Cannonball Coaching

I am in the midst of a major transition and struggling to make sense of everything.  Where do I want to be?  How do I want to live?  What makes me happy?

Intellectually, I know it’s too early to answer all these questions.  I have been back in San Francisco less than a month after spending two years in Barcelona.  But my heart wants answers!  Or, so it thinks.  So, I have decided to just notice what’s going on.  Notice how if feels to drive again after two years without a car.  Notice how it feels to have a house full of my stuff after two years in a small furnished apartment.  Notice how it feels to watch my kids go to a new school.  Notice how it feels to be somewhere so familiar, yet so strange.

I don’t need to understand or judge how I’m feeling right now.   I can just notice.   And that takes a weight off my shoulders.   It’s like I’m collecting data to refer to at some later time when I’m not in the midst of so much change.

What do you notice about how you are living and feeling?

I’m back in San Francisco after two years living in Barcelona.  My mind and heart are bouncing all over the place.  Living in Barcelona with my family had been a long-standing dream of mine, since even before I had a family.

I spent a year and half there in my early twenties.  It was a place where I started to become me, where I stepped into myself in a new way.   These last two years have been a new stepping into myself.  And now I find myself back in San Francisco, unsure of what it all means.  I keep telling myself…just breathe.

I had a moment a few weeks ago when it dawned on me that I have lived my dream.  I took my family to Barcelona and we made a life there.  But now what?  Is being in San Francisco now my dream?  I’m not sure anymore and I’m feeling unmoored because of it.  But I tell myself…just breathe.  I don’t need to know this minute or this week, or even this month.  What I do need to do is get engaged with life here for as long as I am here.  And that’s what I’m working toward.

My first symbolic act of that is to do something I have always wanted to do in California.  It’s one of those “I’m not sure why I want to do this so badly, but I do” things.  I want to climb Half Dome in Yosemite.  And so I’m going to do it some time in September, after the summer crowds and before the snow.  I feel like if I can make this happen, then I won’t fall prey to doubts and complacency.  I imagine being in the Sierras and breathing in the mountain air as I go through things that have been in our attic for two years and wonder why we still have them, as I call Barcelona to cancel our cell phones, as I notice and feel the effect of having other people live in our house for two years, as I take in this new life.  Just breathe.

A couple days ago I was at the Guggenheim in Bilbao with my family.  As we walked through our third exhibit, artwork by Anish Kapoor, I started to wonder whether my children (or I for that matter) would really connect with anything in the museum.  I didn’t really like the first two rooms of this particular exhibit, but the third room was a revelation.  It was full of mirror sculptures, for lack of a better way to describe it.  At first glance it looked just like mirror sculptures, but with no real twist.  Then the lesson in perspectives started.

The first thing I saw when we walked into the room was that everyone walking around was upside down in the mirrors.  That was pretty cool because obviously we weren’t really upside down.  But when I walked closer I was right side up again and parts of me were huge.  Stepping back a little, I said to my family, “Oh, I like this mirror, it makes me look thin!”  They burst out laughing because apparently from where they were standing I looked really fat.

Why am I writing about this?  I guess it was just another reminder of how much perspectives play a role in our lives.  I think we forget that what we see/feel at any given moment is one perspective, and that someone else could be seeing/feeling something totally different.  The exhibit reminded me that we can play with perspectives and have fun doing it.  And then we get to choose the one that feels the best.  Who’s to say what is reality in a room like that…it all depends on where you’re standing!

If your life were a hall of mirrors, where would you want to stand?  What would you want to see?

My younger son turned 9 yesterday.  He is an incredible mix of wise beyond his years, yet still so young and innocent.  There was so much build-up to the day, so much joy opening presents in the morning, and eating the best breakfast ever…fried eggs and pancakes with real maple syrup (a treat in spain).   By mid-morning the letdown had already set in:  the day could never live up to all the expectation.  I saw him struggling to figure out what was going on…he’s not a party kid, so there was no party planned.  But still he felt a pressure for something extraordinary to happen.  I saw the joy of the morning fading away and a cloud of disappoint settling in.

I didn’t want to be a cheerleader or deny his experience, but I also didn’t want his day to be a disappointment.  I told him that people get to do what they like best on their birthday, and for many people, especially kids, that  means having a party, but for others, that might mean staying home.   We talked about what he likes to do and I told him that his birthday, of all days, was a day he should do what he likes to do, even if it’s not what most people would choose.

Why am I writing about this?  I was just really reminded of how important it is to know ourselves and what makes us feel happy, and not try to hide that or live by outside expectations.  If we turn our backs on ourselves, we invariably end up disappointed.  Not surprisingly, that’s hard for a 9-year-old to know, but I think people of all ages do the same thing.

My question is, what would it be like to live with no expectations and just let life unfold?

I have been telling myself for a while now to write a new post here, but I’ve been busy.  Busy with some exciting new work for a website, a few new clients, hanging with my family, a trip to Istanbul, subbing at my kids’ school, exercising, etc. etc. etc.  It’s all true and it’s all real, and it’s all good, and yet I’ve had this nagging feeling that I’m making a choice to put myself/my blog last.  Being honest with myself, I see there is some comfort/safety to supporting others in their endeavors and leaving mine in wait.  I don’t necessarily want/need to put myself first, but do I really want to be last?

When do you put yourself last?  What about that is comfortable?

The cloud of volcanic dust hanging over much of Europe makes me strangely happy.  It’s like a reminder from the universe that we can’t control everything.  I’m not sure why this makes me almost giddy, but it does.  I am sorry for the very real hardship this is causing so many people, but I have to grin when I think of a certain group of entitled people stomping their feet in frustration.

It may be simplistic, but maybe this is a great opportunity to slow down, take a breath and enjoy the day.

This morning I read an article in the NY Times and the following quote really stuck out for me.

“It was a whole personality shift for me,” Dr. Martin said. “I wasn’t any longer attached to my performance and trying to control things. I could see that the really good things in life will happen if you just show up and share your natural enthusiasms with people. You have a feeling of attunement with other people.”

Lack of attachment to outcome, giving up control, showing up, and natural enthusiasm…these are all things that I as a coach and a person try to do in my life, and it is what I want to help my clients achieve.  There is so much power in just showing up and sharing who you are, and outcomes and control are illusory.

The funny thing is that this article (click here to read the whole thing) is about doctors using hallucinogens to help people suffering from depression.  It really strikes me how powerful the shift was for the Dr. Martin quoted above, and how fundamental the elements of the shift are.  Even more amazing is how hard it is for human beings (myself included) to not be attached to outcome, to give up control, to show up, and to share our natural enthusiasms!

What would it feel like to be truly fine with any outcome?

What would it feel like to give up control and simply be present?

What are you holding on to?

A recent blog post on the NY Times talks about a new study that shows people who engage in deeper, more substantive conversations are happier than those who mostly engage in small talk.

But, he (the researcher) proposed, substantive conversation seemed to hold the key to happiness for two main reasons: both because human beings are driven to find and create meaning in their lives, and because we are social animals who want and need to connect with other people.

I have spent a considerable portion of my life wondering how things would be if I could keep things more on the surface…stop questioning so much, stop searching so much, stop feeling so much.  In many ways society encourages people to keep things on the surface and frowns on the deeper connection.  I’m not sure if I’m happier (what is happy anyway?) because of the deeper connections, but I do think I’m more fulfilled and present because I am not pushing down these basic instincts.

What would be possible if there were more connection, real connection, between human beings?   Where are you on the conversation spectrum?

To read the NY Times article, click here.

We all have it…choice.  And yet, I think we often forget we have it, or we don’t want to admit we have it, or we don’t feel like it’s real, or not having it protects us from taking chances, taking a stand.  We tell ourselves why we don’t have a choice, as though it’s something chiseled in stone.  But really, at every moment in our day we have choice.  Sometimes a choice doesn’t feel like a choice because we would never choose it.  But still, it’s a choice.

Where in your life do you believe you have no choice?  Is that really true?

Being backed into a corner, even of your own making, is stifling.  Embrace choice!

There’s so much we don’t know about each other.  Many of us hold our most precious selves in hiding.  In Barbara Kingsolver’s latest novel, La Lacuna, one of her characters tells another that the most interesting thing about someone is the thing you don’t know.  The statement struck me when I was reading, and I keep coming back to it.

I have been on a mission lately of trying to see those hidden parts of people.  Not by asking directly “What are you hiding,” but by listening carefully and following up on threads of information.   And, wow, there are dreams and talents and projects and desires that don’t often come to the surface.  But they are there.  I can feel them bristling below the surface, even when they are not spoken.

I also flipped the statement onto myself.  What am I hiding that is most interesting about me?  And why do I hide it?

My challenge to you, and to myself, is to make space to hear/see/taste/smell/touch the most interesting thing(s) about those around you.  And, then consider sharing those parts of yourself with others.