Tag: love yourself first

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pamper me

I was supposed to be in Austin this weekend, but the cost of airfare priced me out, so I had to stay home. To comfort myself, I booked a facial for yesterday afternoon. I haven’t done one in quite a while, and my skin was feeling dry and lifeless, so off I went.

I didn’t go for anything fancy, just your basic facial which consisted of cleansing, a hydrating face mask, etc. It was 60 minutes of laying on a massage table having someone who wasn’t me pampering me. It was lovely.

Usually, when I want pampering, I get a massage, so this was something a bit different. I could still use a massage though! My last facial was a few years ago in Denver at the Sirens conference.

I always forget how good my skin feels after a facial. This morning my face is soft and it feels amazing.

It doesn’t completely make up for missing out on Austin, but it did make me feel better.

In writing news, I’m editing book 3 of The Blood Witch Saga, book 2 is with the publisher, and book 4 is underway. I also have a ghost story brewing in the back of my mind. I’ll toy with that later.

For now, I need to finish up this cup of coffee, have some breakfast and get myself busy. Happy Sunday, Readers. Go pamper yourself a little.

Photo by Adrian Motroc on Unsplash

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melancholy moments

I haven’t been writing much, obviously including here on my blog. I’ll be real honest and say that living has been hard recently. I have found myself feeling heavy and unmotivated.

I know everyone is feeling it. Six months of living in crisis mode is wearing us all down.

Then came the news that Ruth Bader Ginsburg had passed from this life and I am not ashamed to say that I was dragged into a deep dark hole. Everything felt hopeless and dark and like the country I love had taken that last step out of the light, out of the promise of who we are meant to be and we are now tumbling headlong into the abyss, driven by avarice and greed.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg

Honestly, as an author, had I presented a story like 2020 to an editor, I would have been told that it was not believable. Pick a single plot and stick with it, would you?

I spent Saturday in grief-cleaning mode. When everything is out of your control, control what you can, right? When I spiral down into the land where anxiety borders on depression, I tend to just let stuff go…I don’t clean, I don’t eat properly, I forget to take my meds. You know, stuff like that. Climbing back out looks like cleaning, preparing actual meals and setting reminders on my phone to take my meds.

So, here we are back at Monday. I’ve been awake since 2:30 am, I’m drinking coffee and trying to find the light. There are still things I can’t control, but I’m going to start controlling what I can. And one of those things is voting my conscience, voting for stepping back from the abyss of the last four years. I can’t help those who hate, those who are determined to believe that the last four years have been good (what value of good are they using anyway?).

All I can do is love hard enough and bright enough that the hate retreats in shame. I love you, Readers! I’m not a really huggy person, but I’d hug you all right now if I could. Remember, it’s okay to step back, to disengage when it’s all too much for you. It’s okay to cry, to rage, to just withdraw. Just remember to get back up again and step back into the fight.

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the elusive nature of unconditional love

Back in the day when I was an evangelical Christian (yes, really), I  spoke a lot about unconditional love.  I believed that I acted inside that love.  I believed that I understood what unconditional love really was.

The truth is, I was clueless.

It took a lot of changes in my life to realize that.  It took leaving behind everything I thought I knew, everything I believed.  It took discovering myself under all of the layers of learned behavior and belief/fear conditioning.  I often liken those days to days spent in a cult.

Unconditional love is something that springs from inside you and because of that, nothing external to you can change it.  Nothing someone does, nothing someone says can change that kind of love.

That’s a really powerful thing.  It’s the kind of thing that changes lives.  It changed mine.  I’m not saying I practice it perfectly, I am, after all, still human.  And I’m not aiming for sainthood here.  I still make snap judgments about people.  I still criticize things I know I shouldn’t.  But I try to embody unconditional love to all.

It’s what drives me to act with kindness.  To meet people where they are, as they are and try to be helpful without inserting my own prejudice and needs into their life.  It’s why I can be friends with people so very different to me. How I can give of myself where others won’t.

Sure, sometimes I miss the mark, but the longer I practice this idea, the longer I choose to put love and kindness ahead of judgement and fear, the better I get at it.   I just keep hoping to one day get it right.

I hope your Saturday is filled with the light of Love, Readers, and that you radiate that love back out into the world around you.  Let’s light this place up!

 

 

 

Photo by freestocks.org on Unsplash

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wedded bliss

All around me people are planning weddings.  I must know at least twelve couples getting married this year.  I’m happy for them, if that is what they truly want in their lives.  Love is, after all, a wondrous thing. For myself, however, I can love freely without needing to be defined as a half of a couple.

I’ve known since I was in my early teens that marriage was not something I aspired to.  I have nothing against marriage, I just never saw myself as a married woman.  As I aged and discovered that there were options outside of straight, monogamous marriage and I started to understand myself better, I realized that the reason I had no designs on finding that one true love is that, for me at least, love is so much bigger than that.

I was introduced to polyamory as a concept nearly twenty years ago.  It made so much sense to me, for me.  Not that I am seeing anyone right now, but when I am dating, it will be a relationship built on mutual love and trust, and the understanding that he or she is not my one and only.

I haven’t tipped my toe into the dating pool in a while, and I don’t plan to any time soon, though as wedding season rolls around, it would be nice to have someone to take with me, even if just to forestall the conversation about why I’m not dating/coupled/engage/married.  Somehow complete strangers seem to think they have the right to ask me about these things when I show up to events alone.

If I had a dime for every time I’ve been told I just haven’t found the “right person” I could retire on my own private island.  At fifty years old, I’m having the time of my life, just like I am.  I don’t need a husband or a wife to complete my life.  Love infuses my life, and when I feel the pull toward a person, I explore it, without hitching my ride to another’s existence.

Either way, love wins.  Love should always win, marriage or not.

Happy Saturday, Readers!  I hope love infuses your day, and happiness fills your pockets.

Photo by Marc A. Sporys on Unsplash