I’m finally back from my 16 days in SoCal — it feels to me like I was gone for far longer because of the energetic toll that hit me in body, mind, spirit. It also feels like I’ve slept about 20 hours a day since I’ve been back.

The re-entry process back into regular life when I no longer feel like a “regular me” has always been a tricky one. As a policy, I never book flights immediately before or after out-of-state live events like most do; I know my body well enough to know that I require some serious aftercare to come back down to Earth.

It’s not because I’m a diva or because I’m rolling in mega-riches — it’s because I’ve developed a relationship to my body of respect and love. What that means is when I haven’t taken care to make sure I’ve got the space I need after going really hard, I would end up paying for it.

Can’t even tell you the number of times I’ve absentmindedly lost something valuable (a passport, a purse, about four different iPods) or got physically lost because my brain was offline and I didn’t realize it. And this isn’t just a post-stroke symptom; it’s just become about 1500% amplified since the injury.

To deny that this shit happens only guarantees that it will happen in fuller force. It’s a part of me, and I’m getting better with it all the time, but denying it definitely wasn’t helping.

Can you love the body you’ve got as it already is, now?

Like, not just “warts and all,” but for serious — warts, rolls, freckles, moles, grey hairs, wrinkles, whatever — plus all its other “defects”? How about all its ways it tries to get your attention?

A lot of those “defects” can feel like wasted time in the moment to try and prevent, but can I just point out how much time, money, energy is spent trying to recover from losing track of important stuff/things/people etc. after the fact?

Although beauty is important, this goes way beyond aesthetics. This touches everything about you and your experience. So you’ve had a stroke; maybe one side of your body, like mine, feels a little “behind.”

Can you let that be okay? Can you, despite any impatience around how slow progress may feel, still hug yourself and send love to yourself, let your body know that you see it’s been hurt somewhere very profound — because it has been! — and that it’s okay as it is, right now?

I remember the first time I ever sent loving energy to my left arm. I released tears I didn’t even know I’d been holding onto for a decade. The experience changed my life.

Try it for five minutes today.

And five minutes tomorrow.

The relationship to your body takes time and nurturing to build — and if you can do it (I know you can), it will change your life for the better.

This will be hard if you have never given yourself permission to give yourself what you need, and all you know is to fight that you have any needs at all.

How has that been working for you?

You know what to do. Incorporate, comment, share. Because I care about you, and you do too.

Warmly,

Pamela

The thing is, everyone has these sides to them, and when we aren’t willing to express them, we aren’t being truthful. This doesn’t mean we should all willy-nilly go on rampages attacking innocent bystanders (though clearly the American collective especially has been moving through that for a long time); it comes with personal responsibility. It comes with knowing our impact.

And so even though I can play a masterful long game of pretending I’m all love and light all the time (and I have), the truth is I’m not. When I chronically hide my more unsavory feelings, it is an act of violence against myself.

When we aren’t being truthful about who we are, we are inherently un-trustable. We are engaging in a subtle manipulation rooted in the fawning trauma response in an attempt to find safety in our audience. Yes, trauma responses make sense given our histories — but the kicker is, when we do that, we inevitably become the one who is unsafe for others.

So I’m going to experiment with a series here called “Feeling Spicy.” Please take care of yourselves and don’t read the posts about topics you know you don’t have the capacity to stay grounded in and hold yourself in. I’ll be mindful of informing you of what I’m about to talk about on those posts.

A note, too, about this series: It is likely that conditioned “stuff” will come up for you. You may want to rebut or argue with me or convince me.

This is not the place for that. This is my digital space that I pay for, care for, and put my love into creating out of generosity.

If you become so activated you cannot tolerate reading my words without jumping into my comments section to try and put me in my place, know that I will definitely delete it.

The Internet can be a magical place where we are able to share ourselves, and I am so fucking thankful for it. And, it’s also a place where lots of people have developed the cowardly habit of hiding behind anonymity to dump their vitriol.

This was something my friends and I would do as 14-year-olds discovering chatrooms for the first time. I’ll rephrase this: Hiding behind anonymity on the Internet in an attempt to antagonize another is a behavior appropriate for young teenagers dealing with the confusion and turmoil of puberty without a healthy outlet.

So as much as I accept I haven’t always been “above it,” I encourage anyone who may find strong issue with hating on what I have to say to take it to their space. Their journals. Their art. Their therapist. Their blog. Their social media.

That said, being a human is complex and nuanced. There is only hope to heal rifts within ourselves and others through connection and personal responsibility.**

What that might look like is this: if you are able to stay in your body, to breathe and ground, with your heart open, any entitlement to my time/attention/energy in check, and there is something you’d like to say in response, you are welcome to write to me from that place.

Here we go!

Pamela

*For those of you who are familiar with Human Design, I’m a 5/1 emotional generator with the full Channel of Mating that includes Gate 6 (friction). If you aren’t familiar with HD, I will eventually post either some resources or a full article on this very important system I live in experimentation with.

Let’s talk about transitions.

I was once at a hot yoga class, where I changed postures and suddenly I experienced some sharp pain in my knee! I’d never had that before and I was concerned I’d done something incorrectly. I’d done it very quickly, aiming to keep myself at pace with everyone else.

At the end of the class, I approached the teacher and shared what had happened. What she said next has remained with me for years:

“We must be the most mindful during transitions.”

I don’t know about you, but I often get myself in the most amount of trouble when I do things quickly out of trying to keep pace with the rest of the world (or what I perceive as the rest of the world). It’s the easiest time for me to self-abandon, and the best safeguard I have found in 15 years against this is to deeply ground into my body and slow everything the heck down.

Transitions are any pockets of time between one activity and the next — for me, they’re non-negotiable. I don’t do anything back-to-back. The more activity I outwardly do, the more of a rest period I build in in between that and the next thing. This could be a game changer for most people post-stroke.

The tricky part is even if I’m doing something that energizes me, I still need at least a brief interlude between activities to get back into my body and get present once more. The trappings of engaging in high-energy-taking-as-well-as-giving activities for me is I can fool myself into believing I can just go, go, go endlessly.

Energy management is a skill developed mindfully and with great devotion to presence to your body and what it needs from you. It is an unlearning of wider societal habits and a re-learning of getting in touch with how your body communicates with you.

The cool thing about presence is that it’s got this funky ability to bend time, and the more present I am — the more paradoxical my experience becomes.

The more present I am, the slower I can move, yet the more efficient I become.

The more present I am, the more deliberate my movements, yet the more free of tension I am.

The more present I am, the more I occupy my entire body, yet the more connected to Spirit I am.

The more present I am, the more loving I become towards myself, yet the more I love others.

I’ve found that the more I integrate deeper and deeper presence to my transitions, ironically — the less I need all that time to transition! I make such a regular practice of becoming present with myself (through meditation, dance, journaling, among other things) that dropping in and fully inhabiting everything I am takes just a moment. Not even five minutes. Sometimes, just a deep breath will do it.

That kind of deep love for yourself will always be there for you — but first you must be there for it.

I invite you to start a practice of getting present. Of stopping all the doing and just being for a change, of dropping all the judgments and the stories of what “should” be and being kind enough to yourself to create much-needed spaciousness in your life.

Begin with just five minutes at a time. A timer can be one of your best friends!

Notice whatever comes through for you, in your body, whether that’s emotion or even numbness. Do your best to remain neutral about what you feel/see. You can even name the sensations aloud: “I feel tingling in my foot, and a warmth in my belly. A small constriction in my throat, and my eyebrow feels a bit itchy.” There’s no way to do it wrong besides not doing it at all.

I promise, the more presence you bring into your life, the less frantic you’ll feel, the less inclined to succumbing to outside pressure. There’s nothing better than true groundedness in who you are and honoring exactly what it is you need to do you, boo.

Leave a comment and share your experience with getting present — and share this with someone who’d benefit from this!

Enjoy your weekends, all.

Love you.

Pamela

I used to hate my last name because almost no one could read it properly, and the various misspellings were creative at best and horrendous at worst.

(For the record, it’s more or less pronounced “shay” — like shea butter.)

But in recent years I’ve really come to love it, because what is it they say? That it’s impossible to be angry and grateful at the same time? Turns out, it’s the perfect gift to have such a constant reminder.

We live in a scarcity culture, where nothing is ever enough.

I literally practice reminding myself, via writing, every single night of everything I’ve gotten to do that day (whether it’s getting dressed, having taken a walk around the neighborhood, or created something kickass) and what that achieved so that I don’t fall into a rabbit hole of scarcity. I also list out random things I appreciate about myself and as a practice, share appreciations with Anthony verbally before bed. Some days it feels like swimming upstream and most other days I feel freeeeeee.

The other day, someone close to me was feeling down on himself, like “the day was a wash.”

Though I totally understood where they were coming from (I’ve been there many times), that’s an insidious habit that’ll send you plummeting into the world of never enough. Something I ended up saying in response to them moved me to tears as I spoke.

I told them that every single day they got to open their eyes, take a breath, and start the day was a gift. That there were countless other people who tomorrow couldn’t do the same. And then I pointed out that every single day they get to move their body all day long in ways I still dream of, in ways I haven’t moved mine in 15 years. That that was a miracle, and that I wished they could see it.

I didn’t share this at all to disparage them, but to gently point out that this is something we all do sometimes. Being a human is hard.

Carrying on after a stroke is hard. Damn hard. And there’s no manual.

But if you are well enough to be reading these words right now, then you are blessed with so much more than you are seeing when you’re having one of those moments. Swap scaricity out for gratitude, and really let it into your heart.

Watch your life transform.

Did this resonate? Drop a comment and tell me why — or share with a friend who needs to hear it.

Love,

Pamela

Impatience.

We all slip into it once in a while — some more than others.

There’s this thing with our energy, when it’s charged up in a flurry to meet some sort of outcome, that the last thing it wants is to be still.

I had a flashback during my meditation today, where I suddenly remembered that when I was in preschool, my class had a mandatory nap break in the middle of the day.

I usually never wanted the nap, because I wanted to do stuff! I wanted to connect with people, play games, anything but nap. So they spoke to my parents. Told them I wasn’t allowed to bring my pillow to school anymore because all I did during nap time was play with it and it was disruptive to the other kids who were actually trying to rest.

Though I did eventually end up hiding behind my writing especially in my teen years, and then the stroke hit at 19 and turned my entire life upside-down, this energetic and active, magical child that I once was is still alive and well.

Regardless, for a long time post-stroke, because suddenly doing anything took way longer than I felt it should, I reeeeally had to develop a capacity for generosity towards myself and the time I needed.

A few years ago, I traveled out of state with a small group of women on my business team at the time. There was supposed to be a shuttle to pick us up from the airport to take us to our hotel, and for some reason, the shuttle was running behind. We were to wait another 45 minutes to catch the next one.

I remember just how upset the entire group became at this news. Instantly, like awakening a sleeping dragon, the complaining began, and I stood beside them. I, however, was silent, and had to excuse myself to the bathrooms to find peace and quiet again.

Because for me, on any given day, 45 minutes can be how long it takes me to meditate and feel decent enough to get out of the house. I could take an entire 45 minutes to eat a meal — probably more.

The stroke taught me a lot of things, but above all, it forced me to sloooooow down.

Of course, I fought the slowness at first, but now, I sometimes will take myself to a coffee shop just to order a tea and enjoy my own company.

Not everything must be done so quickly, at all times. Of course, there are times I feel impatient too, but most of the time — and I’d venture to say even, every time — impatience is just a complete waste of energy.

It’s not kind; it’s not generous. It’s not all that effective, and it takes away the gift of the moment.

So when you feel tempted to rage at someone or something that’s taking longer than you’d prefer, take a breather. Do your best to take in what’s all around you. It’s here for you, supporting you, all around.

All is well. I promise.

You guys, I loved going live yesterday. I was a #hotdangmess — furreal, my surroundings looked like they’d exploded and the only presentable place I could find to record myself was in front of my white curtains, and then I was over 10 minutes late to the redo after I had to delete the abruptly ended broadcast I originally did — and since I had to do it twice, I got to watch a whole lot of me rambling to see what worked and what didn’t.

This was me leaning into my own yes: Inspiration had hit on my way home in the snowstorm to doing a livestream instead of writing a post, and though going live is always intimidating, I knew that challenging myself to do so would change things up in an interesting way and build up a muscle that I’d like to develop.

I’m extraverted by nature and loooved performing as a child and young adult. But because I began to hide from the world post-stroke, mainly because for a long time having had the stroke was a source of shame for me, I really stopped doing a lot of things I actually loved. It wasn’t necessarily conscious, of course, but I stopped dancing, theatre, sports. Stopped wearing things I wanted to wear so that I could feel safer walking around or safer being seen.

So doing a live broadcast is actually exciting for me. There’s no one making me do it, but it’s aligned with the way I enjoy expressing myself. That’s where my yes lay.

Hiding out is no fun. It feels . . . flat, uneventful. Like I’ve purchased a front-row seat to someone else’s show, someone else’s life. I don’t get to participate, be an active creator in what’s going on.

To be sure, hiding is a useful tool at times. Hiding out from the Inquisition in 1500s Spain when you’re secretly a Jew? Probably an actual lifesaver. But hiding who I really am from the world when there are people who need to hear some truth told to them in the way I deliver it? Who’s that in service to? My inner scaredy cat, and no one else.

Part of this yes naturally comes with a sense of danger, of thrill. There was no real voice of resistance, other than, “I don’t want to have to do this every single week. I know how you are.”

Ha. By the way, did I forget to mention that the voice of resistance (i.e., the ego) is very tricky, and VERY clever? Of course she is. She’s you, designed to protect you by holding you back — and if she weren’t a tricky trickster, you’d get the best of her every time.

Give thanks to her. Acknowledge her for trying to protect you, and then work with her to find a win/win.

So I’ll address the elephant in the room: Am I going to do FB Lives on the regular now that I’ve had this win? Now that I’ve done two in one day(!)?

I don’t know yet. I still need to have a chat with my Resistance, but I can’t say for sure. I’ll keep you posted.

This week, I got sick.

I almost never get sick.

I think there was a part of me that actually wanted the excuse to slow things down and refocus on me again. Instead of either pushing ahead, blinders on, or completely shutting down and becoming a total couch potato for two weeks (what I might’ve done in the past), I did my best to find a sweet spot between the two. I’ve slept good amounts and watched a few hours of Gilmore Girls reruns, but I’ve also kept focus on my goals all week without exhausting myself.

Guess what — what normally would’ve dragged out for two long weeks, I can already tell, is having its chance to work its way out of my body, and even though I’m not yet 100% to my normal energetic best, I feel pretty damn good for someone with the sniffles!

I share this because it is so. important. to listen to your body. So important to intentionally slow down when you’re running on fumes, and equally important(!!), to pick up the reins on necessary structure and direction when you’ve been flailing.

By the way, most people in our society regularly run on fumes. Which means most of them expect you to, too.

I historically have received a lot of flak for the pace I live my life at. It’s upsetting to a lot of hardworking people who hate to slow down, and especially since by appearance alone I can “pass” for one of them, I become an easy target.

It’s kinda like when I was an undergrad and all my roommates (where were always science majors!) would be like, “Do you ever study?” and I’d laugh — because my version of “studying” looked more like staring at my surroundings. (I majored in creative writing and Italian.)

I vastly prefer to live my life with plenty of space to do my own thing. It doesn’t mean what I’m doing is less valuable than what “the scientists” are doing, just that it’s different.

As a matter of fact — the other day I stumbled across this meme with statistics around Australia’s “working age” (18-65) stroke survivors and felt really validated:

Of the interviewed, the number one unmet need for these survivors was “psycho-emotional and cognitive support.”

The validation and joy I experienced wasn’t because I’m happy to see there are stroke survivors strongly in need of more emotional support (#duh), but because sometimes I wonder if what I’m sharing here is useful. If it’s needed.

Of course it’s needed. I write what I frickin’ wish I had had access to after I experienced my stroke.

But here’s an opportunity. Where else in my life am I seeking validation for what I am doing? That, just because it’s not popular, I feel like I have to defend or justify?

For me, it’s often around slowing down or speeding up. Every day I experiment with different doses of this.

We’ve discussed how I’ll sometimes get honked at while crossing the street “too slowly” for some impatient drivers. When that happens, I shake it off. (What am I going to do, chase them down the street to have a meaningful conversation about the virtues of compassion and patience?)

“How you do one thing is how you do everything” is a blanket statement, for sure, but oftentimes is also true. I get “honked at” for crossing streets “too slowly” all over the place.

I take “too long” to eat.

“Too long” to say what I want to say.

Often, I take a long time to even process what I’m feeling in real time.

It’s taken me 15 years to get to the point where now? I know that I just need the space I need. I don’t schedule calls and meetings back to back because I’d rather set myself up to win. I do my best not to agree to things I’ll inevitably disappoint people over. (“Can you be there two hours early?” Uh, have you met me?)

It’s a question of self-esteem and valuing what it is you need in order to be effective.

I don’t go a day without ensuring I’ve got “me” time to replenish my own energy before (and during, if I’m honest) energetically demanding circumstances. Ideally, I’ve got a couple hours in the morning to meditate, dance, and talk a walk (yes, even in the snow). And at night, I complete the day with journaling and energetic practices.

I do this often, so that on the days I don’t, it’s okay; I’m already loaded up, like a bank balance with a $1000 buffer. I’m making regular, daily deposits.

If you’re apologizing for taking care of yourself and/or people are accusing you of being too selfish for doing so, stop apologizing. Stand your ground and bask in it.

Guaranteed, without these practices I’d be Bridezilla, where my entire life is my wedding.

You may lose people you love, perhaps for a time, but I assure you, life feels far better when you’re surrounded by people who at least respect your needs. Where one person may leave you, there then becomes space for someone more aligned with you to fill. We live in a world of plenty — don’t be too attached to things looking a certain way. Better to have fewer, higher quality people in your life than a boatload of nasty shade-throwers.

On a very quick, but related, aside, the poet Mary Oliver passed away today, and I’d love to leave you with her poem “Wild Geese.”

You do not have to be good.

You do not have to walk on your knees for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.

You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.

Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine. Meanwhile the world goes on.

Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rainare moving across the landscapes,

over the prairies and the deep trees,

the mountains and the rivers.

Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,

are heading home again.

Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,

the world offers itself to your imagination,

calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting —over and over announcing your place

in the family of things.

Mary Oliver, “Wild Geese”

Your homework for today is to find one thing you need to provide yourself that you haven’t been (until now), such as finding a pocket of your own “me time” or half an hour to read a good book — and claim it for yourself.

Meanwhile, the world goes on.

It always will. And as long as you live, you will have needs. Isn’t it about time to drop the judgments around having them — and start getting them met?

Stand your ground; it’s your job.

Did this resonate with you? Confuse you? Inspire you? Let me know in the comments, and share with someone who could use it!

Warmly,

Pamela

Happy New Year!

Some things:

1. My word of 2019 is “lighthouse.” I’ll be experimenting with broadcasting in fun, fresh new ways, more often.

2. Since that is my intention, the content is not always going to be as long-form as some of my past posts. I’d like there to be a variety of long and short creations in my “portfolio,” as it were.

3. None of this will always look very polished. I’ve been honing my writing chops for 2/3 of my life and am very comfortable hiding behind the written word — but by committing to becoming a lighthouse and experimenting with creative license, there’s gotta be some room for me to put out content that’s done, but not perfect. Be prepared for a little ghetto fabulosity.

A note on new beginnings, and incidentally, the piece for today’s Forgiveness Friday:

Today coincidentally is my eight-year anniversary with my partner, and over the years, we’ve been steadily building a foundation of shared values as we uplevel our relationship. As this has happened, I have found myself unconsciously “testing” him and myself because there is some old junk from our pasts that hasn’t yet been fully resolved or cleared out of the way.

This is super normal in any close relationship that has withstood a long time. Even with people who are so like-minded that everything generally feels easy peasy, closeness always comes with checkpoints where “stuff” needs examination. I’m the first person to say that relationship duration is only one factor in relationship strength; I’ve had superclose besties that I became that close to in the span of a couple months, and acquaintances of several several years whose life aspirations and preferences I couldn’t even begin to tell you.

Intimacy is always evolving, and it’s a practice. It’s a commitment to self-care, so that you can show up energized and generous with others, and vice-versa.

You know why resentments build up between people whose lives are very close, but lack emotional intimacy? Because one or both (usually the case) of the people is holding on to baggage from the past and carrying that baggage from year to year. They aren’t clearing what’s preventing them from being as generous and loving as they’d like to be, and they’re allowing that resentment to build a case for not being giving and not loving that person.

And if you’re doing this with another person — your partner, your friend, your family member — then, chances are, you’re doing it with yourself, too. (Even if that’s a lack of forgiveness for a post-stroke condition.)

I descend from a line of impossible perfectionists. The levels of toxicity that would build up in my body holding grudges against myself or others who didn’t meet my (often completely unreasonable) expectations kept me so blocked off from true closeness with others that I’m actually astonished I had any friends prior to 2015. Yup. That recently.

A lot can change in a really short time, even if it feels like transformation can take forever. Hint: It goes faster when you’re willing.

I wasn’t truly willing to take the chance to ask for what I needed, which suddenly increased in a huge way after having had the stroke. Obviously.

It felt like too much to ask, to ask for anyone to slow down as they walked beside me, or to give me more time to physically do things.

Instead of empowering myself to voice these things, I just hoped for the best. Hoped friends would intuitively know how much time I needed to go from A to B, hoped men I dated would read my mind.

I got lucky sometimes, and other times I lost people because I didn’t know how to talk to them about these new things I needed. (We definitely don’t need to go into how the mind-reading thing went in my love life!)

Part of it was that I was only 19, part of it was that I wasn’t raised with modeling of effective communication, part of it was a lack of discussing any of this in therapy at post-stroke rehab. Regardless, I hope that my 15 years of practice in powerful communication and developing self-trust models some valuable tools for you.

So the first practice of 2019 I’d like to leave you with today is the practice of getting to know what your needs are. Your needs can be practical (“I need a full week to pack a suitcase before I travel anywhere,” “I need my phone to be fully charged at the start of the day”), they can be basic (“I must be fully fed before I start my workday,” “I need eight hours of sleep a night”) — in fact, I encourage you to start there, and they can be emotional (“I need to ask for five minutes to vent before I can move forward”). The last area often feels the hardest to ask for, in our emotionally constipated society, but it is KEY.

Just blindly going through your life not even knowing what your needs are is a great way to not get them met. It’s a great way to add to the baggage everyone’s carrying around year after year (especially you), and that’s frickin’ exhausting. Right?! Stop the madness!!

You have to name it to claim it, and that’s the first step to letting it go and creating more space and less conflict in your life and internal experience.

Don’t get caught up in creating a list that consumes you. If you’re a recovering perfectionist like me, you could go on forever with a list of grievances/demands. If that’s you, start with a list of five things only, and know that even if only one of those needs started getting consistently met that would be a huge improvement from where you were before.

If you find yourself consumed with despair at how many unmet needs you may have right now, there’s a part two to this exercise. Balance this list with a second list — a list of appreciation. Flood your mind (and ideally, your heart) with everything and everyone that you do have in your life that you truly are grateful for and remind yourself there is no lack in your life. Let that list be as long as possible. Really let it into your heart and mind and bathe in that feeling.

Take a deep breath. Know that you’ve taken an essential first step to taking ownership of your own personal power, and that that’s something to celebrate!

Questions? Comments? Share what comes up for you below, and share with someone you know. I would love to hear how the exercise adds to your life!

To new beginnings and renewed aliveness,

Pamela

It took me a while to face the discomfort I felt for not getting a handle on the messiness of my life’s unfoldment over the last few days, but alas, I’m here and that’s what counts.

Let’s lean into this though, because I know I’m not the only one who gets paralyzed by her own unmet expectations.

There’s a relentless overachiever driving me forward at all times. Scared to pieces of not getting life “perfectly,” convinced that there is a way to do life perfectly.

The problem with this relentless overachiever? She’s exhausted, because she’s constantly fueling this illusion of perfection, which leaves nothing untouched. NOTHING. She spends her energy constantly putting out fires — fires around what we create, how we move, how we look, what we do.

And there’s no doing right by her because with her attitude, perfection is completely unachievable. Even the infinite magnificence of the Universe gets dwarfed by her myopic need for control and personal will.

I bring this part of me up today because historically, we’ve had a strong love/hate relationship. I loved how she pushed me to artistic mastery and expression but hated how miserable I felt living with her criticism all the time.

And when I felt miserable, so then did the people around me because I stopped really seeing and appreciating them, and I projected onto them the relentless and unrealistic expectations that I had going on inside of me, too. (I’m actually shocked I had any friends growing up!)

Everything that exists in us has a purpose. Our shadows hide our light, but ultimately, when they’re welcomed back into the light, become the light themselves.

So what happens when my relentless overachiever grabs the reins, unchecked? I start viewing everything from the lens of suffering, of “never enough.”

The tricky part is that our wider society really subscribes to a lack mentality. We can’t ever get enough, particularly this time of year — wild, untethered consumerism threatens to put the masses into debt each holiday season just to show people they love them. Whether you subscribe to this particular manifestation or not, chances are you’ve absorbed the lack mentality of our culture somewhere.

What if, just for a moment, we reexamined our motivations behind our unconscious behaviors? Shone a bright light on what we’ve been doing for weeks, years, lifetimes, and really wondered what we’re doing it all for?

Have you ever heard of Nick Vujicic, the man without limbs? (He’s a scintillating motivational speaker you can find easily on YouTube.)

This is a man who was born literally without arms and legs. What I love about his story is that as he grew up, he never viewed himself as missing anything. His parents treated him as they would any other child and even assigned him household chores like vacuuming.

I don’t know about you, but I’ve still got all four of my limbs and many days it’s damned near impossible for me to not compare the right, unaffected side of my body with the left, and make the latter “wrong” for not doing things the way the other side does. Even unconsciously.

The point isn’t to compare myself with Nick; it’s to point out that his quality of life undoubtedly has been pulled forward by love and acceptance, as opposed to pushed by the sting of self-flagellation and -rejection, and regularly.

Your body believes everything you say about it. How many times have I heard stroke patients refer to their unaffected and affected sides as their “good” and “bad” sides? That was me, too.

Your relationship with your body is no different from a parent-child relationship. Unless you were blessed with kind, structured, emotionally and physically present parents who made zero parenting mistakes (whatever that would look like), it’s likely your relationship with your own body could benefit from some unconditional love.

If you feel constant resistance, like I did and still do in some areas, to doing what you know in your heart of hearts is the right thing, drop into your body and put a hand on your heart. Tune in. What does your resistance have to tell you?

Invariably, your resistance is trying to protect you from something. Mine is usually trying to protect me from the harshness of my relentless overachiever perfectionist (or that part in other people) and/or reminding me that this is where I often self-abandon for the sake of my image and reputation.

Whether that image is an identity (“a generous friend,” “a good writer,” “a stroke survivor,” “a competent student”) or a commitment I made to others, I can often lose myself to trying to prove whatever it is, and trying to hide from what I fear is my actual inadequacy:

• What if my friends don’t feel the love I have for them?
• What if the article I wrote is crap?
• What if I look too disabled/not disabled enough to fit in here?

(That last one is super fucked up, by the way. The result of not accepting the two worlds we occupy suspends us in a sort of limbo where we feel inadequate no matter which we’re exposed to. We’ll go into this in more depth another time, and PS. never call yourself disabled, please.)

So you can see why there’d be a constant part of me that’s perpetually exhausted. She’s so busy managing illusion at the cost of anything else that if she’s running the show, I’ll forget to nourish myself in the ways that really count.

In other words, it is my responsibility to provide myself whatever it is I really need. If I’m afraid the people I love don’t feel my love for them, I’m probably not feeling my own love.

This morning I finally returned to my mind-body-soul practice in my zen space — something that I do, non-negotiably, every morning, when I’m not tripping over my own stuff.

Unconditional love is a lost art. It’s always the answer. You must find a way to give it (and receive it!!) for yourself, to set yourself up to win, and everything will fall into place.

It is what will interrupt the chaos of a hectic mind. The tension of too-high expectations. It will heal you faster than doing 100 reps of any exercise would.

(Ever seen a fully able-bodied person hate imperceptible flaws on themselves? You might be convinced your supposed inadequacy is based on simply your abilities — but the measuring stick of lack is always, always longer.)

Through the lens of forgiveness and unconditional love, there is only the gift of life.

This holiday season, give yourself the gift of seeing and appreciating everything you do have going for you — the fact that you’re alive and able to read this post, for example.

Close your eyes. Flood your heart with these appreciations for five minutes, and see what that does to the voice of your own relentless overachiever.

And in the day to day, also, be willing to show up even if “it” doesn’t look the way you want.

It was never about that, anyway — it’s about loving what “it” already is, right here, right now.

It’s called presence for a reason. Love love love,

Pamela