Planet We

Loneliness can be hazardous to your health. 

Really. I just heard about a study that revealed how loneliness raises your cortisol level. That dastardly stress hormone is higher in the morning in lonely people as if in preparation for another day of assault. I found this fascinating. In a culture where loneliness is considered a weakness, something to be gotten over, I hadn’t realized that feeling like you don’t belong or are on the perimeter of a group actually alters the brain and places it on high alert, a state that after prolonged activity can result in compromised immunity and fragmented sleep. 

While we are wired to be aware of physical danger it was a revelation for me to view loneliness as a threat to one’s social body. In the old days, in a village if one felt lonely you could simply wander down the road and drop in on a neighbor. Today we try to ignore it or fill the hole with substances or TV. And sadly when this becomes chronic you are literally getting wired repeatedly to guard against people in the name of self-preservation.

 Loneliness then leads to continued isolation and that state leads to dis-ease. Think of a school of fish. It is always safer for the fish in the middle, surrounded by others. Those on the outside are more likely to be eaten by predators and are in far more danger. So too with us, swimming on the edge of the social perimeter, feeling like an outsider leads to an activated brain that makes the body more susceptible to disease.

Who would have thought that the need to belong is actually an evolutionary force? 

Here is where it gets tricky. If the need to belong requires us giving up parts of ourselves in order to fit, we are going against our nature. This too will have disastrous consequences. Yes I am waving my banner again. The marriage of togetherness AND autonomy is without a doubt my current curriculum and I get the opportunity to flex this muscle and grow it every time I meet a new person or in my current situation read…man. 

 Yup another interesting internet connection has arisen and I am challenged with each exchange as to what information I share. I usually default to sharing everything but find this time I am doing more listening than talking. And the talking I am doing is vulnerable and real. There is no strategy to tone down parts of myself to fit with him and at the same time I have no agenda to get him to open up to me. Feels kind of freeing actually. Perhaps my evolution has brought me to swimming for the sheer joy of it and not making my experience of belonging dependent upon his acceptance. I accept me…that is enough. 

Although I must say when I ask him if he is interested in personal growth and he says” I am interested in you, that’s the same thing,”it sure makes me smile. Lets face it, we all need each other. Independence may be cool but for me, what's behind door number three is calling. I need to put what I know about interdependence into practice. I am holding out for the Divine Merger and it may not look at all like I have pictured. That is the mystery.

If I had a current soundtrack it would be http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3VcjrLgJXlk&feature=kp

Branded by being real AND connected::

Authentically Yours,

Marty

What’s love got to do with it?

Everything.

I couldn’t figure out why I was inflicted with a pretty serious case of “writer’s block” for the past week and a half.  I kept putting off writing my post because I couldn’t come up with anything that I thought was worthy of your time.  I also had a hunch that there was something I was being beckoned to ponder but I didn’t want to go there. What if I found something I wasn’t prepared to look at?

Then on Sunday, I happened to run into a long-time friend and we got around to talking about this blog. I asked him if he had ever read it and he said he hadn’t, and proceeded to tell me why.  What an eye-opening (heart-opening?) conversation that was!

Let’s start with the fact that we enjoy each other’s company even though we have never dated. He is very bright and perceptive, and we have meaningful conversations.  He’s not afraid to go deep, make tough observations, and in short, call a spade a spade… sometimes a tad less delicately than I’m comfortable with, but nonetheless, brutally honest.

His reason was that if my blog is a “tell-all”, then who would want to be my partner when there’s no room left for private information, just between the two of us? I assured him that there were some things that I haven’t published (have I mentioned my tattoo?) but still, he was pointing at something that rang a bell for me. And I am really grateful for his candor.

Here’s my takeaway from our tête-à-tête… he had also referred to my ability to connect really well with a large group of people when I’m performing. And I also suddenly remembered what I had said about Molly of the Beachcombers in a previous post… that I resonated with her because of her public persona but didn’t give much thought to her private life. Am I unattached by choice? Do I believe that I am getting all the love I could ever want or need from a very large group of people, vs. “the one”? Am I crowd-sourcing my love to hedge my bets and avoid nakedness (on all levels)?

I think I am. Way safer to be loved by many than by one. Fear of loss? You bet. All the things I am afraid of are taken care of when I garner affection from many. Safety in numbers.  Don’t have to be completely visible and vulnerable in a crowd. I’ve got it made! Yeah. Sure.

And while I’m writing this, I realize there’s a third option and that’s the possibility of having it all.  It’s not a case of one or the other.

Love. Is. Everything.

Branded by it.

Love Buns

P.S.  And yes, back in the day, I did perform this song many times!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kcj2OyqU1Zs

Blinded by the Light

I just finished a weekend training called Rock the Stage with Karen Mcgregor. It was a jam packed, info laden, edge of your seat marathon that invited entrepreneurs to develop one signature talk that they would deliver.

Some people were conquering their fear of speaking on stage, others their inner critics. For me the challenge came in choosing what to talk about. I had so many tracks, so many topics that I felt overwhelmed. I understood that once you learned the structure you could apply it to other topics so you could have a number of signature talks but I wanted this one to be the quintessential one. And that attachment had my head spinning. I would come home after a full day and work till midnight only to wake up knowing I would throw away what I had written the day before and start again. I watched myself bounce from elation to crankiness as I wrestled with landing in ONE topic.

They all rested on a similar foundation, that lasting change can only occur if one is inhabiting and feeling fully in the body but to make the topic as juicy as I wanted, had me spinning.

Once again the impermanence of life reminded me of what was important. My friend Andrew read a letter from his 18 year old son Daniel on our last day of the workshop to inspire us. Daniel had written the letter to himself three days before he died. Dear Self, he began. As Daniels words landed in my heart, I was touched and awed at his wisdom, at the knowing that could radiate from such a young man with such an old soul. He reminded me of the art of appreciation, loving the present moment exactly as it is. He reminded me of the power of gratitude and showed me how contagious excitement and a positive edge is. He reminded me of the beauty of tenderness and curiosity as he invited life to mark him through nature. Daniels life was short but it was inspired and flowed with grace.   

As I took the stage to start my signature talk I knew my opening words were sparked by his spirit.

 “A palliative care nurse made a list of the five things people regret as they are dying. The first is not living the life they wanted but rather the life others expected of them. The second is not feeling all their feelings and expressing them. The third is working too hard. The fourth is not maintaining deep friendships and the last was not choosing to be happy more often.”

I smiled inside as I continued my talk knowing that Daniel did not have even one of those regrets. He had lived his young life with full abandon relishing each new adventure and welcoming the dawn of every day.

 Elisabeth Kubler-Ross saw death as a graduation like a butterfly shedding its cocoon as it transitions to a new beginning. I know for me death has been a profound teacher, a mirror that makes sure I look at myself and live true, live real.

As Kubler-Ross says, “It is not the end of the physical body that should worry us. Rather, our concern must be to live while we’re alive-to release our inner selves from the spiritual death that comes with living behind a façade designed to conform to external definitions of who and what we are.”

Somehow I feel certain that Daniel already knew that.

Branded by light:

Authentically Yours,

Marty

http://karenmcgregor.ca/events/quantumleapspeaking/

Are you sitting down?

Normally I post every other week, but I asked Marty if I could do a sequel to last week’s “The magic of Molly”.  This just couldn’t wait.

Let’s start with a dog named Dudley. He arrived in our household twenty years ago when his owner was no longer able to care for him. I thought the boys might like to have a pet.  It didn’t take long to realize that this just wasn’t going to work.  Great dog.  Wrong household.  One day I heard that our neighbours’ Bart the Wonder Dog had been hit by a car on the highway and they were devastated.  I picked up the phone that very day and said to them, “this could be the most insensitive phone call you’ve ever received, or the most well timed, but I have a dog that desperately needs a better home. They arrived 10 minutes later and for years afterwards were grateful that I had offered Dudley to them.

Next stop on our timeline… 6 months ago. I had already begun to formulate a vision of my dream wheels – a turquoise, convertible Mini – and wondered if there even existed such a car.  I walked down to a local restaurant for our weekly business association meeting, and there, out front, was a Mini.  A turquoise, convertible, 6-speed Mini! I was stunned.  I took the picture because I wanted to have it on my phone and put it on my vision board. When I walked inside the restaurant, I looked around to see if I could match the car with the owner.  The only person I knew was Dudley’s “dad” from way back when, but I didn’t get a chance to talk to him as I had to chair the business meeting. When we were finished, I looked around to see if he was still there, but he had left.  And I didn’t even know if the Mini was his.

In the meantime, the search for my Mini intensified.  I contacted the dealerships around town, and some of them told me it would be like finding a needle in a haystack. Others said that colour didn’t exist.  I sent them my picture.  They said perhaps it was custom ordered. One of them even suggested that red Minis were all the rage.  I promptly wrote back and told them that they clearly didn’t know me and my level of determination to find my dream car.

Roll forward to two nights ago when I was singing at Hugo’s Restaurant – a now-weekly gig that keeps me off the streets. Who walks in but Dudley’s “dad”.  There I was, up on stage, supposedly paying attention to the song I was singing, but in between verses, I craned my neck to look out in the parking lot to see if there was a Mini out there.  There wasn’t.  I was undeterred.  After my set, I went over to him and we got caught up.  We probably hadn’t spoken in ten years.  I decided to go for it and ask if he drove a turquoise Mini.  He said he did, just not that night! I showed him the picture on my phone, and he said that was his exact car. So at this point, having nothing to lose, I asked him if he would sell it to me. And without batting an eyelash he said, “of course”.  Like it was a no-brainer for him.  Like it was obvious to him that it needed to be mine.  To say I was gobsmacked is a complete and utter understatement.  I stammered that I didn’t have the money yet, but that I only needed to get it before my birthday in June.  He said that was no problem, he needed to keep it for a couple of months anyway.  When I asked him why he would sell it, he said his new partner doesn’t drive a manual transmission so he has to get a new car. We settled on a price (I already knew what it was worth) and shook and then hugged.  And then I had to.  I did a happy dance right in the middle of the restaurant floor.

Lots of laughs and “holy cows” from my friends who were there. They knew I’d found my Molly.

Now I just have to find the moolah.  No problem.  The hard part is over.

Branded by determination,

Buns

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kZ6h0kyqSRk&feature=kp

The magic of Molly.

Stop me if I’ve told you this before, but when I was a teenager, I used to watch “The Beachcombers” on CBC every Sunday.  At the time, I was living in Ontario, and the characters with all their West Coast antics – and romantics – enchanted and captivated me.  To me, it was quintessentially British Columbia. I had a major crush on Bruno Gerussi, I loved the boat, Persephone, and when I grew up, I wanted to be Molly.  She owned the local restaurant and all the guys would gather there after a hard day’s work to soothe their souls.

I often fantasized about operating a cozy little eatery in a small village, where the locals would meet and we’d all get to know each other as part of a tightly-knit community. With university, marriage, and kids arriving in the next few years, the idea of becoming Molly was relegated to the back burner. However, I did end up moving to the coast with my young family.  From our new home, we could see Gibsons, where the original TV series was filmed. I even became friends with one of the women who co-starred in the series!

Fast forward to the late ’90s, and I found myself the proud part owner of the Lions Bay Café where I got to know the locals very well and I was in my glory.  I was also the editor of The Seagull, our community newspaper, and for a while, I was known as “The Queen of Lions Bay”. I hadn’t kept the possibility of becoming Molly at the forefront of my mind, but it was so real to me when I was a teenager that I guess it remained anchored at a much deeper level.  Then in 2003, I co-created another establishment in nearby Horseshoe Bay, and although not a café, I have been nourishing souls there too from a more spiritual menu. Only quite recently I realized that I had put all the ingredients together and I had cooked up my own version of Molly – not once, but twice. 

Now that I am closing the doors in a couple of months, I have been conjuring up the next reincarnation.  She is going to be a 5-speed, Ice Blue Mini convertible.  And her name is going to be Molly.  While this is a bit of a departure from the original icon – it’s what she represents to me that counts. I have dreamt about owning this particular car for a long time, and I am using my absolute belief of its becoming a reality as my fuel. (In fact, you might say I have been taking it a little too far… last week I decided to pretend I was already driving my Mini, and my real car is bigger.  I actually was so in “Mini Land” that I smucked the front end on a garden retaining wall.) I decided to dial it back a bit, and still enjoy my current wheels until Molly arrives on the scene. 

Molly #3 represents to me the undeniable Truth that our thoughts create our reality. I hope that she will continue to remind me of this. I want to take it a step further, and look at the thoughts that I’m unaware of… they are the ones that could be holding me back. One more piece and I’ll let you go… Molly played a very independent character and I don’t remember if she had a partner. Her “loves” were her adoring public… if she was married or in a relationship, that wasn’t what I liked about her. I am going to ponder that for a bit and I’ll get back to you on that.

Branded by conviction,

Love Buns, a.k.a. Molly

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ENMOwXwRTZU

Falling Uphill

My spark keeps wavering. Like a Bunsen burner it flares, I feel ME and then just as suddenly it dampens. I wonder what the heck this means. And I get nowhere. Like Sisyphus I long to get that boulder up to the top of my mountain and often experience the journey as a few days rolling up and then down it goes. Unlike the Greek myth I do not feel I am being punished by Zeus for being deceitful but there may be an element of blindness that keeps the process in motion.

I don’t really know what the rock represents. What am I rolling up this mountain? What the hell is the mountain? Who says I have to go uphill?  In not knowing am I deceiving myself?

Here is what I do know…the sensation.

This wavering pulse of energy when flowing bright is like radiant life force. I feel hopeful and full of possibility. Life is delightful and humorous with many random synchronistic punctuations. And just as suddenly I wake up immersed in a cloudy weight of meaninglessness. And like Sisyphus I am trying to regain lost ground, rolling that damn rock back up that mountain. Maybe the rock is my old structure, my old identity and I am not meant to roll that old girl uphill.

Could the weight of holding onto something archaic be generating this sensation of bringing me down?

How does one dissolve an identity that has served for years but no longer fits? Wish it was as easy as taking off your constricting clothes after a long day’s work and getting into jammies. Not a whole lot of thinking needed there. The desire for comfort is instinctual. This feels tight…take it off. This feels good…put it on. That’s clear.

 This process I am in the middle of …is not!

So what can I do but pay attention and keep accepting what arises? Ride it out and trust. Hey it’s a bit like being on a train clearly going somewhere but I have no real idea where. I know I can sense the destination though. That feeling that is me when fully in the moment and open as love. Both solid and light, full of bubbling possibility and the pleasure of connection with others and the world. Playtime mixed with purpose. Just like that dive into the stillness of a lake that is so much a part of my primal yearning for peace and freedom.

Surrender Dorothy. That’s what I tell my head so I can land myself back into the now.  Surrender and breathe. Just lean into it and fall.

Ahh….  

Branded by the exhale,

Authentically Yours,

Marty