Lazy W Marie

Carpeing all the diems in semi-rural Oklahoma...xoxo

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in defense of positive thinking, “The Secret,” etc.

I woke up early Friday, at 4:47 a.m. in fact, thinking about this. About how so many people are missing out because they have a weird, tangly, sandpaper view of the simple belief that our thoughts are actual power sources.

You guys. Indulge me. Let’s back away from pop-culture fads and failures and just chat. I promise to not pass the collection plate or tell you what clothes to wear. 

I want you to consider (or reconsider) that our thoughts are silent, renewable, orchestratable, abundant sources of power and energy. Or maybe, that they are conduits for the powers that can flow through us. Everything that exists or happens begins with thoughts and intentions. And thoughts literally alter the Universe.

I believe this fact as strongly as I believe that watermelon and tortilla chips are what I will request as my last meal if given the chance.

But seriously. Positive thinking has a funky reputation, maybe because it sounds like all wooden-beads-and-excessive-patchouli. Or maybe because we are barely a generation away from those folks who died with rolls of quarters in their pockets and hopes of spaceship ascension to paradise.

I get it. And I’m sorry to mock other religions, no matter how bizarre and dangerous they obviously are. I also get that most thinking adults do not want to be associated with fringe belief systems right now. It’s crazy times, and all.

But this stuff is so easy and good. It risks nothing. It’s nature, after all.

always face the light

With regard to matters of faith and philosophy, I see that most people in my life fall into one of three camps:

  1. Traditional Christian values, with the known wide array of dogmatic expressions (Oklahoma = Bible Belt)
  2. Sternly scientific and logical, with a results-and-reason-based work ethic (action-based morals, largely)
  3. Atheist or agnostic (just eff it all man)

That’s all cool. Truly. More power to each of us to explore, discover, and articulate the things we believe to be true.

What I am offering for your consideration does not challenge any of that. Pinky promise.

Because all of us have thoughts. We are thinkers by nature. We can’t even help thinking. Some people think so much they need help to slow it down and numb out a little. And (this is my solid belief) those thoughts are all wildly powerful signals to the Universe, whether the thinker of those thoughts realizes it or not. Every human being, regardless of both religious constraints and life circumstances, has an unlimited wealth of power stored in his or her mind. 

So why not harness it? Why not at least try?

Okay. Right now as we chat, two things are happening in my brain, and maybe in yours too:

On one side, the old school Christian voice is whining excitedly and sucking her front teeth at me, prissing, “Now little girl, that sure smacks of humanism! Sounds like someone’s a Rainbow Brite doll away from the mark of the beast!” 

(Did you imagine Dana Carvey just now, wearing a wig and a polyester skirt suit? Me too.)

Meanwhile, a sexier but less enthusiastic voice is purring from the other side of my skull, just oozing unhappiness: “Yeah, sounds nice, but that’s BS and you know it. If your thoughts are so powerful then why do you have so many real problems?”

(That voice for me belongs to Angelina Jolie. Infinitely beautiful and seductive but dried up on the inside, miserable, cruel, constantly seeking what she cannot find. Who was it for you?)

I really do get it. Both the disbelief, the indifference, and the mild repulsion to “positive thinking” as even an ingredient for faith.

(Sorry, I do not possess internal dialogue for atheism and not know how to assign that one a voice. If you do, please share!)

The place of faith where I have landed is less like a mix the three camps and more of a completely separate level or reality that actually connects them all. This is complementary, not competitive.

Your thoughts can serve as a beautiful support net that strengthens, illuminates, and girds up your existing system of faith. In fact, it kinda should. I have found that if my inner thought patterns contradict what I am seeking in prayer, if I am wringing my hands with worry as I pray, imagining the worst, then my prayers don’t get answered the way I say I want them to be. Does that make sense? Thankfully, the exact opposite is also true.

I have a handful of personal stories to share that are pretty good mile-markers in my own little evolution of belief. I will work on some blog posts to tell those stories, but for now…

Please join me on a brief vacation from worry. Treat it like a fun experiment, if you like that kind of thing. Just get really still and honest with yourself about the things you want in life (not the things you don’t want, that’s key) and, the rest is pretty simple… Start thinking about them. But do it more vividly and with more dogged positive energy than ever before.

Start thinking about them. But do it more vividly and with more dogged positive energy than ever before. Drum it up from deep inside yourself!

Continue working on your goals and living your daily life and being accountable for your actions, always. And maintain your prayer life, whatever that means to you. Thinking strong, constructive, loving thoughts is a nourishment to all of those efforts. 

Let your mind fall easily and happily on the details of your heart’s desires, like it’s playtime in your heart and brain. In your free moments, while you’re exercising, if you’re in the shower and the warm water loosens your mind. Try falling asleep thinking about what you want for the future; it’s much more fun than privately scanning an unaccomplished to-do list, and I bet you’ll sleep more soundly. 

This is meant to be lots of fun and hopefully spark some discussion. The expectation is not that suddenly all of your dreams will come true and all of your problems will evaporate. The expectation is that you will get a spark of control over the positive energy buried in your mind. Also, though, I happen to know that the thoughts you choose (during this experiment and anytime) are like seeds that will germinate and can manifest at any time in the future. I just don’t want to convince you of too much at once, haha : )

Maybe you will feel emotionally better day by day or begin to sense more possibility and gratitude in your life, if you are usually worn down by the limits and the negatives. Maybe you will detect an opportunity for healing in a broken relationship or solve some practical problems. Maybe something truly uncanny will happen as a result of your focused thinking (this is how it happened for me) and you will be like, WHOA. 

I’ll be checking back in about this. I am so excited for you. And thank you for indulging me today!

If you want to read a few past posts about this, here ya go:

  1. Mitt Romney (my husband is a skeptic)
  2. Diamonds, Dreams, and Worry Doors
  3. The Worry Door

Heading out now to see some friends and enjoy another hot and humid summer evening in Oklahoma. We’ll be looking for that technicolor sunset again.

Think well.
XOXOXO

 

 

 

 

a much happier storm season blowing through us

When the farm has just emptied of kids, evidence is plenty. The deck, pool, and surrounding lawns are all festooned with brightly colored plastics: Water guns and leaky swim masks, half-inflated floats, sun-crunchy pirate beach towels, and orphaned flip flops and hair ties. They are all scattered like confetti across the calm, green expanse. We discover an empty juice box here and there, a chewed-to-nothing melon rind, a discarded (hopefully used up) bottle of sunblock.

The chairs and chaise lounges are all askew, abandoned and resting happily like exhausted chaperones after a late night middle school dance.

When we bought these nine acres in 2007, our dream and vision was to give our girls, then 10 and 12, a second half of childhood, a healthy, wholesome coming of age with lots of space for deep breathing and long-leg stretching, animals to love and learn from, and much more.

The seeds of that vision had barely germinated when some destructive life storms blew through our family and changed everything for a season. We hung on, everyone survived, and eventually the sun came out again, brighter than ever. But that’s another story for another day.

Now I sit outside soaking up the cheerful debris of a happier storm, one of so many like it, each one important. “Cousin-Palooza 2017” came and went in a flash, leaving in its wake all this color and all these good vibrations. I sit here taking note of how much love and joy have actually grown here in the midst of that other storm.

Despite it? Or because of it?

For all the years that storm took from our family, has it actually nourished our foundation?

I think so.

I think, I feel in my bones, that the culling and strengthening and the deep watering from both tears and sweat have all contributed to an ongoing beautification. Not just a bigger deck or prettier gardens, not just faster internet, better food and more artwork on the walls- although yes to all of that!

But really, more trusting hearts for my husband and me. Freer minds. Effervescent joy that is actually pretty difficult to flatten.

We are blessed beyond reason. Thankful for adult siblings who trust us with their children so we can share these nine acres in some of the ways we always imagined. Happy to cultivate memories and bonds with our nieces and nephews that, despite inevitable storms headed our way in the future (that’s just how life goes), will last a lifetime and anchor us all.

Chloe, Kenzie, & Greg. July 2017 xoxo
Daybreak in Fort City, upstairs in the Apartment. They slept hard for almost 7 hours then sprang awake at full power, ready for chocolate chip pancakes and more fun.
Little fishes doing tricks all day long.

I always resist the hurry to clean up after a party. I am in no hurry to see it all wiped away, all the colorful debris that kids especially leave behind.

Except that other good stuff is on its way, and we need to make room. Every day, every moment, holds a new promise and a host of surprises. The whole big, beautiful, equally colorful future is about to happen.

I’m ready.

XOXOXOXO

 

going by feel

I had scribbled this down in my notebook a full week before it all clicked. Our friends Mickey and Kellie visited the farm on Memorial Day, and together with my sister Angela and brother Philip we all luxuriated in some pretty great conversation. As the golden hour grew purple and the honeybees were going to bed, we explored the vegetable garden together. I was pulling errant weeds, and Kellie asked how to tell the weeds from the plants. Our visit was nearing an end, so I just tried to answer briefly. You know that feeling when starting a brand new conversation would have been too much? But she and I had shared thoughtful vibrations about so many other things, how I wished to explore this with her that night!

Private note: This has both of my grandfathers wrapped up in its sentences: My paternal Grandpa Dunaway who was a sharp-witted, light-hearted writer and has always been my personal Will Rogers (also son to Papa Joe the slightly famous beekeeper), and my maternal Grandpa Rex, who you know by now was the world’s best gardening mentor and given to much puttering in exactly his own style.

bare-handed & going by feel

Assuming all basic safety from garter snakes, burrowing frogs, and other deadly creatures, the best way to pull weeds is bare-handed. After a brief re-acquaintance between the inner edge of the forefinger, the first pad of the thumb, and the exact dimensions of every upwardly mobile green thing in the garden, the task becomes commonplace, an easy old dance, even more familiar (and I will say more useful) than riding a bike.

The fuzzy, round barrel chest of a cucumber vine is easy to distinguish from the skinny weeds growing thick against it, though the weeds are also fuzzy. Another fuzzy-stemmed neighbor, the tomato plant (blunt and wounded thanks to a llama without borders) has a somewhat squared off base, and is woodier. Alpha and well rooted. Vastly different except for the green and the fuzz.

The gardener should be able to go at the task with eyes closed, flicking gingerly from one thread of life to the next, deciding which can stay and which should be plucked out. Just a swift, underhanded twist of that well informed forefinger, and the cooperating palm is filled with chlorophyll and potential energy, one tiny decision at a time.

If, in a fit of momentum, the gardener grazes too near a bed of arugula, crushing a few leaves or maybe even uprooting a thread like seedling or two, then the sharp, peppery fragrance will announce the misstep quickly. A friendly alarm to redirect, so that no more than a trace of food is lost. And even that bit of green will find its way to a happy chicken’s belly.

This is one of my favorite things about easy gardening moments. Pulling weeds bare handed and getting really up close and personal with every shape and texture, usually with my eyes closed.

And it points gently to so many Universal messages I have been receiving lately. Messages about being quiet, going about my work more privately, relaxing into the moment so much that I can keep moving with my eyes closed. Trust and steady movement, knowing that nothing is wasted. Believing that every detail in this complex life is beautiful and useful. Acknowledging that as different as I feel from people near me, we have some things in common.

Most of all, the message that it’s okay to operate by instinct once you are informed and practiced. That is exciting. 

I love you and miss you Grandpa Dunaway, I love you and miss you Grandpa Rex, and I love you too Kellie. I am so happy to know you better and better.

Go by feel and trust in Love
XOXOXOXO

,

looking around to improve your perspective

Yesterday afternoon I stumbled into the weirdest funky mood. It lasted maybe 90 seconds and had the effect of a low, dark cloud crawling meanly across an otherwise brilliant sky. It was so distinct and forceful that it literally stopped me in my tracks. I was walking downhill toward the vegetable garden and paused, looked around like maybe I heard something behind me? Klaus stopped too and crooked his head to wait for my next step. His face and the green lawn and a few other beautiful things reminded me that I was home. That the moment was good and the context was magical. 

I’m grateful for awareness when my perspective is shifted negatively and for the power to bring it back to center. It’s often just a small exercise of noticing physical beauty, then maybe indulging in the quiet, inner messages some of them bring:

Fallen tree branches that resemble antlers. I cannot resist collecting them and inserting them into every flower pot, and it gets me thinking of the hundreds of patterns in nature, in the universal patterns of the human experience, from one generation to the next.

A stout gray and white horse who loves to scratch the hollow of his chin against every T-post on the farm. Oh Dusty, I love you.

That weird but pleasant summertime fragrance combination of latex paint, sweet clover, and manure, all warmed by the sun and stirred by the breeze. It’s just nice.

Watching our German Shepherd (I can no longer in good conscience call him a puppy) and our llama play together like little boys. Remembering the girls when they were little and prone to indulging in “Mud Monster” afternoons. Dreaming of their futures. Watching the dog and llama again, best friends on the muddy edge of the pond. 

The pond is still so high! Exceeding its banks, our own small lake, all these weeks after the heavy rain. Grace is abundant. We are fattened by it.

Walking around the bee hives, seeing the Honeymakers float and parade near their respective porches. Each colony is so unique, and all three of them are so entrancing. This is an endless metaphor.

Raking up great, thick, heavy clods of crabgrass, recently tilled, and shaking loose the dirt. Looking up just enough to visualize the food that will soon be growing here.

Checking for the day’s newly laid eggs, having to gently lift each hen to find them. Feeling the warm, sticky film on eggs that stay in the nests, waiting to hatch. Learning to trust the life cycle without counting chicks too early.

The lingering smell of marigold blossoms and arugula, the rough texture of kale, the jewel toned petunias and geraniums near the kitchen door. Oh man I had the best Grandpa…xoxo

Neatly pruned trees that had once been a chaotic black jack grove. Peace and strength that have brought some order to a fearful heart. Order and more beauty.

Frozen things are long thawed, mountains are moving, fear is losing once again to Love.

“Most people think it takes a long time to change. It doesn’t. Change is immediate! Instantaneous! It may take a long time to decide to change…but change happens in a heartbeat!”
~Andy Andrews in The Noticer
XOXOXOXO

will I ever blog again & it’s fine

Stuff is crazy, man. Life is full to bursting, in the coolest and scariest ways, and by that I mean only the very best, most nourishing and fulfilling ways. Trust and gratitude, gratitude and trust. It’ll all be fine.

Day after day I have ideas of things that need writing. Most days I sketch them in the nearest spiral notebook and sometimes jam out a few sentences on Facebook, but the full depth and breadth and height of life will never be captured this way.

klaus kale shirt happy C

Even when I want to sit and spend the sunrise hours writing, it’s really time to feed the animals, play fetch with Klaus, drink my last cup of quite strong perfect coffee, make the beds (ours is a two-bedroom marriage now, it’s cool like being bi-coastal but together), start some laundry, scoop some manure into the compost, and BAM it’s finally time to lace up and run some miles. Preferably before my stomach starts growling obscenely and I cave and eat breakfast first. Fasted miles are my favorite.

Also, am I losing weight? Getting speedier? Slimming down or not? Do people care, should I blog about that journey? I don’t know.

It’s fine.

This morning I ran at the farm. Our sandy hills are doing their very best to dry out from all the glorious early spring rain, but they are still quite slick and mushy. Lost in thought, about halfway through mile three, my toe caught a slick tree root and somehow I fell up in the air instead of straight down to the ground. My mind commanded to my body, “Go limp! Go limp!” and my body obeyed. Not only did I go limp; I managed, at the apex of this weird tumble, to twist myself so that in a slow-motion moment I landed on my cush posterior, facing the sky. I just laid there looking at the pulsing blue, relaxed because I luckily had the presence of mind, mid-twist, to hit pause on my Garmin. Pace records are suddenly very important to me. Apparently as important as not crashing my porcelain teeth on a slab of red rock. Or this steel pipe gate pictured below. Anyway it was a very Matrix-James Bond moment for me, and the only damage was some damp red earth scuffing my clean white compression socks. My posterior is unharmed, as are my porcelain front teeth, etcetera.

forest gate C

Then midday, my friend Amber visited the farm for the first time, and we had the best real conversation. In less than an hour we dove deep and swam easily through topics like sex education for young women, honesty and transparency in the coming of age, marriage and how men apologize differently than women, motherhood, the importance of treasuring the exact chapter you’re in, how beautiful mundanity can be, smoking meats, and much more. I met Amber through beekeeping and learned that she practically lives around the corner from our farm, which happens so rarely I get quite excited when it does. I have the most wonderful feeling that she and I will be spending more happy time together this spring and summer.

My dog is in love with her. Awkwardly, I am afraid.

With what remains of today I plan to finish a small pile of ironing, sew one apron, and get a pork tenderloin started for a late supper. Then the chicken coop gets a serious cleaning and fresh supply of nesting straw and the middle field gets as many scrapes from my manure shovel as time will allow. More friends are visiting this afternoon, and I am pretty happy about that.

klaus cuddle sky C

The thing is, really, it’s fine. All those thoughts that swirl and pester us, the What-If needles, all the things that keep our hearts frothed up, they are under control. Let’s go ahead and relax. Enjoy the day whether it’s busy or mundane. Love your people. Say your prayers. Trust God with the stuff you cannot (and should not) control.

Blogging again soon, maybe. After Klaus is done snuggling my feet.

It’s better than fine. It’s perfect.
XOXOXOXO