I Say Hooray

Let me officially lend my voice to the bulk of women on this planet, as we say:

HOORAY!

For more Hugh Jackman

Egg Crackers #1 - An Old Question, Made Entirely New

I've discovered one of the best gifts the universe can offer is a walking buddy who will ask you imponderables in the early morning.

Here's my most recent favorite. So, anyone who's been on any sort of formal personal growth path (including being about to graduate and talking to career counselors), has been asked the question "If you had all the money you'd ever need, what would you do?" or "What would your perfect day look like?" or "If you didn't have to work, what would you do with your life?" I'm no exception, and I have a laundry-list of pre-fab answers to these questions I've heard a hundred times. Kind of defeats their usefulness. Bhadra threw me the question in a whole new way, though... she asked:

"Imagine you didn't have your childhood, and all your life up to this point. If it were all just starting today, what do you want to do with it?"

See, all my prefab answers were based around things I've found joy in in the past - music, theater, facilitating growth in others, travel... but this isn't the past anymore. This question has the strange effect of requiring a deep awareness of intuition and the call of my spirit, right here, right now, in real time. And my being so stumped at the question seems to show me that's not something I'm so practiced at. It cracks my egg open. I love it.

If it's all new, right now... what do you want to make with it?

Around The House #2 - Smooth Suffering

This one's not really an alternative home remedy, as expected in the hippie sense... but it is a remedy of sorts, and a little alternative. Okay, maybe a lot alternative. But I love it.

The Russian mystic Gurdjieff said that addiction to suffering was the one he had the hardest time getting his students to give up*, and I can relate. I mean, we've got to struggle a little in life to make it worthwhile, right?

Well, I'm tired of fighting out there. I think I'll control how I receive my pain from now on, thanks. Conveniently, I've found a great way to get all the torture I could ever need in one place. I've also decided it's okay to relinquish my old quasi-feminist body-hair-for-the-principle-of-it stance, and give into my aesthetic enjoyment of hairlessness. (Hmm.. sorry, ex-boyfriends!) So,

Ladies, and deliciously metrosexual men, say hello to your new worst best friend:

The Epilady Discrette

Why sabotage success in your life because you have some subconscious programming that says you have dues to pay? Just take all that shit out on yourself with one easy handheld device, and be done with it. Nothing like ripping hairs out of their folicles, root and all, to put you in your place. Plus, you may just find yourself a little sexier, when you're done.

$35 on Amazon. Enjoy!

*Conscious Loving by Gay and Kathlyn Hendricks, pp.90

These are a few of my favorite things #1 - what they've said

Sometimes, especially in periods of flux and apparent downturn, its important to acknowledge how far we've come, the close connections we've made, and the wonderful way we're each blossoming as people. (I know that grammar is all wrong, any English teachers out there, I'm taking poetic license).

I thought I'd support myself in this by listing here, my favorite things that people have ever said to me, about me. Not to brag or toot my horn, but just to summon up a reminder in myself that of how incredibly much love pours my way every day. I invite any of you to sit down and try this out too, it'll really pick you up on a bad day.

In gratitude...

*"You're like a juvenile Maude" (as in Hardold and...)

*"Well, it's not always easy to be a pioneer. But its in your blood."

*"Tonight, your voice sounded like the universe vibrating."

*"Just practicing the old 'Neilson eat-sh*t, huh?" (lovingly, when snowboarding)

*"I've been secretly hoping I could pass on the business to you someday"

*"All this might just amount to a hill of beans, but I don't care. This is our hill, and these are our beans!" (Yeah, I still count it)

*"You know out-of-body experiences? Well that was an in-to body experience. Wow."

*"Stop trying to make everyone else proud, Heidi. You've done that already. It's time to live for you, now"

*"You try to fight it, but you can't help it. You ARE a yoga teacher."


*"I've loved every part of you for the past 2 1/2 years. And I always will."



mmm...

Around The House #1- Nix the Nagging Gnats

We have gradually found ourselves with a growing fruit fly infestation over the past couple weeks. The cloud of them that would emerge when I opened the compost bin wasn't so bad... it was outside, and good for a repulsed laugh. The ones in the kitchen were for the most part, mildly annoying.... until they got uppity. Once it got to the point where they'd wander from the kitchen and start jumping on the keyboard, leaving comments for their Myspace friends while we were trying to do homework, it was all too much.


I sat down with my good friend Google, whom, sadly, I spend more time with than any of my friends who are actually human beings.... wow....

Woops, sorry got distracted there. So my buddy Google and I went in search of non-toxic home remedies for this growing Drosophila problem (my friend also reminded me of this scientific name, I'd forgotten since high shcool.... awesome.) There were, as there always are, a plethora of answers, all swearing they worked, but after the number of home health-remedies I've tried and all the places I've put bizzare concoctions in my body to no avail, I was suspicious.

I went for the simplest first: a couple drops of dish soap, 3/4 inch of apple cider vinegar, let stand. Easy. I guess the soap breaks the surface tension of the vinegar, so the flies, who would normally land on liquid and be able to fly right away, end up meeting a blissful end of drowning in sweet beloved nectar. This is how one has to phrase an extermination when one is a hippie.

Lo and behold, it worked!! Check out all these little babies who we were able to help transgress into a higher life form:

Pretty incredible, huh? Highly recommended, next time you find yourself near-neurotic around your gnat nuisance.

The Nature of Sanctity, or, Because We Say So

My half-brother died last week. Actually, it was 2 weeks ago, of an apparent accidental drug overdose. We, the Southern California contingency of the family, found out 2 days ago that his memorial service would be hapenning yesterday morning. Sometimes communication takes a little while in Utah.

Now, I've missed 2 funerals for members of that side of my family in the past. At the time, it was clear that going just didn't make sense... first, when my cousin's suicide came in the middle of ferocious high school preparations for AP tests and the SAT, and years later, with the overdose of another cousin I'd only known decades earlier. At the time, these decisions were clear. Over time, though, I started to see myself as the kind of person who always prioritizes work over friends and family, and started to use these two examples as evidence against myself.

When Aaron's time came, and I was so moved and grateful to be able to be so present, and sharing in the grief of all of us who loved him coming together in tribute, (RIP, you hairy, level-463 wizard cookie chef, farting machine), I decided I'd never miss another friend or family funeral.

So Monday, I was stuck. My dad was actually awaiting calls from the doctors as to whether his heart was about to give out if he got on a plane (physically... dealing with a lot there), we were struggling to find flights, we're all struggling to make rent and hard a hard time conceiving of hundreds of dollars to fly away and back for one day, we didn't even know most of the small group that was planning to gather, and we were all judging ourselves as crappy family members, for noticing the facts that going just wasn't going to work out smoothly.

Then, in a bizarre coincidence, my dad and I were hit at the exact same time, with the idea to have our own memorial here. I like to think we both received the same spiritual broadcast from God, because I enjoy looking at the world that way. We juggled schedules, me and my brother fought over rearranging appointments, some of the biting effects grief can have came out, but it came together - in a lovely family lunch, and subsequent releasing processes at sunset.

Our lunch wasn't much different than any other lunch my dad, brother and I have had together. Most of our time was even spent talking business and the stock market. But sometimes a little avoidance is something people need in grieving too, and just in holding the intnetion to celebrate and release Vincent's life, our gathering had special signifcance, and subtle psychological effects, I think, for each of us.

We didn't have to fly anywhere, we didn't have to listen to some so-called religious official recite the words he's been taught about death, we didn't have to be in the presence of a no-longer-soul-containing body. We just mourned together. And our service was sacred. Because we said so.

Going From Broke #4 - How to Take a Break

Hi Guys,

I'm Heidi, and I'm a workaholic.

But, I'm in recovery. Fortunately, I was lucky enough to choose the most socially sanctioned addiction there is, but still, I wanted out. So now, help me out, please.

I'm compiling a list of fun activities to do to blow off steam, get away from work, or just enjoy life. I want a big, fat, exciting list to draw from, so if you could send me your ideas of fun and favorite things to do, I'd really appreciate it. My list so far consists mostly of driving around with the "windows down and the system up", playing at the beach, watching movies, and going out with good friends (or staying in for chocolate and ice cream ;))

Help me think bigger, will you? Oh, and smaller... little simple things too.

Thank you!!!

I am a rather Ironic Maiden...

Okay, so this won't really be ironic. Please refrain from Alanis Morriset references while pointing out flaws in my use of the proper English language. The pertinent information is that I am a thorough product of my generation.

Unlikely but fun metal head that I am (I think headbanging-hippie was a well-coined term), I take great delight in exploring a most impressive CD collection, which was left in my foster care, while its owner resides in Boise. With this joy, comes a wondering at why it has taken me so long to appreciate some of the great metal classics. I'll take this moment to stroll through a recollection of my heavy music fandom.

Indeed, an enjoyer of the metal music I've been as long as I've been grown enough to make conscious music choice. I think that happened somewhere around the time I heard my angsty teenage big brother listening to The Black Album (yes, that Black Album), and decided that was the kind of cool I wanted to be. Then, once my own teenage discomfort hit, Korn was the primary order of the day, followed by the logical metal-fusion bands of the late 90s like RATM, Limp Bizkit (how however they spelled it), SOAD, Slipknot, and The Deftones. I sincerely apologize to anyone who's refined 90's music sensibilities are offended at my including all those bands in one sweeping generalization. I acknowledge it's an oversight, but it's sufficient for my low-level of musical snobbery.

College brought an added level of sophistication, as college tends to do. My tastes deeped into more symphonic black metal like Cradle of Filth, and Dimmu Borgir. Looking back, my exposure to that genre, as cherished as it was, was mostly through one person (like I said, isn't it always a guy?), and they faded from the front of my time and consciousness as he did. Though, I should note, both those bands and that lovely man still hold huge warm places in my heart, and will always simmer like dark, macabre, potpourri in the back burners of my mental existence.

The later college years called for something more trippy, as college tends to do, and I came to cherish the ear-gasm of combining the satsfying dark crunch of heavy guitar driven riffs with the "Du-Must-Danz-Now" throbbing pulse of good psytrance. (It doesn't work unless its through a German accent.) I'm always on the lookout for artists who do this consistently - X-Dream does occaisionally, as does GMS.

Old metal, I thought, was not quite dark enough for my metal sensibilities, not quite light enough for my hippie sensibilities, just not quite me....

Until Iron Maiden became my driving companion.


Seventh Son of a Seventh Son lasts exactly as long as a drive from Santa Monica to Simi Valley in medium traffic (which I do twice a week), and hasn't left my CD player for the last several weeks. I could indulge in a rant about why its just so good, but that's been done for decades, and I'm not sure I'd have anything to add to the totality of human knowledge on that front. What I do have is an admission. An admission that, despite my attempts at cooleness, I am a kid in my 20s in 2008.


My confession is this...
.
.
.


I can't listen to Bruce Dickinson's dramatic spoken verses, without hearing Jack Black.



There, I've said it.

Maybe it's because there are some Maiden songs in contention for the title of Greatest Song in the World... No, it couldn't be that. That was just a tribute.

It's just all the joy bubbling forth under the darkness. It could be Mr. Black has simply impersonated ole lovable Bruce Bruce in his stirring musical numbers, but that would be disappointing, and no fun, because it would invalidate my coming point entirely.

I think these men LOVE metal. And while I definitely could be giving The Tenacious half of the D way too much credit for comparing him to a legend of the genre, I can't help how my ears hear it. I think the melodramatic darkness is full of such enjoyment for both these crooners, that you can't help finding yourself simultaneously wanting to stir up a cauldron of fend-off-the-inquisition, and laugh at it's silliness. I think they do too. I think under all the silliness, and blood on stairs of famous relics, there's a boyish delight that can't help but spring out of the voices of these two men.


... or, I could just be brainwashed to hear everything through the filter of my decade's music. But I like my explanation better. Do you guys ever hear songs this way too?




"Rock music should be gross: that's the fun of it. It gets up and drops its trousers. " - Mr. Dickinson

"There's nothing you can really do to prepare to rock. Do you prepare to eat a delicious meal? Are you hungry? Then you're gonna eat it. " -Mr. Black

Going From Broke #3 - Gone Overboard

I'm frikkin tired. I feel like I've been running a marathon.... and really, in my terms, I haven't been doing all that much. What I have been doing a lot of is examining my financial picture, and digging into core values and assumptions around oh, little questions like, um... only my worth as a human being.

One of my books seems to shame readers into realizing they shouldn't live on credit, spending above their means. Of course, logically I agree with this assertion by all means. However, it's only been a few months ago that I, realizing I'm trying to build a new business, and bound to see a lull in income, accepted that maybe it's okay to live a stint as young and broke, and let myself accumulate a little credit debt. Well, with my allowance from old Uncle Unemployment Insurance running out, I got scared last week, and thought maybe I should just learn how to live within my means, whatever they are at any given moment. So, I budgeted the rest of the month, and have been trying to nurse $48 to cover life in LA for 2 weeks.

Now, tired, hungry, and lonely, I say "f*c& this."

Living within my means right now would require moving back in with my parents, which would prevent me from two other financial keys in this process: 1) building a client base on the Westside, and 2) stepping into adulthood and acknowledging my real value as a human being. Neither of those things can I do from my messy childhood bedroom in Simi Valley.

So, with caution, and awareness, but a healthy-dose of much-needed self love, I say "Welcome back, citicard! I missed you!"

Rule 5 for Newbs

So its Oct 9, Game 1 of the NLCS. I've been gradually becoming a casual Dodgers fan over the past 2 1/2 years (why that amount of time?...it's always some dude, isn't it?), and it's my first time, to my knowledge, ever watching the Phillies play.

<<<--- This man made me sad. He's friggin good. Then, aforementioned "some dude" tells me Victorino was a Dodger, till he got stolen..... what? Rule 5 Draft? What's that? Upon hearing it was too complex for texting, which seems, dishearteningly, to be my primary means of communication with most people these days, I set out to find the answer for myself. And now, in terms other casual fans and those us of rocking estrogen won't mind hearing (shit, I know.. my Berkeley degree just got revoked again... it happens often... bad feminist....) here's a little rundown of

ye ole' rule 5:
1.Boy plays baseball
2.Boy is good, but young, gets recruited to minors
3. Boy shows promise, but not good enough for 40-man roster (Major league team, plus backups that can be "called up" from where they play meanwhile in the minors), he still plays minors
4. To prevent hoarding talent in the farms (where attractive young ball players are fed and watered), after a certain number of years (depending how old he was when he caught that special scout's eye), another team can take roster-less boy as their own.
5. Stealing team doesn't actually steal boy... they have to pay $50,000 for him. (Or they can do the same thing for lower-levels of their own farm, at cheaper rates). They also have to have an open space for him.
6. Boy has to be part of the major league "stealing" team (with only 24 of his partners in crime) for the whole season, or else they have to give him back, if they don't want him anymore.

Victorino, it turns out is a fascinating case.
1.Dodgers grew him, pouring water and fertilizer on the little Shane seed.
2. 3 years later, Padres rule 5 drafted him. F@ck you again, Aaron Kiefer.
3. Padres changed their minds... fickle, fickle team. Gave him back.
4. 2 years later, Phillies rule 5'ed him.
5. Our little Dodger Shane seed has grown up to kick ass for the Phillies.

This could be our grass-skirt wearing Bobblehead, LA --->

Actually, nevermind. That wouldn't be cool at all.

But I do think it's cool to make sure kids get a chance to get out there, even if it might kind of suck for the team that's cultivated them.

Meanwhile, much to Danny's chagrin, I think I'm taking a big step in my personal fan-dom.
I'm about to start following my second team, casually. The Phillies impressed me. I know I'm not allowed to say that in LA, but *Cartman voice* I do what I want!*end Cartman voice*

Yes, folks, I'm making the transition... from being a half-assed Dodger fan, to being a half-assed baseball fan. Hats off to me!

Technology Meltdown...

I, in the electronic sense, which I say because I realize how sadly my identity was wrapped up in my addiction 1s and 0s on my harddrive, have been largely erased. Virus? AVG didn't find anything. Circuit fryage? Not that I can tell. I'm bewildered.

I see this as clearing room for a fresh start. And maybe encouragement to not spend so many damn hours in front of this screen.

That said, back up your junk, kids.

Going From Broke #2: Revving Up...

So there's several posts swimming around in my head right now, but I've just been catapulted into the 2nd year of my master's degree program, and holy crap, is my life changing. Namely we have a big second year project, and I have a question for anyone who'll brave an answer: actually, a choice of questions either (1) What supportive beliefs about money have helped you bring in enough to support you in a thriving life, or (2) What limiting beliefs do you hold about money that keep you from ever having "enough"?

I'll start with one of mine... I caught myself subtly, barely detectably thinking "If I'm financially successful, I'll be alienated from the people I love." Then, I realized I kinda already have alienated myself. (When was the last time I saw you in person?) So, here's a little virtual act of reaching out in bloggy friendship.

The next year of my life is based around researching and restructuring money beliefs and practices, so let the games begin!

Ball of the Bases

So, to my friends out there who have followed baseball longer and closer than I (thankfully?) have put the time into yet....

What does it mean for us (Go Dah-yers!) that we're up against the Phillies in the NLCS? What can we expect to see, and what needs to happen?

Going From Broke #1

The first installment of the chronicles of entering financial adulthood, and stuff.

I realized something today. My Spiritual Psychology education will make me question this statement later, but I'll just say it anyway: Making a living is hard.

I interject with a moment of Heidi history (feel free to skip ahead, if you're feeling impatient) : I know I haven't reached the stage where I don't struggle with it yet, but I figured that was because up until the last couple months, I've still been sorting out what I want to be "when I grow up". Well, after a year of philiso-psychological unpacking of that question, I finally (like in my last post) just let it go. I gave myself permission to not know, and not be "successful" (whatever that is), and to be a broke kid for a while, if that's the life experience I seem to have been supposed to be having. I also removed the burden of my entire fulfillment from the shoulders of my career, where I'd placed it years ago. In doing so, I freed myself up to be open to what I really want to do know. Which is Integrative Personal Training, or Mind-Body Coaching, in case I haven't already told you. (No, there won't be a shameless self-promotional plug in every post, I promise).

Follow all that? It's the Cliff-notes version of about a year of self-work, so I don't expect it to make sense. It's tangential to the matter at hand anyway. The matter at hand is that life is expensive, and paying for it... (again, my inner life-coach is trying to get me to rephrase as I write, but) paying for it blows.

I've been toying with the idea of working in food-service lately. Never done it, I'm just barely charming enough to be able to handle myself well in a tip-driven job, I bet, and working in a cool hippie-fueling vegan joint could be rad. I notice myself delaying applying though, for fear that working the kitchen at YMCA camp won't be sufficient experience to get the job.

Fuck, I think.. I'm a grad student, with a degree from a top-tier university, who gets paid to jump off buildings and crash through furniture, and helps people change their lives on a daily basis (well, okay, on good days), and I'm afraid of not being good enough to get some crappy waitressing job that I'm sure to use as a good source of complaining down the road? Well, yeah. I don't have much experience.

A buddy of mine is looking at taking a job hanging Christmas lights this holiday season, to fill the gaps between stunt jobs. He has extensive foodservice work history, so I asked him... "you'd make so much more money, why don't you get back into that for a while?" So get this... he tells me it's too competitive. He'd have to spend months pounding the pavement to get a waiting job. Which strikes me as not too different from stunts. Or building my training client base. Or landing yoga classes. Or selling paintings. Or booking singing gigs. Or any of the things I've considered doing with my life. Shit, parents pay thousands of dollars for SAT tutoring for their kids, cause this crazy competitiveness makes the average teenager "not good enough".

I used to think that was frustrating and stupid... why does everything seem to be so much harder to succeed at now than I imagine it for previous generations? Why does the majority of my age group have to go back to live with their parents during at least one point in their supposed "adult" lives? There's some actual statistic I could cite, but you'll just have to take my word for it.

Now, I've changed my mind. I like that everything's so fucking hard... it means you had better damn well love what you do. I think it was tempting for earlier generations to get stuck in jobs they didn't really like, because landing and keeping those jobs was easier than having to put the immense energy required to carve out their own paths. Now, it seems to me that going one's own way hasn't really gotten much harder, but there are fewer and fewer easy default paths. At least with Southern California costs of living, just hoping for "whatever" in terms of work won't pay rent. Anything is going to take ridiculous amounts of energy. So, its like the forces-that-be have sweetened the "be true to ourselves" pot, by removing some of the allure of living by default. We're left to make the choice.

So I'm taking one of my favorite sage's teachings, and above all, having fun. I might go work my ass off to get a waitress job, and stay there as long as its fun. I will most definitely slave away creating my marketing machine for my business, because working with my clients just feels damn good inside. I'll put the energy out... cause damn it, it's becoming clear I'm going to have to. But I'm only going to give it to what makes my life joyful.

Think it'll work?

(next time on Going From Broke... does it really have to be hard?)

Stills from an Inspirrupted Cerebellum

With the first post out of the way, and the pressure to make some grand entrance off my back, I thought I'd explore a little what this blog is all about.

I love people who write themed blogs, like my classmate and a wonderful Life Mastery Coach, Rob Gruber, or eco-chic MacGuyver Danny Seo. But I suspect my consciousness will take a more random-spewing approach.

I'll probably get caught in Danny's thematic momentum, and do some chronological narratives of the past. I'm planning to borrow a page from Ryanne, and spread the love in a series of appreciations for the kickass people in my life. I suspect I'll share some vegetarian/vegan cooking discoveries, and probably a martial arts training and stunt story or two. (Working Desperate Housewives next week, so watch for tales...) Of course, with Spiritual Psychology coursework providing an undercurrent for much of my thought, I'll probably have a lot of philisophical musing, perhaps ala some of Josh's posts. I'm certain to lapse into discussion of ways to facilitate growth, as I build my Integrative Personal Training/ Mind-Body Coaching practice.

Will there be a uniting theme? A character arc? Will an autobiographical image develop enough to build suspense in the audience when there's a hit on my life in act II? I don't know. I'll launch this blog, with the biggest life lesson I'm finding now: freedom for joy and accomplishment rests largely on letting go of attachment to outcomes. Know what I mean? Like the cliche'd story of finding love as soon as someone discovers they're happiest single, or... well, you tell me. What outcomes have you let go of lately?

Hello World!

That is all.



...for now.