by Heather Plett | Mar 18, 2010 | Uncategorized
(not the river I stood by this morning, but another river I've learned from)
This morning I went to see the river. I’d barely left the house all week and needed to sit with Mother Nature for awhile. Water calls me. Always.
This time it wasn’t the mighty Red River that flows close to my house. It was the smaller Seine a little further away.
A week ago it was frozen. Today it was surging with Spring thaw. I stood on a small man-made water weir, mesmorized by the churning water a few feet below me.
The nature of a river can be boiled down to one word. Flow. If it didn’t flow, it wouldn’t be a river. To fulfill its purpose – its calling – it must flow. At all costs. It might sit frozen for a few months (just like the cocoon in yesterday’s post), but when the Spring comes, it returns to the only thing it knows – flowing.
The water weir presents a challenge for the otherwise sleepy little river. How will it get past this barrier? By rising, that’s how. By building up enough volume and strength to flow over top of the wall in front of it.
If the river ceased to follow its very nature and let the obstacles win, it would become a stagnant pond, no longer able to sustain life. Or it would flood the farmland and wreak havoc with the life forces around it that depend on its reliability.
“What about me?” I thought. “How do I respond when the Spring thaw calls me to come out of hibernation and bring forth life? And what do I do when obstacles get in the way? Obstacles like fear, uncertainty, or criticism? Do I cease to follow the path I feel called to? Do I stagnate and forget how to sustain life? Do I flood the land with negative energy and disappoint the people whom I’m called to help? Or do I gather my strength and rise even higher than I was before?”
Just before I walked back to my car, I heard the river whisper “Flow, baby, flow.”
by Heather Plett | Mar 16, 2010 | Beauty, beginnings, fearless, journey, Uncategorized
I’m writing this from my little cocoon on the couch. The big picture window lets me catch glimpses of the outside world, but until I am sufficiently healed from my breast reduction surgery, I remain mostly indoors, in this position, with a few good wisdom books, some green tea, my journal, my laptop, and a box of tissues within reach.
The last time I remember cocooning like this was in September 2000. I was in the hospital for a few weeks hoping the baby I carried would remain in his little cocoon long enough to emerge a beautiful strong butterfly. He didn’t, but that doesn’t mean a butterfly didn’t emerge. It was a transformative time for me, Marcel, and our family. Transformation that was brought on largely because of those three weeks I sat in the quiet little retreat space that my hospital room had become, holding space for the son who would never breathe but would change my world.
During that time, my friend Stephanie gifted me with a story about how a butterfly had become a beloved symbol for a woman who had gone through the loss of her dad. She also gave me a butterfly clip that I wore until I left the hospital. Amazingly, after that day, butterflies started showing up everywhere, including my 5th floor hospital window.
Even after I left the hospital without Matthew, butterflies served as a regular reminder of my son and the way that he had changed me. The following Mother’s Day, while we ate lunch outside with our family, an amazingly friendly butterfly, with one flawed wing, landed on the heads of almost everyone at the table. It was my son, coming to bless us on Mother’s Day.
This week, I’m cocooning again. I was resistant at first, wishing for the time to pass, wishing for friends to visit, wishing I could at least accomplish something. But then I listened to Jen Lee’s simple but wise podcast about how sometimes, when it looks like nothing’s happening, the truth is that everything’s happening. When Jen talked about the transformation that happens when she’s busy taking a nap, it triggered a deep, resounding “YES!” in me, and soon I was relishing my quiet little cocoon on the couch.
The thoughts that came after Jen’s podcast sent me to my bookshelf for an old friend. More than 20 years ago, a beloved teacher/mentor I had at the time, gifted me with “Hope for the Flowers“, a transformative little picture book about a young caterpillar who, after trying repeatedly to “reach the sky” by climbing to the top of a “pillar of caterpillars”, learns to give in to his true nature, climb up on a branch and spin a cocoon. Only once he is willing to take that risk and just be still is he ready to be transformed into the butterfly he is meant to become.
Re-reading that book for the umpteenth time reminded me of how valuable it had been, nearly 10 years ago, to pause from clamouring up my own “pillar of caterpillars”, and rest in my little cocoon with my unborn son as my spiritual guide.
With rather uncanny timing (isn’t that often how these things happen?) I stumbled on Lianne’s lovely (and free!) e-book that asks the provocative question “What is dying to be born?” I haven’t been able to stop thinking about that question since I read through the book. (It’s beautiful and full of so much goodness!)
Wow! What is it that has to die in me in order to let something else be born? What do I have to be willing to abandon in this cocoon in order to emerge the butterfly I am meant to become?
Last year was a restless year. Despite a great job and lots of goodness in my life, I was full of some deep dissatisfaction. Try as I might, I couldn’t find the right way to FIX it. I tried some new things, took some new paths, restled with demons, but still the dissatisfaction lingered.
Until… well, until I was willing to do two of the things I’d been avoiding. Rest. And wait.
I haven’t quite figured out what is dying to be born in my life, but I know that I won’t figure it out with restless clamouring, trying to reach the sky.
I’m giving in, and spinning my cocoon. Some day soon, the body that I chose to transform through surgery, will carry me through the deeper transformation into my butterfly life.
by Heather Plett | Mar 14, 2010 | Beauty
“A life without delight is only half a life.”
“In order to become attentive to beauty, we need to rediscover the art of reverence.”
“If we attempt to own beauty, we corrupt it.”
“The call to the creative life is a call to dignity, to a life of vulnerability and adventure and the call to a life that exquisite excitement and indeed ecstasy will often visit.”
“We have a sacred responsibility to encourage and illuminate all that is inherently good and special in each other.”
“It is a wonderful day in a life when one is finally able to stand before the long, deep mirror of one’s own reflection and view oneself with appreciation, acceptance, and forgiveness.”
“Your strange and restless uniqueness is an intimate expression of God and who you are says something of who God is.”
“Rather than trying to set out like some isolated cosmonaut in search of God, maybe the secret is to let God find you.”
(Just a few of the things I underlined in “Beauty: Rediscovering the True Sources of Compassion, Serenity, and Hope” by John O’Donohue.)
by Heather Plett | Mar 12, 2010 | Uncategorized
I was awake at 4:30 in the morning. After sleeping almost steady since my breast reduction surgery at 10:30 the previous morning, there was very little sleep left in me.
I lay there in bed, on my back – my least favourite position, but the only position that works when your breasts have road maps of slices across them. My hands moved down to my chest… and I started to cry.
No, it wasn’t the pain – that was mostly managed by the painkillers. Partly the tears were just about the beauty of that moment. For the first time since the day I ballooned out of a wimpy training bra, I was putting my hands on my breasts and feeling small, firm, normal-sized breasts, even under the layers of bandages. Nothing flopped to the side or hung down to my belly-button. They were PERKY!
But there was something deeper behind the tears. A release. A forgiveness. A realization that I am okay and that I didn’t make a mistake.
All of the baggage I’ve been carrying? The reason it took me so much time and contemplation to get to the place where I was ready for this surgery? It’s all because I believed that wanting smaller breast was just too selfish.
If there’s one thing I’ve been raised to fight against, it is selfishness. After all, isn’t a good Christian woman supposed to be the embodiment of selflessness? Especially once you’ve become a mom? Doesn’t that verse in the Bible really say “Do unto others. Period.” ? At least that’s the way my internal monologue seemed to interpret it.
Oh, it’s not that I haven’t learned to be selfish in my life. I can be VERY selfish. Often. But… it usually comes with a good helping of guilt. Or I manage to justify it because “others are benefitting too – not just me.” Or, if nothing else, I get to be kind to myself once in awhile just because I”ve EARNED it – through hard work, pain, diligence, whatever.
Not only was it selfish, but it was… oh that dreadful word… frivolous.
What’s a mature 43 year old do-gooder feminist in management in a non-profit organization who has been known to stand on the soapbox of simple living, justice, treehugging, and compassion now and then doing contemplating something as frivolous as plastic surgery? Sheesh! Aren’t there people to feed in this world, HIV orphans to look after, injustice to stamp out?
And yet, there I was at 4:30 in the morning, knowing that I’d made the right decision. And crying happy tears because I was okay. I had given myself permission and I had worked past the many ways I judge myself, and I was not going to hell for it.
I have a pretty good feeling God’s not standing in judgement somewhere shaking her head in my direction. Probably the only person judging me all this time was myself. And I’m letting that go, bit by bit.
And soon… I’m going to buy myself some lovely, frivolous, fitted blouses. And they might not even come from Value Village.
by Heather Plett | Mar 10, 2010 | Uncategorized
This day wasn’t easy. There was the “clean up my desk before disappearing from work for a few weeks”. And the “put out the fires and make last minute decisions” that the staff require of me every day but even more-so when I’m about to leave. And on top of that, the “sign these documents, wire this money, make sure you submit your outstanding expense forms”. Oh, and then the “calm some of the uneasiness among new staff about being leader-less for a few weeks”. Plus the “notify all consultants, make sure they know the next steps in the process and who to contact in my absence.”
And then at the end of the day, there was some potentially disappointing news about some things I want to do this Spring that might not work out after all.
Boo.
The hardest part? I was trying to cope with all of this with a raging head cold. One that I can’t take medication for because of pending surgery. AND one that could potentially postpone said surgery if they’re uneasy about putting me under general anesthetic if I can’t breathe through my nose.
Ugh.
But… here’s the good part… it’s the end of the day, I’m about to head to bed, and I’m feeling quite relaxed. And peaceful.
Why? Because YOU lift me up. Yes you.
Each of you who reached out to me in one way or another – you’ve made a difference. The dear friend who phoned me at work to wish me luck. The other dear friend who met me for lunch. The two members of my staff team and my colleague who gave me gifts and lovely cards. The other staff people who wished me well. The kind members of my family who sent emails and said prayers. All of the people who commented on my last (rather vulnerable and raw) blog post and/or sent follow-up emails. And then all of you lovely Twitter friends who sent me good vibes when I admitted to feeling low. And my mom who’s getting up early and giving up a couple of days (of her busy social calendar) to be my nurse-maid.
I don’t know what tomorrow will bring, or the next day, or the next. But I know that it will be easier to bear because YOU lift me up.
NEVER underestimate the power of an encouraging word. Or a prayer.
(And never be afraid to ask for it when you need it, because it really does help.)
