why blog about my life and love and all that?

The last time I dove into blogging it was almost ten years ago (2003 to be exact), and I was struggling with the frustrations and isolation of stay-at-home motherhood and looking for a community of peers to help me make sense of the complexities of my current situation. I found that community and they not only saved my life and sanity, confirming to me that I wasn't alone, they also inspired me daily with their compassion, kindness and wit.

As my kids aged and I found other creative outlets (screenwriting and filmmaking) my blogging fell by the wayside. Facebook status updates became my daily contact with the online community.

Now, I find myself dusting off the old blogging skills because I sense that once again it might just save my life and sanity. 

So why now?

As I enter midlife, the challenges are so much greater than even new motherhood was.  While my own midlife crisis hit me hard, knocking the wind out of me, I am at least mature (and hopefully wise) enough to realize that this major life transition -- like all others -- is offering me an amazing opportunity to redefine who I am and how I want the second half of my life to play out. It is natural to struggle with identity in midlife and take stock, I know...but it doesn't make it any less painful.

Right now, my life is in a sort of limbo. Some would even say it sucks, but I am trying to take a more optimistic take on it and say it merely is "challenging."

Here's the scoop:  After 18 years of marriage, my husband and I took a ten-week break from each other, that now feels short, but at the time felt a lot longer (because for the first time I didn't know where we were going). Luckily despite the pain and discomfort of that separate time, we discovered we wanted to continue our journey together.

Meanwhile, my life as mom has been shifting as well. My kids are 15 and 13 and I love them to death, but most days I'm just the woman who carts their butts places. They are moving away from me, as I know they are supposed to and it would be weird if I was still carting them around in Snuglis and popping Binkies in their mouths.  But logic and facts don't make it sting any less. My heart aches for my babies...and they are growing up.

I've lost touch with too many friends throughout the years, didn't make time to make many new friends, and that's inconvenient at a time when I find myself longing for connection. Family is family...but they are scattered throughout the country, and tending to their own lives, and aren't in the same exact life cycle as me and so they can't really appreciate what it is I am going through.

As I said, I once was part of an active online blogging community but I really lost my taste for blogging after taking a paid job to cover American Idol. There was too much snarkiness, negativity and outright hostility coming from the readers...I didn't feel inspired by their compassion, kindness and wit like I had my earlier followers. I felt disappointed and disenchanted and often times outright sickened. While the internet has potential for good, it also has the equal potential to bring out the bad in people. Even normal people can become really MEAN when they hide behind "Anonymous."

I became too busy to hang out and blog at the same time that I began neglecting people in my real life too. Trying to work from home, take care of a house, raise two kids and keep a marriage going, I used the old "I'm too busy excuse" that everyone these days seems fond of using. I was taking care of me first and didn't have time to look around me and see what anyone else might need. I did what I had to do, or thought I had to do at the time. Now I see perhaps I should have been expanding my support system and not shutting it down.

The recent challenges of my life have opened my eyes to a very important fact -- I DON'T WANT TO BE TOO BUSY FOR MY LIFE or FOR THE PEOPLE I LOVE.

If people I love are  in crisis, I want to be there for them, not someone who offers convenient excuses.  But let's face it, connection - REAL CONNECTION -- takes time and energy and patience. And you have to sometimes give and give and give without expectation of getting back. That's the part I'm still having trouble wrapping my mind around....but I think I'm starting to get it.

The ENERGY we put out there does comes back to us....eventually...but not in the way we expect it and not directly from those we give it to. But the point is, put out negative energy and that's what you'll get back and attract into your life. Put out positive energy and that's what you'll get back and attract back into your own life.

So what I've decided to PUT OUT and ATTRACT BACK into my own life is LOVE.

In order to do that I have a lot of work to do -- including some major attitude shifting. You could say that for a long time I majored in negativity and judgment. My minor was low self-esteem. It is always easier to see others' flaws and ignore our own.

This blog is part of my attitude shifting -- a CONSCIOUS EFFORT to practice love, nurture love, share love and inspire love in myself and others.

I'm not perfect.  There are days I am still bitter, and frustrated, and scared. But I am trying to change...and hoping that in doing so I will inspire change in those around me.

Ultimately, I believe we have a responsibility to use our VOICES and our WORDS in constructive ways that inspire courage, hope, and love, rather than just add more noise/garbage. Criticizing others and tearing them down is easy. Showing compassion takes grace.

So the plan is to write about LOVE in the hopes that it will permeate my thoughts, my feelings and my actions...until it is second nature to me.

I will still offer opinions on even distasteful topics (like Joe Paterno's scandal or the Aurora shootings). The purpose of turning towards love isn't to bury my head in the sand.  The goal is to only join the discussion if I can offer a different take on it, look at it through a loving lens, and see if there is anything of value that can be learned from such things.

Hope you'll check in regularly and join the discussion.

For more information on this blog, go here.

Comments

[Robyn]

Hi Liz,

I've given a lot of thought to what you've written and what we've talked about, and I have two cents to offer :) I think one important way to express love is to really listen to the other person (partner, child, friend, etc.) and make it a practice to not respond immediately - to refrain from the temptation to get into the rapid-fire back and forth of questions, negative comments, assumptions and defensive positions. I think many of us are guillty of slipping into the pattern of hearing the first couple of words, assumimg what's coming next, and then we begin formulating our response without truly hearing the other person out. The other person often perceives this as "you're not listening to me" or "you're always critical of what I have to say" - even if we don't perceive our questions or comments as critical or dismissive. This is a lesson I had to learn over time. I haven't perfected it, but I've worked on it - a lot. Sometimes keeping my impulsive comments or questions to myself - and giving myself time to really hear and process what has been said has kept me from engaging in unnecessary bickering and petty arguments. Occasionally that moment of silence gives me the time to ask, "Do I WANT to be RIGHT more than I NEED to be HAPPY?"

~Robyn

[Lizbeth]

Robyn, I agree with you completely. So many of us want to be right (and I'm not excluding myself). I too am learning is that maybe we can both be right. What is is that makes us think everyone must see things exactly the way we see things?

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