In last week's blog I wrote:

The “Go big or go home” rule does not apply in my version of this game.  What matters is to show up and play.

This invited some fun discussion and perspectives to consider. One question stayed with me and stirred me to ponder it further:  Does not having to “Go big” encourage people to “Play small?”

Well…  it depends upon your definition of playing small.

If “playing small” is synonymous for shrinking away from your full potential for any reason, then that is not what I mean here. At no time have I experienced the exhilaration of playing while also diminishing my value or sticking my light under a bushel.  

On the other hand, if “playing small” means making bite-size, obtainable moves toward your dreams and goals, then play on!  There is no "big or small" measuring stick in my version of this game.  In fact, attempting to "play big" will drive me to overwhelm and halt play faster than a streaker bolting across a ball field.

All evolutions begin with a step, a tweak, an idea on the back of a napkin, or a choice to live with love rather than fear.  Forward momentum ignites with one small step after that.  Continued forward motion happens with nourishment between moves and the ability to stay in the place of playful observation and curiosity.  Most importantly, all evolutions are not "big."

It's possible that all of these steps will add up to something "big" in the eyes of the world one day, but is that really the point?  To me, the point is consciously making the decision that I want to play and not go home and hide.  I choose to play. I choose to embrace what is small and live life in a sustainable way.  The desire to create a flow of sustainable living has been its own "small step evolution" in my heart that is now manifesting in my life!

There will never be another Steve Jobs.  That would be redundant.

What there will be are many gifted souls who, by taking his lead, will dare to share their form of crazy with us.  We all have our place in this world to leave a mark.  What a shame it would be to choose not to because we are afraid of what others might think.  Or we are afraid of tasting our own flavor of crazy.

I could keep my gifts and thoughts to myself.  Sometimes I do.  Then they become heavy and weigh my life down.  My growth is stopped, frozen in “ToDo” on my iPad, when I quit sharing and choose to crawl under fear.

I could pull up my big girl panties and play this thought-sharing, world-changing game. In that, I grow.  I give whatever gifts or ideas I was given a chance to play, too. This doesn’t mean to “just deal with it” and walk through fear.  Instead, it makes it a team sport, which, in my view, is much more fun than solitaire.

With gentle permission, we all start showing up, learning that our flavor of crazy is how we identify our position on the team. It translates to enthusiasm and passion.  When I play my position with that energy, I add value to the world.  Then, I feel compelled to invite others to play along.

The “Go big or go home” rule does not apply in my version of this game.  What matters is to show up and play. What I find to offer the world might not have a Steve Jobs type impact on millions.  I’m happy igniting one hungry soul at a time.  Sometimes that soul is me.  It’s the single ignition that keeps the playful game going.

With this, I’m extending to you the invitation to play.  Crawl out from under fear and embrace whatever form of crazy you were gifted.  This team can never be too big.

And in this moment, that is all that matters.

“Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do.”

photo credit:  jonathan mak

Last week, I wrote about giving myself permission to play.

I had a few people ask how I could be talking about play when there is so much work to do to clean up the storm damage at home and other places around the country.

Honestly, I believe that the more earth shattering events there are, the more important it is to redefine and practice anything that qualifies as "play."  It can include resting, laughing, creating and helping others find something to smile about after the grieving and tears have run their course for that moment.

It is from the Life Is Good website (the company of T-shirt fame) that I first saw the phrase "Life Can Hurt.  Play Can Heal."  (They get all sides of the equation, don't they?)

What touched me about Life is Good is that they are reaching out to help children NOT STOP PLAYING in the wake of traumatic events.  One of their videos says something like this:

When a person loses his or her ability to play, they begin losing their ability to be creative.  Creativity is how we come up with solutions to help us pull through difficult situations.  Losing the ability to generate solutions can lead to helplessness.  A child (or adult, for that matter) who stops playing can become a helpless, lost soul.

Re-learning how to play is what the horses were teaching me in Phoenix.

It is what Playmakers is going to be helping the caregivers and children with in Tuscaloosa this summer.   Here's a video to further explain what they do:

 

Play is a powerful force and I intend to keep practicing. : )

In Truth & With Love,

ps - I invite you to check out the Playmakers site. Read about what they are doing and how they have helped other caregivers and children on the Gulf Coast, in Haiti and other areas of the world. Any donations given between now and June 10, 2011 will go directly to their work on the ground in my hometown of Tuscaloosa.

Play that is inter-laced with self judgment is not really play.

Kind of obvious when it’s put like that, isn’t it?

I learned this lesson was from a stubborn Palomino in Phoenix.

(Okay… so I was the one who was stubborn.  The horse just happened to be standing there showing me what I looked like as I tried to muscle it into walking backwards.)

I’ve wanted to play for years, but it seems that I didn’t give myself permission to really (really) do it.  I would engage in fun activities, laugh a lot, play with the kids.  Yet there was this constant, nagging voice always judging whether I should be doing something more productive, income producing, cellulite reducing or that resembled worshiping “busy.”

When the horse picked up on that nagging voice, he stopped dead in his tracks and bit me on the arm.  He didn’t like that voice any more than I did.  It only took him a few minutes to try and get rid of it.  I’ve been toting it around for years.  Smart horse.

What he showed me is that play is the place where I stop taking myself so damn seriously, soften my focus, relax and enjoy the experience of trying to find out what works... without judging what doesn’t.  Better yet, nothing about it worships the almighty, stress inducing, mother of all nagging bullsh*t belief systems that call out to us that we have to always be perfect, politically correct, polished and busy.

You can step off of whatever scale you are measuring yourself with and just be.

Without make up on.

Without matching accessories.

Without perfect scores, flat bellies or manicured nails.

Without expectation or attachment to any outcome.

Without all this, you leave room for dirty boots, a sweaty shirt and a full heart.

You fall in love with nature, those around you and yourself.

And the horses pay attention to that.

Real play is that powerful.  I highly recommend it.

In Truth & With Love,

ps - Don't get me wrong... I happen to think the process of getting manicured nails is like play.  For the record, I'm still getting a pedicure this week.  Just making sure we are still all on the same page.  : )

This past weekend, I ventured to Scottsdale, Arizona for the second on-site Equus Coach training with Koelle Simpson.

For those of you who know me, you know that the idea of being un-tethered from my computer for this long used to be completely outside of my comfort zone.  Prior to this year, I was also far from being a “horse person” who spent time riding or around stables.

So why, in heavens name, would I do such a thing?  For three main reasons:

For the Magical and Spiritual Pull

These days, I don’t question anything that has a magical and/or spiritual pull about it.  While I don’t understand how everything I’m being called to do quite fits together yet, I’m starting to see glimpses and have faith that it will.  In the meantime, I’m having a heck of a good time giving myself space to heal and helping others do the same.

For the Healing Power of the Horses and the Experience

I learned more about myself in the round pen with Koelle and the horses during three days last summer than I did in months of traditional coaching.

Since then, I have become a fan of the deep, efficient and experiential healing power of this work.  Every time I step into a round pen, I seem to be able to peel another layer of scar tissue back and shine light on whatever caused it to be there in the first place.  It is sometimes not easy, often humbling and always empowering.

For Permission to Play Outside

I was entranced by the playful spiritual connection that Koelle and the horses seem to have.  I wanted to learn how to really relax, have fun, to be patient and channel my energy in that way.

Additionally, the horses will not fit in my home office where I no longer want to hide.  Moving outside, I gave myself permission to stop looking at the clock, monitoring my e-mail and take a real stab at doing this thing called “play.”

The Ground Truth Aha Moment

This past weekend, just as on the previous trips to work with the horses, I ended up breaking into pieces of myself that still needed some loving care.

It was there that I also realized that the reasons I am becoming an Equus coach are the first basic Ground Rules of finding your Ground Truth.

• Pay attention to the magical, spiritual, intoxicating pull. It could be a tap root touching your soul and leading you to a piece of you have not yet met or forgot long ago.  Embrace it.  Even if it doesn’t make logical sense, it will make energetic and spiritual sense if it touches your Truth.
• It will lead you to an experience that will promote healing.
• And guide you to a life full of permission to really show up and play. If you have forgotten how, you are not alone.  I’m learning again too.

More on that next week.

Until then... give yourself permission to play.

In Truth & With Love,

I woke up this morning serious about being intentional.

For the past few weeks, I have allowed myself to get brain scattered, body weary and sleep deprived.

Not today.

Today, I was going to choose (and complete) a couple of important, feel-good-to-get-done-and-off-the-plate tasks.  I was also going to meditate and stretch and a few other things that a good life coach does for self care.  No Facebook or catching up on American Idol until those things were scratched off the to do list.

I wanted to be like the momma-to-be bird in the nest on our porch.  She is focused on nothing but protecting her eggs from the kids and our dog.  She's serious about her priorities and has not packed her calendar with anything other than the essential worm finding excursions.

So I sat down this morning to meditate.

Be the bird.
(Without the idea of more kids on the way.)
A loving kindness meditation would be good at this point.

May you be happy.
May you be a friend to your body.
May you be free from suffering.
May you be at peace.

And then Maddie, our 7-ish-year old puppy comes skidding across the hard wood floor, excited and happy about some new discovery, landing in a butt-in-the-air-tail-wagging downward dog position directly in front of me.

Smiling.
Kind of like this.
(Except in focus.)
Definitely not the bird.

She had a message and a clear determination to deliver it.  Startled, I listened.  Laughing, I heard this:

May you be playful.
May you stop taking yourself so seriously.
May you forgive yourself already.
May you always choose love.
In this, there will be peace.

I'm pretty sure this was meant to be shared.

There are times, of course, to be the singularly focused and serious bird.  It's also fun to remember that we can find peace while playing like a dog.

In this world that seems a little too serious, scattered and sleepless at times, it's a great reminder, don't you think?

In Truth & With Love,

“No one can play a game alone.  One cannot be human by oneself.”
- James P. Carse, Finite and Infinite Games

Amen.

Connection is Martha Beck’s 9^th menu item on The Joy Diet.  This chapter, no matter how many times I read it, is the one that moves me the most.

Real soul-deep connection with others is frightening, yet counter-intuitively the most effective way to remain secure.

On the down side, allowing love to flow unconditionally will guarantee that you will be hurt.  But, as Martha points out, "as long as you never react by cutting off your willingness to love, you will always – always – emerge from these situations with more capacity for joy than you took into them.”

Due to the downside, I was afraid of this type of connection for a long, long time.  My belief (even though I didn’t consciously realize it) was that food was the “safe” friend and a connection to better feelings.

What a lie.

For a fleeting second, I would feel better by eating the chocolate hidden in the sock drawer.  Then I would berate myself for succumbing to unhealthy habits.  I was no more a friend to myself than the food was.

Then I went on The Joy Diet. I began to sit still with myself, listen to the truth about how I felt and take risks to get what I really wanted.

ALL of that meant building a real connection with myself first.  Connecting over and over…  move forward, second guess, trust in the connection with my soul, laugh, move forward...

And in that cycle, I got it.

The magic happens when you connect with your inner peace AND with others at the same time.

Unconditional love lives in this place.  It's where you are fully present, inwardly truthful about what you want and then take the risk to openly communicate about it in your relationships.

I had a client e-mail me today with a gorgeous, sweet example of how you can’t help but be totally in love with someone else when you’re fully present with your own soul.

…this morning, as annoyed as I was that my daughter woke up super early and totally killed my alone time, I stayed present with the joy of having someone so incredibly happy to see me and snuggle with me every day.    Laughter and joy indeed.

There’s an old saying about connection that goes something like this… "There's a ripple effect in all that we do. What you do touches me. What I do touches you.”

If there’s going to be a ripple effect… by golly, I want to feel it.  In the center of the ripple can be the calm, the connection to everyone else.  The rings can spread the energy you and I bring to the table.

The energy doesn't always have to be generated from life changing movement and cliff jumping risks.  It can be as sweet and peaceful as a snuggle with a child when she's taken the unknown risk of interrupting your best laid plans.

Love that.

How much better do you feel after a good belly laugh?

One that catches your breath and you have a hard time breathing.  Which just makes everyone else laugh harder, to the point that it becomes contagious.  Tables across the room in the restaurant can’t help but turn around and wonder what’s up.  And in the “When Harry Met Sally” fashion, they pronounce… “I'll have what she’s having.”

It’s sad that we, as adults, sometimes forget to play, and subsequently, forget to laugh.  Yet, it’s so important that Martha Beck dedicated menu item #8 in The Joy Diet to a good guffaw.  Not a single giggle, though.  Thirty or more a day.

That good fun energy does more than just make you smile.  There’s all kinds of scientific evidence that it will simply make you healthier.  Laughter will stimulate the brain to release feel good hormones that will help your mind and body function more efficiently.

An abundance of laughter can also help you lose weight.

When you ask for the Super Size or eat anything made by Little Debbie, it’s usually not due to physical hunger, but because you’re on a quest to feel better.  Next time you’re looking for something to emotionally feed you, try consuming laughter instead.

Two of those feel good hormones are dopamine and endorphins.  Endorphins are capable of a pain relieving narcotic effect and dopamine raises your happiness levels.  The more you replace emotional food inhalation with laughter, the more these hormones will help reinforce in your brain that laughter is an excellent substitute for Cinnamon Buns ice cream.

Better yet… laughter doesn’t come with that nasty sugar crash and mental backlash that a box of Girl Scout Thin Mints will induce.

So…

How do you come up with thirty things to laugh at a day?
Especially when Thanksgiving is right around the corner and many of us get to endure family drama that puts the fun back into dysfunctional.

First – Change your mind. Look at the pieces of the dysfunction or the things that cause you stress.  Which pieces are actually funny when you detach the facts from the embellished stories?  Can you laugh at how predictably each member in the drama assumes his or her role?

Second – Stop taking yourself so seriously. This doesn’t mean that you love yourself less.  Laughing at yourself actually allows you release the perfection hook and love yourself more.

Third – Surround yourself with laugh outlets. You know what makes you chuckle.  Seek it out.  Ellen DeGeneres makes a living making people laugh every afternoon.  Here’s one clip that I love because it pokes fun at the crazy things we buy in an attempt to beat ourselves thin.

If this is your type of funny, meet me back here often.  Join the “Lite Thoughts for a Lite Life” group on Facebook for other links.  When I find something that makes me laugh, I’ll pass it along.  If you find something, e-mail it to me and I'll share.  (jennifer (at) litethoughts (dot) com)

Laughing sounds so much more fun than dieting, doesn't it?

ps - Non-family friendly stuff will still help my daily laugh ration, but it might not get published.

pps - This is the 9th installment in the "Diet for Your Soul" blog series.  I was ready for some title variety.

Play is the place where, if you’re doing it right, you stop taking life so damn seriously.

It is also essential to maintaining your sanity and losing weight.

I forgot this minor detail for about twenty years.  Menu item #7 in Martha Beck’s The Joy Diet* reminded me that I could think of 99% of my daily routine as play.  So I changed my thinking.

You can too.

If you engage in play, or lighten your thoughts, your mind become less heavy.  Do this consistently and your body will lighten too.  Life becomes more about the happy and less about the struggle.

So…
How do you increase your play when you have to work every waking hour?

Here are four of the steps from The Joy Diet:

First, define your real career.
Not what you do in the cubicle.  What you do in life.  Ask yourself these questions:

• "When your life is over, how do you want the world to be different – in large ways or small – because you have lived?"
• "What experiences must you have to feel you’ve lived a completely satisfying life?"

Make a list.  The things on that list are what make up your REAL career.  Only these activities.  Everything else is stuff you do to prepare for it, ignore it, sabotage or support it.

Second, surrender to the idea that life is a game.
Just because there's a paycheck attached doesn't mean it can't be play. Almost everything (outside of death and taxes) can be like playing a game if you reframe your thoughts around it.   Think about it…

• Your REAL Career – the game of meaning
• Work – the game of strategy
• Marriage – the game of love
• Parenting – the game of learning, diapers and teenage drama

Step back and think of the strategy you use to navigate the games you play each day.  When played with integrity and laughter, the games in your world can be less stressful and more joyful.  Even in that cubicle.

Third, ask whether the games you are playing serve you.
If you are not having fun or it’s distracting you from your real life’s work, consider switching games.  If it's your teammates ruining the fun, switch to another team.   It’s not play if you don’t love the ones you’re with.

And... I added one more point since I like to play infinite games.

Fourth, are you playing for the sake of winning or for the joy of the game?
Either is fine and both can be fun.  Yet, how often have you found that playing to win creates a lot of stress and only fleeting joy?  I'm after something more sustainable.

I'm on a quest for infinite games and players.
The idea came from James P. Carse’s “Finite and Infinite Games.” Here are the phrases that struck me:

• “A finite game is played for the purpose of winning, an infinite game for the purpose of continuing the play."
• "Finite players play within boundaries; infinite players play with boundaries."
• "Surprise causes finite play to end; it is the reason for infinite play to continue."
• "The finite play for life is serious; the infinite play of life is joyous."
• "The joyfulness of infinite play, its laughter, lies in learning to start something we cannot finish.”

That laughter of infinite play is menu item #8.  Meet you back here next week for some unending fun.

In the meantime…

Are you a player?

*  This is the 8th post in a blog series based on Martha Beck's The Joy Diet.  Previous posts discussed:
Doing Nothing, Truth, Desire, Creativity, Risk and Treats.  The next post will be on Laughter.  My favorite!