Wednesday, March 23, 2011

Oh Yeah! (More Self-Care Ideas)

How could I forget to mention listening to as much Michael Franti as humanly possible?

"Hey hey hey
No matter how life is today
There's just one thing that I got to say
I won't let another moment slip away.
I hold on."
       --- "Hey Hey Hey," The Sound of Sunshine

On a Lighter Note

Here's a picture of my cute kid.


I love this picture because 1) he looks a lot like I did growing up, and usually I just see The Dude in him, not me, and because 2) he just looks so freaking confident. When I know that he was nearly out of his mind with excitement (not only are fire trucks one of his favorite things in the world but he also got to SIT in it). I am so very proud of him.

Plus I made yummy blueberry muffins this weekend. Still no progress on any of my sewing projects, though!

Nope, Not Going to Write About It

No, I've pretty much decided that I'm not going to write about what I've been studying the last few weeks* because it's just too sad. It's one thing to need to talk about this stuff for work, and still another if I end up finding a way to work on these issues through my own church, but this is my own personal blog where I write about fun things, like running and baking and my cute kid. Not things that make me angry, or that horrify me, or that make me mourn.

But what I can write about is what I am doing to try to sustain myself as I continue to study and try to figure out what actions I can/should take. And for me it comes back to a need to deepen my faith life. So going regularly to my church** and letting the liturgy and readings ready sink into me (I'm so grateful we have found a church that prioritizes outreach). Committing to a program of prayer and theological study during Lent. And finding ways to weave myself more thoroughly into our faith community, so that I'm never in danger of thinking that I'm alone.

And giving myself permission to be quiet, myself, and to seek out silence around me.

*Child sexual exploitation, global and domestic trafficking.
** Not where I work, which is a great place, but not the right place for me to attend.

Saturday, March 19, 2011

No Race This Weekend

So, I'm not running the St. Paddy's 8K this weekend after all. I didn't feel like changing my workouts to get myself into racing form, and I don't have any emotional connection to this event that would make me want to do it as a fun run instead. I also didn't want to give over any part of a precious open weekend as next month will have some pretty intense ones. Plus, they had the UGLIEST SHIRT EVER.

Just not feeling it.

That's okay, I have some other truly fun runs in my sights, and I've been enjoying my running, though I probably won't be writing about it much for a while. I've been studying and reflecting on some serious matters for a few weeks and trying to figure out how to bring some of that here --- that will probably be my focus for a while. More questions than anything else, I imagine. Questions are good.