Ordinary Life, Extraordinary Living

Abundance During a Recession

I've never felt abundance like I have during this recession.

It's a paradox. As my monthly income has dropped to its lowest level in years, and the sales cycle is longer than I ever imagined, I'm experiencing abundance.

Photo by *sean.

Abundance looks like this:

• Getting a gift certificate in the mail for a 30-minute massage,  from an SEO consultant I used once, several years ago.  Just in time to treat myself on my birthday. 
• Finding that the certified massage therapist is in training to do healing energy work. In return for another body to practice on, I'm getting free "energy work" for the next nine months. (BTW--if you want to get in on this and you are in the Boulder area, contact Joni Rumsey, jonilynn4 [at] msn.com. In addition to giving *great* massages, Joni is a natural healer and has a wonderfully gentle demeanor.) Photo by Perfecto Insecto
• Hearing that my sons opened up a bank account at 1stBank and that the first $50 was matched by the bank. Free money!
• Spending time with extended family at a first communion,  a high school graduation, and over a long weekend in the mountains. Meeting new people at a pot luck for the choir my husband sings in. Enjoying home-cooked dishes throughout. Bringing a big pot of fresh, sweet, buttered corn-on-the cob to share. Playing Monopoly and Boggle and miniature golf with family and enjoying every moment of it.
• Finding my favorite candy (Enstrom's Toffee), on sale at a local grocery store, at less than $5 a pound, when it normally is $19 a pound.  In the orange juice section, no less! Go figure.
• Running across an Origins store in Boulder that advertises complimentary facials. I signed up with my sister, mom, and nieces for a ladies' afternoon out. 
• Enjoying the personality and love of my cat, Yama. Our first family pet, he's doted on by everyone, to which he responds with loyalty, rich purrs, and "head butts." 
• Taking a decorative jewelry box with small compartments and turning it into a collage of my kids at different ages, as a Mother's Day gift for my mother-in-law. I had fun looking through old photos and she had fun receiving the end product. 
• Sampling beginning tai-chi at the local recreation center, for less than $9 a lesson. Doing chi gong (another form of energy work) with my mom on Sunday mornings.
• Flowers blooming in my backyard, with a wonderful fragrance that fills the air. 
• Getting help, left and right, from the participants in the Networking Naturally Program, to help improve the next version of it and build it into a thriving business. 
• Taking two-hour naps on the weekends and not feeling like I needed to do anything more than give into the urge.
• Receiving free coaching and consulting from a marketing expert over many months, as he starts up a new business to help small business owners. Again, I'm a test case as he hones his craft. 
• Connecting with my husband in lively discussions on politics, public policy, and education. 
• Having a long lunch at the perfect restaurant with my sister and mom, paid for by a gift card received last Christmas.
• Discovering that the Lululemon Athletica store in Boulder provides a free yoga class on Sunday evenings, with invited instructors each week. Photo by judepics.
• Having time with my kids on the way to school every morning, and getting their viewpoint on everything from driving (cool) to award ceremonies (not cool) to summer jobs (cool if it involves computers.) 
• Receiving a gift card for a local bookstore from a fellow coach, as a thank you for a recent referral. 
• Connecting with some great people on Twitter and finding blogs like The Inspired Writer, with gorgeous photos of flowers.

There's more, but that's plenty.

Abundance comes in many forms--in relationships, time, meaning, health, peace of mind, intellectual stimulation, expertise, and yes, money.

I'm convinced that abundance is about my state of mind--being able to see it, sometimes right in front of me, and being grateful for it. It's magical in how it appears. Recognizing abundance seems to create even more abundance. 

How are you experiencing abundance? 

Photo by The Marmot.

Spreading Gratitude Through Twitter and Blogs

I'm still trying to figure out how I want to use Twitter, a micro-blogging service that's getting press and becoming more mainstream. One of the fun uses: organizing a conversation around a specific topic, with a bunch of people you may or may not know ("followers" in Twitter language.)

In the blogging world, people have referred to this as a meme. Never quite understood this to the depth that I wanted to. But I think I started a meme today, when I provided this "tweet":

"I'm grateful for: lunch with sis and mom, middle of workday. Homemade "jook," Chinese rice porridge, acquired taste. And you? #gratefulfor"

If you aren't familiar with Twitter, each tweet can be no more than 140 characters. It pays to be concise.

You'll notice "#gratefufor" at the end of the tweet. That's called a "hashtag," a searchable identifier to find more tweets on a specific topic. Read more about hashtags here and here.

Well, probably more than you want to know. To participate on the conversation on Twitter, get an account if you don't already have one (it's free, like most social media tools these days), fill in the "what are you doing?" box with what you are grateful for, and be sure to add the hashtag, #gratefulfor, somewhere in the message.

If you want to get my updates on Twitter ("tweets"), search on my Twitter name, carolross, and click on Follow Me, underneath my photo. You'll see a list of my tweets, which so far, has been sporadic, with a "dipping my toe in the water" feel to it. Now I know how new bloggers feel.

If you'd rather skip the Twitter route, post the six things you are grateful for here or on your own blog. To start off, six things I'm grateful for, right now:

1. A sunny, blue sky day in Colorado.
2. Being home after traveling the last two weeks.
3. A husband and two teenage sons who I adore, testosterone and all.
4. Getting a large Bhakti chai at the local coffee shop for free, after completing my frequent buyer card.
5. Time to reflect, think deeply, and generate new ideas.
6. Filling up my gas tank for $20.

I think the protocol with memes is to tap other bloggers to do the same exercise--six things you are grateful for, right here, right now. I'm tapping Mitchell Ashley, Stephanie West-Allen, Simon Young, Paul Merrill, Deb Cooperman, and Marissa Bracke. 

Gratefulness in Full Color

Here's a video that I really love, sent to me by a friend. I hope you love it as much as I do.  Many thanks to Marissa for helping me figure out how to embed a YouTube video in a blog post. (Yes, I really was an engineer at one time!) What does gratefulness look like for you?

Homelessness: A Glimpse into a Foreign Land

I previously announced the newest blogger in my family,  Ryan, my nephew. A twenty-something, he has been blogging about his experience in the Jesuit Volunteer Corps, working in a resource center for homeless men and helping them navigate the court system in Oakland, CA. He lives on a very small stipend, in a house with other volunteers. He writes about his clients, what they experience, and how he's a stranger in the foreign land of homelessness. This, from a college graduate of a major university, who lived in a comfortable suburb of Denver with his parents after finishing school.

What I admire about Ryan's writing is that he brings me closer to the human experience--the parts that we know deep down in our gut but which we divert our attention from in our daily lives. Who among us has not felt the uncomfortable feeling of isolation? Or on the other side, of wanting to detach from those in society who were reminders of "but for the grace of God, go I?" Ryan's posts also help me remember that I  have so much, both materially and in terms of support and relationships, and that I often fail to appreciate or put into context the abundance that I'm blessed with. 

A colleague recently blogged about her experience with a close friend who had fallen on tough times. She talked about receiving desperate phone calls from motels and good intentions turning into visits to the ER with high blood alcohol levels and not knowing how to help.

Are they so different from us, the fringes of society who show us what mental illness and alcohol abuse look like? It's good to get a glimpse of the foreign land, to teach us compassion, to connect us to human souls who have lost their way but who have the map inside of them, to practice gratitude.

There, but for the grace of God, go I.

The Gift of Long Walks on a Winter Afternoon

During this holiday break, I've been taking long walks in the afternoons with my sister. She moved to my town last year, after living in other states and countries for decades.

Inspired by the crisp winter air and the snowy landscape, we let our minds wander to places that normal conversation doesn't usually touch. One day, we reminisced about Christmas trees from our childhood--how our parents were the only ones who placed the tree on top of a coffee table, probably to make it seem bigger than it really was.  Every December, the holder of stacks of magazines and an infrequently used celadon green ashtray transformed into the dais for Santa's gifts.

Yesterday, we talked about our father's last days in the hospital before succumbing to a year-long struggle with cancer. Our father died over thirty years ago. My family of origin has always been private with their feelings. For me and my siblings, things have gotten better as we've become adults and found more emotive spouses. But in the 70's, when talking about dying and death was relegated to professionals inside hospitals and funeral homes, we just didn't say much, even if we felt all sorts of things inside.

What a gift it is to have time with my sister now. Twelve years older, she had the perspective of an adult in knowing our dad. She was in her twenties when he died, and was my mom's right hand woman and confidante in dealing with the details of a chronic illness and preparing for my father's death.  I was 13 and knew him more as the strong authoritarian figure who withered away to skin and bones.

My sister gave me some flesh to put on the bones, along with a good dose of love. She told me that my father talked about taking me on a trip when he got well, suggesting that we go to Disneyland. She remembers him being so optimistic, when the prognosis was so bleak. I have no recollection of his words or his intent. I only knew that the way the household felt, we were in for a long battle with a disease called cancer.

I remember the impact of the illness on the family. She remembers the signs of his love for us.

I was old enough to stand vigil with my sister and mother during my father's last days in the hospital, yet I stayed home with my two older brothers. Only adults took up their places in hospitals, watching over the last stages of dying, when this world and the next world intermingle.

My father, from his hospital bed, asked to see "the girl." My sister went to his bedside, thinking he was summoning her. He asked again to see "the girl," the other girl. My father was asking for me. I'm not sure what he would have said to me if I had been there. What I do know is that I was on his mind near the end.

In the last days of 2007, in the waning afternoon sunlight, my sister gives me the gift of my father's love. Like a bottle with a missive transported throught the oceans of time, the message is clear and lucid.  I am truly grateful. 

Jay, the Appliance Repair Man

We have a house that's of age. Unlike people who become of age, a house becoming of age is nothing to celebrate. It means that things naturally break down, one after another. Closet doors come off their tracks and flap in the virtual wind of the indoors. Handles to microwave doors break off.  Dishwashers make alarmingly loud noises and refuse to clean thoroughly, leaving particles of dried rice and whatever cereal you had for breakfast on bowls and plates. Patio lights go dark, even with new bulbs installed. Furnaces become not just inefficient, but unsafe.

I have a secret weapon to combat the most annoying of breakdowns--Jay, the Appliance Repair Man. While he doesn't call me by my first name, he knows me by sight. Jay showed up at the door this week, to install new parts for our dishwasher that had been part of a recall. "Use of Rinse-Aid causes electrical short-circuit, resulting in fire." It's not a headline that CNN or the Denver Post or even the Boulder Daily Camera would use. But it's one that the manufacturer of our dishwasher blasted in a letter to us last month.

As Jay entered the house, he remembered my face. "Oh yes, I condemned your dryer a few years ago."  Yep, that was me with the wet laundry.

Jay condemned my old dishwasher before that. And left me voicemail when I called about the dishwasher not getting things clean ("A teaspoon of Tang and a rinse cycle and call me in the morning.") 

Today was a freebie and I got my money's worth--three times over. Jay installed new wiring, insulation, gasket, and dishwasher door. He also fixed my stove top knobs that have been loose for the last few years (metal inserts got misplaced over the years.) Best of all, he figured out how to turn my refrigerator light back on. My family had been rummaging through the fridge for the last two years in the dark, not knowing if the food container held lasagna or boiled eggs, until it reached the light of day.

There is something miraculous that happens when small, chronic problems get fixed. The miracle is not in the fixing. It is in the receiving. Having two problems fixed in one day leaves me on top of the world, grateful for Jay's knowledge about appliances and talent for tinkering until the job gets done. 

If I can feel this good about light coming into my fridge and stove top knobs that fit, what else could I fix in my life? 

What Makes Me Happy

What I'm noticing makes me happy these days:

1. New filing cabinets. Actually the thought of new filing cabinets makes me happy. I've been living with stacks of files on my office floor and on countertops for the last year. 
2. Customer service that makes my life easy. The sales person at the office furniture store was able to email me links to pictures of the file cabinets that fit what I wanted. Ordering over the phone, 4-6 weeks for shipment. And then he realized when sending me a quote that they had two misordered file cabinets in the show room, available now, $100 less than the quote, for the same amount of space and meeting my configuration and appearance requirements. Now that's good service.
3. Home-made certificates from my eleven-year old son entitled: "Stop-playing-video games-or else certificate, usable twice" and "Get-outside-now-or-else certificate, usable twice."  Presented on Mother's Day.
4. Tulips in my backyard.  Deep pink, tall and statuesque. Pink and white, fluffy. Orange and yellow, with fringe at the top.
5. Having great colleagues to work with, who exceed both the client's and my own expectations. 
6. A chocolate birthday cake, with chocolate ganache filling, and buttercream frosting. Ordered from a pastry shop in my own town.
7. Win-win. While getting paperwork notarized at the local insurance agent, I asked about insurance for my business that I was already in the process of shopping for. The notary public beamed with delight when I asked. The insurance agent got a prospective client, I got my paperwork done, and a lead for another quote.
8. Bike rides with my sister on a Saturday morning. Meandering through town, at a leisurely pace, stopping at the local coffee shop.

What makes me happy is also what I'm grateful for.  Look around your life and my bet is that you'll find alot that makes you happy and even more to be grateful for.

Lost and Found

Lost last week:

• Garage door opener
• Cell phone
• Prescription eye glasses (with high index lenses, Varilux progressive bifocals, and anti-reflective coating)
• Son, skiing at Copper Mountain

Found last week:

• The wisdom of asking for help.  Son in backseat finds garage door opener underneath driver's seat.
• The goodness of strangers. Voice answering my cell phone informs me he found my phone on the Copper Mountain and will turn it into the attendant at the bottom of the lift.
• The insight into how much I depend on my eyes to learn and read and work. Never did find my eyeglasses. Thank god for LensCrafters where I can get glasses in a day.
• The delight of seeing my son and him seeing me, on the Copperfield trail of Copper Mountain. 

What have you lost and found over the last week?

Reflections on the Year

Here's a great exercise for looking back on the year from my coach, Shirley Anderson:

At year’s end, I generally ask my clients to list 25 things they are most proud of accomplishing in the past year.  And also, what do they regret or wish had turned out differently. I think you’ll find it totally worthwhile and very heart-warming.

I tried a version of this with two clients last week and it was a nice way to end the year.  Instead of the client listing 25 things, we traded off things that we were grateful for in the last year, until the client and I both had listed 10 things. You could easily do this with a spouse or friend. I found I had few regrets and many blessings.

BTW--Shirley is the founder of the long-running Coaching Salon. If you aren't familiar with it, check it out.  It's a great venue for learning and wisdom, independent of what you do for a living.

Sisters

My sister is twelve years older than me. The last time we lived in the same town was nearly 40 years ago, when I shared a bedroom with her.  She went away to college when I was six.

For over twenty years, she lived in Asia. When she moved to Hawaii, she was considered close--at least in the same country.  We got the same TV shows. 

This past August, she moved to the same town I live in, just a five minute walk from my house.  It has been an odd and wonderful feeling to have my sister so close by. I am used to seeing her once a year, usually in the summer, on "home leave." Now, we go for walks in the morning or run errands together.  I can call her up and she's ready in a flash to go out for lunch. We ride bikes together. 

The convenience of our relationship has been great. She is slightly smaller than I am, so we swap clothes when she's bought something too big or I have something too tight. 

In many ways, we are not alike at all. My sister likes glitz and sparkle. She was most at home when she lived in Hong Kong.  I like wrapping gifts in brown paper and raffia and adding a pine cone from my backyard. My sister has always been right-brained, loving mythology and studying Asian literature in college. I went the left-brain route with engineering and math.  My sister can be temperamental and sometimes even downright pushy.  She fit in well with New Yorkers when she was grad school at Columbia. Most people describe me as even keel and diplomatic (except when I'm not...)

Despite our differences, my sister and I can erupt into laughter with just a few words spoken between us.  We know how to use humor with each other such that our stomachs hurt from small chuckles turned into huge guffaws.

I didn't realize how much I missed having a sister in my daily life. What a joy to discover a loss only through having it filled later in life.