Life as an experiment

I haven't written on this blog in a long time.  It's mostly because I've been extremely busy and so much is happening.

Our play "Scrambled Eggs" is opening this coming week.  It's very exciting and also very stressful.  I have never had much confidence, so this is really a stretch for me.  I know that every creative endeavor, when you put it into the world, requires some nerves of steel, which I don't have.  But I do have the awareness that life is about taking risks and sometimes you come out okay and sometimes you don't.

The fun of this experience has been in the work.  I have enjoyed writing this for a long time and working with this cast is a joy.

Also, I've continued writing for the Huffington Post on various subjects - faith, loss, grief, dancing, divorce, women leaders.  It's been a great outlet for me to write anything I am interested in.

Today, I have mostly been obsessing about the play and how the dress rehearsal had some major mistakes and that the leading man, like me, seems to have terrible allergies.  And on and on......my mind can go into the most imaginative and creative disasters.

So once again, Pema Chodron came to the rescue. I was cleaning out my wallet and I came across this passage, that I carry around with me (and forget to look at):

"My teacher, Trungpa Rinpoche encouraged us to lead our lives as an experiment, a suggestion that has been very important to me.  When we approach life as an experiment we are willing to approach it this way and that way because, either way, we have nothing to lose.

This immense flexibility is something I learned from watching Trungpa Rinpoche.  His enthusiasm enabled him to accomplish an amazing amount in his life. When some things didn't work out, Rinpoche's attitude was 'no big deal.'  If it's time for something to flourish, it will; if it's not time, it won't.  

The trick is not getting caught in hope and fear.  We can put our whole heart into whatever we do; but if we freeze our attitude for or against, we're setting ourselves up for stress.  Instead, we should just go forward with curiosity, wondering where this experiment will lead."  

As I published this, I noticed that my last blog post included this same passage!  Interesting coincidence.  I guess it's important that I take this in.

Right brain and follow through

I have this problem:  too many ideas and not enough follow through.  I think it's a challenging dilemma, probably much better than others I could have, but still a problem.

Now that my mom has passed away and my family is scattered and all I have to really worry about on a daily basis is myself, my fourteen and a half year-old incontinent dog with diabetes incipitus (sp?), my seven and a half year-old blind, arthritic dog with disk problems, my financial situation, my teeth, my friends, where I'll live, when I'll meet someone to love, etc., etc., perhaps I can finally really channel all the ideas I have into actions and actually accomplish something important.

Some of what I've already done is pretty much out of my hands...but new projects are beginning to come to my mind and I want to really focus attention on them and make them real.

2010 may be the year of accomplishment, or at least the start of the decade of accomplishment.  I hope so! 

Boredom Is Good!

Today in the Science Times, one of my favorite sections of the New York Times, is an article entitled "You're Checked Out, but Your Brain is Tuned In." The article states that "it's time that boredom be recognized as a legitimate human emotion that can be central to learning and creativity." (The quote is from The Cambridge Journal of Education.)

This is good news for me. For years I was the kind of person who was always doing something. Working, exercising, reading, writing, going constantly. I loved when Zoe was little and I could spend hours in the park talking to other parents and babysitters. I really enjoyed the feeling of community, but then I would have to race home and work on something. I even enjoyed doing the laundry because it gave me a feeling of accomplishment and that was always the goal. The only time I watched TV was when I was too exhausted to do anything else and then I generally passed out on the couch in the middle of "Law and Order."

Sometime in the past couple of years though, that attitude has shifted for me. Maybe it was when I was dealing with some serious family problems, my mother was very ill, Zoe was having issues at school, and I started walking a lot to help me deal with the stress. I always went to the gym, but while I was there I usually talked to friends or listened to music, so I was always distracted. But somehow walking across the Brooklyn Bridge, or walking through Central Park, I came to really enjoy having no distractions. Essentially walking with my own thoughts, or trying not to think, just being.

I have friends who have always been good at this. As the article states: "It's the difference between the sort of person who can look at a a pool of mud and find something interesting, and someone who has a hard time getting absorbed in anything." Susie (if you're reading this) - you are the pool of mud person and I really admire that about you. I can almost always get absorbed, but I understand that for many people, there's a constant search for distraction.

I do find that I often get my most creative ideas when I just let my mind wander. And meditation is another way of clearing my mind, which is why I enjoy it.

Yesterday I was talking to a friend about Buddhism and the idea that when you are feeling really bad, really suffering, Buddhism says you should allow yourself to sit with the pain. And therapy has taught me that too, that rather than fighting it, you should allow yourself to wallow (well, maybe not wallow, maybe just BE in it.) And then my friend and I agreed that when you do that, sit with it, it really stinks. It's really misery to be so down. But then eventually it does pass. And you find that you haven't gained ten pounds in one weekend, or spent too much money, or drank too much, or slept with someone you never want to see again. (Although it's been awhile since I did that.)

Anyway, it's possible that I've managed to bore you to death with this post and if I have, I am quite pleased.

One more thing...I got the DVD of our monologue performance night and I have to say that I wasn't miserable about it, it was pretty good. Except that next time I perform, I will have done thousands of biceps curls so my arms look tighter, I will have lost ten pounds and will be wearing my contact lenses. The best part of seeing it though, is being able to study and learn from it.

Thank you Jake!