Optimism

Nancy Davis wrote a book about optimism and MS. I ordered it immediately. I am frighteningly optimistic in thinking I can control this strange disease. I balk at the word disease as I type it. I refuse to think of it as a disease but rather just another thing that I can manage within my list of priorities. A little self deception? Maybe. Whatever gets you through the night. An attack could suddenly change my life. But I can also get hit unexpectedly by a bus. Could result in the same outcome. Yet....I do not worry about being hit by a bus. I will not worry about this as there is little affect that will have on my outcome.

Here is what the knowledge of a possible attack of MS should do. It should make me re-evaluate what I am doing with the precious minutes and days that I have available. Am I doing the things that I enjoy or am I doing the things that people my age do. I think it is the latter and I am making it the former. So....now armed with my list of things I want to do, I am carving out a new lifestyle for myself. “Every adversity and defeat carries the seed of an equivalent benefit, if we are ingenious enough to find it.”

This should not be an exercise related to an MS diagnosis but one which we should all do to create the life of our dreams. Ask yourself if you are you who you dreamed you would be when you were young? The answer to that will probably be "no". But the achievement of that is not beyond our reach. So how can we gradually change our lives to become who we had hoped to be. We all need to feel the momentum of new goals that we stretch towards and feel the victory of reaching new levels of ability in every area of our lives.

"The difference between stumbling blocks and stepping stones is all in how you use them."

We all have precious time left and we want to be sure to do the things that make our hearts sing. Today, not someday.

No Space or Time

These are the kinds of things I think about when I am in the shower. Einstein said that the concept of space and time does not exist; that it is a human invention designed to organize our perceptions. It implies therefore that everything is happening in the present. I can put this in words but I cannot truly get my lovely adept human brain to comprehend this. Maybe it gets close to the reason why time seems to rush by faster as you get older. Maybe we become more able to deal with the concept and get closer to it's meaning by seeing time rush past. Maybe spirituality(not defined as religion) and science do meet on another plane at some point and we get closer to that as we get older. Maybe Einstein was a spiritually advanced human being as well as a mathematical genius. Is it possible that the two qualities emerged concurrently because they are related? I know that the time between getting ready to go in the morning and getting ready to go to bed at night seems to get shorter as I get older. Is this evidence of my emerging comprehension of the Einstein concept of space and time. Maybe evidence of spiritual growth. Maybe evidence of being too busy. A lot of Maybe's.

Big Idea! Starting Small!

Working on the big new idea. Breaking out of old patterns. I have spent my whole life as a great employee. Now those well honed talents can be used to achieve my new goals.

I am thinking that I do not want to be 70 and looking at the path not taken and wondering what if..... Boldness looks good on me. It puts an excitement into my step that I did not know was missing. When you are in love, love does that. It colours everything you do with a magical palette of intense colour. Finding your path can make you feel the same way. That explosion of colour also tells you that you are on the right path. Where am I going? I don't know but it certainly is fun getting there.

False Events Appearing Real (F.E.A.R.)

I have a plethora of great ideas for new businesses. Every time that I have an idea I write it into my notebook. Some ideas are discarded because it makes sooo much sense to discard them. Others I scope out in detail until....I figure out why I should not go forward. I seek reasons why each will not succeed. I magnify them in my mind until I am unwilling or unable to go forward. New honesty. It is called fear. Here is a wise thought.

"Do the thing you fear, and the death of fear is certain."
Ralph Waldo Emerson

Here is another. "You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face.... You must do the thing you think you cannot do."
Eleanor Roosevelt

I know these truths intellectually. It doesn't quell my fears. I do know that every time I have been afraid, but have gone forward (or been pushed forward), I have emerged stronger, wiser, and more enlightened. Knowing all these things does not change my fear. Yet if I keep doing what I have always done, I will get what I have always had. Old results. Not bad. I can see the new results waiting for me in the distance beyond my fear

What People Think

What would you do if you did not care what people think? Who would you be? What would you do? Where would you live? I answered this by trying to define what are the things that I could not live without....the things that give me pleasure. Here is what I came up with. I would like to have my family, my computer, my camera, clean fluffy bedclothes, a place to cook amazing creations, lots of books, a bicycle, good running shoes and really good red wine (no wine is better than bad wine). Depending on if I am travelling or home based I would also need a car...although sometimes I think walking and biking everywhere would be fun (but I may never see my friends who live further away than my current state of fitness allows.)

Would I work at this job? I think I might like to do my own creative thing instead. Interesting that when I was in University, it was quite in vogue to pursue Business disciplines. My natural tendencies leaned towards the Arts -- psychology and the brain fascinated me and still does. I moved to a Business Major because that was deemed to be a route to "success". I was successful on the job when I got out of school too. But it never fascinated me. It propelled me forward because I received accolades and promotions. And I was the archetypal successful woman at a time when the idea was still new. So although I definitely blazed new trails, they might have been on the wrong mountain. So now I want to define what it is that floats my boat.

The list of my favourite things is quite simple. So what is this complex life that I have built around me. Time to dismantle.

Van Gogh Did Shoot for the Moon

A few people have asked me why I write a blog. To me it is just like journal writing which I have done in brief intermittent moments of clarity but really nothing that endured. In a blog, you get the chance to write about your hopes and dreams. Sometimes when you write things down, it gives clarity to what seem to be rather haphazard and unrelated thoughts when they are in your mind. Journal writing and blogging lets you recreate the story of what you want your life to be. "Writing in a journal helps you to live with greater clarity and more deliberately." It lets you dream and create new possibilities, first on paper and then in real life. It lets you sort through some of the big ones. Writing them down clarifies the key points that need action. It lets you formulate a plan for action and it lets you dream bigger than life. Because "if you shoot for the moon and you miss, you will still be among the stars." And blogging gives me a time to focus on my thoughts and develop one or two of them before I return to the busy-ness that takes over all of our lives. Brian Souza says "...if we are not careful, we can very easily fall into the trap of focusing all our energies on making progress on our daily to-do lists rather than fulfilling our heart's deepest desires." I am good at the former and working on the latter.

What Is It That I Am Longing For?

Barbara Sher talks about our feeling that "growing up has stolen something of enormous value from you", in her book It's Only Too Late If You Don't Start Now. Hmmmm....it never occurred to me but as soon as I read that statement I locked in on it but still had difficulty defining what it was that was stolen from me. Read on. She will hit another point of clarity with this statement. "We have never forgotten the special freedom of childhood and we miss it, deeply". Hmmmm...again. She then arrives at the fact that it is that delicious sense of childhood wonder that we miss...."an adult dose of exciting thoughts, full strength intellectual and creative stimulation." That is why we crave travel to new lands, artistic endeavors and the attainment of heart racing new physical feats. We want to feel that mental excitement all over again.

We want to have the freedom "to go for our dreams and to rediscover your original self that got buried under the seductions of achievement and family." In her book, Barbara is so eloquent that I find my thoughts reflected on the pages of her book. She believes that you can get your sense of wonder back without leaving your current world and that when you have it back then you can travel and create and learn and feel like a child all over again. I like that.

I read her book just after I turned 40. I thought it was all right. I guess I was not ready to hear all that she had to say. I am fifty plus now and I am ready.