By Peggie Arvidson A Fond Farewell “Someone asked me, Aren’t you worried about the state of the world? I allowed myself to breathe and then I said, What is most important is not to allow your anxiety about what happens in the world to fill your heart. If your heart is filled with anxiety, you will get sick, and you will not be able to help. There are wars – big and small – in many places, and that can cause us to lose our peace. Anxiety is the illness of our age. We worry about ourselves, our family, our friends, our work, and the state of the world. If we allow worry to fill our hearts, sooner or later we will get sick.”- Thich Nhat Hanh As I write this, the world has more or less shut down to slow the growth of the Coronavirus. Student athletes who have prepared to play their hearts out won’t get their chance, moms and dads who don’t have health insurance and are working multiple jobs in the hopes that they can provide their kids a better life, are torn – because their kids won’t be in school for a while, and those of us who have cared for people with severely compromised immune systems are dealing with it all as best we can. And I opened my word processing tool to see that the above quote was just sitting there in one of those – unsaved shut down moments. I truly have no idea when I saved this quote. The Universe is like that – the answer you didn’t know you were looking for shows up and you smile and nod. Today I’m writing you my last column for the Old Town Crier. It’s time, perhaps some of you may say it…
By Peggie Arvidson This Spring…..Just Get Started! Ah sweet Spring. You approach as a gift after the cold and wet of winter. No matter where you live you find that there is an ebb and flow to Mother Nature. So, with Spring arriving full of blossoms and bugs and sneezes is a welcome reminder of the consistency of being alive. Winter is the reminder that everything must end in order to begin again. Spring is the not-so-subtle reminder to celebrate the surprises and fun of starting over. Why is it then that we avoid starting over? No one relishes being a beginner. Whether you’re lingering in an unfulfilling job, a house that you’ve outgrown (or it’s outgrown you) or a city that you hate, odds are you’re hanging on because you hate the idea of starting over. Is there fear in beginning? Probably. Starting something new brings on lots of fear for me – fear of looking silly, fear of failing, fear of not fitting in or not being able to figure out whatever it is that I’m contemplating, and that is tied to the fact that I want to be an expert, all the time, right away. Lucky me – I’m onto my ego’s tricks and try not to fall for the whining and fears and simply face the fact that I’m going to have to be a beginner if I’m going to do something that’s purposeful (and often fun). I was talking with a co-worker (at a job that was brand new to me just a year ago!) about the way that kids can just have a friend for a day, or even an event. They know how to begin things, without worrying about looking silly and as a result they seem to have a ton more fun…
By Peggie Arvidson How to Check for Signs Your intuition works when you set an intention, take action to make the intention real, AND release your attachment to the outcome. This seems a little counter-intuitive, right? Releasing your attachment to a specific outcome does not mean that you sit on the couch, watching reality TV for hours and just hope that your intention manifests. It’s not an excuse to let yourself off the hook when the intention doesn’t come through, rather it’s a state of being – that lets you hold the vision clearly and specifically, all the while believing that your outcome exists. This is an important and often over-looked nuance when tapping into your intuition and noticing signs. Addressing and making use of signs is a first step in the pursuit of stretching your intuitive muscle – and if you question whether or not your sign is just “wishful thinking,” read on. It’s all about attachment to the outcome. Are you struggling more than you need to earn what you’re worth? Maybe you’re putting up with a less than stellar work situation, or stagnating with a direct marketing company or some other work-related issue which leaves you feeling worn out. The good news of course is that you’re not alone and changing the situation is literally in your hands. The really good news is that you can make a choice and decide to get out of the blech and into the flow of more fun and better times and you can ask for Divine guidance and information about how to do it. Really. No one is more blessed or talented or worthy than you. Conversely no one is less blessed or worthy than you. Here’s how to make a stand for your worth and trust the signs that…
By Peggie Arvidson Roaring into the 20s. Look, I don’t want to flatter myself and think you’ve been following along all year, so I’ll give you a recap: 2019 went sideways before it began and I spent the next nine months flailing like a kid caught in an undertow on what looks for all the world like a sunny, breezy, beach day to everyone else. In short, it wasn’t fun. It was exhausting emotionally, physically and spiritually. However, true to my form the one area of life that was easy was finding a job and working hard. I’m a classic workaholic – and I have even tried to convince myself that the ONLY way to stay whole – spiritually, physically, emotionally is to work my ass off and avoid looking up and around. I am still not convinced that working like a horse isn’t the key to keeping my life revolving around the sun without incident. The more I recognize this pattern, the more I remember the remonstrations of my first hand analysis teacher. She insisted that with a life purpose on both thumbs, and a classic fire-earth hand I’d be prone to focusing on material success. She said that with a bit of literally holier than thou attitude. At least I heard it that way. Isn’t that the way communication goes? We hear what we want to hear – or think we should hear. I know you’re not supposed to read tone in email, but let’s be honest, we hear undertones even in spoken conversations. And that’s true for those of us who grew up when our phones were still attached to our walls instead of our faces. So, I heard her say (with disdain) that to fulfill my purpose I needed to get out of my workaholic, money-grubbing…
By Peggie Arvidson What’s Love Got to Do With It? “When we see love as the will to nurture one’s own or another’s spiritual growth, revealed through acts of care, respect, knowing, and assuming responsibility, the foundation of all love in our life is the same. There is no special love exclusively reserved for romantic partners. Genuine love is the foundation of our engagement with ourselves, with family, with friends, with partners, with everyone we choose to love.” ― bell hooks Is then, love, or rather loving, the meaning of life? If so, why is it so hard to find meaning day in and day out. It should be rather easy to show up and love, and yet, at least for me, it’s pretty complicated. I spent most of my 40s looking for meaning and purpose. I discovered hand analysis. I reignited my interest in astrology and tarot and I found wonderful teachers to help me access my guides, my crossed-over loved ones and my angels. While I’d been practicing yoga off and on in my late thirties, a more consistent practice, beyond the physical asanas became part of my life through my 4th decade. Learning these things did not lead me, as I had hoped, to a life of ease and perpetual goodness. I was going to say that learning these things didn’t lead me to a life of love or purpose. However, that’s not entirely true. Through the practice of showing up and paying attention purpose walked alongside me every step of the way. My belief in the meaning of a life’s purpose has changed though. I no longer believe that you have ONE PURPOSE and that you must take action on it or miss out on your chance for enlightenment. What I know now is that purpose…
By Peggie Arvidson Keep Going. Six months ago pretty much everything I thought I knew about my life, my happiness and my future, started to fly apart at the seams. The only way I can explain how it felt is that it was like being in a vacuum vortex in a near constant state of vertigo. My world felt like it was crumbling and I saw myself as the little Dutch boy of myth – trying to stop a deluge with a finger blocking a hole in a dam. A particularly apt description because water almost always represents emotions in any spiritual setting. At the time I felt utterly alone and exhausted while also being supported by dozens of people and angels. The angels were the strangers I met, the miraculous coincidences that popped up and of course, the animals that I encountered every day. Water was pouring from the sky – it was the wettest winter in memory in Tucson and on the day that I packed up to move back east the snow was falling in big, wet flakes. Looking back, I know I was shell shocked. I couldn’t sleep, didn’t eat and found a very macabre sense of humor to get me through the worst. The people who surrounded me with love from near and far held me up when I didn’t know what to do next and kept me focused on forward momentum. Because of that support system I could put one foot in front of the other, just like Indiana Jones when he took his leap of faith, in order to move toward an open-ended future. That’s the thing about the future of course. As much as I was sure what my next year and next decade would look like, from the house I would…
By Peggie Arvidson Adulting is Hard. It’s a popular meme theme these days – “Adulting is hard.” Some variation of that shows up in my social feeds every week. And I laugh – usually wryly. Because I’m not in the business of one-upping pain and suffering (trust me, there is more than enough for us all) I have no desire to dispel the Millennial’s truth that separating colors while doing laundry is a pain the neck. It is, after all, so annoying that I admit that I rarely separate colors from whites. (Yes, that explains why my entire wardrobe is a lovely shade of eggshell blue.) The older I get the more compassion I have for my ancestors (and yours). Being an adult is a unique opportunity in a human lifespan. Certainly, in nature there are adult animals, adult trees and adults abound among the living, yet human adults find themselves in a position that comes as a surprise to each of us. (If you haven’t been surprised by the occurrence of adulthood, I’d love to know.) Obviously, I am not surprised by the FACT of being an adult. I knew it was coming all along. In fact, I might say that I’ve been hurtling toward it from an early age. I couldn’t wait to “grow up.” Here are some of my favorite moments that I couldn’t wait to achieve – simply by merit of aging: getting my ears pierced; getting contact lenses instead of glasses; a driver’s license; college; my own apartment; holidays at my house; marriage! That’s a short list, but you see the point. From 3rd grade on, I’ve been willing time to race so I could arrive at the next “thing,” and by merit of that achievement be grown. Of course, age is just a number….
By Peggie Arvidson May You Get Un-Busy I’ve spent my life around busy people. In my 20s I thought that meant that to be worthy and successful, I too, should be busy. I took this constant busy-ness to mean that I was doing important things. My to-do list never ended. I joked – heck – I bragged that crossing the last thing off my to-do list would mean that I was ready to die and that at the rate I was going I would live forever. In a state of constant motion, you can buy into the illusion that you’re in control, right? Going from work to the gym to pick up the kids to making dinner to following up on emails and calls and getting the kids ready for bed before crawling into bed with your partner to watch the Late Show gives you a sense that you’re doing something. That what you’re doing is important and worthwhile and that if you didn’t do it things would fall out of control. Eventually there’s a breaking point. For me the breaking point started as a nearly imperceptible fissure that grew over the years to a full-blown disease. By the time I was hospitalized I was mostly in a state of berating myself for not being able to get things done because my body was cursing me and not participating in my 24/7 march for control. The good news is that I had already started studying and learning about the mind-body connection. It was, of course, just another way of DOING SOMETHING but I convinced myself that it was for a higher cause and therefore it was somehow more worthy than my old way of constantly doing active stuff. I convinced myself that by studying the mind-body-spirit connection I was shaking…
By Peggie Arvidson 9 Lessons from the Mat If you’ve been reading along for any amount of time you know that I’m a big believer that life, or the Universe, likes to toss a few curveballs in from time to time to make sure we’re on our toes. How we deal with the curveballs is a big indicator of how well we deal with life in general. No one gets out without dealing with uncomfortable and downright painful stuff. So-called “spiritual” people are not immune either. At the moment I have multiple friends dealing with a parent’s illness, facing scary issues with their children and addressing rifts in their personal relationships. Each of these people are good people. Each is dealing in their own way and some days are better than others. Yet everyone (myself included) seems to find the silver lining, recalibrating to the positive before long. Coincidentally (or not) we all have a personal yoga practice. While I’m not a yoga instructor, I have been practicing yoga somewhat faithfully for 12 years. That doesn’t make me a better yogi than anyone – if anything, it reminds me how important it is to get on my mat and practice. Practicing yoga keeps me grounded, literally, and helps me find my balance when my life feels like it’s out of control. Here are 9 things I’ve learned from my yoga practice in trying times. 1. Yoga doesn’t keep score. Showing up on my mat means just that – showing up. Yoga doesn’t keep a scorecard of how long it’s been since my last practice, nor does it care how wobbly or crabby I am. It’s just there, waiting to meet me. That gives me the freedom to be where I am and do whatever I can to find my…
By Peggie Arvidson Firsts and Lasts Firsts get a lot of attention, but lasts can sneak up and take your breath away. What is it about “Firsts” that grabs our attention? You know, “Aw, it’s our first holiday season with the new puppy!” kind of first. There are first kisses that get books and songs written and first days on new jobs and seeing our first byline in print. Firsts, are like springtime. They pop up and delight us with the scent of something fresh and green in the air. The sky seems bluer and less cloudy when we’re in the season of firsts. Getting to start over is a delightful part of being alive, isn’t it? I think that’s why we track our firsts from Instagram captures to Facebook stories, to good old scrapbook notes. Firsts, of course, are tied to beginnings. However, they are not tied to being a beginner. No one seems to like being a beginner. I had lunch the other day with a friend who was lamenting the fact that she’d never learned to play the piano and now that she’d inherited one, she really wished she could play. I looked up from my wilted arugula, “Why don’t you take lessons?” “Lessons!?” her eyes wide and a sheepish grin across her face, “I hate being a beginner.” That seems the general consensus about being a beginner these days, unless we’re tracking firsts. My friend is never going to play her first sonata and document it on social media if she doesn’t get started, right? After a year or so of firsts, you find yourself in the long slog of daily-ness. Unless you take off for a new destination or challenge yourself to have a new adventure regularly, you lull yourself into that long, hot summer…
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