Boundaries

The sunset was incredibly beautiful last night after Wednesday night racing on a new to town J111. The breeze was steady, not too much and not too little. Jenny was at the helm and the other three of us were all over the boat getting sails up and down, letting sails in & out and trying to sail faster. It had been awhile since I've been racing and it took me a bit to remember all the moves. Especially after being sick for over a week and barely recovered. Nonetheless it felt great to be out on the water harnessing the power of the wind. On a boat it's pretty clear where the boundaries are. You go beyond the lifelines and end up in the water where the boundaries are harder to define.Life is more like the water than the boat, contantly changing and flowing without a clear sense of boundaries. With language it's a challenge to describe exactly what I'm talking about because words can have so many different meanings. The kind of boundary I'm talking about has to do with  the invisible guidelines for creating our reality. There's a huge amount of freedom or wiggle room for creating the life that we want but it's not limitless like I once thought. There are boundaries and I'm trying to learn and define what they are and what purpose they serve. On a boat the lifelines are the boundary and you can step beyond them but generally it's not a good idea unless you're at the dock. It's beneficial to have boundaries and to know what they are. They help clarify otherwise abstract notions and redirect us when we feel lost. I guess my point is here that it pays to learn where our boundaries are in every sense that you can make of that sentence. 

Everything in interconnected so ultimately boundaries are an illusion but it is the illusion that helps us to learn what we came here to learn. The illusion of separateness that is. The boundary I'm trying to define is something that prevents us from stepping off a ledge before we are ready to fly. Forgive me, I am still learning and trying to assimilate this concept that I've been chewing on. Time to give it a rest and go do some laundry. Thanks for listening.

Wide Awake

   It's 3am and I'm wide awake. Thoughts of the past, present and future are racing through my head after my bladder raised me out of bed. The chilly walk to the bathroom stimulated the mental process and I wish there was an easy way to quiet the mind. Flashes of dream recall are interspersed with a longing to go back to sleep and anxiety about random unrelated thoughts. I feel as if I almost had something figured out while dreaming yet I can not put my finger on it.  Life is like a dream and when I'm dreaming I sense that there's more to the stories I find myself vividly engaged in. Impossible scenarios play out like a movie with an unlimited budget and crazy special effects. Then I wake up and this reality is so tangible, physical needs like getting up to pee are very grounding and a good reminder for why this life experience is so special. The contrast between the many realms of awareness and all the facets to being human are limited yet limitless. The ideas we have, our capacity for bringing concepts into existence is brilliant yet we waste so much time.

Time is moving as a constant reminder like waves on the water created by the winds of change. Storms roll through the waters of my internal environment and I know that it does not last. Shifting back to stillness after the wild moments of wondering I hope to fall back asleep. I wander slowly back toward the cozy cocoon of rest with visions of potentiality and hope that the insightful parts of dreamland re-occur....

5 Months

Today is the last day in the 5th month since I stopped drinking Alcohol. These last few hours of the 31st day of March have my mind wandering. Just 5 months ago alcohol was my go-to companion every single day, every evening (and even some mornings) I spent drinking some form of the intoxicating liquid. For several years before it was even legal for me to drink, I drank. I loved it. Beer, wine, booze, all the different flavors, colors and stages of inebriation. For the last 10 years before these 5 months my life and my perspective of alcohol was very different. I knew there was always the potential for it to be a problem. I was clinically diagnosed as an alcoholic at the age of 13 after getting caught a few too many times with booze on my breath. As Ani DiFranco sings in her song Fuel- "They say that alcoholics are always alcoholics even when they're dry..." and I was far from dry but figured I had a handle on it. I was fully functional, healthy & successful in very obvious ways. I was spending over $300 a month just on alcohol and still had enough to money to pay the bills, buy organic foods, have nice clothes, cars and toys. From the outside it appeared I had it all- life was good and it was one hell of a party. I could drink almost anyone under the table and still drive home. (Thank God I didn't get caught or worse, hurt someone in those moments of poor decision to take the wheel.) I even liked to drink at home- I didn't need to go out to get hammered, I didn't even need a drinking buddy. And sometimes I'd wake up in the middle of the night after passing out drunk only to look at myself in the bathroom mirror after emptying my bladder wondering... Why the hell was I doing this?

Was it really all fun and games? Sometimes it was really fun but then sometimes the hangovers were really horrible too. Hair of the dog only works so well after a few hours of restless sleep after torturing ones liver. I tried to cut back after the bad days, limiting myself to one cocktail for an evening, only to find myself doing it all over again a week later. I craved it, some days I couldn't wait until 5 O'clock to get my drink on. I'd go to the grocery store and tell myself I wasn't going to buy any more alcohol only to find myself with 4 bottles of red wine in the shopping cart. It was especially bad when Washington changed the liquor laws and booze moved into the grocery stores. A bottle of bourbon was just too easy to grab while picking up a few items for dinner. Now I don't even look twice at that section of the store.

These 5 months have gone by really fast actually and some days have been harder than others to stay on track. I've come a long way for being sober only this long and it's amazing how different my whole world appears. The future looks bright and I'm ready for April 1st tomorrow. One day at a time, one foot in front of the other, I'm finding better ways to cope with the twists and turns of life. I know I have the power to control my destiny and it all begins with each choice in each moment. I hope to continue to choose not to drink that intoxicating liquid that was distracting me from becoming who I really want to be. Life is so beautiful and I'm extremely Thankful to be where I am today- happy, healthy and sober. :) 

Flight

One flight of stairs... Distracted with an e-mail on the device in my left hand and a ceramic mug full of coffee with honey and milk in my right, my socked foot slid on the edge of the second top step and I took flight. Split seconds later the same foot found the wall at the base of the stairs halting my fast forward motion. My phone was still clenched tightly in my left hand, my favorite mug was now empty and I was drenched in coffee but fortunately nothing was broken. I sat there stunned looking through the creamy brown liquid dripping down from my hair into my glasses. I had just been thinking to myself a few days before how I should be careful and pay attention when traversing this nicely varnished wood stairway. My awareness then shifted from the puddle I was sitting in to the walls and banister that appeared to have been sprayed with muddy water. Such perfect decoration could not have occurred intentionally. It was Saturday at 9:45am and my plans for the day just changed in an instant.

First I had to clean up the mess. I don't always put honey in my coffee and the sticky situation would only worsen with time. Paper towels gracefully went from white to tan as they absorbed the incident and the eco-friendly spray cleaner left the area smelling fresh with a slight hint of greasy beans left behind. I peeled off cool soggy layers of dark clothing, drank some fresh black coffee from my refilled mug and then jumped in the shower. As the hot water hit my left arm I almost squealed it stung so bad. I didn't want to look so I went about washing my hair and biting my tongue. My ego was bruised and I knew my body probably was too. After the shower rinsed away the shock from the flight of stairs I thought about my plans for the day, took a deep breath and looked at my forearm. Ouch.

A beautiful raised red J written in friction above the swollen lump of skin that acted as a shock absorber on each step it had collided with. It could have been worse yet I wondered why this had just happened to me. I decided to take it easy the rest of my day and went out to soak up some Vitamin D. The sunshine felt good on all of my skin except that J spot and I relaxed into the moment. Life can change so rapidly, maybe this was a wake-up call for me? Maybe I just needed an excuse to slow down? Hopefully I'll remember next time to give myself permission to take it easy without injuring myself first?

I woke up this morning with a few more aches and pains in some strange places. Remembering my flight, bump, slide and the landing I decided to check out my backside in the mirror.  A perfectly purple goose egg on my left cheek just in time for Easter. I'm happy my body likes to use color therapy for healing and does it so quickly too. My arm has some nice green-blue hues behind the red J now too. Still I am amazed and very thankful that the human body is so resilient and ready to recover. I know it will take some time to feel 100% again but I think there's a reason this happened. I'm not sure exactly why yet but every time I bump my arm or sit down for the next week I'm sure going to think about it.

Eleven

I ate eleven different things today, a bowl of gf cereal, a protein bar, an apple, a chocolate peanut butter bar, a cheese stick, a few crackers,  a couple scoops of goat cheese, too much nettle pesto, a whole cucumber, handfuls of chocolate sun drops & some peppermints. Now all that tasty yet pungent garlic in the nettle pesto is stuck on my breath and my sphincter is releasing some seriously noxious fumes during this digestive process. (I love my body.) Today was a busy day, I ate, I drove, I worked, I played, I cleaned, I talked, I yawned, I tweeted, I sang, I farted and I wrote. Well, I'm writing now and that's the 11th thing I have done today so far. There are still way more than Eleven items left on my task list and so many ideas spinning around in my head. The clock is ticking once again and my energy is waning. I have been up since 6am and it's almost time for tea. I'm fading fast yet I just couldn't help thinking about the numbers once again.

Specifically, Eleven and ones, so many ones, each thing is one thing and they all add up. Then depending on how you look at it eleven equals two. One plus One. Back two basics, eleven has been a powerful number for me and it all started with 11:11. Always seeing 11:11. I knew it meant something but what? Two plus two is Four? 11 plus 11 is 22, 2 plus 2 is 4. Four Ones. Four ones I see all the time in many different shapes and forms.

My life path number is 11- Based off my birth-date. My birth-name equals 22 in numerology. Once again, the ones and the twos and the elevens all are adding up. The numbers have meaning, we use numbers in numerous ways multiple times each and every day. Today is the 22nd of March. Twenty two days so far in this month and the additional impact of seeing repeating number sequences has me counting on the fact that this life is way more than it seems.  Careful calculations leading me back to my roots and seeing that everything is truly interconnected and mathematically equated.

Rambling Joygirl. I had my tea and now its time for bed. I wish you all sweet dreams and happy thoughts.

Life's a Beach

  Amazing to think that not long ago when I would visit this beach I didn't even have a phone let alone a device that I could use to communicate directly with the entire world. Here I am, at the beach, getting Vitamin D from the awesome sunshine, inhaling fresh ionized salty sea air, listening to hummingbirds and chickadees as they dance in the trees above my head all while writing on my blog. I have to say I love technology. Now if only there was an agate finding app. 

I could stay here all day but there's still items on my task list that won't be accomplished by being part of this scenery. A fly just landed on my hand reminding me that persistence will pay off, I just have to keep my focus even when life is a Beach. I get overwhelmed and impatient with myself sometimes but I truly am very grateful for this beautiful life I have and this amazing place where I live.

Tuesday

I've been a little stumped for what to write on this blog so I'm going to keep it short and simple. Today is Tuesday, I like Tuesday's-they're usually better than Monday's. Last Tuesday I had a free introductory guitar lesson at the Guitar Center. My first official session starts at 5:00pm today and I'm excited to push beyond what I already know. Ready to absorb new information and hopefully get past where I have been stuck musically for almost 11 years.

I appreciate music in all its many expressions and have craved the ability to make music myself. I've been considering going back to school for numerous reasons recently and this is just one step of many possible directions I could go. I'm not doing this for practical reasons, I'm doing it for love. For the love of music.

Leap Day

   February 29th, 2016 is the accumulation of excess time during the past four years that have to be put somewhere to keep our calendars accurate over the long-term. The rotation of the earth in relation to the sun, moon and stars is all a mathematical equation that had been calculated repeatedly and refined as observations create more data. 

Apparently eventually there will no need for a Leap year when every year will be 366 days long. That means time is actually slowing down by microseconds even though it feels as if it is speeding up. Perceptions of experience are as vast as the ever expanding universe we find our eyes witnessing in the myriad ways we pay attention. Infinite potential is ultimately defined by numbers and can be calculated and refined by sequences like the one Fibonacci brought to light. 

Which means if all of creation is a mathematical equation then it's our perception that creates the magic. How we view the sequences of numbers and manipulate them into explanations of what we see is truly a fascinating concept. Just imagine the possibility.

Esoteric

  By definition it's difficult word to define and as my (now official) ex-husband said recently to me, "you responded to my e-mail with some esoteric bullshit". It got me thinking maybe I have been a little bit too vague with my writing here. I thought an image of caution was necessary because at times the facts are potentially hazardous. You can proceed at your own risk- even though the sign basically says no trespassing, it's just a way of being protected from liability when someone wants a closer look.

We separated on 11-1-2015 and the divorce was finalized yesterday on 2-22-2016. The full moon was reassuring as a bright light in the sky last night while adjusting to my (now official) new name. The best part of the divorce was that I finally got to choose a new name. I've gone by middle name since I was 17 and had wanted to change my first and last name legally but it always seemed like too much hassle. I changed my last name when we were married and thought that was a good start. After almost 7 years as a "Sloan" seeing that last name in almost every public restroom (and not being related to the founder of that well-known successful valve company) I was pretty sure I didn't want to keep that last name either. What I didn't realize was that in a divorce whatever someone writes down on one line on one page in the final document could be anything. Unlimited potential for redefining oneself all because of a committed documented relationship that didn't work out. Thank God.

There is a required 90 day waiting period after separation to determine if the marriage is irretrievably broken so I had some time to think about what I wanted to be called. I still love my middle name and decided that will never change, it's the core of my identity, the creme between the two cookies. My first name I've always felt a bit ashamed of, the early years of my life were filled with moments of emotional upheaval, traumatic experiences and personal lack of understanding the big picture. A lot of memories I associated with my first name caused me to cringe whenever I heard it. And it was inevitable that someone at the bank or grocery store would call me that name as they read it off my identification unknowing that the second word written there was what I wanted to hear. So then I thought, if I keep my middle name what do I want people to call me when they don't know me and are looking at identifying documentation? It didn't take me too long to decide, anything but "Tina" would suffice.

I chose a name that in Turkish means, "Halo of Light" around the sun (or moon). Realizing right away that the name could be mispronounced easily because of the spelling. I was okay with that, sometimes I unknowingly speak with an accent and people hear "Joey" or "Joyce" in stead of "Joy" when I introduce myself. Ayla, (which I prefer to hear pronounced eye-luh) sounds way better no matter how you say it and kinda makes me want to sing. For some reason the song, "Lola" comes to mind leading into more random daydreams of potential stories and adventures of Ayla put to music. Ayla Joy felt right so on to the last part of a common 3-word identifying name.

As with my first given name, my last name was a colorful one including lots of experiential associations and family history. I like the color when I think of it as earthy but somehow those shitty memories of kids chanting, "How now, Brown cow?" as a chubby middle school student made it less than desirable to keep. I love my family too and the Brown side has qualities I sincerely appreciate. The word itself is not pleasing to my ears and makes me feel kind of down, or like a clown, or like I'm wearing an old gown, or... I think you get the picture. A rhyming mind leads me to Love- sent from above, fits like a glove, on the wings of a dove... And I thought of many last names I would love to have.

Ayla Joy... Osprey, Raven, Light, Peace, Forest, Moonstone, Star... so many words I love came to mind. The options were overwhelming and the potential implications of choosing something I would regret later was scary. Then looking into numberology my mind wandered all over the place searching for an answer that felt right. I went back and forth, felt high and low, free and stuck until suddenly I realized I knew it all along. There were signs everywhere confirming that my inner thoughts were correct. Even writing during the Super Bowl the answer was right in front of my face. The super bowl! Really? How many crazy signs did I need outwardly to confirm what I already felt deep inside? Apparently I needed a lot because the screen shots and pictures I have taken in the past threes months show a common theme and "Love" is the Answer.

I changed my Facebook profile name the day before the court hearing and then announced to all my friends via a post yesterday with two re-affirming photos taken the same day of my official new name. I received a text from my beautiful friend Jen last night, "Ayla Joy Love ❤️💗❤️ I love it!" And I do too. It feels right and when I saw the car with Joy Love stickered on the black fender and read the pink words written across the back window "Live with purpose" I knew. 

Change, no matter how scary, can be a really good thing and sometimes it's all about timing. Why did that person park their car there then and why did I park next to it, how did the timing create the circumstances to show me such a profound message in such a simple way? That I have to leave to the great universe, I don't really need to know that answer. My logical mind can make up all sorts of reasons why that had nothing to do with my name change but I choose to believe something different. I'm choosing to believe in something I feel in my heart. My purpose is to act out of love, to share the joy that is a choice we can make to believe in what makes us feel good. It's always an option to choose how we see things and how we react to things we see.

I'm making a different choice now than I used to. I know everyone is doing their best. My family gave me a beautiful name, they took care of me, they taught me things I needed to know to survive, they kept me warm and safe and did everything in their power to do what they thought was right and I am so thankful for everything they have done and everything they have taught and continue to teach me. Family is always going to be family even if I have a different name than what was given to me at birth. It's another one of those choices we all have to make in life. We always have options and that's what makes our world go round. 

Yes, I like playing with words and some of the ways I have used words in this blog post prolly had some of you rolling your eyes. In the past I believed pictures are worth a thousand words and now I believe words are worth a thousand pictures. It all depends on the context and it's useful to have both tools to convey messages in this physical world we exist within. There I go being esoteric again and I'm a Taurus, an earth sign who is generally very grounded. There is definitely a shift happening on this planet and I can feel it. At first I thought I was going crazy and had completely lost my mind. 

I never thought I would get divorced, we had figure 8's- a symbol of infinity tattooed on our ring fingers. Our life wasn't perfect but I truly believed I had committed to spending the rest of my life with that man. I was sure that if anyone was stubborn and strong-willed enough to make it work it would be me. With a big heart and an open mind I've done my best to be faithful and true to the ones I love. This openmindedness led me to explore a vague nagging feeling I couldn't quite shake and suddenly my heart felt like it was going to explode. What I didn't know what that I had closed off parts of myself that I love because it wasn't practical or acceptable by the man I married. He told me multiple times that those parts of me, those things I felt, "didn't matter" and I tried so hard to believe it, to make it work. 

One of my favorite new sayings is you have to "believe it to see it" and I'll admit that sometimes no matter how much we want to believe in something if it doesn't feel right in our heart it won't work. There are boundaries and guidelines for our beliefs for a reason, body, mind and spirit have to communicate and cooperate in this process. Hard lesson to learn but so valuable and I just hope that the man I spent the last 10 years of my life with can understand some of these truths I have learned.

I know I wasn't perfect and I know now I'm not the right person for him. Yet we learned a lot from each other and had some incredibly amazing adventures together. The love was true and there will always be a special place in my heart for him and I wish him well on his journey. He has great potential if he allows himself to be who he really wants to be. And only he knows what that is. I am thankful for our time together and sad that it didn't work out the way we had hoped. Life goes on and it's unproductive to dwell on what could have been.

This moment is all that really matters and the future is a gift waiting to be opened. I am grateful for this life and all these opportunities that await. I have spent the battery on my smart phone and have stuff on my task list to check off. It's time to continue switching over to my new name, number one being a new drivers license. What do I want the new identifying picture of Ayla Joy Love to look like...? 

I hope everyone has a magical wonderful day today. Love to you all. 💞

Raw

Pure, raw, unadulterated honesty. I know that I am only human and part of me wants to control all the situations I find myself in. My ego wants to believe that I have it all figured out or that I can figure it all out. I know that I'm not perfect and have a lot to learn. I have yet to become the person I think I want to be. I have yet to figure out exactly why I incarnated into this earth reality once again. I have some idea why,  some vague sensation of something far greater than I can comprehend at this moment in time. There is a specific path I find myself on again. I had gotten away from this path and now things are coming around full circle. I just want to lay it all out on the table and share this raw food for thought.

My heart aches sometimes for things I don't understand, my head hurts for reasons beyond common sense and my eyes see things there are no words to describe. I have this longing to express something I can't quite put my finger on. I just want to be true, to live true, to learn and speak the truth. Yet I ponder if the truth is even acceptable, if my truth is acceptable and if it's even a good thing to share during my quest for it. I guess because what I believed to be true and what I believe is truth is fluid and changing. As time passes energy moves in waves while life lessons twist and turn. There are so many questions and I want to know all the answers, I want true understanding of all that matters. I feel we are all connected, we share this amazing planet yet the human condition has such pervasive tendencies that distract us, confuse us and make us feel like crap when we least expect it.

Sometimes I can be my own worst critic, I beat myself up inside until tears seep out like blood from a place deep within that has been rubbed raw from the friction of my own thoughts. Why would I do such a thing when I should know better? Why is it such a challenge for us as humans to live from our hearts and stay in the moment? Why do we replay & regret the past? I want solutions and I want easy ways for everyone to figure these things out for ourselves. I want us all to live to our potential, to experience our own and each others awesomeness without all the pain and suffering that seems so common sometimes. I want to help build a better world, inside and out, above and below, this way and that way... but how?

Beetle Juju

While walking under the clear starry skies with the newly waxing moon last night I crossed the path of this beetle and paused for a moment. Jupiter and Sirius were twinkling and the sun-lit crescent of the moon glowed orange toward the horizon with the shadow-side a luminescent perfect circle in contrast to the crisp clear indigo sky. The late winter evening air scented with Bellingham bay saltwater and fresh green buds ready to bust open and bloom with the nearness of spring time. My ever expanding awareness that this life is actually an amazing dream and I am lucky to be alive. Choosing to believe more and more each day that I am the artist painting this picture of me & my world in each moment. Appreciating the opportunity to experience life with these eyes and love with this heart in this universe on this planet we call earth that is so full of magic. All we have to do is look and we can see all the wonderful creations of nature, the divine design, including the black beetle. A living being doing his beetle thing with the full spectrum shimmering as the flash from my camera strikes his body, the protective shell on his back dotted with constellations resembling the sky above. Contemplating me from that perspective I imagine the long, sensitive antenna picking up the vibrations of my human body. Extra sensory perceptions of light and frequencies. What is our purpose dear beetle, why have our paths crossed on this lovely evening? A creature so small and often easily overlooked has left an big lasting impression on me and I wonder... How did I get to be so lucky? I feel so fortunate to be who I am and where I am in this lifetime. I feel so thankful and so grateful to be so blessed in so many ways-beyond words. I want to share, I want to inspire, I want other people to feel the joy of being alive, to believe in themselves and believe in the power we each have to paint our own pictures, to create our own realities and to share them with each other. I sometimes feel like that beetle, so small, so easily overlooked (and lucky I didn't get stepped on in the twilight), but I think, if that beetle caught my attention and made a difference in my world, then maybe, just maybe, no matter how small or insignificant (or insecure) I may feel sometimes, I can make a difference in this world.

We are all connected and I believe this is our purpose, to move beyond the pain and sadness, to get past the illusions, to stop creating things we don't want and to start to enjoy this physical reality of life to its fullest most beautiful potential.  Love is the answer. You have to believe it to see it.