Beautiful Olive

Tag: women

  • Temper Thyself!

    TEMPER : verb

    tempered; tempering ˈtem-p(ə-)riŋ 

    transitive verb

    To dilute, qualify, or soften by the addition or influence of something else : MODERATE

    Each time I study a painting, I wonder how much it differs from the novel idea the artist first had.  Did he or she paint the entire scene in their imagination first, only to deconstruct and overhaul it on canvas a multitude of times?  Were there layers upon layers of paint on that canvas?  Or was it just right?  Did they perfect it all in the mind first, the only subsequent job being to transfer the image to canvas?

    I write in my head for days before my fingers ever touch a keyboard.  The ideas are born from daily life.  My kids, my husband, my business, my dog, things I read online and things I witness as I wander about the earth.  Same as you – I look around, I make observations and then I say something about them.  This past Friday morning, I woke to the news of women behaving badly in congress.  And, poof, there was my original idea for a post.  Women Behaving Badly in Congress.    

    That was Friday morning.  It’s now Saturday evening.  The Invisible Pencil in my Brain (where all first drafts are written) has been making notes for two days about Women Behaving Badly in Congress, but the keystrokes just started a half an hour ago.  How much does this final, written product differ from my original idea that swam in my head?  Read on.

    The Invisible Pencil in the Brain, Friday morning 10:37 a.m.:

    What in the actual hell is happening up there in Washington???  I can’t believe what I am reading.  One grownup adult woman actually said to another grown-up adult woman, WHILE THEY WERE BOTH DOING THEIR ADULT JOBS THAT THEY ARE PAID TO DO (albeit not paid much, I do appreciate that):  I think your fake eyelashes are messing up what you’re reading.  Again…I THINK YOUR FAKE EYELASHES ARE MESSING UP WHAT YOU’RE READING.

    I read on to understand more about how this unfolded and where it went from there.  It didn’t get better.  It got worse.  There is no reason to replay it here.  Google has a purpose, you can look it up if you’re unfamiliar.  Throughout the day on Friday, the Invisible Pencil in my Brain was furiously writing.  There was so much to say, really.  Women in Afghanistan just want to go to a store or a school without a male escort and we are over here tearing each other down over eyelashes???  I was hopping mad and the Invisible Pencil was mad at work.  The ideas were building and forming and molding.  

    I woke up the next day ready to get it all down on paper.  I asked some of my women friends and family for their thoughts on what had transpired in Washington.  I emphasized to them that my post would not be political, but would instead focus on what it means to be a woman and the ways in which we treat other women.  Here are their thoughts:  

    “Oh boy!  I’ll have to give that some consideration.  I’m not sure my thoughts on how it made me feel should be published!”

    “You mean beyond my first reaction?”

    “I need to look into more about the catty congresswomen argument, I saw a brief clip and was disgusted!!”

    “It was like a Jerry Springer episode omg I was so embarrassed to be an American watching that.  How pathetic.”

    “Hellooo!  I have a different take on it.  I don’t like to see it described as cat fight or whatever other terms to make it a fight between women.  Many of the men and women in that Congress behave shamelessly every single day.  To tag the women with this creates yet another double standard.”

    “I actually didn’t follow that.  I don’t really pay much attention to the news and some of the things that go on in politics.  I do, but not as much as others.  I just kind of focus on the platforms and what people stand for enough that I can vote and feel good about it.  All that background noise and everything I kind of stay away from…I just try to stay away from all that negative BS because it distracts me from the main point of trying to decide which way I wanna vote and where my beliefs are.”

    “I just watched it this am and my first comment was that it made women look so bad and catty.  I’m sure even the congressmen in the room were like omg…It was embarrassing – on both sides.  The eyelash comment was childish, but Crockett could’ve/should’ve responded/addressed it in a more mature, grown-up manner…not how representatives should behave.”

    I let their texts roll in throughout the day and by evening, I was ready to write.

    My first words:

    What in the actual hell is happening up there in Washington???  I can’t believe what I am reading.  One grown-up adult woman actually said to another grown-up adult woman, WHILE THEY WERE…………

    And then, much like the painter and his painting, this piece began to evolve and change.  Type, erase.  Type, erase.  As I read and reread the comments my girlfriends shared with me, my heat started to dissipate and I realized I was no longer coming in hot.  I wasn’t even lukewarm anymore. Their words were varied and thoughtful and truthful and I felt a responsibility to be the same with my words.  It was no longer about Women Behaving Badly in Congress. It was about Women Living Above the Bar. Way Above the Bar.

    To Temper something is to Moderate it, according to Merriam-Webster.  But to Temper something is to also Mature it.  To Mature the thought, the idea, the prospect, the delivery, the spirit.  These paragraphs you’re reading have been Tempered over the past 48 hours.  And why?  Because I asked some of my dearest friends and family to share their thoughts with me.  It caused me to pause and consider what message I would deliver using their words as backup.  I had to change my tone.  

    What’d I learn?  To pause.  To think.  To consider.  To allow a thought, an idea, a brainstorm to ebb and flow for a minute.  48 hours ago, I had a bullhorn and was ready to use it.  I had to get the word out that women were destroying women and were being catty and immature.  And it WAS catty and petty and immature.  But, it’s also other things besides that.  Were their actions Jerry Springer-ish?  Yep.  Were they embarrassing?  Yep.  Were they unique?  Nope.  Why?  Because none of us are good at tempering ourselves.  None of us.  Men AND women.  

    I was ready to throw down about how women backstab and belittle and create scenarios where one wins and the other loses.  But over the course of 48 hours, because of the comments from my supremely awesome women friends, I changed my tone.

    We often don’t witness the creation of something from its inception.  We don’t see the layer upon layer of paint that exists under the surface layer of brushstrokes.  We don’t even get to know which brushstroke was the first or the last.  In writing, we don’t see the words that were there, and then weren’t, wiped out forever with the ‘Backspace’ key.  We only get to see the final product.  And I would argue it’s 1000% better than the first-born idea.

  • Do You Know What a Loser Is?

    This past Friday, I was prepared to shut down the blog. The internet was full of sadness over the passing of The Queen of Mommy Blogging, The OG Mom Blogger, Dooce. I pored over the tributes and read some of her best posts. I loved her take and will miss her beautiful words. As I took in the commentary from around the planet, I thought “It sounds like blogging is mostly dead. I think there are other platforms like Tik Tok and Instagram and a whole host of others that I know nothing about that must be the platforms of today. I missed the boat and have nothing new to add to these new-fangled ways of communicating. People don’t want to read blogs. They want visual content and it needs to be in 1-2 minute increments.”

    So I decided I would bury Beautiful Olive. Why pay for the website hosting, the Constant Contact subscription, and the domain name rights when it was just sitting out in the internet world languishing with no new content? When blogging was old-school and a thing of yesterday?

    Have you ever tried to cancel an auto-renew subscription? Well, the business-savvy peeps of the world are business-savvy for a reason. And they have figured out that if they make it really hard to cancel an auto-renew subscription, 92% of people won’t cancel it. You can buy almost anything online, without talking to a single person, with a single mouse click. But if you want to cancel something, you have to CALL someone and TALK to someone first. No amount of mouse clicks will get you there. This is why, two days later, I have not yet canceled Beautiful Olive or any of the internet extras that accompany her. I would have to make phone calls and talk to people and I am an introvert. We don’t play that way. We do not like to talk to strangers whose goals are exactly opposite ours.

    So, the blog is still here because it was too much of a pain to cancel it. And, then I woke up today and I decided to write. So, there you go.

    “Do you know what a loser is? A real loser is somebody who is so afraid of not winning they don’t even try.”

    Grandpa, “Little Miss Sunshine”

    It’s Mother’s Day and my typical MO celebration has been to do whatever I want with wild abandon. Mimosas and blueberry muffins for breakfast. Naps. Reading. A dinner fit for a queen, complete with dessert. And wine. Plenty of wine. Sometime after becoming a mom, I declared it the day of indulgence and I always indulged.

    But, some things happened to me over this past week (which I will tell you about in a minute) and all week when my husband or sons would ask what I wanted to do for Mother’s Day this year, I would answer “I don’t know. Not much. I know what I don’t want. I don’t want to have mimosas or blueberry muffins or a bottle of wine or naps. I know that’s what I don’t want. I’ll get back to you…”

    I’ve been on a collision course for the past year with my bad choices and habits. I weigh more than I should or ever have, I drink entirely too much alcohol, I don’t get the exercise I need and my ability to deal with life’s stressors is out of whack. The real struggle is in the knowledge of these things on the one hand and doing nothing about them on the other hand. The cognitive dissonance takes our anxiety to an even higher level and then we are even more unhappy with ourselves. It’s a vicious cycle. Because we are thoughtful, intelligent beings, we really should be able to figure this out. But, we can’t. So, we are losers.

    I’ve had the “Why do I KNOW what I need to do, but do the opposite?” conversation with myself so many times over the past year I’ve lost count. And every time I have had that conversation, I would follow up with “And, are you ready to do something about it?” And every time, the answer was a resounding “Nope. Tomorrow. Come back tomorrow and ask again. Maybe the answer will be different.” And I would stroll off with my glass of wine.

    About a week ago, I had the same conversation, but the answer was different. You can tell when it’s different. It feels like it rises up from your core and is straight-up bellicose. Everything starts to align and suddenly you’re just ready. You holler back at the old self who answered “Nope” every time. “Hey. Old Self. New Me is taking over. We don’t need your help anymore. We got this. Bye-bye.”

    I don’t know what flipped the switch. All I know is that I’ve been praying for it to flip for the past year and I knew I would know when it did. I was glad it flipped on Sunday because I had an appointment for a routine physical on Tuesday. “Whew!” I thought. “This is great! I dodged that bullet! Thanks, Me!” But, apparently, two days of changed habits is not enough lead time for your lab values to be whipped into shape and my doctor called me on Wednesday to tell me that I might need to go on some medication to combat some concerning findings. 😲

    Truth be told, my inactivity, my diet, my relationship with alcohol (that is a really dumb term) was really getting wildly out of control. I think it was pretty dark at times. And when it’s dark, we peer out of the hole and look around at everybody else to see how they’re doing. And when everybody else seems to be doing just fine, we clamp the shell down even tighter, don’t we? But the inner turmoil is still there beneath the surface. Somehow, we can’t figure out how to just do what we know we need to do. We are losers.

    Well, when the student is ready, the teacher will appear. The switch will flip. The inner turmoil will work its way to the surface and demand a decision about who wins. I woke up this Mother’s Day and I RODE A BIKE for 30 minutes. I drank water and fasted until 2 p.m. I’m writing, not napping. At dinner, I’m going with CAULIFLOWER MASH instead of POTATO MASH. I e-mailed my physician and asked for a 6-month reprieve, medication-free, to get my sh*t in order. And I’ll gladly pay out of pocket to get new labs drawn in 6 months so I can prove that my switch has indeed flipped.

    Will I feel as sure tomorrow or the next day or the next as I do today? I don’t know. This isn’t my first rodeo. We are all a work in progress, all of the time. Today, I woke up and I felt like writing. I felt like riding a bike instead of drinking a mimosa. I felt like eating an orange instead of a blueberry muffin. And I felt like being a better mom to my boys, which means some of my dark, crap habits have to take a back seat. So many of us are fighting crazy fierce battles. We get really good at hiding them from the world. Keep the conversation going with yourself. Let her answer “Nope” as long as she needs to. When the timing is right, she will suddenly answer “Yes” and you will know. And you will always be a winner in my book.

    Happy Mother’s Day, my beautiful friends. You are nothing short of fabulous today and every day.

  • Mid-Life Crisis: The Kayak Project

    I’ve been struggling lately. Have you? Struggling. Isn’t that the phrase du jour? Covid. Wild Fires. Floods. Climate Change. Murderous Insects. Something called an Army Ant that literally took my friend’s yard from lush green grass to dead, dead, dead in just 3 short days. Yep. I’ve been struggling.

    As I am firmly planted in middle age, I feel like I am watching my life from outside my body. And it’s full of judgment:

    • I thought I would be further along by this point in my life (insert retirement savings, college savings, savings in general, health and wellness, travel, business, friendships, spirituality, enlightenment)
    • I thought “this…” was what I wanted (insert clothes, shoes, house, car, massage, bike, fancy makeup brushes), so why am I still dissatisfied?
    • I thought I would “be…” by now (insert “here, there, anywhere”)

    I believe the mid-life crisis for women is slow and drawn-out. It’s a gradual feeling of unease that creeps in around the edges and blurs our sense of self. In our twenties, we take risks. We are full of confidence. Our bodies will still do exactly what we ask of them and our brains are whip-sharp. We just go and do and drive that bus wherever we need it to go. Life is so full of potential and the horizon is barely visible.

    In our thirties, we are so busy. Our careers are solidly moving forward. Our kids are young – they make us smile and laugh and give hugs and sloppy kisses freely. Our bodies still do what we ask of them because what choice does it have? We are BUSY. But, it’s a GOOD busy. The horizon is beautiful, but still so far away.

    In our forties, our kids have grown older and more independent. We are glad to do all of that taxi-driving because we are spending precious time with them. We are still BUSY, so we barely notice that the body is getting a little more defiant about things we ask it to do. We start to hold our book or our phone or our mail an inch farther away from our eyes. And then another inch and another inch still. Finally, we are holding all required reading at arms-length before we trudge into Costco to buy the 6 pack of readers. The horizon is not so far away now, but we are busy with teens and careers and everyone knows “We are in our PRIME because we can go to dinner or a movie or even a night away because our kids are old enough to be home alone for more than 30 seconds” so who cares about a horizon??? And we don’t mind the readers, they come in tons of fashionable styles!”

    I’m on the precipice of turning fifty. I can’t yet write about what the fifties will be like because I’m not there. But, the latter part of the forties has been admittedly uncomfortable. They’ve made me question everything I’ve done up to this point and everything I’ll do in the latter half of my life. This is why it’s a Mid-Life Crisis. MID-LIFE. See? You look behind and you look ahead and you tell yourself all sorts of ridiculous stories about how your life is turning out now that you’re in the middle of it (see above “I thought by now…..). And I hate to generalize, but I will anyway. I believe that for men in Mid-Life Crisis, the realization that they are within it comes fast and furious. And then the decision about what to do about it also comes fast and furious. They buy the sports car. They jump careers or jump out of an airplane or put in a pool and a backyard kitchen. They turn 180 degrees and everyone nods and says “Mm-hmm. See? Mid-Life Crisis.”

    This is not the case for women. Remember, it’s a gradual unease. We start to question ourselves and our station, but it’s so subtle. We are a little heavier than we were in our twenties and thirties and early forties. We are noticing our skin is more wrinkly and worn and tired. Our bodies are getting more belligerent when asked to do certain things. Our kids are growing into adulthood and we are seeing that we most definitely made some mistakes in parenting. Ouch. That’s a blow to the mom-ego.

    The Merriam-Webster definition of a crisis: An unstable or crucial time or state of affairs in which a decisive change is impending. This is where I am. It is an unstable and crucial time. I can’t, nor do I want to, live in this state of unease indefinitely. And I think I’ve been here for several years. It’s making me tired and scared and despondent. I want out of the Mid-Life Crisis. Because when we live in this state too long, it causes us to withhold all of our gifts and talents and goodness from the world around us. The world needs each of us as we are, not as we think we should be.

    So, how to climb out? We are told by all of the professionals to take baby steps. Incorporate small changes daily. Walk twice a week for just twenty minutes. Add one piece of fruit a day. Wake up ten minutes earlier. Get your coffee at home, save $$$. Drink one more glass of water a day. Start small and the change will become a habit. Right? Here’s the thing. We think too small. The reason we are uneasy at this stage in our life is that the world NEEDS us to be our big, beautiful selves and instead we are over here in the corner being small. That’s why we are STRUGGLING. We are grappling with a horizon that is now clearly approaching and we gave up our coffee and drank more water and ate the banana and NOTHING HAPPENED. We still feel uneasy and restless and inadequate.

    The Mid-Life Crisis requires a bold response. The other day I came across this in Jen Sincero’s book “You Are a Badass at Making Money”:

    If you want to change your life, change your life.

    Well, there you go. That’s really all there is to it. But, instead, we women are over here overanalyzing, overthinking, overstressing. If we want to change our lives, let’s change our lives!

    There is a saying “Spend twenty minutes a day in nature unless you are too busy, then spend an hour.” I am one of those “too busy” people. I multi-task and juggle 18 things at once. I am a “doer”. And I am pretty sure I wear it as a badge of honor. But, I’ve always been intrigued by this saying because it is the antithesis of the way I live my life. I don’t know how to “not” do. As I pondered the Mid-Life Crisis and how to get out of it, I realized that what we all need to do is something dramatically different, completely out of our comfort zones. Something that will make us terribly uncomfortable for a little bit.

    Enter The Kayak Project. To begin emerging from my Mid-Life Crisis I plan to get a kayak, take it to the lake several evenings a week and float around in nature for an hour all by myself. I’m not going to be on my phone or talk to people or read or listen to podcasts. I’m just going to be in that kayak all by myself for an hour. I am going to do this MOST ESPECIALLY when I don’t have the time. As a Type-A person who really doesn’t know how not to be busy, this is going to be HARD for me. I don’t yet know how to be alone, skimming around aimlessly in nature when there are so many things that need to get done on the homefront. It gives me anxiety just considering it. I don’t even own a kayak! I have only actually been in a kayak one time in my 48 years of life! But, all of this is solvable and I am going to solve it. I realize many of you already kayak and go do all kinds of things on weekday evenings and stay up late all the time, opposite of me. That’s not the point. The point is, I DO NOT. But, now I am going to. So, yes, your Kayak Project will probably look different than mine – just make sure it’s out of your comfort zone and makes you nervous and makes your heart skip a bit. Go take a class, open a business, write a book, bake a souffle, climb a mountain, take a solo trip. Just get it going.

    Eckhart Tolle says “You cannot find yourself by going into the past. You find yourself by coming into the present.” We need to think bigger, ladies. We are restless and uneasy and watching our life from outside of ourselves because we are not being bold enough. Pick something that scares you and gives you some anxiety and do that. Just one thing. If it just so happens that eating another piece of fruit every day or drinking that extra glass of water is what it takes to make your heart skip a beat and scare you, then maybe that’s your thing. But, I’ll venture a guess that it’s not. We can take a lesson from how men deal with the Mid-Life Crisis and think BIGGER. Small thinking is holding us back. Grab your readers, it’s time to go! Xoxo

  • Making Sense out of Non-Sense.

    Do you know how many blogs and essays and opinions are out there for us to soak up? I’ve never googled it. But, I know it’s a lot. There are so many, that there are no words or ideas or phrases that I will pen here today that will be necessarily new. So, why do those of us who like to throw our ideas onto paper keep doing it, if it’s not really laying down anything that hasn’t already been said before? Because in the same way that many give big, giant hugs as a means of support, I give words. I do like hugs. Human touch (especially now) is golden. But, for as long as I can remember, I’ve always recorded my deepest emotions in words. And then I give them to other people. Like a hug.

    I’m sitting here on a Sunday afternoon and the window is open because it’s 62 degrees with a barely noticeable breeze. I hear a bird. I hear a dog. I hear the bouncing basketball and the dad and the son shooting it around on the driveway. I hear the unattended tv in our family room – also hoops. I hear an airplane. And because we had an unbelievable tragedy in our state last Monday, as I pause and listen to my surroundings, my mind takes me back 7 days to last Sunday. The day before that tragedy. Did any of those 10 souls, whose lives on Earth were cut short without their permission, hear any of these same things last Sunday? It was cooler that day, maybe the windows weren’t open. Dogs surely barked and birds sang, though. Families played ball. People flew in airplanes. Same as today. Just seven days ago.

    My mind wonders what sounds each of them noticed last Sunday. Of all the sounds that competed for brain space, which ones sped VIP to the frontal lobe, beating out all of the other riff-raff sounds that didn’t matter? There are a lot of sounds that come into our ears every minute. We don’t pay attention to them all. We can’t. Filtering is vital to our survival. The world would be a cacophony from birth to death without it. The possibilities of what each of those 10 heard and noticed on that Sunday before that tragedy is endless. As I listen to the dad, the son, the basketball, the dog, the bird, the airplane, I find myself hoping that whatever it was they each heard and processed, noticed, and felt on that day was full of meaning, emotion, reverence, and love. That they heard the most important things for him or her on that day, at that moment.

    How do we move forward in light of a horrible tragedy? How do we fix what’s broken? How do we heal people who hurt? And how do we heal people who might hurt other people? How do we heal them before they hurt people? Fractured families, workplaces, schools, nations? How do we help people to visit stores, attend movies, drive down the highway, get on airplanes, and go to school without a fear that tomorrow might not look like today?

    The truth is, I don’t know. I honestly don’t know. But, you know how a loved one will jump in to hug you as tight as a vise when the sadness in your heart threatens to overtake you? I know you know what I’m talking about. There are people we encounter in our lives that can literally hug the hurt out of us – if only just for a few seconds. But, there is power in that few seconds. Those seconds allow you time to catch a needed breath and get some clarity. Clarity not to forget what brought you the hurt in the first place, but to know how to move forward when the hug is over and in a way that doesn’t destroy you in the process.

    In that same vein, I offer my words. They are my hug to you. And in the same way that a hug can’t directly make you feel at ease getting on the airplane or walking through the shopping mall or ducking in to buy those eggs, that hug gives you so much power. You have power. We have power. We have a beautiful world full of birds and basketballs and people who hug us so tight we see stars. Is it fragile? Of course, it is. Why do you think we see stars and only stars for a quick second when somebody hugs us that tightly?!? Because life is fragile. Fragility is okay. The world doesn’t require us to be tough and unbreakable. It only requires that we care more than we fear. That is how we help each other. Give and get all the hugs this week. They don’t always come physically, especially in Covid.

    XOXO

  • Go Get All That You’re After!

    It’s Sunday. We need fuel for the week ahead. Let’s arm ourselves.

    The Four Stages of Creativity

    Stage 1: The Problem

    Last Thursday, I was told that something that was supposed to be approved/done/operating by this point in time, was now going to take another few months. I was counting on this particular thing to come through. It has the potential to grow my business more quickly and get us into a more stable position. Less worry=happy owner. But, it’s just not going to happen right now. It’s almost completely out of my control, aside from writing a few letters to my state representatives. The Calvary is not coming. They’re busy. It is time to pivot (I am really hating this word).

    When I am delivered a dagger such as this, the feelings are overwhelming. Me, talking to me: What am I going to do??? I was really counting on that coming through and it would have made such a difference. Think. Think. You’ve got to come up with something different. Why does this have to be so hard? There’s got to be another answer, another option, another way to do this. Think. Think. You’ve got to keep fighting, keep clawing, keep climbing. Think. Think. You’re smart. You’ve done this before. You just have to find the right answer. Think. Think. Think! Why aren’t the answers coming??

    All the time I’m having this conversation inside my head, I’m still going through the motions of the day because the day doesn’t stop. I can’t just sit and stare at the wall. People need me to do what I do, no matter the banter inside my skull. So I carry around this urgent, scary matter. It’s not productive, but I carry it because it’s urgent and scary and somebody has got to fix this problem. It’s like a ball and chain around the ankle. I can move all about, I’m not shackled in place, but the damn thing is stuck to me and it goes everywhere I go and it’s ugly and heavy. Stage 1. The Problem.

    Stage 2: LaLa Land

    At some point, my brain becomes tired of carrying this mental anguish around and decides that there has got to be a break. I cut off the ball and chain. I tell it “I know you’re not going away. You’re going to be back here Monday morning. That’s fine. But I need to not think about you right now. I need a break. I need to feel normal and believe that everything is fine.” Then, I spend time doing things that make me feel like there is zero problem. Time with friends, family, a book, a tv show. Something that takes my mind away to a better place. Stage 2. LaLa Land.

    Stage 3: The Creative Process

    LaLa Land typically lasts 12-24 hours. You can’t disengage for much longer than that or there will be even bigger problems than the original problem. Gradually, I start to come back into the mainstream. I take control of some things that can actually be controlled like my schedule, my environment, my thoughts. Grab anything that can be controlled and corral it. For me, it was a cleaning frenzy.

    In the midst of my cleaning, I let my problem edge back into the forefront. Lenny Kravitz, who is just the best there is, was singing to me through all my chores. Creative ways to approach my crisis began to randomly pop into my head. The thoughts were jumbled at first. But, I just kept doing what I was doing – controlling what I can control, in this case, cleaning the bedroom – and just letting the thoughts flow. I was feeling more optimistic and more in control. As ideas were taking on a more concrete form, Lenny belted out “Go get all that you’re after.” Hmmm.

    Go get all that you’re after. Inspiration and energy were creeping in. I was starting to see new ways of looking at my problem. And there was Lenny telling me what to do. I grabbed my husband and we went to lunch. We spent two hours hashing through the ideas that were forming and devising plans for carrying them out. I was operating on all of the cylinders and I felt so in control. It was a great day and the world was deliriously full of promise because I now had a laundry list of solutions. I was ready to fix everything. Stage 3. The Creative Process.

    Then, I woke up the next day…

    Stage 4: The Creative Process Hangover

    This is where you have to be really, really aware. You will wake up the next day and you will question everything you told yourself the day before at the height of your creative inspiration. You will doubt every one of your ideas. You will look them over and think “These might be good ideas, but it’s going to take too much energy to carry them out. I’m not bold enough or brave enough or skilled enough. I don’t know enough. I’m not the right person. I need to slow down a minute and think about this. This might get UNCOMFORTABLE.” Stage 4. The Creative Process Hangover.

    Listen up. NO, YOU DON’T NEED TO SLOW DOWN. DO NOT SLOW DOWN. Do you remember how energetic, how alive, and how inspired you were yesterday when you were in the midst of all those ideas? Remember how good it felt to crack open novel solutions that you knew were the right answer for YOU? THAT is who you are! That is YOU! You are NOT the timid, questioning, cautious, scared person that you think you are. You are brave, bold, and daring and your soul knows it. That’s why it gave you all of that content in Stage 3. That’s why your heart beat the most perfect rhythm, your smile hogged all the facial real estate and your energy was infectious to all who were around you in that creative element. That’s your best you. It just is.

    I don’t know why we can’t live in Stage 3 all of the time, but we don’t get to ask those questions. As near as I can tell, this is the process. Maybe the desperation of an “unsolvable” problem followed by the subsequent LaLa Land escape have to happen first so we can enter this creative nirvana? Problems are not solved when we stick too close to the problem. We have to get off the highway and roam around for a while. Find something else to do. Go bury ourselves in something we CAN control. Pretty soon, the answers will come. When they start to take shape, we have to relish the feeling of empowerment, courage, optimism, and energy. We have to ride that wave for as long as we can. We have to squeeze as many ideas as we can out of that moment. Let it go on for as long as it must! Document, document, document. Journal, Tik-Tok, paper napkin, sketches – put those ideas any and everywhere, but put them down! We will need the evidence tomorrow, I promise you. Stage 4 has never NOT appeared on the heels of Stage 3. I hate her.

    You must expect the creative process hangover. It’s real. Every time I go through one of these really intense dreaming/planning sessions where the ideas and possibilities explode, I have to beware the next day. I wake up and I doubt all those great ideas. I get caught up in the logistics. I get stuck in the “Yes, but…” and I disbelieve that I am the one that has the authority to carry out these dreams of mine. It’s good to ask some questions, but please don’t doubt what your soul told you in those really fruitful moments. The reason you felt so alive and so proud and so full of enthusiasm was that these solutions were true for you. You gifted them to you! They are genuine – use them!

    As I get older, I realize the importance of documenting everything I come up with when I am in Stage 3. Every idea, no matter how wild. We need that hard evidence. We lose our memories as we get older and we won’t remember every one of the great ideas. Only figments. And figments aren’t enough to fend off Stage 4. When Stage 4 comes around you need to gather all of your evidence, your hard-fought ideas, your sketches, your videos, your notes and shove them right into Stage 4’s eyeballs. Fight back. Don’t believe the negativity that Stage 4 feeds you. It is not true. It is not you. You have to go get all that you’re after. You wrote all the good stuff down in notes to yourself, yesterday. That is the truth. Reference it as often as needed. 💪👊

    Have a glorious week, ladies. Go get all that you’re after! XOXO

  • A Menagerie of Things

    Hi! Long time, no see! Sorry about that. 😬

    When I started this blog, I made a deal with myself – that the blog was a HOBBY and that the writing must be enjoyable and never forced. So, I just haven’t felt the passion to write over the past month. If I don’t feel it, the words don’t appear on the screen. It’s just how it is. I hope you have a hobby where you do the same. Hobbies should never be forced. Take a moment (seriously) and make sure that your truest, most beloved hobbies are present when you need them and not required when you don’t. Okay, let’s move on.

    How are you doing at this mid-point of February??? This time of year is always a mixed bag. Maybe you are crushing some of your beginning-of-the-year goals and maybe some of the other goals had to be hurled out the back door, reimagined, or rewritten. February always brings a reckoning of sorts. We have to decide which things we are going to “stick to” and carry right on into springtime and which things we are D.O.N.E. with. Hence, this little write-up. I don’t know what you need right now because mid-February is a motley for all of us as we sort these things out. So I have for you some words of advice, some food ideas (both healthy and not, because we are all in a different space in time) and some cool stuff I’ve found. It’s a menagerie of things and maybe you need one of them!

    First things first. The advice of the day is to keep showing up. Whatever it is you’re grappling with, keep showing up. During the big quarantine that began last March, I started a daily Bible reading practice using the Bible in One Year app. Before last March, I had never really shown up daily to read the Bible. I had a few microbursts through the years, but I had never been this faithful to the practice for such a consistent time. I am now 9/10 of the way through reading the entire Bible. I’ve never done that before.

    And now this is where you think I’m going to say “And wow! This consistency has changed my life!”

    Well, I’m not going to tell you that. The first 6 weeks of 2021 have been HARD. Much harder than I thought they would be when we flipped the calendar over on January 1. I’ve had increasing stresses, worries, and issues that keep appearing and I thought for sure we were going to turn a corner. Multiple times I have mumbled to God “I don’t know how much more of this I can take, God, what is THE DEAL? I need to see the plan. I don’t think you have the right plan…”

    The other morning I came downstairs, made the coffee, grabbed the Bible and opened the app. Just like I always do. And I distinctly remember thinking “Why do I keep doing this? I’ve been doing this for almost a whole year. Daily, I’ve been showing up and poring over His word. I’ve never been this devoted to this practice before and yet, nothing magical seems to be happening. Things seem messier than ever. I’m running out of ideas. I thought this would bring me closer to God and make my path in life clearer and instead it feels like I am stuck on pause.”

    But, I opened the reading for that day anyway and I sat down and did what I’ve been doing every morning for the past eleven months. Why??? Because in my soul I feel this practice is important and valuable. Even if nothing results that I can tangibly grasp at that moment. Even if nothing results that I can tangibly grasp, ever! This advice is not about whether you should read the Bible or pray or meditate. We’re not getting into religion here. This is about showing up for whatever you believe is important FOR YOU. So, whatever it is that YOU KNOW IN YOUR SOUL to be so important that you just have to keep doing it, keep showing up for that. Even if you can’t see the reward. Because that is the foundation of HOPE. And where there is HOPE there is always another day, another opportunity, another way.

    Now. Onto more whimsical, but equally important things. Let’s talk food.

    Do you need easy ways to feed your kids? Yourself? Do you need healthy? Do you need yummy? Here are several ideas I’ve relied on through the years that have yet to fail.

    • Peanut Butter, Jelly, Banana, Chocolate Chip Sandwiches (PBJB&CC) Hands-down favorite in this household. It’s a little messy. It’s a lot yummy. Butter two slices of bread on the one side and lay them butter-side down on a cutting board. Now spread peanut butter on one piece and jelly on the other. Layer banana slices and chocolate chips on top of the peanut butter. Use a thin spatula to slide the slice off the cutting board (remember, there’s butter underneath there and it’s just messy – as thin a spatula as possible will do the trick), slide that onto a hot griddle or skillet, place the jellied slice on top and let everything get toasty and melty, flipping once. Everybody loves this one. There is just nothing wrong with this sandwich. Not one thing.
    • Nacho Bar Lay out several cookie sheets, lay sheets of foil on top, and power the oven to broil. Lay out any/all fixings you can find. Leftover meat, any and all cheeses, mangos, black beans, onions, peppers. I once made turkey nachos after Thanksgiving and everyone laughed and laughed until they saw my plate. Nacho anything is the bomb. This is a great clean-out-the-fridge idea. Everybody makes their own, the foil IS the plate, cleanup is super easy and everyone is happy, happy, happy.
    • Chicken Sandwiches This is modeled after a sandwich from Quinton’s Deli (Lawrence, Kansas) called the T.A.C. If you’ve been there, you know. You need sliced grilled chicken, avocado, provolone cheese, red onion, and cream cheese. You need honey mustard – we make our own. Mix mayo, honey, and yellow mustard. Keep mixing and tasting until it’s right. I can’t give you specific measurements, that messes up too many kitchen utensils. Just keep mixing, tasting, adjusting until you like it. You need deli bread of some kind – we use hoagies. Butter the inside of the bread and toast or grill the bread before assembly. Please don’t skip this step. Toasted sandwiches are elevated and fancy and we’re trying to mix it up here. Slap honey mustard on both top and bottom slices, layer on provolone, grilled chicken slices, avocado, red onion, and cream cheese slices. We never even have a side dish with this because it is that good.
    • Teriyaki Chicken Wraps This is modeled after a long-since-closed salad and wrap shop on Lawrence’s west side called Razzy’s. RIP Razzy’s, we loved your wraps. You need large tortillas, cooked rice, teriyaki sauce (don’t make your own – you don’t need to see how much sugar goes in there), sliced mango, grilled chicken, red onion, avocado, and lettuce. Layer the ingredients, roll it, eat it. Our kids ask for this on repeat and have been for years.
    • Avocado, Tomato, and Mozarella Bowl Need something healthier than all that yumminess I’ve thrown at you? This is my go-to. I eat this almost every day. Sliced avocado, mozzarella cheese (find it in the deli section – I buy the pearls, they’re already in bite-size pieces and I just tear off what I want), sliced grape tomatoes. Drizzle on olive oil and balsamic vinegar, add salt and pepper. It’s the right balance of healthy fat, protein, and FLAVOR. And it’s a beautiful, colorful bowl of food waiting to be devoured. Have some.
    • Oscar Meyer P3 Portable Protein Pack You want the turkey and cheddar with Dark Chocolate Nut Clusters. You’ll find these near the Lunchables. It’s the perfect portion size and you get the chocolate toffee clusters for dessert. Be aware that there are other P3 varieties, but NONE of the others come with these chocolate nut clusters, which are perfection. Consequently, the grocery store is very often sold out of this pack and yet they have a bazillion of the other varieties. Listen up, grocery stores: Nobody wants your protein packs without the chocolate clusters. Stop cluttering the shelves with nonsense and just order the right amount of the right kind to keep us going! I shop at a Kroger store and many, many times these packs go on sale – last week I could get them for 99 cents apiece. When they do, I buy them all. (It’s probably not helping, because whenever you see someone buy ALL of something, you immediately think you are missing out. Reference Covid, grocery stores, toilet paper, tortillas and yeast in the spring of 2020) As a hilarious aside, my husband said “I don’t understand why you don’t just cut up turkey and cheddar and find a recipe for chocolate clusters and make your own.” BECAUSE THE PORTION SIZE IS PERFECT AND I DON’T HAVE TO THINK OR DECIDE OR PREPARE ANYTHING. I JUST OPEN AND SAVOR. EVERYBODY NEEDS SOMETHING CONVENIENT THAT MAKES THEM HAPPY AND THIS IS MINE. Thank you, Oscar Meyer. Please tell Kroger to buy more.
    • Lily’s Chocolate Bars Stevia-sweetened, for all of you low-carbers out there and genuinely delicious. My favorites are the milk chocolate hazelnut with sea salt and the salted caramel. They come in easy to separate squares, so I just tear off a few small squares whenever I want. These also go on sale at Kroger a lot. I have a stash of bars, all the flavors, none of the guilt…😁

    • Quest Lemon Cake Protein Bar These are also, apparently, hugely popular because my grocery store keeps running out. They’ve even started filling the empty space on the shelf where the lemon bars SHOULD be with all the other flavors. All of the other flavors are fine, but they are NOT lemon cake. Quest bars are expensive, no doubt. But, one bar gets me through an entire day so cost, schmost.

    Okay, enough about food. Now, here are a few other things that I love.

    • Blackwing Pencils I googled “What is the best pencil” and this is what I found. It’s true. I love them. They just feel very special in my hand and the eraser is the bomb. The eraser doesn’t wobble and then suddenly decapitate itself when you try to use it and it doesn’t leave stupid dark smudges. The lead is like butter. And the box is beautiful. If you want a special pencil, this is it. Also, I googled “What is the best pen” and the options are awesome. I don’t have the funds to square that purchase away just yet. Let me know if you have/find a favorite pen. Maybe next month, the finances will free up, per God (see above) and I will also get said pen!
    • The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle This book is wild and brilliant and definitely a little “out there.” But whenever I am freaking out because life feels reckless, I open this book and read something I’ve underlined. There are so many sound pieces of advice in this gem. This book is like having Yoda right there beside you, making everything make sense.

    So there you go. A menagerie of things, depending on where you are and what you need. February can be a bear. I’m cheering for you. I will see you soon. XOXO

  • Under The Bridge

    I once heard a man give this advice: When I come home at the end of the day, I visualize myself hanging up the work day’s stresses on a tree outside my door. I know I can pick them up the next morning on my way out. This way, I can come inside to my family and be present, knowing I left my worries outside.

    I liked the concept, so I tried to practice this. The way he described it, I pictured him walking up his curved brick sidewalk, draping the problems on his Japanese Maple and then breezing through his red front door. Carefree, of course, because he left his problems on the maple! Duh!

    I hit a few snags while trying to make this work, First, this guy assumes a distinct transition between work and home. Before Japanese maple, work. After Japanese maple, home. Line drawn. Done!

    My drive home is more like this:

    Text one son about haircut while walking to the car; think about first patient tomorrow; ask myself why my car keeps making that clunky noise when I start it; add paper towels to the grocery list; outline email to dental equipment rep in my head; stare at the Christmas decorations while I’m idling at the light; think about how we should gussy up the office for the holidays and that we should play Christmas music over the next week; make mental note to find non-annoying 8-hour Christmas playlist by tomorrow morning; wonder about the decisions I made today; wonder what decisions I’ll have to make tomorrow; think about whether I should ride the bike, play with the dog, make dinner, order dinner or even what IS for dinner? Ladies, even our thoughts multi-task.

    So, that’s the first problem. That guy’s line between work and home is a tree that greets him every evening like clockwork. Same place, every day. The line between my work and my home is a hurricane spaghetti model at best. And if it’s a spaghetti model, when/where am I supposed to hang the day’s worries?

    The second problem is, I enter my house through my garage (I actually park in the driveway, not the garage, but that’s another story). We do have a tree out there by the driveway, but it’s an ugly pear tree and I don’t really like it. It seems ill-suited for this task. As I walk through the garage there are PLENTY of places I could hang my next-day-worries, not unlike many of your garages I’m sure. But, once I fling my problems into that garage, good luck finding them again! Those problems will disappear into the garage abyss just like my favorite folding chair, the basketball airer-upper, 27 flashlights, 18 Phillips-head screwdrivers and my cute little mini shovel that I have needed and can never find every single May since 2002.

    What to do? Where am I going to hang these worries for at least a few hours or days at a time?

    I recently started my own business. Last week was slow, which generates stress, anxiety, and a general sense of impending doom. You know how it is: “This isn’t going to work and we’re going to lose everything and live under a bridge!” (Because thoughts like this are super-helpful and productive. That’s exactly why we have them. Duh.) I worked throughout the week tweaking marketing plans, changing my outreach approach, reviewing my advertising and social media outlets. Pretty soon it was Friday afternoon. By that point, the people I needed to market to were long gone, out of their offices and home with their families. I needed to leave it for Monday and go home to my family. But that stupid voice kept prattling away about losing everything and living under the bridge, making my head hurt and my stomach upset. My body felt so heavy. I knew it was time to go home and do the weekend but I was trying to figure out how to do the weekend with this anxiety in the background.

    Then I had a thought (thank you, good part of my brain, where have you been anyway?). I walked into the house and told my husband “I’ll be with you very soon. I need about 15 minutes to put some things on paper and prepare for Monday so that my weekend is all about being here, with all of you, and not about work or the bridge we might have to move to.” I grabbed one of my favorite journal books, poured a glass of wine, slapped on the noise-canceling headphones, and began to write. I made a list of 10 things I would do on Monday that would work to move my business forward. Some tasks were small, some were larger, some were scary. Also, I added this to the list: Every time I have a negative/anxious/worried thought this weekend I will immediately refocus back to the present moment and what I have to be thankful for right now. Even if it’s as simple as my dinner plate or the fact that I have fingers and toes.

    Guess what? It helped! It wasn’t perfect. My anxious part of my brain is frequently running ahead of the rest of the pack so the thoughts would slam in out of nowhere and interrupt a perfectly fine moment. But I got better at refocusing on being thankful for whatever I could find – one time it was an avocado. I had a good weekend and Monday morning, I picked up the plan and I went to work.

    This list gave me permission to relax and spend time with my family knowing that I had a plan for those worries come Monday. It’s not as idyllic as a Japanese Maple along a curved path to the door, but the wine helps! I think I’ll do the same this afternoon. Maybe it will even become a Friday afternoon ritual.

    We have to learn to put our thoughts down every once in a while and pick them up later. Our brains do their best work during these breaks and often give us the solutions we are seeking. You need peace this weekend. Find an avenue for that in any way you can because you need a break. Monday will be here soon enough and the list of tasks will be waiting for us and we will be ready to take them on, even if we have to go bridge-shopping! Xoxo

  • Welcome to “Beautiful Olive”!

    Olive: Grandpa, am I pretty?

    Grandpa: You are the most beautiful girl in the world.

    Olive: You’re just saying that.

    Grandpa: No! I’m madly in love with you and it’s not because of your brains or your personality.

    Have you seen Little Miss Sunshine (2006)? Olive Hoover stole my heart from the minute I met her. At 7 years old, Olive believes that if you want something bad enough and you work hard, practicing every day, you can achieve your dream. When do we stop believing this? Most assuredly, adulting kills the Olives of the world.

    I first met Olive when I was 36 years old and I remember thinking “What a glorious personality! I wish I’d met her when I was a child! To feel free to create, perform, dive in head-first despite the fear! Who doesn’t love Olive!?” But, I soon left Olive behind because the very next day my 3rd son was born and, as they say, life took over again. I haven’t thought about Olive for years. Until today.

    The purpose of this blog is to feed women funny stories, tidbits of energy, ideas to help us all push forward into another day. We might talk about things as big and terrifying as opening a business and as small and insignificant as eyebrows and socks. Maybe you’ll see things about coffee or wine, how to find balance, or how to find the car keys. We’re most definitely going to talk about how to stop beating ourselves up with our negative self-talk. We’ll just see where this journey takes us. And all blogs need a name and a personality so sweet, beautiful Olive popped right into my brain today!

    This blog is written for women. Women who work, women who work at home, women who are raising kids, never had kids, who are married, divorced, single. Women who are having a good time or a rough time, women who just want to make the most of what time we have. Women who are trying to train a new puppy or raise the most challenging child. Women who have lost something precious, who are sick to death of social isolation, women who need a reason to smile right now. Women who wake up with energy, thinking “Today, I will…” and then subsequently hit the pillow that night thinking “Dammit, I fell short again…”

    Here is what I am. I am a dentist. I recently opened my own business after working for others for years. I am married. I have three teenage sons. I am more introverted than extroverted. I love my small group of friends and I love my alone time (introvert, after all). I listen to all types of music, I read all kinds of books. I love to learn about new things and share the thoughts that pop into my head. I love words and I like to write. I’m awful in front of a camera and I think my voice sounds ridiculous when I hear it played back to me. Hence, a blog.

    Here is what I’m not. I am not a business expert, parenting expert, financial expert. I’m not a gourmet chef, exercise aficionado, or fashionista. I don’t have connections or links to things that will make your life a million times better by Saturday. I don’t have all sorts of tricks, tips, or easier ways to do things. I barely know how to run Instagram. I’m not a crafter and my house will never be Pinterest-ready. I don’t think I really have very many answers. But, I do love a community of women who want to support each other and that is what I want to grow.

    I’ve entertained the idea of a blog for a while now. Content would pop into my head, I would get that excited, butterfly feeling that it was interesting and worth sharing and I would resolve to get the blog up and running. And then a few hours later, the inspiration would fade into this:

    • It’s probably been shared before.
    • Would anyone even want to read it?
    • I’m not an expert on this.
    • My grammar isn’t good enough.
    • I am a dentist, not a blogger.
    • It’s not unique enough.
    • It’s not interesting enough.
    • I’m not smart enough.
    • I’m not fit enough.
    • I definitely do not have my ducks in a row.
    • And so…that was a dumb idea.

    Poof. The inspiration fluttered away into nothingness. This has happened at least 150 times in the past two years. But it just so happens that I picked up Elizabeth Gilbert’s book Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear and on page 90, she gave me a permission slip to write this blog:

    “All of which is to say: You do not need a permission slip from the principal’s office to live a creative life. Or if you do worry that you need a permission slip — THERE, I just gave it to you. I just wrote it on the back of an old shopping list. Consider yourself fully accredited. Now go make something.”

    So, here we go! I’ll post every couple of weeks (ish). I’ll share ideas and observations about all kinds of things. Business. Work. Family. Recipes. Funny things I see or hear. My only real agenda is to bring more of our internal Olives front and center. Welcome to Beautiful Olive!