Shame happens; in this journey and frankly, throughout our lives. We can’t completely eliminate shame; it will somehow find a way to get to us because shame is what happens to us and not about our own sinful nature. However, we can become resilient to it. I have adapted this teaching from Brene Brown’s audio teaching “Men, Women, and Worthiness”. You can buy the full teaching on iTunes, Amazon, or Audible. I highly recommend it. Here is a short summary of Brown’s shame resiliency steps.
I am not the best at reflection. I am more of a plunge forward continually until I exhaust myself and find myself crying for no apparent reason, kind of person. I have watched Emily P. Freeman do a quarterly reflection blog for every season for quite some time now, and I thought I would give this a go. Here are 7 things I have learned this summer in no particular order.
I can’t tell you how many times I show up to a blank document and find myself already wishing for a final draft to magically appear. This is one of my biggest mental blocks when it comes to writing and my creative life. Just the sight of a blank page, and I am instantly in panic over the foreseeable rough draft: the run-on sentences, the bad grammar, the unformed thesis and my tendency to overuse the word “that”.
“I feel so overwhelmed!” may have been on repeat during the best part of the last few months in 2019. I’m sure my husband, actually, I know my husband was quite sick of hearing it and yet would always express his concerns and listen empathically despite his annoyance. I just had too many irons in the fire, I confessed. I knew I shouldn’t have started all these things at once, I would admit but I just couldn’t let any of them go.
This 5 Things Wednesday is dedicated to my classmate turned friend who has asked me a couple of times: What would you tell your 23 year old self? At 23, she is experiencing the turmoil of finding direction in life. Soon to graduate, the uncertain future is approaching quickly and she is feeling the pressure to figure it out.
Writing isn’t about inspiration, it’s about faithfulness. Yes, that first inspirational spark, that calling that draws you to your keyboard on a regular basis, is relevant but it’s not what keeps you writing. I have a sticky note on my computer that reminds me “Writing is a job, so treat it like one”. It may not be one that pays (yet) but our callings are worthy of pursuit and require our faithfulness.
Last Wednesday was the worst. It started out fine until once again it hit me: I’m pouring all the energy into my work and finding it producing very little fruit. And what I mean by fruit is MONEY. I don’t need to make a ton, just enough to pay my mortgage and get my hair done. The tail spin of doubt begun with looking at our budget and playing around with the numbers.
Everything I have learned about shame, I learned from Brene Brown. Shame is an emotion I felt I had very little knowledge about nor even a basic awareness of its existence in my life. I remember listening to Brene Brown’s teaching “Men, Women, and Worthiness” back in 2010. My husband and I were on a road trip and decided to listen to it. It was pretty life changing and marriage changing to say the least but I remember feeling like I couldn’t relate while listening. I didn’t think much of it then but then a few hardships hit our life like a bird to a clean glass window and we went running back to the content of that teaching.
I have been struggling to write a post for sometime now. Primarily it is because of the mass amount of frustration I have been experiencing due to a personal situation. I can’t tell you how many times I have sat down this summer to write and just couldn’t get my head into the right space. One day, in my frustration, I finally reached out and posted on the Hope Writers Facebook group about it. Within minutes I received encouragement and tips, and I felt more at ease with this battle. One of the tips was to write a “list post” of which I had to actually google but quickly figured out. Writing this simple “list” post snapped my out of current pity party and forced me to reflect on all the things I have learned in just the last 30 days.
Ahhh summer… It’s so magical even when it’s ridiculously hot outside like it is now, here in Portland. Our bodies awaken from a winter slumber, our energy spikes, we start planning trips and hikes, and watch our gardens grow. We move at a different pace during these months and much of it is focused on rest and play. And yet, even with a new, slower pace I still find myself saying, “It’s mid-July!! Where did my summer go?!”
Summers can be a great season to start new habits as well especially when it comes to our health. We are more active in the summer, eating more fresh produce especially here in Portland where the Farmers Markets are plentiful! But summer can also be a time where we start to let other habits slip.
Colette Eaton 