August 2008

I just returned from my very first trip to the Big Apple and it was love at first bite, once I got in, that is. The weather pattern sent us to Allentown, PA to wait it out. The occasion for the visit was work and fun. One of my daughters (#4 of 5) graduated from college and nursing school in May and passed her state board exam, which now places her in the possession of a registered nursing license and represents a tremendous amount of focus, determination and resilience on her part. It was time to celebrate!

We did most of the usual tourist activities. We rode the subway to the World Trade site and that was a sobering experience. Although I never personally viewed the Towers, much like the site of the Murrah building in Oklahoma City, a sense of hushed holiness was everywhere. This is sacred ground and no signs need to be posted to point it out. The energy shift in the hundreds of other tourist was palpable.

We went to Battery Park and after seeing the five hour waiting line for the water taxi, decided to wave to the leading lady of the harbor, Lady Liberty in all her green glory, from the shore. It was an interesting perspective of her I’d never seen before.

We walked north from the harbor area, through the financial district, down Wall Street and turned north to find China Town, Little Italy and Soho, which is so named because it is an area south of Houston Street. We walked and walked and then walked farther. The distance didn’t register with me because I was engrossed in the moment, the many faces coming toward me, the air rushing over me in the wind tunnel of lower Manhattan, the shops, the gum on the sidewalk, the sprawling smell of ethnic foods, their aromas all blending together in a lip smacking crescendo, being prepared in tiny little restaurant kitchens across the web of the city. We even stumbled upon the filming of a Burger King commercial. When you see poor Burger King running down the streets of NYC with two policemen on his tail, just remember, I was there! We even found out one can get to Yankee Stadium via Queens…it just takes a lot longer. We had a pretty big laugh over that, but we made it to the Bronx and found a “Clemens” t-shirt for my son-in-law with daylight to spare.

(photo courtesy geocities.com)

The highlight of the trip, if there can be only one, was seeing “Wicked” on Broadway. The show is based on the book, Wicked, the Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West. The show opens with Glinda the Good in her bubble over Munchkin Land, declaring that the Wicked Witch of the West is, indeed, dead. All the Munchkins cheer but one, who asks Glinda if it is true that the dead witch was actually her friend. That’s the shift in perspective, the twist, the hook that changes the way we saw everything.

In the interest of time and space, the story goes back in time to the school years of both Glinda and Elphaba, nicknamed Elphie. Elphie becomes the Wicked Witch of the West and Glinda becomes Glinda the Good. Elphie is green. You’ll have to see the show to find out how that happens, but I was struck by the idea that there was more than one green leading lady in NYC. Yes, that’s right, Liberty and Elphaba, green and cast in the role of a lifetime. And though they be separated by the years between 1886 and 1939, the message of freedom, possibility and transformation are simply profound mirrors of the possibility that exists for us all always.

Elpheba, meet Lady Liberty…she upstaged you by 53 years, but you share more than your greenness. You share your vision of hope and courage, your beauty and wisdom. It was nice to meet you both in New York. I am green with envy!

Have either of you ever taken the subway to Yankee Stadium via Queens?

Elphaba and Oz

You’re out of the woods
You’re out of the dark
You’re out of the night
Step into the sun, step into the light
Keep straight ahead
For the most glorious place
On the Face of the Earth
Or the sky

Hold onto your breath
Hold onto your heart
Hold onto your hope
March up to the gate
And bid it open

Lady Liberty and America

“Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

Much to my own astonishment, I ran the OKC Marathon in 2007. You can see an earlier post that discusses my experience of being a part of such a meaningful run, but the journey to that moment, the eight months of training, the view from the road while logging untold miles and the lessons I learned along the way about myself are what I will cherish forever.

Since then, running has been a little hit and miss for me. I enjoy it immensely, but it is so easy to make excuses for not taking that first step out my door. It’s too cold, it’s too hot, I’m too tired, I don’t have enough time, I don’t feel well, I didn’t sleep well last night, I need to work. I’m reading a new book. I would be more committed if I were training for an actual event. I could see that I had fallen into a familiar old rut. While my mind churned out excuse after excuse, the authentic me knew they were nothing but B.S. There’s no other way to say it.

I had choices, as we all do from a place of awareness. I was allowing my excuses and justifications to run my life. I was not in charge, a stubborn 15 year old was wielding all the power and I was just trying not to beat myself up about it. I wasn’t doing too well at that. Truth be told, I felt like a loser that I had trained my body to run for five hours at a time only to slide down to the level where pulling out three miles was a real challenge. I remember when it took a good three or four miles for me to even warm up when I was logging 45 miles a week.

When I trained for the marathon, I never ran with ear buds. It was strictly my body, my mind and the road. One of my daughters who ran distance in high school and college warned me that some events won’t allow ear buds and even if they did, I shouldn’t train with them because I would be at a real psychological disadvantage if the battery went dead on my MP3 player mid event and I had never learned the mental fortitude to keep going. She was right and I really leaned on my internal resources April 29, 2007.

Then one weekend not so many weeks ago, I got into a really good book, you know the kind that you just can’t put down? So, I basically sat in a chair all weekend and read that book, cover to cover. On reflection, I thought about how much I enjoyed the story, but how unproductive I felt. Then it hit me like the proverbial ton of bricks. I could download audible versions of books I want to read onto my MP3 player and listen to them while I run! I made the rule that I can only listen to the book while I am running. So, when I can’t bear to wait for the next page or chapter, I have to get my shoes on and hit the road. Brilliant!

I have faithfully logged an average of 12 miles a week since I began this “run and read” program and have even gotten my distance back to 8 miles and climbing. I have really improved how I feel, dropped a few pounds and read a few books I’ve been dying to read.

The real struggle for me here was to resist my temptation to go all the way down the “yellow brick road of beating myself up” because of my lack of motivation. In awareness, I was able to see the pattern and find another way to honor myself enough to take the hardest step in any fitness program, the first step out the door.

I was recently in attendance at a women business owners forum that included 15 business women from Rwanda who have been in Oklahoma City for four weeks as part of the Oklahoma City based  Institute for Economic Empowerment of Women’s Peace Through Business program. The forum was hosted by EWF International, which is also an Oklahoma City based company that provides professionally facilitated peer advisory groups for women business owners and executives.

These Rwandan women are simply incredible. They are bright and articulate, well educated and willing to do what ever it takes to succeed in business, with one caveat. Each woman expressed how her business model included more than profitability, it must also serve the greater good, the Rwandan people who live in scattered villages and live in extreme poverty. They actually do want to create peace and prosperity for all through business. 

I was asked to present a business issue to the group. The process is the genius behind EWF International, but it can be challenging. Basically, an issue is presented to the group, then the group is allowed to ask clarifying questions that I may answer. The last round is feedback from every forum member. This is the part where I don’t get to talk. No explanation, no “yeah, but,” no excuses. This is my opportunity to just be still, take it all in and actually hear what is being said. 

I mention all of this because somewhere in the clarifying question stage, I felt an old familiar companion creep in. His name is Self Doubt. He had lots to say to me as I tried to answer questions like, “what makes you qualified as a coach?” “What makes you different from other coaches?” “Why would I want to work with you?” I could feel the panic rising. My old companion, Self Doubt, whispered, “see, they know you…they see through you…who do you think YOU are, anyway?” I felt totally exposed and vunerable. In walked another old buddy, You’re Not Good Enough. He sat down beside me.

Later a friend told me that she saw me turn to moosh. She said that because I have always been known for directness with myself and others. My dad used to tell me that I called a spade a spade and sometimes I called it a damned old shovel. The truth is I allowed Self Doubt to creep in and take over. It happens to all of us from time to time and that’s just one of the many reasons I chose coaching as a profession.

Feeling vulnerable, belly up, is a horrible feeling of powerlessness. That is a false conclusion, of course, because each of us has a companion like Self Doubt who lingers just below the surface, but we don’t have to buy what he’s selling. We don’t have to give in and indulge him and let him bring in his buddies, Fear, Shame, Worthlessness. We have a choice. We have a great counter-measure and that’s Awareness.

From a place of awareness, I was able to hear the words without letting them completely engulf my mind. In Awareness I can see that as a human I will always have moments in which I feel inadequate. They are a natural function of the wounded ego, the false self. I can embrace them and say, “I know you are afraid, but I love you anyway. We can do it anyway.” Fear and action are not mutually exclusive. We can be afraid and do it anyway.

My willingness to be vulnerable and to experience it with awareness was actually a gift. I remembered that I can be belly up and I won’t die. I can always stand up.