Forgiveness

"Forgiveness is not always easy.  At times it feels more painful than the wound we suffered, to forgive the one who inflicted it. And yet, there is no peace without forgiveness. "
-- Marianne Williamson

I am my toughest critic. I'm harder on me than any of you could ever be. I beat myself up over things that I've said, done or thought. I replay scenes in my head  more times than I can count.

I admit, sometimes I mess up. But you do too.  We're all just human. We all have the ability to love and we all have the ability to forgive.

Saying I'm sorry takes a lot of courage. It makes you vulnerable. It's putting yourself out there in front of someone you've hurt. Someone you care about, even love. All in the hope that they can find it in their heart to forgive you.

There are very few things in this world that I think I couldn't forgive. I'm guessing if you slept with my husband that might be one of them. Other than that, I think I could find forgiveness.

Some wise person once said, to err is human. Owning your mistake takes courage. So does forgiveness.

Forgiveness is freeing. Carrying anger weighs us down. Makes our hearts heavy.

Admitting when you've screwed up, no matter how hard, lets us inhale fully. And breath is life. We can inhale  the positive and exhale the negative.

I am human. I make mistakes. I will try and forgive myself. Can you?

Peace and love. 

Work it, girl!

They say there is a first time for everything.  And I would say that generally, I'm up for trying anything once.  I mean, why not? Life's short, you only live once, blah, blah, blah.  So today, I tried something that I've never done before. It's one of those things that looms on the outskirts of my reality.  Something kind of dark, mysterious, a bit naughty even.  Something my mother would surely not approve of. It piqued my curiosity enough to gather three friends together to try it.

Pole dancing.  A tiny bit naughty, wouldn't you agree??

The ladies and I had purchased a Groupon a few months ago and it was about to expire.  So we called Ashley (of course) at Vertical Addition (truth) and signed ourselves up for a beginner class at 9:30am (the sexiest time of the day).

I had visions of the space looking like Scores (not that I've been there), very dark and smokey with a stage and a shiny, gleaming pole front and center with a spotlight shining on it.  Lots of surgically enhanced young, hard bodies contorting themselves into very unladylike positions.  But in fact, it was a fairly plain room with some mirrors and five or six poles bolted into the ceiling.

Besides my ever so fabulous friends, the rest of the clientele was rather plain as well.  With the exception of a rather large woman, who whipped out some knee pads and some sort of half-sock like contraption to make her spin around the pole faster.  Yikes!  She, I can promise you, would not make very much money at Scores!

But between all our nervous giggling, we did pretty well.  The class started out with a "warm up" which included some rather suggestive hip circles and neck rolls (to really get the ponytail whipping around).  She then had us stretching our hamstrings, because no one wants to pull a hammie on the pole!  Finally, we ended our warm up with a full split.  Which, I am proud to say, I was the only one that could do that!!  Thank you yoga practice!  My friends all called me a show off.  :-)

We then took to the pole and learned a basic spin, something called a compass spin, and some sort of crazy floor move that's supposed to look sexy but was really quite a disaster. Finally a move where you pull yourself onto the pole, squeeze REALLY hard with your thighs and, if you're feeling very brave, release your arms out the the side.  Ouch!!  No seriously.  Ouch!!

By this time in the class, we were all hysterical, though trying to be very serious as to not be rude to the other students who were all really serious.  Ashley announces that it's time to dance, like, with the pole. Seriously, I'm not kidding.  It was supposed to be freestyle, using the techniques she showed us and pulling it all together in some kind of hot stay-at-home-mommy meets 50 Shades of Gray routine.  Well...I mean who can keep a straight face??  It was just too much.

By the end of class we all had lots of bruises up and down our legs (which is very sexy), tired arms and a whole new respect for the girls who can really work the pole.

Two of my friends said they'd definitely go back for more.  One even said she wants to put a retractable pole in her bedroom!  I can only envision some kind of epic pole disaster happening and having to explain to the kids why mommy has a traumatic brain injury.

As for me, I think I'll check that off my list of things I've done, not sure about a second class though.

But in the meantime, maybe I'll show off some of my new found skills to Mr. X this evening.  That is, if I don't pull a hammie in the process!!

Peace and love.

Well it's about time!

OK, ok, so I've been a little out of it lately.  A lot out of it actually.  I just looked at the last time I wrote and it was back in September!!  What can I say?  I've been uninspired.  Writers block.  Good thing I'm not trying to make a living at this, I would have lost the house and starved to death by now.

And speaking of starving...

As many of you know, or at least those of you who I see and speak with regularly, I am in a constant battle with 10lbs.  Ten measly pounds.  OK, maybe 12.  Anyway, for a long as I can remember I've been dieting and working out (then not dieting and not working out) all in an effort to rid my middle of 10 pounds.

Let's think about this for a minute.  I'll list all the things that I can think of that are 10 pounds.  Here we go:

1.  my dog
2.  Primo at birth (not quite 9.2lbs.)
3.  my makeup bag
4.  my basket full of dirty laundry
5.  the boys container of miscellaneous Legos
6.  my entire collection of yoga mats
7.  my pile of half-read books

I'm sure there's plenty more but that's what I could quickly come up with.  10 pounds.  The bane of my existence.

So beginning Monday, me and two dozen other brave, competitive (or maybe crazy) people are forming teams to being the Game On Diet.  The basic gist of it is you compete with other teams to earn points based on exercising, eating, drinking (water, not the fun kind), sleeping (yes, sleeping!) and forming heathy habits.  The team that wins gets bragging rights.  Oh and a $25 iTunes gift card. The losing team...well, they're just losers.

I know a few people who have done this and have said that it's really fun and have lost a few pounds too!  So I'm going to give it a try.

Here's the thing about me, I'm really competitive.  So I figure I should be really good at this. Though I am a bit worried about how much water you have to drink each day (3 liters!!!  That's like 90ozs!!). I'm pretty sure I'll have to cancel all appointments over the next few weeks because I'll be in the bathroom peeing.

I will track my progress and report back weekly to give you the highs and lows of this game.

But until Monday, I think I'll just slug around, eating chips and drinking wine.

Peace and love.