The books Wild at Heart and Captivating propose three core and interrelated desires that drive men and women (crazy). I frequently forget what they are, so for easy reference:

Wild at Heart (men):
- a battle to fight
- an adventure to live
- a beauty to rescue

This is easiest for me to remember by A-B-B: adventure, battle, beauty. (Thank you, Andrew!) Initially, I was imagining the adventure to be outdoors, but it could be in math, or music, or whatever gives that thrill of discovery and challenge. I think of the battle like a mission. As for the beauty, I just picture Murron in Brave Heart, sigh. A related question that apparently preoccupies men is: do I have what it takes?

Captivating (women):
- to be romanced (or pursued)
- to play an irreplaceable role in a great adventure
- to unveil beauty

I'm having a hard time with these points, though there must be something to them since enough people I respect relate to these books and their premise. Related questions that apparently preoccupy women are: am I lovely (or captivating)? do you see me? do I have a beauty all my own?

The male and female points are intentionally linked to each other, by design, so that men and women can answer each other's longings. These books did a great job in establishing some ground work and will surely remain classics, but I personally feel limited by these three core motivations, and somehow have grown a little tired of this plot.

What is more interesting to me, at this point in my life, is Donald Miller's book Scary Close which feels to me like a fuller portrait of love, accounting for the myriad psychological influences that can disconnect us from ourselves and from others. All with his trademark easy-to-relate-to style and humor. Some of my favorite excepts include:

"Good friends do that; they guard each other when things get scary by putting themselves in between their friends and what could harm them." - Bob Goff (in the foreword) 

"Having integrity is about being the same person on the inside that we are on the outside, and if we don't have integrity, life becomes exhausting." (p.65) 

"A woman, though, can rob your manhood and reduce you to a boy at the drop of a word." (p.97)

"...more to do with keeping people contained that with setting them free. And I'm no fan of it." (p.124)

"...unless people feel safe around us, intimacy would never happen." (p.165) 

With this, I laughed out loud. A lot.
"I don't think men are as bad at intimacy as we might think. It's just that we get pressured to go about intimacy in ways that are traditionally more feminine, specifically we're asked to talk about it and share our feelings. We don't really want to do that." (p.188)

Though I didn't watch even one second of it, something lodged in my mind during the Superbowl and - shockingly, for the first time in my life - I've actually been thinking about football ever since. More specifically, I've been thinking about the job of the "receiver." Of course, I needed some education on the topic, so I consulted my local expert who explained to me the basics of the job: catch ball, run, pass, score.

Those steps might be out of order (something about not running with the ball), and what the difference is with a wide receiver, I couldn't tell you, never-mind other peculiarities like a tight end...but as for the all important job of a receiver, Wikipedia calls them:

a pass catching specialist, or someone whose principal role is to catch passes.

Isn't that what we need to set a game in motion - someone who is ready to play? Not just the one to kick it all off (trying out my new vocabulary, I believe that would be called the quarterback, but I could be wrong), but also the one who is ready and waiting to grab onto what's coming their way?

So often, things seem to fall flat - near misses, fumbles - and it gets discouraging out there on the field. Sports are dreadfully boring (to me), but a good receiver feels like a total game-changer, turning it into a I want-to-stay-in-this-game kind of game. The kind of quality working partnership that's worth getting started and continuing, like a dance, or a good conversation.

My year-long release, this free-flow pouring out, is great and all but much greater with a recipient of some kind. Granted, I'm not exactly hurtling flying objects at record speed. But even on my slow and subtle level, I still want someone to await this pass. With open arms.

Someone who can pick up exactly where and when and what is coming. Who can keep the whole thing in motion. Maneuver obstacles and get to the next safety zone. Who's aiming for me at the same time that I'm aiming for them. Who adjusts as necessary, because it's all about seeing and seizing that pass. In that moment. And then, who can take it a step further, or even run with it, or even score.

A receiver. Yes, please. Now I'm thinking that's a job actually worth those big bucks.

For Lent, I'd like to say I got rid of negative thinking, or striving, or managed to:

"Get rid of all bitterness, rage, and anger, brawling and slander
along with every form of malice"

Ephesians 4:31

but I'm still getting rid of stuff (slightly obsessed). Somehow with every physical layer comes an emotional layer and it all feels like a big weight off. Originally I thought I'd do one item per day but it ended up being a big pile of 185 things to add to my running list, for a grand total of 365. Because every day matters.

It's actually hard to get rid of stuff, sometimes for logistical reasons and sometimes for emotional reasons. This lenten season was slightly different than my usual purge in that I tried to release more emotionally significant things, asking myself - really, why hang onto this? - something I think is worth questioning of every item in my house and especially in my heart.

I've seen too up close and personal how the inward environment gets manifested in the outward environment. Or how the outward environment mirrors the inner world. One mess can reflect a deeper mess, like strange Russian dolls, making us smaller with every layer. Living in that kind of cemetery is no kind of life for me. So, in the (belated) spirit of Easter, here's to opening tombs and any removing barriers to our inner and outer sanctuaries.

40 CDs
40 more CDs for school physics project
15 cases for school art project
3 gowns to school costume department
5 piles of clothes donated
2 more huge bags donated to Big Brother / Big Sister
2 clothing consigned
1 slipcover and the huge box it came in
1 big bag of Real Simple magazines
1 Print Gocco awesomeness
5 gifts
18 books
18 gifts for my seniors
1 picnic basket
5 pairs of shoes
3 DVDs
2 websites
4 products
1 planter
1 table
1 filing cabinet
1 big rug
11 years of sent email from 2015 -> 2005 (may regret this)
4 ex-boyfriend items, each from a different relationship spanning the past 17 years: a necklace re-gifted, a broken bracelet, a lovely little something, my home-made journal (but saved poem, since it's gorgeous, and since he became famous, ugh.)

Guardrails
Your conscious should light up when:

1. it dawns on you that your core group isn't moving in the direction you want your life to be moving

2. you catch yourself pretending to be someone other than who you really are

3. you feel pressure to compromise

4. you hear yourself say "i'll go, but i won't participate"

5. you hope the people you care about most don't find out where you've been or who you've been with

"Your life is limited; so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma - which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice."

- Steve Jobs

Revisiting an old favorite:

Sweet Darkness
...

Give up all the other worlds
except the one to which you belong.

Sometimes it takes darkness and the sweet
confinement of your aloneness
to learn

anything or anyone
that does not bring you alive

is too small for you. 

- David Whyte

Question for decision making. Ask it!

In light of my past experience

my current circumstances

my future hopes and dreams

What is the wise thing to do?

I just love this woman, what she has to say as well as her artwork. It's weird how a role model can be a random stranger who doesn't feel like one at all. There's something about this one that grabs me at this uneasy time of feeling seen and unseen, known and unknown, yet thankfully not a stranger after all. To be...Known.

Julian Fellowes, creator of Downton Abbey, on love, as highlighted in Krista Tippett's interview with Helen Fisher:

"Lust, that state commonly known as 'being in love,' is a kind of madness. It is a distortion of reality so remarkable that it should, by rights, enable most of us to understand the other forms of lunacy with the sympathy of fellow-sufferers. And yet, as we all know, it is a madness that, however ferocious, seldom, if ever, lasts... But, paradoxically, mad and suffering as one is, and the heat of the flame, few of us are glad as we feel that passion slip away. No, while most people have been at their unhappiest when in love, it is nevertheless the state the human being yearns for above all."

Lessons from chickens (on sabbath):

Lessons from geese (on teamwork):

Fact 1: As each goose flaps its wings it creates an "uplift" for the birds that follow. By flying in a "V" formation, the whole flock adds 71% greater flying range than if each bird flew alone.

Lesson: People who share a common direction and sense of community can get where they are going quicker and easier because they are traveling on the trust of one another.

Fact 2: When a goose falls out of formation, it suddenly feels the drag and resistance of flying alone. It quickly moves back into formation to take advantage of the lifting power of the bird immediately in front of it.

Lesson: If we have as much sense as a goose we stay in formation with those headed where we want to go. We are willing to accept their help and give our help to others.

Fact 3: When the lead goose tires, it rotates back into the formation and another goose flies to the point position.

Lesson: It pays to take turns doing the hard tasks and sharing leadership. As with geese, people are interdependent on each other's skills, capabilities and unique arrangement of gifts, talents or resources.

Fact 4: The geese flying in formation honk to encourage those up front to keep up their speed.

Lesson: We need to make sure our honking is encouraging. In groups where there is encouragement, the production is much greater. The power of encouragement (to stand by one's heart or core values and encourage the heart and core of others) is the quality of honking we seek.

Fact 5: When a goose gets sick, wounded or shot down, two gees drop out of formation and follow it down to help and protect it. They stay with it until it dies or is able to fly again. Then, they launch out with another formation or catch up with the flock.

Lesson: If we have as much sense as geese, we will stand by each other in difficult times as well as when we are strong.

too good to be true
remembering, forgetting
blurring, repeating?

Help me become more like this woman, Jan Richardson, author of the blessing below as well as How the Light Comes.

Blessing in the Chaos

To all that is chaotic
in you,
let there come silence.

Let there be a calming
of the clamoring,
a stilling
of the voices that
have laid their claim
on you,
that have made their
home in you, 

that go with you
even to the holy places
but will not
let you rest,
will not let you
hear your life
with wholeness
or feel the grace
that fashioned you.

Let what distracts you
cease.
Let what divides you
cease.
Let there comes an end
to what diminishes
and demeans,
and let depart
all that keeps you
in its cage.

Let there be
an opening
into the quiet
that lies beneath
the chaos,
where you find
the peace
you did not think
possible
and see what shimmers
within the storm.

carefully, love her

as your own body, two forms

formed from the same clay

Let these words lay flat
make jagged edges gentle
smooth over us both

The Big Dig, as far as I understand it, excavated Boston's infrastructure within the heart of the city. The surface roads were replaced with underground tunnels, creating more green space above and more direct access to critical points like the airport and highways. It replaced an outdated system with one that better meets the needs of modern life. It caused a huge mess for quite a long time but ultimately improved circulation along the main artery of the city.

What if our own hearts could get remodeled like that?

To dig up worn out pathways, creating direct access to our most vital points. Along fresh roads with no traffic. To make use of previously wasted space. Enabling more life both outside and in.

For me, it's been a long time coming, hard and messy work that's surely not done and will require some ongoing maintenance, but...

Lately it's felt like all this effort to clean out my heart has taken some effect. Like there's a fresh breeze blowing through those tunnels. Like the rubble has been removed and replaced with new ground.

It's startling how certain words spoken seem to land right in the center of my heart, like they were couriered expressly. Bypassing everything else, speeding along some straightaway, echoing loudly in some inner chamber. They come crashing in, reminding me that these transit lines are for (e)motion, not to sit idly just burning up energy.

I've never ridden a motorcycle, except to sit on my former roommate's, but I'm thinking it must feel a little like this. Everything that was so slow before suddenly seems so fast. And what was so narrow suddenly seems so vast.

I'm pretty sure there used to be a traffic jam here:

i thought more than twice
about fire, and chose nice
over desire

Lord, if this is from you
   let us know
and if it's not,
   let us go.

If this is from you
   let it last
and if it's not,
   then let it pass.

If this is from you
   let love stay
and if it's not
   take it away.

a little a
is all it takes
to go from place
to palace

On the topic of not repeating mistakes of the past, and starting over, exactly what I'm beyond ready to do:

1. Own it
2. Rethink it
3. Release it

My word is weaving itself into the year, starting here!

* You make peace with your past by owning your piece of your past
* How far into your future do you intend to carry the angst created in your past?
* My past will remind me, not define me
* Release the past, so the past can release you
* Forgiveness allows us to leverage the lessons of the past without lugging around the luggage

Search me, God, and know my heart;
   test me and know my anxious thoughts.
Point out anything in me that offends you,
   and lead me along the path of everlasting life.

Psalm 139

Morning
I can't. You can. You can through me.

Night
Teach me the mystery of Christ in me.

"Would you let me lead you?"

Words so sweetly spoken. Feminists aflame, let this melt your hearts. It does mine.

In dancing, partnering is a tricky thing. Women generally don't like to dance with men who can't handle them. They feel insecure. I recall this truth from my own experience and the various ways it can go down. Getting dropped. Spun around just to impress others. A clumsy jumble of limbs. Fits of starts and stops, never knowing who's going where or when. The whole thing is confusing at best.

Recently I tried dancing the man's part. It was so hard. He needs vision: to look out for oncoming traffic. To anticipate and steer clear of collisions. To see a long view of the space and a close view of his partner. He needs pacing: too fast and she can't keep up, pulling, rushing. Too slow and you lose momentum, dropping the beat, your bodies disconnecting. He needs spacing: too tight and she can't move, smothered and suffocating. Too loose and she slips away. He needs direction: too wishy-washy and she has no choice but to take over. Except she's often going backwards and can't see what's in the way, so sometimes only he can navigate through the crowd and set a course. As if that weren't enough, together, they need to problem solve: sometimes you're off the music and need to skip something in order to catch up. Or someone messes up. How do you recover?

How can anyone be expected to do so much? Especially westerners who are usually too preoccupied with their own awkwardness to multitask anything else.

In ballet, the guy has his moments jumping and whatnot, but when they are together partnering, it is truly to lift her up. His job is to make her look good. His primary function is to present her. In grace. For her glory.

From a Christian viewpoint, I'm told this is part of the man's job. To lead her into the fullness of her (natural, innate, God-given) beauty and eventually account for how he has cared for and cultivated the gift he was bestowed.

You see this in the great partnerships - Margot Fonteyn and Rudolf Nureyev, for example - that the one was made greater by the other. My parents were lucky enough to have seen them on their second date (go Dad!).

The thing is...it's really hard to partner. You're trained as a soloist and then suddenly you're expected to follow. Usually my independent instinct takes over, I get claustrophobic and writhe myself free. Except on the rare occasion when I can relax into a strong lead. I remember little else of that night, but years later I still recall the feeling of Stephen's hand upon my back. I definitely didn't know that jig, but he did. He'd get me where I needed to go. And admire me while he was at it.

Culture tells men to get as much as they can from a woman as fast as they can and then repeat the process with someone else. In contrast, my friend Ed shared some good news:

"The guy should provide some leadership in the relationship, to set the pace based on the woman's heart and needs." So it's more about attentiveness, willingness, and responsiveness (see #26). That attunement is actually what will "get" him so much more. He needn't be super skilled at dancing (thankfully, since most guys aren't) so much as responding. Happily, I got some synchronistic confirmation about this thought from the word of the very next day:

Respond The voice of the One who has made us and redeemed us calls to us in love, and waits for our hearts to awaken and respond with a corresponding love. -Br. David Vryhof

How do you know how to respond? I believe, maybe in the same spirit as our relationship to God, if you pay close enough attention, she'll tell you. He'll tell you. Follow, lead; lead, follow. It's a kind of fine tuning that takes practice. Just look at them:

My childhood favorites, Trinidad Sevillano and Patrick Armand, whose picture I've kept all these years. Not because of their prettiness but because of their grittiness. Their intensity, their focus, their sweat and disheveled hair and broken down dance clothes. The cross on its sturdy chain upon his hairy chest, her fingertips pressed into his flesh, balancing herself against him. Training in each other's terrain. Their bodies and minds poised at full attention. His on her, and hers on something captivating. All in service of the dance.

God knows my heart and what I need better than I do. But for whatever it's worth, I've said it before and I'll say it again, as far as I'm concerned, I want a dance partner.

where

underneath the stars
in between the evergreen
and the world unseen

Prayer

May I never not be frisky
May I never not be risque.

May my ashes, when you have them, friend,
and give them to the ocean,

leap in the froth of the waves,
still loving movement,

still ready, beyond all else,
to dance for the world.

- Mary Oliver

My first 50 felt so good that I took it a little further. I'm up to 180, the number of days in a school year. The number of days (x10 years) that got swallowed by stress, not counting the August meltdowns + the Sunday anxiety that sometimes has the nerve to creep into Saturday.

Since I can't get that time back, I'm assigning this arbitrary number to give some structure to this otherwise free form purge project. It's part of my ongoing effort to reclaim the past for the sake of the present. It symbolizes those last drops I poured out and am trying to soak back into this burned out land and restore into fertile soil.

Like a mathematical truth, these two negatives somehow make a positive. That time and energy lost (and my related regret, anger, diminished health and appearance) + the subtraction of stuff somehow produce a positive result = making up for lost time and giving myself a cleaner slate. It goes something like this:

Even after all the years gone by, and the messes accumulated, I can choose to simply throw it all away (and get the gift of greater freedom today).

You could say it's all about "simplify, simplify, simplify" but I think it's more than that. God forbid we "complicate, complicate, complicate" but I simply couldn't go straight from may-hem to may-belle in a day. They are like two neighbors with a blurry property line. It's really all the same garden but they feel like worlds apart.

Like the coast of Maine, a la "you can't get there from here", the two points appear so close yet without a boat, it's impossible to travel that short distance quickly. There's no choice but to slowly snake along the rocky coastline. So there I've been, just trying not to fall in, missing both the boat and the gorgeous view.

I kept getting rerouted along the long road lined with lions and tigers and bears and rabbit holes and snakes and the whole menagerie. For a while, that was all I could see. And it finally brought me here. Maybe the sweet spot lies somewhere in between, amidst the weeds and the flowers alike.

Actually, that kind of compromise feels like a convenient way for a high school student to neatly wrap up an essay, like when I tried the wake-up-from-a-dream-scheme ending to my elementary school story. For me, the truth is, God was always offering a better way, I just couldn't see it. So that's why I'm trying to clear the view:

10 abstract yet huge items
25 things given to my students
45 VHS (in addition to several previous boxes...still a few more to go)
50 first round
50 second round:

1 door - yes, a door - and the associated project I am letting go of
1 bag full of Real Simple magazines I'd been saving for a rainy day
4 piles of clothes
5 wooden shelves that delighted my dad
2 CDs returned 9 years later
4 original burners from my awesome stove
1 key to ex-boyfriend's ex-place
2 vessels (1 vase + 1 flower pot)
5 products
3 flash drives and the associated guilt for not delivering those pictures sooner
10 little jars
1 pile of alumni magazines + photos + postcards
1 ironing board
1 bag containing 8 lbs of products I let myself get sucked into buying (sigh)
5 pairs of eyeglasses donated to the Lion's Club
1 iphone 4
1 meaningful gift that went to just the right person
1 lamp
1 wedding gift finally given

Where would you have me go?

What would you have me do?

What would you have me say and to whom?

May God bless you with a restless discomfort about easy answers, half-truths and superficial relationships, so that you may seek truth boldly and love deep within your heart.

May God bless you with holy anger at injustice, oppression, and exploitation of people, so that you may tirelessly work for justice, freedom, and peace among all people. 

May God bless you with the gift of tears to shed with those who suffer from pain, rejection, starvation, or the loss of all that they cherish, so that you may reach out your hand to comfort them and transform their pain into joy.

May God bless you with enough foolishness to believe that you really CAN make a difference in this world, so that you are able, with God's grace, to do what others claim cannot be done.

A Four-fold Benedictine Blessing by Sr. Ruth Fox, OSB (1985)

Heavenly Father,

I believe you will use this

until you choose to remove this.

Grant me wisdom to see as you see

and strength to do as you say.

After dedicating 2014 to the word reclaim, my word for 2015 will now be released. Did you catch it?

release

I debated between two words this year: reveal and release. To me, reveal is prettier, more elegant, and more mysterious, whereas release has several detractions:

1. The quantity of others who have already chosen this word, since I'm want to be original (and pretty, elegant, and mysterious, sigh),
2. The voice of my boss repeating this word each year as she quotes Michelangelo in her standard graduation speech,
3. The somewhat sexual association.

Nonetheless, I was persuaded in favor of "release" by this 8 second dialogue @ 1:14:58-1:15:06 between Madeleine and Mr. Levinson [Season 4, episode 8]:

Levinson: "London has remade me in a different image."
Madeleine: "Maybe London has released you, to be seen as you really are."

Replace London with God and I'm in business. I'm eager for the freedom of "release." To break free from bonds, real and imagined. To be made and remade in His image. And yes, to be seen as I really am.

Reveal started to feel like a bit of work. Reveal what? Some underlying truth needing to be uncovered. To search with the expectation of finding something like a secret masterpiece or hidden treasure - compelling pursuits, to be sure. But what treasure map do I have other than praying for God to reveal (something, anything, everything) to me?

Reveal and release are nearly interchangeable words when paraphrasing Balanchine (or Michelangelo, for that matter). Both were in the business of showcasing what was "already there"; they merely laid their gifted hands upon reality to let the heavenly emerge. Mortal that I am, I just don't always see it in my own life and pray that God will open my eyes.

"We don't create, actually. We assemble what God created. See it's already there, anyhow. You just choose. You just take what's in front of you and you manipulate (it). You put it together. This inspiration, it's not anything that is all of a sudden like a stomach ache...."

It may be splitting hairs, but "release" feels more within my realm of control. Maybe even an antidote to my being woefully overworked. I can "work" on letting go. After all, isn't the point of the Enneagram not to "reveal" our false/shadow self, but to "release" us from the predictable traps and provide pathways to freedom and connection?

Finally, the real reason for choosing "release" is this phrase that just came to me. You could say it was "revealed" to me. I like to think of it as a "recent release" for 2015:

Release yourself to me and I will reveal myself to you.