Eat, Pray, Love: Review

It's been a while since I posted a book review. I've been sort of busy doing other things and not taking time for my #1 favourite activity. And to be honest, Eat, Pray, Love: One Woman's Search for Everything Across Italy, India and Indonesia is not a book you read. It's a book to be Savoured. Word by word and sentence by sentence. Like hand-turned Italian gelato. Like a morning meditation. Like the gathering dew on a Bali rice field.

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It took me 2 months to read Eat, Pray, Love on purpose, because I knew from the beginning that there was a wealth of life for me to find in it. A life of pleasure, and prayer, and passion. And a life of love, and balance, and growth. I rationed it. Alternated it with my own journey, with books of learning. With life.

I don't know if I've ever had so many favourite passages in a book. Or felt so much like an author was speaking not to but for me. I want to re-read it instantly. And towards the end I let go - I read late. I read early. I stayed in my pj's on Saturday and read some more.

It may not be that I can even recreate for you the beauty and humour and soul of Eat, Pray, Love. So I will just say please read this. Right now.

A couple quotes, since I have no words of my own

• As David once put it, 'You have the opposite of poker face. You have like ... miniature golf face.' [see, sounds like no one more than me, right?
• The Bhagavad Ghita - that ancient Indian Yogic text - says that it is better to live your own destiny imperfectly than to live an imitation of somebody else's life with perfection. So now I have started living my own life. Imperfect and clumsy as it may look, it is resembling me now, thoroughly.

Family Interrupted

It's a mixed-bag around here right now. And I came home and am watching a documentary called 'Boy Interrupted' about a family that lost their 15 year-old son to depressive Bipolar-related suicide. It's a beautiful film - never morose or over-wrought. The filmmakers are the boys parents, and they do a great job of sharing their pain and confusion and love and frustration.  

I'm achingly grateful that sometimes 15 year olds don't know how to end their lives. And horrified that some do. And wish I knew what to do to get people at least talking about teen mental health and suicide, because I'm so convinced that talking about it would make a difference.

As the Quran says, (Chapter 5, verse 32), "anyone who saves one life, it is as if he has saved the whole of mankind."

I Just Haven't Met You Yet (or Have I?)

I took a little road trip today up to the 'Mo to see my parents & my bestest twin cousin & his lovely wife & kids. So that was awesome. What was also awesome was cranking my tunes, & roaring up and down Highway 1 with nothing but the Jade Dragon and my thoughts for company. It was a good drive. Though even after 4 months I still have a hard time driving through Duncan and not taking the right turn into Mill Bay. I've really been missing Cowboy the past 10 days or so. Now that the rest of life is falling into place, I've space to think of him, to reminisce about the great times we had together, and to contemplate again what worked, what didn't work, and what was missing from my side. The terms "baby" and "bathwater" occur to me a lot. So a lot of my drive I was busy looking backwards - no regrets, just questions.

Honestly, and I know some of you will be surprised to hear me admit this, I have been very lucky in love. I choose a wonderful father for my sons. I have had fantastic friends who became lovers, who became friends again. One of my go-to people for 12 years continues to teach me and stand for me and call me on shit and make me smile and giggle and blush. Some have chosen not to be friends, and that's their prerogative, but it sure doesn't diminsh my affection and respect. And hellz ya, I've dated jerks, and learned from them as well.

And while I'm choosing not to date right now, it's no reflection on any of them. Two of them I would consider totally workable, possible, 'maybe someday' options if they were willing and interested and if we grew in ways that make us more compatible instead of less.

So all of that was on my mind as I descended the Malahat this evening. Cruising, passing, lane-changing, reminscing. And then this song came on. And I thought - hey! When did I read Michael Buble my journals?

I'm Not Surprised

Not Everything Lasts

Have Broken My Heart So Many Times,

I Stopped Keepin Track.

Talk Myself In

I Talk Myself Out

I Get All Worked Up

Then I Let Myself Down.

I'm slightly embarrassed to realise how like me the words are. And also slightly relieved that I'm not the only one. I'm drumming on the steering wheel, tapping my foot, singing at the top of my lungs! What's that, Michael, you too have

I Tried So Very Hard Not To Lose It

I Came Up With A Million Excuse

I Thought I Thought Of Every Possibility

And I'm smiling. And laughing at myself. And dreaming. And I'm promising the promises from the bottom of my heart as Michael sings

And I Know Someday That It'll All Turn Out

You'll Make Me Work So We Can Work To Work It Out

And I Promise You Kid That I'll Give So Much More Than I Get

I Just Haven't Met You Yet

And suddenly I'm 100% focused forward - excited about the future that awaits me as of January 1, 2011. I don't know who you are, or who I'll be then, and maybe you are someone I've already met and didn't recognise because I was busy looking at me. But my gosh are we going to have fun working it out!

I Might Have To Wait
I'll Never Give Up
I Guess It's Half Time
And The Other Half's Luck
Wherever You Are
Whenever It's Right
You Come Out Of Nowhere And Into My Life


And I Know That We Can Be So Amazing

And Being In Your Life Is Gonna Change Me

And Now I Can See Every Single Possibility

Whoops-a-Daisy

Somehow I forgot to post on Thursday. Guess I need a new reminder system - I don't think I've missed a Thursday in a long while.

Having a nice quiet Saturday at home and heading off-line and out of doors in a few minutes, but first let me introduce you to a blog I found just now (and have added to "Blogs I Read") - Big Girl Bombshell. She's sassy, brilliant, sparkly, fun, and (I'm guessing) well-rounded & has the best blog design ever and great content. :)

That's all for now; the beach calls.
___________________________

I came back from the beach & wrote 800 words. And then I read them. And realised I've said it all before.

Deliciously Dull & Temporarily Chaste, or Fun with Homonyms

I promised the other day a deliciously dull update. In fact, I’ve never been so excited about having ‘nots’ in my life. Instead of feeling like these spaces are emptiness, all I see is freedom and choice and the ability to create what I REALLY want: Being Healthy, Wealthy & Wise.

So here are my THREE FREE’s for the rest of 2010:

Sugar Free

So far so good. It’s day three and my only symptom of withdrawl was actually because I wasn’t drinking coffee, which was an oversight, and not part of the overall Freedom plan. And, to be honest, my version of sugar-free and yours may be vastly different. I am eating as much fruit as I can – much more than I normally do. That’s because fruit has enough sugar to satisfy my cravings, but also a whole lot of other benefits I need that Dairy Milk bars – no matter which variety - simply don’t deliver. Fibre, vitamins, texture, flavour, fun. Dried fruit, fresh fruit, fruit smoothies. Yes, overall this likely doesn’t impact my blood sugars (which are just fine, thank you very much), but it does impact my overall feeling of health and vitality. And for a girl to go from 2-4 sugary snacks a day to fruit is a pretty big move. Especially when it just occurred to me, once the drama queen was adequately silenced on Friday night, that I don’t need sugar. I just don’t. All done. As my body uses up the sugar I've already over-loaded it with (something like a year's supply for a smaller nation, in the last 4 months) I'm sure I'll ease back on the fruit as well. But for now it's a good start. A balanced start. [committed sugar-free until July 18; will re-assess then]

Over-Draft Free

I have an overdraft on my chequing account. And it has been at least 10 years since I considered that over-draft anything other than ‘my money.’ Yes, I get charged both fees and interested when I use ‘my money’ to that extent, but it seems like my money none-the-less. Well, not anymore. For the first time ever, I’m excited about my budget. I’m excited about figuring out what it will take to replace the furniture I want to replace, how much I’ll have to save and by when to take myself to Paris, if there’s room for a family trip at Christmas. I have a fancy spreadsheet on my laptop that tracks actual spending v. Budgeted amounts and calculates both bar graphs and pie charts (I am such a sucker for colour coded charts!). And I have a simple, fun & always accessible app on my iPhone (based on the book & program Wealth Watchers http://www.ewealthwatchers.com/) that calculates my daily disposable income based on my fixed expenses, then tells me each day if I’m over or under that day’s allotment. Over time it averages, gives monthly totals, etc. And it too is colour coded (colour coding is clearly the secret to financial freedom). So really this promise is to track my spending every day and live to my budget; but I needed it to be 'free' and one benfit will definitely be losing the over-draft habit.

Man Free

Which, as we learned on Friday, goes hand-in-hand with my commitment to being drama free (or at least forcing the drama queen back into exile when she tries to regain her throne). And while I’d been toying with this idea, or resisting this idea, or wondering why on earth someone would want to do this since I ended my relationship with Cowboy in February, I made the decision over a week ago. And then I waffled. And then I thought that if I didn’t say anything to anyone I could just pretend I’d never made the promise to myself. And then I faltered and life got messy. And then I realised that the promises I make to myself are the ones that matter most. So, for the next 6 months and 9 days I am going to be dateless-by-choice & temporarily chaste. And no, those two things don’t necessarily go together (if you are a parent or son of mine, I’m sorry – this paragraph should have had a warning).

I have been discovering about myself and observing some behaviours I am not all that fond or proud of. And I don’t mean to sound like I’m judging myself, but, well, I haven’t yet learned how to respect myself and request the respect of others when all I want is for them to love me, to really really love me. Or how to show up as just me in a relationship instead of trying to gain information and evidence for who you would like me to be. Miss Lady suggested it long ago, but she's young - what does she know. And I could never quite get the idea out of my mind. And then last week while perusing the blog of a co-21.5.800-er I found a kindred spirit who'd been there, done that, an reaped the benefits

So for 6 months and 9 days I’m going to learn. Not through more trial and error, but through treating myself with respect and re-learning (maybe for the first time?) what I offer in a relationship. It’s already making a difference – last week I had dinner with a friend I’ve had a crush on for years, and instead of wondering what he was thinking ABOUT ME, and if I laughed too loudly or not enough, and if I’d made all the foods he likes, and ME ME ME ME ME I could just be with him and chat and laugh and get to know him as a person instead of wondering which trap is best to catch this particular prey. It’s oh so freeing not to have that in the space!

I thought of all these things choices while laying in my bed Friday. And then I slept through the night for the first time in months. I woke up Saturday full of energy and ready to focus on other people. And I spent the weekend mostly off-line and doing things I love. And I slept all night Saturday. And all night Sunday.

This low-drama life is something I could get used to. Who knows, if this keeps up I may even stop over-filling my schedule!