Another New Year…Another Chance at Full Catastrophe Living!

Posted on January 4, 2015 by llpitlwp

Happy New Year!

With the advent of a new year comes a new chance to do some of the stuff that I did not get to do last year.

As a wife, mother, grandmother and blogger, my plate is mostly full. I love it that way.

It seems that as exhausting as my days are, when all is said and done, I enjoy them. This is especially evident when I fall into my bed at night and am asleep almost before my head hits the pillow.

We are lucky to have a full house, which includes myself, my husband and three dogs. With our daughter and granddaughter living nearby, unexpected visits make my day.

I like to think, I live what Zorba the Greek referred to as a “full catastrophe life”!

“Catastrophe here does not mean disaster. Rather it means the poignant enormity of our life experience. It includes crises and disaster but also all the little things that go wrong and that add up. The phrase reminds us that life is always in flux, that everything we think is permanent is actually only temporary and constantly changing. This includes our ideas, our opinions, our relationships, our jobs, our possessions, our creations, our bodies, everything.”

via Spirituality & Practice: Book Excerpt: Full Catastrophe Living, by Jon Kabat-Zinn.

To me, life is full of great happinesses alongside its trials and sadnesses, the yin and yang of what makes up all our lives. I am grateful that my days are not permanent or frozen in time.

Although there are definitely wonderful moments I would seriously like to last longer than they do, I know they will not. Another shoe will eventually drop. Always knowing that all moments are fleeting, my camera is never too far from me so I can capture and freeze frame a scene from my personal movie.

Simply said, I love that every day is new and brings with it the expected and the unexpected. I love that each day has its own uniqueness. It makes me happy to know that when I go to sleep at night, the morning will dawn with a new sunrise and another opportunity to make a difference in the lives of those I love and those I come in contact with that day. My troubles of the past are one day farther away from me each and every morning. A wonderful thing!

Last week, over the New Year, I spent some time in my happy place, which is in Rhode Island. The spectacular views of the sunrises never cease to amaze me and make me smile. The ebb and flow of the tide makes me calm as does watching the ducks on their endless search for fish, along with the seagulls perched on the dock just waiting for a quick snack.

The holidays are over and life is fast returning to the routine.

I look forward to setting my sails and living the full catastrophe life of the New Year 2015…what about you?

Attachment and Loss …2013

Posted on January 4, 2014 by llpitlwp

Loss and Attachment…

Years ago, a very astute clinical social worker made this simple statement at one of my supervision sessions…”life is a series of attachments and losses” and it is important how we form attachments and how we deal with eventual losses.

The year 2013 has come to a close and along with it some life moments of attachment and loss.

Family attachments are really my most important and this year we welcomed my daughter’s fiancé into our family. We give him our love and support and wish the very best to them as a couple for a long, happy and healthy future.

Together as a family, we are stronger than the sum of the individuals. Helping and supporting each other to the best of our ability given distance and our own separate lives is something we try to never forget.

Attachment at work.

My granddaughter still continues to amaze me. I anxiously look forward to sharing her “firsts” during 2014.

I love looking through her eyes as she welcomes new experiences. It brings back memories of my own childhood as well as those of my own children’s experiences.

Friends are dear to me and during 2013 our family lost one of our nearest and dearest.

It is a loss that we are still grieving. It will be a year of “magical thinking” as we go through firsts without him. His family suffers most and this is so hard to witness. They are grieving the loss of the deepest attachment, a father and a husband.

The year 2013 has brought me into contact with many new “virtual friends” and social media has kept me in touch with many old attachments. I love blogging and FB for this reason. It allows me to share with those that live across the country on a daily basis…even if it is just a simple photo. I love seeing the mundane as well as the fantastic.

After all isn’t the mundane what it is mostly about as we age?

I feel like I have just rambled but after two weeks of holiday…at home with a five year old it is where my mind is at…we have all been nursing varying degrees of winter illnesses and a severe bout of “cabin fever”.

Today…it is 24F and perhaps we will venture outside…if only to prepare for subzero deep freeze and the snow that is promised for tonight.