Expert in the Know

How fun is this? I just discovered that I was published in the Globe and Mail (Canada’s largest national newspaper) this last Wednesday (March 21^st). Not like I had no clue, I did after all write the piece, but I didn’t know when they were planning to put it in. So imagine my surprise when I was merrily googling myself (that sounds either very rude or very self-absorbed, but I had my reasons) and came across this little advice piece by me. They even went so far as to describe me as an expert in the know. Hmmm, do you think I might be able to leverage this to get across the border?

Reign Over Me

Saw a movie yesterday. Reign Over Me with Don Cheadle and Adam Sandler. There is much to recommend it, but the piece that stood out for me the most is the feeling I was left with - that grieving has a life of it’s own. It really does have to happen in your own way and your own pace. There is no simple or cookie cutter way to do it. It might require rage or tears, or not. Denial can be a friend. Self-medication might be what gets us through the short run (but I don’t recommend it for the long term). Whatever is true for you is all that is important. And from the outside in, there really is no point in imposing the way we grieve onto someone else. Just no point, because how can we know what works for other people, or what will heal them. And isn’t that the point of grieving, to heal and move on with our lives (which is not the same as forgetting the thing or person we are grieving).

For me, when I was recovering from cancer, the grieving was probably the most profound part of the experience (and there is lots profound about having cancer), when I had to make peace with what had happened. And the grieving couldn’t happen during the treatment, I was way too busy with fighting for my life to deal with my life or my feelings about my life. So then, when all the doctors dropped away, and there were no more appointments to keep me busy, and everyone got a well deserved rest from “taking care of me”, and there was just time and space. And an awful lot of time and space, emphasis on the awful. That is when the grieving started, and the healing. That is when I cried for hours, which turned into days, and finally weeks. That is where I had to surrender and see what feelings surfaced in what moments. That is where I let my body call the shots and tell me what needed doing next. That is where I regained myself again. My real self, my buried self, my sacred self. In that moment it felt like the sun had broke through the clouds (kind of like this Vancouver day), and I could breath again. Just a little at first. Like sipping on a straw. But eventually I could take in great big gulps of life-giving oxygen. And I was ready to start thinking about living again.

Feeling Forgotten

So my relationship ended last week. And while I do miss my guy, I am struck by the fact that what I miss more is someone to do things with. You know, someone. Having the ready made plan. The built in companionship. The person you can count on to be up for just about anything, not having to call way in advance, or set up a plan, but just someone to ad lib with. I miss THAT. And am suffering from the boredom that comes from the absence of that. And as a collaborative person, I so much prefer coming up with plans together with someone, rather than coming up with something and then rolling it out to people to see if they want to join in. Sigh.

Then there is the “back to the drawing board” feeling that comes from needing to start the process of looking again. And yes, I refined what it is that I need in a lifetime mate. Through learning what worked and didn’t work, and how I respond to certain, shall we say, stimuli. I learned that I really need to be with a charismatic man, someone who is very self-assured, and has the range and space to meet and hold me. Because when I am not around that I shrink down, so as not to make him feel bad or less or something. And since I only have one dial, that covers all of my functions: charisma, boldness, zest, directness, fire, passion, speaking up, speaking out, etc, then, when I want to dial down one function, well, I accidentally dial them all down and turn into a watered down version of myself. Sort of passive and uninteresting. And not certainly not the person that my partner first met and fell in love with. Another sigh.

I am doing a lot of sighing these days. And while I was feeling AMAZING just a few days ago, cleansed of the past relationship, and feeling the flow in my life, with magical, great, new things happening like the chance to be writing semi regularly for an article in the Globe and Mail. Well, today it is different, it is a rainy, grey, Vancouver day, and I am bored, and have no clear plans set out for the day. And the place I get to here smacks of self pity. But really the root or the core of it is feeling as if the Goddess has forgotten me. Like I have emailed her, called her, sent her a memo all saying something along the lines of “Gee, if you could connect me up with my ideal guy, the man worthy to be my lifetime partner, that would be great. And if you could move on that soonish, that would be even better.” And that she has now, somehow, misplaced my memo, or is too busy to respond to the email and that in a year or two, or perhaps a decade or two (her time arc seems to be so different from us regular people), she will come across my note and say “Shit, I totally forgot that I was suppose to do that for Signy. Damn it, and now it is way over due.” But that is assuming she has the same shortcomings as I do, and on good days I know that isn’t true. I guess, unfortunately, on bad days I think it might be, and this feeling, of being forgotten, comes in like one of those grey Vancouver clouds I already mentioned, and rains down on me, leaving my hope, optimism and positive attitude a little soggy and water logged. Triple sigh.

And, with all that said, here I am, doing my blogging in a café, and there are plenty of interesting, apparently single people here. And the engineer with the steel blue eyes across from me keeps meeting my gaze when I look up, and so I guess the Goddess really does have it handled, and it is just a matter of time. Time and trust.

God, grant me the serenity to accept the thing I can not change, the courage to change the thinks I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.

February Sucked

Well it has been ages since I have written, mostly because I have been absorbed in my own joyful journey (and not a bad place to be I might add). But recently I have been rudely interrupted. Well, no that is a terrible way to say it, rather it is that I have had the reality of life, and death, crash down around my ears in a most painful and prolonged way. The month of February 2007 was a devastating month of large losses.

Firstly, and closest to my heart, is the loss of my Aunt Disa. Who had been fighting cancer as best she could for about 8 months. She was courageous and willing to make changes and try new things. In the end, the cancer claimed her suddenly, which really is the way it should be, as this was a woman who attacked life and would rather be doing something, anything, than just sitting around. If cancer had taken her in that drawn out, aching, suffocating way, well she just would have hated it. She has left in her wake (or sort of instead of a wake) a lot of confusion and pain. And still, I am able to see her as someone who was always trying to do her best. May she enjoy the company of her two older sisters who went before her.

Next comes a professor who started her teaching career at Queen’s when I was there. I didn’t have her as a prof but knew her more socially since she was closer in age to us students than many of the ivy-covered, tenured profs. Her name was Shirley Taylor and she died of breast cancer. And so, for that reason alone, my heart feels heavy to know one more woman taken by the illness that flirted with me, but passed on by. Her impish smile and twinkling eyes will be missed. Not to mention her sharp intelligence.

Than we have my name mother (A relatively common thing in Iceland, to have a person after whom you were named. And the personality and longevity of your name parent is considered to impact the namesakes make up and chances in life). Obviously, my name mother’s name is Signy. Signy Stefansdottir. She was my grandmother’s baby sister. And I am very happy to report that she died at the ripe old age of 101. Mostly just from being worn out. Not a bad way to go. And she gives me something to shoot for. That apparently should be within my reach. And still it is a significant thing to lose her. My name mother. And that last one of her generation.

Henry Dorst, not a close friend, but a man I respect and have taken workshops with also died this month. Of cancer. He was probably in his late 60’s. And a cheeky man, always doing his own thing, not concerned with what people thought. Changing the world one feng shui workshop at a time.

And finally, last but not least, on the very last day of February (it has been such a very long month, for the shortest month of the year), Laura Whitworth, co-founder of The Coaches Training Institute, co-author of Co-Active Coaching, inspiration to tens of 1000’s, and a woman who changed the trajectory of the world with her vision and her work died of lung cancer. She fought bravely and hard. Like nobody’s business in fact. This lady was a fighter in everything she did. Powerful, purposeful, and clear. The world has lost a brilliant beacon of light with her passing. And yet she will live on and love on in so many ways through so many different people.

This posting is mostly to pay homage to all these fabulous people. And also a place for me to say, not that I haven’t already said it before, that cancer really, really sucks, and that if we don’t put some effort into containing this epidemic then forget global warming, there won’t be anyone left to complain about the heat. Come on people, let’s move on this!!!!