SHIT AND SUNSHINE
Yesterday morning I woke up early and had to pee. I wasn't ready to like wake up, wake up, given it was a kid free Sunday morning and all, so I decided not to push my sleep mask up and just you know...try being blind. I thought, in my half-slumbered state, that it might be a good exercise in using my other senses to move around, to sort of appreciate what it's like to not be able to see etc. I felt my way to the washroom no problem, but on the way back I had the unfortunate luck to step in dog shit that my 15 year old husky had accidently deposited in the small space of hallway between my bedroom and the washroom...which is practically no space at all...it was inevitably waiting for me. (Anyone who knows me, knows I have absolutely zero sense of smell so that was clearly not one of the senses helping me navigate as a fake blind person) I was then forced to push my mask up, wash my foot, clean up the poop, wash up and only then...crawl back into my super soft, Sunday bed. By now I was thoroughly awake...something I had hoped to avoid with the whole 'let's be blind' experiment.
After a few minutes of laying there like a sloth and catching up on what total strangers on the internet were up to in lives I had nothing to do with, I figured I may as well get up and do something with my life. I decided to go for a walk down to the river as it was finally NOT snowing and actually looked like Spring outside. I ate breakfast, got dressed, managed to find matching socks, laced up my shoes, got my playlist on my phone ready and went to find my head-phones......no head-phones.....I had no head-phones....shit. "No bother", I told myself, "it's a gorgeous day and it wouldn't hurt, in the least, to just go outside and be fully present in experiencing the day". Off I went.
This is where I get all reflective and what not.....
Had I been listening to music, on my walk, I would have missed out on so much. I would have missed the sweet sound of a little girl calling for her Daddy to run. I would have missed all of the happy barks of the multitude of dogs scampering around the dog park. I would have missed the sound of the gentle Spring breeze blowing through the trees and grass. I would have missed the sounds of the rapidly, running, newly thawed river, the happy, bubbly rolling of the creek, the sound of children playing and laughing, and the sound of people stopping to exchange animated hellos, full up on the joy to finally be out and about in the sunshine. All the sounds I enjoyed, as a result of my missing headphones, were a gift........as was the dog shit I stepped in earlier that morning.
How is dog shit a gift you may ask...
Well honestly I am grateful that my old girl has made it this long. She's 15; a ripe, old age for a large dog. No shit = No dog. So while the poop accidents are not ideal and I recognize we are in the canine twilight of her long, doggie life....she's still here and I'm grateful for the life I've had with her right up to today, shit and all.
In life we end up in all sorts of shit....both real and metaphorical. How we react and how we interpret what that shit means in our lives is totally up to us.
I once read someone's comment that said that my words sound like sermons and I should practice what I preach. This stung, immensely. While I am sure there are some kick ass sermons out there, from all walks of faith, sounding sermon like is not my intent. Nothing of what I share is ever meant to say that you should do it my way or think like I do. And to have someone say that you aren't what you share of yourself is a very difficult thing to see and read. But again here comes the stepping in shit wisdom......bare with me while I circle round to it.
Not everyone will like you, even if you are like THE NICEST, SUNSHINE OUT YOUR BUTTHOLE, RAINBOW BARFING, GLOWING HUMAN. Not everyone will understand you or your story as their own experiences, personality, beliefs and feelings will always, inevitably, affect how they process and relate to you and everything about you. And that's okay. People that disagree with you, judge you, don't understand you, don't believe you, or don't like you are a gift....you just have to dig a little deeper to think of why. I think they're a gift because they teach you acceptance. They teach you to just let go and, in some cases, to move on. They also force you to look at yourself and to reflect upon how grounded you want to be as a person. Do you want every single person's words to rattle you? Define you? I don't. It's in moments like these that you get the gift of being able to be your own, greatest supporter and say "Hey, ummmm, no. This is me, take it or leave it because this is authentically who I am and validating that is not up to you or anyone else." As I'm fairly certain someone on the internet has said.....You do you, and I'll do me.
So it is very possible to turn shit into sunshine....you just have to cut out the noise (leave the headphones at home) and spend some time just accepting things as they are, as you are....because that's all there ever is and that's all there ever needs to be.
xoxo
After a few minutes of laying there like a sloth and catching up on what total strangers on the internet were up to in lives I had nothing to do with, I figured I may as well get up and do something with my life. I decided to go for a walk down to the river as it was finally NOT snowing and actually looked like Spring outside. I ate breakfast, got dressed, managed to find matching socks, laced up my shoes, got my playlist on my phone ready and went to find my head-phones......no head-phones.....I had no head-phones....shit. "No bother", I told myself, "it's a gorgeous day and it wouldn't hurt, in the least, to just go outside and be fully present in experiencing the day". Off I went.
This is where I get all reflective and what not.....
Had I been listening to music, on my walk, I would have missed out on so much. I would have missed the sweet sound of a little girl calling for her Daddy to run. I would have missed all of the happy barks of the multitude of dogs scampering around the dog park. I would have missed the sound of the gentle Spring breeze blowing through the trees and grass. I would have missed the sounds of the rapidly, running, newly thawed river, the happy, bubbly rolling of the creek, the sound of children playing and laughing, and the sound of people stopping to exchange animated hellos, full up on the joy to finally be out and about in the sunshine. All the sounds I enjoyed, as a result of my missing headphones, were a gift........as was the dog shit I stepped in earlier that morning.
How is dog shit a gift you may ask...
Well honestly I am grateful that my old girl has made it this long. She's 15; a ripe, old age for a large dog. No shit = No dog. So while the poop accidents are not ideal and I recognize we are in the canine twilight of her long, doggie life....she's still here and I'm grateful for the life I've had with her right up to today, shit and all.
In life we end up in all sorts of shit....both real and metaphorical. How we react and how we interpret what that shit means in our lives is totally up to us.
I once read someone's comment that said that my words sound like sermons and I should practice what I preach. This stung, immensely. While I am sure there are some kick ass sermons out there, from all walks of faith, sounding sermon like is not my intent. Nothing of what I share is ever meant to say that you should do it my way or think like I do. And to have someone say that you aren't what you share of yourself is a very difficult thing to see and read. But again here comes the stepping in shit wisdom......bare with me while I circle round to it.
Not everyone will like you, even if you are like THE NICEST, SUNSHINE OUT YOUR BUTTHOLE, RAINBOW BARFING, GLOWING HUMAN. Not everyone will understand you or your story as their own experiences, personality, beliefs and feelings will always, inevitably, affect how they process and relate to you and everything about you. And that's okay. People that disagree with you, judge you, don't understand you, don't believe you, or don't like you are a gift....you just have to dig a little deeper to think of why. I think they're a gift because they teach you acceptance. They teach you to just let go and, in some cases, to move on. They also force you to look at yourself and to reflect upon how grounded you want to be as a person. Do you want every single person's words to rattle you? Define you? I don't. It's in moments like these that you get the gift of being able to be your own, greatest supporter and say "Hey, ummmm, no. This is me, take it or leave it because this is authentically who I am and validating that is not up to you or anyone else." As I'm fairly certain someone on the internet has said.....You do you, and I'll do me.
So it is very possible to turn shit into sunshine....you just have to cut out the noise (leave the headphones at home) and spend some time just accepting things as they are, as you are....because that's all there ever is and that's all there ever needs to be.
xoxo
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