Simple Abundance - April 2008

As I began to read April, I was drawn to the introductory page that discusses how sunlit April is.  I realize it is only day 2 of the month but it was sunny both days and my disposition is starting to improve already.

This month we are travelling along the path to Simple Abundance and discussing beauty.  We will touch on personal style, verve, color, art and that bane of all female discussions - weight loss and body image.  Some of these issues will be easy - what color looks best on each of us and how to possibly get the best look for the least money.  Other issues - body image - will be less easy to discuss.

Deal gently with yourself and take from each day’s reading what you can.

Please also check out the joyful simplicities at the end of the month.

Simple Abundance - March 2008

I know you are all probably thinking I am nuts.  March is almost over, as I was reminded this morning by my mother who was wondering if March came in like a lion or a lamb as it is looking like it is going out like a lion.

This month Sarah Ban Breathnach is discussing the principle of simplicity.  I always find this to be one of the hardest principles for us to grasp in our world.  We seem to collect “things.”  Materialism seems to be rampant.

 In looking back over March, I want to point out a few important readings.  I also want to remind you all to use your Gratitude Journals.  If you have been remiss in this area, please dust it off and get back on track.

The very first reading of the month - about restoring our sanity to our lives - is not one I could have read on March 1st.  I was the whirling dervish that SBB discusses.  I was up at 4:30 am that morning and out the door, even though March was coming in like a lion and there was still a snow-covered road by my house.  I dropped my 13 year old at the local diner to have a “pre-event” breakfast with his Science Olympiad team.  Then, I was off to the high school to set up for the tournament that would find seven middle schools competing for the chance to advance to the state tournament.

The next discussion on meditation moves me more now than it did at the beginning of March.  I am currently reading Eat, Pray, Love  and am in the section on meditation and prayer.  We all, regardless of who we pray to or why we meditate, need to revive these practices.  The quiet time in our souls will help our creative selves come out and play more easily.

 The discussion of what appearance we put forward and can we find the inspiration in it if we are not “pulled together” intrigue me.  I am one of those who can sit at home and work in a hoodie and sweats.  I go out for a run in old warmups and ratting baseball hats.  I do, though, try to look together when I am heading out for other things as can be seen below in my “Easter” outfit.

The mid-month discussions of self-nurturing and self-acceptance always make me smile.  How can we nurture those around us and help them build self-acceptance if we cannot do this for ourselves?  I have often wondered how the mother who cannot nurture herself, even if only occasionally, can nurture her young ones.  

I also love the discussions of style and fashion here at the end of the month.  I am slowly finding my “style” and have gotten rid of a lot of things that were in my closets and drawers for I don’t really know what reason. 

If you have not yet taken part in the Joyful Simplicities for March, please read them over.  Many can be done in April!!!

Simple Abundance - Feb 11 - 17

I realize I should do these second time through readings of the daily meditations in advance of the week, not in retrospect.  Anyone who is reading along may not come back to look now for the past week.  I am going to seriously try to do this for the upcoming week later today.

 I truly love our search through ourselves for our authentic selves.  The discussion of “spiritual electricity” resonates with me.  I have been trying to create some varying backgrounds and works of art but have seemed to feel there was nothing there.  I did not work on Friday of this week as my son had a sectional diving event and, then, decided not to play catch up on Saturday.  Instead, I flipped the switch of my “spritual electricity” on and did some painting and creating.   My first creation was three and a half dozen ginger cookies for my visiting 21 year old daughter to take back to college with her.  Then, the work from Julia Andrus’s Paper Transformed began.  That is another post altogether, though.

And, that 10 year old girl…. oh my!  I do not have this picture but I can see it in my mind.  It was on my father’s desk in his office, when the office was behind an old barber shop.  I had hair about mid-back, straight as a board and pulled back in a partial ponytail.  The chestnut colored hair is a color I yearn for these days but it is not the hair color that speaks to my authentic self.  I was wearing a high necked green plaid dress.  This dress does not speak to my authentic self either.  It is my face that speaks of who I really am.  I had the remnants of two black eyes.  I had spent the summer camping with my grandmother and tripped over a wagon tongue.  In the process, I fell - hitting my forehead in a very precarious spot.  The doctors said I could have been blinded had the point of impact been a fraction of an inch in any direction.  The blood from the huge egg on my head drained the only place it could - into the whites of my eyes.  Then, the bruising came.  I had these huge black eyes for weeks.  But getting them was fun!  I was playing with the boys, a tomboy at her best.  And, that is truly me.

Wanderlust and travel are also explored in ways now that could not be previously.  Do you dream of travel?  I have done the travel in a small part.  I spent one fall travelling up and down the eastern seaboard.  I went 13,000 miles from August until November.  I saw many wonderful places and beautiful people but I loved it most when I came back home.  I don’t think this is where home will always be but it where it is now and I love it!

Simple Abundance - thru Feb 10

I know - I should post first thing in the morning all these thoughts I have on the daily musings.  I have been very wrapped up in politics lately and those have been my first, and sometimes second and third, posts of the day.  I will try to fix that starting Monday.

If you go back to the beginning of the month, on February 2nd, Ban Breathnach discusses creative excursions but of a slightly different note.  I love this particular excursion to a home furnishings or decorative accessories store.  I have three that I go to for these particular outings but my favorite is Pier 1.  If I cannot make it to the actual local store, I could spend hours going through things on their web site. 

I like to go in, walk around.  Then, I start thinking about my house and which items here I could use.  I think about the changes I have always wanted to make to my kitchen - a tile backsplash in Tuscan colors behind my sink, painting of the one set of cupboards a gold and green.  I think about what I could do to make my living room look much less like an office and play area - more on the wall, a nice way to have candles lit all the time.  I think about how to make my bedroom, which doubles as my craft room, more of a sanctuary - throw pillows, maybe a screen to keep the craft stuff behind.

After I walk through, I go out to the car and write down the items I like.  I print pictures off at home of them with pricing information so I can purchase if I get a small windfall.

On the days of February 3rd and 4th, we are introduced to our “authentic self.”  I do understand the keeping her available for those important moments.  I think I did this earlier in my life.  Now I feel that I am at a point where I am more comfortable with myself than I have been in the past.  The light is on daily.  I do know this is hard for women.  We invest so much of ourselves in others.  As a mother, we invest ourselves in our children.  As a wife, we invest ourselves in our husband.  As a worker, we invest ourselves in our job.  We need to be able to take those pieces of us back and make ourselves whole.

I think I relate most to the discussions of being an artist.  I do create art.  It took me a long time to think of myself as an artist.  I make crafts, cards, scrapbook pages.  I do painting, molding of clay, bending of wire.  I bake and cook.  All of these things are creating art.  So I really enjoy reading February 7th & 8th.  I also love reading the 9th where SBB talks about each day being a fresh canvas.

A Look at January

You all know that making resolutions doesn’t normally last.  I know this to be true but I like to try to check in each month with how I am doing on my aspirations.

I have been creating new items but have not yet submitted anything for publication.

I am well on my way to The Triple Eight Challenge.  I read three of my Penguin Paperbacks in January.  I also read The Art of Happiness by His Holiness the Dalai Lama.  I have started three other books that will take me most of the year to work through or read - Celebrate Your Creative Self, Paper Transformed and Simple Abundance.  These were all in January.  I just this past weekend started reading Jimmy Carter’s most recent - Beyond the White House, which I am finding a wonderful book.

I still have not purchased a new pedometer.  It is on my list but I haven’t gotten where I can find one I like.  I did run 75.26 miles in January.  A lot of this was done indoors as the weather in upstate NY in January can be detrimental to your health if you do not take care.  I also have managed to put some strength training into my schedule but not as much as I would like.  I have not yet gotten back to my Pilates as I had hoped.

I did pay some minor debts in January.  I have a few more slated for February so am working towards a debt-free life.

I also did two weeks worth of posted menu plans.  I sort of did a plan in my head when I went grocery shopping at the end of that time frame.  I am currently living in a somewhat rural area but without a car so I have to plan what I need when I get to the store.  I am working on a February menu plan today as Lent starts on Wednesday so my menu planning becomes more essential as I have meatless days that need to be worked into the plan.

I just realized I have not yet heard from the farm I participated in community-supported agriculture yet so I am going to email her today.  I do hope she is still doing this as it was wonderful last summer.  I am set to go with it this summer.

February - Simple Abundance

February is the first month where we concentrate on one of the six principles of the journey for the entire month.  This month we will concentrate on gratitude.

I have to reiterate.  You really NEED a gratitude journal and need to make writing in it a nightly habit.  There are days when the nights are long and I also write about gratitude in my daily dialogue but definitely I write five things I am grateful for in my gratitude journal every night.

Second, please be sure to read the “joyful simplicities” at the beginning of the month.  In February, there is a joyful simplicity geared towards today - February 2.  If you wait until where they are placed - at the end of each month, you will miss information about today.

Please feel free to comment on any day in February on any post I have about Simple Abundance.  I really would like this to be interactive.  I am not willing to do an actual forum - which is where I lead a book group for this book the past three years - but I do like hearing what other journeying along have to say.

 February starts off with the discussion of a creative excursion.  Sarah Ban Breathnach talks of these creative excursions.  For those of you who have read Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way, you may be tempted to draw a line between this and the artist’s date.  Creative excursion can be so much more.  A few years ago in February, I went on a creative excursion to a tile store.  I was thinking about redoing some backsplash behind my kitchen sink.  The creative excursion of just going to the tile store and looking, seeing the possibilities, was wonderful.  I have also gone on creative excursions to Pier 1, to Starbuck’s to a new kitchen wares shop, to a thrift store.  I like to make these excursions something I will love!!  You should, too.

Look ahead to see if the titles - or teases as I think of them - on any particular days call to you.  I know many do to me.

Wrap-Up of January Simple Abundance

Hopefully, you are reading along daily as opposed to waiting to hear something from me.  I have lead a book group around Sarah Ban Breathnach’s Simple Abundance for three years now and I never seem to get out the things I want when I want to but I keep trying.

From the middle of January until the 19th, Sarah went over - in great detail - the six principles of simple abuncance.  These six principles will be the themes, individually, for six of the months in the upcoming year, starting with February and gratitude.  They are also the backbone of the journey.  If you are thinking you don’t recall these, please go back and re-read January 13th through January 19th.

My favorite reading of the year was on January 24th - “Blessing Your Circumstances.”  So many parts of my life make this reading ring true.  First, this particular year the 24th of January was the 21st birthday of my twins.  Second, my faith leads me to believe that my circumstances are a blessing to me as yours are to you.

Finally, in wrapping up the first month of the new year and new journey, please be sure to look at the days following January 19th.  Look at what Ban Breathnach calls the basic tools for the journey.  She introduced the one tool you MUST use back on the 14th - the gratitude journal - but the rest of these tools are wonderful for your journey.  Read about the illustrated discovery journal, the daily dialogue (which, if you have ever read Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way, I find similar to morning pages), your personal treasure map, and golden mirror meditations.

More About Gratitude

My Simple Abundance posts are not quite daily.  As the year goes on, they will be come less frequent also.  Just making sure you know.

 As I was reading on the tenth about old cemeteries, several thought quickly ran through my mind.  First was how grateful I was to be alive.  The second thing was maybe this was what put the thought in my head that I wanted to visit old cemeteries and photograph headstones.  I know even my teens think it is weird but I just love the idea of a book of cemetery shots in black and white.

I was also struck by the quote that started the day by Elisabeth Kubler-Ross.  I have been thinking about her work on grief a lot lately.

January 11th had a new meaning this year.  I truly believe that the US is headed into a recession.  The sentiment that men know how to live with money but women know how to live without it was interesting.  All the while, Sarah Ban Breathnach continued to point out that the most important part of this was gratitude.

Still thinking about recession, the scarcity discussion on the 12th made me think of more recession talk.  It was true that when items get scarce, laser focus comes into play.  When gas goes up to $5 a gallon, the focus will be on ways to conserve, on ways to get around without a car.

As we continue to discuss gratitude, SBB says that she finally realized that it was not security that she was searching for.  She was searching for serenity, for peace.

 The reading on January 14th discusses the one item that Ban Breathnach says is essential to the journey to authenticity - a gratitude journal.  This year I am using a composition notebook I received in an altering swap last year.  It is beautiful.  Every night I will write in it five things I am grateful for.  These things can be anything from the standard health, family - these come to mind when the days are long and tiring and hard - to the flowers and the birds - when days are brighter and lighter.

What are you thankful for?

Simply Happy

The last few days in Simple Abundance have talked about happiness - our inability to find it within ourself, our inability to get happy ourselves, the source of happiness being outside our control.

More than anything, the January 8th reading, which I just re-read, spoke to me.  I was at a funeral yesterday - a funeral of a young man who died too young but who lived to the fullest while he was here.  While I am sure he was in pain near the end of his life, he didn’t stop living.  He definitely showed those of us who knew him - and there were thousands of us - that happiness was not dependent on a remodeled kitchen as author Sarah Ban Breathnach mentions nor on what is going on around us but it was dependent on a faith in our God or a higher authority and on ourselves and knowing our authentic self.

Then, as this morning awakened, I read about the differing between wants and needs.  When I read this, I always think of children.  They seem to “need” every new gadget they see.  As they become older, their “needs” get more elaborate and expensive.  We, as parents, need to teach children the difference between want and need.  These things are usually wants.  When I think of what I “need” as a woman and as an adult, I realize that there is truly little I need.  But the list of wants could get long.

Gratitude and Dress Rehearsals

Yesterday, I spent the day trying to get everything done I needed done so as to spend the evening with my daughter.  It seemed like I was spinning wheels going nowhere until we left for her college’s hockey game.

As I read yesterday’s entry from SBB, I noticed that she gives us first definitions.  These are always tricky as she is creating a synergy - new buzz word from work - so that the combination of the words simple and abundance creating more together than the sum of their individual parts. 

The talk about happiness I am taking with a new light also.  The other book I am reading right this moment is The Art of Happiness by his Holiness the Dalai Lama and a Western psychiatrist - I believe his name is Howard but don’t have the book handy at the moment.  I am reading what SBB has to say about happiness and authentic awakening and what the Dalai Lama has to say and they are meshing quite well.

We also get our first introduction to gratitude on January 3rd.  The bigger push to creating a grateful life will come later in the month when we start a gratitude journal.  If you are truly interested in more on gratitude, Deborah Norville has a book out about it.

I always find the January 4th post about life not being a dress rehearsal a favorite.  I realize that many times we think it is.  We work but do not prosper.  We have family but do not have time for them.  These are all part of the dress rehearsal of life.  Life is NOT a dress rehearsal.  You need to live your life.  While you may not want to cook every night - or even every other night, it makes for a better life for your family in so many ways.  While you may laugh at putting makeup on to go to the grocery for a few minutes, trust me when I say it is worth it in more ways than one. 

You can create the setting for your life.  You need to look at your life like a book.  You have control over so many of the items that it takes to make a best seller - characters, setting, and the plot.  You just need to be yourself and be sure of the story you are weaving.