2014 Year in Review

I have been spending a lot of time lately transcribing some year-in-review material and it's caused me to think about that: what this last year was all about. Reflecting isn't always easy when the year was a challenging one.

The year 2014 started off in the worst possible place for me. I was, for all intents and purposes homeless. I had closed down my life in Wisconsin to move to Florida and live with a friend. Our plan had been to spend our silver years enjoying each other's company and living out our days in the Florida sun, on the beach.

Suffice it to say it didn't work out as planned. The details aren't important. I've accepted that "shit happens" and it certainly happened at the start of the year. So I was reborn, yet again, as a "carpet bagger". It wasn't my physical condition that was dragging me down as much as it was my mental condition. I had slipped into a very dark place.

My daughter, bless her heart, took me under her wing. For being all of 105 pounds, she's fierce when it comes to defending and protecting those she loves. I so appreciate that about her. Even when she was little, a tiny child on a school bus, she stood up to a bully who was taunting her friend and paid the price by getting physically tossed around, and yet she came back just as fierce as ever in her friends defense.

She took me in and made sure I was taking care of myself, and yes, I was that far into the darkness of the hopelessness that I wasn't really paying attention to even some of the basics. She nurtured me, cajoled me, taunted me at times to get my "sorry ass" in gear and get back to living. 

My friends in Wisconsin rallied around as well. They are such great people who have hearts of gold. They ensured I had things to do, people to connect with, places to go. They took me in, like my daughter, and helped to bring light back into the darkness I had fallen into. 

In all honesty, it was nip and tuck for awhile, but slowly, slowly, the light started shining into the corners, the heaviness that weighed on my heart so terribly started to lift and even when it seemed that I was just going through the motions, it felt like I was moving away from the "suck zone" that the depression I was battling had me trapped in.

I was able to do some work for the company that I had retired from. I was able to get more work to do online with people that I enjoyed, and by Spring, early Summer I was doing much better. I am forever grateful to my "ladies" who made sure that we had regular lunches together and just chatted and laughed and shared.

I did break off all contact with my friend in Florida. I had to in order to move on. I have come to the place where I wish her well and hope life holds only good things for her. There is no fault in what happened, just events that spun in bad directions.

My dream of living back by the beach never completely faded. I grew up on the ocean and I wanted to spend my last years by the ocean and in warmer climates (Wisconsin winters are brutal). So I packed up my things, once again, and sight unseen rented a place in Florida on the east coast and headed back down to the Sunshine State. This time my daughter decided to come with me.

I have been in Florida, on the east coast now for three months. We are settled into a small apartment that is just perfect for the two of us. I continue to do my work online and to build my book of business, and Jess has a new boyfriend and is working to build a life for herself down here.

I love getting up in the morning and opening the patio doors to hear the sound of birds singing and to enjoy the warm air. I love to hear the children playing and people going about their lives as I enjoy the indoor/outdoor lifestyle that this region affords. 

I have found and explored every farmers market, and every health-food store. I am over-the-moon pleased that we have a Trader Joe's here. The beach and ocean are a short drive away and the sun shines a lot more than in Wisconsin this time of year. 

I love the spiritual opportunities here: the church I've connected to, the Buddhist monastery that I am a part of. I love the rich culture of the area. The delightful parts of the city that have eclectic coffee shops and tantalizing import bazaars. 

Life is slower here, but that feels right as well. There is an ease of life that doesn't have to be crammed into a few short months before it's driven indoors. There is something satisfying to be able to smell fresh mowed grass year round.

I miss my people in Wisconsin. They are a forever part of my heart-space and my extended family. I still stay in touch and call and correspond and connect whenever possible. I will go back and visit when the leaves are on the trees.

So as I look back on 2014 I am grateful for all of the good that so very much outweighed the not so good. I am grateful for the people who cared about me and for me, I am grateful for my dear daughter and my dear friends, and I am pleased to be in a substantially better place than I was at the start of the year.

The year 2015 is beginning with me in a good place physically and emotionally. I have a lot to work on this year and I am excited to do that work and move towards that future me that I am excited to connect with.

Sending you all hugs and best wishes for the coming year.

Love,
Betsy

Looking Back...Looking Forward

2014 was an interesting year. It was my first full year of not working full time for the company that I retired from. I truly enjoyed the change in pace. One of my goals when I left the company in the fall of 2013 was to honor my body's rhythms regarding the need to take breaks, to rest, to meditate: to create space that supported my highest good and my best work. That effort has been amazingly rewarding.

I don't think most businesses understand the loss in productivity and creativity they experience at the expense of regimented work environments. I am reminded of Covey's book The Speed of Trust when I think about how empowering the freedom to be able to create your work space and time-frames allows. So 2014 was a year where I was able to really immerse myself in developing the self trust necessary to create and live optimally.

2014 was my first full year in living the life of a freelance creative. I give a deep bow to Alexandra Franzen for her amazing guidance and inspiration in pursuing this undertaking. There are a lot of collective fears harbored by Baby Boomers around not being gainfully employed. There is a fear that if income requirements were to suddenly find them adrift from the corporate, single employer world, all would be lost. I personally had similar fears as I undertook this adventure towards my better self. At the end of a year I am pleasingly surprised at how much more productive I am; at the variety of work that I do, working only for people I truly like and admire, doing things that truly make a difference in the world. It has been a rewarding year and I continue to grow my income base, spreading it across multiple projects. The upside... the loss of a project or job doesn't throw me on rocky shores. I have found that resilience in resetting the sails and adjusting course is much easier to work through than being cast adrift. I no longer fear the latter outcome as I have a greater opportunity to control the variables.

The year did start on a very sad note for me, as a friendship that I truly valued and thought was a lasting one came to an end. I am now OK with not knowing what really happened, and I choose to forgive and move on, but the loss is still with me and will be for some time. Sometimes relationships aren't meant to last forever, and the important thing is to hold on to the good and let the rest go. So that is something that I have worked on this last year.

My goal of living close to the ocean and in a warmer climate has been realized. In moving from Wisconsin to Florida, I am now in a much better place for me with regards to weather and location. I found myself a virtual shut-in in Wisconsin as I battled allergies and asthma, but in Florida I am able to go to the beach regularly. There are, available to me here, year round Farmer's Markets and fresh organic produce 365 days a year, allowing me to eat healthier.

Spiritually, the beginning of the year saw me having to move away from a spiritual center that I had been volunteering at and felt strongly connected to and move back to Wisconsin. That was a difficult move for me as I felt a strong connection with this center and a strong bond with it's members. I continued to stay in touch and continued to serve and volunteer from a distance. I am pleased that I was able to end the year having moved back to Florida, and in a Compassion Meditation Retreat at my beloved center. It feels that I finally came full circle through this year's detour and am once again back where I am supposed to be and need to be. It feels good.

Finally, the unchanging commitment that I have to the highest good of all is still the thread that continues to weave itself through my life and has for many, many years, so I close this post with my wish for all for the upcoming year and years beyond:

For all of the peoples and the nations of the earth, may not even the names disease, famine, war, and suffering be heard, but rather, may their moral conduct, merit, wealth and prosperity increase and may supreme good fortune and well being always arise for them.

I send this out into the world to take hold in the hearts and minds of people everywhere, to bring peace and compassion, and to enrich lives. Wishing you a year full of blessings.

With Love,
Betsy

Thought 21: Capturing Stillness

Someone once said that life is something that happens to you while you are making plans. I am in a bit of a lull at the moment. You know, one of those rare moments when emails aren't coming in; when projects have been temporarily put on a back burner; when friends are busy, or out of town, or not calling - one of those moments. It's not the norm, but the exception and I'm finding that I have to shake myself out of the habit of doing. I should be REVELING in this moment...rolling in it like a dog who just smelled the most amazing thing and wants to be covered in it...so why is it sooo hard to let go of the doing?

I find myself searching for things that will put a demand on me; feeling lost when there isn't something I haven't done...feeling incomplete without, as the poet Robert Frost put it, "having miles to go before I sleep". My heart wants to love this moment, this ceasing of doing. If anything, it comes as a sense of relief, of exhaustive gratitude for a break, yet the drive to make, to create, to push, pull, drive, understand, develop... it pokes at me incessantly. 

This moment of quiet is an opportunity to really connect with the "life" that is happening while I'm usually making plans. It is a time to be still and just be. The sense that I have that things will fall apart somehow if I am not doing, creating, ,making, becoming, is a lie because if I am gone tomorrow, MY world may no longer exist but THE world would continue without my driving it with my efforts. In the same instance I am absolutely positive that my efforts ARE making a difference, otherwise I would not be as committed as I am to contributing in my small way. Perhaps it is not so much my doing that would be missed but my unique perspective that lends dimensionality to the chaos that is the stuff that life is shaped from. 

Like a star in the heavens, we each twinkle for awhile and when that light goes out the totality of light is forever changed...These are the types of thoughts that this moment was made for.

Thought 20: Labor of Love

It's taken me 60 years to rest in my truth - Life should be a labor of Love.

Believe me, I tried it a LOT of different ways:
- Work hard and you get rewards.
- Give, give, give until you absolutely can't or don't have anything more left.
- Plan it and then stick to the plan.
- Don't even try, just let it happen.
- Let others tell you how to live and then at least you have someone to blame.

The years have peeled away the reasons, one by one, showing them for their misguided approach or failed founding principles.

When I was finally empty. When I finally let go. When I stopped thinking so long and doing so hard, Love found its way to my heart. It quietly entered in, and washed over my view of the world. 

It is simple now. It is Love based, and it just is. I don't have to try, I don't have to be anything or do anything. I can if I want to, but that is not the path of Love, it is simply a potential expression of it. When love entered, so did peace.

I still wrestle with my humanness, but it's more of a friendly arm wrestle now rather than a life or death, self or other struggle. 

Love embraces and that is enough.

With Love

Thought 18: Simple Gifts

Give yourself permission to be outrageously kind, irrationally warm, improbably generous and to feel the sheer joy and celebration in doing this.  If a day were to have a theme, this is certainly a great one. I see the benefits of a day spent like this of being very similar to the benefits that Shakespeare speaks about in his quality of mercy speech from Merchant of Venice:

The quality of mercy is not strained; 

It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven Upon the place beneath. 

It is twice blest;
It blesseth him that gives and him that takes.

To be twice blessed is a win/win. Remember, a warm heartfelt hug provides the hugger and the huggee with a healthy burst of oxytocin which is a key hormone for promoting trust, bonding, and devotion - key to human connectedness. So every time you hug someone, think of it as your own personal act towards nurturing world peace.

Love and hugs,

Betsy

Thought 19: The Seasons of Our Days

Patterns and rhythms, patterns and rhythms...they play throughout our lives like sunlight playing through the leaves of a tree mottling the ground beneath with light and shadow. The syncopation of life is a story of patterns and rhythms - rising and falling, sustaining then changing - an orchestration of time and space - patterns of light and dark.

It fills our senses. Listen and you can hear it. Look and you can see it. You are immersed in it, cradled in it. One moment you are lifted by it's sweet metered pulse, and the next moment you are driven down by it's relentless pounding beat. It is life. It is equal to the same force that erodes deep canyons; abrading, carving, wearing - exposing the layers that time has deposited. It is the same force that pushed up mountains; tearing, crushing, driving - fiercely reducing granite to rubble and shaping rock like clay.

It is equivalent to the delicate beauty of a butterfly's wings, to the transparent aqua  blue-green of the curl of a wave. It is life. Hear it in the song of a bird. Feel your body move to it in the rhythm of day and night; of youth and old age; of life and death.

It is impermanent. It will not last, or ever be the same as it was sometime in the past. It is an amazing, powerful, delicate, creative gift that will ultimately end in your demise. It is Life.

I choose to love it. I choose to be grateful for it. I choose to make the most of it. I choose to live what time I have, as brilliantly as I can. I choose to celebrate myself and others on this wonderful journey. So here's to life! May we all live long and prosper.

Thought 17: Bits and Pieces That Come Together

I am walking along the beach, my feet grounded deep in the sand, my head in the azure, sun-drenched sky, and my body and spirit are connecting each to the other - a prism of joy, happiness and gratitude. I walk balanced between sand and sky - between earth and heaven, and the ocean sings to me. Its voice rising and falling, its waves flashing as it forms its language, unintelligible to the human ear but so enchanting. My heart dances with the waves, my rhythms become one with those of the wind and sea. I turn to see my footprints in the sand of where I have been, soon swept clean and erased by the water's ebb and flow. They are forgotten as I I look ahead, down the beach, at the stretch of bright white sand that teases me to continue my walk. This is the landing strip for my soul. I follow the sea birds as they dive and sweep, dart and call. I sit for awhile on the top of a dune, watching the wind move through the sea grass, stirring it into motion, rustling as it passes through the grass and trails off down the beach in small spirals of sand. This world of sea, and sand, and sun, is intoxicating, and I drink until I can't possibly take in any more. This day is a gift like no other, and I look forward to saying the same thing...tomorrow...and the next day...and the next...


This is my life, as I've always dreamed of it. I love my cottage by the sea "Coeur de la Mer". It is an indoor statement of light and water and sand so that it mirrors a sunny day at the beach. Piece by piece I found exactly what fit. Yard sales, estate sales, friends knowing just the piece. The interior is a lovely orchestration of gestures of art and love, in furniture and wood, in fabric and paint. Put your ear to this cottage and you can hear the ocean. Step out on the deck and feel the sea breeze as it pushes the hammock and the seat swing. Everything designed for comfort, designed to move, to give to hold, to nurture to welcome, it is all so familiar. White washed canvas artfully brushed with shades of sea greens and blues, of shell pinks and peaches, beautifully worn in just the right places. And all acquiesces to the expanse of white sand and dunes that is the beach. I have planted beach roses leading down the path to the beach. They remind me of days in Rhode Island ... but no rocky beach here, no. The harshness of the New England shore has been replaced by white beach and Atlantic swells. I love it so much that I can't see leaving yet. Other places will wait. I want to enjoy this while I have it. Impermanence is such that I want to roll in it like a dog in something that smells amazing - I want it all over me. If I leave I want to carry the smell with me.