Connection (Last One, Part 4)

Before I jump right in, I wanted to explain that Connection (Last One, Part 4) is not a culmination of Connection (Part 1), Connectors (Part 2) and Connection (Part 3). All three posts are individually exclusive of each other so you can enjoy any one of them at any time without having to read them in consecutive order or not read any of them at all. You can just start right here.

I would be remiss to talk about connection without sharing my thoughts on the connection to oneself. Sure, I’ve practiced yoga for over three decades and I dabble in meditation but the connection I want to touch upon is different. I mean, those who practice yoga and meditation definitely connect within themselves and the benefits are truly transforming. However, when I say connect with oneself, I mean to really form a relationship with the good, the bad and the ugly within each of us.

I didn’t set out to find a connection within myself when I first became aware that connecting is the easiest way to live life less randomly. I didn’t even think about it. I considered myself to be on hiatus from the outside chatter for the past few weeks. I just wanted to sit in silence so that I can hear myself think. Sounds ridiculous but I didn’t listen to music or watch TV (minus football and Yellowstone), no books on audible, no podcasts - nothing. In fact, in my parenting class the other day there were recommendations for a few highly praised podcasts for us moms to listen to because we were all struggling with some situations with our kids. I trust these women and I know that when they say a podcast is amazing, I should listen to it. But I just can’t listen right now. For weeks, almost months, I felt like I needed silence. I needed to tune out instead of tuning in. I needed to not know what is going on about Covid or politics 24/7. I was hoping that my mind could be still even though I was racing around for carpool duties.

The gift of silence has been interesting and fortunately, the majority of my self-connection has been very positive. But the bad and the ugly connections will always supersede even the largest doses of good connections that I will ever make. Our minds and bodies are like the media outlets - only the bad news will get people to tune in while the good news rarely makes the 6pm news. It would be futile for me to try to convince myself and others to only focus on the good parts of ourselves because we need bad and ugly to evolve and to grow. We need things not to go our way in order to see why it matters when they do go the right way. My tendency, when there is so much coming at me all at once, is to make the horrible decision to take care of it all at once. Which in turn, causes me to lose sight of my family and their needs. Even though I’d say 60% of the issues that come my way is related to my son and/or daughter, those problems tend to become greater than my relationship with them. I soon realized that these moments of silence over the course of a few weeks became thoughtful pinches that I gave to myself. Now that I am able to recognize that this is my reaction when things get rough, I hope that my family can benefit from this awareness.

The Good

Self-care, Girls Night Out, taking a hike in nature, cranking up the music and singing to the top of our lungs to a song that brings back great memories, reading a relatable novel, seeing a live theatrical performance - these are all examples of how we can connect with ourselves in a positive way. Getting a good grade on a test, picking the perfect gift for someone, achieving a physical goal like a marathon or making it onto the best hockey team - these are also connections with ourselves but our efforts are rewarded or indicated in some way. When we journal or we are asked to fill out surveys or create profiles about ourselves, we self-reflect. That doesn’t necessarily translate to connecting with ourselves. But it’s moving in the right direction and it’s a great start. I think it mostly brings to the surface positive things that we know about ourselves. Once we know what our strengths are, we should celebrate them and just as important, we should never stop looking for more good within us.

The Bad

I recently shared on an Instagram post that I wanted to help a person who does not like me. The point of giving that detail in the story was to give background as to why my plan to help them turned into a disaster. Below my post, a few friends commented that they couldn’t believe that someone did not like me. And that is just it, we all have some bad qualities or tendencies that we wish we didn’t have. We don’t want to go shouting from the roof tops all our faults but we also can’t hold everything inside us. When we connect with ourselves and find things that we don’t like, we have the choice to keep on keeping on or to get off the bus and stop the madness. Doesn’t it seem like a no brainer to just tell ourselves, “Hey, snap out of it and fix it.” ? If only it were that easy.

The Ugly

If we make the time to identify something about ourselves that isn’t good - in fact, purposely find something bad, we should ask ourselves what are our next steps? And maybe that is why we don’t always take the time to sit in silence. Maybe the next steps are harder to take than finding out what doesn’t feel right within us. For me, I’m the kind of person that finds it impossible to have an awareness and let it sit there. It’s the ugly part about me; I can’t keep my mouth shut even if it ruins everything. In my quest to have a light heart and sleep better at night by being fully transparent, I piss off a lot of people.

To summarize, this self-connection is the real deal and it’s as raw as it gets. We find this sort of connection when we sit still long enough to feel. Once we have this connection within ourselves, it’s special to connect with others who have done their own homework. Learning the good, the bad and the ugly about ourselves, makes it easier for us to choose our next steps. Which can be scary but also restoring and energizing. Find your connections and connectors and live life less randomly.

Pinches,

Barb