choosing to go through them rather than trying to go around them is how we find our way back home to ourselves. To our true self.

In the midst of a conversation the other day about such things, I suddenly recalled a scene from the movie Apollo 13. An explosion mid-flight had damaged the spacecraft which changed the mission from landing on the moon, to finding a way to bring astronauts Jim Lovell, Fred Haise, and Jack Swigert back home.

The heat shield on the Command Module had been damaged in the explosion, and it was not known whether it would be able to withstand the intense heat of reentry. There was no other way home but to ride it out, trusting that the heat shield would hold.

It did, and on April 17, 1970, at 1:07:41PM, the Command Module splashed into the Pacific Ocean, and they were home.

Mission accomplished.

It occurs to me that whenever we are engaged in the dangerous adventure of finding our way back home to ourselves, we too have to trust that there is a heat shield surrounding us. That we are protected by a love that wants us to be whole. A love that wants nothing in the world more than to bring us back home.

Mission accomplished.

https://airandspace.si.edu/collection-objects/command-module-apollo-13

Wherever We Go

Sometimes a message just keeps showing up. This is one of those...

Do the work. Do it now. Do it here.

Whatever we choose to ignore comes with us wherever we go.