Thank you for lines from the Tao Te Ching:

Map difficult through easy

Approach great through narrow

The most difficult things in the world

Must be accomplished through the easiest

The greatest things in the world

Must be accomplished through the smallest.

Thank you for the Morning Pages habit and benefits it brings.

Thank you for the color and smell of gochugaru.

Thank you for allowing thoughts. (This may be a repeat.) Years ago I set the rule that thoughts are a safe space. I decided never to shut out a thought, whether it imagines something heinous like beating up an old lady or cursing out a little kid, or is randomly inappropriate like yelling in a library. There is no, “Stop thinking about it.”

The freedom encourages me to process. I’m not pushing out but am tugging and digging —“From where does this thought or feeling arise? Why is it here? What would result from acting on it?”

To me, it’s like the Bible passage Mark 9:43-47 advising that if your eye or hand causes you to sin, then cut it off. I (mis)interpret that advice as a call to seek causes. When we look at the cause of a less-than-healthy inclination, it won’t be a hand or an eye. It may instead be the influences we absorb (media we consume, for instance, or people we’re around)…stuff like that. 

Thank you for how Peaches has transformed my life. It’s a lesson in the ease of making a difference. Peaches doesn’t talk. She has zero dollars or education and very little stuff. Her meals are humble. Her dress, basic. She’s content with simplicity. She accepts and she forgives. Being real—exuberant, affectionate, calm, aware, curious, hungry, vulnerable—how much light she adds to the world!

Thank you for the vets and vet techs and front desk staff at Aztec Animal Clinic caring for my sweet lady.

Thank you for geese honking in the sky over SR 313.

Thank you for a new way to see life challenges (a bike ride thought). The sum of them can seem like a mountain—a heap of difficulties piled up, blocking freedom. To whittle down the mountain, we may use what meager or grand tools we have to dig. 

As we plow down, though, life adds on. We start to realize—we’ll never level it this way. So how do we make a real dent? And how will doing so ever help if life relentlessly builds? The struggle will be nonstop. 

The thought was, external life doesn’t block our way. We needn’t combat nature because the Mountain that’s stalling us isn’t out there. I mean, rather than referring to happenings beyond us, the heap of hardships is within—in the way we think and feel about the landscape outside.

Since it’s in our minds, it’s not actually blocking our way through the external world. Not having “level ground” outside us is compatible with moving forward as long as we have choices. And as for the ranges in our heads that seem insurmountable, we can actually think our way through them. In their center, deep under the base, are seeds from which our living inner mountains grow.  We can examine that base and below it to the roots. Then, even the inner peaks are not obstacles but guides.

Thank you for the OG male supermodel on the RRP discussing mental health for men and the call for them to engage in real and vulnerable ways. Thank you also for the talk of mentors. 

Thank you for my first serious mentors (in grad school on the west coast). It’s counterintuitive how they built me up by giving break after break. They weren’t hard on me. They didn’t rage or insult. It showed me to be kinder to myself. In turn, I felt warmer toward others. 

Thank you for stable and mature adults who communicate wisdom from experience to those in their charge. 

Thank you for sureness that solidifies from questioning what we deserve. Thank you for awareness as a byproduct of discerning other perspectives. Thank you for compassion.

Thank you for luxurious self-care rituals. 

Thank you for little happy moments like quiet breakfasts, rides lost in thought, warm baths, cozy bedtimes, fun reads, movie nights, heartfelt chats, doggy cuddles…that strung together make for a happier life.

Thank you for BT hanging curtains in my room as a surprise. Thank you for her patience and understanding during a challenging time.

Thank you for unapologetic hope in truth and healing for all, with the understanding that I’m responsible solely for my own truth and healing. Please wish me healing. Please wish me success in efforts to stay clear of what is less than healthy and focus on what nourishes (like gratitude). If you are choosing to read this, I hope you find nourishment in it, too. 

Thank you for this article on self sabotage and for this quote from it: “Love the person you’re becoming, and believe you have something special to share with the world.”