Author: Erin

I write - all the time - mostly random thoughts on that which makes me happy every day of my life.
Words in Sentences

So Sick and Tired @ Front Steps in the Sun

by Erin1 Comment on So Sick and Tired @ Front Steps in the Sun

My belly has been in knots lately and I know it is because I am back to regularly consuming news media.

I have also recently been exposed to first hand Trump thinking via several people in my immediate orbit and it honestly makes me want to cry.

I am so sick and tired of the evolution of our society being at the mercy of “dems” or “republicans”.

I am so sick and tired of elected officials obviously not understanding the dictionary definition of “public” or “servant” in regards to their role.

I am so sick and tired of narrow minded views trying to cast a lens on the whole of society.

I am so sick and tired of watching my neighbors work upwards to 3 or 4 jobs and have to pay $8 to cash a check at Wal Mart.

I am so sick and tired of fees and charges being passed on to entrepreneurs for services to launch their small business. Services of which the founders are in the top 1%.

I am so sick and tired of fees and charges being passed on to people doing the right thing and ordering groceries through Amazon to avoid risking their health due to a global pandemic when the founder of Amazon is in the top 1% and could care for their delivery personnel easily.

I am so sick and tired of women’s reproductive rights being summed up to “abortion”. Period.

I am so sick and tired of people being ignorant to the fact that our country and ways of living are largely built on racist principles. Facts that you cannot ignore or spin.

I am so sick and tired of people justifying murders because of what the murderer was wearing. I am so sick and tired of people thinking all lives matter when only black lives were enslaved in America, only black lives were discriminated against in America, only black lives were taken, limited and scrutinized. Get over it. GOD. Get over American ideals of pursuing the dream being accessible for everybody when they simply were. not. Were not. Are not. Oh that one really gets me.

I am so sick and tired of being the wealthiest nation in the world and believing you really can make it in America yet being afraid of pursuing my own dream because my corporate job gives me health care.

I am so sick and tired of the middle class not having free and informed tax consultation. I am sick of not seeing the whole of my tax dollars. I am sick of loopholes. And I am tired of our President.

I am so sick and tired of the media not having accountability and the Associated Press not offering fact accuracy percentages on mainstream media articles. I am tired of media not being required to denote what are facts and what is opinion. I am tired of misinformation in advertising.

I am so sick and out right tired of the lack of community revolutions in order to change the country from ground up.

I am so over it. I am over all of it. I am tired of knowing immigrant families who work back to back and pay their taxes and be scrutinized.

I am so sick and tired of people thinking that because they believe homosexuality is wrong or who subscribe to their assigned gender that people who are homosexual or gender fluid *do not deserve the same rights*. ARE YOU KIDDING ME.

So much of right wing propaganda is on par with a statement like “because we don’t like peanuts, we do not offer grocery stores”. I am so sick and tired of living in a society where people do not even know they are slaves to media and marketing.

I am so tired of people being media illiterate and not knowing how to question the news.

I am so tired of people not being able to focus and be fully present on the real and painful realities in their own lives because they are afraid and preoccupied with the people governing and their incompetencies to serve the public.

I am so sick and tired of single use plastics. I am tired of the lack of choice in recycling. I am tired of fast fashion and the cotton wars. I am tired of how much people consume. I am tired with how much people throw away. I am tired of major leaders in industries not realizing that innovation should not be only about the middle and upper class but about interconnectivity and opening doors.

I am tired of all of it. I am tired of poison in our water and in our food. I am tired of how advertisements reflect my digital profile. I am tired of my data being used and sold. I am tired of nobody informing the public on how this works. I am tired of small seemingly insignificant tweaks to make life better for the whole of America be overlooked for profits.

I am tired knowing that mental health is misunderstood and that holidays are about spending and not resting. I am tired of the grind people go through to do something they are programmed to do.

I am tired of the people who don’t understand their vote for Trump keeps so many oppressed. I am tired of people who don’t see what Mitch McConnell is doing as disgusting. I am tired of hearing that liberals are ridiculous and naive and stupid when a progressive agenda is actually moderate and on par with the rest of the modernized world.

I am tired of people ignoring human trafficking, connecting the dots between homelessness and the opioid crisis, and continuing to sexualize women and exploit feminine beauty. I am tired of people excusing the President for his misbehavior and for their double standards of what they expect from the men in their homes and in their lives from what they expect from the highest office in the land.

I am tired of the women who do not expect more from the men in their homes and in their lives not realizing they should.

I am tired of protests not hitting our country’s biggest wallets where it hurts. I am tired of business as usual when we have serious work to do. I am so sick and tired of the moderate white woman who doesn’t influence with her dollars. I am tired of the chardonnay white woman who doesn’t even realize the world needs her. I am tired of the educated being ignorant and the ones with the best views being blind.

I am tired of white middle class or white rural people not realizing the benefits of the democratic platform are *for them too*. I am tired of the lack of diversity in news media.

I am tired of everybody being so opinionated based on click bait and news bytes and holding tight to that rhetoric and never sitting with a person at a bus stop, never mourning with a family when their black son was killed, never looking into the reality of what is going on at the border, never sitting with the command to love the foreigner, never sitting with the command to love your neighbor – not even seeing all of the diversity in America AS their neighbors.

I am tired of white people thinking America looks just like them and missing the bigger picture. I am tired of not feeling proud of our country. I am tired of things that should be in place and well-running being debatable, back and forth and unfinished.

I am tired of seeing the poor and the weary giving up. I am tired of the NRA, big pharma, wall street and every other organization holding the health and safety and well being of America hostage.

The current day Republicans have shown nothing to say to me they will help me stop being sick and tired of any of these things. Fox News Republicans are an irrelevant cancer.

I think that will do it. I just had to get it off my chest.

Words in Sentences

one certain thing @ my yoga mat in webster

by Erin1 Comment on one certain thing @ my yoga mat in webster

If there is one thing I know for certain, it is that one of these five kids is going to be talking to their therapist at some point in their twenties and will experience a major break through when their therapist smiles and says, “Honey! YOU *can* get a medium concrete!” all thanks to my sincere commitment to the belief that a small really is enough.

And I do think that. David has ordered mediums for me a couple of times and I never finish them. I have been generous and gone against this belief before to find my daughters’ forgotten half eaten medium concretes and slushies in the freezer “for later”.

Part of the reason they will be in therapy about this is because it is the true battle of what you believe (small is enough) and what you want (a medium).

I believe they will also believe that smalls are enough (on some level) because my belief, in its affliction upon them, has proven itself to be true.

Life updates seem a little mundane these days. I struggle writing about the day to day because I am not really sure how it will translate. I am learning a lot about grace and forgiveness and am back studying some yoga phenomenons that I have been witnessing in my regular-ish restorative practice.

It has been well over a year since I have taught a slow flow as restorative, meditation, yin and gentle yoga have been more of my immediate audiences’ appetite. With that, I woke up on Thursday unable to move my head in a complete circle and have been experiencing major pain for a couple of days.

Part of this is because I have miles on the car and my body is my body and it is crooked in places it used to be straight. But I also am victim (like many) to weakened muscles in the neck and shoulders due to screen time and those weakened muscles, when shocked – jerked – or strained unhinged tend to kink up.

I am also extremely tight in my shoulders and back. I would say this probably is related to two years of lots of cross country travel, airplane rides and road trips as well as day to day life stressors relative to change, automatic bill pay and working for the man.

Yoga Nidra teaches there are the “threefold tensions”: muscular tension, emotional tension and mental tension. As forementioned, I have (although less now than 5 days ago) all three in my body. Likely, so do you.

Normal relaxation is understood to be closing the eyes, resting back and taking a break from the things you are plugged into. However, yoga nidra (yoga sleep) goes a little beyond this. Google it. It’s a life changing experience using revolving awareness of 61 points of the body to basically rock your consciousness to sleep while your awareness transitions to your subconsciousness and (if you’re lucky) your unconsciousness. AKA your motherboard where all your wiring and habits and beliefs (like how a small concrete is enough) live.

The first successful (although any yogic sleep is successful in that you will at least play with the consciousness) experience I had, I woke up to the image *and sensation* of a skeleton becoming dislodged from the center of my chest and relieving my body of its stagnant bony complex.

Incredible. I was hooked.

I started up nidra again last night, with my neck in shooting throbbing pain supported by a sandbag. Yes. A sandbag. Although I am pretty sure my attention got off at the exit before entering my subconsciousness, my body relaxed and I fell asleep. I woke up with full movement and a little cold nerve hangover.

I am committed to resurrecting a slow flow practice at home, even if I am not teaching. Today I got into an inversion – though shaky – and I played a lot with shifting my weight into my arms. I also heard that pulling your head back so you have triple chins for 20 seconds ever hour or so during the day is super good for you. I am hoping my slow flow practice builds up some strength and evens me out a bit. I am hoping my nidra continues to release the tension in threefold manner.

I am studying nidra again to go a little deeper into sankalpas. Rumor has it that use of sankalpas in your yoga nidra practice can actually re-wire some of that motherboard program… call it karma… archetypes… religious beliefs that won’t go away…

And I need that right now. I am getting quiet in my days and – though nothing is wrong – my heart is aching a little bit. I am thinking the shedding of the muscular tension is letting me get into some emotional tension that can be released. I want this to transform my generosity and my service towards others. AH! OMG – honestly? I’m flow of consciousness here… that may just be my sankalpa. (They say it is usually a courser, broader, directional thing than a “quit smoking” thing.)

Ok. WISH ME LUCK. Anybody out there tried yoga nidra with sankalpas??

Words in Sentences

Fly in the Mouth @ The Intersection of Relaxation and You Gotta Be Kidding Me – Webster

by ErinLeave a Comment on Fly in the Mouth @ The Intersection of Relaxation and You Gotta Be Kidding Me – Webster

Hold on – I need to brush my teeth with Listerine and fire…

k, back..

I finally did a last round through the ole inboxes: making sure I knew my work calendar (blocking myself with tentative forewarning from 8a – 9a “I’ll accept your meeting but may be troubleshooting zoom”) and making sure I knew just what a 2nd grader should be doing during “independent work”.

I truly can’t imagine being a teacher. I had a nice, healthy – helpful response from Maddox’s teacher and I just felt like “man”. She taught these kids all day and is responding to me, on behalf of my kid, in depth. I am just absolutely amazed by their stamina.

I yelled at the girls last night. First time laying into the quad of teens – a signature mom move “I don’t care who, I don’t care when, I don’t want to hear why, I don’t need to know what – all I need is to tell each of you this one time and one time only: go. to. bed.”

Period.

Thing is – I don’t do well on little sleep. Any spat David and I have can for sure be assumed to have some degree of “Erin needs to go to bed” at play. My mind gets overwhelmed, I can’t spit words out, I just need people to understand and all I want to do is close my eyes.

So, naturally, when back to school hits and your job as parent becomes: Tech Support, Task Manager, Snack Guardian, Waitress, Secretary, and Accountability Partner (all which are going on my LinkedIn) on top of Cook, Household Operations Manager, General Keeper Upper of Things and Loving Devoted Wife *on top of* a 40 hr week full time job supporting four priority efforts on a team that is new and requiring massive change management communication and your teenagers wake you up at midnight laughing about the internet? Yeah. You take them to task.

If I were a teacher, I think it’s possible I would yell at my students if I was tired.

The one thing I am being careful about is not feeling sorry for myself. I can feel the tendency and I can even, sometimes, feel David’s expectation that maybe I’m in a funk. But even when I am doing something that is not, technically, “my task” – I am doing it not to be proud but because it’s when I need the task done, so I will do it, reminding myself that I am choosing to do it.

I also feel that it is an honor to be trusted with people. Kind of a slap in the face to be be trusted with 3 cats but 6 people? That’s kind of amazing.

And that isn’t me being sunshine and rainbows. I like them feeling both guided towards expectations (really with the Ritz cracker crumbs on the floor? You didn’t see that and clean up after yourself?) as well as cared for and allowed to focus on the things they need to. I care about these things as much as I value a well run house, finished laundry and stocked toilet paper.

I love the feeling of accomplishment, certainty and seeming control that fresh towels in all the bathrooms provides; especially during a global pandemic. During a time where so much is just, well, chaotic; a perfectly folded stack of towels and reliable source of washcloths – inclusive for everybody – is a really meaningful thing to be able to provide.

In a time where I am not “doing my best” only “doing”, towels cleaned and available is my bar.

Ok, my friends. It’s 7:15 and the taste of the fly that drowned in my strawberry, lemon & basil seltzer is finally out of my mouth. The weird “is that taco or is that a fly” sensation still looms a little on my tongue, but it is nothing a four click user path to get to a zoom call link and passcode can’t top as the worst thing ever.

To all the parents out their distant learning, I hope you don’t also have flies in your house.

Honestly? Where did they come from…