A Pilgrim on the Path

I teach creativity workshops based on The Artist’s Way that are ostensibly about artistic pursuits but mostly about giving ourselves permission to love what we love and do what we love. A big chunk of the journey involves learning to value ourselves enough to believe that we deserve self-designed and even self-indulgent lives. About midway through the course and book, there’s a list of fill-in-the blank questions to assess where we are in this process. One of them goes: “I think I have nice ___.”

A common response among my students is, “I think I have nice friends,” but I’m often hoping to hear things like “eyes,” “hair,” “teeth” or any answer that sounds like a bit of a boast. This same chapter invites us to try on the phrase, “Treating myself like a precious object will make me strong.” Not surprisingly, many people squirm out of that task, along with the weekly artist dates they are supposed to take for the sole purpose of experiencing pleasure and inspiration.

From what I’ve seen, this tendency towards self-denial is widespread in our culture. Why is it so hard for us to brag a little, give ourselves a break from endless productivity, and treat ourselves like the precious objects we truly are?  I only know my own story, which includes years of doubting my self worth in a patriarchal culture, believing that selfishness was a kind of sin, aiming to please everyone, and shrinking myself down to whatever size seemed non-threatening to others. Fortunately I’ve outgrown a lot of that.

As I near the half-century mark, I’m happy to say that I love myself and treat myself pretty well ninety-something percent of the time. And that’s a good thing because, as my friend Allison points out, I have more years of life behind me than in front of me now. That’s a sobering thought. Do I want to spend any part of these remaining years depriving myself of the love, friendship and validation that I willingly extend to others? I think not.

So today I’m declaring myself my own valentine. How do I love me? Let me count the ways…hmmm…I have nice eyes, healthy curiosity, pretty feet and great taste in music. I’m a basically kind and usually thoughtful person who’s always trying to become more compassionate, patient and forgiving. I’m funny! I value authenticity, possess several useful talents and keep a cozy, colorful home. I was smart enough to marry a hardworking and devoted man who tells me I’m beautiful at least once a week. When called for, I’m also humble.

But enough about me. Can you be your own valentine today? Look at your to-do list and see if your own needs or true pleasures are anywhere on it. And how about creating a list of your positive qualities? Does that feel like an exciting assignment, a vain pursuit, or a task just slightly less painful than doing your taxes? You can try starting with, “I think I have nice friends.” Just keep going, and get personal. Next, jot down some beloved activities that you’ve lately denied yourself and put a few of them on your calendar. Do one of them today. Start with taking a deep, nourishing breath right now.

You don’t have to let anyone know what you are up to, by the way, but the funny thing about treating ourselves well is that it often leads to treating others well, so the people in your life might enjoy being along for the ride and seeing you smile more often. I’m especially talking to any female readers who typically put others’ needs first, and anyone who believes that life equals suffering. Martyrs are boring, right? Satisfied, happy people are fun–just ask Mama Gena, who’s made a whole career out of getting women to brag, strut, and live out their pleasures to the delight of everyone around them.

This Valentine’s Day I’m going to enjoy the rose petal tea and the pink lilies that my husband brought home last night, along with the dinner he’s arranging (asking for what you want and need and being a good receiver is part of being your own valentine). I’ll get some work done, read a book or take a walk, nap with my cat if I feel like it, and mute my inner critic to the best of my ability (i.e., talk nice to myself all day).

I may also have a bit of chocolate, from me to me, with love.

Oprah Winfrey and I celebrate our birthdays this week. She has zillions in the bank and can spend her big day anywhere on the planet with 200 of her favorite people in tow. I have, well, less money in the bank and will spend my birthday with my husband and friends in and around my neighborhood. Oprah has incredible wealth, access and adventures, but that’s not what makes me jealous of her.

Nope. It’s the fact that she has a best friend named Gayle King whom she calls every day. From what I can tell, Gayle and Oprah do pretty much every meaningful thing together and rehash it on the phone. I often wish I had a Gayle King.

Lisa and I goofing around, late 1960s

I lived next door to my best friend Lisa when I was a little girl. We hung out in each other’s homes making Easy Bake Oven cakes, watching Mr. Rogers, and playing dress up. We also spent hours setting up elaborate apartment complexes for Barbie, Ken, assorted doll friends, and my brother’s GI Joe (for added intrigue). Often, just as we put the last piece of cardboard furniture in place, one of our moms would disrupt the whole scene by shouting, “Dinner!” We didn’t really care, though, because we just loved being together.

A few years later, my dad moved our family to another state and I tearfully said goodbye to Lisa. Little did I know it was the beginning of a pattern.

At this point in my life I’ve moved about eight times and moved on from several jobs, leaving countless friends and communities behind. I tried to stay connected to high school and college friends, but those ties weakened as our careers and lives blossomed in different cities. In my 30s I lived my own version of Sex and the City with Julie, Alice, and Liz amid countless cocktails, cigarettes and debauched nights in Manhattan. When that lifestyle took its toll, I left my party pals to reclaim my soul in a yoga ashram. Two years later I moved to Boston.

And so it went for decades, these departures that left me with dear friends in faraway places. I, too, have been “abandoned” by girlfriends who’ve been called elsewhere. Despite our good intentions, months and years can pass without a call or visit, and so Facebook is where we end up hanging out. I have 331 friends on Facebook and, while they give me a much-needed sense of community at times, I’d trade most of them for a flesh and blood BFF.

Which is why I’m in awe of Oprah and Gayle, who, after three decades, seem closer than sisters (something else I don’t have). I’d love regular check-ins with a girlfriend like that to relay the fascinating details of my fascinating life. I used to pay my therapist for this privilege and now I force my husband to listen, but it’s really not his forte. While he’s loving and devoted and willingly takes out the trash, he rarely asks the right questions, cares about the right details, or wants to hear all about my feeelings the way girlfriends do. People like John Gray tried to warn me about the whole Mars/Venus thing.

A friend of mine jokes that she processes her day with her cats each night. While my cat is a really good listener, she rarely gives feedback, poses leading questions or affirms my fabulousness. Except when she wants something.

I know that I’m not unique in wanting more meaningful and consistent relationships in my life, and I sometimes wonder if loneliness is an American epidemic, despite all the tweeting and texting. A yoga student of mine confesses that her loneliness sends her to the kitchen for beloved companions like Godiva chocolates and Ben and Jerry. The problem is, they don’t really love her back.

My husband is from Senegal, where people hang out in each other’s homes all the time and steady human companionship is a given. His favorite American TV show is Seinfeld, because Jerry, George, Elaine and Kramer remind him of his mates back home and make him laugh after a day of commuting and working alongside New Englanders who avoid eye contact. “I’m used to it,” he says, about the isolation he feels in this culture, and that makes me sad.

It takes real effort and determination to maintain friendships in this age of transience, social fragmentation, and overcommitted lives. Proximity helps, too. As I write I’m heating up a pot of homemade lentil soup, thanks to my neighbor Ellen who supplied the recipe after I enjoyed some at her house. Ellen and I are slowly cultivating a friendship via email, Facebook, phone calls, face-to-face visits, and “Hey, got any bay leaves?” moments across the fence. It’s the perfect fusion of modern and old-fashioned relating, and it makes my world feel cozier.

I just hope neither one of us moves anytime soon.

I’ve heard that nearly 90% of New Year’s resolutions are broken by February, and my acupuncturist says that spring is actually a more fruitful time to make significant life changes. But the start of a new year offers itself up like a landscape of fresh snow, unmarked by footprints and tire tracks, and begs the question: Can we make better use of the next 365 days?

For several years I’ve participated in Burning Bowl ceremonies on New Year’s Eve. They involve writing a list of things we want to shed – from resentments, to self-destructive habits, to those extra ten pounds – and burning them. We’re supposed to accept and even thank those things before we place them in the fire (because what we resist persists), and immediately create a list of positive intentions for the New Year (because nature abhors a vacuum).

Topping my burn list this year was a “my way or the highway” attitude that can impair my ability to see things from another’s perspective and tie me in knots when people don’t do what I want them to do. It’s related to being a control freak, I’m afraid to admit, and it can poison all kinds of relationships, including the one I have with myself. I know where it comes from and I can see how it once served me in a twisted way, but it’s really gotta go now.  In its place I seek to practice more acceptance, curiosity, compassion, and patience…and to begin all over again when I slip.

I asked friends and family members to share their own lists of things to burn in the fire of transformation and I heard much about shedding fears, worries, negative thinking and procrastination. A former student says, “I wish to shed my habit of living under the cloud of a never-ending to do list,” while another wants to let go of “the tendency to compare myself to others and beat myself up.”  I, too, want to use my precious time more wisely in 2012 and halt the downward spiral of “compare/despair” thinking.

“I want to allow everyone the freedom and sovereignty to be who they are, and where they are, in their journey and level of self-awareness,” one student writes, and a friend of mine chimes in with wanting to release, “the need to enforce my ideas on certain family members…I seek to have compassion for the mother of my grandchildren and patience with my grandchildren when they display ‘inappropriate behavior.’”

Trying to see our own part in the dramas around us is an important step towards ending them.

On September 11, 2001, I was visiting the island of St. John when the twin towers crumbled. As evening fell I walked down to the beach to escape the television screens. Waves lapped the shore and the sun set amid pink-orange clouds, oblivious to the human suffering in lower Manhattan, the Pentagon, and Pennsylvania. I thought about the terrorists and asked myself where I similarly harbored hatred for another in my heart. The answer came quickly, and I was humbled. I certainly couldn’t relate to those acts of terror, but I could examine my own prejudices and resentments in response, and aim to do something about them.

The next day I saw an email that was circulating among those trying to make sense of the attacks. It referenced a Sufi teaching that says, “Past the seeker as he prayed came the crippled and the beggar and the beaten. And seeing them, he cried, ‘Great God, how is it that a loving creator can see such things and yet do nothing about them?’ God said, ‘I did do something. I made you.’”

Such is the central message of the moving documentary film I Am. I watched it the other night with friends and we discussed its powerful teachings about the emptiness of materialism, the interconnectedness of all life, our inborn instinct for cooperation and empathy, and our ability to be the change we seek in a world full of so much unnecessary suffering.

And so while I do want to shed a few pounds, amp up the exercise, and experience more ease and fun this year, I also want to be part of the solution. I can do this by treating others as I want to be treated, appreciating and sharing my blessings, and forgiving myself and others for our mistakes and ignorance.  As Maya Angelou says, “When you know better you do better.”

Doing better this year is one resolution I believe I can keep.

(Note: You can also read this essay at: www.jasminbalance.com/2012/01/09/how-can-we-resolve-to-do-and-be-better-in-the-new-year/)

The rush is on to buy gifts and goodies to celebrate the season of lights, American style. I’ve made a few purchases, including one gift that I can’t wait to give, but I’m also trying something new this year: if I can’t come up with a meaningful item for someone, I’m giving them the gift of my presence. I’m offering lunch and movie and afternoon tea dates to people I love and inviting them to cash in when it suits them. Otherwise, I’d be handing them something from a sense of obligation, and isn’t this the season to be jolly?

For me, there’s nothing merry about fighting traffic and crowds to buy gifts that may not be appreciated. And there’s no joy in spending money if it increases our debt load instead of someone’s pleasure. I’m lucky I have no kids, because it would make me crazy to buy toys that they might cast aside by New Year’s Eve. I myself can only remember a handful of the gifts that I received as a kid, and one of my best childhood Christmas memories has nothing to do with anything from a store, excepting the grocery aisle…

When I was eight years old, my father moved our family to Cape Cod to start his own business. Recently laid off from a town job in New Jersey, Dad wanted to be his own boss in the place where he’d grown up. Because this meant uprooting my two brothers and me from our friends, schools, and cousins, we protested. But the relocation was especially hard on Mom, as it placed her hours away from her mother and sisters for the first time in her life. Adding insult to injury, several precious things broke on the moving van, including our Christmas tree ornaments.

We landed on the Cape in September, and my brothers and I spent the fall trying to like our new classmates, neighbors, and the children of Dad’s old buddies with the funny accents. Mom had a harder time than we kids did, having no school or neighborhood games to supply her with new pals. On top of that, we were broke, which often meant relying on what Dad fished out of the sea for dinner. The problem with that plan?  My brothers and I had eaten no seafood up to that point beyond canned tuna and processed fish sticks coated with enough breading to render them tasteless. On Cape Cod, of all places, we consistently turned up our noses at clams, scallops, mussels, and the most dreaded creature of all…bluefish.

Mom, bless her culinary heart, tried all kinds of ways and recipes to make the stuff palatable to us, but still we refused to eat it. Our resistance was extreme. One night my baby brother, prohibited from spitting out a scallop at dinner, kept it wedged in his cheek rather than swallow it. My parents discovered the deed when they caught him brushing his teeth with a chipmunk-style bulge in his face. Mom gave up the battle at that point, and we kids had pancakes or macaroni and cheese on the nights when my parents ate seafood.

As fall approached winter and money remained elusive, Mom’s spirits grew as grey as the skies. She was lonely for her own mother and sisters, and Dad was spending a lot of time outside the home networking for his new business.  Christmas was looming, and gifts were not in the budget. Suddenly a woman nicknamed Happy was feeling anything but.

So I was surprised to come home from school one mild December day and find Mom out back, assembling an impromptu craft station on the picnic table. “We lost our ornaments,” she proclaimed, “so we’re gonna make our own this year.” Mom had spray paint and glitter all ready to adorn the unlikeliest of decorations—soup can lids. She’d spent the morning removing the lids, and waited for us kids to arrive before cutting them with tin snips into stars, bells, angels and trees. My brothers and I got to choose our shapes and decorate them as we laughed, sang carols, told tales, and basked in Mom’s renewed cheer. That December afternoon at the picnic table was more memorable than most Christmases.

To this day, my brothers and I fondly recall our “poor folks” Christmas as we point out the few surviving ornaments on our parents’ tree. Primitive, yet crafted with love and hope, they are more precious than the shiny new ones. I recall that ornament making party as a glowing example of my mother’s creativity, resilience, and ability to bring love and light to our days no matter how dark her own were. Saddled with three kids, persistent migraines, various part-time jobs and a business to co-manage, Mom didn’t have room to explore her passions during my childhood. But she was always up for fun, and she could turn tin cans into angels.

What kind of memories will you give yourself and others this year?  Hopefully the kind that’ll last longer than the warranty on an iSomething. As for Mom and I, we’re going to take in a Rockettes show, which should be a kick (pun completely intended).

Happy Holidays. Let’s celebrate the light in each other, which is what this season’s really about. And if you need a reminder, spend four minutes with these creative Alaskans who are bringing joy to their world.

At its worst, this recession has left countless people homeless, jobless, hungry, angry and injured. At best, it’s led many Americans to cut up their credit cards and cut out unnecessary spending. Others are voluntarily simplifying their lives, reducing consumption, sharing resources with neighbors, and finding new value in the so-called “simple” pleasures of a not-so-big life. I say “Amen” to that.

I know a lot of people with very rich lives and small bank balances, and I know some wealthy people who feel trapped and miserable in their lives. Of course there are lots of folks in between those simplified extremes, but I’m starting to know in my bones that feeling rich has more to do with how we are living that what we earn for a living.

I should disclose that I’m an American who has never known poverty. As a kid, I watched my parents struggle when my father was starting his own business, but that just meant more homemade gifts and hand-me-downs during lean times. I myself have never earned six figures, but I’ve always paid my bills, pursued my pleasures and lived comfortably. I have a roof over my head, food in the ‘fridge, health insurance, disposable income, and a ’98 Corolla that gets me where I need to go. I recognize that I live in a state of abundance compared to most on the planet, and I try not to take it for granted.

And so while my income is smallish these days, I feel rich in many things, including time. I work from home and make my own hours, which allows for sleeping in, dressing comfortably, taking walks in nature, and running errands leisurely. I also feel fulfilled by the work that I do as a writer and teacher. I have a husband and family who love me, and cherished friends with whom I can share the good, the bad and the ugly. While these things alone put me in the lucky camp, I also get a 20% family discount at Whole Foods Market, my version of Bergdorf Goodman. Ch-ching!

Curious to know what was making others feel rich these days, I asked. Most who responded to my query echoed my appreciation for family, friends, good food, pets, and natural delights like trees, sunsets, dragonflies, and a night sky thick with stars. One friend said, “I like who I’ve become in recent years,” while another feels enriched by “clarity, mutuality, partnership, and learning.” A former student says she feels wealthy when she orders whatever she wants from the menu, including dessert, without sweating the bill.

“The thing I’m most grateful for these days is all the spiritual teaching I’ve received over the years,” says a new acquaintance. “It’s been a reliable friend through some tough times and always something I can count on.” Others said they find tremendous value in feeling seen and validated, connecting to people with similar interests, donating to the local food bank, expressing their creativity, experiencing synchronicity, being there for someone in need, and enjoying art and music.

Comforting pleasures made the list, too, including fresh sheets, warm beds, purring cats, belly laughs, home-canned goods, home cooked meals, long distance calls, fireplace fires and cuddling. One friend appreciates easy access to organic produce, while another luxuriates in “reaching for something to wear after all the laundry is washed, dried, and put away.”

Good health makes many feel rich, including me. Last month I watched my dear friend Tom lose a noble battle with cancer at the young age of 50. While it was a sobering, terrible loss, those of us who companioned him during his last days actually felt gratitude—not only for our own health, but also for the chance to be included in his passage. For months, members of Tom’s spiritual community came forth to offer him support, prayers, sacred chants, and loving presence. Many of us remarked about how rich in community he was—in life and in death.

“My yogic breath makes me feel full of life,” my sister-in-law reports. “There is nothing like a deep, sweet sip of healing breath to make me feel blessed.” I agree with her, and with a fellow writer friend who says, “I love the feeling I get when I write without effort…and sometimes I am just blown away by the fact that I can see and hear and have a home to rest in.”

Whether or not you’re feeling abundant and giving thanks this week, consider these words from writer/astrologer Rob Brezsny, who notes that, no matter what’s troubling you, “Thousands of things go right for you every day, beginning the moment you wake up.”

Including the fact that you can read this right now, while many lack literacy. Give thanks. Feel rich.

It was 7:05 a.m. on the day before Thanksgiving, 1997. I was anchoring a public radio newscast in Newark, New Jersey, as I’d done every weekday morning for months, when the music host left the studio to grab more CDs. Alone with the microphone and a million listeners, I became aware of a sinister thought. It said that I was in danger of blurting out something outrageous over the air.

Alarmed, I pushed down the thought and kept reading, “Mayor Giuliani and Police Commissioner Safir say New York City’s all set for tomorrow’s big parade…” Inside, I was battling a rising tide of fear that set my heart racing and squeezed the breath from my lungs. Finally, my voice failed me and the host took over, apologizing to the audience for “technical difficulties.”  I gulped enough air to proclaim that something was caught in my throat, but that was a lie. I was having a panic attack.

Somehow I managed to get through the rest of my shift and hide my condition from coworkers. Terrified of what was happening to me, I went straight to my doctor, who put me on anti-anxiety meds. Terrified of becoming addicted to medication, I cut out caffeine, increased my yoga practice, and booked sessions with hypnotherapists, massage therapists, and homeopaths. Eventually I found my way to a psychotherapist who held my hand on the journey of recovery and healing that I was apparently beginning.

The panic attack didn’t cause my departure from radio news; it hastened it. I’d spent nearly a decade in public radio, producing and reporting for local and national programs. My favorite moments on the job were those spent interviewing fascinating people, retelling their stories, and hearing from inspired listeners. I loved the work, until I found that the kinds of stories I increasingly wanted to cover were not the stories that my editors wanted to assign. As my own personal recovery work was pointing me toward hopefulness and healing, I could no longer muster enthusiasm for city hall corruption, drug war updates and presidential sex scandals. When I quit my news anchor job in the fall of 1998, Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky were dominating the headlines.

In the year following the panic attack, I’d binged on self-help books, personal growth workshops, and audio recordings by spiritual teachers and motivational gurus. I’d committed to therapy and joined the 12-Step world to heal childhood wounds and addictive patterns that no longer served me. My life began to feel saner and, when I finally quit my job with none other in sight, I did so because I trusted that I’d be okay. I had no kids, no debt, good health and cheap rent. I could afford to take risks, and I was rewarded for them. My resignation letter was barely out of the printer before I had two exciting and lucrative freelance jobs to sustain me for several months.

About a month after leaving my job I met a psychic. His name was JT and he worked out at my gym. We struck up a conversation on the treadmills one day and he offered to give me a free reading. Being someone with no plans for the future, I accepted. Among other predictions, JT told me, “You will teach one day in your purpose way.” While I was more interested in knowing when I’d meet my soul mate, his odd words gave me some hope.

The following summer, jobless and still clueless about my next career move, I bought a car, sublet my apartment, and headed to the Kripalu yoga center in western Massachusetts for a work exchange program. The idea of spending the summer chopping vegetables and doing yoga in the Berkshires held much more appeal than temping or waitressing in hot and steamy Manhattan. I went to Kripalu for three months and stayed for two years. During that time I met people who spoke my language of recovery, emotional healing, spiritual seeking and transformation. I danced, drummed, sang and chanted with fellow seekers and free spirits who quickly became my new tribe. I learned about holistic health, complementary medicine and Eastern spiritual practices, soaking up knowledge like a human sponge from world-renowned teachers and alternative healers. It was like being in grad school, minus the tuition and research papers.

I became certified to teach yoga while living at Kripalu and I began to lead others in the transformational practice that was changing the way I related to my body and my self. I also started guiding groups of people in creative recovery workshops based on The Artist’s Way, the book and course I was working through when I had my panic attack on the air. Finally, I started to write about my journey, publishing essays and recording radio commentaries about the lessons I was learning. When I left the yoga center to seek my fortune in Boston, I had new words to describe myself: writer and teacher.

Ten years into this new career, I understand what JT the psychic was talking about. I now teach people how to connect with and trust their bodies, their spirits, their truths and their desires. My work feels like play, and it’s profoundly meaningful. I can accompany my students and readers on a path of recovery and self-discovery because I’ve been steadily walking my own. The media projects I now accept as a writer and editor are those that inspire people to positive action, personal empowerment, social responsibility and greater wellbeing. I’m still a communicator at heart and words are still the tools of my trade, but I now use my talents to speak and write helpful and hopeful messages that ring true for me.

While I wouldn’t have chosen a panic attack to launch my reinvention, I’ve come to understand that I lost my voice all those years ago in order to find it, and use it, on purpose.

I love children. I just never felt the desire to have any of my own. Well, maybe for a fleeting moment. There is, after all, a certain sweetness in thinking about creating another person with someone you love and seeing the two of you reflected in that little child. But I didn’t marry until my mid-40s, and I know that I currently do not have the patience, selflessness, or energy that it takes to raise a child well. Case in point: I get so annoyed when our cat wants to play and chat at 6am that I hustle her outside and leave her there (with food…I’m not heartless) until we’re ready to rise. Pretty sure you can’t do that with a kid.

There’s also the fact that my husband, a new immigrant to this country, has required a tremendous amount of my time and energy these past three years as he launches a life over here from scratch. I’m sure he’d also tell you that I don’t have the patience to raise a child, given the many (many) times I’ve lost my cool when things haven’t gone smoothly for us. I see, too, how much I worry about his safety and wellbeing out there among people who don’t always treat him, a heavily accented black African, with kindness and respect. With kids, I could see myself vacillating from worried mess to hovering nuisance to control freak—none of which foster healthy child development.

I do, however, feel rather maternal toward the adult students I guide in my yoga classes and creativity workshops, where I coax many wounded inner children to come out and play. When I later run into my “grads” around town and hear about the positive changes that took root during my classes, I beam and coo. This work feels like my life’s calling, a large part of my legacy, and the best use of my nurturing skills. I do have some actual kids in my life, too, and they are fabulous. The list includes three delightful nieces, a brilliant nephew, the four precious children of my Sudanese “little sister,” and my neighbor Sophia, a toddler who greets me with an exuberant “I!” whenever she can. I get my kid fix spending time with these honest, observant, funny and amazing little people, and I enjoy them.

All this, and no diapers to change!

In truth, I have occasionally wondered what I’ve missed by not having a special wee someone to love and call my own, but the thought usually passes pretty quickly. A wry girlfriend of mine put it this way, “You can’t miss something you never had. I’m at peace with the fact that I’m childless, and happy being ‘married with dog.’” I wanted to know what my other childless friends had to say on the subject, and so I asked. I was happy to learn that none of the women I surveyed had felt criticized for their choice, even if they may have felt the unasked question coming from friends and relatives, including their mothers. A few of them shared my own early experience of being a so-called “parentified” child, meaning that we took on too much responsibility for ourselves and others as kids. Some believed that this was enough to put them off becoming a mom.

One friend of mine reports that she wanted to have kids until she moved to a yoga ashram at age 30.  “Living a celibate lifestyle as my biological clock ticked faster and faster helped me get clear that I was fine not having babies and preferred to work with the child in myself and the adults around me,” she recalls. “This led me to my career as a life coach, helping others to birth their own evolving consciousness. While I would never claim that my choice was more rewarding than being a mother, I feel truly honored and gifted by all those who allow me to assist, serve, and mentor them. I often silently thank their parents for birthing them so that I might also be part of their lives.”

Another friend and colleague admits that, when her younger sister first got pregnant, she thought “for about 12 seconds” that it would have been fun to go through pregnancy together. “Today I am so clear that the decision to be ‘childless by choice’ was absolutely right for me,” she reports. “My work as a coach, helping women to have their dream relationships, is incredibly gratifying for me. While I never felt pressured to be a mother, I do think there are plenty of women who have kids because, ‘It’s what women do.’ I’d love to see more women opt out of those ‘shoulds.’”

“I don’t remember making a conscious decision to not have children,” says one friend in her late 40s, “but I never felt a strong pull towards having them. I do think I’ve turned some judgment on myself with thoughts like, ‘I’m not really a full woman if I haven’t labored through the physical birthing process.’” What it feels like I’m birthing now is a more authentic and whole expression of myself…seeking to know more about how I move in the world, how the feminine shines through me, and what kind of mothering really feels like my calling.”

Another dear friend says that even though children “just didn’t happen” for her, she’s enjoyed being there for her nieces and her friends’ children. “I love spending one-on-one time with them,” she says. “I’ve taken them on adventures to glamorous cities, river rafting and coast exploring, and on day trips to old-time amusement parks and science museums.” Having now developed close relationships with two stepsons and a daughter-in-law, my friend adds, “I know I missed something special in not experiencing a child’s development from infancy and I suspect I missed a personal-development opportunity in not knowing the compromises that come with child-rearing, but I feel fortunate at this point to be essentially free of child-worries, yet enriched by the love I feel for the young people in my life.”

“I feel like I never got to be a kid,” says a former colleague who’s worked hard to heal from her abusive mother. She also worked hard as a first grade teacher for many years before growing weary of the repetition and routine that children require. “At 48, I love being single and having only myself to care for. It’s fun that my life belongs to only me! I get to check in and see what parts of my child or immature self need some attention. My mature self supports, nurtures, and cares for my kid self. And my kid self gives my mature self joy, laughter, and adventures of all kinds.”

A relative of mine says that even though her parents were loving and devoted, she never wanted a family of her own outside of a husband and some pets. One deterrent, she says, is the idea of bearing a child. “My uterus has been nothing but trouble for me since I was 12 years old, so the idea of being pregnant does not appeal to me at all. My body may have been “built to take it,” but squeezing out a seven-pound (or more!) child with all that pain and mess is something I have no interest in doing. The care and attention that follows is something I also have no desire to experience, and I simply do not have the patience to deal with a teenager. After spending time with my friends’ children, who are great, I know my decision is the right one. The joyful chaos I’ve witnessed is an experience I’m more than happy to forgo—preferring structure, order, tidiness and a fixed schedule.”

And sometimes it takes other pioneering women to show us that it’s okay to blaze unconventional trials. My former roommate is a storyteller and maker of whimsical jewelry who once thought she was flawed because she never caught “baby fever,” even as her biological clock was winding down. “But then I read Gloria Steinem’s Revolution from Within: A Book of Self-Esteem,” she recalls. “It made me realize that there is no wrong way to be a woman.  This simple truth lifted a great weight off of my shoulders and I became something I was far more qualified to be:  A fairy godmother.”

And so I raise my glass to all the special moms, stepmoms, aunties, mentors, grandmas, teachers, coaches, counselors, godmothers, fairy godmothers and childless women out there. Honor your choices. Celebrate your life. Be yourself, as Oscar Wilde said, because everyone else is already taken.

Three years ago today I was stopped at a red light near Harvard Square on a sunny afternoon when it hit me. A Chrysler minivan, to be precise. A traveling salesman from Cleveland, oblivious to the stopped cars in front of him, was talking on his cell phone as he plowed right into my little Corolla. Today, I’m actually kind of grateful to him.

The rear-end collision left me with whiplash, and a frozen shoulder that lasted for months. While super painful at the time, the injury allowed me to take a much needed break from teaching yoga without having to tell my students that I was, in truth, burned out. It also took me on a healing journey that introduced me to my talented acupuncturist and my equally talented personal injury lawyer, a man who actually uses the word “broads” in conversation, but whose wily ways secured enough compensation to help me pay my medical expenses, buy a few goodies, and grow my savings.

But the biggest impact of that collision is how it changed my own driving, because I used to be one of “those.” You know…a…tailgater…sometimes. I cringe to admit it. And it’s especially embarrassing to reveal that I occasionally did it on the way to teach yoga, yelling things like “Choose a lane, buddy!” a mere ten minutes before presenting myself as Ms. Equanimity on the mat. I’m truly lucky that none of my victims ever stopped short, and I call them victims because I was an aggressor during those tense moments in the driver’s seat. Now I’m keenly aware of tailgaters behind me, feeling the anxiety that I must have caused others as the skin on the back of my neck begins to tighten and my blood starts to boil. I considered buying a nasty bumper sticker, but decided that tailgaters aren’t likely to heed them. It was fun to peruse the choices, however, like, “Back Off – I’m Not That Kind of Car,” and my favorite, “Are You Following Jesus this Closely?”

Today I always leave plenty of space between me and the vehicle ahead of me, and I leave earlier for appointments so I don’t have to speed. But don’t start envisioning a halo over my head because I still make and take cell phone calls while driving, and I often risk getting pulled over for a DWG (Driving While Grooming) as I apply mascara or tweeze an errant hair behind the wheel. Nonetheless, I am consciously trying to become a safer, saner driver. I’d like to imagine that others are doing the same, but what I see through my windshield (and in my rearview mirror) tells me otherwise.

The other day I had this thought: maybe it’s time to start inspecting not just cars, but drivers. What if, once a year, an inspector could ride beside us for 20 minutes and watch for things like good judgment, rule obedience, alertness, and, dare I say it, patience and courtesy? I wonder how many drivers would pass? Probably the same three people who slow down for yellow lights, make a complete stop at stop signs, and truly yield when entering highway traffic (and rotaries, folks!).

My bedroom sits above an intersection with a delayed green light. It’s also a popular cut-through route for commuters. This means that I’m often awakened by loud car stereos and even louder attempts to imitate favorite singers. Occasionally I’m serenaded by a cool baby blue Cadillac that plays classic jazz as it passes (thank you, my mystery driver). But all too often, and many times when I’m praying, my ears are assaulted by the angry honking and verbal violence of livid morning drivers who feel that the person ahead of them is ruining their life (i.e. causing them to miss the green light).  Some of the incidents border on road rage.

We’re all so impatient, over stimulated, and wired for multitasking that it’s no wonder we’re crashing into each other. God forbid we just focus on driving as we drive. And whatever happened to silence? The other day as I was pumping gas, I heard voices coming from the…pump(!)…where a small TV screen was replaying the latest pre-season football highlights. I don’t know about you, but I really don’t need to be entertained while I fill up my car. And yet I’m not immune to Monkey Mind syndrome. I still catch myself reaching for the cell phone a few minutes into a long drive because, well, I have the time to talk.

Buddah and other friends on my dashboard altar.

But there are those precious times when I’m quiet and contemplative behind the wheel, letting my own thoughts entertain me and allowing for some space to arise between those thoughts. Sometimes I’ll even pray or chant in the car, glancing at my dashboard altar where Buddah reminds me to calm down and find peace in the driver’s seat. Like any good spiritual practice, it only works if I work it.

And so I try, one mile at a time.

I used to think cities were where it’s at.  My European travels and my years in Philadelphia, London and New York found me gaping at skyscrapers, hitting hot clubs and trendy restaurants, and finding endless entertainment in the tapestry of skin tones, hairstyles, languages, and fashions around me. Having grown up on Cape Cod, I was hungry for the thrills of city life.

But I started to fall out of love with cities in my late-30s, when I went to live at a yoga center in the green, green Berkshire Hills of western Massachusetts. I went for three months and stayed for two years, soaking up the environment and spiritual teachings. When I finally left the Berkshires (too frozen in the winter, with too few eligible men for this single gal), I relocated to a peaceful suburb of Boston, with tree-lined streets and plenty of parks. I’m now just minutes away from Walden Pond, where Henry David Thoreau famously found tranquility in the wilderness, and it suits me to a tee. Because these days I’m paying more attention to Mother Nature, the great artist, architect, and companion.

When I stroll the bike path near my home, a majestic cathedral of trees shelters me, receives my prayers, and keeps my secrets. When I need to walk off some anger, the dirt under my feet absorbs my ire. My immigrant husband strides along this same path on his way to a low level job that’s unrelated to his chosen profession, reporting, “The trees and birds talk to me, telling me to hang in there, and giving me encouragement.” I think of the line from Mary Oliver’s Wild Geese, promising that the world offers itself to our imagination and calls to us like wild geese, “harsh and exciting, over and over announcing your place in the family of things.”

I recently heard a news report that said we humans are spending more time with machines than people, which makes me guess that time in nature has probably dropped way down the list. How sad. As much as I love my lap top, it rarely gives me the same thrill as the red flash of a cardinal across my path, the sight of a hummingbird at a feeder, the eerie sound of an owl or a mourning dove outside my window, or the spectacle of shooting stars in the night sky. I’ve seen lightening storms over the Stockbridge Bowl, full yellow moons rising over the desert and the ocean, the playfulness of elephants and whales in the wild, technicolor Caribbean sunsets, and the awesome power of hurricane winds disturbing waves on a beach. To me, they all trump anything I can watch on a screen.

We had a particularly long, snowy, humorless winter in Massachusetts this year. A few months later as the land was finally turning green, I was arrested on my morning walk by the sight of a shining silver birch tree. An exuberant “Hi!” came out of my mouth before I was even aware of the impulse. I looked around, wondering if anyone had heard me talking to a tree. Later, I was met with nods of recognition when I told the story to friends who were equally starved for the rebirth that comes with spring.

Last year during springtime my husband and I were astonished to find a nest full of tiny blue eggs in a geranium plant that hung on the front porch. Like an expectant mom, I hovered by the nest for days to see what would happen. One afternoon, picking up on tiny chirping sounds coming from the geranium, we grabbed the camera and took a quick shot of the new babies. You would have thought they were mine, the way I showed off that picture, and the response from those who saw them was equally passionate. I see why animal videos go viral all the time.

The surprise in the geranium plant

My mentor and guru in my work as a creativity coach is Julia Cameron, author of The Artist’s Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity, who says in the book that, “The capacity for delight is the gift of paying attention.” When nature is putting on a show 24/7, how can we not pay attention? And how delightful, and thrilling, it can be.

Back when I was single, I created a few personal profiles for online dating sites. When asked to name my religion, I wrote “Kindness.” It sounded cute at the time, but it’s also what I truly believe in. Kindness touches the soul, or at least my soul, and connects us all. Raised as a Christian, I knew all about the Golden Rule of doing unto others as we’d have them do to us. And who doesn’t want to be treated with kindness?  The hard part is doling it out on a regular basis in our stressed out, fast-paced, I’ll-trust-you-when-you-prove-trustworthy culture. And that’s why I’m a sucker for strangers who extend kindness to me.

I have struggled with depression in my life and, even though it no longer overtakes me, I’m still what they call a highly sensitive person on the planet.  Some days, I just feel everything very deeply. When I see people with physical challenges moving tentatively on the street, I recognize that they are moving through space and time in the same way that I do when I’m in a tender place, emotionally. Sharp words, like sharp objects, can slay me on those days, and being rushed or dismissed can feel like violence. So when someone takes the time to be kind to me, it feels like a big deal, and pierces through the emotional haze like Cupid’s arrow. It could be the barista making my latte and complimenting my shirt, the deli clerk who helps me to choose the best sliced turkey and offers me samples, the women with the umbrella offering to escort me (sans umbrella) to my car in the driving rain, or the gas station attendant smiling and wishing me a great day when all he had to say was “Thanks.” No matter the source, kindness really sticks.

When my husband moved to the U.S. to join me, he arrived from Senegal with a duffel bag and a knapsack, which obviously didn’t allow for a lot of clothes and accessories. Not that he had much of those, because he’d given nearly everything away to friends and family before emigrating. He did have sandals and a pair of slightly small working boots that a friend had given him. As it was March in New England, the sandals went straight to the closet. As funds were limited, we took the boots to a shoe repair shop for stretching. The Ugandan man behind the counter welcomed my husband to the United States with a 1,000-watt smile, unlike the airport worker who’d met him with hostility the day before. The shop owner also handed my husband a pair of shoes that another customer had long ago left behind. My husband still visits his African brother who showed him kindness during a time of traumatic change.

The other day, I dialed the yoga center where I teach and left a message about some business. Moments later, I got a call back—from a guy in Brooklyn who gets “these calls all the time” because his phone number is similar to the yoga center’s.  “Namaste from New York,” he said into my voice mail. “You dialed the wrong number and I didn’t want you to think that no one returned your call.” Namaste, indeed, for being considerate enough to call me with that information.

A real King of Kindness in my book is Narayanan Krishnan, who gave up a promising career as a chef to start feeding the homeless, hungry, and destitute in his Indian hometown. The astonishing part is not the succulent meals he delivers, but the love that he feeds to his people—cutting their hair, and bathing and hugging them even as his caste rules forbid it. As Krishnan says, “We all have 5.5 liters of blood,” no matter our race, class, or bank account balance.

And so I try, and sometimes fail, and try again to be kind to those around me. It helps when I remember to start with myself, because practicing self-compassion often makes it easier to feel compassion for others. I also try to remember—especially with strangers—that I can never know what sadness or trouble is in the heart or mind of another person. The guy who cuts me off at the rotary may have just had a fight with his wife or lost his job. The woman who doesn’t hold the door open for me when I’m right behind her may be worried sick about a sick child. “If you’re gonna make up a story, make up a good one,” my friend Karen used to say when I’d be all twisted up about a perceived slight from someone. Of course, some people just behave badly. But when I remember to cut them (and me) some slack for being human and having bad days, life just feels kinder.